What I Know

Jesslyn Rollins’s dad created a product in secret. She brought it to the masses. What would it take for him to let her run the company? Christine Lagorio-Chafkin speaks to the CEO of the electrolyte beverage company, Biolyte, that saw a remarkable three-year growth rate of 1,052 percent. The first in our season series exploring the stories behind fascinating companies that made the 2022 Inc. 5000...

In this flashback episode, Christine Lagorio-Chafkin talks with Rosie Mattio, founder and CEO of Mattio Communications, about saying yes and taking a risk on a burgeoning industry. (Original Air Date: Sept 13, 2021)

Being chief executive doesn’t mean doing everything–or, necessarily, being good at every little thing your company does. In “What I Don’t Know,” What I Know host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin asks founders to explain a skill or task they just aren’t good at. Maybe it’s the first thing they delegated once they hired staff–or something they would like to get off their plate. On this week’s bonus episode...

Shivani Siroya had worked in microfinance around the world for major banks–and saw a lot of structural issues with lending to unbanked or non-traditional entrepreneurs in small doses. Before launching her own company to fix those, she went back to school–and also worked in Kenya, for the UN Population Fund. It was there she began lending her own money to small-business owners–and learned firsthand...

Being chief executive doesn’t mean doing everything–or, necessarily, being good at every little thing your company does. In “What I Don’t Know,” What I Know host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin asks founders to explain a skill or task they just aren’t good at. Maybe it’s the first thing they delegated once they hired staff–or something they would like to get off their plate. On this week’s bonus episode...

The past few years have been catastrophic for many coworking spaces. WeWork’s dramatic crash was the most well known–but spaces created by and for women, too, hit walls due to pandemic lockdowns and leadership crises. But in Minneapolis, there was a holdout. It’s called The Coven, and it is a coworking space with virtual and in-person memberships, designed to be inclusive and welcoming to all type...

When Matthew Herman quit his job in L.A.’s fashion industry to work full time on his brand, Boy Smells, he’d been pouring wax and formulating fragrances for candles in the evenings in his kitchen for more than a year. Since growing his brand into retail and direct-to-consumer sales, he’s maintained his creative vision–and still is the brand’s creative director. He explains to host Christine Lagori...

It started as a side-hustle, pouring wax for candles at his dining-room table in the evenings. But what Matthew Herman began selling was soon attracting the attention of major fragrance houses…and customers around the world. In building his brand, Herman burned through his savings in 18 months…and that was before the pandemic hit. But during it, direct-to-consumer sales took off. But so much inter...

Stu Landesberg, The co-founder and CEO of Grove Collaborative, describes why he has gratitude for his job and puts positive energy into everything that he does.

Since he was a grade-schooler, Stu Landesberg dreamed–as odd as it sounds–of starting a sustainable home-products company. When he founded it, in 2012, he called it ePantry, and it didn’t exactly soar. Investors were lukewarm–and customers hard to come by. But with a rebrand and reshaped strategy in 2016, Grove Collaborative started finding lots of eco-minded consumers online and over social media...

The founder and CEO of Madison Reed, Amy Errett, started her career in finance, and before long, was managing large teams through sizeable changes. She’s become known as a leader who creates, and navigates, organizational change. Her secret isn’t in strategy–it’s in leading with love, and with an open heart. She explains to host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin how building a fast-growing company is like...

Amy Errett might be a natural leader, and an expert team-builder–but she wasn’t always a founder. She spent her early career in banking and investment companies, before turning to venture capital. But once she was at the table with startup founders, making decisions on who deserved funding infusions…she realized she wanted to be not in her seat…but rather, the CEO’s seat. She founded Madison Reed...

The co-founder and chief executive of Strava explains how storytelling is wrapped up in being able to take risks. He first ventured into the unknown in 1995, wanting to build a community of athletes. He didn’t know how that story would end–and it certainly wasn’t immediately successful. His company has grown to 100 million athletes in 200 countries–and he tells host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin that...

