The Eccentric CEO
By Aman Y. Agarwal
The Eccentric CEOJul 17, 2022
Skyrocketing America's Math Grades with Video Games — Dr. AnnMaria De Mars
Today's guest is a tough, tough badass — in the realest definition of the word.
She was the first American to win the Judo world championship (1984) — which involved coming out on top over her Japanese, Korean, and Eastern European counterparts, who trained full-time as professional athletes — while she had a full-time job as an industrial engineer, a baby daughter, and... get this... a non-functional leg that had been operated upon.
Fast forward to today, she's on a crusade to improve the way math and sciences are taught to kids in the USA (and beyond).
Only 25% of people who graduate from high school in the USA are considered "proficient" in math — a surprisingly large number have trouble even doing basic multiplication and division. And the standards are still going down — the average kid would have easily flunked 10 years ago for what they get As and Bs today.
But as it turns out, the American schooling system is quite complicated. Every state has their own rules, and so does every district.
So how do you build a profitable, mission-driven company in a highly regulated, chaotic industry (filled with bureaucrats on top) where every penny is hard to squeeze, and kids are involved?
And how do you do it while making it "harder" (devoting a significant amount of resources on reforming low-income districts who need it the most — but which most ed-tech companies ignore)?
Well, I guess you just go ahead and do it.
Dr. De Mars is the Founder and President of 7 Generation Games, which has solved a multitude of problems one at a time:
- First, building a smashing product that kids, teachers, and parents unanimously love. Her company makes interactive video games that use real-world, culturally rich problem examples (from the life of an Aztec diplomat, or a Sioux hunter, or fisherman, etc) to teach math — raising average grades by a 30%.
- Second, they solved distribution — taking the games both directly to consumers, as well as building a partnership/B2B channel such that schools can deploy them for every student en mass, and using an innovative mix of private and public funding to finance it.
- Third, they also built the software platforms needed to churn out high-quality educational games in quick succession, in any language — enabling them to both move faster and scale at the same time.
In this episode, we discuss:
- There's a Judoka who's never been injured??!
- The REAL problem with math education in the USA, and how to fix it
- Why focusing on affluent kids is, counter-intuitively, a bad business decision
- Competing with the Microsofts and Pearsons of the education industry
- Where does most ed-tech funding go?
- Why most "math games" don't actually teach you math
- Their big fight with Apple about... the Aztec smallpox pandemic?
- Building the "Wordpress for educational games"
Time Travel Through Japan's Business Landscape: 1980s to 2020s — with Terrie Lloyd
I seem to have a weird fascination with Japan. But not in a "weird" way of course. (I've been around weebs and realized I'm not one of them.)
I find Japan especially interesting from a business person's perspective. They were the biggest success story after WW2 — not only the second biggest economy in the world after the USA, but also the most technologically advanced, having had bullet trains since the freaking 60s. And all this despite having no natural resources to speak of.
But recently, Japan's competitiveness has shown signs of wavering, with an aging population, abysmal birth rates, and a general lack of technology proliferation.
To understand what it means for international entrepreneurs, I invited Terrie Lloyd, CEO of Japan Travel (and founder of several other companies), a rare serial entrepreneur based in Japan for over 35 years. Terrie is probably the foremost authority in the world for any foreigner thinking about Japan as a business location.
We cover:
01:30 – Why Terrie is the #1 voice among all foreign entrepreneurs in Japan
04:17 – A secret office romance, translation company, and selling submarine parts
8:00 – How the US' jealous move overturned Japanese currency overnight
10:36 – Why Japanese banks can be hard to deal with
14:50 – Hiring foreigners in Japan: then and now
16:39 – The sad state of English teaching in Japan
18:15 – How Tokyo's skies turned from grey to blue
22:00 – Step one in hiring network engineers: bail your recruiter out of prison?!
27:00 – The bubble pops
34:12 – Why are Japanese business valuations so low?
