Zap's Wrap August 11th

hi friends,

I’m in Costa Rica this week learning how to surf and ending up with lots of rash burn.

Unfortunately, I only have photos of me falling off of a surfboard…so here’s a photo of the plane me and Brianna took to where we’re staying:

A big win from last week: Adam is joining Joey @ Longview as a technical partner.

One of the best things happening at The Lighthouse right now is how builder energy attracts other builders. When that happens, magic follows, and sometimes those builders team up.

I’ve had a lot of success helping startups with < 10 people find the right folks to join them. Those wins are some of my favorites, because I know just how game-changing it can be when a startup finds the right technical partner, cofounder, or early team member!

Moments like these make me feel like I’m on the right track with what we are building here. Some other great pairings from the last year:

• Daniel Steele & Seth Steele (no they are not related lol)
• Joe & Julie
• Mike & cofounder
• Ross & cofounder
•. Jimmy & Jared Burke

Startup stuff that’s cool

• I met Jon, who previously scaled the Daily Wire, one of the most successful direct-to-consumer media companies, to over 200M in revenue as COO and then President. He’s now decided to take a swing at building a tech startup that’s helping the manufacturing & construction industries optimize productivity. His team launches their first pilots today and next week!

• I caught up with Chris at Heard Music, who is building the moneyball for music. What started as an agency has now turned to a technology that helps labels run marketing campaigns for songs that 2.4x revenue. Scaling in music tech is really tough, but Chris already works with most of the recognizable labels. This is one that I am watching closely!

• I met Shaun, who has been building restaurant tech for over a decade as the CEO of Fresh Technologies. He’s now moved into a board role and thinking about what’s next and how to help startups.

• I met Emin, who has spent his entire career building and selling tech to the capital markets space. Most recently he sold FX HedgePool.

• I met Matt, who just left his role as Head of Product at Amazon to build vertical saas for dentist offices! He raised a bit of early capital and is working on building his MVP now.

• Once again, I am always looking for engineers, salespeople, revops, etc who want to join early stage startups! HMU.

• I don’t have any photos, but it was a busy week. We hosted a unit economics workshop with Tim Connors, a startup run club, a poker AND craps night with Lighthouse members, and I spoke on a panel about startup valuations at the EC.

Events

• Thursday, August 14th @ 9am- Scaling Your Team & the Legal Considerations to Protect Your Company

  • Topics will focus on bringing on cofounders, advisor agreements, the difference between an independent contractor and an employee, etc.

• Wednesday, August 20th @ 6:30am- Startup Run Club

3686 is coming!!! This is TN’s biggest startup event. Did you get your ticket yet?! Some stuff I’m hosting during it:

• Monday, September 8th @ 8:30pm- BURNT with 11 Tribes

  • 3686 is a MUST attend event for folks inside and outside of Nashville interested in startups! I’m hosting a founder late night hang with Kristina, GP at 11 Tribes in Chicago.

• Tuesday, September 9th @ 6:30pm- VC Dinner (invite-only)

  • HMU if you’ll be in town and want to join!

• Wednesday, September 10th @ 9:30am- Founders, Funders, & Financiers Breakfast @ the Lighthouse

Hackathon

Are you an aspiring founder or early team member who reads my newsletter???

You should 100% come to a hackathon so you can experience startup-life in 1 weekend. Also, there’s a chance you could win CASH or mentorship from VCs or other startup founders. THIS IS YOUR SIGN TO JUST DO IT.

Lightspeed is a 48-hour sprint where builders turn real startup and investor challenges into working MVPs- no fluff, just launch. Challenges come from active startups and VCs, so what you build could actually go to market.

🏆 $2,500 Judges’ Pick

🏆 $2,500 Audience Favorite

🔥 Mentorship prizes from challenge sponsors like Tim Connors, GP of PivotNorth, Mike Rosengarten, GP of 1121vc, and others.

Sign up here! Or DM me if you want to find a way to get involved.

Personal

I caught up with Dan, founder of Listening Post and one of my portfolio companies. He has booked over 1M in revenue in his first few months!

He took me to Verna, a brand new cafe 2 blocks from the Lighthouse. This place was awesome and I will be hanging out here way more!

Ask me questions about Nashville startups through my AI-self here.

Or, come visit me at in-person office hours weekly on Thursdays.

to the moon,

zap