Future Roots

Steven Sashen (Co-founder & CEO, Xero Shoes) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

Steven explains why overstriding and cushioned shoes work against your body, and why support makes your feet weaker. He walks through bootstrapping Xero Shoes from a DIY sandal kit to around $68M a year on content and word of mouth, Shark Tank, cash crunches, testing marketing cheaply, and why AI search is just PageRank again.

Chapters

0:00 Walking, posture and overstriding

6:55 From retirement to barefoot sprinting

10:00 Flat feet and foot strength

12:38 Why support makes you weaker

14:23 Getting people to unbelieve

17:38 The first customers: give it all away

20:38 Shark Tank and word of mouth

24:53 Inventory, cash and a financial partner

26:08 Debt, risk and testing cheaply

30:08 Content that's different

33:53 AI search is PageRank again

36:58 Relaunching Scriptware

Connect with Steven: linkedin.com/in/sashen

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Erica Brinker (Founder, At The Brink Media; former Chief Commercial Officer, Array Technologies) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

From Tiffany, Ralph Lauren and Kate Spade to Honeywell and solar trackers, Erica explains why a B2B marketing leader has to own sales too and how to run voice of the customer before things break.

She also gets into sustainability without a green premium, the loss that led her to start At the Brink, and the lateral move that got her to VP.

Chapters

0:00 Fashion to solar: the through line

0:51 Know your customer, then segment

3:13 Why the CMO should own sales

6:37 Ruthless prioritization

7:17 Voice of the customer in solar

10:19 ESG and no green premium

16:23 Why she started At the Brink

20:26 Proving yourself in the room

25:14 Leaving marketing to make VP

29:17 Selling ideas inside a big company

Connect with Erica: linkedin.com/in/ericabrinker

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Eric J. Gall (Founder, Edison Business Advisors) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

Eric went from 17 years at Ford to buying auto shops, selling them in the 2008 crash, and founding Edison Business Advisors, with 300+ businesses sold since.

He gets into what owners get wrong about value, where deals die, how AI is leaking confidential listings, and the two things to do two years before you sell.

Chapters

0:00 Why he started Edison Business Advisors

1:30 Buying auto shops, then the 2008 crash

7:15 Learning to package a business

10:18 What owners get wrong about value

15:41 Where deals die

21:05 What moves the final price

23:27 Younger buyers and the boomer wave

28:13 Buying vs founding

33:17 AI and keeping a sale confidential

44:26 Get ready two years before you sell

Connect with Eric: linkedin.com/in/ericjgall

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Peter Samuelson (Co-founder, Ripples of Kindness; President, First Star) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

Film producer Peter Samuelson, founder behind Starlight, First Star and EDAR, on making kindness spread like a network and why giving at checkout sells more than a discount.

He also covers what producing 27 films taught him about raising money, how Starlight started with one sick boy's trip to Disneyland, and why you shouldn't wait to be successful to give.

Chapters

0:00 Kindness, ROI and servant leadership

3:33 Coming to America with nothing

6:34 Ripples of Kindness: kindness as a network

13:02 Why giving sells more than discounts

16:25 From junior crew to film producer

20:07 The film producer's toolkit

24:09 How Starlight began

30:34 First Star: foster kids to college

32:55 EDAR: a bed for the unhoused

37:22 Hunger, food waste and giving early

Connect with Peter: linkedin.com/in/petersamuelson

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Tim Ketchum (Co-founder, Composer) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

Why 80% of US food waste still ends up in landfill, and how a quieter, safer garbage disposal can keep it out without asking anyone to pay a green premium.

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Jan Breukers (Founder & CEO, First Choice Bio) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

From Dutch pig farmer to Auckland bar owner to Bay Area biotech founder, Jan explains why fresh human cell samples have to reach researchers within hours and why blind random samples only give 15% reproducibility.

He gets into screening cells by biomarker, building global collection centers, the personal loss behind First Choice Bio, and why medicine should chase root causes, not symptoms.