45:11 – The roots of Masayoshi Son's "street fighter" mentality
52:00 – Why Japan has so few unicorns
57:00 – The PLUS points of starting a business in Japan
62:00 – The annoying problem of IP theft in China
65:00 – Terrie's M&A business
The Next Revolution in Fast Food and Drive Thrus — Steve Bigari
There's a fast-food "apocalypse" going on. The average fast-food franchise owner 20 years ago made more money with fewer locations than they do today.
How did this happen, how can operators avoid the "culling," and how is this landscape changing with new technologies? That's the focus of this episode.
My guest was Steve Bigari, who is a longtime pioneer in the fast food industry in the USA, and the first person to introduce digital order-taking at McDonalds' drive-thrus back in 2002, which he was featured in the New York Times for. Today he's the CEO of Synq3 Solutions which provides digital customer service and AI tools to restaurant brands:
9:55 - What is "drive-thru 1.0"?
15:00 - The economics of fast food drive-thrus
20:30 - Why fast food profits have DECLINED dramatically over the years
29:30 - Robots that run commercial kitchens and REPAIR themselves
40:35 - The simplest way to improve restaurant profitability
45:00 - Why Steve still believes in independent restaurant operators, not just big chains
50:00 - Why convenience and value for money trumps every other thing
1:01:55 - How Synq3 helps restaurants digitize customer service
"Tech Fluent CEO": https://aman-agarwal.com/tfc
Owning the World's Best Restaurants as a Billionaire Hobby — Lars Seier
You've heard of Michelin star restaurants, and you may even have eaten at some of them. And today, you'll meet a person who owns two of the BEST among them – as a hobby.
Lars Seier Christensen is a Danish billionaire, who was the Founder and CEO of Saxo Bank. But while he's most well known as an industry leader in finance and technology, he's also a man of refined tastes who owns many lifestyle businesses on the side, from football clubs to aqua parks, as well as two of the best restaurants in the world: Geranium (3 stars) and Alchemist (2 stars), both in Copenhagen.
Lars and I talk at length about elite Michelin restaurants, the controversies surrounding them, as well the larger landscape of different kinds of "luxury." We hold nothing back, and as always, I promise you won’t find a more insightful conversation like in this episode anywhere else:
0:31: How his restaurant deals with having 35,000 people on its waiting list
1:51: Lars' portfolio of luxury and entertainment businesses
4:00: Lars' philosophy on choosing people to work with, and who he considers the funniest person he's ever worked with
7:55: Why Michelin restaurants are more value for money than other luxury experiences
16:11: The pressure of earning and keeping stars, and why some chefs refuse them
22:05: Why Lars didn't allow a single employee to be laid off during the pandemic
25:00: The financial struggles of great restaurants
30:01: The different tiers of the "luxury" market, and Lars' view of empire builders like Robuchon and Ducasse
37:34: The challenge of differentiating yourself from other high-end restaurants
43:00: Why you'll never find a Michelin restaurant deal on Groupon
49:10: Lars' opinion of food critics
52:00: How Lars is very different from most restaurant investors
*At 35:10, Aman mixes up the names of Alain Passard and Alain Ducasse (they're both famous French chefs)
For the full episode and transcript, visit https://aman-agarwal.com/ecceo
Secrets of Running a World-Class, Profitable Bar — Yangdup Lama
What makes a bar succeed, and what makes it fail?
How do you build a WORLD-CLASS bar, and how do you run it profitably?
I don’t drink alcohol (honest!), but I’ve always been fascinated with the business and culture of drinking (especially watching friends get drunk, but we digress).
Yangdup Lama is the Co-Founder of Sidecar, ranked among the 50 best bars across the WORLD, and a Partner at the Drinks India Company through which he runs 2 more successful bars. He himself is renowned as the TOP BARTENDER in INDIA since 1996.
Talk about an “eccentric” CEO!
