Zap's Wrap November 11th

hi friends,

Last week was super busy. This email is going to be short and sweet because I spent a lot of time meeting with investors, potential talent, and working toward 2 big projects I hope to announce really soon (:

Startup stuff that’s cool:

• I caught up with Sammy, founder of Morrow. They just signed an LOI for a 6-figure contract with a PE firm to work with one of their portfolio companies (and hopefully eventually all of them!). This will put them over 500k in ARR starting Q1. Also, the reason this contract was signed was because they want to use Morrow’s new product around ESOP education/management/communication for employees that they are launching next quarter.

• Over the weekend, Grouped attended their first event where all of the tickets were sold through their platform for one of their users, SoMo.

• I had drinks with Kayla who is the Head of Community at Menlo Ventures and Martin who is a Principal at Struck Studio. They moved here from SF and San Diego! Always great to have more venture and startup folks in town (:

Things that I did last week

• Had over 60 engineers to my friend Josh’s house. One of the best things I’ve worked on this past year is developing relationships with the software engineering community. It blows my mind how much startup ecosystem development there is that leaves out an audience of engineers. Every great sales founder needs a great coder founder to win. Now, not all of these folks are going to go work at a startup, BUT they are the best audience to find the person or introduce me to the person who will be!

• Emceed the Program Showcase for the Nashville Entrepreneur Center. This was the first cross-program event. Applications for ALL of their programs are now open.

• I talked about capital on a panel with Jonny with Wefunder, Lasawni with InvestTN, and CJ with Fintop Capital.

Personal stuff:

• My personal trainer and now really good friend Heather wants to start using LinkedIn. I would be so thrilled if you connected with her and checked out her first post here!!! I picked to work with Heather because I want to look and feel like HER when I’m 50.

• I watched the Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix. She is super interesting and I feel inspired by her decision to constantly bet on herself. This one is worth checking out.

• As a full-time bicycle commuter, I was super happy to find out that the Mayor’s transit plan passed. I was skeptical that people actually ride the bus, but it turns out they do. I need to try it…

• I tried out an aerial arts class. I am certainly not a natural talent but it was fun 😂

to the moon,

zap