Founder Secrets with Taylor and Flaviu

Taylor and Flaviu have a lot of fun talking about AI and how to decide on a startup idea, a cofounder, and much more.

(1:20) What is Chat GPT?

(3:31) Taylor’s AI Poem Business Idea loveseternalframe.com

(8:07) Book written by AI - What Makes Us Human: An Artificial Intelligence Answers Life's Biggest Questions

(10:27) Avatar AI Apps Taking over; LensaAI reaches 13M installs , AvatarAI.me

(13:59) AI Generated Business Emails on Twitter

(16:10) Is AI all Hype?

(21:53) How do you know if your startup idea is good?

(29:02) Flaviu and Taylor disagree about the best type of cofounder

Taylor and Flaviu get to interview THE KELLY of kellyfaetanini.com - an amazing creative designer of wedding dresses, and an innovator in the bridal industry. So many insights below, from starting the business, to investor challenges, bridal industry secrets, and much more.

(1:14) Kelly Faetanini’s origins in San Marino

(3:58) Nature vs. Nurture in artistic talent

(5:37) The leap from designer to entrepreneur

(9:29) QR Code for Bridal

(11:29) Early mistakes Kelly made

(14:02) How Kelly found her investors

(15:18) The vision for Kelly Faetanini

(19:01) Finding a young partner that can grow with Kelly

(19:55) Next generation of brides

(21:00) Abusive relationship between designers and retailers

(23:08) How much does a wedding dress cost?

(24:33) 3D version of Paper Doll

(26:50) Why it takes 6 months to make a dress

(28:42) How Kelly gets customer feedback

(30:05) 2 week shipping on wedding dresses!

(31:26) How Covid changed the buying process

(32:39) Why are bridal stores appointment-only?

(33:25) Risks of naming a business after yourself

(35:31) How do you keep the inspiration alive?

(38:28) The Tudor Rose

(39:10) What happens to dresses after their season?

(40:07) How Kelly designs a new dress

(41:22) Would you sell your name?

(42:36) Instagram, FB, Pinterest or Google ads?

(45:42) How do you manage creatives?

Flaviu and Taylor talk to Bryan Luoma, a half Filipino / half Finish entrepreneur who went from Civil Engineering in Minnesota to a rapidly growing business named Tahche in the Philippines.

(3:15) Being on stage is better than being in the audience

(5:43) Why Bryan became a Civil Engineer?

(8:25) What made Bryan take the plunge to Entrepreneurship?

(11:08) The Craigslist hack

(13:48) Misconceptions about staffing in the Philippines

(15:14) Is the pendulum swinging back to the office?

(16:31) 50% of all nurses in the US are Filipino

(18:43) How to manage 2 businesses, family, across timezones

(20:33) Secrets to Bryan being happy all the time

(23:52) Being a good communicator

(29:34) Cashier with an outsourced person in Toronto

(32:16) Does being a parent make you more efficient?

Taylor and Flaviu go over some tips, hacks, and stories of how they got their first customers and how they would get their first customer today. Also, covered some interesting stories of gratitude (Happy Thanksgiving!), how Wave Cars hacked Shark Tank, Bill Gurley giving some “advice”, alt lenders, and tax softwares that gave their customers’ data to Facebook (who does not want it).

(1:13) Tip: Bilt.com

(2:27) The Power of Gratitude [Twitter Link]

(5:51) How to Hack Shark Tank (Link Mentioned) - Wave Cars

(9:57) Bill Gurley talk and VC Advice

(15:27) Alt Lenders disappearing

(18:35) Intuit H&R Block sending private info to META [Link to Verge Article]

(24:41) How did Flaviu and Taylor get their first customer?

This is the best episode of Founder Secrets yet! Flaviu and Taylor speak with Mona Patel, a creator, writer, founder, CEO, entrepreneur, and general amazing person. This is one you won't want to miss.

(5:15) - How do you know who to trust?