When Michael Horvath, the co-founder and CEO of Strava, meets with employees, he doesn’t just start saying what he’s thinking. Instead, the first thing out of his mouth is: “what’s on your mind?” His company, Strava, is an app that serves 100 million athletes, to help motivate their movement, connect them with a community, and improve their safety. And these days, it’s a company of more than 400 p...

The co-founder and chief executive of Colossal Bioscience is setting out to de-extinct the 4,000-years-extinct woolly mammoth. As his company grows fast, he has a goal to be totally transparent about the company’s audacious moon-shot mission–one that a lot of people think is impossible. To that challenge, he brings his skills as a diligent student, and a marketer, who can translate complex systems...

By the time he teamed up with Harvard geneticist George Church to found Colossal Biosciences, Ben Lamm had founded, built, and sold five companies. This one would be the most audacious yet: Its goal is to create disruptive conservation technologies, including, to de-extinct the woolly mammoth. Yes, it is actively working to edit elephant genes to create a cold-hearty herbivore to help decelerate m...

The co-founder and chief executive of Full Circle Brands manages three sustainability-minded international brands out of New York City. He tells host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin how he boost productivity by keeping his meetings short, and cramming them all into one day. Plus: When his team is in the office, he plays jazz–and orders comfort food. 

He and his co-founder dreamed up their company over an unconventional Thanksgiving dinner in Shanghai. In 2009, they launched Full Circle, a line of sustainable household goods–and set out to change consumer perception about “eco” products. Today, they run three brands, including Full Circle, For Good, a line of household disposables, like compostable bags, and Soma, a line of filtration, pitchers...

If there was a super-simple way to tweak the whole way you think about an experience…would you do it? Serial entrepreneur Toni Ko, the woman behind NYX Cosmetics, Perverse Sunglasses, and, most recently, Bespoke Beauty Brands, explains to host Christine Lagorio-Chafkin how she changes her wording to change her perspective.

Her family emigrated from Korea when she was 13 years old, and serial entrepreneur Toni Ko has since founded three different–each totally fascinating–companies. Her first, NYX Cosmetics, made $4 million in its first year, and, within a decade, was in beauty aisles of Target nationwide. But with growth, came some sacrifices–and, within years, she sold it to L’Oreal for a reported $500 million. A no...

Trinity Mouzon Wofford founded superfood company Golde in 2017, and has grown it into a national brand that sells its drink mixes and face-mask blends direct-to-consumer and in national retailers like Target. She bootstrapped the business for years, doing everything from formulation to sales herself. One skill that helped her along the way was her ability to connect with others–to see things from...

There’s Silicon Valley’s playbook…and then there’s Trinity Mouzon Wofford’s radical bootstrapping. The founder of Golde, the maker of superfood powders that can be blended to make lattes or facemasks, and which is sold at Target and Goop, as well as direct-to-consumer. Trinity explains how she built her company herself, mixing turmeric lattes in her kitchen, and pounding the pavement of New York C...

Delane Parnell’s $400 million startup, PlayVS, builds a platform on which high school students can compete against one another in team-based video games, also known as esports. Host and “Ahead of the Game” author Kevin Ryan talks with Parnell about his journey from a violence-ridden neighborhood on Detroit’s west side to building one of the most important companies in the rapidly growing gaming in...

Payal Kadakia, the founder of Classpass, which was valued at $1 billion before its acquisition by Mindbody in 2021, wasn’t always great at keeping track of her priorities. Sure, she had a calendar, and a schedule–but sometimes the big-picture goals would get pushed aside. She came up with a 20-minute-a-week way to stay focused–by setting her priorities for the week. And, as a bonus, she finds the...

Growing up in New Jersey, Payal Kadakia found a passion for Indian dance. As an adult living in New York City, she founded her own dance troupe, Sa Dance. But when it came to finding fitness classes, she was at a loss. She created a boutique-class-search-engine–which went through many, many, iterations, before becoming the $1 billion company ClassPass. Christine Lagorio-Chafkin speaks with Payal a...