Charles Coristine thrived in pressure-packed environments when Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) hired him as a trader in the early 1990s. Twenty years later, he was suffering from severe burnout. He tried everything from meditation to enrolling in graduate school, but nothing seemed to cure his frustration. Then, he took a drastic step that changed his life. Despite having no industry experience, Coristine bought a struggling snack company for $250,000. He just sold it for $750 million.
Coristine's adventures in the highly competitive snack industry started by chance. It began in 2011 when Coristine met the then-owner of LesserEvil, a healthy snack company he was trying to sell. Coristine told CNBC's "How I Made It." that he was intrigued by the challenge of doing something new and thought the name LesserEvil was "synchronistic" with a "healthy, mindful lifestyle." Unfortunately, LesserEvil's balance sheets were anything but healthy.
