
The Peel
By The Peel
Get a behind the scenes look into the founding stories of your favorite companies. Learn how the industries they operate in actually work, and learn playbooks and tactics you can use to launch and scale your own business.

The PeelAug 16, 2023

Secrets to Product Market Fit with Wade Foster (Co-founder and CEO of Zapier)
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Topics discussed include:
The founding story of Zapier
Wadeâs contrarian take on Product Market Fit
Why new products are usually built on emerging distribution channels
How Wade deals with imposter syndrome
Never raising more money after a $1.3 million Seed during YC
How Zapier thinks about itâs product roadmap
Shutting the company down for a weeklong AI hackathon
Why Wade thinks LLMs will unlock new types of product interfaces
How he delegates work without losing track of the details
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Referenced:
zapier.com
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Where to find Wade:
Twitter: twitter.com/wadefoster
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/wadefoster
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Where to find Turner:
Newsletter: www.thespl.it
Twitter: twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Banana Capital: bananacapital.vc
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Production and distribution by: www.supermix.io
â Want to sponsor the show? docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

How Solugen is Saving the $5 Trillion Chemical Industry (Co-founders Gaurab Chakrabarti & Sean Hunt)
Gaurab Chakrabarti and Sean Hunt are the Co-founders of Solugen, which replaces petroleum based products with plant-derived substitutes without sacrificing affordability or performance. They met playing poker in college, kickstarted the company with $10k from an MIT pitch competition, and have since scaled the business to over nine-figures in revenue.
Solugen has raised over $642 million from investors like Fifty Years, Lowercarbon Capital, Founders Fund, Refactor Capital, and Cantos Ventures.
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Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://bit.ly/47sxTQ0
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Topics discussed:
- How the chemicals industry touches 25% of US GDP
- Why the industry is like real estate: fragmented and focused on asset utilization
- The reason chemicals companies have terrible NPS scores
- How Solugenâs manufacturing process converts plants and C02 into chemicals
- Meeting over a game of poker while getting their PhDâs
- Winning $10k from an MIT pitch competition to capture 10% of the float spa market in Dallas, Texas
- Why the first wave of Cleantech startup fail
- Why logistics and supply chain are the biggest problems in Chemicals
- Their framework for thinking big, but taking little steps to get there
- Running their homemade metal catalyst reactor at YC Demo Day
- Launching, scaling, and selling a CPG wipes company to prove their chemicals worked
- Building their first factory (the BioForge) on the site of an exploded wax distillery
- Their strategy for getting large, multinational companies to try their products
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Referenced:
- YC Application video:Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tItLPnLIH4o
- Solugen - The First Carbon Negative Molecule Factory:Â https://jeffburke.substack.com/p/solugen-the-first-carbon-negative
- Solugen - The Century of Biology:Â https://centuryofbio.com/p/solugen
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Where to find Gaurab:
- Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/gaurabc
- LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/gaurabchakrabarti
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Where to find Sean:
- Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TungstenSeanide
- LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/huntsean
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Where to find Turner:
- Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
- Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
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Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
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For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Secrets of the $131 Billion Parking Industry with Jonathon Barkl (Co-founder and CEO of AirGarage)
Jonathon Barkl is the Co-founder and CEO of AirGarage, a full-stack parking management company that helps real estate owners increase their income.
Jonathon and his co-founders Chelsea and Scott started the company in 2017. Theyâve since raised roughly $15 million from investors including Founders Fund, Floodgate, a16z, Abstract, and prior guest of the show Ryan Delk.
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Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts. Get compliant with security and privacy frameworks like SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, GDPR, and more.
Sign-up here:Â https://bit.ly/3QOr2eo
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Topics discussed:
- A crash course on the business model of parking
- Why parking lots make most of their money from tickets and towing
- The reason American cities dedicate up to 30% of space to parking
- How the $131 Billion parking industry evolved to be so complicated and outdated
- Why dynamic pricing in parking is harder than hotels and airlines
- The three primary business models for a parking lot
- Why Air Garage can increase a parking lots profitability by 4-5x
- How part of its business was inspired by scooter companies like Bird and Lime
- Starting âAirbnb for Drivewaysâ in 2016 to solve their own problem as college students
- The sales lessons Jonathon learned doing door-to-door sales in the Arizona heat
- How getting scammed out of $6,000 led to pivoting their business model
- Moving to San Francisco with no connections and raising a Seed round
- How they closed a Series A in a week
- The importance of investor brand when hiring early employees
- Why Jonathon cares so much about branding as a parking company
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Referenced:
https://www.airgarage.com/
https://parkingreform.org/resources/parking-lot-map/- Mac vs PC ads:Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eEG5LVXdKo
- Never Split the Difference:Â https://www.amazon.com/Never-Split-Difference-Negotiating-Depended/dp/0062407805
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_States
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Where to find Jonathon:
- Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/jonathonbarkl
- LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathonbarkl
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Where to find Turner:
- Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
- Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
- Banana Capital:Â https://bananacapital.vc
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Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
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Want to sponsor the show?Â
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Raising $61 Million to Fortify Open Source Software with Dan Lorenc, Co-founder & CEO of Chainguard
Dan Lorenc is the Co-founder and CEO of Chainguard, the best way to secure your open source software. Dan and his co-founders Kim, Matt, and Ville started the company in 2021 after spending a decade working together at Google on all things open source and software security. Theyâve since raised $116 million from investors including Spark (led Series B), Sequoia (led Series A), Amplify (led Seed), The Chainsmokerâs Mantis VC, Banana Capital, and dozens of angels in the cyber security and open source communities. â Topics discussed:
- What is the âsoftware supply chainâ?
- How the SolarWinds breach created the software supply chain security market
- The history of open source software
- Why open source software makes software supply chains even less secure
- The moment Dan and his co-founders decided to start Chainguard
- Why they started selling consulting services before even building a product
- The reason their first two products solved completely different problems (top-down and bottoms-up), and why the one that didnât work at first is now their main business
- Why Chainguard decided to focus on a broad communications and marketing strategy so early on
- How Dan gets quoted in major media publications as an early stage startup founder
- Why Chainguard uses memes for marketing
- Why Dan thinks startups should âmake content optimized for the group chatâ
- How they raised their Seed round from Amplify a week after leaving Google
- Raising a Series A from Sequoia as the market started collapsing in Spring of 2022
- Danâs advice for founders on dealing with investor inbound when not fundraising
- Why he wish he hired sales reps sooner
- Raising a Series B from Spark Capital to accelerate their enterprise sales process
â Referenced:
- https://www.chainguard.dev
- https://www.sigstore.dev/
- Battling the Trojan Horse in Open Source: https://www.sequoiacap.com/article/dan-lorenc-chainguard-spotlight/
- Chainguard Series B Announcement: https://www.chainguard.dev/unchained/series-b-funding
- Danâs favorite open source project: https://github.com/jqlang/jq
- Reflections on Trusting Trust: https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rdriley/487/papers/Thompson_1984_ReflectionsonTrustingTrust.pdf
â Where to find Dan:
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/lorenc_dan
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danlorenc
â Where to find Turner:
- Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
- Banana Capital: https://bananacapital.vc
â Production and distribution by: https://www.supermix.io â Want to sponsor the show? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

