Seed Money

For years, there was a formula for raising money from VC's: perfect your pitch deck, polish your twelve slides, practice the elevator pitch, and hope someone in the limited VC circle gives you a shot.  But that formula worked in a different era, when venture capital was still a close knit club and the same 1,200 people decided which ideas got funded. Those limited rules don't apply anymore. And th...

Starting a beverage brand might be one of the hardest things you can do in CPG. The margins are thin, the logistics are brutal, and most investors will tell you not to even try. But Harvard Business School grad Vanessa Royle and her co-founder did it anyway. They built Tilden, a ready-to-drink, premium non-alcoholic cocktail from the ground up. It all started with kitchen experiments, then they ra...

CPG products are notoriously hard to launch, fund, and get onto shelves. That's why the failure rate is so high. But what if right now is actually the best time to do it? The barrier to entry has never been lower, the consumer has never been easier to reach, and the path from idea to traction has never been more open.  You can test, sell, and scale from your laptop without begging for retail space...

When most people dream about launching a consumer product, they imagine seeing it on store shelves—but few realize what it actually takes to get there. The (painful) truth is, success in CPG isn't about having a great idea. It's about surviving the numbers. Most founders underestimate how much money, time, and data it really takes to earn that spot in a category. And in this business, "bootstrappi...

If you're raising money, one of the first questions you'll run into is whether to DIY your pitch deck or hire someone to help. And trust me, it's not as straightforward as it sounds. I've wasted money on "professional" help that didn't move the needle, and I've also seen founders burn months trying to DIY when they should have just invested a little upfront. That's the real challenge. It's not jus...

When you're building a business that appeals to investors, you have to show that you can scale and stabilize at every level.  But here's the thing - scaling isn't clean or painless…it's not supposed to be. It almost always means that things will break. Systems will strain, processes will collapse, and the business will feel unstable.  This is inevitable. Growth will always stress the business.  As...

A lot of founders go into fundraising with the wrong idea about pitch decks. They think the deck has to include everything, every detail about the product, every market stat, every bio. But that's not what a pitch deck is for. The real job of your deck is simple: get you to the next step. It's not supposed to win the deal on the spot. It's supposed to grab attention, tell your story clearly, and m...

Podcasting and fundraising don't seem to have much in common until you've done both. On the surface, each looks shiny and glamorous. But behind the curtain, they're two of the hardest things to stick with, and that's why most people quit before they ever see results. What makes them work isn't polish or perfection, it's the grit to keep showing up, the systems that keep you from burning out, and t...

When you're getting ready to pitch investors, it's easy to get caught up in saying all the right things. You want to sound polished, credible, maybe even impressive. But in trying to be professional, you might be dialing down the one thing that matters most in the room: your passion. And I don't mean hype or over-the-top energy. I'm talking about real conviction, the kind that shows up in your voi...

When you're building a company, it's tempting to obsess over tactics. What to put in your deck, who to pitch next, which lever to pull. But that's not what separates the founders who break through from the ones who burn out. It's not tactics, it's tolerance. Your tolerance for risk, rejection, ambiguity, and delayed wins is the true edge in early-stage entrepreneurship. When fundraising is slower...

You're doing all you can to reach out to investors, showing up, pitching, and doing everything right, but you're still getting no's… or worse: crickets.  Like many businesses, fundraising slows down in summer.  Feeling in limbo is one of the worst feelings, and can be super discouraging. Investors are on vacation, inboxes are quiet, and momentum feels like it's evaporated.  Unfortunately, when inv...

If you're walking investors through your pitch deck slide-by-slide. Hiding the biggest risk in your business until the very end or treating meetings like job interviews, you're making the same mistakes that keep founders stuck in the endless cycle of "we'll pass for now."    Fundraising isn't just about your traction or your vision. It's about breaking the pattern-recognition bias VCs use to filte...

