Betsy Sperry’s Recipe for Entrepreneurial Learning

Heavens to Betsy founder shares real-world insights, and the occasional hot fudge sauce sample, with Foster students

For Betsy Sperry, entrepreneurship isn’t just something she teaches—it’s something she lives.

Sperry, who teaches in the Master of Science in Entrepreneurship program at the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business, has spent years guiding students through the challenges of brand strategy, customer insight, and market fit. But it wasn’t until she started her own food venture, Heavens to Betsy, that she experienced firsthand the messy, rewarding reality of building a business from scratch.

Sperry has always enjoyed experimenting in the kitchen. When she came up with a homemade hot fudge sauce recipe, her husband insisted it was too good not to share. As a Christmas gift, her husband and daughter teamed up to create the full branding package—a name, logo, and packaging design. They called it Heavens to Betsy.

“They assumed I was just going to give it to friends as holiday gifts,” Sperry says. “But I thought they were trying to help me start this business. So I started the business.”

Betsy Sperry teaching entrepreneurship students in the classroom at the University of Washington Foster School of Business.

Betsy Sperry leads a discussion on brand strategy, followed by chocolate sauce tasting, with students in the Master of Science in Entrepreneurship program at the UW Foster School of Business.

FROM A CAREER IN BRANDING TO THE FOSTER CLASSROOM

It wasn’t the first time she’d built something from scratch. Sperry has spent her career at the intersection of marketing, entrepreneurship, and strategy—first in advertising and media, then as co-founder of One Degree Brand Chemistry, a brand strategy and design firm. Along the way, she taught entrepreneurial marketing at Stanford University and eventually moved to Seattle, where she joined the Foster School of Business.

Today, Sperry teaches Entrepreneurial Marketing to both undergraduate and graduate students in the Foster School, as well as a “Personal Brand in the Era of Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL)” course. Her classes blend industry expertise with real-world experience, including lessons she continues to learn as an entrepreneur herself.

“I always taught about common traps founders fall into with their marketing,” she says. ‘Don’t try to do too much. Focus, focus, focus. Listen to your customers instead of assuming they’re like you.’ As a founder, I discovered that those are good rules for a reason.”

Betsy Sperry offering samples of Heavens to Betsy hot fudge sauce to entrepreneurship students at the UW Foster School of Business.

During the final day of the quarter, Betsy Sperry invited students to sample her Heavens to Betsy hot fudge sauce—a sweet lesson in brand testing and customer insight.

lessons from the hot fudge aisle

Developing Heavens to Betsy reminded her just how easy it is to fall into those traps, even with decades of marketing experience. She spent a year refining the recipe to be shelf-stable without preservatives. She worked to get it placed at DeLaurenti in Seattle’s Pike Place Market, a specialty food store that matched the high-end audience she envisioned. But it was at local holiday markets, not luxury retailers, where the product took off.

“Even though holiday gift events aren’t the most prestigious, people are there to buy. They have an opportunity to taste the sauce,” she says. “We assumed that because we put fancy chocolate in it, people would want fancy chocolate. But what people really wanted was a unique gift.”

It’s the kind of insight that only comes from paying attention to the market—a mindset she works to instill in her students. “You need to understand what a consumer wants. It’s important to orient to what they need, not what you think or what you want to sell.”

Students taste Betsy Sperry’s Heavens to Betsy dessert sauce during a classroom marketing exercise at the University of Washington Foster School of Business.

A spoonful of strategy: Entrepreneurship students get a real taste of the startup life—literally—sampling Betsy Sperry’s Heavens to Betsy dessert sauce during class.

learning the realities of entrepreneurship

For Sperry, these experiences add a layer of honesty and humility to her teaching. “It validated how easy (and how human) it is to fall into those traps,” she says. “And it reminded me to use the frameworks we teach entrepreneurship students to avoid them.”

She also emphasizes how much hard work and persistence go into building a business. “It’s really nine-tenths hard work. The difference between becoming a successful entrepreneur vs. millions of other people with good ideas is that you do it and they just talk about it.”

Sperry takes those words to heart. In class, she doesn’t just talk about perseverance. She models it. When students hit midterms, she brings in Heavens to Betsy samples for a mid-class pick-me-up. It’s part encouragement, part real-world product testing.

“Some of the people who get the most out of the Master’s in entrepreneurship program enroll when they’re actively building something,” she says. “They have experience and are on a mission. They’re intellectually curious and start the program with the mindset that it’s going to help them with what they’re doing.”

Betsy Sperry, entrepreneur and Foster School of Business instructor, who believes success comes from doing the work, not just talking about ideas.

“The difference between becoming a successful entrepreneur vs. millions of other people with good ideas is that you do it and they just talk about it.”—Betsy Sperry

A Foster-friendly ecosystem

Sperry sees the Foster School as an ideal place to cultivate that mindset. “Seattle is one of the most entrepreneurial markets in the country, and Foster does a great job of tapping into the communities here,” she says. She points to experiential learning opportunities like those offered by the Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship, CoMotion Labs, and campus business competitions as ways students can apply what they’re learning while developing a product or service.

“There’s a vibrancy of University of Washington alumni who give back and stay engaged, who serve as advisors and competition judges, who provide real-time feedback to students, and who are eager to serve as mentors. It’s an incredibly reciprocal environment. And the Master’s in Entrepreneurship cohort experience is special—you have a whole year to bond, learn, and develop lifelong friendships with classmates and entrepreneurs. That’s a powerful outcome.”

Her own entrepreneurial journey is still unfolding, but for Sperry, that’s the point. “If you listen to the market, you need to be open to change, refine, and evolve. You’re never done–you’ll always be improving, course correcting, and growing.”

Betsy Sperry and her entrepreneurship students at the Foster School of Business end class on a high note after the Heavens to Betsy dessert sauce tasting.

Betsy Sperry and her entrepreneurship students at the Foster School of Business end class on a high note after the Heavens to Betsy dessert sauce tasting.

 

Learn more about the Master of Science in Entrepreneurship here.