Zap's Wrap March 10th

hi friends,

This email will be brief…

Right now, a lot of my time is spent doing activities that don’t necessarily drive my ‘winning metrics.’

Aka- setting up processes at the startup house, recruiting sponsors, planning my anti-conference for VCs & founders, etc. All important work, but they don’t necessarily give me as much energy. The good news, I can see the light!!! I am almost through the sales and planning slog so I can get back to doing more of the good stuff- helping founders.

My winning metrics are capital raised for founders, people hired, and customers made and they are my favorite thing to spend time on!

I did get another 100k into a startup last week, putting 6.68M raised for Nashville startups.

I also invested into 3 things!

I invested as an LP in a micro VC fund and into another Nashville startup. Both are still in stealth…

I also invested in Present Tense on Wefunder. Think it’s a cool way to support a local business and I love their food!

Startup stuff that’s cool

• I had dinner with Dan, a 3x founder working on his 4th. Dan is most notable for being a cofounder of Influential, acquired by Publicis for 500M. He is now building AI for the same industry.

• I got to check out the Convoy Conference at Vandy and was super impressed by all of the founder and investor alums it pulled into town. Baxter is making it happen over there.

• Ben launched his product, Basalt Health, an AI agent to support medical assistants. Google even wrote about them. One to watch!

• I had my first office hours at startup house. These are really fun and I liked the topics people came with. Here’s my link for future office hours if you want to come.

Startup house

• We hosted Larry for a fireside chat. Larry might be one of the most ‘New York’ folks I’ve ever met and his career story lives up to it as well. He was a M&A lawyer in the 90s and he went on to operate media businesses, eventually doing a PE roll-up of several. His most recent stint is building Thnks, which is a platform to share gratitude and gifts with potential clients that works with huge companies.

• We now have 22 startups building with us! ❤️ 

• We have a semi-functioning courtyard!!! Spent all weekend powerwashing (my new fav activity) and setting up some shade/furniture. This coming weekend will be spent hanging lights, building a new fence, and finding more outdoor furniture/plants/decor.

Events

• This Thursday 3/13, I’m running a panel on different capital sources and how they work at the EC. Come hear from InvestTN, Wefunder, and GrowthX about how to work with them. Sign up here.

• Mark your calendar- I’m hosting a VC reverse pitch on Wednesday, April 23rd exclusively for founders. More details coming soon…

Personal updates

My friend Manuela hosted an International Women’s Day crafting event. I don’t typically craft, but I was so glad she got women together to hang.

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

to the moon,

zap