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.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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.