Hamdi Ulukaya is a Turkish American entrepreneur and businessman. He is the founder and CEO of Chobani, the number one-selling Greek yogurt brand in the U.S.
Originating from a Kurdish dairy-farming family in a small village in Turkey, Ulukaya came to the U.S. in 1994 to study English and took a few business courses as well. He started a modest feta-cheese factory in 2002 on the advice of his father, but his real success came from taking a major risk: purchasing a large defunct yogurt factory in upstate New York in 2005. With no prior experience in the yogurt business, he created a yogurt empire, Chobani, that went from zero to over $1 billion in annual sales in less than five years, becoming the leading yogurt brand in the U.S. by 2011. Ernst & Young named Ulukaya the World Entrepreneur of the Year in 2013.
So if I go back at the Chobani story, which I've been in the center of it, it's the best thing that ever happened to me in my life. The best thing. From five factory workers in an upstate New York village in a factory that closed 90 years later, starting with painting the walls. If somebody told ...(Full transcript available to logged in subscribers.).
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