The Read And Retire Podcast

Leaving your job and starting your own business as a person of color can be difficult. If you’re going to begin, it’s important to know how and where to start. For Episode 4 of the podcast, we figured who better to talk to about the process than serial entrepreneur, Andrew Simpson. 

At 27, he left his job as an Accountant to help run his own luxury fashion brand, YACTEN (You Are Called To End Namelessness) with his business partner, Clark Duplessis. Two years later, he’s learned the business of fashion, had a number of celebrities wear his clothing, founded an interior design firm, and secured his first AirBNB unit under his company.

If you’ve ever thought about being an entrepreneur and starting your own business, this is a must listen!

When we were younger, we didn't know many minorities who worked in Finance, rubbed shoulders with high net-worth team members, and invested in private companies before they planned to go public or get acquired. For Episode 2, we decided to sit down with former Investment Banker and current Venture Capitalist Roshan Joshi - who achieved all of those things before the age of 27.

Growing up in an immigrant family, his grandparents came to America in the early 90s and saved almost every penny they made working at a convenience store. This allowed them to eventually buy a convenience store of their own, and from there they began trading up assets to get a few small motels before eventually owning a number of Hilton properties.

In this episode, we discuss his background and time in Investment Banking and Venture Capital before chatting about how beginners should invest in stocks, how entrepreneurs can pitch and raise capital for their business, and how a person can invest in a private company before it goes public or gets acquired.