We dissect the operations of his unique bar as he walks me through his thought process about its various aspects, from inventory management to how cute the floors are.
This is a very SPECIAL episode because even though I’m from India, it took me 15 episodes to bring my first Indian guest on the pod.
As always, I promise you won’t find a more insightful conversation like this one anywhere else online:
01:00 - A bartender’s perspective on alcohol as a commodity 06:30 - Smart alcohol management: what it really looks like 14:40 - Profitability of different types of bars 19:00 - Failure and success rates in bars as a high-risk business 26:40 - Metrics to track and optimize while running a bar 32:00 - Why the “rotation of liquors” is so important 37:41 - How to extract actionable insights from a bar’s sales numbers 40:00 - Signature cocktails vs the classics 43:25 - A bar’s “discovery rate” and “return rate,” and how they vary 48:14 - Fundraising and financial planning for bars 56:50 - The most difficult part of running 2 bars 59:01 - Sidecar's vision and future plans
The Delicate Craft of Managing ＞$500M of Other People’s Money — Chad Willardson
Managing other people’s money is a delicate position — a lot of things can go wrong.
Do you ever think about the people who actually MANAGE the taxes you pay to your government? Do you know how to choose the right financial advisor, and how to tell if they’re legit or not?
As an entrepreneur, I always wanted to dive into the unique “fiduciary industry,” which includes financial advisors, financial planners and the like. (Specific to the USA.)
Today I interview Chad Willardson, the Founder and President of Pacific Capital — an independent financial advisory firm based in California. What’s especially interesting about Chad is that he not only manages money for high net-worth individuals but also his city’s entire portfolio of $400M (yes, 400 million USD).
As usual, being the best business podcast in the world, I bring to you the most insightful discussion of the subject available anywhere:
- Strange truths about managing $400M of taxpayer’s money for the government in America
- Differences between managing the money of an individual versus an entire city
- What a city CAN and CANNOT invest its money
- The “nutritionist at the butcher shop”: Why more than 95% of financial advisors and planners make more money if they lie to you
- How to tell legit fiduciaries from imposters
- Shocking inside stories from Merill Lynch and other banks
- Ways how the company acquire customers and market their services
- Pacific capital’s framework for inspecting clients’ finances and deciding on a plan
The Mysterious, Shifting Landscape of Non-Fiction Book Publishing — Tucker Max
Today’s episode will forever change how you look at a “book.”
For example, did you know that pretty much all bestseller lists are scams?
Book publishing is a fascinating industry, with a rapidly changing value landscape, and is also very opaque — the business is pretty mysterious in its ways.
How publishing business works directly affects our culture, so much that it’s not a coincidence that the word “author” and “authority” have a similar spelling.
Over the last 20 years, this area has completely changed with the internet, and traditional publishers are struggling to keep up.
To pull back the curtain and throw some light, I invited Tucker Max, the former CEO and Co-founder of Scribe Media, which is a new-age book publishing and author marketing company focused on non-fiction. He is himself a 4-time NYT bestselling author, and has helped launch the books of some of the world’s most popular authors, from Tim Ferriss to David Goggins.
We get into many fundamental questions about the books business, dissecting everything about the publishing value chain and uncovering fascinating insights along the way!
As usual, this is a power-packed episode with content you simply won't find anywhere else:
- How many books are published each year, and where people buy them
- The fluid, changing concept of a “book” — what is a good definition?
- Why the future of books is in audio and video
- The diverse types of publishing firms, and why new models are emerging
- How the traditional “book deal” to authors is dying
- Why bestseller lists are scams, and how much it costs to be on one
- Why fiction books are a totally different world with their own economics
- Scaling a high-end services company — frameworks, economics and strategy
The Challenges of Building Medical Software for Hospitals — Anna-Maria Henell
Building new tech for the medical industry is hard — there's a LOT of regulation due to safety issues, especially when the tech directly influences treatment/surgery or diagnosis.
