Learning Life with Jon Tota

This week Jon sits down with Will Read, CEO and founder of CannaPlanners, a marketing agency that helps cannabis retailers with their branding, identity, and digital presence. After graduating college, Will moved to Burlington with his band as a musician before moving down to New York City to work for sales at Apple. As many Vermonters will understand, he felt the Green Mountain State calling him...

This week Jon sits down with Cairn Cross, co-founder of FreshTracks Capital in Shelburne VT.  FreshTracks is a venture capital and private equity firm focused on investments in Vermont-based growth companies. Cross sits on the board of multiple Vermont companies including Native Energy, Faraday, and Vermont Teddy Bear, as well as Mamava (previously on Learning Life,) and a board observer for Think...

This week we're excited to have Lindsay DesLauriers, the co-owner and President of Bolton Valley Resort. A mountain legacy, Lindsay's father Ralph founded Bolton Valley back in 1966 and developed it into an iconic indie ski mountain in the Northeast. In 1997, her family had to sell the resort, but recently bought it back in 2017 with a group of local investors to restore and modernize Bolton Valle...

Our guest this week is Kevin Pellon, the founder and CEO of raisedVT, live in our studio! Listen in as Kevin Pellon explains what it means to him to be raisedVT and what it means to be a proud Vermonter, even if you weren't born in the Green Mountain State. This retail clothing brand focuses on what makes Vermont, Vermont, with unique imagery from ski to farm culture, and from the Champlain valley...

Our guest this week is Byron Batres, a wealth management advisor and financial planner in the Burlington area who is the founder and CEO of EZ-Probate. After realizing the trials and tribulations of dealing with the court system for the probate process of wills and estates for families, he set out to build a turbo-tax like system to avoid the hassle during an already emotional time. Now EZ-Probate...

Happy New Year! This week, Learning Life is talking innovation for moms with Mamava co-founder Sascha Mayer. A certified B corp, Mamava was founded in 2013 by Mayer and Christine Dodson, now COO. Mamava has over 2000 lactation pods across the country, providing mothers privacy and security while breastfeeding or pumping, as well as digital resources, community, and advocacy. Sascha began her caree...

This week Jon gets down with Jason Levinthal, who founded LINE in his parents' garage back in 1995 and is known for creating some of the first twin tip skis. After selling LINE to K2 sports, Jason was longing to get back into the industry, with the lessons he learned about scaling and the new prospects of online selling. In 2013, he founded J Skis with a direct-to-consumer business model with limi...

This week Jon sits down with Cyrus Schenck, CEO of Renoun and co-founder of Mission V Sports. If you're a skier or snowboarder in Vermont, you've surely seen Renoun skis all over your favorite mountain, but many people don't really know what makes these skis so special. A graduate of Champlain Valley Union High School, Cyrus went on to learn about material sciences in college. There, he got the id...

This week Jon sits down with Vermont’s favorite weatherman, Tom Messner. After 31 years at NBC5 serving Northern New York and Vermont as Chief Meteorologist, Tom is retiring from our televisions and moving on to a new chapter as a media consultant, early stage investor and advocate for the Vermont entrepreneurial community. Messner may be leaving TV, but he’s invested right here in Burlington. Bet...

This week Jon sits down with Ryan Nakleh, founder and CEO of Local Maverick, a sales and marketing platform that makes it easier to discover, shop, and support local businesses. Listen to the story as Ryan got a local business off the ground during the pandemic, and how he aims to bring the Amazon buying experience to communities and help them buy local. Learn more at https://www.localmaverickus.c...

This week Jon sits down with Sophia Rabe, founder and CEO of Olive and Milo Social. Olive and Milo is a digital marketing agency that focuses on social media, offering services such as consulting, strategy, management, and measurement. Rabe grew up in the Mad River Valley and is a Champlain College alumni, choosing to set up her business right here in Burlington. Rabe chose Vermont over big city l...

This week Jon sits down with Barry Finette, founder of ThinkMD. ThinkMD is an innovative healthcare and technology company, seeking solutions to expand quality healthcare coverage across the globe. Barry is also a professor in pediatrics, microbiology, and molecular genetics at the University of Vermont. ThinkMD aims to put physician-based decision logic into the hands of anyone, so areas underser...

