Consumer VC

Our guest today is Soraya Darabi , General Partner at Trail Mix Ventures where she focuses on the future of living well. Previously, she worked at the New York Times, co-founded Foodspotting (acq. by OpenTable) and Zady. Some of her investments include Classtag, The Wing, and Alleyoop. Lots of insights on this episode as Soraya shares her amazing experiences both as a founder and investor, so with...

Thank you Sumeet Shah for the introduction to today's guest, Meera Clark , Senior Associate at Obvious Ventures. Obvious Ventures invests in startups that combine profit and purpose for a better world. Some of their investments include Beyond Meat, Carezone, Goodeggs and Medium. I highly recommend following Meera on twitter @itsmeeraclark . You can also follow your host, Mike, on Twitter @mike...

I would like to thank Adelle Archer for introducing me to today's guest, Eric Paley , who is one of the Managing Partners at Founder Collective . Founder Collective's mission is to be the most aligned VC for founders at seed. Eric is a pretty legendary seed stage investor, some of his investments include Uber, CoverWallet, Seat Geek, Whoop, Thred Up and so many other incredible companies....

*Please note Office Hour episodes are not edited and the sound quality will not be as good as other episodes as they are recorded on one track.* Office Hours are opportunities for listeners to ask past guests questions themselves. We will be releasing the recorded versions each Saturday. This Office Hour with Jason Shuman was recorded live on June 9th. Jason Shuman  is a Principal at  Primary Vent...

Our guest today is Alex French, founder and CEO of Bizzy Coffee , the #1 seller of cold brew coffee on Amazon. We discuss Alex's initial approach to entrepreneurship, how they've been able to maintain #1 Best Seller on Amazon, how he approached fundraising and was able to raise, and COVID's effects on Bizzy. Without further ado, here's Alex A couple books that inspired Alex are The...

Thank you Alex Pattis for the introduction to today's guest Pippa Lamb who is a partner at Sweet Capital . Sweet Capital in an early stage investment fund built by the founders of King.com (Candy Crush), following their sale to Activision Blizzard in 2015. Pippa focuses on early stage consumer technology investments ranging from software and next generation social communities to fintech. This...

This is a compilation episode about fundraising from the founders perspective. Some of their tactics, strategies when evaluating investors and how they reached out to investors. The founders featured are Kate Boyle , who is the founder of Banjo Robinson, Nadine Habayeb from Bohana, Adelle Archer from Eterneva, George Milton from Yellowbird Sauce, an amazing hot sauce company, and Jessica Rolph and...

I'd like to thank Adelle Archer for introducing me to today's guest Dan Graham , one of the co-founders and General partners of Springdale Ventures . Some of their investments include Eterneva, Literati, and Beatbox beverages. Previously, Dan co-founded BuildASign.com in 2005 and grew it to an over $100 million dollar CPG, Ecommerce business that was purchased by Cimpress (VistaPrint) in 2...

Hello and welcome to The Consumer VC. I am your host Mike Gelb and on this show we talk about the world of venture capital and consumer facing startups. Thank you very much Natalie Dillon for the intro to today's guests, Jessica Rolph and Rod Morris , the co-founders of Lovevery , Staged-based play essentials designed by experts, built for babies and toddlers up to age 3. Previously, Jessica c...

I'd like to thank Fernando Gentil for introducing me to today's guest, George Milton , co-founder and CEO of Yellowbird Sauce , Spicy condiments crafted to take you on a fiery–fresh food adventure. This is a conversation all about things hot sauce, which I really enjoyed. George takes us through his journey from playing music gigs to becoming known as the hot sauce guy in Austin Texas and...

I'd like to thank Natalie Dillon for introducing me to today's guest Tyler Handley , co-founder and CEO of Inkbox , the tattoos for now. These are temporary tattoos that last for 1-2 weeks and fade as your skin naturally regenerates. We talk about the state of the tattoo market - both temporary and permanent, opportunity he saw at the early stages, how he was able to fundraise and scale. I...

We have a few Office Hours / AMAs coming up -> https://theconsumervc.com/events/ Kanyi Maqubela is a Managing Partner at Kindred Ventures . Kindred Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital fund, whose mission is to back visionary and dedicated founders who want to solve the most important problems and vastly improve people’s lives around the world. Some of their investments include Uber, Poshma...