From Food Stamps to a $20 Million Fund with Nichole Wischoff
Nichole Wischoff is the founder of Wischoff Ventures, a Pre-Seed and Seed firm that invests up to $1 million in non sexy industries. Nichole closed her first fund in 2021, and previously was an early employee at Blend (NYSE:BLND), One (acquired by Walmart in 2022), and Built.
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Topics discussed include:
âą Growing up on food stamps in Arkansas
âą How studying abroad in Belgium changed Nicholeâs life
âą How falling in love with running got her into college and her first job
âą Why Taylor Swift could be the first female President
âą Opening a bakery to pay rent while teaching English in Spain
âą Getting her first job at Citiâs non-profit housing financing team
âą Leveraging that experience to get a job in fintech
âą Making her first angel investment in Vesta
âą How Nichole got One Financial its first 25k users
âą Helping sell One Financial to Walmart
âą How Lee Fixel and Chad Byers helped raise her first $5m fund
âą Lessons learned going from a $5m to $20m fund in 2022
âą Nicholeâs advice for anyone raising their first fund
âą Behind the scenes of her viral âThird Tier VCâ moment
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Referenced:
âąTaylor Swift (Acquiredâs Version):Â https://www.acquired.fm/episodes/taylor-swift-acquireds-version
âą Nicholeâs $20m Fund Announcement https://techcrunch.com/2022/12/16/solo-gp-nichole-wischoff-raises-20m-fund-backed-by-peter-thiel-to-invest-in-unsexy-businesses/
âą J Calâs â3rd or 4th Investor in Uberâ Montage:Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OK4Mku_s4H4
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Where to find Nichole:
âą Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/NWischoff
âą LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicholewischoff
âą Wischoff Ventures:Â https://www.wischoff.com/
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Where to find Turner:
âą Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
âą Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
âą Banana Capital:Â https://bananacapital.vc
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Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
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Want to sponsor the show? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Lessons From Scaling Pilot to a $1.2 Billion Valuation with Co-founder and CEO Waseem Daher
Waseem Daher is the Co-founder and CEO of Pilot, the bookkeeping, CFO, and tax provider for startups and fast growing businesses. Prior to Pilot, Waseem and his co-founders Jeff and Jessica sold companies to Oracle and Dropbox.
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Waseem, Jeff, and Jessica started Pilot in 2017, and have since raised over $160 million from investors like Index Ventures, Stripe, Sequoia, Whale Rock, Jeff Bezos, and over 40+ angel investors.
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Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts: https://bit.ly/3FoYm52
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In this episode, we discuss:
âą Why Waseemâs building a startup that does your accounting
âą The reason he first started doing his own bookkeeping, and why he doesnât recommend it to other founders
âą When startups should build something themselves and when to outsource
âą All the mistakes Waseem made building and selling his first two startups to Oracle and Dropbox
âą How to avoid âfake workâ
âą How to get ROI from conferences
âą His disastrous first ever meeting with a VC
âą Why the best fundraising advice is to build a business that doesnât need to raise money
âą âCompanies are bought, not soldâ and his framework for startup M&A
âą Why itâs a mistake to build your startup just to be acquired
âą Why consensus startup ideas rarely work, and the best startups need some secret or structural change that no one else has noticed yet
âą Why tech-enabled service businesses are so hard to scale
âą How Pilot got its first customers
âą Pilotâs unique approach to raising its Seed round
âą The initial scare when raising their Series A
âą Why its Series B was half of what they could have raised
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Where to find Waseem:
âą Twitter: https://twitter.com/waseem
âą LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wdaher
âą Newsletter: https://waseem.substack.com/
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Where to find Turner:
âą Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it
âą Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
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Production and distribution by: https://www.supermix.io
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For sponsorship inquiries: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Bootstrapping Webflow to $10M ARR, and scaling to a $4B Valuation with Vlad Magdalin (Co-founder & CEO)
Vlad Magdalin is the Co-founder and CEO of Webflow, software that empowers designers to build websites without code. Vlad started the company with his co-founders Sergie Magdalin and Bryant Chou in 2013, and has since raised roughly $335 million supported by investors like Accel, Khosla Ventures, YCombinator, Capital G, and Eric Bahn.
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Brought to you by Mercury, the bank built for startups. Join more than 100,000 startups and venture capital firms on Mercury, the powerful and intuitive way for ambitious companies to bank.Sign-up now:Â https://bit.ly/46ImCuD
Disclaimer: Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank & Trust; Members FDIC.
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Topics discussed include:
âą The history of web browsers, websites, and web design
âą Why websites are the ultimate economic enablers
âą How Webflow empowers anyone to design websites without code
âą Why website design is a gateway into programming
âą How the movement to CSS and web standards in the 2000âs and 2010âs created the opportunity for Webflow to build a product around responsive design
âą Moving to the US with his parents and five siblings as refugees from the USSR at nine years old
âą How losing half of their luggage and immigration documents in the move enabled his dad to buy the familyâs first computer
âą The first website Vlad ever designed for a Brad Pitt movie
âą How his experience dropping out of a computer science degree to work in 3D animation at Pixar, then going back to school gave him the idea for Webflow
âą Failing to build Webflow three times between 2005 and 2008
âą Why the spouses and partners of founders are the unsung heroes of startups
âą The moment he immediately quit his job and attempted Webflow for the fourth time
âą Burning three months of runway on a Kickstarter that never went live
âą Liquidating his retirement account, paying rent with credit cards, and selling and leasing back the family carâs to keep the business running
âą Vladâs exuberant optimism that kept him going for 10 years
âą Failing to get into YC, and the crazy story behind getting accepted the second time
âą The trajectory-altering customer and fundraising advice they got from Paul Graham
âą The âInvesting on Principleâ contract they signed with Accel who led Webflowâs Series A
âą Why Vlad thinks every startup founder should operate with the assumption theyâll never be able to raise money again
Referenced:
âą Inventing on Principle (Video):Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PUv66718DII
âą Inventing on Principle (Transcript):Â https://jamesclear.com/great-speeches/inventing-on-principle-by-bret-victor
âą The Infinite Game:Â https://simonsinek.com/books/the-infinite-game/
Where to find Vlad:
âą Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/callmevlad
âą LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/vladmagdalin
Where to find Turner:
âą Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
âą Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
Want to sponsor the show? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