Chapters

0:00 From Dutch pig farmer to New Zealand

6:36 Computer science, consulting and the Bay Area

8:37 How he got into cell samples

12:00 Why 15% isn't good enough

15:02 Cells can't wait: the 48-hour clock

19:05 Treat the cause, not the symptoms

21:27 The raise and the collection centers

27:12 Collaborate, don't franchise

29:13 Why this is personal

37:41 Advice: stop chasing perfect

Connect with Jan: linkedin.com/in/jan-johannes-breukers-53b1b5114

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Dr Pradeepkumar Sacitharan (Founder & CEO, Donsfield) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

From war refugee and Olympic weightlifter to Oxford scientist and commodities founder, Pradeep explains how he rehearses big deals before they happen and why Donsfield is built to outlive him.

We get into critical minerals, trade finance on thin margins, stacking debt against short trade cycles, and what years of failed lab experiments teach you about business.

Chapters

0:00 Built to outlive the founder

2:31 From war refugee to Oxford

4:52 Guru, Navy SEAL and Forrest Gump

9:36 The deals that changed everything

12:38 Pretoria, Colombo and China

15:19 Critical minerals and the energy transition

20:24 Pivoting on daily data

22:47 Trade finance and the capital stack

31:52 Lessons from the lab

33:53 Be the hero of your own story

Connect with Pradeepkumar: linkedin.com/in/pksacitharan

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Tristan Roberts (Founder, Dog Years DAO) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

Tristan explains the biotech valley of death, why his team ran a follistatin gene therapy trial on a Caribbean island, and the surprise arthritis result that led him to dogs.

We get into gene therapy vectors, whether aging is a disease, who gets to live to 200, and how crypto tokens could reward the people and pets who finish a study.

Chapters

0:00 The valley of death in biotech

3:33 A trial on a Caribbean island

5:55 Follistatin, the muscle gene therapy

7:56 An unexpected arthritis result

11:18 Incentives, patents and vectors

16:21 Why Dog Years starts with dogs

19:43 Is aging a disease?

22:44 Who gets to live to 200

28:26 Tokens for trial participants

32:09 What the dog study showed

Connect with Tristan: linkedin.com/in/tristan-roberts-932b2923

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Onofre Tamargo (Co-founder & CEO, S4IoT, the team behind Sensigas) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

A French telecom engineer 18 years in Guadalajara, Onofre explains how his team built a Mexican-made sensor that sends your rooftop LP gas tank level to your phone.

We get into building every layer from hardware to app, selling a $120 device the industry said nobody would buy, turning plumbers into a sales channel, and why hardware takes time.

Chapters

0:00 From France to Guadalajara

2:51 Three decades of telecom

7:34 What IoT actually is

11:36 The rooftop gas tank problem

15:39 The $120 device nobody would buy

17:02 Gas, CO2 and trees

19:24 Building every layer in-house

22:25 Scaling through retail

26:50 The plumber program

35:37 Why hardware takes time

Connect with Onofre: linkedin.com/in/onofretamargo

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Bryan Fikes (Founder, Bonsai Marketing Company) joins Emiliano Gutiérrez on Future Roots: conversations with the people building what's next.

After nearly 30 years in digital marketing, Bryan explains why your story still matters when AI does the searching, and the "so what" test every business owner should pass.

We get into answering the questions people actually ask, running a whole agency's output with AI and one assistant, and the AI inspection report built for roofers and plumbers.

Chapters

0:00 30 years in digital marketing

2:32 Getting back in the ring with AI

5:33 SEO basics in the age of AI search

7:54 The "so what" test

10:36 Answer the questions people ask

12:17 Why he does it

18:00 Marketing as intelligent systems

22:21 One person, a whole agency

26:45 The AI inspection report

33:11 The next five years

Subscribe: youtube.com/@futurerootspodcast

Listen on Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/4p1mksXI62GbTbEg82fTFD

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