Tech In Chicago

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Helping Restaurants Make the Most of the Internet - Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally / Co-Founders of Chowly Apr 24, 2020

Show notes

Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally, Co-Founders of Chowly, a restaurant technology company that integrates third-party online ordering platforms with restaurants' point-of-sale (POS) systems.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

The Cannabis Marketplace Bringing the Industry Online - James Yi / Founder of LeafTrade Feb 05, 2020

Show notes

James Yi is the Founder and CEO of LeafTrade, a startup building a wholesale ordering platform connecting licensed cannabis vendors and dispensaries. Before LeafTrade, dispensaries were doing most of this work manually with emails, calls, and spreadsheets. With Chicago legalizing recreational cannabis it seemed like a perfect time to have James on. They also recently announced a $4.5M seed round.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Turning Data into Stories - Stuart Frankel / Founder of Narrative Science Dec 09, 2019

Show notes

Stuart Frankel is the Founder & CEO of Narrative Science, which translates all the data companies produce into digestible information. The company started out producing software that turned raw baseball scores into stories for reporters. They have raised $43.4M in funding and have reinvented themselves multiples times in their decade plus in business.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Selling a Bootstrapped Startup for $22M, Building a Marketplace, Manufactured Housing - Dave Bowen / CEO of Purchasing Platform Nov 18, 2019

Show notes

Dave Bowen is the CEO of Purchasing Platform, an online marketplace for real estate developers to buy products for their properties. Before Purchasing Platform, Dave was the founder of Market Maker 4 (MM4), an e-sourcing tech startup, which he bootstrapped and sold for $22M in 2016. Dave is taking a different approach with Purchasing Platform and they just raised their Series A.

Topics Covered:

Selling a bootstrapped business for $22M
Deciding to join an established business vs starting a new one
Issues with joining an established business as a CEO
Changing a startup's culture
The revolution of mobile home communities and manufactured housing.
Building a niche marketplace
Losing & winning back their biggest customer
Focusing on internal communication as much as external

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Future of Travel, Growth Hacking Instagram, Doing Things That Don't Scale - Konrad Waliszewski / Founder of TripScout Oct 28, 2019

Show notes

Konrad Waliszewski is the CEO and a co-founder of TripScout, a startup making a travel app that curates the best recommendations around the world and provides trip-planning tools. Konrad, a long time digital nomad, has visited 100 countries and Forbes has called him a "modern day Marco Polo." Prior to TripScout, he was the COO of Speek, which raised $6m in venture capital and was acquired by Jive. Follow his adventures on Instagram.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Chicago's Next Consumer Unicorn - Steven Galanis / Founder of Cameo Aug 20, 2019

Show notes

Steven Galanis is the Founder & CEO of Cameo, a startup that allows you to book personalized shoutouts from your favorite people. Cameo has raised over $65m in VC funding with a reported $300 million valuation from some big names including Kleiner Perkins, Lightspeed, and Spark Capital and Chicago's very own Chicago Ventures, Origin Ventures, and Starting Line. Before founding Cameo, Steven was a film producer, account executive at LinkedIn, and an options trader in Chicago.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

The Free School Preparing Anyone for a Sales Jobs in Tech - Brian Bar / Founder of Victory Lap Jul 25, 2019

Show notes

Brian Bar is the Founder and CEO of Victory Lap, a sales bootcamp empowers candidates from all different backgrounds to find success in sales.

Before launching the business, Brian served as the VP of Sales for ThinkCERCA, where he devised a national distribution strategy, while simultaneously building out the sales organization. This experience, coupled with his work creating Groupon's sales onboarding department (overseeing the hiring and development of over 1,000 entry-level sales representatives) led Brian to start Victory Lap.

He is a sought after expert for companies hiring, training, and managing Gen Y and Gen Z sales talent. Brian lives with his wife, daughter, and dog in Chicago, and enjoys summers in his hometown of Long Beach, IN.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

From Dot-Com Bust to Late Bloomer Entrepreneur - Jeff Hunt / Founder of Snap36 Jun 21, 2019

Show notes

Jeff Hunt is the Founder of Snap36, a 360° product-photography startup that works with everyone from Amazon to small, family-owned businesses to optimize their e-retail photography.

Jeff got his start in the late 70s as a Kodak salesman and worked his way up the corporate ladder to the leadership team for Adobe's European division.

But he always had an entrepreneurial streak. He launched three startups in the 90s. Two went public. One went from zero to $55 million in two years and then $55 million to zero in two months with the dot-com bust.

In 2008, with the world economy in a tailspin and e-commerce in its infancy, Jeff made his final leap of faith, quitting Adobe to launch Snap36.

The company now has big clients in a range of industries (manufacturing and automotive to CPG and footwear) and boasts millions in revenue.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Building a Valley Company in the Chicago Way / Brian Luerssen (CEO) & Tim Grace (COO) @ DraftBit & VCs @ LongJump Fund May 26, 2019

Show notes

Brian Luerssen is the CEO & Tim Grace is the COO of DraftBit, a startup building a new way to build cross-platform, native iOS and Android apps in minutes instead of months, and they are both Venture Capitalists at LongJump Fund, a first-check venture fund designed to invest in the best new founders right when they begin their journey.

Before Draftbit, Brian was a Managing Director at Techstars and Tim was Head of Product at Trunk Club.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

Disrupting the Massive Commercial Real Estate Market - Tom Smith / Co-Founder of Truss Apr 09, 2019

Show notes

Tom Smith is the Co-Founder of Truss, a commercial real estate platform that helps small businesses find office space. You can think of them as Airbnb for commercial real estate.

The company's marketplace allows one to find, explore, compare, lease and tour office, industrial and retail space, immediately receive feedback on tours and spaces, manage all documents in one place, among others, providing small and medium businesses with a cost-effective way to lease space for their business.

Truss has raised about $23 million since it was founded in 2016 with it's most recent round led by Boston-based General Catalyst, who was also an early investor in Airbnb.

Other backers include Navitas Capital, Hyde Park Angels and Hyde Park Venture Partners, along with Jeff Boyd, the former CEO of Priceline, and Robert Mylod, a former Priceline executive and the chairman of Redfin.

Sponsored by:

Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago's hottest startups. Check out what they're up to at StartingLine.vc.

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