We are founders, operators and investors.

For 25+ years, we have partnered with extraordinary founders to build brands that are redefining the consumer experience. We are passionate about working with exceptional people to build category-defining brands.

Relentless Team

John Burns

Chief Executive Officer

  • John Burns is a founder of Relentless Consumer Partners and serves as Chief Executive Officer. Before founding Relentless, Burns served as CEO of TB12, Tom Brady’s health and wellness brand, which he had led since 2018. He has enjoyed a successful career in executive leadership and private equity. His experience spans 25+ years, the majority of which has been investing and operating in the consumer sector at Breakaway Ventures, Raptor, Highland Capital, and Summit Partners.

    With a strong passion for entrepreneurship, Burns has served as CEO or co-founder of numerous businesses. While his experience spans the consumer sector, Burns has a particular interest in the outdoor and active lifestyle category. A sample of his brand experience includes TB12, Spartan Race, Yasso Frozen Greek Yogurt, Grillo’s Pickles, Bowers & Wilkins, EverybodyFights, and Oath Pizza. Burns received his undergraduate degree from Boston College and his M.B.A. from Babson College.

Scott Caras

President

  • Scott Caras is a founder of Relentless Consumer Partners and serves as President. Before founding Relentless, Caras spent eight years at Breakaway Ventures, a private equity firm that invests in healthy and active lifestyle brands and takes an active role in supporting value creation. During his time at Breakaway, Caras served in leadership and active board roles with brands such as EverybodyFights, Grillo’s Pickles, IdeaPaint and Oath Pizza.

    Prior to joining Breakaway, Caras led corporate development initiatives for Escalade Sports, a publicly traded company that owns 30+ brands in the sporting goods and outdoor industry, such as Bear Archery, Goalrilla Basketball, and STIGA Ping Pong.

    Previously, Caras founded and served as CEO of North Point Brands, owner of Cheeky Fishing and Wingo Outdoors, where he still serves on the Board today. Caras received his undergraduate degree from Bowdoin College and his M.B.A. from The Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia.

Daisy Vu

Fund Operations

  • Daisy Vu runs fund operations for Relentless Consumer Partners. She has run operations for Breakaway Ventures for the last six years. Prior to Breakaway, Vu served as a Client Services Coordinator at LMA Marketing & Advertising in San Diego, where she helped execute strategic planning for all client campaigns and projects, working with clients in the media industry for television advertising, public relations, and media research analytics.

    With over 15 years of experience supporting executives in professional operations positions and a track record of strong performance in high-volume, high-pressure environments, Daisy skillfully manages operational duties and client relations for Relentless.

Joe De Sena

Operating Advisor

  • Joe De Sena is the founder and CEO of Spartan, the world’s leading endurance sports and wellness brand.

    De Sena has grown Spartan into a global experiential sport and wellness brand encompassing all things “tough fitness.” With its 10 million+ strong community, Spartan creates transformational experiences, products, and content to help people, companies and teams tear down boundaries and expand what they believe possible. Spartan’s portfolio of tough fitness brands has expanded beyond its signature obstacle racing events into Spartan Training, Spartan Trail, DEKA, La Ruta, and Tough Mudder.

    De Sena is a New York Times Best Selling Author with three books “Spartan Up,” “Spartan Fit,” and “The Spartan Way.” He also hosts the Spartan Up! Podcast, which features weekly interviews with some of the world’s greatest minds in business, sports and leadership.

    Throughout his lifetime, Joe has competed in any extreme sports adventure he could find, testing his mental and physical endurance against nature. Joe turned an interest in endurance racing into a passion. His racing resume is the stuff of legend – over 50 ultra-events overall and 14 Ironman events in one year alone.

Tara McRae

Operating Advisor

  • Tara McRae serves as a Director on the Kegg Board of Directors for Relentless.

    McRae is a creative and performance-driven executive skilled at managing all forms of digital, brand, marketing, and commercial activities. She possesses a proven track record of success in growing digital and traditional businesses while enhancing the brand. 

    McRae is currently the senior vice president of marketing and brand strategy at PUMA, a $9b global sportswear company. McRae has 20+ years of experience in marketing, digital, commercial, and brand executive roles at world class companies such as Clarks, TB12, and Bose

    Recognized across the industry, McRae was named in 2015’s Top 50 Women in Brand Marketing by Brand Innovators, followed by the Top 100 in 2016. That same year, and the following three years, she was included among Footwear News’ Power 100 Most Influential Designers, Influencers, and Leaders in the Shoe Industry. In 2021, McRae was selected to the Lead’s Direct 60 for DTC innovation. More recently, she was selected as one of the top 50 Forbes Entrepreneurial CMO‘s in 2024 while in her role at Clarks as chief marketing and digital officer.

