I've Morphed for 40 hours in the past week. That's a full time job just out of delivery driving. Add in the 50 hours of work it took during the day to keep things afloat and moving forward, and that's the work week of an over-achieving investment banker. Maybe even a bit more.
It's been a lot of driving, and all the hours have been a distraction from getting work done that needs to be done. However, it comes with some benefits. I've been getting paid, so I've covered almost two months of rent in the past week's work. I've been listening to some stellar audiobooks (really recommend Chris McDougall's Born to Run. It's epic.) I've made a chart of best parking spaces for every restaurant which I can pretty up and publish for our drivers.
But it's also taught me something: it's time to start hiring. I've driven a few hundred hours this semester, but that should not be my main job. The 5 hour shift can and should be spent on business development, not sustainment. I haven't signed or even pitched a new business in over a month. I haven't made a plan to do so either. Our tech has been stagnant and our business potential is capped at what it was a month ago. I can't blame it all on the amount of driving I've done, but I can attribute a large portion of my complacency there.
We've done our final deliveries for 2015 (unless McAlister's Deli hits us with a few more, which would be great.) 2016 is going to be about growth. It's time to put money into recruitment, and effort into sales. It's time to grow the the point I know we can get to- and time to grow fast.
I am no longer going to be driving unless it's an emergency. I am going to need to get creative about hiring, smart about training, and stay cash-efficient, but not penny-pinch.
Effort, time, cash. I've got those three to spare, and in that order.
Saturday, December 12, 2015
Thursday, December 10, 2015
Could have been leaner
The concept of 'lean' is learned better through experience than through books. While Eric Ries did a commendable job of putting the concept into 300 pages, there is no teacher better than the real world.
I've sunk a lot of money into Morph. We'll keep it general, but many thousands of dollars have been my own, and no meager amount has come from my faithful family. I've invested financially, committed professionally, and pained emotionally over this company. It's been so fun and worth it all, especially as I learned one major lesson: I could have been leaner.
Our technology works, but is currently sitting and gathering dust. We don't need it, and don't use it. The first 4 months of operation has been more of a business play than anything technological. That right there would have been over $8,000 and a few points of equity saved.
Knowing that I could have been smarter gives me perspective about future actions. This is a lesson in the value of bootstrapping. Having limited resources makes you understand your business model in a way that massive free cash flow cannot. Investment dollars may put a thick green bandage on problems, but never address them fundamentally. Moving forward, I can use this past experience to be leaner, smarter, and faster than before. All of this will serve to put us in an exquisite position once we begin to look for investment.
I've sunk a lot of money into Morph. We'll keep it general, but many thousands of dollars have been my own, and no meager amount has come from my faithful family. I've invested financially, committed professionally, and pained emotionally over this company. It's been so fun and worth it all, especially as I learned one major lesson: I could have been leaner.
Our technology works, but is currently sitting and gathering dust. We don't need it, and don't use it. The first 4 months of operation has been more of a business play than anything technological. That right there would have been over $8,000 and a few points of equity saved.
Knowing that I could have been smarter gives me perspective about future actions. This is a lesson in the value of bootstrapping. Having limited resources makes you understand your business model in a way that massive free cash flow cannot. Investment dollars may put a thick green bandage on problems, but never address them fundamentally. Moving forward, I can use this past experience to be leaner, smarter, and faster than before. All of this will serve to put us in an exquisite position once we begin to look for investment.
Friday, December 4, 2015
Every conversation counts
A year ago, when Morph was Morphood and we were still aiming for an A in Chris Mumford's class, I would walk up and down Franklin street, popping into restaurants to interview managers about their delivery. I talked about that a bit in this post.
One restaurant manager I spoke to was Charlie, day manager at McAlister's Deli. The first time I met him, we talked a lot about their current delivery situation, and what it would take to make it better. A few weeks later, I popped in to see Charlie with some more questions. Then some weeks after that, I showed him our wire frames. We'd chat at least once a month for the past year, as I provided him updates on our build-out and he provided insights into managing a restaurant and dealing with delivery.
In one conversation with Charlie, I learned that McAlister's does a lot of catering orders. Customers place their order online or on the phone, and McAlister's delivers it. Seeing as these are pre-scheduled orders, McAlister's can't send them off to a third party delivery service like Takeout Central. They have one of their managers leave the store to deliver it. So the store is left without a manager for 30-60 minutes as he brings the food to his car, delivers, drives back, parks, and returns to the store.
"How much would it be worth if we were to do that for you?" I asked.
"That would be huge," he replied. "I'd give up most of our delivery fee, if it were up to me."
And so, we began that conversation. First with Charlie. Next with JD, the regional manager. Then with the McAlister's corporate office.
And finally, we've got ourselves our second customer, in a way that my white board plans would never have anticipated. The McAlister's manager emails me dates and times for their catering order. I send a driver over (usually Danny or myself) to pick up the food, and deliver it. And the McAlister's manager can stay in the store to manage it, like he's supposed to.
And so far it's been great. It is all within Chapel Hill, so drives are no more than 10 minutes. Since catering orders are often in the hundreds of dollars, the tips have been fantastic. And, most importantly, McAlister's seems to be happy.
So two lessons learned here. One- it's a startups job to solve customer problems, not to stick to a business model. We're accepting orders (and making money) in a different way than our business model demanded of us previously, but it remains as unquestionable growth for Morph. Two- every conversation counts. If I hadn't walked into McAlister's to meet Charlie a year ago to ask his opinion on Morphood, I could never have had the opportunity to work with them today.
One restaurant manager I spoke to was Charlie, day manager at McAlister's Deli. The first time I met him, we talked a lot about their current delivery situation, and what it would take to make it better. A few weeks later, I popped in to see Charlie with some more questions. Then some weeks after that, I showed him our wire frames. We'd chat at least once a month for the past year, as I provided him updates on our build-out and he provided insights into managing a restaurant and dealing with delivery.
In one conversation with Charlie, I learned that McAlister's does a lot of catering orders. Customers place their order online or on the phone, and McAlister's delivers it. Seeing as these are pre-scheduled orders, McAlister's can't send them off to a third party delivery service like Takeout Central. They have one of their managers leave the store to deliver it. So the store is left without a manager for 30-60 minutes as he brings the food to his car, delivers, drives back, parks, and returns to the store.
"How much would it be worth if we were to do that for you?" I asked.
"That would be huge," he replied. "I'd give up most of our delivery fee, if it were up to me."
And so, we began that conversation. First with Charlie. Next with JD, the regional manager. Then with the McAlister's corporate office.
And finally, we've got ourselves our second customer, in a way that my white board plans would never have anticipated. The McAlister's manager emails me dates and times for their catering order. I send a driver over (usually Danny or myself) to pick up the food, and deliver it. And the McAlister's manager can stay in the store to manage it, like he's supposed to.
And so far it's been great. It is all within Chapel Hill, so drives are no more than 10 minutes. Since catering orders are often in the hundreds of dollars, the tips have been fantastic. And, most importantly, McAlister's seems to be happy.
So two lessons learned here. One- it's a startups job to solve customer problems, not to stick to a business model. We're accepting orders (and making money) in a different way than our business model demanded of us previously, but it remains as unquestionable growth for Morph. Two- every conversation counts. If I hadn't walked into McAlister's to meet Charlie a year ago to ask his opinion on Morphood, I could never have had the opportunity to work with them today.
Monday, November 30, 2015
Pitch Party Part Deux
A year ago, the Morph team competed with fervor in the Carolina Challenge Pitch Party, a competition uniting startups, usually in the idea and pre-revenue stages, with the chance to earn up to $1,000 in prize money. A year ago, the Morph team came in confidently. A year ago, the Morph team didn't make it into the top 10- we weren't even close.
But this year, we're so much further ahead, and so much more confident than we were even last year. While last year we had an idea (not even a good idea, as it seems), this year we've got proof. We have thousands of dollars in revenue, hundreds of completed deliveries, and some fairly complex technology. I am confident beyond a doubt that we are the furthest along company competing this year. I'm even confident that we're further along than almost all of the companies that finished in the top 10 last year.
It seems, however, that my confidence and the Pitch Party don't mix well. Just like last year, I came in sure of a top 10 finish. Just like last year, I spent time writing and memorizing my 2-minute pitch for the finals, because I assumed, and perhaps with good reason, that I would be on that stage at the end of the night. And just like last year, we fell short.
I could think of excuses. There were only 2 of us (myself and Danny), so our exposure to judges was smaller. We were in the middle, so fewer judges came around than for the teams on the sides. Too many judges knew me and were either uncomfortable giving me votes, or just wanted to hang out and chat.
But none of those really matter. They don't even almost matter. We couldn't move on to the money round because 10 other teams were, in one way or another, better than us.
That hurts quite a bit. It feels bad to be told that you're bad. It feels worse because I've spent well over a year of thought and painful effort, and many thousands of dollars on Morph, while other teams were old if they'd started the idea in September and advanced if they had a PowerPoint slide showing what their app to order beers faster at sports bars might look like.
But, lessons continue to be learned. Don't get overly confident. Don't expect things before you've earned them. Don't underestimate competition. There is always more to do and more to learn, and this Pitch Party, which puts me at a world record 0-2 for the same idea, is proof of that.
But this year, we're so much further ahead, and so much more confident than we were even last year. While last year we had an idea (not even a good idea, as it seems), this year we've got proof. We have thousands of dollars in revenue, hundreds of completed deliveries, and some fairly complex technology. I am confident beyond a doubt that we are the furthest along company competing this year. I'm even confident that we're further along than almost all of the companies that finished in the top 10 last year.
It seems, however, that my confidence and the Pitch Party don't mix well. Just like last year, I came in sure of a top 10 finish. Just like last year, I spent time writing and memorizing my 2-minute pitch for the finals, because I assumed, and perhaps with good reason, that I would be on that stage at the end of the night. And just like last year, we fell short.
I could think of excuses. There were only 2 of us (myself and Danny), so our exposure to judges was smaller. We were in the middle, so fewer judges came around than for the teams on the sides. Too many judges knew me and were either uncomfortable giving me votes, or just wanted to hang out and chat.
But none of those really matter. They don't even almost matter. We couldn't move on to the money round because 10 other teams were, in one way or another, better than us.
That hurts quite a bit. It feels bad to be told that you're bad. It feels worse because I've spent well over a year of thought and painful effort, and many thousands of dollars on Morph, while other teams were old if they'd started the idea in September and advanced if they had a PowerPoint slide showing what their app to order beers faster at sports bars might look like.
But, lessons continue to be learned. Don't get overly confident. Don't expect things before you've earned them. Don't underestimate competition. There is always more to do and more to learn, and this Pitch Party, which puts me at a world record 0-2 for the same idea, is proof of that.
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
Meeting David Gardner
David Gardner is one of the nation's most successful angel investors. By combining an excellent due diligence team, heavy hands-on involvement, and a keen sense for what it takes to make it, Gardner has found returns in angel investing that first draw in, and then inevitably escape the thousands of others who decide to try their hand at the art. The man knows what he's talking about.
So I was stoked to meet him. I drove into Cary on a rainy Wednesday morning, excited to share Morph's plans, visions, and progress. I've had such positive feedback from everyone and on everything these past months that my confidence was high that this meeting would go similarly.
I walk into his office, shake his hand. Before my butt even touches the chair, he turns and says, "so, you're the guy who's competing with Uber."
No supportive smile, no compliments- straight to business. I make my point that Uber's recent arrival into the delivery space makes things harder, but could be a great opportunity for a quick exit, if we scale quickly enough.
He's not having any of it. It was the most efficiently negative meeting I've ever had. Immediately, without hearing anything about what we've done (which, admittedly, is not much) he says that it's time to drop the idea and move on. More than a pivot- a complete hop in another direction. He starts throwing around ideas- like getting into the cooler industry to sell to Uber. No advice on competing. Nothing about scaling. Not a single "good job so far" that I had come to expect.
I walked out of that meeting defeated. Here was one of the most astute investors in the country telling me that all that Morph is, all that I've spent 14 months working on, all that I've invested thousands of dollars I don't have into is less than worthless- it's detrimental.
Hearing such criticism after months of positive feedback is painful. It hurts because I've never had it before. Sure, Jim Kitchen critiqued my pizza delivery idea a year ago, but that was 2 weeks into a class project, with nothing committed. This was different. This was personal. This hurt more than I might admit. But it was also, in some screwed up ways, refreshing.
The next 30 minutes of dramatic lonely walking through rainy, bleak Cary was a hard self-reflection. It hurt. But, I realized- why bother being down? Who would it help, and how? Nobody, and not in anyway, is the conclusion I came to.
So I brought myself to Caribou Coffee, ordered the most sugary, candy-esque coffee I could find, and started writing. I wrote everything I knew about delivery. I listed problems, existing solutions, communication issues. I put stakeholders, weak points, and uniquities of the industry. I created a few small business plans, got excited about one, and wrote it out.
There's something fun about being well dressed in a coffee shop, latte in one hand, pen in another, writing business plans. Kinda like a boring transition scene in a low budget indie film.
Point is, I came out of it with a plan. Maybe not a good one. Maybe even a dumb one. But a bad decision is better than indecision. I need to remain positive. Aware enough to respect the advice of people like David Gardner. Confident enough to believe in myself and the company. Optimistic enough to defeat adversity, in my mind if not yet in reality.
I'll keep you updated, internet.
So I was stoked to meet him. I drove into Cary on a rainy Wednesday morning, excited to share Morph's plans, visions, and progress. I've had such positive feedback from everyone and on everything these past months that my confidence was high that this meeting would go similarly.
I walk into his office, shake his hand. Before my butt even touches the chair, he turns and says, "so, you're the guy who's competing with Uber."
No supportive smile, no compliments- straight to business. I make my point that Uber's recent arrival into the delivery space makes things harder, but could be a great opportunity for a quick exit, if we scale quickly enough.
He's not having any of it. It was the most efficiently negative meeting I've ever had. Immediately, without hearing anything about what we've done (which, admittedly, is not much) he says that it's time to drop the idea and move on. More than a pivot- a complete hop in another direction. He starts throwing around ideas- like getting into the cooler industry to sell to Uber. No advice on competing. Nothing about scaling. Not a single "good job so far" that I had come to expect.
I walked out of that meeting defeated. Here was one of the most astute investors in the country telling me that all that Morph is, all that I've spent 14 months working on, all that I've invested thousands of dollars I don't have into is less than worthless- it's detrimental.
Hearing such criticism after months of positive feedback is painful. It hurts because I've never had it before. Sure, Jim Kitchen critiqued my pizza delivery idea a year ago, but that was 2 weeks into a class project, with nothing committed. This was different. This was personal. This hurt more than I might admit. But it was also, in some screwed up ways, refreshing.
The next 30 minutes of dramatic lonely walking through rainy, bleak Cary was a hard self-reflection. It hurt. But, I realized- why bother being down? Who would it help, and how? Nobody, and not in anyway, is the conclusion I came to.
So I brought myself to Caribou Coffee, ordered the most sugary, candy-esque coffee I could find, and started writing. I wrote everything I knew about delivery. I listed problems, existing solutions, communication issues. I put stakeholders, weak points, and uniquities of the industry. I created a few small business plans, got excited about one, and wrote it out.
There's something fun about being well dressed in a coffee shop, latte in one hand, pen in another, writing business plans. Kinda like a boring transition scene in a low budget indie film.
Point is, I came out of it with a plan. Maybe not a good one. Maybe even a dumb one. But a bad decision is better than indecision. I need to remain positive. Aware enough to respect the advice of people like David Gardner. Confident enough to believe in myself and the company. Optimistic enough to defeat adversity, in my mind if not yet in reality.
I'll keep you updated, internet.
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
The Pitch
I was raised without fear of public speaking. Speaking in front of an audience is not just non-threatening to me. It's exciting.
It seems that that would make me an exception. Last Thursday, I got the chance to attend two pitch events. The first was an Idea Pitch hosted by IDEA Fund at Launch. Representatives from three startups came by to pitch their ideas. The first was delivered by pros- it was concise, well expressed, and impressive. A second was a well rehearsed pitch by an inexperienced entrepreneur, but a strong speaker. The last was a mess. He was a middle-aged entrepreneur who had been part of an accelerator for 5 months and, in theory, had the chance to be critiqued and coached on his delivery. He bumbled and stumbled on so far over the time limit, and with so little direction, that the judges were forced to interrupt him and say, "I have no idea what you've said, but I don't know a single thing about your company."
Lesson learned: be concise, well rehearsed, and have a framework for your pitch. Skills that many, apparently, do not have.
Later that evening, I volunteered at the Startup Grind's event at which they brought in big time angel investor David Gardner for a talk and a Q&A. My job was to sit at the registration desk and sign people in. I was also told to recruit guests for an impromptu 30-second pitch-off, the winner of which gets a private conversation with David Gardner. A chance for The Triangle's entrepreneurs to pitch their ventures in front of the region's top investor and 50 other entrepreneurs? To earn a chance to practice their pitch, invite guests to ask questions, and get feedback from and placed on the radar of the region's top investor? Sounds like an easy pitch!