And then, beyond regulations, just selling that tech to hospitals and departments, and teaching (+ convincing) doctors to adopt new tools and habits, is its own journey.
But how does it look really, from the perspective of an entrepreneur who's actually in the weeds?
My guest Anna-Maria Henell is the Founder and CEO of Disior, which builds 3D medical imaging software that's used for both diagnosis and treatment planning.
As usual, this is a power-packed episode with content you simply won't find anywhere else:
01:50 — the medical industry’s “consistency problem” when it comes to diagnostics
06:25 — types of medical scans that pose special challenges to Doctors, and why
09:11 — the concept of “radiographical parameters” and why they’re important for doctors
14:30 — challenging of selling new med-tech to doctors and hospitals — how to navigate the sales process
22:10 — current medical imaging technologies are 10 to 70 years old?!
27:50 — in-depth discussion of the med-tech regulation process
36:08 — how the regulatory challenges REALLY affect an entrepreneur: the real picture
45:30 — how do you PROVE how good your medical software is?
52:30 — why Disior doesn’t use much machine learning: pros and cons
59:32 — working around data privacy and protection rules as a med-tech company
1:04:22 — the tedious regulatory process of making CHANGES to medical software
1:06:40 — Anna-Maria’s story and Disior’s founding story!
1:09:24 — Fundraising for a med-tech company: investor outlook
1:12:30 — Has the Theranos example affected the med-tech landscape in Europe?
1:15:33 — Why med-tech is extremely competitive despite the huge costs and challenges
Inside the Business of Managing Fashion Models — Briauna Mariah
The world of high-fashion and modeling may be glamorous, but it is still a business. How do models and their agents really make money, how is that changing, and what is it really like to make a living as a model?
My guest Briauna Mariah is the Founder of "We Speak," a new-age modeling agency in New York managing hundreds of models on its roster — with clients ranging from Victoria's Secret to Microsoft Xbox!
Join me as she gives us a peek into the "business" side of modeling agencies, and all its light (and dark).
As always, we cover a lot of ground on the podcast, so here are some topics!
01:27 — What's a "fashion week" and why it exists
06:11 — Major "market segments" and niches for models
09:54 — Surprising differences between luxury vs commercial clients for modeling agencies: luxury doesn't pay?!
15:15 — How Victoria's Secret Angels are going through a transformation
16:58 — How modeling agencies operate and make money
20:32 — Why models, despite being independent contractors, are not really "independent"
27:31 — How do agencies find models to join them?
30:31 — Why most models aren't busy throughout the year, and what agencies do about it
36:31 — Major expenses of running a modeling agency? How much do they spend on "advertising", and how does it vary over the year?
42:39 — How agencies promote and develop models for fashion week
46:57 — Starting a new modeling agency: what does it take, and what's the hardest part?
50:46 — How Briauna fell in love with modeling, and some awful experiences as a model
53:00 — How some models sustain themselves while they look for modeling work
54:49 — Life as a model manager today
Building Aircraft that Disrupt the Economics of Air Freight — Aleksey Matyushev
Today, we're talking with Aleksey Matyushev, the CEO and Founder of Natilus, a company building unmanned cargo aircraft that intend to revolutionize the business of air freight, by making air shipping costs 50% cheaper than the Boeings, Airbuses and Cessnas of the world.
So in this episode, we’ll discuss the fascinating business of building and selling airplanes, the economics of air freight and how they compare to other shipping methods, the history of autopilot technology, the profitability of maintenance and repair, and how it all comes together!
