This episode takes me back to the early days of Neat Apparel, when Claudio and I were just getting started.

For those who don’t know, Claudio is my business partner on Neat - our sweat-proof Shopify brand and he has one of the most fascinating backgrounds of anyone I’ve ever worked with.

He graduated from Stanford at 20. Climbed to the top of Wall Street. Then pivoted into entrepreneurship—first with a soccer brand, and now with me in performance apparel. In this conversation, we talked through the moment we decided to go all in on Neat.

We broke down the actual negotiations that brought us together, why we decided to buy IP before launching, and how we thought about scaling the brand through content, storytelling, and founder alignment. Looking back, it’s wild to see how much of that conversation still shapes how we run Neat today.

📋 What we cover:

• The power of complementary business partnerships
• How we negotiated (even when it was awkward)
• Why we bought IP before building the brand
• Why we decided to skip Amazon and retail—for now
• Claudio’s leap from Wall Street to founder life
• The “goalie mindset” he brings to our business
• How we planned to scale Neat through storytelling and content

👉 If you’ve ever thought about taking on a co-founder, starting a brand from scratch, or buying IP—this episode gives you the raw behind-the-scenes of how it really comes together.

Resources:

• Neat Apparel
• Storelli
• GrowthHit
• Jim Huffman website
• How We're Growing Neat (Build in Public)

Additional episodes you might enjoy:

• Startup Ideas by Paul Graham (#45)
• Nathan Barry: How to Bootstrap a Company to $30M in a Crowded Market (#41)
• How I Met My Biz Partner and Less Learned Hitting $2M ARR (#44)
• Ryan Hamilton on his Netflix special, touring with Jerry Seinfeld, & how to write a joke (#10)
• How We're Validating Startup Ideas (#51)