What is OpenStore? How Keith Rabois is Acquiring Shopify Brands
Keith started the company in 2021 with co-founders Jack Abraham, Matt Lanter, and Jeremy Wood, and has since raised over $150 million supported by investors like Atomic, Founders Fund, General Catalyst, Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital, and Vine Ventures.
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Brought to you by Packsmith, better fulfillment for growing brands. Sign-up here bit.ly/PacksmithBanana
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In this episode, we discuss:
âą The 3-minute conversation that started OpenStore
âą All the problems that still exist in ecommerce
âą Why Instagram Shopping failed
âą What Keith and team are building at OpenStore
âą Why Wish failed
âą The margin profile of most consumer brands
âą A crash course on contribution margin and profitability for startup founders
âą How OpenStore gets 3x higher contribution margin than other consumer brands
âą As a VC, the one thing Keith looks for in the founders he backs
âą A framework for founders and investors to consider when incubating companies
âą Why Keith thinks no great SF-based startups has been founded since March of 2020
âą The reasons he moved to Miami
âą Why heâs bearish on most AI startups
âą His favorite interview questions for candidates
Referenced:
âą Email Keith - keith@foundersfund.com
Where to find Keith:
âą Twitter: twitter.com/rabois
âą LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/keith
Where to find Turner:
âą Newsletter: www.thespl.it
âą Twitter: twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Production and distribution by: www.supermix.io
Want to sponsor the show? docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

