The founder of $100M brand Late July and Nixie started selling $1 cookies at 12 and learned the snack trade from the founder of Cape Cod chips—her dad

Long before Nicole Bernard Dawes’ brands were lining the aisles of thousands of grocery stores, she got her start in business wheeling around baked goods in a little red wagon. The two-time founder discovered her passion for entrepreneurship as a kid selling $1 cookies to small businesses.

“My first foray into this universe was when I was 12. My best friend and I had a cookie company, and we had customers” Dawes tells Fortune. “I actually sold to local delis in my town, which is kind...