But try as I might, no one seemed up for it. 50 entrepreneurs, each with their own startup, and no one could be convinced to make the pitch. "We're not ready," or "we won't win," or "I'm not in the right mindset," or "I don't know, I haven't really practiced." All of these excuses bounced off of my disbelieving ears. When else might any of us get the chance to pitch David Gardner?
Finally, after dozens of flat out 'no's, a few hesitant declines, a couple nervous laughs, and one person who eagerly signed up, then nervously crossed his name off, then came back to sign up again, then returned 10 minutes later to remove his name off the list once more, one brave soul signed up. He was clearly not prepared or well practiced. He had not done anything like this in the past. But I convinced him of the worth of the opportunity- both as a self-development exercise and a chance to pitch his venture.
So, as he was the only one who had agreed, I would join him. He and I go up to pitch. He delivers his written out word for word on a piece of paper, reaching a minute in length, and in-concise, but nevertheless brave pitch. I give mine- a 30 second hot points of our value, our market size, and our traction to date.
I won, but I was more proud of the man than of myself. He did something difficult. He challenged himself. He put himself in an uncomfortable situation which no one in the entire room was brave enough to do.
Lesson learned: Public speaking really does seem to be America's greatest fear. I am grateful to my upbringing that I am invigorated by speaking instead of turned off. It won me a private meeting with Gardner tomorrow morning, that I look forward to taking advantage of.
To anyone who hasn't spoken in public at least once- go get on stage and preform stand up comedy. If you bomb, you'll never be afraid of speaking again. And if you do well, you'll be addicted.
It seems that that would make me an exception. Last Thursday, I got the chance to attend two pitch events. The first was an Idea Pitch hosted by IDEA Fund at Launch. Representatives from three startups came by to pitch their ideas. The first was delivered by pros- it was concise, well expressed, and impressive. A second was a well rehearsed pitch by an inexperienced entrepreneur, but a strong speaker. The last was a mess. He was a middle-aged entrepreneur who had been part of an accelerator for 5 months and, in theory, had the chance to be critiqued and coached on his delivery. He bumbled and stumbled on so far over the time limit, and with so little direction, that the judges were forced to interrupt him and say, "I have no idea what you've said, but I don't know a single thing about your company."
Lesson learned: be concise, well rehearsed, and have a framework for your pitch. Skills that many, apparently, do not have.
Later that evening, I volunteered at the Startup Grind's event at which they brought in big time angel investor David Gardner for a talk and a Q&A. My job was to sit at the registration desk and sign people in. I was also told to recruit guests for an impromptu 30-second pitch-off, the winner of which gets a private conversation with David Gardner. A chance for The Triangle's entrepreneurs to pitch their ventures in front of the region's top investor and 50 other entrepreneurs? To earn a chance to practice their pitch, invite guests to ask questions, and get feedback from and placed on the radar of the region's top investor? Sounds like an easy pitch!
But try as I might, no one seemed up for it. 50 entrepreneurs, each with their own startup, and no one could be convinced to make the pitch. "We're not ready," or "we won't win," or "I'm not in the right mindset," or "I don't know, I haven't really practiced." All of these excuses bounced off of my disbelieving ears. When else might any of us get the chance to pitch David Gardner?
Finally, after dozens of flat out 'no's, a few hesitant declines, a couple nervous laughs, and one person who eagerly signed up, then nervously crossed his name off, then came back to sign up again, then returned 10 minutes later to remove his name off the list once more, one brave soul signed up. He was clearly not prepared or well practiced. He had not done anything like this in the past. But I convinced him of the worth of the opportunity- both as a self-development exercise and a chance to pitch his venture.
So, as he was the only one who had agreed, I would join him. He and I go up to pitch. He delivers his written out word for word on a piece of paper, reaching a minute in length, and in-concise, but nevertheless brave pitch. I give mine- a 30 second hot points of our value, our market size, and our traction to date.
I won, but I was more proud of the man than of myself. He did something difficult. He challenged himself. He put himself in an uncomfortable situation which no one in the entire room was brave enough to do.
Lesson learned: Public speaking really does seem to be America's greatest fear. I am grateful to my upbringing that I am invigorated by speaking instead of turned off. It won me a private meeting with Gardner tomorrow morning, that I look forward to taking advantage of.
To anyone who hasn't spoken in public at least once- go get on stage and preform stand up comedy. If you bomb, you'll never be afraid of speaking again. And if you do well, you'll be addicted.
Saturday, October 10, 2015
Strife
It wouldn't be fun if it weren't hard, I guess.
Over a month ago, we had our initial test- and it worked. It led to the first and only blog post I ever publicly published. We were ecstatic, the customer was pleased, and the future seemed bright.
Somehow, that seems to have been our peak. While we've done at least a test run a week since using the Morph app the first time, problems keep arising. Orders are getting inexplicably reassigned. The app continually crashes. Glitch after glitch keeps us from being able to expand the way we need to.
Last Wednesday, we gave it another shot. We were confident that we did everything we needed to make it work. Everything was seamless in test mode- live was going to go great. Until it didn't. Minutes into the first order, our system reassigned the order from Danny to driver 0. The second order (supposed to go to Ellis) switched back and forth between the two of them, leading to confusion.
The frustration is that our limitations are currently technical, not on the sales end. We cannot build until we have foundation, and it seems that our foundation is soggy and full of holes. My feeling of helplessness in this situation is a whole other post that I'm sure will come soon.
However, I remain optimistic. I know our potential is enormous, and I'm confident our technical talent can solve the issues we're facing. We took out the excess ruffles in the server and simplified what we've got across each layer of code. The app update was pushed yesterday, and it will hopefully be approved by tomorrow, which would give us a chance to try it. If this doesn't work...well, why bother thinking like that? Let's assume it will work, and deal with the alternative if it arises.
Over a month ago, we had our initial test- and it worked. It led to the first and only blog post I ever publicly published. We were ecstatic, the customer was pleased, and the future seemed bright.
Somehow, that seems to have been our peak. While we've done at least a test run a week since using the Morph app the first time, problems keep arising. Orders are getting inexplicably reassigned. The app continually crashes. Glitch after glitch keeps us from being able to expand the way we need to.
Last Wednesday, we gave it another shot. We were confident that we did everything we needed to make it work. Everything was seamless in test mode- live was going to go great. Until it didn't. Minutes into the first order, our system reassigned the order from Danny to driver 0. The second order (supposed to go to Ellis) switched back and forth between the two of them, leading to confusion.
The frustration is that our limitations are currently technical, not on the sales end. We cannot build until we have foundation, and it seems that our foundation is soggy and full of holes. My feeling of helplessness in this situation is a whole other post that I'm sure will come soon.
However, I remain optimistic. I know our potential is enormous, and I'm confident our technical talent can solve the issues we're facing. We took out the excess ruffles in the server and simplified what we've got across each layer of code. The app update was pushed yesterday, and it will hopefully be approved by tomorrow, which would give us a chance to try it. If this doesn't work...well, why bother thinking like that? Let's assume it will work, and deal with the alternative if it arises.
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
Do whachya gotta do
Our plan was to launch in Chapel Hill with the Morph app on August 31st. Well, didn't that just go to shit.
Getting Takeout Central to implement our software took weeks longer than expected. One, two three, four App store updates have not been enough to solve the bugs we find. I'm sure a few more are crawling around the software, waiting to cause us heartaches. The design quality of the website and app...let's not even go there.
On top of all the technology issues, Takeout Central just went on a hiring spree in Chapel Hill, and doesn't need us here. They won't need us for at least a month, by which time their drivers will start getting bored of their jobs and start quitting. Then, finally, we can start working in Chapel Hill. Probably. Hopefully.
We could wait until we've got everything fixed to start working. We could wait until they really need us in Chapel Hill to do things. But that's boring, its slow, and it's impossibly inefficient.
Our customer has problems, and our job is to solve them. Sure, it would be great if it happened our way. But for now, we do it whatever way we can.
Hiring in Durham has been difficult for Takeout Central. Most days, especially the rainy ones we've had this week (thank you startup gods for those), their drivers they have can't handle the influx of orders. That's where the first few dedicated Morphers come in. Danny, Brandon, Will, Ellis...the dream team of Morph delivery drivers that does whatever it takes to solve customer problems.
Instead of using our own app, we've been using Takeout Central's. Instead of driving in Chapel Hill, we're focusing on Durham. Instead of paying drivers $3 per delivery, we're paying $4. But we're not waiting to solve problems until we're ready to do so. We do things now.
That is what got us to $1,000 in revenue. Our first stack! We're not popping champagne (yet) and know that we have little to celebrate beyond a mostly meaningless bottom line number. But we're learning every day. Our customer is learning that they can- and might need to- rely on us. We're proving our commitment and our value. And- more importantly- we're having a ton of fun.
Monday, September 21, 2015
Ups and Downs
Last Friday, we had our first heavy load of delivery. Danny and Ellis, our two superstar delivery fellas, were on the road taking orders. From 5-9, they were pounding them out efficiently and enthusiastically. We got 14 orders in that evening. I had predicted 9 a day...we did 14 in just 2 hours.
Ladies and gentlemen, Morph has made $28 in profit.
Takeout Central was pleased with our work. They didn't quote a single order over 60 minutes, and everything was delivered well and without complaint. Sending orders was easy, order numbers were pulled properly, and status updates were sent on time. I sat with Oscar and David watching it all happen. There were a few issues, but we were ecstatic. We were up.
But there are still things to fix, both technologically and in the business model. We've got an issue where orders are sent to all online drivers instead of just the one it's been assigned to, and it seems to have temporarily stumped Oscar and David. I worry that our basic design (kept rugged and simple to save money) may scaring off drivers. A lot of potential issues may continue to arise.
On the business side, I continue to worry about convincing customers of our value as more than an overflow service. To work, we need to be at a large enough scale to provide our drivers with business. Otherwise, its valueless. But it seems counter-intuitive to our customers to pay a premium on a service not yet validated while they already have a solution that works. They've already got drivers. They just finished a hiring spree, unsure if we will actually work, and they've got an excess. Where do we fit in? How do we work? What value do we provide? Sometimes, there is reason so be down.
But that is all just an opportunity to take on the challenge and improve. The ups are easy. The downs is where the real excitement comes into play. I believe in our technology and our business. I am confident in the value Morph can provide. Let's see what we can do.
Tuesday, September 15, 2015
An Atomic New Year
It's the Jewish New Year, so congrats to everyone who knows and who doesn't- but you've made it through another round of judgement. Clearly, our year of vigilant Shabbat prayer, annual Tashlikh, and determined commitment to tzedakah and the kosher lifestyle have spared us from God's anger, and has us written into the Book of Life for one more year. This deserves a great celebration!
Oh, you didn't do all of these things? Well, you must have slipped through the cracks. Which, if anything, earns even more respect and commemoration. What are you going to do about it?
New year or not, every day is a chance to accept and create a change. Every day is an opportunity to confidently assert to yourself- and to the world- that you are on this planet as a forceful sandstorm that can shift entire coastlines, not a grain on a beach susceptible to the slightest winds.
I, like many of you, forgot to keep kosher this past year. So to ask forgiveness for this, and my many other sins of the year, I decided to attend a Rosh Hashanah service at the Carrboro Hilton Inn. Yep, that's how we Jew it in North Carolina.
The Rabbi introduced a powerful metaphor, which I would like to share and turn into a challenge. We live in an atomic age. Less than a century ago, destroying a nation took armies of immense size and force, and more combined human and financial capital than has ever been devoted to any single task in history. Today we live in an age where the splitting of one atom- one little nothing so small and insignificant that we cannot see, imagine, and whose insignificance we cannot comprehend- can topple the strongest nation in minutes.
The individual human is in a similar position. A hundred years ago, only large institutions and a few select mega-rich could force their view of the world. Governments, universities, and industrialists blew the winds of change, while the general populace lamented and was swirled around, like the grains of sand that we were.
Today, each of us is an atomic bomb. We have the potential, the desire, and the access to opportunity to do something bigger, bolder, and more courageous than has ever been done before. We can inspire the world to our view. We can create the art we want to see. We can build the industries we know should exist. Inside each of us is this insanely passionate need to EXPLODE.
But still, traditionalists go around persuading us that we are not atomic bombs, but mere arrows. Our only power, they say, comes from the force of being one unknown, forgotten archer in an army of thousands.
My challenge to myself this New Year is to remember that that is a lie. If I want to do something no one else believes possible, I can. If I want to take risks, I can. If I want to forge my own path, and create the world I want to live in instead of fight in someone else's army, I can. I more than can- I have an obligation to myself to do so. I have- we all have- the force of an atomic bomb.
L'Shana Tova and Happy New Year to you all.
-Adriel
Oh, you didn't do all of these things? Well, you must have slipped through the cracks. Which, if anything, earns even more respect and commemoration. What are you going to do about it?
New year or not, every day is a chance to accept and create a change. Every day is an opportunity to confidently assert to yourself- and to the world- that you are on this planet as a forceful sandstorm that can shift entire coastlines, not a grain on a beach susceptible to the slightest winds.
I, like many of you, forgot to keep kosher this past year. So to ask forgiveness for this, and my many other sins of the year, I decided to attend a Rosh Hashanah service at the Carrboro Hilton Inn. Yep, that's how we Jew it in North Carolina.
The Rabbi introduced a powerful metaphor, which I would like to share and turn into a challenge. We live in an atomic age. Less than a century ago, destroying a nation took armies of immense size and force, and more combined human and financial capital than has ever been devoted to any single task in history. Today we live in an age where the splitting of one atom- one little nothing so small and insignificant that we cannot see, imagine, and whose insignificance we cannot comprehend- can topple the strongest nation in minutes.
The individual human is in a similar position. A hundred years ago, only large institutions and a few select mega-rich could force their view of the world. Governments, universities, and industrialists blew the winds of change, while the general populace lamented and was swirled around, like the grains of sand that we were.
Today, each of us is an atomic bomb. We have the potential, the desire, and the access to opportunity to do something bigger, bolder, and more courageous than has ever been done before. We can inspire the world to our view. We can create the art we want to see. We can build the industries we know should exist. Inside each of us is this insanely passionate need to EXPLODE.
But still, traditionalists go around persuading us that we are not atomic bombs, but mere arrows. Our only power, they say, comes from the force of being one unknown, forgotten archer in an army of thousands.
My challenge to myself this New Year is to remember that that is a lie. If I want to do something no one else believes possible, I can. If I want to take risks, I can. If I want to forge my own path, and create the world I want to live in instead of fight in someone else's army, I can. I more than can- I have an obligation to myself to do so. I have- we all have- the force of an atomic bomb.
L'Shana Tova and Happy New Year to you all.
-Adriel
Friday, September 4, 2015
The Beta Test
September 3, 2015.
After a few weeks of delays, we finally made it to the beta test. It was frustrating to keep putting it off, but let's always remain positive. Perhaps it was a boon to us that we were delayed. I'm not certain we would have been ready at the time we optimistically planned on deploying our software. But in the spirit of worry free entrepreneurship, we did all we could to speed things up, and had nothing but joy once the day came.
After successfully running tests yesterday evening with fake orders, we were ready for some live ones. My friend Will Fedder, a loyal Morpher (I hope), and I logged on at 8pm, and got to work. 8:01: no orders. 8:02: I'm freaking out. So much for worry free. Two whole minutes had passed, and we still don't have an order to deliver. What was wrong? Did we mess up? Did the technology not work? Do I need to go find a real job?
8:03: orders and relief come flowing in. We each get our assignment- Will to Artisan, myself to the Town Hall Grill. Yay! For a second. Then right away the problems start. We realize we don't have the order number Tar Heel Takeout gives restaurants to identify orders- oops. We'll have to ask for the specific food. But then it seems that we don't actually get the entire order listed in the app- another glitch! Looks like we'll just need to ask for any order they have for Tar Heel Takeout, and hope for the best. Fake it till you make it, I guess.
Another big problem arises with tips. It seems our system overrides whatever Tar Heel Takeout has, and cancels out all tips unless they are re-entered. So we make a plan for Oscar to text Will and myself as each order comes in with the tip amount, so we can enter it manually at the customer's door. Not ideal, but it will have to do.
I pick up tacos from the Town Hall Grill for my hungry friend, and drive onward to her house. A few things have gone wrong, but a lot hasn't. We were able to accept orders. Two drivers were simultaneously available. We sent status updates back to Tar Heel Takeout. The directions were correct. A lot was going right.
I pull up to the house, run up to the door with a bag of succulently aromatic tacos in hand, and ring the bell. A joke and a pleasant smile later, and I'm back in my car, taking notes on what happened, what can be improved, and my opinion on the experience. I do this after every new experience, meeting, or project. Any information about what went well or poorly should be recorded honestly and immediately, to be able to really understand how the business needs to change, and how it does.
