Sam Parr retired with over $20 Million by age 31, just a few years after losing his job offer at AirBNB. In this interview, Sam goes deep into his journey to share his biggest lessons learned while creating an impressive career and company.  Parr is the founder of The Hustle, a daily newsletter providing an entertaining delivery of the latest news in business and tech. He was born in Missouri, grew up in Tennessee, and moved to San Francisco after graduating from college. His media company The Hustle was acquired by Hubspot in 2021 for a reported $25-30 million dollars.  In today’s ..read more

Arlan is the Founder and Managing Partner of Backstage Capital, a venture capital firm dedicated to minimizing funding disparities in tech by investing in high-potential founders who are people of color, women, and/or LGBTQ. Backstage has raised tens of millions of dollars, invested in 200 startups led by underestimated founders, and has been featured in Forbes, Fortune, Wall Street Journal, CNN Money, Inc., Entrepreneur, and Quartz. Arlan also founded Runner, a talent operations startup that connects outstanding operations talent with inclusive companies. She also published It’s About Damn Ti ..read more

Gary Vaynerchuk (Gary Vee) shouldn’t need an introduction. Revered as the king of content, he has an uncanny ability to spot trends in the market and skate to where the puck is going. Gary has his finger on the pulse of consumers and is one of the most forward-thinking voices in business today. He is also a prolific angel investor. His portfolio is bolstered by early positions in Facebook, Uber, Twitter, Coinbase, and his own NFT project VeeFriends. Mickey Cloud is the Executive Director of The Sasha Group. A VaynerX company based in Chattanooga Tennessee. Mickey works with some of the bigges ..read more

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The last two years have taught us so much. How to be flexible and adapt quickly to change. A whole new style of doing business in a virtual world. Even how to integrate your work and your life in a healthy way. Today we are hearing startup growth stories from 5 CEOs based in the Circle City. These five Indianapolis-based tech companies are doing incredible things and we are joined by their CEOs to hear some stories and lessons learned over the last two years. One CEO opened a 50-acre innovation community during the first year of the pandemic. She proceeded to lead her organization through the ..read more

Culture, when built correctly can be your key differentiator. When built incorrectly it can be your Achilles' heel. Today we do a deep dive into the founding story of Indianapolis darling startup Lessonly. Lessonly is a market leader in training software and was acquired by San Diego-based Seismic in 2021. We sit down with co-founders Max Yoder and Conner Burt to discuss Lessonly's development over the last decade and why culture has always been a North Star in the companies evolution. Max and Conner both started their professional career by means of the Orr Fellowship, a two-year, Indianapoli ..read more

The Minneapolis-St. Paul area may not be as known for tech as San Francisco, but the city has seen huge potential in building a rising tech scene. And when it comes to the Midwest, you couldn't ask for a more tech-friendly city. Minneapolis-St. Paul is home to some of the top accounting firms in the country and overall has a healthy and satisfying tech environment. And with so much untapped potential left for opportunists to unlock...it's hard not to consider becoming a part of the incredible tech ecosystem that's brewing in the Twin Cities. In today’s episode, I speak with two leaders who are ..read more

Every new beginning has its struggles, but getting a business started to call your own can be so fulfilling. Today we dive in with a founder who is ready to risk everything. He gives up his steady 9-to-5 job to chase his passion for the entrepreneurial dream beginning with the simple words "I Quit." On today's episode of the Powderkeg Pitch, we're bringing on Co-founder and BBQ expert of Durham based Mike D’s BBQ, Mike De Los Santos. Mike and his wife Gloria started building a BBQ sauce business with Mike having 'quit' his job. They launched the company back in 2014. And hit their sales goal t ..read more

How much more impactful could your company's marketing strategy be if you could understand exactly what content to create and the best places to publish it in order to keep up with the present trends? Well in today’s episode, you’ll hear from Shawn Schwegman, Co-founder and CSO of Demandjump. DemandJump focuses on taking the uncertainty out of digital marketing by allowing you to see what your customers and competitors are doing, and what you should be doing next to get out ahead. Shawn had only 5 minutes on the Powderkeg stage to pitch his company DemandJump to a live panel of investors and i ..read more

Leaders that are able to build and create a culture of openness and collaboration are able to encourage their team to better self-develop, communicate, and share what they are learning so they can capitalize on the actions they are or could be doing better, and promoting and pushing one another to do the same. But where do we begin in order to create and maintain this idea that we call product culture? In today’s episode, I speak with Marcus Cobb, a technologist, product designer, public speaker, and successful entrepreneur. Marcus is a highly sought-after investor, mentor, and strategist for ..read more