Reformers

For our eleventh (and 2022 season debut) episode of Reformers: The gritty details behind the world’s greatest bootstrap successes, we are excited to share our interview with Chris Meade, the Founder & CMO at CROSSNET, a new sport that combines the best elements of four square and volleyball. Chris founded CROSSNET with his brother in 2017 and has built it into a rapidly-growing sport with tens of millions in revenue, all while raising no outside capital. In this interview, Chris shares his incredible journey including key insights and lessons learned that can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

For our tenth (and 2021 season finale) episode of Reformers: The gritty details behind the world’s greatest bootstrap successes, we are excited to share our interview with Jonathan Strauss, the Founder & CEO at Create Music Group, a media and technology company that helps creators and artists better analyze, optimize, and discover audiences for their content. Jonathan was a serial entrepreneur at a young age who, after losing his entire net worth in an earlier venture, eventually went on to found Create Music Group in 2015. Since its founding, CMG has grown from a singular product that helps artists get paid on YouTube into a suite of products (including a variety of financing options for artists, as well as one of the largest TikTok accounts in the world: flighthouse) that has led to CMG becoming the second-fastest growing company in the country, all while raising minimal outside capital. In this interview, Jonathan shares his incredible journey including key insights and lessons learned that can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Chris Zarou is the Founder & CEO at Visionary Music Group, a music management company with clients including Logic, Jon Bellion, Jeremy Zucker, and Quinn XCII. Chris is a former Division 1 soccer player turned entrepreneur who founded Visionary after being rejected by every music internship and job he applied to. Since its founding, Visionary has grown from being solely an independent music manager into a record label that boasts a 50/50 partnership with Sony Music, all while being completely bootstrapped. In this interview, Chris shares his key insights and lessons learned that can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Andy Prochazka is the Founder & COO at Article, which is the leading e-commerce brand for beautiful modern furniture. Andy is an engineer by background and a serial entrepreneur who has launched a handful of companies during his career, the most recent being Article in 2011. Since its founding, Article has grown from four co-founders into a global organization consisting of more than 900 employees and nine-figures in revenue, all while being majority self-funded by the founders. In this interview, Andy shares his key insights and lessons learned that can be implemented in your own business. 

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Michael Martocci is the Founder & CEO at SwagUp, the leading provider of swag packs to startups, corporations, investment firms, and universities. For as long as Michael can remember he’s been infatuated with entrepreneurship, having started numerous businesses (including one with former NFL punter Steve Weatherford) before ultimately launching SwagUp in 2017. In just four years since its founding, SwagUp has grown into an organization consisting of over 150 employees and eight-figures in revenue, all without raising any outside equity capital. In this interview, Michael shares his key insights and lessons learned -- on topics ranging from Cash Conversion Cycle to shifting founder responsibilities over time -- that can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Alex Klokus is the Founder and Chairman of Gravity Blanket, which created the exploding weighted blankets category. Alex launched Gravity in 2017 as a spinout of Futurism, a media business he founded in 2015 that focused on breakthrough science and technology. Gravity was a hit out of the gate and raised $4.7M on Kickstarter, making it one of the most successful crowdfunding campaigns of all time. After four years of operating Gravity without raising any outside equity, Alex and team decided to sell the business to Win Brands Group, a new holding company of leading e-commerce brands. During this interview, Alex shared his key insights and lessons learned, which can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Blaine Vess is the Founder and Former CEO at Student Brands, an education technology company that operates multiple direct-to-student businesses. Blaine Vess founded Student Brands in his freshman dorm room in 1999. After slow and steady growth for the first 5 years, Student Brands hit an inflection point that saw tremendous user and revenue growth, much of which was due to a business model pivot and an unconventional M&A strategy that Blaine executed. By 2017, after 18 years of operating the business without raising any outside funding, Blaine decided to sell Student Brands to Barnes & Noble Education for $58.5M. Below are some of Blaine’s key insights and lessons learned that he shared during the interview, which can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Laurie Ann Goldman is the Former CEO at Spanx, the international powerhouse famous for its leggings, denim, and shapewear. After a decade as a Marketing executive at The Coca Cola Company, Laurie Ann joined Spanx as CEO in 2002 when it was just 5 employees. After taking the helm, Laurie Ann spent 12 years as CEO, scaling the business domestically and internationally to hundreds of millions in revenue without raising any outside capital. After a long and successful run as CEO at Spanx, Laurie Ann then joined Avon as CEO, implementing a successful turnaround that culminated in a successful acquisition. Laurie Ann currently serves on the board of directors for Joe & The Juice, ClubCorp, and GUESS (among others). In this interview, Laurie Ann shares key insights and lessons learned that can be implemented in your own business.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Michael Segal is the Founder & CEO at Skylight, a digital picture frame that allows users to effortlessly upload photos for display. After a failed startup, multiple stints at a top-tier VC firm, and an introspective two years at Harvard Business School, Michael launched Skylight as a side hustle, later transitioning to full-time and scaling the business to tens of millions in revenue without raising any venture capital. Below are some of Michael’s key insights and lessons learned that he shared during the interview, which can be implemented in your own business. 

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.

Doug Bouton is the former President & COO at Halo Top (and current CEO of Halo Top International). Halo Top invented the better-for-you ice cream category (and in doing so, reinvented ice cream altogether) by offering a delicious, low-calorie alternative. The company scaled to $100M+ in revenue before being acquired by Wells Enterprises in 2019, all without raising any institutional capital (the company simply raised a small friends & family round). 

In this episode of Reformers, Doug shares some of the topics covered include why product is king, methods for optimizing working capital cycles, and his belief that experience is overrated.

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Reformers host Andrew Oved is the Founder & General Partner at Reformation Partners, a pioneer in early growth equity. The firm invests in the best capital efficient enterprise and consumer companies at their point of breakout and supports their growth through profitability, future financing rounds, and / or exit.