No new orders come in, so I have a minute to relax, and think. And I realize- a year of work later, ranging from my first day in the GLOBE course in Fall 2014, through Pitch Parties and Carolina Challenges, through pivots and customer calls, and we made a delivery! One actual, real delivery. A unit of economic activity, measurable if not tangible, was created off of our hard work and lofty goals.
The text I sent Danny upon realizing this was at 8:33pm, on September 3rd It read as such:
"Mariska ordered tacos from the Town Hall Grill. She tipped me $5.26. She had a lovely smile.
Morph's first customer."
It felt good. It still feels good, at 2:30 am that night. But if felt great then. So good, that I decided to stop by Harris Teeter before any more orders came in, and pick up a few bottles of champagne. I had some serious celebrating to plan for, and I earned it. I made $5.26, so the logical thing to do is to spend $24 on cheap alcohol. Well, life is for living, is it not?
I stop the car in front of my house, planning to toss the champagne in the fridge before going off for more deliveries. I open the door, stick my foot out, and some greater force decides to play a prank. My phone slips off my lap, bounces twice, and falls right into the sewage gutter.
Yeah.
I'm in shock. Not too upset about the physical phone, and not even so annoyed that I can't keep delivering. Just amused at the joke being pulled by the highest beings of prop comedy, appreciative of its great unfortunate irony. After something went so right, and I decide to celebrate it, a silly, silly event throws a wrench into my high. Ugh.
But thank God for neighbors. My wonderfully resourceful and level-headed neighbor comes out of the house with a pair of grill tongs. I reach down, retrieve my phone, and spin her in joy. Shaking my fist to the skies in irreverent disregard for their ill humor, I climb back into my car, and drive on.
It was a slow night, and I got a text telling us that were no longer needed. One delivery each is all we got, but its all we needed for testing, and all I needed to celebrate. I walk into the Tar Heel Takeout office, proudly brandishing a bottle of Andre's finest champagne. The dispatchers, the CEO, and I all toast an exciting future. We toast potential, and camaraderie. We toast change, and progress. We toast lots of happy things, confident in a bright and exciting few months ahead.
In reality, we just raise our glasses and chant 'skol'. But in my mind, I toasted all these things. I was proud. I am proud. Of Oscar and David's amazing work. Of Wes and Charles' willingness to take a chance on us, and their support. Of May's contribution for the better part of a year. For all we've done together. I'm proud. I'm excited. I'm ready.
Let's begin.
After a few weeks of delays, we finally made it to the beta test. It was frustrating to keep putting it off, but let's always remain positive. Perhaps it was a boon to us that we were delayed. I'm not certain we would have been ready at the time we optimistically planned on deploying our software. But in the spirit of worry free entrepreneurship, we did all we could to speed things up, and had nothing but joy once the day came.
After successfully running tests yesterday evening with fake orders, we were ready for some live ones. My friend Will Fedder, a loyal Morpher (I hope), and I logged on at 8pm, and got to work. 8:01: no orders. 8:02: I'm freaking out. So much for worry free. Two whole minutes had passed, and we still don't have an order to deliver. What was wrong? Did we mess up? Did the technology not work? Do I need to go find a real job?
8:03: orders and relief come flowing in. We each get our assignment- Will to Artisan, myself to the Town Hall Grill. Yay! For a second. Then right away the problems start. We realize we don't have the order number Tar Heel Takeout gives restaurants to identify orders- oops. We'll have to ask for the specific food. But then it seems that we don't actually get the entire order listed in the app- another glitch! Looks like we'll just need to ask for any order they have for Tar Heel Takeout, and hope for the best. Fake it till you make it, I guess.
Another big problem arises with tips. It seems our system overrides whatever Tar Heel Takeout has, and cancels out all tips unless they are re-entered. So we make a plan for Oscar to text Will and myself as each order comes in with the tip amount, so we can enter it manually at the customer's door. Not ideal, but it will have to do.
I pick up tacos from the Town Hall Grill for my hungry friend, and drive onward to her house. A few things have gone wrong, but a lot hasn't. We were able to accept orders. Two drivers were simultaneously available. We sent status updates back to Tar Heel Takeout. The directions were correct. A lot was going right.
I pull up to the house, run up to the door with a bag of succulently aromatic tacos in hand, and ring the bell. A joke and a pleasant smile later, and I'm back in my car, taking notes on what happened, what can be improved, and my opinion on the experience. I do this after every new experience, meeting, or project. Any information about what went well or poorly should be recorded honestly and immediately, to be able to really understand how the business needs to change, and how it does.
No new orders come in, so I have a minute to relax, and think. And I realize- a year of work later, ranging from my first day in the GLOBE course in Fall 2014, through Pitch Parties and Carolina Challenges, through pivots and customer calls, and we made a delivery! One actual, real delivery. A unit of economic activity, measurable if not tangible, was created off of our hard work and lofty goals.
The text I sent Danny upon realizing this was at 8:33pm, on September 3rd It read as such:
"Mariska ordered tacos from the Town Hall Grill. She tipped me $5.26. She had a lovely smile.
Morph's first customer."
It felt good. It still feels good, at 2:30 am that night. But if felt great then. So good, that I decided to stop by Harris Teeter before any more orders came in, and pick up a few bottles of champagne. I had some serious celebrating to plan for, and I earned it. I made $5.26, so the logical thing to do is to spend $24 on cheap alcohol. Well, life is for living, is it not?
I stop the car in front of my house, planning to toss the champagne in the fridge before going off for more deliveries. I open the door, stick my foot out, and some greater force decides to play a prank. My phone slips off my lap, bounces twice, and falls right into the sewage gutter.
Yeah.
I'm in shock. Not too upset about the physical phone, and not even so annoyed that I can't keep delivering. Just amused at the joke being pulled by the highest beings of prop comedy, appreciative of its great unfortunate irony. After something went so right, and I decide to celebrate it, a silly, silly event throws a wrench into my high. Ugh.
But thank God for neighbors. My wonderfully resourceful and level-headed neighbor comes out of the house with a pair of grill tongs. I reach down, retrieve my phone, and spin her in joy. Shaking my fist to the skies in irreverent disregard for their ill humor, I climb back into my car, and drive on.
It was a slow night, and I got a text telling us that were no longer needed. One delivery each is all we got, but its all we needed for testing, and all I needed to celebrate. I walk into the Tar Heel Takeout office, proudly brandishing a bottle of Andre's finest champagne. The dispatchers, the CEO, and I all toast an exciting future. We toast potential, and camaraderie. We toast change, and progress. We toast lots of happy things, confident in a bright and exciting few months ahead.
In reality, we just raise our glasses and chant 'skol'. But in my mind, I toasted all these things. I was proud. I am proud. Of Oscar and David's amazing work. Of Wes and Charles' willingness to take a chance on us, and their support. Of May's contribution for the better part of a year. For all we've done together. I'm proud. I'm excited. I'm ready.
Let's begin.
Yes man
Update: 9/4/2015
I wrote this post 5 months ago, around April of 2015. I've kept it in drafts until now, because nothing had been official, and I didn't want to ruin any good luck. But here it is- a post about the final pivot that led us to today's Morph.
_ _ _
It isn't always easy to get yourself to work when starting a company. It often seems easier to stay in, or hang with your friends who are soon graduating and running off all over the country to their respective jobs (high paying and health-insurance-providing jobs, as my mother might remind me).
But like it or not, that's the job I chose. It can, admittedly, sometimes seem dull. Scanning the web for the best background check website isn't thrilling work. It can be disheartening, as it was when looking for technical partners, and being rejected time and time again. And it is often nerve-wracking- is the idea good enough, am I good enough, am I working hard enough, is my execution fast enough. All of these questions cross my mind a dozen times a day, but I ignore them all and push through, telling myself that the answer to all of these is a simple, "Yes." Because it has to be, so why bother making it anything else?
However, the fun of entrepreneurship is that the little wins mean so much more than the worst losses. One little win came a few months back and started with an email.
Someone, it seems, had noticed one of my posts in search of a technical partner, and took a liking to my business idea. Wes Garrison sent me an email, inviting me to speak to him and his partner, Charles, at their Chapel Hill office. They were both board members of the National Restaurant Marketing & Delivery Association (which, apparently, exists). They were interested in speaking to me further, and, perhaps, helping me out.
"Sweet." That was my first thought. I looked them up, and there they were- high up on the board of directors of an organization that represented major delivery services around the country. I answered immediately, and scheduled the meeting. But what did they want from me?
"Oh" was my next thought. In addition to their roles in the NMDA, they also happened to be the co-founders of Takeout Central (formerly Tar Heel Takout), the largest local to-be competitor Morph would have. If Morph was an up and coming cereal brand, these guys were Raisin Bran. Sure, they're not quite Frosted Flakes, but they're a force to be reckoned with.
I figured they must be asking to meet me in order to learn what I've already been able to do, and what my plans were. They either wanted to put me out of the business before I got into it and became a threat, or offer me a job with them, just to keep me close by. I had a minor freak out, and considered cancelling the meeting. Why should I subject myself to this? There is nothing I can possibly gain from giving away information to a competitor. This seems stupid.
I frantically started writing our pros and cons lists (like I do with all major decisions. Even today's lunch. I'm glad there were enough pros of the Cosmic mini-burrito to outweigh Jasmine Mediterranean Chicken Zakki, because it was delicious!) I started googling "meeting with competitors" and "getting to know competition", looking for advice in my decision where ever I might find it.
In the end, I decided to go. Not because I thought it was a good idea- I didn't- but because I had made a commitment. I'd rather be thought foolish than a flake. So, foolish me went to the meeting, resolved to stay quiet about any plans I had for Morph.
Walking into their office, I shook their hands, and had a seat. And then they started talking. And talking. Sometimes I listened. Sometimes I zoned out. But then, I started listening more. It seems, they were...pitching me? They were enticed by the idea of someone managing their drivers. It seemed great to them that no one had done this in the past, and this would relieve an enormous stress of their work, allowing them to focus on customer service and restaurant relationships.
"Have you noticed the recent investment into food delivery? Door Dash, Postmates, Munchery- everyone on the west coast is getting major investments and expanding cross country, but they're not doing anything different from what we've been doing for 20 years! It's infuriating!"
I agreed with everything they were saying, but couldn't quite wrap my head around it. They had misunderstood my business model, but what they had thought of was brilliant! We'd be seeling pick axes to the miners- they needed it like they needed any tool, but there was so much more to focus on! If we can provide drivers to Takeout Central and private restaurants with efficiency and at a cost to compete with doing it themselves, that could be huge! Even better is that with their contacts through the NMDA, Wes and Charles could help Morph grow. They'd recommend our service, and even invest in us, if it guaranteed that the big players couldn't gain access to the little markets.
I walked out of that meeting in slight shock. An opportunity just opened for an enormous pivot- to switch Morph from a tech-savvy restaurant delivery services to the company supplying RDS with their biggest need. I still hadn't said much the entire meeting, but that wasn't at all of lack of interest, or intent of secrecy. It was awe that I had missed such a brilliant business model, so much simpler and easier to implement than Morph's original.
And if I had missed that meeting? If I had declined it, or ignored the email in the first place? I'd build a product that would still work, but I'd be competing for a service that required triple the effort on my part. Here, there was an opportunity unmatched to anything I had previously considered. Now, we are on our way.
Let's see where this takes us. I'm as curious as you are.
Actually, probably a lot more curious.
-A
I wrote this post 5 months ago, around April of 2015. I've kept it in drafts until now, because nothing had been official, and I didn't want to ruin any good luck. But here it is- a post about the final pivot that led us to today's Morph.
_ _ _
It isn't always easy to get yourself to work when starting a company. It often seems easier to stay in, or hang with your friends who are soon graduating and running off all over the country to their respective jobs (high paying and health-insurance-providing jobs, as my mother might remind me).
But like it or not, that's the job I chose. It can, admittedly, sometimes seem dull. Scanning the web for the best background check website isn't thrilling work. It can be disheartening, as it was when looking for technical partners, and being rejected time and time again. And it is often nerve-wracking- is the idea good enough, am I good enough, am I working hard enough, is my execution fast enough. All of these questions cross my mind a dozen times a day, but I ignore them all and push through, telling myself that the answer to all of these is a simple, "Yes." Because it has to be, so why bother making it anything else?
However, the fun of entrepreneurship is that the little wins mean so much more than the worst losses. One little win came a few months back and started with an email.
Someone, it seems, had noticed one of my posts in search of a technical partner, and took a liking to my business idea. Wes Garrison sent me an email, inviting me to speak to him and his partner, Charles, at their Chapel Hill office. They were both board members of the National Restaurant Marketing & Delivery Association (which, apparently, exists). They were interested in speaking to me further, and, perhaps, helping me out.
"Sweet." That was my first thought. I looked them up, and there they were- high up on the board of directors of an organization that represented major delivery services around the country. I answered immediately, and scheduled the meeting. But what did they want from me?
"Oh" was my next thought. In addition to their roles in the NMDA, they also happened to be the co-founders of Takeout Central (formerly Tar Heel Takout), the largest local to-be competitor Morph would have. If Morph was an up and coming cereal brand, these guys were Raisin Bran. Sure, they're not quite Frosted Flakes, but they're a force to be reckoned with.
I figured they must be asking to meet me in order to learn what I've already been able to do, and what my plans were. They either wanted to put me out of the business before I got into it and became a threat, or offer me a job with them, just to keep me close by. I had a minor freak out, and considered cancelling the meeting. Why should I subject myself to this? There is nothing I can possibly gain from giving away information to a competitor. This seems stupid.
I frantically started writing our pros and cons lists (like I do with all major decisions. Even today's lunch. I'm glad there were enough pros of the Cosmic mini-burrito to outweigh Jasmine Mediterranean Chicken Zakki, because it was delicious!) I started googling "meeting with competitors" and "getting to know competition", looking for advice in my decision where ever I might find it.
In the end, I decided to go. Not because I thought it was a good idea- I didn't- but because I had made a commitment. I'd rather be thought foolish than a flake. So, foolish me went to the meeting, resolved to stay quiet about any plans I had for Morph.
Walking into their office, I shook their hands, and had a seat. And then they started talking. And talking. Sometimes I listened. Sometimes I zoned out. But then, I started listening more. It seems, they were...pitching me? They were enticed by the idea of someone managing their drivers. It seemed great to them that no one had done this in the past, and this would relieve an enormous stress of their work, allowing them to focus on customer service and restaurant relationships.
"Have you noticed the recent investment into food delivery? Door Dash, Postmates, Munchery- everyone on the west coast is getting major investments and expanding cross country, but they're not doing anything different from what we've been doing for 20 years! It's infuriating!"
I agreed with everything they were saying, but couldn't quite wrap my head around it. They had misunderstood my business model, but what they had thought of was brilliant! We'd be seeling pick axes to the miners- they needed it like they needed any tool, but there was so much more to focus on! If we can provide drivers to Takeout Central and private restaurants with efficiency and at a cost to compete with doing it themselves, that could be huge! Even better is that with their contacts through the NMDA, Wes and Charles could help Morph grow. They'd recommend our service, and even invest in us, if it guaranteed that the big players couldn't gain access to the little markets.
I walked out of that meeting in slight shock. An opportunity just opened for an enormous pivot- to switch Morph from a tech-savvy restaurant delivery services to the company supplying RDS with their biggest need. I still hadn't said much the entire meeting, but that wasn't at all of lack of interest, or intent of secrecy. It was awe that I had missed such a brilliant business model, so much simpler and easier to implement than Morph's original.
And if I had missed that meeting? If I had declined it, or ignored the email in the first place? I'd build a product that would still work, but I'd be competing for a service that required triple the effort on my part. Here, there was an opportunity unmatched to anything I had previously considered. Now, we are on our way.
Let's see where this takes us. I'm as curious as you are.
Actually, probably a lot more curious.
-A
Saturday, August 22, 2015
Worry Free Entrepreneurship
"Have you had your brick for the day?"
That is the question that Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey, founders of Barefoot Wine, would ask each other each day as they went through the tumultuous roller coaster of starting a company trying to compete with the most established players in one of the world's oldest industries.
Shit happens, is the way Mr. Gump would put it.
When founding a startup, the very nature of your work implies that nothing is perfect. More than that even- most things are imperfect. It takes a long time to go from blank canvas to Last Supper, and even the greatest talents have a flurry of discarded sketches, disgruntled assistants, and moments of despair and regret for their decision to pursue such an unlikely and far off outcome.
But isn't that what makes the whole process fun? If problems didn't happen, there would be no challenge to the task ahead. And if there were no challenge, the reward would be equally absent, for the prospect of success gets sweeter with every inch it travels away from us.
Preparation is the best bandage for unexpected "bricks in your day", but there is no cure. Realizing this, and not merely accepting it but embracing it can be the difference between an attitude of success, and one of failure.
Worrying seems to be a lasting feeling in the minds of the entrepreneurs I have met. Stress that a deal won't go through. An omnipresent anticipation of negative outcomes to guide the thought process of an artist in front of a blank canvas will lead to something much worse than a failed experiment- the canvas will remain blank.
