At 71, former nuclear medicine physician is trying his hand at the frozen-food business

After retirement, long-time radiologist Richard Brown, MD, found a new passion for entrepreneurship thanks to an unlikely preference—his fondness for frozen fruit. 

At 71, Brown has branched out beyond his medical and academic background to test the waters of running his own business. Though Brown served decades as a nuclear medicine specialist, his latest career experiment is considerably different; Brown recently launched Poka Snack, a skewer-like product designed to make it easier to freeze and eat fruit, particularly bananas. 

The product was inspired by Brown's own frustration with existing frozen fruit devices. In a recent interview with Fortune, he told the outlet most skewers are difficult to insert into fruit, break easily and sometimes leave splinters; so, he decided to design his own. After testing approximately 40 prototypes, he settled on a design featuring patent-pending semi-helical geometry.  

Brown launched the product on Kickstarter earlier this year, which has raised more than 90% of its initial $4,000 funding goal. He has also built a TikTok audience of more than 14,000 followers. But the product itself may be less important to Brown than what he says the project represents—another opportunity to get outside his comfort zone. 

“My hobbies tend to be learning something new,” Brown told Fortune. “I think I never want to retire. Why would you do that?” 

Brown earned his medical degree from the University of Michigan in 1980 and spent two decades in private practice before returning to his alma mater in 2004. He became a professor and director of clinical nuclear medicine and molecular imaging before retiring in 2020. Throughout his medical career, Brown also was interested in entrepreneurship; during the dot-com boom, he launched several internet businesses while continuing to practice medicine, including websites focused on college textbooks and hotel reservations. Brown also created an educational website for cancer patients and their families. 

He says those early ventures provided a lesson about failure and experimentation that he continues to apply today. 

“I think the problem with most people is they're afraid to look stupid,” Brown said. “If you think that something should be done, just do it. When something becomes routine, you probably have stopped growing.” 

Read the original interview here.