The $4 Trillion Business of Financial Crime with Natasha Vernier, Co-founder and CEO of Cable
Natasha Vernier is the Co-founder and CEO of Cable, the all-in-one effectiveness testing platform for financial services. Prior to Cable, Natasha joined UK neobank Monzo when it had less than 100 customers. She built and led their financial crime team for five years, and is one of the most knowledgeable individuals in the world on financial crime, which amounts to over $4 trillion per year, or 4% of global GDP.
Natasha started Cable in 2020 with her co-founder Katie Savitz, and has since raised over $16 million supported by investors like LocalGlobe, CRV, Stage 2, and Jump Capital.
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Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://bit.ly/3ZyBhWM
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Topics discussed:
âą How crime is a $4 trillion market
âą Why 80% of crime is carried out for financial gains
âą Why the UN estimates we only catch 0.2% of financial crime
âą The reason banks are incentivized to stop fraud, but not crime
âą Why it's so hard to stop financial crimes
âą How $20B in financial crime was committed on crypto rails in 2022
âą What âSynthetic ID Fraudâ is, and why it's the fastest growing type of fraud in the US
âą What Natasha thinks are the new frontiers of fraud
âą Joining Monzo as one of the first employees and staying through a $4B valuation
âą What itâs like to be fully invested in a startup when youâre not a founder
âą Building Cable to enable regulatory and financial crime teams
âą Raising a Pre-Seed round and signing the first customer without a product built
âą Why compliance officers want to buy complicated products
âą How Natasha diversified her cap table, raising a Seed round from CRV and a group of angels with broad skill sets, ethnicity, race, and sexuality
âą How she got two funds to pre-empt her Series A
âą Why founding a startup means getting punched in the face every day, and her biggest mistake is not enjoying the little things sooner
âą The two founders she most looks up to
âą The one interview question she asks every candidate at Cable
Referenced:
âą Cableâs site: https://cable.tech
âą Cableâs Seed round: https://community.cable.tech/weve-raised-5-3m-from-crv-localglobe-and-a-diverse-group-of-exceptional-angels/
âą How They Built the Hoover Dam (Part 1): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXFjLaUxpaw
âą How Vegas Became VEGAS (Part 2): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QNuYHEzS2o
Where to find Natasha:
âą Twitter: https://twitter.com/natashavernier
âą LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natashavernier
Where to find Turner:
âą Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it
âą Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Production and distribution by: https://www.supermix.io
Want to sponsor the show? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Growing Deel to $300M+ ARR in Four Years with Co-founder and CEO Alex Bouaziz
Alex Bouaziz is the Co-founder and CEO of Deel, a full stack global HR and payroll platform. But the company didnât start that way, and weâll talk through Alex and his co-founder Shuoâs journey from zero to one, starting with a product that helped startups hire international employees.
Alex and Shuo launched the company one week before YC Demo day in 2019, and have since scaled to 20,000+ customers and raised over $685 million. Theyâre supported by investors like YC, a16z, Spark Capital, Weekend Fund, Coatue, SV Angel, Soma Capital, Quiet Capital, and angels like Lachy Groom, Nat Friedman, Ryan Petersen, Alexis Ohanian, John Zimmer, Dara Khosrowshahi, Rex Salisbury, Justin Mateen, and more.
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In this episode, we discuss:
âą The initial insight around remote work that started Deel in 2019
âą How they initially built the wrong solution
âą Pivoting one week before YC demo day
âą Listening to customers to build a better product
âą Growing 20% every month for a year
âą Being a default optimist
âą Dealing with the emotional ups and downs of building a startup
âą Moving at âDeel Speedâ, and how the team operates so fast
âą Deelâs remote-first approach and its âWeWork Squadsâ
âą His advice to other leaders building remote teams
âą Why founders shouldnât share too much information with early investors
âą How Alexâs approach to fundraising changed through his Seed to Series D rounds
âą Why founders should always be selling their product
âą How picking board members is a form of marriage, and what founders should prioritize when picking them
âą Why Deel raised a Series A and B in a three month span despite only burning $300k since closing its Seed round
âą How deep pocketed investors unlock optionality as a company scales
âą The benefits to taking on lots of angel investors
âą How Deel prioritized international expansion as it grew
âą Deelâs new Visa / immigration and HR AI products
âą Two things Alex would do differently if he could start over
âą The founders he most looks up to
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Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/growing-deel-to-300m-arr-in-four
Where to find Alex:
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/Bouazizalex
LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexbouaziz/
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