So don't worry. Be happy. Keep preparing. Expect and appreciate that bricks will land on your head, and be excited to sweep up the ones you couldn't catch. Understand that if everything went your way all of the time, the whole job would get boring after a short while.
Chill out, life is good. A broken brick can be cleaned up, but worrying really puts a damper on your day.
That is the question that Michael Houlihan and Bonnie Harvey, founders of Barefoot Wine, would ask each other each day as they went through the tumultuous roller coaster of starting a company trying to compete with the most established players in one of the world's oldest industries.
Shit happens, is the way Mr. Gump would put it.
When founding a startup, the very nature of your work implies that nothing is perfect. More than that even- most things are imperfect. It takes a long time to go from blank canvas to Last Supper, and even the greatest talents have a flurry of discarded sketches, disgruntled assistants, and moments of despair and regret for their decision to pursue such an unlikely and far off outcome.
But isn't that what makes the whole process fun? If problems didn't happen, there would be no challenge to the task ahead. And if there were no challenge, the reward would be equally absent, for the prospect of success gets sweeter with every inch it travels away from us.
Preparation is the best bandage for unexpected "bricks in your day", but there is no cure. Realizing this, and not merely accepting it but embracing it can be the difference between an attitude of success, and one of failure.
Worrying seems to be a lasting feeling in the minds of the entrepreneurs I have met. Stress that a deal won't go through. An omnipresent anticipation of negative outcomes to guide the thought process of an artist in front of a blank canvas will lead to something much worse than a failed experiment- the canvas will remain blank.
So don't worry. Be happy. Keep preparing. Expect and appreciate that bricks will land on your head, and be excited to sweep up the ones you couldn't catch. Understand that if everything went your way all of the time, the whole job would get boring after a short while.
Chill out, life is good. A broken brick can be cleaned up, but worrying really puts a damper on your day.
Sunday, August 16, 2015
The Little Wins
Pizzah!
That was the first idea. Almost a year ago, a team consisting of a Dane, a Norwegian, a Hong Konger, and two Americans (a Chinese girl and a Russian guy) were told to think of a product. They came up with an easy and fun service to order pizza. BAM! Revolution.
A year of classes, models, ideas, designs, arguments, thoughtful discussions, sales pitches, adviser meetings, legal headaches, PowerPoints, venture competitions, employees, and Game of Thrones finales later, and Morph is now officially in the Apple App Store (Morph Delivery).
It hasn't been easy. Some of the struggles have been documented in this blog. Most are simply compilations of difficulties, like a hundred micro-fractures a week piling into one lump of pain. You solve one, another pops up. You have one idea, a dozen issues arise. After a while, the job resembles that of a firefighter (and, at points, the arsonist) than of the artist. You want to create, but you're building a pillar out of a Jenga set.
However, there are little victories, and those are what keep you going. The failure at November 2014's Pitch Party was matched and beat by a successful finish at the Carolina Challenge. The disappointing attempt at outsourcing tech to India (at the usually prudent advice of some fantastic advisers) was surpassed by the value of the talented and eager Oscar and David. The legal pains led to an official (and symbolically self-indulgent) Articles of Incorporation. Insurance fears led to a business model victory. And all of the other countless quarrels, fears, problems and issues are all outmatched by today- the pride at getting a concept accepted by a talent judge and available to the world.
Of course there is a long way to go before anything is truly validated. There are a dozen bugs to fix within the app. The website needs redesigning (anyone interested?) We've got a hundred ideas and improvements that need to be implemented over time. We've still got to make an actual delivery.
But we're making progress, and every tangible moment is a huge win. If a walk of 1,000 miles begins with a single step, well then, I think we must be on step 10.
Driver recruitment begins tomorrow. If you or a friend are in Chapel Hill, have a car, and want flexible, high paying work with a company that is ready to grow fast, visit www.ChooseMorph.com. Oh, and download the app.
-Adriel
Thursday, August 6, 2015
Advisors
One of the most valuable and, let's face it, the only resources available to an individual starting his first business are advisors. While investors have a lot of sagacity to offer, they expect something in return. While parents (at least mine) have opinions every which way and on every topic, they are not always well versed in the troubles plaguing you. Their worldly experiences are a huge boon, and their hope for your success a great motivator, but their perceived power over you can be distraction. Any stranger on the street or, more likely, sharing a shot at the local bar, has a brilliant piece of insight that you, with your meager million hours of thought on the topic, have probably not realized.
Therefore, a line must be drawn between advisors and those who want to offer advice. Everyone has something to add. Friends think you should do one thing, venture capitalists another, and your favorite bloggers a third. But advisors are the people you choose to surround yourself with who will listen because they want to, not because you are contracted to offer them anything but respect and gratitude in return. Advisors have experience in diverse fields that you believe can give them perspective into your own, and are able to leverage their knowledge and bend it to serve your needs. And advisors provide insight, advice and, perhaps most importantly, companionship on your journey.
Starting a company can be a lonely feeling. One small person, fighting the system that says to get a job and the world that just doesn't work the way you think it can. Friends and family care and support you, but few really understand what the struggle looks and feels like. And, truthfully, you try to put on a brave face in front of them all to let family know you aren't letting them down, and tell friends that your career is just as rewarding as theirs (sure, entrepreneurs don't get free weekly happy hours, or gym/sauna/massage memberships or much of a paycheck, but we're on the brink of something huge!!)
Advisors are there for this purpose. They have started companies or been around start ups often enough to appreciate your psyche. They are great sounding boards, great idea generators, and great sources of positivity. They'll provide support, critique, and neutral suggestions at times you need each the most.
So don't go off and think you can do things yourself. Hundreds of people, not too far from you, have something to offer. Whether support, advice, or guidance, surround oneself with people you trust and value can be the difference between failure and success, between quitting and persevering.
Therefore, a line must be drawn between advisors and those who want to offer advice. Everyone has something to add. Friends think you should do one thing, venture capitalists another, and your favorite bloggers a third. But advisors are the people you choose to surround yourself with who will listen because they want to, not because you are contracted to offer them anything but respect and gratitude in return. Advisors have experience in diverse fields that you believe can give them perspective into your own, and are able to leverage their knowledge and bend it to serve your needs. And advisors provide insight, advice and, perhaps most importantly, companionship on your journey.
Starting a company can be a lonely feeling. One small person, fighting the system that says to get a job and the world that just doesn't work the way you think it can. Friends and family care and support you, but few really understand what the struggle looks and feels like. And, truthfully, you try to put on a brave face in front of them all to let family know you aren't letting them down, and tell friends that your career is just as rewarding as theirs (sure, entrepreneurs don't get free weekly happy hours, or gym/sauna/massage memberships or much of a paycheck, but we're on the brink of something huge!!)
Advisors are there for this purpose. They have started companies or been around start ups often enough to appreciate your psyche. They are great sounding boards, great idea generators, and great sources of positivity. They'll provide support, critique, and neutral suggestions at times you need each the most.
So don't go off and think you can do things yourself. Hundreds of people, not too far from you, have something to offer. Whether support, advice, or guidance, surround oneself with people you trust and value can be the difference between failure and success, between quitting and persevering.
Friday, July 31, 2015
The app has been submitted!
Today, July 31st, the Morph driver app has officially been submitted to the Apple App Store. We have one week to wait and hope that what we've built is good enough to be accepted. It's a tough thing, and certainly a huge personal weakness, to have no ability to help the technology process. I feel, in many ways, helplessly incapable in a situation like this. I could do nothing but sit back and watch as Oscar and David work on coding the app. I had nothing to add, no background to help me edit and no knowledge to help structure and guide the process. All I could do was make more demands about functionality and design. If the app get's accepted, its a win for us all. A rejection means I, as the CEO, am responsible. I couldn't help build, and I couldn't attract the right talent to take over.
However, this is a lesson in the value of doing what you do best, and hiring superb individuals to do the rest. Sure, I can sit down and learn to code. But in the many weeks it would take me to get even a basic level of proficiency, I would miss out on developing the skills that my role requires. Additionally, would I ever actually get good enough to want to be coding my own projects? No- I want to be able to identify strong opportunities, recruit premier talent, and focus on building great companies.
Regardless, the app has been submitted, which is an exciting big step. Not as huge as getting accepted will be, but still a fun moment. Our website, www.ChooseMorph.com, went live a few days ago. It is still very raw, and few features are working as they should be, but the skeleton is there, and we're about to start adding some muscle.
If everything continues to go as planned, our beta launch will be the week of August 17th, followed by a full launch (small at first, to be scaled up weekly) on August 31st. I know I still haven't said anything about the pivot and our customer, but I'm waiting on legal confirmation before getting into anything. Our relationship has developed well, there is great trust and belief in helping each other. I am confident that we will be working together...but as much as I love getting in trouble, I'm going to have to play it safe with this one.
Soon, kids. Very soon.
-Adriel
However, this is a lesson in the value of doing what you do best, and hiring superb individuals to do the rest. Sure, I can sit down and learn to code. But in the many weeks it would take me to get even a basic level of proficiency, I would miss out on developing the skills that my role requires. Additionally, would I ever actually get good enough to want to be coding my own projects? No- I want to be able to identify strong opportunities, recruit premier talent, and focus on building great companies.
Regardless, the app has been submitted, which is an exciting big step. Not as huge as getting accepted will be, but still a fun moment. Our website, www.ChooseMorph.com, went live a few days ago. It is still very raw, and few features are working as they should be, but the skeleton is there, and we're about to start adding some muscle.
If everything continues to go as planned, our beta launch will be the week of August 17th, followed by a full launch (small at first, to be scaled up weekly) on August 31st. I know I still haven't said anything about the pivot and our customer, but I'm waiting on legal confirmation before getting into anything. Our relationship has developed well, there is great trust and belief in helping each other. I am confident that we will be working together...but as much as I love getting in trouble, I'm going to have to play it safe with this one.
Soon, kids. Very soon.
-Adriel
Sunday, July 26, 2015
The Juggler
While in Israel (on a business themed Birthright trip) a number of us were having the debate of the value of a non-technical CEO. The business guy shouldn't be leading the company, some said. He has nothing to contribute to the product, nothing to add to the company. Sure, managers are important, but do they actually do anything worthy of being a technology company's leader?
My response is that the CEO of a company, especially a startup in its most early days, needs to be a juggler. My own experience with Morph is highlighted by my need to be able to consistently manage multiple projects. I'm working with a dozen people in as many fields to create insurance policies and legal contracts, manage the customer relationship and the employees' work, consider investment and gather advisers. All of this is in addition to the actual work of building marketing strategies, designing the platform, writing the copy for the website, and everything else.
It isn't the easiest thing, juggling all these knives. You forget about one, or don't manage it properly, and the rest come crashing down, signaling the end of the company. It can be nerve racking. It is certainly difficult. But it is also exciting. You get to work in so many fields, meet so many people, and have control over so much. It's the reason anyone wants to get into this whole job.
So is there value to a non-technical CEO? Yes, there most certainly is. The vision, the management, the relationships: all this needs to be juggled by someone who can do so. Technical abilities are, undeniably, an amazing plus. But management of time, processes, and people is a skill just as necessary.
My response is that the CEO of a company, especially a startup in its most early days, needs to be a juggler. My own experience with Morph is highlighted by my need to be able to consistently manage multiple projects. I'm working with a dozen people in as many fields to create insurance policies and legal contracts, manage the customer relationship and the employees' work, consider investment and gather advisers. All of this is in addition to the actual work of building marketing strategies, designing the platform, writing the copy for the website, and everything else.
It isn't the easiest thing, juggling all these knives. You forget about one, or don't manage it properly, and the rest come crashing down, signaling the end of the company. It can be nerve racking. It is certainly difficult. But it is also exciting. You get to work in so many fields, meet so many people, and have control over so much. It's the reason anyone wants to get into this whole job.
So is there value to a non-technical CEO? Yes, there most certainly is. The vision, the management, the relationships: all this needs to be juggled by someone who can do so. Technical abilities are, undeniably, an amazing plus. But management of time, processes, and people is a skill just as necessary.
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Back to work
I know I said (over a month ago) that I'd talk about an exciting pivot we've had, but I think I should hold off until that is all signed and set in stone. Wouldn't want to mess anything up before its started- but oh man its good. And I'm still as stoked about it as I was when I learned about it back in March.
I've taken much of the past month off for travel. I started with brilliant 14 day trip to Israel, highlighted by brilliant new friends, a lot of discussion about Morph, personal aspirations, and founders roles in businesses. Then, after a one day lay over in Brussels (lots of french fries, Delirium Tremmons, and a crepe), I moved onto an 8 day road trip of Southern Ireland with my family. It was an incredible month (one that I did not completely expect), and I relished the adventure of it all. It was a good break, and, I expect, one of the last long ones I'll be able to take for a long, long time. I cherished it, because there is nothing I love more than the adrenaline of exploring a new city. But now, after a month of rest, its time to get back to work.
Just to clarify, it wasn't all rest. I took calls at 3am to conclude legal issues surrounding foreign visas, contracts, and stock options. But finally, finally, it seems like we're done. Additionally, I had a few chats with Oscar and David, checking in on their progress, and the meetings they've had with our new customer (more to come when I'm actually confident we've signed them). All is going well, their work looks outstanding, from the samples they've showed me, and we're moving at a great pace.
And that's an important aspect of the whole "start a company" thing. I could be on vacation, 10,000 miles away. It doesn't matter- when problems arise, all else goes out the window, and I must be there to solve them. As friends hang out around me, I take calls, answer emails, and schedule meetings. But I am able to find even these grudging activities fun! Because its all for something I love- its all for Morph.
In a few days, I'm returning to North Carolina. I'll be back on July 20th, less than a month before our hoped for beta launch. On the to do list? Insurance, pricing negotiations with our customer, contracts with the customer and drivers (I just love legal work!) and a push to hire, and build some marketing campaigns out for recruitment. We've got a busy month, but I'm ecstatic to get started! This is what I got into the entrepreneurship game for. I look forward to the challenges.
Sababa!
-Adriel
Tuesday, June 2, 2015
To Fund or Not to Fund
I apologize for the tragically unoriginal title. I could have gone with "Who's Ready to Have Some Fund?" or "Funny Funds" or any other 'fund' pun. Or maybe "Who Wants to be a (funded) Millionaire!" Whatever. When the book comes around, I'll think of something better.
From the outside, one of the coolest things about starting a start-up is boasting of one's accomplishments in fund raising. "I raised X hundreds of thousands of dollars" is more than just a boast- it seems to be an affirmation of your ability to succeed. The more you raise, the most obvious it is that people believe in your idea and, more importantly, in you as an entrepreneur. The number after the dollar sign becomes a confirmed and measurable benchmark of one's ability and reason to stay in- and succeed in- the entrepreneurial world.
Or at the very least, it makes Moms everywhere happy.
But I find there to be certain associated limitations that, if an entrepreneur can find the means to support himself without funding, are better off avoided. Giving up a percentage of your company before really finding out its value is often unnecessary. It's like setting up a T-ball instead of learning how to hit a slow pitch. Sure, you'll hit the ball. But how far?
Other people's influence over your project is an unneeded interjection in the life of what only one person (or two or three, depending on your situation)- the founder- has real passion invested into. I'm a strong believer that an entrepreneur- one who is in the business of starting companies for the long game, and not just for the bragging rights that comes with investment- should be able to have at least one project in his life that they build on their own.
Of course, this doesn't mean avoiding advisers. Anyone willing to give you any amount of guidance is practically a saint, especially in the early stages of your company. But I want to run my company towards my vision, not someone else's. I want my company to be guided by my ideas for its future, not my investor's ideas for how to exit big and fast. I want my company to be a true reflection of my work, my mind, and my ability, not of someone's check book.
There will be a time when, if all goes as planned, funding will be unavoidable. And I eagerly anticipate that moment, because that means that I have maxed out the company's ability to grow organically, and the time has come for a cash injection to take the company to an unprecedented level of growth in remarkably quick period of time. This growth:time ratio can't be recreated anywhere as well as in a start-up that has proven its business model and market, and has been gifted money (and advice, contacts, and support) for major expansion. But now- at the pre-market stage- is not that time.
The next post is going to discuss my "take every meeting" philosophy, and where exactly that got us. Hint: the most exciting pivot we've had to date, and the greatest affirmation of a market and potential for success came only after a lucky happenstance, and a "say yes" mindset.
That's if I manage to stop watching Entourage long enough to concentrate.
Chow,
A
From the outside, one of the coolest things about starting a start-up is boasting of one's accomplishments in fund raising. "I raised X hundreds of thousands of dollars" is more than just a boast- it seems to be an affirmation of your ability to succeed. The more you raise, the most obvious it is that people believe in your idea and, more importantly, in you as an entrepreneur. The number after the dollar sign becomes a confirmed and measurable benchmark of one's ability and reason to stay in- and succeed in- the entrepreneurial world.
Or at the very least, it makes Moms everywhere happy.
