
From Amazon to Schools: How Cali Books Turns Customer Feedback Into Growth | Let’s Laugh About It
Zoe Kahn sits down with Carinne Meyrignac, founder of Cali Books, and Rachel Greenawald from the Inevitable Agency team for an honest, funny, and heartfelt conversation about building a mission-driven brand by actually listening to your customers. In this episode, Carinne shares how Cali Books started 10 years ago with "invisible technology" that makes books sing and read to kids, and how watching her own kids get handed Chromebooks in kindergarten shaped the Cali Reader. Rachel, who has run the Cali Books CX program for nearly a year, shares what the inbox reveals about the brand's real impact. You'll hear why a lifetime warranty turned out to be "just positive good business," how one parent's feedback gets treated like a hundred, how the brand grew from Amazon to Barnes & Noble and Nordstrom and now into schools, and why taking the risk on an inclusive, multicultural catalog paid off. Plus: middle-of-the-night support calls with screaming kids in the background, and the Amazon review that called them too conservative for pairing a zebra with a zebra. Tune in, laugh with us, and catch the full episode now.Listen to the episode: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lets-laugh-about-it/id1713846982 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6LgIjI44Ym3jSEcPCGN0UG Follow along on Instagram:📲 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/letslaughpodcast/ (And tell us what your biggest takeaway was 👀) Have a business (or work for one) and want to level up your Customer Experience with smarter, easier customer communication? Try Gorgias free: https://partner.gorgias.com/13120wrvaaxy 🕒 Timestamps 00:59 Meet Carinne Meyrignac (Cali Books) + Rachel Greenawald (Inevitable Agency) 02:06 How Cali Books started: books that read and sing to kids 02:35 Chromebooks in kindergarten 04:40 The lifetime warranty: "just positive good business" 05:40 Building processes (and handing repetitive tasks to AI) 07:05 Midnight support calls and screaming kids (LAUGHABLE) 08:54 Taking Cali Books into schools 10:05 Impact for kids on the spectrum 13:06 The research: kids chose books over tablets 3 out of 4 times14:31 Turning customer feedback into the product roadmap 16:20 Nursery rhymes stuck in parents' heads 17:59 Treating one parent's feedback like a hundred 20:06 The zebra-and-fish Amazon review (LAUGHABLE) 21:26 What's next: the Cali Reader + publishing partners 26:02 Building an inclusive, multicultural catalog 28:41 Advice for founders scared to take the inclusivity risk 33:15 From Amazon to retail to schools35:09 Doing more than customer service 38:35 How listeners can help: ask your schools questions 42:25 Where to find Cali Books Find Carinne: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carinne-meyrignac-%F0%9F%93%9A-a1b3475a/ Try Cali's Books for yourself: https://playcali.com/ 👉 Don't forget to subscribe for more deep dives with leaders shaping the future of e-commerce.#Ecommerce #CustomerExperience #EdTech #DTCPodcast Sign-Up for Zoe and the Inevitable Team's Newsletter here: https://zoes-inevitable-newsletter.beehiiv.com/ Listen on Substack: https://substack.com/@experiencesyoureproudof Mentor Pass: https://www.mentorpass.co/zoekahn Explore Inevitable Agency & get a CX Audit Pre-Screening with Inevitable Agency: https://www.inevitableagency.co/services All things Zoe: Twitter: https://x.com/_zoekahn_ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/_zoekahn_/ Newsletter: https://zoes-inevitable-newsletter.beehiiv.com/ Substack: https://substack.com/@experiencesyoureproudof LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zoe-kahn-5b61aa129/ All things LLAI: Twitter: https://x.com/LLAIPodcast Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/letslaughpodcast/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/let-s-laugh-about-it-podcast/ Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/agavezoe TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@llaipodcast Thanks for watching :)