How Semil Shah Built Haystack
Semil Shah is the Founder of Haystack, an institutional venture capital firm that backs outlier founders at the earliest stages. Semil started Haystack in 2013, and has since invested in X unicorns like DoorDash, Instacart, Figma, HashiCorp, Ironclad, Carta, Applied Intuition, and Opendoor.
This episode takes us behind the scenes of Semilâs two decade journey building Haystack from scratch. Weâll dive into how he raised and deployed each of the first six Haystack funds, including all the mistakes made along the way, plus the details around Haystackâs new $75 million and $25 million funds announced the date this episode was published.
Read Haystack's announcement here: https://semilshah.com/2023/09/10/announcing-haystack-vii-same-model-fresh-funds-and-new-era/
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Brought to you by Mercury, the bank built for startups. Join more than 100,000 startups and venture capital firms on Mercury, the powerful and intuitive way for ambitious companies to bank.
Sign-up now: https://bit.ly/3sQRzOw
Listen to my conversation with Immad, the Co-founder and CEO of Mercury:
- Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/24ujuXZ2uws48bvwOh9NcR
- Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lessons-from-building-mercury-with-immad-akhund-co/id1694440669?i=1000619360042
Disclaimer: Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank & Trust; Members FDIC.
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Topics discussed include:
- Juggling multiple jobs while living paycheck to paycheck his first eight years in Silicon Valley
- Failing to get his first job in venture three times
- Investing in the Seed rounds of unicorns DoorDash, Instacart, Hashicorp, and Envoy within the first six months of starting Haystack
- Why he initially thought Haystack would be a short-term thing
- Turning down multiple lucrative job offers two years in
- How the best LPs evaluate VC funds on the âEntry Ownership to Fund Sizeâ ratio
- Semilâs strategy of âcrawl, walk, runâ to increase Haystackâs check sizes over time
- The pain he felt failing to hit his target fund size on the first four fundraises and how he handled it
- Why everyone should âpre-marketâ a fundraise, and how to do it
- The things most founders donât appreciate about raising a venture fund
- Fighting to invest in Ironcladâs Seed round before he had his next fund raised
- How LPs reference VCs, and how a VC can become referenceable
- Why Haystack Fund IV was the scariest fund to raise
- How Semil builds relationships with LPs
- The hardest questions he faced raising each fund and what other VCs should anticipate while raising their own fund
- How LP investment committees make decisions
- Whatâs going on behind the scenes at most large venture LPs today
- Why the traditional advice of âfinding an anchor LPâ makes no sense
- Spilling his secret on the best quarter to fundraise
- Why VCs should fundraise with a hard cap on fund size
- Why every VC should appreciate and remember how LPs supported them through the pandemic
- All the details on Haystackâs new $75 million and $25 million funds
- Semilâs plan for the next 10 years
- Three pieces of advice for emerging fund managers
Where to find Semil:
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/semil
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/semilshah/
Where to find Turner:
- Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Production and distribution by: https://www.supermix.io/
For sponsorship inquiries: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