But I find there to be certain associated limitations that, if an entrepreneur can find the means to support himself without funding, are better off avoided. Giving up a percentage of your company before really finding out its value is often unnecessary. It's like setting up a T-ball instead of learning how to hit a slow pitch. Sure, you'll hit the ball. But how far?
Other people's influence over your project is an unneeded interjection in the life of what only one person (or two or three, depending on your situation)- the founder- has real passion invested into. I'm a strong believer that an entrepreneur- one who is in the business of starting companies for the long game, and not just for the bragging rights that comes with investment- should be able to have at least one project in his life that they build on their own.
Of course, this doesn't mean avoiding advisers. Anyone willing to give you any amount of guidance is practically a saint, especially in the early stages of your company. But I want to run my company towards my vision, not someone else's. I want my company to be guided by my ideas for its future, not my investor's ideas for how to exit big and fast. I want my company to be a true reflection of my work, my mind, and my ability, not of someone's check book.
There will be a time when, if all goes as planned, funding will be unavoidable. And I eagerly anticipate that moment, because that means that I have maxed out the company's ability to grow organically, and the time has come for a cash injection to take the company to an unprecedented level of growth in remarkably quick period of time. This growth:time ratio can't be recreated anywhere as well as in a start-up that has proven its business model and market, and has been gifted money (and advice, contacts, and support) for major expansion. But now- at the pre-market stage- is not that time.
The next post is going to discuss my "take every meeting" philosophy, and where exactly that got us. Hint: the most exciting pivot we've had to date, and the greatest affirmation of a market and potential for success came only after a lucky happenstance, and a "say yes" mindset.
That's if I manage to stop watching Entourage long enough to concentrate.
Chow,
A
Thursday, May 28, 2015
The Business-Technology 1-2 punch
This is going to be the longest post yet. It's my own experience of finding technical talent to build beta Morph, my start up, and it was not an easy journey. Here's how it happened...
You hear it all the time. The perfect combo of entrepreneurs is business savvy linked with the tech genius. Ballmer and Gates, Jobs and Woz, Thiel and Levchin, Adriel and ____. I needed someone, I was convinced, as dedicated as myself, and loads smarter and more talented. Someone I would get along with, someone who would be my friend, someone who would contradict me and be more creative than me, someone who would push me and help me drag this business forward into the success I was confident it can have.
But where do I start looking? What kind of person do I look for? What can I offer them, or do for them, or inspire them with to convince them of Morph's potential value. How do I get someone to build out Morph, and be committed to the project on the same level I was?
I first went to Chris Mumford, my adviser, and someone who has watched Morph develop from pizza delivery app idea to current form. He was excited that we had come this far. He had a simple solution: what I want is to outsource a project like this. Plenty of talent out in India would be capable of building this out quickly and cheaply. All I would need to do is provide wire frames to help guide the project, because they build what I want, to the t. If I want a square but draw a rectangle, I can undoubtedly expect to get someone longer than it is wide, even if it makes no sense.
Prashant, Chris' man in India, and I began speaking right away. Over Skype sessions, we discussed a timeline (we wanted to try to have a beta test in April. Oh, how silly we were), pricing ($10,000? I estimated 50K on my pro forma, so not too bad), and wire frames (what we had would do just fine. Thank you to proto.io and, of course, to May!).
But slowly, problems arose. He wouldn't answer email for 4 days at a time. He would be 20 minutes late to Skype calls. His internet would go out. He would miss calls, and email me 2 days later with an apology. We just weren't on the same page. My primary expectations of having someone dedicated, and someone I can get along with seemed so far removed from reality.This project that was supposed to be a fun, though challenging experience, was becoming little more than a headache.
I had to make a decision between continuing on this path that was recommended to me by an accomplished professor and entrepreneur in his own right, someone who was a dedicated adviser, and pursuing a trickier choice. The choice wasn't a hard one. I'm in this for the fun- the challenges should not, and should never be, personnel. I thanked Prashant for his time, and moved on.
It was about 8 weeks from our first conversation to our last. 8 weeks of lost time. Where do I go from here? What other options are available? I knew I wanted to launch on September, the start of the new school year. This all had to be built out quickly, and I had no idea where to go.
My first step was research through my network. I reached out to Nick Jordan, CEO of Smashing Boxes. Nick is a successful non-technical founder of a very technical company. Almost everyone working at SB is a coder or designer of some sort. Confident he would had something to say, I reached out.
Reaching out to people with a selfish question like "Please help me with all of my problems, and in return I'll send you more emails later when I have bigger problems" can be tricky. My strategy usually revolves around getting an introduction from a mutual contact, and getting right to the point. Important people have matters much more important than reading your non-important email, no matter how important you find your matter to be.
Also, avoid asking for a meeting every time. There is so much that can be done through 1-2 emails that a meeting or a call would just be a waste of everyone's time. Great blog by the Harvard Business Review covers that further for y'all.
He came back with a dozen articles all about what "technology people" expect, where to find them, what to do. Some were positive- saying that showing enough excitement for a scaleable idea can get any CTO on board. Some were action-supportive, telling the business guy to just go learn to code to build it himself and not waste time and energy in a potentially fruitless search. And another straight up said to not bother, because "tech people" hate being called "tech people" and looking for someone to build your idea is just plain rude.
So over all, more questions then answers.
I spoke to other young entrepreneurs who I know had hired tech partners. I read articles, asked professors, and made that one of my biggest questions to any adviser or accomplished entrepreneur or I ever met with. It was on my mind all the time, and I was nervous, all the time. I joined LinkedIn premium to use their Recruiter feature, with no success. Contacting a dozen people with coding skills, under the age of 35 and based in the south-east led to 11 no-answers, and one guy who wrote simply, "You seem to have no idea what you're asking for."
I joined websites that intended to set up business and technology founders with similar success.
I asked everyone I met with for their advice and experience. "Go to meetups and pitch your idea." "You need a 40 year old manager type." "You won't find anyone on this coast." "No one from the west coast would want this." "Ignore the tech guy, get venture funding first".
All of this advice was thrown at me, and all served to confuse me more. I reached out to dozens of college grads, with no success. Time to focus on getting a younger recruit. I met with a UNC computer science student, Jesse Osiecki, to get his opinion on the project, and some information about the next steps I should take. Per his recommendation, I reached out to 4 professors in the UNC computer science department (Jesse recommended 2, I decided to double it, to be safe), hoping someone would respond. One, Diane Pozefsky, did.
Diane, UNC Director of Undergraduate Research in Computer Science, helped me understand my project better from a technological background, and from a timeline perspective. She told me that the most important thing in any of my candidates is passion. Without passion, they will simmer out. Without passion, they simply won't try. Without passion, you'll get a passionless product. And this was sage advice that I value still in every individual I work with, in any field.
But perhaps most importantly, she told me the words I prayed I would here: "Oh yeah. Any decent college junior can do this for you."
With my lack of any technological knowledge, I had assumed this was going to be tricky. Trickier than Jesse or any of my other CS friends told me it would be. But apparently, the path was clearer than expected. Lesson learned: ask for help from every direction, because everyone has something different to tell you.
Per Professor Pozefsky's advice, I sent out emails to the head of the Undergraduate Computer Science Department of the top 10 schools around the country, asking them to forward a little blurb about Morph, and our search for technical talent over the summer. I put out fliers all over campus with (what I thought were) funny and eye catching messages, asking for applicants who love "breakfast, beer, and also coding".
I received responses from students from MIT, Georgia Tech, Duke, and UNC. Each response, resume attached and with a paragraph describing their excitement about and interest in working on Morph, was highly reminiscent of my own (failed) applications to companies, and an exciting validation of how real this whole process was becoming. It felt good.
I interviewed every individual who applied, no matter how strong or weak the application. Why not? On my part, all it cost was time. And this time invested could have an enormous return if I find the right partner.
A few were excited, though seemingly faking some of it. Some seemed nervous about the prospect of doing it all on their own. One never showed up. I guess she changed her mind.
But one guy came to me with a plan. Oscar Wang arrived at The Looking Glass cafe, one of my favorite work cafes in Chapel Hill, and sat down. He was smiling from the beginning. He told me that he wants to work on a start-up for the excitement of having so much (often too much) responsibility and pressure. The kicker came when he told me he and his best friend David Zhang (who I would be interviewing a few days later) have already thought through some basic elements of what the app would require.
He took out three sheets of paper with drawings, arrows, diagrams, and descriptions on them- a very basic wireframe that he and David had drawn up about what Morph might look like. In truth, it could have all been senseless scribbles. They could have tacked on some pictures from Wired magazine and made a collage. They could have had anything on those papers, but coming to me with enough excitement, forethought and initiative to have put some ideas together before even meeting with me- that was the passion I was looking for. I dragged them on for a bit and had another meeting with the two of them together to chat a little more, but they were hired the second they showed me those papers. About that, I had no doubt.
Did I make the right choice? Are David and Oscar able to build out Morph in the creative, fluid way a west coast start-up with west coast money might be able to? The jury is still out, but I believe in them. I'll keep you updated on how that goes. My next post will be about the reason I decided to forgo any funding, and why I'm happy with that decision.
Techie techie yeahhh
-A
You hear it all the time. The perfect combo of entrepreneurs is business savvy linked with the tech genius. Ballmer and Gates, Jobs and Woz, Thiel and Levchin, Adriel and ____. I needed someone, I was convinced, as dedicated as myself, and loads smarter and more talented. Someone I would get along with, someone who would be my friend, someone who would contradict me and be more creative than me, someone who would push me and help me drag this business forward into the success I was confident it can have.
But where do I start looking? What kind of person do I look for? What can I offer them, or do for them, or inspire them with to convince them of Morph's potential value. How do I get someone to build out Morph, and be committed to the project on the same level I was?
I first went to Chris Mumford, my adviser, and someone who has watched Morph develop from pizza delivery app idea to current form. He was excited that we had come this far. He had a simple solution: what I want is to outsource a project like this. Plenty of talent out in India would be capable of building this out quickly and cheaply. All I would need to do is provide wire frames to help guide the project, because they build what I want, to the t. If I want a square but draw a rectangle, I can undoubtedly expect to get someone longer than it is wide, even if it makes no sense.
Prashant, Chris' man in India, and I began speaking right away. Over Skype sessions, we discussed a timeline (we wanted to try to have a beta test in April. Oh, how silly we were), pricing ($10,000? I estimated 50K on my pro forma, so not too bad), and wire frames (what we had would do just fine. Thank you to proto.io and, of course, to May!).
But slowly, problems arose. He wouldn't answer email for 4 days at a time. He would be 20 minutes late to Skype calls. His internet would go out. He would miss calls, and email me 2 days later with an apology. We just weren't on the same page. My primary expectations of having someone dedicated, and someone I can get along with seemed so far removed from reality.This project that was supposed to be a fun, though challenging experience, was becoming little more than a headache.
I had to make a decision between continuing on this path that was recommended to me by an accomplished professor and entrepreneur in his own right, someone who was a dedicated adviser, and pursuing a trickier choice. The choice wasn't a hard one. I'm in this for the fun- the challenges should not, and should never be, personnel. I thanked Prashant for his time, and moved on.
It was about 8 weeks from our first conversation to our last. 8 weeks of lost time. Where do I go from here? What other options are available? I knew I wanted to launch on September, the start of the new school year. This all had to be built out quickly, and I had no idea where to go.
My first step was research through my network. I reached out to Nick Jordan, CEO of Smashing Boxes. Nick is a successful non-technical founder of a very technical company. Almost everyone working at SB is a coder or designer of some sort. Confident he would had something to say, I reached out.
Reaching out to people with a selfish question like "Please help me with all of my problems, and in return I'll send you more emails later when I have bigger problems" can be tricky. My strategy usually revolves around getting an introduction from a mutual contact, and getting right to the point. Important people have matters much more important than reading your non-important email, no matter how important you find your matter to be.
Also, avoid asking for a meeting every time. There is so much that can be done through 1-2 emails that a meeting or a call would just be a waste of everyone's time. Great blog by the Harvard Business Review covers that further for y'all.
He came back with a dozen articles all about what "technology people" expect, where to find them, what to do. Some were positive- saying that showing enough excitement for a scaleable idea can get any CTO on board. Some were action-supportive, telling the business guy to just go learn to code to build it himself and not waste time and energy in a potentially fruitless search. And another straight up said to not bother, because "tech people" hate being called "tech people" and looking for someone to build your idea is just plain rude.
So over all, more questions then answers.
I spoke to other young entrepreneurs who I know had hired tech partners. I read articles, asked professors, and made that one of my biggest questions to any adviser or accomplished entrepreneur or I ever met with. It was on my mind all the time, and I was nervous, all the time. I joined LinkedIn premium to use their Recruiter feature, with no success. Contacting a dozen people with coding skills, under the age of 35 and based in the south-east led to 11 no-answers, and one guy who wrote simply, "You seem to have no idea what you're asking for."
I joined websites that intended to set up business and technology founders with similar success.
I asked everyone I met with for their advice and experience. "Go to meetups and pitch your idea." "You need a 40 year old manager type." "You won't find anyone on this coast." "No one from the west coast would want this." "Ignore the tech guy, get venture funding first".
All of this advice was thrown at me, and all served to confuse me more. I reached out to dozens of college grads, with no success. Time to focus on getting a younger recruit. I met with a UNC computer science student, Jesse Osiecki, to get his opinion on the project, and some information about the next steps I should take. Per his recommendation, I reached out to 4 professors in the UNC computer science department (Jesse recommended 2, I decided to double it, to be safe), hoping someone would respond. One, Diane Pozefsky, did.
Diane, UNC Director of Undergraduate Research in Computer Science, helped me understand my project better from a technological background, and from a timeline perspective. She told me that the most important thing in any of my candidates is passion. Without passion, they will simmer out. Without passion, they simply won't try. Without passion, you'll get a passionless product. And this was sage advice that I value still in every individual I work with, in any field.
But perhaps most importantly, she told me the words I prayed I would here: "Oh yeah. Any decent college junior can do this for you."
With my lack of any technological knowledge, I had assumed this was going to be tricky. Trickier than Jesse or any of my other CS friends told me it would be. But apparently, the path was clearer than expected. Lesson learned: ask for help from every direction, because everyone has something different to tell you.
Per Professor Pozefsky's advice, I sent out emails to the head of the Undergraduate Computer Science Department of the top 10 schools around the country, asking them to forward a little blurb about Morph, and our search for technical talent over the summer. I put out fliers all over campus with (what I thought were) funny and eye catching messages, asking for applicants who love "breakfast, beer, and also coding".
I received responses from students from MIT, Georgia Tech, Duke, and UNC. Each response, resume attached and with a paragraph describing their excitement about and interest in working on Morph, was highly reminiscent of my own (failed) applications to companies, and an exciting validation of how real this whole process was becoming. It felt good.
I interviewed every individual who applied, no matter how strong or weak the application. Why not? On my part, all it cost was time. And this time invested could have an enormous return if I find the right partner.
A few were excited, though seemingly faking some of it. Some seemed nervous about the prospect of doing it all on their own. One never showed up. I guess she changed her mind.
But one guy came to me with a plan. Oscar Wang arrived at The Looking Glass cafe, one of my favorite work cafes in Chapel Hill, and sat down. He was smiling from the beginning. He told me that he wants to work on a start-up for the excitement of having so much (often too much) responsibility and pressure. The kicker came when he told me he and his best friend David Zhang (who I would be interviewing a few days later) have already thought through some basic elements of what the app would require.
He took out three sheets of paper with drawings, arrows, diagrams, and descriptions on them- a very basic wireframe that he and David had drawn up about what Morph might look like. In truth, it could have all been senseless scribbles. They could have tacked on some pictures from Wired magazine and made a collage. They could have had anything on those papers, but coming to me with enough excitement, forethought and initiative to have put some ideas together before even meeting with me- that was the passion I was looking for. I dragged them on for a bit and had another meeting with the two of them together to chat a little more, but they were hired the second they showed me those papers. About that, I had no doubt.
Did I make the right choice? Are David and Oscar able to build out Morph in the creative, fluid way a west coast start-up with west coast money might be able to? The jury is still out, but I believe in them. I'll keep you updated on how that goes. My next post will be about the reason I decided to forgo any funding, and why I'm happy with that decision.
Techie techie yeahhh
-A
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
The Name
Yeah yeah, I know I said that this post would be about finding techies to build out Morph. But its my blog, and I'm the only one who reads it, so hop off.
I noticed that I ended the last post signing off as "Morph", and with a picture of a check being given to "Morphood". A typo, perhaps? Maybe we stole someone else's check, out of spite?
While not an inconceivable thing, you're wrong. Morphood and Morph are- wait for it, drum roll please- one and the same. Way back in November, when we were preparing for the Pitch Party, we had to think of a name. I was put in charge, and put it off day after day, thinking that it wouldn't be too hard. I was certainly not correct.
I brought out the whiteboard and, as I do with most tough decisions, just started writing and talking aloud. (My housemate Dan was in the room, but I doubt he, the musician that he is, cared much for my silly business rants.) I wrote and said every adjective I could think of associated with the idea we had. "Fast, fun, seamless, efficient, Uber, quick, food, delivery, different, change, rapid, quality, excellence, drivers, cheese burgers." Anything that had any relevance, I wrote.
