From 4:30am panic attacks to 20% utilization
Six months ago I was waking up at 4:30am.
Not from an alarm. From anxiety.
Seven SKUs just went live across 480 stores. A pallet went missing somewhere between the manufacturer and the distribution center. If I couldn't figure out where, that's thousands of dollars gone.
I was personally liable. Lose-your-house liable.
The first two years at Always Cool Brands were about building. Formulations. Tastings. Winning trust with retailers. Stress, sure, but it was meetings-at-desks stress.
Then the award letter came. We got selected. We got the reset date.
Everything changed.
Year three was commercialization chaos. Seven SKUs launching at once. I didn't sleep more than 4 hours a night for about 5 months.
Somewhere in year two I had a realization: I wasn't going to survive by working harder.
What if I could take the anxiety-inducing knowledge rattling around in my head and encode it into software?
Not just automate tasks. Capture the thinking that makes the tasks possible.
So I built three systems:
The Orders System - Python, Claude Code, LangGraph. Turns unstructured chaos into structured data. Every PO becomes a transparent object with full traceability.
The Claude Code Skill - Connects Claude to our backend. Ask questions in plain English. Get reports generated. I spent 4 years at Oracle Cloud Infrastructure. I know how tedious ERPs are. This is the opposite.
The Label Compliance Engine - A simple label can hold up a product release for a quarter. Built a LangGraph state machine that runs regulatory checks in seconds instead of weeks.
The pattern I landed on: Observability-Driven Evaluation.
- Encode business processes in agent graphs
- Log everything via OpenTelemetry
- Run evaluator agents over the workflow
AI reviewing AI. With a complete audit trail for when regulators ask how you ensure compliance.
Today I wake up at 5:30am naturally. Refreshed. Ready for my morning workout before the world gets their act together.
I'm at 20% utilization now. Down from 150%.
The business runs. Not because I'm grinding 80-hour weeks. Because I encoded my anxiety into software that doesn't need sleep.
What just went live:
A2A protocol. Our compliance engine is now discoverable at alwayscool.ai/.well-known/agent.json. Other AI agents can query our label compliance services directly.
No more emails. No more portals. Just agents coordinating with agents.
That's the future. And it's running in production.
The anxiety isn't gone. But it's encoded now.
And that makes all the difference.
Read the full story
Encoding My Anxiety: Building AI Agents to Run a CPG Supply Chain | Colin McNamara
A co-founder's 3-year journey from 4:30am panic attacks to 20% utilization - automating a $9M run rate CPG business with Claude Code, LangGraph, and AI.
If you're building agentic systems for high-stakes operations, or interested in A2A/AP2 integrations, I'd love to hear from you.
Colin
FOOTER: Colin McNamara Always Cool AI | Always Cool Brands colin@2cups.com