đ§Ș The Einstein of Ecommerce: Bootstrapping to 9-Figures in Revenue with Sean Frank (CEO, Ridge Wallet)
Sean Frank is the CEO of Ridge Wallet, a menâs wallet and accessories brand that does over 9-figures in annual revenue. The company started in 2012 and raised $266,000 in a Kickstarter campaign to sell the first 5,200 wallets. Ridge hasnât raised a single dollar of outside capital since, and has also expanded into new categories like rings, knives, watches, backpacks, and keys, with dozens of more products coming soon. Sean is known in some circles as the âEinstein of Ecommerceâ, and he gives us an inside look at running a consumer brand in 2023.
Brought to you by Packsmith, better fulfillment for growing brands:Â https://bit.ly/PacksmithBanana
In this episode, we discuss:
- Why wallets are a terrible product category
- How Ridge has 80% gross margins
- Why brands should generally not raise venture capital
- When a founder should step down as CEO, and how to hire a new one
- Why Ridge is one of the top 10 advertisers on Twitter
- When and how to hire a marketing agency
- Why Ridge never raised outside capital
- Closing clients in a 1991 Honda Civic
- A crash course on the menâs and womenâs fashion markets
- Why Sean thinks womenâs fashion will have 50% return rates this holiday season
- Investing in a watch manufacturer and building a factory in Arizona to vertically integrate
- Why every company needs a core competency
- The simple tech stack Ridge uses to run their business
- Why Crocs is a great business
- Sponsoring 5,000+ influencers
- Why Amazon shut down its private label program and every brand should sell on it
- Why influencer marketing performs so well, and how to start and scale an influencer marketing program
- Why more companies should incorporate creators in their content
- How FTX and other crypto companies inflated influencer marketing prices
- Paying $1,000,000 to hire a creator in-house
- How the Ridge Wallet has saved customers from a bullet and a chainsaw
Where to find Sean:
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/SeanEcom
Substack:Â http://seanecom.substack.com/
Podcast:Â https://9operators.com/
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Referenced:
https://www.amazon.com/Great-CEO-Within-Tactical-Building-ebook/dp/B07ZLGQZYC
https://www.theloganbartlettshow.com/
https://www.maryruthorganics.com/
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Modern Treasury: How to Move Quadrillions of Dollars, with Co-founder and CEO Dimitri Dadiomov
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts: bit.ly/3OwGdGC
Sign-up for Ramp and get $500: bit.ly/3KSqfFV
Read the transcript: www.thespl.it/p/how-to-move-quadrillions-of-dollars
In this episode, we discuss:
How the global banking system moves over $1 quadrillion per year
Why B2B products should be easy to use with broad use cases
What makes a good API business
Why the YC application is a great forcing function for founders
How it took them six months to get their first customer, but never pivoted
Why the first customers of a B2B business should get more credit
How PLG helped build a better product
Finding holes in the market for an initial go-to-market strategy
The depth of Modern Treasuryâs product
Why they should have built a sales team sooner
How deep customer relationships across many industries helped them raise a Series A
Why itâs important to go slow to go fast
How Dimitri set an intentional culture around studying other businesses
When distribution can be more important than product
What happened inside Modern Treasury during the collapse of SVB and Signature Bank
Why Dimitri sends Saturday update emails to entire company
The founders Dimitri really admires
Where to find Dimitri:
Twitter: twitter.com/dadiomov
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/dadiomov/
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter: www.thespl.it
Twitter: twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Read the transcript: www.thespl.it/p/how-to-move-quadrillions-of-dollars
Production and distribution by: www.supermix.io
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đź Growing Medal to Tens of Millions of Gamers | Pim de Witte (Co-founder and CEO, Medal)
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts: bit.ly/3OwGdGC
Read the transcript: www.thespl.it/p/growing-medal-to-tens-of-millions
In this episode, we discuss:
Why we play video games
Why 200 million gamers play Roblox
Learning to code at 13 to build a private Runescape server that did $1.5 million in revenue
Why paid acquisition is so important in mobile gaming
Why consumer platforms need a social inflection point
How Medal blew up during COVID
Why multiplayer platforms die when network effects unravel
Why Medalâs Seed round was so hard to raise
Pimâs biggest mistake building Medal
His three favorite interview questions
Medalâs unique hybrid in-person / remote work environment
Why itâs a mistake to focus on competitors instead of customers
Why rapid iteration is everything
How to acquire another startup
Why building product is the ultimate game
How Elonâs changes at Twitter caused a great reset in tech
Where to find Pim:
Twitter: www.twitter.com/PimDeWitte
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/pimdw/
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter: www.thespl.it
Twitter: twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Read the transcript: www.thespl.it/p/growing-medal-to-tens-of-millions
Production and distribution by: www.supermix.io
For sponsorship inquiries: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

The Business of Newsletters with Kendall Baker, âThe Sports Newsletter Guyâ
Kendall Baker currently leads Yahooâs sports newsletter business. In 2017 he launched the first daily sports newsletter called Sports Internet, which he sold to Axios in 2019. Before Sports Internet, he convinced the founders of The Hustle to focus their online tech blog on a daily newsletter, which he wrote for a year and a half. And before The Hustle, he produced SportsCenter at ESPN. Heâs spent nearly a decade at the intersection of daily news and sports, and this episode is packed with insights on both.
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://bit.ly/3OwGdGC
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-business-of-newsletters
In this episode, we discuss:
- The history of the newsletter industry
- Why the best writers delete more than they write
- How he got on ESPN SportsCenter
- A crash course on the sports media business
- How to write a daily newsletter
- The importance of experimenting
- How he got his first dollar of revenue
- Why Kendall spent $0 on growth
- Selling his âSports Internetâ newsletter to Axios
- Why Adam Silver, commissioner of the NBA, reads Kendallâs writing
- Why Yahooâs the next rocketship
- The surging momentum in US soccer
- And the most underrated athletes (current and all-time)
Listen on other platforms:
Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-business-of-newsletters-kendall-baker/id1694440669?i=1000624033211
YouTube: https://youtu.be/4es4p7sFMf0
Where to find Kendall:
Twitter https://twitter.com/kendallbaker
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-business-of-newsletters
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io
For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