What I really liked about the idea, and what I wanted to come across in the name, was that it seemed like a vastly different way of doing business in this industry. No one really took good care of the restaurant. Very few companies had elite technology. Many were slow and disgruntled. But we were different. We did food differently than the rest. We changed food. We morphed it. We morphed food.
So, we became Morphood.
And we loved it! It flowed, it mentioned our line of work, it made people want to order "more food". It was great! As the idea developed, however, we learned that we should not constrict ourselves to just delivering food. We can deliver flowers, or books, or groceries. Literally anything that you want delivered, we can do. And so, we were still a change in the system, still an upgrade, a transformation from the status quo. But we were no longer just 'food'.
We followed Justin Timberlake's advice from The Social Network (because I'd probably follow JT in anything he says, ever) and 'dropped the ood'. And so we became simply, Morph.
Or perhaps not so simply. Either way, I promise that the next post will be about techies. I know that, because I'm going to write it right now.
Much love,
Morphood
I noticed that I ended the last post signing off as "Morph", and with a picture of a check being given to "Morphood". A typo, perhaps? Maybe we stole someone else's check, out of spite?
While not an inconceivable thing, you're wrong. Morphood and Morph are- wait for it, drum roll please- one and the same. Way back in November, when we were preparing for the Pitch Party, we had to think of a name. I was put in charge, and put it off day after day, thinking that it wouldn't be too hard. I was certainly not correct.
I brought out the whiteboard and, as I do with most tough decisions, just started writing and talking aloud. (My housemate Dan was in the room, but I doubt he, the musician that he is, cared much for my silly business rants.) I wrote and said every adjective I could think of associated with the idea we had. "Fast, fun, seamless, efficient, Uber, quick, food, delivery, different, change, rapid, quality, excellence, drivers, cheese burgers." Anything that had any relevance, I wrote.
What I really liked about the idea, and what I wanted to come across in the name, was that it seemed like a vastly different way of doing business in this industry. No one really took good care of the restaurant. Very few companies had elite technology. Many were slow and disgruntled. But we were different. We did food differently than the rest. We changed food. We morphed it. We morphed food.
So, we became Morphood.
And we loved it! It flowed, it mentioned our line of work, it made people want to order "more food". It was great! As the idea developed, however, we learned that we should not constrict ourselves to just delivering food. We can deliver flowers, or books, or groceries. Literally anything that you want delivered, we can do. And so, we were still a change in the system, still an upgrade, a transformation from the status quo. But we were no longer just 'food'.
We followed Justin Timberlake's advice from The Social Network (because I'd probably follow JT in anything he says, ever) and 'dropped the ood'. And so we became simply, Morph.
Or perhaps not so simply. Either way, I promise that the next post will be about techies. I know that, because I'm going to write it right now.
Much love,
Morphood
Monday, May 18, 2015
The Carolina Challenge
The beginning of anything is a fun, but incredibly amorphous time (pun intended). If you start learning to play an instrument, your first months are a painful cacophony of squeals and discord. Taking your first tennis lessons is essentially subjecting yourself to the embarrassment of hard, missed swings and 0-6 shutouts. And working through an idea for a company is no different in its ambiguity and often, its pains.
What it takes to move forward in any of these tricky ventures is perseverance. And a mom who drives you to all of these lessons as you complain in the back seat, only to thank her for her patience and sacrifice years later. What Mom does is to give you structure. She guarantees that every Wednesday, from 3-4, you'll have to sit in Mrs. Welsher's living room, banging on piano keys. She also gives a benchmark for progress, because when she compliments your C scale 8 weeks after you first started practicing, she really means it.
Unfortunately, when working on a start up, Mom isn't around. Not only is she not there to help, but her reminders about her friend Marge's kid getting a cushy job at BlackRock ($80,000 salary and full benefits), or Cousin Tommy starting his second year of medical school don't really help inspire much of a self-confidence. What we really needed to give us structure and mark our progress was a competition. And we got that, in the form of the Carolina Challenge.
This annual competition receives a hundred applications a year for its cumulative $50,000 in prize money. Entrepreneurs from around the state of North Carolina, and at all levels of their venture from idea to cash flow positive, compete in a series of pitches to prove to judges, themselves, and their mothers that their idea is validated and their work worth it.
As this was my second time competing in the Challenge, my first coming two years past in a disappointing ending in the semi final round, I had some insight into what the judges did and did not want. ((My first idea was for a drinking glass that lit up when any common "date rape drug" was dropped into a drink was stolen by students out of NC State and raised 100K, by the way. Clearly, I'm totally over it.) May and I worked hard to produce certain results that I knew the judges looked for.
The first round, however, was just a two minute pitch without any slides, and one minute for questions. I love this stuff. Pitching is exhilarating to me. You have an idea, or a strategy, or a concept, or a whatever that you worked really hard on and believe in. You've spent countless hours researching, preparing, and structuring your pitch. You've got a cute opening line that you're proud of and- my favorite part- a zinger to close on. And now, you've got X minutes of silence for a couple (4 in this case) of very accomplished men and women to listen in on your idea. Its show time.
This part of the pitch went spectacularly. I give them the spiel about the problems in delivery. No competitor is serving the market correctly, because they are all using a business model developed in the 90s. To be clear, that's the 1990s. Restaurants are unhappy, and are begging for a change. We've done 20 interviews and have 5 committed restaurants and we are the right people to make this company happen.
"Morph. May we take your order?" I conclude, whipping out a fancy black napkin from my back pocket and flourishing it over my left forearm with a deep, waiter-esque bow.
The judges came at me with a few questions about scalability, pricing, and the market, all of which we were overly prepared for. 3 minutes after I started, I was out the door, overflowing with confidence. And rightfully so, as a few days later, we get the email confirming that we moved on to the second round.
Now we have a 5 minutes presentation, 4 minutes of questioning, and some serious competition. We get to work on preparing a slideshow of everything we might need (typical business, and not something I've ever enjoyed or been particularly good at). This is where the Challenge provided us the structure we needed. We knew that we needed to show our pro forma financials. The judges would expect a market size (as I learned from the Pitch Party), an explanation of the idea, a competitive landscape, and a few other things. These expectations were the same (in a parallel discipline) as Mrs. Welsher's when she was teaching me piano a decade ago. Learn the major scales, then the minor scales, then show that you can play this song. These requirements gave us something to work towards, and dammit we worked hard.
The day of the second round came, and we couldn't be more ready. Our deck was beautiful (thank you, May) our pitch practiced and perfected to the point of seeming impromptu (the pinnacle performance goal of a good pitch), and our appendix slides so extensive that we couldn't imagine a single question that we wouldn't be able to answer with prepared statistics and well thought out reasoning.
As we were scheduled towards the end of the order, we got to watch almost all of our competition pitch before it was our turn. Waterless Buddy's was in our room and, as usual, crushed it. A few others went up with huge ideas and little execution or lots of execution on a little idea. It seemed like we had a niche right in between where our very scalable idea and our wonderfully designed, very explanatory wireframes and progress with customers would help propel us into the finals. If we felt good before the pitch, then damn did we feel amazing afterwards.
We did our 5 minutes so perfectly, the judges seemed like they weren't sure what to ask! One came at us with a question about keeping drivers on the road, and we answered with a bucket of data about student employment, and a fully developed strategy about incentive structures. Then silence. Another judge asked about the restaurants we had committed. An easy question, and a superb way to prove our past work and success. Then silence. The third had nothing to ask, even when prodded. And this comes after every team- even the best ones- were absolutely drilled on their business models, financials, or some other part of their pitch.
May and I felt so good, we high fived before even retaking our seats.
Unfortunately, we must have been missing something. Later that week, we get an email notifying us that we placed in the Top 10, but will not be competing in the finals. 'Disappointed' wouldn't get close to describing how I felt. All of our work, all of our confidence, popped like a balloon. Sure, we placed. But to not even pitch in the finals? Who could have possible beat us? Was their something about us, the founders, that the judges didn't like? Where did we fall short?
When the day of the finals came, we were invited to hear the other pitches, and receive our checks. Lisa Li, my GLOBE entrepreneurship buddy and cofounder of the amazing idea that will soon become Open Oceans, delivered a remarkable pitch that earned her first place in the entire Challenge.
But as May and I sat and watched the teams that had beat us out, I needed every bit of encouragement from May to keep me happy. We were better than those guys, I told myself. We worked harder, or our idea was better, or our pitch style was loads better then the people up on stage right now.
What I learned is- it doesn't matter. Its all a game, and the best players are not the ones that win the first time they play, or even those that win the most. The best ones are those who find the fortitude to roll the dice again, no matter the past results.
Sure, I was disappointed we weren't higher ranked. And it definitely took some of the confidence out of me, and forced me to question my abilities, the idea, and my own willingness to continue. But that feeling of self-pity was short lived. We won $1000! And 7th place in this huge competition. We did well. Now, lets see if we can do great.
After the Challenge ended, it became time to get serious. I had committed to Morph as my full time career. This was my baby, and my future, and it was going to die as a $1000 Happy Gilmore check unless I started pushing. The next step surrounded technology. It was time to start building. Next time, on Orange is the New Morph.
Much love,
A
What it takes to move forward in any of these tricky ventures is perseverance. And a mom who drives you to all of these lessons as you complain in the back seat, only to thank her for her patience and sacrifice years later. What Mom does is to give you structure. She guarantees that every Wednesday, from 3-4, you'll have to sit in Mrs. Welsher's living room, banging on piano keys. She also gives a benchmark for progress, because when she compliments your C scale 8 weeks after you first started practicing, she really means it.
Unfortunately, when working on a start up, Mom isn't around. Not only is she not there to help, but her reminders about her friend Marge's kid getting a cushy job at BlackRock ($80,000 salary and full benefits), or Cousin Tommy starting his second year of medical school don't really help inspire much of a self-confidence. What we really needed to give us structure and mark our progress was a competition. And we got that, in the form of the Carolina Challenge.
This annual competition receives a hundred applications a year for its cumulative $50,000 in prize money. Entrepreneurs from around the state of North Carolina, and at all levels of their venture from idea to cash flow positive, compete in a series of pitches to prove to judges, themselves, and their mothers that their idea is validated and their work worth it.
As this was my second time competing in the Challenge, my first coming two years past in a disappointing ending in the semi final round, I had some insight into what the judges did and did not want. ((My first idea was for a drinking glass that lit up when any common "date rape drug" was dropped into a drink was stolen by students out of NC State and raised 100K, by the way. Clearly, I'm totally over it.) May and I worked hard to produce certain results that I knew the judges looked for.
The first round, however, was just a two minute pitch without any slides, and one minute for questions. I love this stuff. Pitching is exhilarating to me. You have an idea, or a strategy, or a concept, or a whatever that you worked really hard on and believe in. You've spent countless hours researching, preparing, and structuring your pitch. You've got a cute opening line that you're proud of and- my favorite part- a zinger to close on. And now, you've got X minutes of silence for a couple (4 in this case) of very accomplished men and women to listen in on your idea. Its show time.
This part of the pitch went spectacularly. I give them the spiel about the problems in delivery. No competitor is serving the market correctly, because they are all using a business model developed in the 90s. To be clear, that's the 1990s. Restaurants are unhappy, and are begging for a change. We've done 20 interviews and have 5 committed restaurants and we are the right people to make this company happen.
"Morph. May we take your order?" I conclude, whipping out a fancy black napkin from my back pocket and flourishing it over my left forearm with a deep, waiter-esque bow.
The judges came at me with a few questions about scalability, pricing, and the market, all of which we were overly prepared for. 3 minutes after I started, I was out the door, overflowing with confidence. And rightfully so, as a few days later, we get the email confirming that we moved on to the second round.
Now we have a 5 minutes presentation, 4 minutes of questioning, and some serious competition. We get to work on preparing a slideshow of everything we might need (typical business, and not something I've ever enjoyed or been particularly good at). This is where the Challenge provided us the structure we needed. We knew that we needed to show our pro forma financials. The judges would expect a market size (as I learned from the Pitch Party), an explanation of the idea, a competitive landscape, and a few other things. These expectations were the same (in a parallel discipline) as Mrs. Welsher's when she was teaching me piano a decade ago. Learn the major scales, then the minor scales, then show that you can play this song. These requirements gave us something to work towards, and dammit we worked hard.
The day of the second round came, and we couldn't be more ready. Our deck was beautiful (thank you, May) our pitch practiced and perfected to the point of seeming impromptu (the pinnacle performance goal of a good pitch), and our appendix slides so extensive that we couldn't imagine a single question that we wouldn't be able to answer with prepared statistics and well thought out reasoning.
As we were scheduled towards the end of the order, we got to watch almost all of our competition pitch before it was our turn. Waterless Buddy's was in our room and, as usual, crushed it. A few others went up with huge ideas and little execution or lots of execution on a little idea. It seemed like we had a niche right in between where our very scalable idea and our wonderfully designed, very explanatory wireframes and progress with customers would help propel us into the finals. If we felt good before the pitch, then damn did we feel amazing afterwards.
We did our 5 minutes so perfectly, the judges seemed like they weren't sure what to ask! One came at us with a question about keeping drivers on the road, and we answered with a bucket of data about student employment, and a fully developed strategy about incentive structures. Then silence. Another judge asked about the restaurants we had committed. An easy question, and a superb way to prove our past work and success. Then silence. The third had nothing to ask, even when prodded. And this comes after every team- even the best ones- were absolutely drilled on their business models, financials, or some other part of their pitch.
May and I felt so good, we high fived before even retaking our seats.
Unfortunately, we must have been missing something. Later that week, we get an email notifying us that we placed in the Top 10, but will not be competing in the finals. 'Disappointed' wouldn't get close to describing how I felt. All of our work, all of our confidence, popped like a balloon. Sure, we placed. But to not even pitch in the finals? Who could have possible beat us? Was their something about us, the founders, that the judges didn't like? Where did we fall short?
When the day of the finals came, we were invited to hear the other pitches, and receive our checks. Lisa Li, my GLOBE entrepreneurship buddy and cofounder of the amazing idea that will soon become Open Oceans, delivered a remarkable pitch that earned her first place in the entire Challenge.
But as May and I sat and watched the teams that had beat us out, I needed every bit of encouragement from May to keep me happy. We were better than those guys, I told myself. We worked harder, or our idea was better, or our pitch style was loads better then the people up on stage right now.
What I learned is- it doesn't matter. Its all a game, and the best players are not the ones that win the first time they play, or even those that win the most. The best ones are those who find the fortitude to roll the dice again, no matter the past results.
Sure, I was disappointed we weren't higher ranked. And it definitely took some of the confidence out of me, and forced me to question my abilities, the idea, and my own willingness to continue. But that feeling of self-pity was short lived. We won $1000! And 7th place in this huge competition. We did well. Now, lets see if we can do great.
After the Challenge ended, it became time to get serious. I had committed to Morph as my full time career. This was my baby, and my future, and it was going to die as a $1000 Happy Gilmore check unless I started pushing. The next step surrounded technology. It was time to start building. Next time, on Orange is the New Morph.
Much love,
A
Monday, May 11, 2015
Structuring Meetings
Sorry for the delay. Graduated college yesterday, so been a bit busy. But we back!
So, starting January 2015, our last semester of college, May and I decided to get to work and see what we can make of our idea of a better run food ordering and delivery platform. Think GrubHub meets Uber, and you have what would eventually become Morph.
We decided to commit to one meeting a week. Setting it up as a constant in our calender, every Monday at 11am in Cafe McColl, helped make it a real responsibility that we could not take loosely.
We first divided our roles based on our skills and interests. I would do all the 'business stuff'. We need to continue talking to customers, learning about the market, answering the problems we faced in the Pitch Party, gathering data, learning about competitors, etc. And May would take care of the designs. All of our PowerPoint decks, the logo, and- most importantly- our wire frames for the app we were going to build. This worked out great for me, as my design skills (clearly not inspired by my many years of art classes) are at a sore minimum, while May did not have the time to devote to all that needed to be done on the business end.
At the end of each meeting, we would make a list of goals for the week. We wrote these down- each of us recorded what the other would need to do- to keep ourselves accountable. We would spend the week working hard on getting our parts done, believing in each others' commitment enough to feel responsible to ourselves, the company, and each other to get our own work done to a level of excellence.
The start of each meeting was a checklist of all we had accomplished. We went over May's designs and discussed what needed to be developed or fixed. We discussed my progress, and assessed holes in our business plan and research. We were honest, candid, and critiqued fully. Because if we are not honest with our business partner, how can we ever expect to actually improve?
These meetings were superb, because they kept us moving. We set goals for the next week, the next month, and the next half-year. We worked towards these goals as well as we could, and adjusted them as needed. We helped each other in our tasks, were honest with mistakes, and celebratory of our successes. We helped each other move forward every day, and transitioned Morph from a cute idea to a true high-potential concept. I am very proud of what May and I were able to accomplish. No matter how Morph ends up, we worked our hardest, and I confidently say that we were supremely dedicated, and had an absolute blast working on Morph.