This week we have a UVM student entrepreneur with a firey new idea - all natural fire starters that are sustainably sourced and safe for the environment. Meet Adam Liszewski, CEO and founder of Stokes Firestarters.   After making fire starters as holiday gifts as a child with egg cartons and dryer lint, Adam has moved on to production models using food-grade paraffin and recycled sawdust from East...

This week we are excited to have Mieko Ozeki and Bethany Andrews-Nichols, the co-founders of Vermont Womenprenuers, an organization driving the mission of helping women entrepreneurs build their businesses in the Green Mountain State. In addition to helping other women start up their businesses, the duo are small business owners of their own. Mieko owns and runs Radiance Studios, a website, digita...

This week we have Scott Finn, President and CEO of VPR and Vermont PBS. With the recent merger of Vermont Public Radio and Vermont PBS, Scott is now leading the green mountain state’s largest media organization with a reach of over a million people each month and the goal of expanding to a broader and more diverse audience. Modern public media is more than just TV and Radio. Scott is looking to de...

This week we have Matt Murray, founder and CEO of Widewail. A Vermont native and Navy veteran, Matt has worked through numerous tech and automotive companies before starting his company to help businesses with their online reputation. Widewail provides a suite of management tools for online product and service reviews, helping businesses invite their customers to review and engage with reviewers....

This week’s entrepreneur story goes back more than 100 years! We are excited to have Sarah Morris, a fifth generation host and concierge at Basin Harbor, the historic 700-acre resort in Vergennes, Vermont. Basin Harbor began as a working farm back in the 1800s, and in the 1920s, Sarah’s great-grandfather was inspired by the tourism boom in Miami and began to build out cottages on the beautiful Lak...

This week we have Peter Miller, owner of Mini Golf on the Go and a student at the Stiller School of Business at Champlain College. Peter is another great Vermont entrepreneur story with a miniature twist - his company designs and rents mini golf courses at any event, indoor and outdoor, complete with clubs and balls. Peter puts his Vermont-grown woodworking skills to the test building each hole of...

This week we have Ryan McDevitt, co-founder and CEO of Benchmark Space Systems. Based right here in Burlington at HULA Lakeside, Ryan is looking to go from Vermont to space with micro-satellites that will change space systems as we know it. After working at Pratt and Whitney as a jet engineer, Ryan returned to Vermont with his wife and he began working on propulsion systems at UVM. With a spark gr...

This week we have Dawn and Sarah Lancaster, mother and daughter co-founders of Pure Energy Apothecary, focused on healthy and accessible skincare and home fragrance products. A graduate of Champlain College, Dawn is acting CEO and owner, while Sarah is a current student at Champlain and a fellow at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, headed up by our previous guest Dr. Kylie King. Afte...

This week we have Benny Boas, CEO of Burlington Code Academy and Upright Education. Benny began teaching coding and software development with online courses and bootcamps through BCA right here in Vermont. Now, he's going national. Upright Education partners with colleges and universities to prepare adults for software-based work with rapid re-skilling courses, teaching a wide range of skills from...

This week we are excited to have Dr. Kylie King, Academic Director of the Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship and Assistant Professor of entrepreneurship and analytics at Champlain College. Jon and Kylie sit down to discuss the connection between Champlain College and the Burlington community, fostering entrepreneurship in students and young adults, and looking ahead to Champlain in 2030....

"That is a big rallying cry for us–– how do we engage more entities, businesses, and people in seeing how, and feeling clear about how they can give to the environment broadly defined to drive positive change." This week we have Kate Williams, CEO of 1% for the Planet. 1% for the Planet is a global network of businesses, individuals and nonprofit organizations tackling our planet's most pressing e...

This week we have Vermont entrepreneurial success story, Rich Tarrant. Tarrant founded what would become IDX Systems Corporation back in 1969, later acquired by GE Healthcare. His latest company is Marathon Health, based right off the Winooski Circle. Tarrant sits down with Jon to discuss his basketball career at St. Mikes, and how it led to being a pioneer in healthcare technology. Tarrant also t...

This week we have Vermont serial entrepreneur Sas Stewart. You may know Sas as the co-founder of Stonecutter Spirits and creator of the sought-after popup Adventure Dinner events. Sas sits down with Jon to discuss making things special - from food and drink to experiences for customers and employees alike. Sas has been running Adventure Dinners since 2014, providing a bespoke experience of locally...