đ How Overtime Grew to 85 Million Fans | Dan Porter (Co-founder and CEO, Overtime)
Dan Porter is the Co-founder and CEO of Overtime, a sports network for the next generation of fans. OT reaches 85 million fans per month and runs a basketball league (Overtime Elite, OTE), a flag football league (OT7), and is launching a boxing league (OTX) the week this episode airs.
Dan started Overtime with his co-founder Zack Weiner in 2016, and has since raised over $215 million. OT is supported by investors like the late ex-NBA Commissioner David Stern, Jeff Bezos, Drake, Carmelo Anthony, Trae Young, over 25 other NBA players, Spark Capital, Redpoint, a16z, Greycroft, Afore Capital, and Banana Capital. [Turner Novak and Banana Capital are investors in Overtime].
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â â http://bit.ly/3Qk4RNd
In this episode, we discuss:
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/how-overtime-grew-to-85-million-fans
Where to find Dan: Twitter:Â â https://twitter.com/tfadpâ LinkedIn:Â â https://www.linkedin.com/in/danporter/â
Where to find Turner: Newsletter:Â â https://www.thespl.itâ Twitter:Â â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovakâ LinkedIn:Â â https://www.linkedin.com/in/TurnerNovakâ
Where to find The Peel: YouTube:Â â https://www.youtube.com/@ThePeelPodâ Instagram:Â â https://www.instagram.com/ThePeelPodâ TikTok:Â â https://www.tiktok.com/@ThePeelPodcastâ
Read the full transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/how-overtime-grew-to-85-million-fans
Production and distribution by:Â â https://www.supermix.ioâ
For sponsorship inquiries:Â â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewformâ

đ« How to Build a $70 Million Chocolate Factory | Nick Saltarelli (Co-founder, Mid-Day Squares)

đ The $1.3 Billion Pizza Business: How Ilir Sela (Founder & CEO, Slice) is Arming the Pizza Rebels

đ„ Making Healthcare a Product, Not a Service | Adrian Aoun (Founder and CEO, Forward)

Lessons From Building Mercury with Immad Akhund (Co-founder and CEO, Mercury)
Immad Akhund is the Co-founder and CEO of Mercury, a digitally native bank for startups. Mercury is supported by investors like a16z, Coatue, CRV, Chapter One, Ryan Peterson, Scott Belsky, Serena Williams, Terrence Rohan, Zach Coelius, Todd Goldberg, and more. Before Mercury, Immad was a part-time partner at YC, co-founded Heyzap which sold for $45 million, and co-founded and scaled Clickpass to millions of users.
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://secureframe.com/request-demo-4?utm_source=partner&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=062023-thesplit
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-future-of-banking-remote-work
In this episode, we discuss:
- The future of banking
- Why Mercuryâs beautiful onboarding was an accident
- Cultural mistakes most startups make
- Two lessons from selling his first company for $45 million
- How to get free legal advice
- Why itâs better to build a network of entrepreneurs than investors
- How to fundraise
- Why its contrarian to start a non-AI company right now
- How Mercury is thinking about AI
- Why each operational team has its own engineering team
- The embarrassing pitch meeting that raised his Series A from a16z
- How crypto used up all its goodwill
- The hiring advice he gives every founder
Where to find Immad:
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/immad
LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/iakhund
Podcast:Â https://curiositypodcast.substack.com/
Where to find Turner:
Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it
Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Mentioned in this episode:
Mercury https://www.mercury.com
The Logan Bartlett Show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcL_cjZDeFU
Timestamps:
(0:00) Intro
(5:58) Mercury's "accidentally great" onboarding experience
(8:13) The fundamental banking business model
(9:34) The basics of banking regulation
(11:07) How Mercury works with banks
(13:27) The future of banking
(19:34) Immad's previous startups
(22:30) What culture actually means
(27:06) Importance of ideas vs execution
(32:03) Learning banking from scratch
(35:54) Why the first banking partnership failed
(37:56) Why the second banking partnership worked
(39:24) The difference between compliance and risk teams
(42:08) Why compliance is so relevant for better banking
(50:13) The biggest mistake for doing remote work
(51:21) Mercury Raise
(53:33) The game theory of fundraising
(54:54) Playbook for generating fundraising momentum
(60:45) Common fundraising mistakes
(63:12) Hilarious fundraising mishap in front of a16z
(68:16) Companies that aren't like this shouldn't touch AI
(70:57) Who will win big from AI?
(72:10) Immad's take on crypto
(86:14) Outro
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-future-of-banking-remote-work Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