These meetings were also instrumental in helping to prepare our team for the Carolina Challenge, UNC's premier entrepreneurship competition. Once we applied and were accepted, our goals began to tailor themselves to the needs of the competition. My next post will be about how we prepared for the Challenge, and how we progressed through the competition for a (fairly) successful ending.
Adios and much love,
A
So, starting January 2015, our last semester of college, May and I decided to get to work and see what we can make of our idea of a better run food ordering and delivery platform. Think GrubHub meets Uber, and you have what would eventually become Morph.
We decided to commit to one meeting a week. Setting it up as a constant in our calender, every Monday at 11am in Cafe McColl, helped make it a real responsibility that we could not take loosely.
We first divided our roles based on our skills and interests. I would do all the 'business stuff'. We need to continue talking to customers, learning about the market, answering the problems we faced in the Pitch Party, gathering data, learning about competitors, etc. And May would take care of the designs. All of our PowerPoint decks, the logo, and- most importantly- our wire frames for the app we were going to build. This worked out great for me, as my design skills (clearly not inspired by my many years of art classes) are at a sore minimum, while May did not have the time to devote to all that needed to be done on the business end.
At the end of each meeting, we would make a list of goals for the week. We wrote these down- each of us recorded what the other would need to do- to keep ourselves accountable. We would spend the week working hard on getting our parts done, believing in each others' commitment enough to feel responsible to ourselves, the company, and each other to get our own work done to a level of excellence.
The start of each meeting was a checklist of all we had accomplished. We went over May's designs and discussed what needed to be developed or fixed. We discussed my progress, and assessed holes in our business plan and research. We were honest, candid, and critiqued fully. Because if we are not honest with our business partner, how can we ever expect to actually improve?
These meetings were superb, because they kept us moving. We set goals for the next week, the next month, and the next half-year. We worked towards these goals as well as we could, and adjusted them as needed. We helped each other in our tasks, were honest with mistakes, and celebratory of our successes. We helped each other move forward every day, and transitioned Morph from a cute idea to a true high-potential concept. I am very proud of what May and I were able to accomplish. No matter how Morph ends up, we worked our hardest, and I confidently say that we were supremely dedicated, and had an absolute blast working on Morph.
These meetings were also instrumental in helping to prepare our team for the Carolina Challenge, UNC's premier entrepreneurship competition. Once we applied and were accepted, our goals began to tailor themselves to the needs of the competition. My next post will be about how we prepared for the Challenge, and how we progressed through the competition for a (fairly) successful ending.
Adios and much love,
A
Sunday, April 26, 2015
The Pitch Party
We have our customer validated idea. We have our awesome PowerPoint deck. We've got our pro forma income statement, our marketing plan, and our advisers. We've been working on our pitch. Now, its time to get in front of complete strangers- strangers with some credibility in this field, be they investors, entrepreneurs, or other impressive business folk- and see what they think about Morph- the Uber of food-delivery.
At the pitch party, a hundred booths are set up, with teams representing different ideas behind them. There were foods like pecan milk, apps to get your car washed, apps to help diet and cook, products to never need to tie shoelaces again, and what seemed like a million more. Judges walk around and talk to as many of these companies as they could, learning, asking questions, and probing further into the business model to decide how feasible and scalable the idea really was. To the ideas they liked, they awarded a million dollar bill. To others, they gave advice. I was looking for the former, and thought that we were far too smart and prepared to bother listening to the latter. That, right there, was my biggest mistake, and one of my greatest learnings of this whole year.
As the event wore on, our stack of money did not increase nearly as much as I expected. I was feeling down and slightly desperate, and began walking far from our booth, poaching judges. I'd come up to anyone who would listen, and begin my spiel about Morph. I'd tell them about the problems we learned about, how our solution is better than all others, how easily and well we can scale. And then I'd expect the money, because I was so confident that we deserved it.
But alas, little came. The advice, however, was essential, and it took a tap on the shoulder and a private talk with Ollie, one of my GLOBE class team members, to set me straight. "Listen," he said. "Listen, write down their issues, and come back to them. Learn what you don't know, and figure that out."
And so I finally did. I stopped trying to pitch our idea for some monopoly dollars, and instead took the whole event as a chance to gather as many critiques as I could and, hopefully, find some insights we hadn't thought of. I was asked legal questions about how we would handle charges like those faced by Uber. While previously I would try to deflect it and tell them about how quickly we would serve customers, I now would nod and tell them that its an important subject to learn into.
When asked about the market size before, I would reply with our revenue projections, hoping that would be enough. Now, I admitted it was an important piece of missing information, and replied with a question: "How would you go about sizing this market? Do you have any suggestions?"
This whole experience was- and should have been- an opportunity to learn. Financially, the best case scenario was $1000. Not a make it or break it amount by any means, but I had seen it as validation of our hard work and, more personally, my credibility and ability to be an entrepreneur. But with so many smart judges around, all who came to donate their time and ears to our idea, it was the advice that I should have recognized as the most valuable part of this whole event, not some fake money that would tell me I'm good enough to do this.
So there you have it. Look for advice when its offered to you for free. Admit the gaps in knowledge, and fill them as immediately and completely as you can. Asking questions is more than fine- its encouraged. And do all this to prepare yourself to fight another day.
We're finishing up 2014 with this post. The last weeks of the year were spent researching the issues that came up at the Pitch Party. Just before school let out, I came up to May, the one American on my GLOBE team, and talked to her about Morph. I told her that it's been an awesome experience working with her on this, but I don't think we should be quite finished yet. There is a lot we can do, and I want this to be much more than a class project. Is she willing to get to work, and see where we can take this? Does she want to join me, and try to turn this idea- an idea that began as a pizza app- into something real, tangible, and potentially huge?
Luckily for me, she did. Because there is no way I could have done this alone, without her. In my next post, I'll talk a bit about how we structured meetings, what we did, and how we set goals for ourselves. This is all leading up to the Carolina Challenge, which, soon, should get us to the present day.
Much love,
A
At the pitch party, a hundred booths are set up, with teams representing different ideas behind them. There were foods like pecan milk, apps to get your car washed, apps to help diet and cook, products to never need to tie shoelaces again, and what seemed like a million more. Judges walk around and talk to as many of these companies as they could, learning, asking questions, and probing further into the business model to decide how feasible and scalable the idea really was. To the ideas they liked, they awarded a million dollar bill. To others, they gave advice. I was looking for the former, and thought that we were far too smart and prepared to bother listening to the latter. That, right there, was my biggest mistake, and one of my greatest learnings of this whole year.
As the event wore on, our stack of money did not increase nearly as much as I expected. I was feeling down and slightly desperate, and began walking far from our booth, poaching judges. I'd come up to anyone who would listen, and begin my spiel about Morph. I'd tell them about the problems we learned about, how our solution is better than all others, how easily and well we can scale. And then I'd expect the money, because I was so confident that we deserved it.
But alas, little came. The advice, however, was essential, and it took a tap on the shoulder and a private talk with Ollie, one of my GLOBE class team members, to set me straight. "Listen," he said. "Listen, write down their issues, and come back to them. Learn what you don't know, and figure that out."
And so I finally did. I stopped trying to pitch our idea for some monopoly dollars, and instead took the whole event as a chance to gather as many critiques as I could and, hopefully, find some insights we hadn't thought of. I was asked legal questions about how we would handle charges like those faced by Uber. While previously I would try to deflect it and tell them about how quickly we would serve customers, I now would nod and tell them that its an important subject to learn into.
When asked about the market size before, I would reply with our revenue projections, hoping that would be enough. Now, I admitted it was an important piece of missing information, and replied with a question: "How would you go about sizing this market? Do you have any suggestions?"
This whole experience was- and should have been- an opportunity to learn. Financially, the best case scenario was $1000. Not a make it or break it amount by any means, but I had seen it as validation of our hard work and, more personally, my credibility and ability to be an entrepreneur. But with so many smart judges around, all who came to donate their time and ears to our idea, it was the advice that I should have recognized as the most valuable part of this whole event, not some fake money that would tell me I'm good enough to do this.
So there you have it. Look for advice when its offered to you for free. Admit the gaps in knowledge, and fill them as immediately and completely as you can. Asking questions is more than fine- its encouraged. And do all this to prepare yourself to fight another day.
We're finishing up 2014 with this post. The last weeks of the year were spent researching the issues that came up at the Pitch Party. Just before school let out, I came up to May, the one American on my GLOBE team, and talked to her about Morph. I told her that it's been an awesome experience working with her on this, but I don't think we should be quite finished yet. There is a lot we can do, and I want this to be much more than a class project. Is she willing to get to work, and see where we can take this? Does she want to join me, and try to turn this idea- an idea that began as a pizza app- into something real, tangible, and potentially huge?
Luckily for me, she did. Because there is no way I could have done this alone, without her. In my next post, I'll talk a bit about how we structured meetings, what we did, and how we set goals for ourselves. This is all leading up to the Carolina Challenge, which, soon, should get us to the present day.
Much love,
A
Saturday, April 25, 2015
The Second Idea
So, I'm learning more about the needs of the customer. Per Jim Kitchen's emphasis on "lean" methodology, per Diana Kander's emphasis on "All In", customer interviews- open ended questions learning about customers' biggest problems (or 'migraine problems', as Kander calls it)- has led the idea through some twists and turns.
I understand that restaurants want to deliver, but this desire is surrounded by problems. Price, customer service, efficiency, labor, insurance- all of these variables, and a dozen more, make it a headache. In what way would we be able to come up with a solution to help solve the problems?
Well, let's look at how they are currently solving it. Companies like Takeout Central, Crunchbutton, and hundreds of others around the country, some with heavy VC backing like Door Dash, and some with regional market power like Delivery Now in New Jersey, are doing their best. They have a set number of drivers under contract, divide up the shifts, and serve as many restaurants in a region as they can. This way, in exchange for a cut of the profits that varies by company, a restaurant can deliver without the headache of managing drivers. A whole new market opens up to them, they have their menu on line, and they can grow their business enormously.
But obviously, as I learned from interviewing restaurant managers, many are still unhappy with these options. Additionally, personal experience coupled with a survey of the UNC student population told us that end customers- the hungry people who order delivery and drive the whole industry- are also unhappy. High delivery costs, limited options, and, most importantly, slow delivery times make customers annoyed with their options, but resigned to use them, as they don't have any alternatives. How can we create a better model to this existing system?
Well, what do we need to do? Get food to customers faster than anyone, in a way that costs restaurants less. We also need to do all the little things- better customer service, smoother ordering interface, access via mobile and web. But if we can deliver food faster and cheaper, we can win.
I drew pictures, made tables, and wrote whole pages of notes by hand discussing the problem, trying to figure out how to solve it. The problem with current third party delivery services is that they don't have enough drivers. Often they might have just 8 drivers on a weekend dinner shift for 60 restaurants, leading to delivery times of over an hour and a half. So we need more drivers. But managing all their shifts, telling them to work certain times- all of that seems like a headache.
So what do we do to have more drivers on the road, with less pain of managing them? How about an Uber model? If drivers can come in and out whenever they want, as long as we have enough drivers in the system, then only a small percentage of them needs to be working at any time, and we'd already have more people on the road than our competitors. We can serve any number of restaurants, because the more restaurants, the more orders. The more orders, the more business for drivers. The more business, the more drivers want to apply to work. The more drivers in our system, the more restaurants we can serve. And as long as we always have a surplus of drivers, customers will always get their food faster from us, than any alternative.
So we finally had something. An idea very different then our first, inspired by customer interviews, and solving a serious customer 'migraine problem'. We're ecstatic.
We continue to interview, asking more about statistics and metrics than before. How many orders do you do a day? How many drivers do you employee (if you do). We use all of this information, begin coming up with our financials, our marketing plans, our pitch deck. This is a validated idea worth working on. Our amazing team put in hours of work and effort, and beat out the work until we had something to be proud of.
As the semester finished up, our idea was getting better. We though of incentives to make sure we've always had drivers on the road. We had marketing strategies, and recruitment tactics. We had estimates for our revenue streams our our profit projections. Basically, out of an initial idea came a target customer, and out of interviews came a problem, and from the problem a solution. We've got something here, now its time to get validation from others.
All of this work prepared us for the Pitch Party, an annual UNC entrepreneurship pitch competition. Over 100 teams pitch their ideas to judges who walk around the room, giving us monopoly money to reward an idea that they thought deserved backing, culminating in a final "pitch off" of the top 10 teams. We were looking forward to this for a long time, and we were ready! I'll tell you how that went next time, on the Dr. Oz Show with your host- Adriel Oz.
Much love,
A
I understand that restaurants want to deliver, but this desire is surrounded by problems. Price, customer service, efficiency, labor, insurance- all of these variables, and a dozen more, make it a headache. In what way would we be able to come up with a solution to help solve the problems?
Well, let's look at how they are currently solving it. Companies like Takeout Central, Crunchbutton, and hundreds of others around the country, some with heavy VC backing like Door Dash, and some with regional market power like Delivery Now in New Jersey, are doing their best. They have a set number of drivers under contract, divide up the shifts, and serve as many restaurants in a region as they can. This way, in exchange for a cut of the profits that varies by company, a restaurant can deliver without the headache of managing drivers. A whole new market opens up to them, they have their menu on line, and they can grow their business enormously.
But obviously, as I learned from interviewing restaurant managers, many are still unhappy with these options. Additionally, personal experience coupled with a survey of the UNC student population told us that end customers- the hungry people who order delivery and drive the whole industry- are also unhappy. High delivery costs, limited options, and, most importantly, slow delivery times make customers annoyed with their options, but resigned to use them, as they don't have any alternatives. How can we create a better model to this existing system?
Well, what do we need to do? Get food to customers faster than anyone, in a way that costs restaurants less. We also need to do all the little things- better customer service, smoother ordering interface, access via mobile and web. But if we can deliver food faster and cheaper, we can win.
I drew pictures, made tables, and wrote whole pages of notes by hand discussing the problem, trying to figure out how to solve it. The problem with current third party delivery services is that they don't have enough drivers. Often they might have just 8 drivers on a weekend dinner shift for 60 restaurants, leading to delivery times of over an hour and a half. So we need more drivers. But managing all their shifts, telling them to work certain times- all of that seems like a headache.
So what do we do to have more drivers on the road, with less pain of managing them? How about an Uber model? If drivers can come in and out whenever they want, as long as we have enough drivers in the system, then only a small percentage of them needs to be working at any time, and we'd already have more people on the road than our competitors. We can serve any number of restaurants, because the more restaurants, the more orders. The more orders, the more business for drivers. The more business, the more drivers want to apply to work. The more drivers in our system, the more restaurants we can serve. And as long as we always have a surplus of drivers, customers will always get their food faster from us, than any alternative.
So we finally had something. An idea very different then our first, inspired by customer interviews, and solving a serious customer 'migraine problem'. We're ecstatic.
We continue to interview, asking more about statistics and metrics than before. How many orders do you do a day? How many drivers do you employee (if you do). We use all of this information, begin coming up with our financials, our marketing plans, our pitch deck. This is a validated idea worth working on. Our amazing team put in hours of work and effort, and beat out the work until we had something to be proud of.
As the semester finished up, our idea was getting better. We though of incentives to make sure we've always had drivers on the road. We had marketing strategies, and recruitment tactics. We had estimates for our revenue streams our our profit projections. Basically, out of an initial idea came a target customer, and out of interviews came a problem, and from the problem a solution. We've got something here, now its time to get validation from others.
All of this work prepared us for the Pitch Party, an annual UNC entrepreneurship pitch competition. Over 100 teams pitch their ideas to judges who walk around the room, giving us monopoly money to reward an idea that they thought deserved backing, culminating in a final "pitch off" of the top 10 teams. We were looking forward to this for a long time, and we were ready! I'll tell you how that went next time, on the Dr. Oz Show with your host- Adriel Oz.
Much love,
A
Friday, April 17, 2015
Three divisions of customer
So here is what we know. Restaurants don't care about ordering. As long as a customer has access to their entire menu (not just two options with easy click), they're satisfied.
The big problem is delivery. After walking around to a dozen restaurants, I am able to divide them into three categories: those that manage their own delivery, those that use a third party, and those that don't have any delivery whatsoever. Always writing and taking notes and making charts, I begin to think heavily about each of these groups.
Restaurants that manage their own delivery do so for two reasons. First, delivery is a huge part of their business, often up to 50% of their entire daily revenue. Second, they have some obvious issues with third parties. Some are too expensive, some provide unbearably poor customer service, some are too slow. Whatever the case, they find it simpler to manage their own delivery. However, this is no easy task. When your core competency is making food, managing drivers, understand routes, and taking orders is an annoying, and difficult process, that only a few restaurants are able to get right. Chains like Jimmy Johns have the operational efficiency to do it well. Delivery reliant business like Bskis need the right manager. Speaking to Babatunde Omari Williams, a former manager of Bskis, I learned that once he left, their delivery almost fell apart. You need the right guy in charge of something that complicated, and it isn't easy to find the right guy.