    McRae resides in Massachusetts with her wife Candice, who is an elementary school educator, her two children, Lyla and Gavin, and their energetic doodle, Rocco.

John Frascotti

Operating Advisor

  • John Frascotti currently serves on the Board of Directors of Party City Holdings, Inc. (PRTY), The Children’s Place (PLCE), and the SeriousFun Children's Network, and recently joined the Board of Advisors of Dephy, Inc.

    Before he retired from Hasbro in March 2021, Frascotti was Hasbro’s President and Chief Operating Officer and a member of Hasbro’s Board of Directors. He led a global organization, doing business in over 140 countries, focused on creating and delivering the world’s best play and entertainment experiences across Hasbro’s Brand Blueprint, including toys and games, immersive entertainment experiences, digital gaming, and consumer products. Frascotti was instrumental in leading Hasbro’s transformation from a traditional toy and game manufacturer into a global entertainment and play leader. Frascotti played a critical role in the re-imagination and re-invention of Hasbro’s world-class portfolio of Franchise, Gaming, Partner and Emerging Brands, and the expansion of Hasbro into several emerging global markets. During his tenure, Hasbro’s market capitalization increased from $3.2B when Frascotti joined in January 2008 to $12.8B at the end of 2020, achieving a high of $15.6B in 2019. Under Frascotti’ s leadership, Hasbro emerged as an ESG leader, having been recognized for 9 consecutive years as one of the “Top 25 Best Corporate Citizens” and for 10 consecutive years as one of the “World’s Most Ethical Companies” due to Hasbro’s commitments to climate change; environmental sustainability; diversity, equity and inclusion; human rights and ethical sourcing; and transparency.

    Frascotti served as a member of the Board of Directors of the Toy Association and the Board of Directors of Discovery Family Channel, a joint venture between Hasbro and Discovery Communications.

Dennis Baldwin

Operating Advisor

  • Dennis Baldwin has over 25 years of consumer products and experience and is the Founder and Managing Partner of Breakaway. His expertise ranges from venture investing to strategic planning, brand marketing, product innovation, and business development. As the former Chief Marketing Officer of Reebok International, Baldwin established a mission to connect the brand to global youth through sports, music, and technology. Prior to joining Reebok, Baldwin was a Management Consultant with Ernst and Young, where he worked on strategy and business innovation projects for consumer brands, including American Express, Ford Motor Company, Harley Davidson, and Starter sportswear.

    Most recently, Baldwin launched AlphaMiner, a platform established to build better consumer experiences through Web3. Baldwin graduated from Cornell University with an MS in Industrial and Labor Relations and Union College with a BA in Economics, where he competed in NCAA Varsity Ice Hockey and Lacrosse.

James McCann

Operating Advisor

  • James McCann spent 20 years in the food and grocery industry and was the CEO of several Tesco businesses in Europe and Asia, Carrefour’s French business, and Ahold’s US business. Today McCann is the Founder & CEO of Food Retail Ventures LLC, which has invested in over thirty of the most exciting early-stage companies in the food and retail technology area.  He serves as a Board Director for a number of these investment companies, including; Afresh; Atlas Bars; Fetch Rewards; Foodmaven; Fillogic; Flashfood; Green Rabbit; Halla; and Weee.  In his spare time, he loves flying and is a trustee at Dana-Farber cancer institute in Boston. 

Art Drogue

Operating Advisor

  • Art Drogue is a CPG industry veteran serving in corporate roles at General Mills in sales and marketing positions, Nabisco in domestic and international positions, including Sr VP of International Sales, and Unilever leading the $12 billion U.S. Foods and Personal Care sales organization and retiring as Sr. V.P of Sales for the $18 billion U.S, Canada and Latin America organization.

    His professional affiliations have included being Chairman of the Global Marketing Committee for the Consumer Goods Forum based in Paris, a member of the Grocery Manufacturers of America Sales Council, and serving as a Director of ENACTUS and the NACDS foundation. He has also been awarded the William H. Albers Industry Relations Award for his years of leadership in the CPG Industry. He has served on the board of SPAR Group, as Chairman of Yasso until its’ sale in 2017, on the board of JM Global Holdings, on the board of TABS, a CPG analytics company, and as an Operating Partner at Raptor Consumer Fund investing in early stage CPG brands.