You're not "too busy" to fundraise, you just have too much on your plate.  If you keep telling yourself you'll start pitching investors "next month," but that month never comes, this episode is for you. Because let's be honest, fundraising isn't something you accidentally find time for. It's something you make time for.  And if your calendar is packed with tasks you shouldn't be doing, you'll neve...

There's nothing that crushes your confidence quite like staring at your bank balance and realizing you might not make your bills in a few months.  Your savings are dwindling, you've got a life to pay for, and there's still no funding in sight.  At the same time, you still have to step up, sell your vision, and pitch your startup like everything's fine.  You're not alone, so don't feel bad.  This h...

If you're in the early-stage and struggling to find the right investors and feeling lost in the startup maze, we totally get it, we've been there. It's no easy task to leave that comfortable job with big dreams but zero roadmap. When I first started my entrepreneurial journey, I had no clue how to network, who to talk to, or where to even begin building the connections that could make or break my...

Listen as Jay reveals the strategic approach he took that led to a successful pre-seed funding round in just 4 weeks! Jay Kriner, a Shark Tank alum turned tech entrepreneur, shares his methodical 9-month strategy for building investor relationships before ever making an ask. His approach centers on authentic networking, professional preparation, and timing—spending months connecting with VCs, ange...

Want to know the hard truth? Today we have Shaun Gold, a polymath and entrepreneur with extensive experience in pitch decks and fundraising (oh and bonus, he's hilarious). He shares killer insights on the common pitfalls you'll face when making pitch decks and pitching investors to raise seed money. With plenty of humor, he talks about the importance of clarity, concise storytelling, and understan...

In a competitive fundraising environment, traction is everything. Investors want to see proof that people care about what you're building, and few signals are stronger than an active, engaged community. When customers gather around your product, share ideas, support each other, and drive word-of-mouth growth, you're not just building a loyal user base. You're creating an ecosystem.  And that makes...

Patents, trademarks, trade secrets, and copyrights: if you're building a startup, these aren't "nice to haves," they're mission-critical. Locking down your intellectual property protects your ideas, your company, your product. And it makes your startup more attractive to investors. Whether it's your brand name, your technology, or your trade secrets, different types of IP protection help you avoid...

Many founders have a killer product, a passionate team, and traction, but they don't realize that investors are really betting on THEM. The truth is, your projections don't need to be perfect, your deck doesn't need to be perfect. But you need to do the things that most people won't do to stand out. You need to show that you are strategic, thoughtful, and aligned with your growth narrative. In thi...

Why do handshake deals in business go bad? I get it, it starts with good intentions, you're grinding to raise money, and when a friend or family member shows interest, it feels like a lifeline.  So you say yes. Sometimes that verbal commitment feels rock solid. And then a surprise cash injection seems too good to question. But this is exactly why handshake deals in business go bad : no clear expec...

If you ask seasoned investors what the common mistakes in seeking funding are, chances are you're making at least one of them — maybe without even realizing it. That mistake? Being so focused on raising capital that you forget to keep building traction in your business.  Yes, it's easy to do when you "feel" like you need the funding to get to the next step, but you cannot stop pushing ahead. It co...

Finding an investor and getting the funding you need is a huge win, BUT it's not the whole story. There can be red flags in investor deals that founders need to watch for and navigate. The truth is: not every investor is right for you, and not every deal will favor you. Some investors might do more harm than good and even screw you over in the end. Some deals come with hidden strings, controlling...

As much as I avoid real life drama with all my might, I've been guilty of falling into some of these White Lotus character traps in business. Yes it's a show about people who are conflicted and struggle through their emotions and relationships (among other many things), but it actually has some solid lessons that can be valuable in the startup/fundraising process. From Belinda desperately holding...

On every Shark Tank episode, one of the most intense moments is when the founder and the investors start talking valuation—how much the company's worth and how much equity the founder's willing to give up. Figuring out how much equity you should give up in a seed round is a huge decision, and with it comes some serious consequences. No wonder it's nerve-wracking, especially if you're facing it for...