As always, we cover a lot of ground on this podcast so here's a list of the topics we discuss:
00:47 — Different business models in the world of cargo airplanes
03:15 — Why you have to build a plane from scratch, instead of just selling an advanced autopilot
04:24 — The cost breakdown of a single cargo flight from A to B, and how that varies
09:25 — Aman summarizes the economics of air cargo and how that affects plane design
11:01 — Price categories of different cargo planes
14:09 — Profiting from air shipping: domestic air freight vs trucking, and the operations model of delivery companies like FedEx, and building the right type of plane
21:45 — The current global state of Hydrogen fuel for aircraft
24:37 — Deploying the planes: the extremely profitable business of maintenance and repair
28:39 — Choosing the right engines for the planes, and how that varies across the competitive landscape
31:48 — Coming up with the design for the plane — a little history
35:36 — Why companies like Boeing and Airbus are not competitive in cargo
36:27 — Choosing the right material for building the plane, and how it effects the economics
38:47 — The different stages of regulatory approval, and how much it costs to get from idea to manufacturing!
45:47 — Brief history of autopilot technology, and how that compares with self-driving cars in costs and performance
56:00 — Fundraising landscape for an airplane company: raising investment for "moonshot" projects
01:01:00 — Aerospace workplaces aren't funny
The Economics of a Grocery Brand — Kyle Oglesby
Pick up a jar of jam in your kitchen — can you guess all the people involved in its supply chain, and who makes how much money? Today we'll grant you "X-ray vision" into the business and supply chain of grocery brands.
Kyle Oglesby is the owner of a barbecue sauce company called Daddy Sam's, and has slowly grown to nationwide distribution in the USA. We talk about everything from the margins on different types of grocery products, manufacturing, packaging, copackers, sales and distribution channels, marketing strategies, relationships with grocery stores, and much more.
As always, we cover a lot of ground on this podcast so here's a list of the topics we discuss!
01:49 — Categories of groceries as seen from a store's perspective
05:42 — How exactly does a product get classified as "shelf-stable"?
07:46 — Distribution channels for a grocery brand: direct to consumer vs wholesaling
10:05 — Differences between supply chains for B2C and B2B sales: selling directly to consumers or to the foodservice industry
12:32 — Does selling to restaurants increase direct to consumer sales too?
15:05 — Copacking challenges of selling B2B and B2C together
20:34 — The business model of grocery stores (stocking fees etc)
24:00 — Negotiating with stores to put your product on the shelves — navigating slotting fees and free fills
28:18 — Distributors' relationships with stores; how it varies for different types of chains
35:41 — Selling barbecue sauce online: pros, cons and important considerations
41:49 — Cost breakdown of a jar of barbecue sauce
47:37 — Margins differences in slow-moving vs fast-moving groceries
50:31 — Why selling on Amazon is a mixed bag, different types of fees etc
54:03 — Business implications of using high-fructose corn syrup vs sugar, and plastic packaging vs glass
58:20 — Pricing of Gourmet vs Commodity products
1:01:27 — Important packaging considerations
01:06:35 — Storage, warehousing, shipping & transport: how product density affects these costs
01:08:44 — Selling off your grocery brand
01:12:13 — Access to capital for different purposes
01:16:26 — The glass shortage in 2020, and how it affected the grocery brands!
01:19:42 — Warehousing economics, and pricing model
The Economics of Self-Driving "Motorcycles" — Ain McKendrick
You've heard a lot about self-driving cars and electric vehicles. They're cool, about to change the world, yada yada yada.
Today, I bring to you the MOST thorough and transparent discussion anywhere online about the business side of this industry.
Everything from the development, manufacturing and operational costs of autonomous cars, to various revenue and pricing models, how the state-of-the-art technical challenges can be cleverly hijacked, and whatever else you need to know as an investor or analyst in this field.
My guest today is Ain McKendrick, CEO of Faction, a company that develops self-driving fleets of 3-wheel electric vehicles. Given our shared history in this industry, this is an informative episode you don't want to miss.