Our guest today is Catharine Dockery founder of Vice Ventures. Vice Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital fund conquering stigmas and striving towards superior returns by investing in good companies operating in "bad" industries. Investments include early stage startups from non-traditional verticals including, cannabis, alcohol, CBD, e-sports, addiction recovery, sextech, and others. S...

This is my first compilation episode. I typically ask every guest what is one piece of advice he/she may have for B2C founders? I've pulled together a few that hopefully can be helpful to folks that are founders or are looking to found. Below are the investors featured and the minute marks on the episode when they share their thoughts if you'd like to jump around. Kiva Dickinson - 1:45 Gau...

Our guest today is Nadine Habayeb , CoFounder & CEO Bohana . Bohana is a popped water lily seed snack brand that believes in a free-spirited snacking. Thank you Madeline Keulen for the introduction! You can follow Nadine on Twitter @Nadinodxb . You can also follow your host, Mike, on Twitter @mikegelb . You can also follow for episode announcements @consumervc . For all episodes, please visit...

Our guest today is Daniel Gulati . Daniel has spent the last 6 years at Comcast Ventures , a financially-focused venture capital firm with a 20 year history investing in consumer, enterprise, and frontier technology companies. He joined as Entrepreneur in Residence, and worked his way up the ranks to Principal, Partner and Managing Director at the firm. His seed stage portfolio includes D2C compan...

Thank you again Courtney Nelson for introducing me to our guest today, Byron Ling . Byron is a partner at Canaan . Canaan is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in visionaries with transformative ideas. Byron invests in consumer companies that are reinventing the way we shop, entertain and educate ourselves. Some of his investments include Roman, Papa, and Bravo Sierra. He was previou...

Our guest today is Claire Fauquier a Principal at Highland Capital Partners . Highland Capital Partners is one of the oldest venture capital funds that invests primarily at Series A and focuses on the early growth stage. Some of their investments include Harry's, Rent the Runway, and Clearbanc. In this episode we explore some of the differences and milestones companies typically have at the se...

Anna Whiteman , Vice President at Coefficient Capital . Coefficient Capital is a new venture capital fund that leads early growth investments in fast-moving consumer goods, typically investing in Series A and B rounds. So far they've invested in Just Spices, NomNom, Hydrant and Personal Care. Anna also founded Rad Ladies, a private network of female founders. Previously Anna worked at VMG on i...

Adelle Archer is the founder of Eterneva , which celebrates remarkable lives by making diamonds from Ashes. Eterneva was featured on Shark Tank , in which Mark Cuban joined other incredible angels and VCs as an investor. This episode focuses in the end of life space. You can follow Adelle on Twitter @adellearcher . You can also follow your host, Mike, on Twitter @mikegelb and for episode annouceme...

Sasha Strauss is the founder and Managing Partner of Innovation Protocol, a full-service strategic brand consulting and design firm based in Los Angeles, with a presence in San Francisco and New York. Some of his clients include Google, Doordash, Nestle, Paypal, and Concur Endurance Group. Sasha also teaches Brand Strategy to MBAs at UCLA, USC and UC Irvine. Highly recommend Sasha's TED Talk i...

Michael Duda is the Founder and one of the Managing Partners at Bullish . Bullish is a creative agency and a pre-seed fund, investing in early stage consumer companies. Some of their investments include Warby Parker, Peloton, Casper and Birchbox. Prior to founding Bullish, Mike spent 13 years at Deutsch Inc., where he became the youngest Partner in the company’s 35-year history overseeing business...

Joe Tonnos is a Principal at Mistral Equity Partners and a Co-Founder of Ketch Ventures . He invests across the consumer spectrum from seed/pre-series investments at Ketch to growth equity, private equity buyouts and even some public market investments at Mistral Equity Partners. Joe is also a Venture Partner at Natureza – a newly formed consumer VC focused on Series A investments. Some of his inv...

Arie Abecassis , is the founder and partner of ICONYC Labs and was the chairman of the board at SeatGeek . ICONYC labs is a business and funding acceleration platform customized for early-stage Israeli tech startups looking to accelerate growth and cut time to market. SeatGeek is the largest internet event ticket search engine. Arie also is a venture partner / mentor at DreamIt Ventures and has ov...

Kate McAndrew (Bolt) - Distributed Teams, Fundraising Outside the Major Hubs, and Impact of COVID