How Primer Turns Teachers Into Superheroes | Ryan Delk (Co-founder and CEO, Primer)
Ryan Delk is the Co-Founder and CEO of Primer, a startup helping ambitious kids unlock their potential by empowering teachers to launch and run their own micro-schools. Primerâs supported by investors like Founders Fund, Khosla Ventures, Village Global, Susa Ventures, Sam Altman, Naval, Ryan Peterson, Amjad Masad, Julie Zhuo, Tobias Lutke, Lachy Groom, Howie Liu, Dylan Field, Packy McCormick, and many more. Before Primer, Ryan was the COO at peer-to-peer rental marketplace Omni (sold to Coinbase), and prior to that led Growth and Partnerships at Gumroad from $10,000 to $50 million in GMV. Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://secureframe.com/request-demo-4?utm_source=partner&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=062023-thesplit
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/turning-techers-into-superheroes In this episode, we discuss: - How the $1 trillion US K-12 education system works - The broken incentive structures in education - Why teachers are superheroes - How to double a teacherâs income - Primerâs origin story - How to open a school - If online school works - Why founders make the best employees - How the US government wastes billions of dollars - Why everyone should care more about local politics Where to find Ryan: Twitter https://twitter.com/delk LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/delk/
Where to find Turner: Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak Timestamps: (3:42) The state of K-12 education in the US (6:35) The structural problem causing a radical misallocation of resources (8:00) The importance of teachers (9:34) The âtotally flippedâ incentive structure for teachers (12:22) The problem of bureaucracy in education (13:38) Primerâs thesis (14:52) How to start a school (16:00) How Primer helps teachers start their own schools (18:20) Using underutilized real estate to host micro-schools (20:05) Ryanâs take on digital vs in-person learning (21:59) How Primer supports teachers (23:21) Inspirational stories from Primer users (28:00) The underestimated entrepreneurship of teachers (29:12) How Primer stays affordable for all users (30:26) How Primer gets teachers on board (32:04) The role of after-school activities (33:07) How Primer sets its Curriculum (35:14) Ryanâs unique education and how it inspired Primer (38:39) Why someone hadnât solved this problem yet (40:24) Primerâs initial strategy (41:30) The breakfast that changed everything (42:09) The concept of âBarrelsâ from Keith Rabois (42:36) Finding and recruiting Ian Bravo (43:31) How Primer recruits ex-founders (44:52) The 3 things Primer screens for in teachers (46:27) What Primer messed up when launching (48:19) Re-thinking school admissions from first principles (51:03) How they convinced the very first teachers to try Primer (51:59) The ineffective usage of education spending (53:28) Policymakers prioritizing âsignal over outcomesâ (57:21) The worst public schools are worse than you think (59:08) How the Government wastes billions of dollars and Ryanâs idea for solving this (61:31) The importance of increasing engagement with local politics (63:37) The vision for Primer
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/turning-techers-into-superheroes
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io/ For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform

Selling $100 Million in Dog Collars | Ken Ehrman (Co-founder, Halo Collar)
Ken Ehrman is the co-founder and Managing Partner of Halo Collar, a smart dog collar that tracks your dog with GPS. Halo Collar uses patented technology that allows customers to instantly create up to 20 unique virtual dog fences from their phone using GPS.
Brought to you by Secureframe, the automated compliance platform built by compliance experts:Â https://secureframe.com/request-demo-4?utm_source=partner&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=062023-thesplit
Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-iphone-for-your-dog-ken-ehrman
In this episode, we discuss: - Working for Mike Markkula, the first investor in Apple - Building hardware and the importance of patents - Listening to customers, solving their problems, and sizing a market - Qualifying enterprise customers and selling with "calm confidence." - Early investors trying to buy 95% of his first company - Getting the US Post Office and Army to fund $15 million in R&D - Taking a company public in 1999 with $3 million in revenue - Using AI to train dog movements and make "the Apple Watch" for dogs - The crazy story of how he met his celebrity co-founder, Cesar Millan the Dog Whisperer - What happened when they met famous TikToker Charli D'Amelio Where to find Ken: LinkedIn:Â https://www.linkedin.com/in/ken-ehrman
Where to find Turner: Newsletter:Â https://www.thespl.it Twitter:Â https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak
Referenced: Buy the Halo Collar:Â https://www.halocollar.com/ Cesar Millan, 'the Dog Whisperer':Â https://www.cesarsway.com/ More on RFID tags:Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ukfpq71BoMo&ab_channel=ALLABOUTELECTRONICS Read the transcript: https://www.thespl.it/p/the-iphone-for-your-dog-ken-ehrman
Production and distribution by:Â https://www.supermix.io For sponsorship inquiries:Â https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebvhBlDDfHJyQdQWs8RwpFxWg-UbG0H-VFey05QSHvLxkZPQ/viewform