0:19 — Terminology around "consumer transport," "vehicle-on-demand," etc
2:06 — Use cases in the micro-logistics and urban transport market
6:29 — Cars vs Motorcycles, from production, operations and regulatory standpoints
10:24 — Difference between the power sports and automotive industries
12:00 — Worldwide adoption of motorcycles vs North America
15:32 — Pricing, revenue and go-to-market models for Faction's driverless technology
18:47 — Faction's platform "DriveLink," how it makes the vehicles safe, and their addressable market
23:12 — The marginal costs of upgrading a vehicle to different levels of autonomy: real numbers
29:10 — Doing the cold math on manufacturing and operation costs of self-driving vehicles, and getting to a viable product
37:01 — How putting humans in the loop is better for drivers
38:21 — Building a state-of-the-art autonomy stack: what is still R&D, and what can be outsourced?
43:55 — The 3 generations of teleoperation (human control/supervision) in driverless vehicles
50:10 — Why you HAVE to build a vehicle from scratch, even if you don't plan to manufacture them yourself
52:55 — What a typical week looks like for Ain, and how he tries to make productive decisions
55:06 — Investor sentiment evolved around autonomy and electric vehicles over the last few years
Faction: www.factionmoto.com
The Business of Social Documentary Filmmaking — Jennifer Huang
What makes a "successful" social documentary film? How do these filmmakers measure their "impact," how do they get funded, and what is it really like to be in the middle of this journey?
Today we talk about the "business" side of making independent social documentary films.
Jennifer Huang, Founder of Treeclimber Media, is a director, producer and fascinating character. She's currently making "The Long Rescue", a film about human trafficking.
She teaches us everything she knows about navigating the film industry and the challenges faced by independent films.
2:00 — Case studies of very "successful" social documentaries
4:00 — How they define "impact" and set goals
9:43 — The thorny topic of distribution of documentary films
11:43 — ROI of getting your film into festivals, Netflix, Amazon Prime
15:30 — Traditional model of film distribution
18:34 — How film rights are negotiated
21:09 — What film aggregators do
25:03 — Getting your film on online streaming platforms
27:52 — Differences in making a film for theaters vs streaming
33:13 — Fundraising and other revenue streams
42:19 — Slice of Jennifer's life: what it's really like
Correction: The film about sexual abuse in the military is called The Invisible War, not The Hunting Ground as mentioned in the podcast — though both are from the same filmmaker.
Investing in Japan's Special Real Estate Market - Ziv Nakajima-Magen
Today we do a DEEP dive into Japan's real estate investment landscape. We discuss what makes it unique, and look at both the buyer's and seller's sides.
My guest is Ziv Nakajima-Magen, the cofounder of Nippon Tradings International - a firm that has helped broker international property deals in Japan for 10 years.
If you're a modern real-estate investor, this is probably the single-most informative piece of content you'll need to understand this market.
1:42 - Bad for capital gains, great for cash flow
3:35 - Why local realtors often don't work with foreigners
8:44 - How an old population and low birth rate affect the market
13:10 - The buildings themselves: legislations, maintenance costs, etc
16:53 - Attractive areas in the commercial sector
23:21 - COVID impact: why the residential sector still did very well, etc
27:56 - Financing and mortgages, both pre- and post-COVID
31:36 - Rents: the numbers
36:22 - Rent negotiation
40:02 - Why people sell despite low capital gains and high cash flow?
44:28 - Who typically invests in Japanese real estate?
51:08 - Other emerging markets like Latin America and Africa
53:31 - Buyer's journey through Nippon Tradings
1:00:19 - Property price negotiation and competition in Japan
1:04:38 - Challenges for Nippon Tradings as a company
Opening the U.S. Stock Market to Middle Eastern Investors - Abdelazim El Toukhy
Investing in the American stock market isn’t simple or straightforward for international investors, and there’s a big barrier to entry if you’re not very rich.
Abdelazim El Toukhy is the Founder and CEO of Ticr, a Robinhood-style trading platform for people in the Middle East / North Africa regions.
In this episode, you’ll learn how the industry is set up, how people in this region typically invest their money, what current solutions exist, and what it takes to solve this problem. Azim talks about the whole industry ecosystem as well as the compliance/licensing challenges they are facing right now.