    He is currently serving on the board of Ruiz Foods, the largest Mexican Frozen Food brand in the U.S., Demers Foods, and Atlas Bars, among others. He has worked with several early-stage CPG businesses with a focus on healthier, better-for-you products serving consumer needs and interests.

Amanda Helming

Operating Advisor

  • Amanda Helming is Chief Marketing Officer at United Natural Foods Inc (UNFI), the largest publicly-traded grocery distributor in America (~$27 billion in annual sales), where she currently oversees marketing along with a portfolio of 20+ owned brands and 5,000 SKU’s, making it a billion dollar plus Top 50 CPG in the United States.

    Before UNFI, Amanda was one of the chief strategists for Dunkin’ Brands as VP of Brand Strategy & Marketing, where she helped lead the company’s transformation to be the most loved, on-the-go coffee brand over the past decade. She previously spent time at General Mills in brand marketing and at Disney & ESPN in sales and marketing, where she negotiated long-term distribution deals with cable operators, bringing award-winning sports and family programming to millions of households worldwide.

    She has an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a BA from Middlebury College in Vermont. She now resides in Hingham, MA, with her husband and two kids.

Adam Kaufman

Operating Advisor

  • Adam Kaufman has over 25 years of experience leading consumer brands. Today Kaufman serves as President of Grillo's Pickle's, which he has led since 2018 including through the brand's acquisition by Kings Hawaiian in 2021.  At Grillo’s Pickles, he helped navigate a global pandemic while at the same time driving 100% growth.

    His ability to leverage a financial foundation and an operating mindset has allowed him to support brands of varying sizes from $20 million up to $20 billion.  Before leading Grillo's, Kaufman served as CFO of Yasso Frozen Greek Yogurt, where he was part of a successful business turnaround and exit that drove a 6x return for investors.  Kaufman previously held leadership roles at the Adidas Group, Welch Foods and served as a consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Blaine Hurst

Operating Advisor

  • Blaine Hurst, recently retired Vice Chairman and CEO of Panera Bread, a member of the Fast Casual Hall of Fame, a four-time Fast Casual Mover, and Shaker, is one of highest impact restaurant leaders of recent times, leading two of the largest restaurants in the U.S.

    Now, as an Executive Board Member of Hero Bread, an ultra-low net carb bread products company, Hurst is intent on helping people eat healthier without compromise. At Panera, he led the team that revolutionized guest experience through technology (Panera 2.0), rolling out the largest loyalty program in the industry – MyPanera, online ordering, rapid pickup, and delivery from 2010 to 2019. He and his team grew Panera’s catering business to be the largest in the nation. As a result, Panera was named the most innovative restaurant and named the 23rd most innovative of all companies by FastCompany. As Hurst's responsibilities expanded, he was named President and then CEO before his retirement. As President of Papa John’s in the 90’s, he oversaw its rapid growth from 450 stores to nearly 3,000 in the US and 9 international markets. And in 1998, he rolled out the first online ordering system available nationwide for any restaurant chain, generating more than $1 billion of annual revenue. Hurst previously partnered with Ernst & Young and founded one of their two research centers.

    Hurst is an advisor to several early restaurant and technology companies and a retired board member of the Women in Foodservice Forum, a board member of Oath Pizza, and an investor/advisor for the Shepherd Hotel, a hotel project in Clemson, SC that has partnered with ClemsonLIFE in the employment of individuals with special gifts. He is the author of 8 patents, has been a frequent speaker on the national stage, and is a thought leader for restaurants, food tech, technology, leadership, and diversity and inclusion. He is a proud Kentucky Colonel.

AJ Rich

Operating Advisor

  • AJ Rich is Managing Partner at Legacy Capital Ventures, a Real Estate and Private Equity Fund powering the built world. At Legacy, Rich focuses on deal origination in the Construction Development and Construction Technology spaces. He pulls off his 20-year experience as a Real Estate Developer, Venture-Backed Operator, and Product Technology Team Lead. Rich previously founded and served as President of EverybodyFights, a leading multi-unit owned and franchised boxing fitness experience. At Relentless, Rich will be focused on providing guidance and advisory around Programmatic Real Estate opportunities and product-led technology, and go-to-market strategies.

Bill Harrison

Operating Advisor

  • Bill Harrison is the Founder of and a Managing Partner at Harrison Co., a consumer-focused investment bank that is dedicated to advising entrepreneurial and family-run businesses. Bill has over 25 years of experience advising consumer companies and started his career focused on M&A in the Consumer Groups at Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette and Credit Suisse