Then you have restaurants, which make up the majority in Chapel Hill, that use third party services. Locally, that was primarily Takeout Central (formerly Tar Heel Takeout), but a California based app called Crunchbutton was newly introduced and had a few restaurants on its platform. These services gave an ordering platform for customers, faxed or emailed the restaurant when an order came through, and sent one of their own drivers over to pick it up. They were a huge help to restaurants, who could run a reliable delivery service and create an additional revenue stream without any of the managerial issues. However, there were problems here too. On the restaurant side, some services charged a 35% fee off of each order, while others do an awful job providing customer service. On the customer's end, high delivery fees, limited options, and, most importantly, slow delivery make these options a turn-off. Though with no real choices, neither hungry customers nor profit-driven restaurants have much of a choice.
Lastly, there are the restaurants that don't run delivery at all. They're either fed up with the issues with third party services, unable or unwilling to deal with the problems associated with running their own delivery, or just not ambitious enough to undertake delivery at all. Either way they are- and they often know that they are- missing out on enormous potential revenues by avoiding delivery.
The restaurant is, in many ways, the customer most important to please. We need to provide cheaper service than Takeout Central, better support than Crunchbutton, more efficiency than self-managed delivery, and better technology than anyone else out there. But we can't forget the hungry food-orderer, whose chief complaint is slow delivery times. How do we combine all of these issues into one, multi-fold solution? Next time, on Good Morning America.
Much love,
A
The big problem is delivery. After walking around to a dozen restaurants, I am able to divide them into three categories: those that manage their own delivery, those that use a third party, and those that don't have any delivery whatsoever. Always writing and taking notes and making charts, I begin to think heavily about each of these groups.
Restaurants that manage their own delivery do so for two reasons. First, delivery is a huge part of their business, often up to 50% of their entire daily revenue. Second, they have some obvious issues with third parties. Some are too expensive, some provide unbearably poor customer service, some are too slow. Whatever the case, they find it simpler to manage their own delivery. However, this is no easy task. When your core competency is making food, managing drivers, understand routes, and taking orders is an annoying, and difficult process, that only a few restaurants are able to get right. Chains like Jimmy Johns have the operational efficiency to do it well. Delivery reliant business like Bskis need the right manager. Speaking to Babatunde Omari Williams, a former manager of Bskis, I learned that once he left, their delivery almost fell apart. You need the right guy in charge of something that complicated, and it isn't easy to find the right guy.
Then you have restaurants, which make up the majority in Chapel Hill, that use third party services. Locally, that was primarily Takeout Central (formerly Tar Heel Takeout), but a California based app called Crunchbutton was newly introduced and had a few restaurants on its platform. These services gave an ordering platform for customers, faxed or emailed the restaurant when an order came through, and sent one of their own drivers over to pick it up. They were a huge help to restaurants, who could run a reliable delivery service and create an additional revenue stream without any of the managerial issues. However, there were problems here too. On the restaurant side, some services charged a 35% fee off of each order, while others do an awful job providing customer service. On the customer's end, high delivery fees, limited options, and, most importantly, slow delivery make these options a turn-off. Though with no real choices, neither hungry customers nor profit-driven restaurants have much of a choice.
Lastly, there are the restaurants that don't run delivery at all. They're either fed up with the issues with third party services, unable or unwilling to deal with the problems associated with running their own delivery, or just not ambitious enough to undertake delivery at all. Either way they are- and they often know that they are- missing out on enormous potential revenues by avoiding delivery.
The restaurant is, in many ways, the customer most important to please. We need to provide cheaper service than Takeout Central, better support than Crunchbutton, more efficiency than self-managed delivery, and better technology than anyone else out there. But we can't forget the hungry food-orderer, whose chief complaint is slow delivery times. How do we combine all of these issues into one, multi-fold solution? Next time, on Good Morning America.
Much love,
A
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
Writing it out
Writing has been an important part of my life for a very long time. As a child, I tried writing another edition of the fabulous, historic Captain Underpants series. In high school, writing comedy sketches for Cabaret Night was an exciting and defining moment of my development. And more recently, I have used writing to help myself sort through questions, issues, and worries, as well as to document and remember successes.
Throughout the course of building this business, writing has helped me develop ideas, draw out concerns, and record thoughts. I've filled a full yellow pad with notes and drawings, have at least 10 notes on my iPhone, a dozen on Evernote, and various scribbles and ideas all over my class notebook. Anything I think of, or question, or learn, I immediately write down. This helps in two ways: record keeping, and analysis.
"The palest ink is stronger than the best memory." Or something like that. I've heard it, but never has the saying been more applicable to my life than with this business. Here, where every detail matters, where every fact or quote or observation can lead to a light bulb going off, recording conversations I have with advisers and customers, making notes about competitors and the industry, and writing about the progress we've made from start to present all aggregates to help me understand what the business is today, where else it can go, and all of the alternatives to what we might be doing.
While record keeping helps me categorize and monitor my learnings and thoughts, writing also helps understand what I want and can do. Pros and cons lists have become a weekly tradition. I have a number of paths I can take? I make a pros and cons list. I'm deciding between accepting cash or using only cards? Pros and cons list. Deciding on a date to launch? Pros and cons list. These lists help put into perspective the many decisions available, and give me a platform on which to come to defensible conclusions.
Writing all of this down allows me to think through things in a different way. I write for an hour straight, anything and everything that comes to mind, and look over it afterwards. A lot of it is nonsense, but there are always a few hidden jewels in there that help me unlock the answers to questions I grapple with.
So after all of my customer meetings, I sat back at my yellow pad, and began writing. The problem isn't ordering, exactly. Its delivery. If we can solve delivery, customers would flock to us. But why hasn't it been solved? Why isn't it working? What can I do about it? In the next post, I'll talk about the idea that writing led me to. We were obviously moving away from the world's easiest ordering app. Customers told me we have to. But where are we going? That's for next time, but until then,
Much love,
A
Throughout the course of building this business, writing has helped me develop ideas, draw out concerns, and record thoughts. I've filled a full yellow pad with notes and drawings, have at least 10 notes on my iPhone, a dozen on Evernote, and various scribbles and ideas all over my class notebook. Anything I think of, or question, or learn, I immediately write down. This helps in two ways: record keeping, and analysis.
"The palest ink is stronger than the best memory." Or something like that. I've heard it, but never has the saying been more applicable to my life than with this business. Here, where every detail matters, where every fact or quote or observation can lead to a light bulb going off, recording conversations I have with advisers and customers, making notes about competitors and the industry, and writing about the progress we've made from start to present all aggregates to help me understand what the business is today, where else it can go, and all of the alternatives to what we might be doing.
While record keeping helps me categorize and monitor my learnings and thoughts, writing also helps understand what I want and can do. Pros and cons lists have become a weekly tradition. I have a number of paths I can take? I make a pros and cons list. I'm deciding between accepting cash or using only cards? Pros and cons list. Deciding on a date to launch? Pros and cons list. These lists help put into perspective the many decisions available, and give me a platform on which to come to defensible conclusions.
Writing all of this down allows me to think through things in a different way. I write for an hour straight, anything and everything that comes to mind, and look over it afterwards. A lot of it is nonsense, but there are always a few hidden jewels in there that help me unlock the answers to questions I grapple with.
So after all of my customer meetings, I sat back at my yellow pad, and began writing. The problem isn't ordering, exactly. Its delivery. If we can solve delivery, customers would flock to us. But why hasn't it been solved? Why isn't it working? What can I do about it? In the next post, I'll talk about the idea that writing led me to. We were obviously moving away from the world's easiest ordering app. Customers told me we have to. But where are we going? That's for next time, but until then,
Much love,
A
Monday, April 13, 2015
What does the customer think?
You hear it over and over again, but you don't really believe its value until you do it for yourself. "Go talk to the customer," everybody tells you. And that's exactly what Jim Kitchen told me. "Go talk to customers, and then you'll find out if you've got something worth sticking with."
It makes sense. If you build something incredible- like the world's smallest bar stool, and are super excited about it, if you don't ask the sitters of the world if they would enjoy being closer to the ground, then you've really got nothing worth selling.
So, armed with my brilliant idea of easy, one push food ordering, I marched down to Franklin Street, the epicenter of Chapel Hill restaurants (epicenter being a dramatic, though accurate word, as Chapel Hill is essentially one small street with a dozen restaurants.)
Before I get to my first visit- just a quick note on what its like to "cold call" in person. Walking into an establishment and asking questions, often personal questions, is weird. And its annoying for all parties. The manager could be cleaning, or working, or taking a much deserved break. All of my friends are day drinking in the back yard, why can't I just join them? Doing this takes some initiative, but mostly it takes a big smile. Be excited to talk to your customers! People are fun, and these people in particular might be paying you a lot of money pretty soon. Do it with a smile, I tell myself, and anything is fun.
And here's how I do it. I walk into the restaurant, dressed casually, but cleanly, in jeans and a t-shirt. I've heard the term "first impression" so often that I have nightmares about giving off the wrong one. So I walk in, head held high and fancy Kenan-Flagler padfolio in hand. I try to give off a friendly but professional vibe. Not intimidating in a suit, not slobbish in athletic shorts. A healthy medium. I respectfully stand to the side until the cashier is finished speaking with customers, and ask for a manager. Often times, they announce themselves as such.
Whoever it is, I introduce myself, and tell them that I'm doing some research about restaurant delivery for a class. Its amazing how willing people are to give away information to students. Most say they've got a free ten minutes, and gladly answer my questions while continuing to serve customers. I'm as polite as a good southern boy might be, realizing they're doing me a huge favor. I let them talk much more than I do- you won't get any useful stuff by constantly asking questions. Just prod and poke and nudge them along, smiling, allowing pauses, and let them say all that they might want to say. Immediately after leaving each restaurant, I write down the manager's name and description, and all of the information I can remember about them. And I try to eat at their places often enough so that they begin to recognize me, and even know me by name. The better the relationship is, and the more they like you, the happier they will be to give you information and, ideally, become a customer. Now back to my first restaurant stop.
I walked into my first stop, Krispy Kreme...got a doughnut, and went home to take a nap. Just kidding. I walked in ready to pitch my brilliant idea- what if ANYBODY can order either a dozen chocolate doughnuts or a dozen glazed doughnuts with the click of a button! I'm a genius!! What would it take? What would you want? What would we have to provide you with? Ready with a list of a dozen more operational questions, I'm excited for his response.
Right away, I get a "I don't think we'd be very interested in that. Delivery sounds like it could be pretty great, if we didn't need to run it ourselves, but I think we would want all of our options." Well, okay. At least he talked to me. I walk out, take a few notes, and move on to my next victim: Time Out.
An establishment as old as Chapel Hill itself (again, dramatic, but they're undoubtedly a Chapel Hill institution), Time Out is the 24 hours biscuit and southern cooking fast food joint that's been serving drunk students for decades. I walk in with the same questions, but the conversation switches almost immediately away from my easy ordering idea, to delivery. He didn't seem at all excited about the idea, but very willingly told me about their current delivery system.
A company called ChowNow built out an app for them, for a monthly fee, that allows mobile ordering. I check it out, and the app looks great! Clearly its done by professionals with an eye for design and expertise in restaurant ordering. The only problem is, it doesn't provide delivery drivers. The owner Eddie explains to me that when an order gets placed, he calls an Uber or a taxi, and asks them to come pick up the food, and deliver it to the customer.
It seems like a complicated, annoying, and potentially expensive process to me, one that can definitely be simplified. A few more stops to Franklin Street restaurants, and it dawns on me- the problem isn't ordering...its delivery!
All of these restaurants understand the value of delivery, but so many of them are fed up with the current available options. Each restaurant manager I speak to, though I intended the conversation to take a very different route, tells me all about how much doing delivery sucks, though it continues to support up to 50% of the business.
Over time, I divide up restaurants into three fields: those that run their own delivery, those that use a third party, and those that do not have any delivery at all. Each type of restaurant, it appears, has an issue. Managing drivers is annoying and expensive. Third parties are expensive, and often do not have the customer service expected of them. And if you don't run delivery at all, you're losing out some some enormous potential profits.
And so, our first pivot. Perhaps fun, easy ordering isn't the right way to go. Perhaps, that is the world's tiniest bar stool. Customers have spoken- the problem isn't ordering, its delivery. In the next post, I'll talk about all of the writing I did about the idea, and how much that helped me.
Much love,
A
It makes sense. If you build something incredible- like the world's smallest bar stool, and are super excited about it, if you don't ask the sitters of the world if they would enjoy being closer to the ground, then you've really got nothing worth selling.
So, armed with my brilliant idea of easy, one push food ordering, I marched down to Franklin Street, the epicenter of Chapel Hill restaurants (epicenter being a dramatic, though accurate word, as Chapel Hill is essentially one small street with a dozen restaurants.)
Before I get to my first visit- just a quick note on what its like to "cold call" in person. Walking into an establishment and asking questions, often personal questions, is weird. And its annoying for all parties. The manager could be cleaning, or working, or taking a much deserved break. All of my friends are day drinking in the back yard, why can't I just join them? Doing this takes some initiative, but mostly it takes a big smile. Be excited to talk to your customers! People are fun, and these people in particular might be paying you a lot of money pretty soon. Do it with a smile, I tell myself, and anything is fun.
And here's how I do it. I walk into the restaurant, dressed casually, but cleanly, in jeans and a t-shirt. I've heard the term "first impression" so often that I have nightmares about giving off the wrong one. So I walk in, head held high and fancy Kenan-Flagler padfolio in hand. I try to give off a friendly but professional vibe. Not intimidating in a suit, not slobbish in athletic shorts. A healthy medium. I respectfully stand to the side until the cashier is finished speaking with customers, and ask for a manager. Often times, they announce themselves as such.
Whoever it is, I introduce myself, and tell them that I'm doing some research about restaurant delivery for a class. Its amazing how willing people are to give away information to students. Most say they've got a free ten minutes, and gladly answer my questions while continuing to serve customers. I'm as polite as a good southern boy might be, realizing they're doing me a huge favor. I let them talk much more than I do- you won't get any useful stuff by constantly asking questions. Just prod and poke and nudge them along, smiling, allowing pauses, and let them say all that they might want to say. Immediately after leaving each restaurant, I write down the manager's name and description, and all of the information I can remember about them. And I try to eat at their places often enough so that they begin to recognize me, and even know me by name. The better the relationship is, and the more they like you, the happier they will be to give you information and, ideally, become a customer. Now back to my first restaurant stop.
I walked into my first stop, Krispy Kreme...got a doughnut, and went home to take a nap. Just kidding. I walked in ready to pitch my brilliant idea- what if ANYBODY can order either a dozen chocolate doughnuts or a dozen glazed doughnuts with the click of a button! I'm a genius!! What would it take? What would you want? What would we have to provide you with? Ready with a list of a dozen more operational questions, I'm excited for his response.
Right away, I get a "I don't think we'd be very interested in that. Delivery sounds like it could be pretty great, if we didn't need to run it ourselves, but I think we would want all of our options." Well, okay. At least he talked to me. I walk out, take a few notes, and move on to my next victim: Time Out.
An establishment as old as Chapel Hill itself (again, dramatic, but they're undoubtedly a Chapel Hill institution), Time Out is the 24 hours biscuit and southern cooking fast food joint that's been serving drunk students for decades. I walk in with the same questions, but the conversation switches almost immediately away from my easy ordering idea, to delivery. He didn't seem at all excited about the idea, but very willingly told me about their current delivery system.
A company called ChowNow built out an app for them, for a monthly fee, that allows mobile ordering. I check it out, and the app looks great! Clearly its done by professionals with an eye for design and expertise in restaurant ordering. The only problem is, it doesn't provide delivery drivers. The owner Eddie explains to me that when an order gets placed, he calls an Uber or a taxi, and asks them to come pick up the food, and deliver it to the customer.
It seems like a complicated, annoying, and potentially expensive process to me, one that can definitely be simplified. A few more stops to Franklin Street restaurants, and it dawns on me- the problem isn't ordering...its delivery!
All of these restaurants understand the value of delivery, but so many of them are fed up with the current available options. Each restaurant manager I speak to, though I intended the conversation to take a very different route, tells me all about how much doing delivery sucks, though it continues to support up to 50% of the business.
Over time, I divide up restaurants into three fields: those that run their own delivery, those that use a third party, and those that do not have any delivery at all. Each type of restaurant, it appears, has an issue. Managing drivers is annoying and expensive. Third parties are expensive, and often do not have the customer service expected of them. And if you don't run delivery at all, you're losing out some some enormous potential profits.
And so, our first pivot. Perhaps fun, easy ordering isn't the right way to go. Perhaps, that is the world's tiniest bar stool. Customers have spoken- the problem isn't ordering, its delivery. In the next post, I'll talk about all of the writing I did about the idea, and how much that helped me.
Much love,
A
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