01:25 – Current process of U.S. stock investing in the Middle East, different options available
07:15 – The landscape of brokers and middlemen explained
11:56 – How this expands to different countries and geographies
14:04 – Challenges of building an overseas trading platform – licensing etc
18:30 – How Ticr solves it – system, stakeholders, business model
23:00 – Costs of legal compliance
25:43 – Other ways Ticr differentiates itself, differences in investor preferences between US and EMEA
33:45 – Ticr’s education platform
35:53 – Competition
38:51 – How sanctions and international politics affect the business
41:50 – Azim’s personal journey in entrepreneurship
50:00 – Fundraising thoughts
"Social Network" for Real Estate Maintenance - David Albrecht
Real Estate has to be maintained regularly just to keep it from losing value, and it costs the industry a lot of money every year. Surprisingly, most of this real estate maintenance is never recorded anywhere.
Today you'll learn about the business of real estate maintenance, and how technology can help us save BILLIONS of dollars per year in this yet-to-be-disrupted space.
Our guest is David Albrecht, and he's the Founder CEO of Shortbar. He is building a product called Dials (dials.co) which is not only a tool to track and make sense of real estate maintenance, but at the same time a unique "social media" tool for contractors!
01:41 - Inspiration for Dials and overview of industry
06:26 - What "Github" is and why it's revolutionary for other industries
08:56 - Target customers and their biggest pain points
20:15 - Business model and critical features
29:45 - Why nobody uses existing software options
32:24 - The social networking aspect, pricing model
40:21 - How Silicon Valley sees the rest of America
48:21 - The business plan and fundraising logic
1:04:49 - Aman begins nerding out over topic of engineering culture
1:08:04 - Challenges
Education in the Japanese "Casino" Industry - Rob Okada
How is the Japanese casino industry different from the rest of the world? How do casinos make money, and how does it affect the way they hire and train their most important employees - the dealers? Today, you get a glimpse behind the curtain.
Rob is the founder of IRGI, an innovative education + tech company in this unique market.
Rob shares everything he knows, and also gives away an incredibly honest truth about his industry that you'll want to hear (37:48).
1:45 - What makes the Japanese casino industry unique?
5:30 - Why the industry is hot now: history, legality, new opportunities
14:10 - A school that trains casino dealers
21:30 - Gambling addiction, how it's perceived in different markets
25:44 - What goes into a world-class dealer training experience, how big is the market for dealers
37:48 - Twist in the story: it's a dead business???
57:45 - A tech product for the dealer community
Get a beautiful video tour of Rob's academy: https://youtu.be/qMvqRn7AIgA
SaaS for Scaling Business Operations - Alicia Butler Pierre
Surprisingly many small businesses actually have MORE customers than they can handle. Alicia Butler Pierre's 15-year-old company, Equilibria Inc, is now building a SaaS tool that helps these businesses scale their internal operations.
Having solved scaling challenges in all sorts of companies, Alicia is a TRUE student of her craft. In this episode, she shares the secret to her "magic" and gives us an HONEST, vulnerable account of the opportunities (and challenges) ahead of her.
1:26 - Challenges of too much demand, and how to handle it
12:59 - Contractors vs Employees: what's the legal difference, and how you scale a services company
23:46 - How her SaaS product helps business owners
30:57 - Roadmap for her new tech company
44:57 - Competition
1:01:26 - Two-pronged sales model
Meet Alicia on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aliciabutlerpierre/
Alicia also hosts a popular podcast where she discusses all things related to scaling companies. You definitely want to check it out! https://businessinfrastructure.tv/podcast-2/
Introduction - by Aman Y. Agarwal
Welcome to the show! In this sub 5-minute intro, I cover an extremely short but shocking story about Michelin 3-star restaurants and fast food joints. After that I share what you can expect from this podcast. And in the end I leave you with some catchy music.