(6:36) - Writing "Reframe: Shift the Way You Work, Innovate, and Think"

(8:25) - Pre-Frame

(10:50) - Hiring your replacement

(17:05) - How you listen better?

(18:45) - Grey Zone, Sexual Harassment and Racism

(22:40) - What brings Joy, Impact, Ease, and Abundance

(27:15) - What Mona thinks of NPS, eNPS, Surveys, and Polls

(31:25) - Mona on Negotiation

(35:00) - How to be more creative?

(40:20) - Talking to God - The Power and Importance of Psychedelics 

(46:00) - Creativity without Pain

In this episode, Taylor and Flaviu go over some news with FTX and Twitter, then deep dive on how to get the motivation to start a company, sharing some of their personal stories, discuss whether founders should do sales. Then they talk about donations as a company, and a liquor business that’s (maybe) successful in South Carolina.

(1:02) - FTX and Sam Bankman-Fried

(5:35) What is the price of Bitcoin in 6 months?

(7:01) Twitter <> Elon Fiasco

(9:47) How to get motivated to start a business?

(14:54) How Taylor found his cofounder

(18:00) Should a Founder do sales?

(21:56) How to handle donations

(26:3) Unsexy Liquor Business

In this episode, Taylor and Flaviu talk to Namu Park about her journey to starting The-Sloth.com , a fashion tech startup fighting consumerism by enabling everyone to resell their clothes.

(2:11) - Deciding to be an entrepreneur

(3:32) - What is The Sloths?

(9:18) - Why the name Sloth?

(11:45) - Learning Product Design and Product Management

(15:00) - To have or not have a cofounder

(18:22) - What is the vision?

(20:54) - How to acquire customers

(23:47) - How does Sloth make money?

(26:31) - The challenge of consumerism

(30:11) - Why do people resell clothes?

(32:44) - Fundraising is HARD

This week Taylor and Flaviu are back in the studio and brought a serial entrepreneur friend from EO, Liz Reitman. Liz and and Casie Fariello are the founders of Other Parents Like Me (OPLM.com). They took their personal experience and saw a big need in mental health for parents supporting their children struggling with addiction. It is an amazing story and a big challenge they are taking on. So much to learn from these two. 

(1:26) - From Flight Attendant to Entrepreneur 

(3:39) - Why start OPLM? 

(4:49) - How Liz and Casie Met 

(9:48) - What is OPLM? 

(14:10) - Business vs. Non-profit? 

(15:52) - Is it stupid to be 50/50 partners? 

(18:38) - Liz - second time entrepreneur lessons 

(23:01) - You can’t give everything 100% 

(24:30) - Future growth of OPLM 

(25:45) - How to have a business partner 

(28:15) - What is the biggest challenge to scaling? 

(34:55) - Would you sell OPLM? 

(38:55) - Is success of this app for users to stop using it? 

(41:21) - How to keep groups interesting as they grow? 

(45:14) - A 4-letter .com domain name

Taylor and Flaviu sit down with Retta Abraham in Ocho Rios, Jamaica to talk through his journey from being second generation immigrant from Ethiopia and Japan, building a successful career in finance, and then leaving it all to find personal balance, growth, and freedom via entrepreneurship. In particular Retta focused on Amazon seller businesses in ecommerce, and he shares some very valuable tips from his journey.

( 4:12 ) - Selling Lollipops

( 05:25 ) - A kid’s vision of suit and tie and banking (50B in deals)

( 10:40 ) - A quiet period in Wall St when Retta decided to take the leap

( 13:01 ) - The search and learning the Amazon sellers businesses

( 15:33 ) - How and where to buy an Amazon ecommerce business

( 16:54 ) - Loans and financing over 100% of the business (not money down)

( 19:11 ) - Managing people in a startup enviroment

( 23:30 ) - What’s next?

( 25:07 ) - Making an impact

( 26:40 ) - How to give a hug - My first real hug - How to not wear the armor

( 28:30 ) - America Scores - a non-profit Retta is passionate about in NYC

( 29:30 ) - Is it still a good time to start an Amazon business?