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The DNA Test to Stop Sounding Like a Robot

One of my editors at Wired used to say, “Put a fact in every sentence.” It was a way of eliminating throat-clearing intros and excess opinion. In our era of ghostwritten gray goo, my key element of style is this: put a piece of you in every sentence.

If a line doesn’t contain your DNA, delete it.

2 Minute Read TimeBy: Joseph Flaherty

Welcoming Jack Arenas

We’re thrilled to announce that Jack Arenas has joined Founder Collective as the new Principal in our SoHo office. He represents the value and ethos of FC – he’s a builder at heart, lived the ups and downs of the founder journey and loves to work with founders across the tech industry.

3 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

To Pivot or Not to Pivot

Pivots are part of many successful startup stories, but there’s no clear playbook on how to make them work. There should be no shame in pivoting, despite what many founders think, but they need to be well thought out before burning the boats.

6 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

The Many Incentives of VCs

When I started in VC, there was one incentive — capitalize startups, help founders build their businesses, and bring in additional capital (when necessary). Hopefully, if the stars aligned, the funds delivered outsized financial returns for the risk, ideally 3X or more, to their LPs. This model was a relatively well-tested formula for venture-backed startups — provide enough capital to the company (but not too much) and maximize its chances for a healthy return, hopefully in less than ten years.

6 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

The Two Laws Of Startup Physics

Fifteen years into my venture capital career, I’ve come to believe there are two undeniable laws of startup physics: 1) Capital compounds both positive and negative formulas. 2) All positive formulas compound at diminishing rates of return.

10 Minute Read TimeBy: Eric Paley

How Sarah Kauss bootstrapped a billion-dollar bottle startup

If you work in tech or have attended a conference over the last ten years, you’ve likely come across S’well water bottles. Sarah Kauss, an accountant turned entrepreneur, invented the iconic, insulated vacuum flask as a sustainable and stylish alternative to single-use plastic water bottles. Sarah launched the product in 2010 with $30,000 in savings and grew the company to over $100 million in revenue annually while turning hydration into a form of sustainable haute couture. And she did it without a drop of venture capital.

8 Minute Read TimeBy: Amanda Herson

Amanda Herson is Founder Collective’s Newest Partner

Being a successful venture capitalist requires various skills, but we believe that the ability to empathize with founders separates the good from the great. The first years of a startup are a rollercoaster of stress for founders where success is unpredictable and sometimes seems out of reach. Most investors have no idea what operating under that level of ambiguity is like, but Amanda Herson does.

3 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

What to Do When a Co-Founder Can’t Scale

A high-quality startup problem is when the company starts to scale but one of the co-founders can’t grow at the same pace as the other. It’s a good problem but a real challenge nonetheless. Here are some thoughts on how I’ve seen it handled well (and not).

6 Minute Read TimeBy: David Frankel

Don’t Quote Me

In my role at a VC firm, I have the privilege of seeing the pitch decks of startups as they set out to raise new funding. In the main, they’re masterful, but I’ve seen a lot of founders making a similar mistake—including quotes from random users in their presentations.

3 Minute Read TimeBy: Joseph Flaherty

The “Get Rich Slow” Exit Strategy

These are the liquidity events that give the impression that startups are a great way to “get rich quick,” even though building a saleable company often takes the better part of a decade. Less often discussed, or championed, is a third option — the “get rich slow” method of building a company and making millions of dollars in profits, for years or decades.

6 Minute Read TimeBy: Joseph Flaherty

The IPO Alternative No One is Talking About

In a world where IPOs are an unlikely outcome and traditional M&A exits are difficult to manufacture, there is a new alternative for liquidity starved founders and investors — The PE exit. It’s an invisible ecosystem to most, but when you see a headline about a PE firm making an “investment” in a mature SaaS startup, and there is no mention of valuation, or even what series it represents, you’re most likely witnessing an acquisition, of sorts.

6 Minute Read TimeBy: David Frankel
Startups, Beware “The Next Big Thing”

Startups, Beware “The Next Big Thing”

In 2007, Groupon took in the first million dollars of what would ultimately be $1.4B of venture capital, raised with ambitions of reshaping shopping. For a while, it looked like group buying, social commerce, daily deals, or whatever you call the practice of time-limited sales paired with social pressure was really going to change buying behaviors in a big way. In the space of four years the category exploded:

5 Minute Read TimeBy: Joseph Flaherty

How to Break Bad News to Investors

There’s no good way to tell your board that you’ve blown a quarter, or your superstar head of data science is jumping ship to Google. Still, breaking bad news is a key skill for founders and delivering it well is often what keeps a company alive.

7 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

How to Write Better Cold Emails to VCs

When I used to write for Wired, a cold email was the lowest probability way to get press, but it still worked with some regularity. Cold emailing a VC is a similarly low-percentage play, and many of the best VCs in the world advise against the practice. Still, it does work from time to time.

8 Minute Read TimeBy: Joseph Flaherty

Diligence 101 for Seed Stage Startups

For some entrepreneurs, raising capital is effortless. When you see a company raise tens of millions of dollars, series after series, especially if they have few other milestones to promote, you know you’re in the presence of a world class presenter. Fundraising is a startup super power, just like consumer product instincts and B2B sales acumen. Some founders are just “natural athletes” who possess a knack for storytelling paired and charisma, typically topped off with some credibility in a prior venture.

6 Minute Read TimeBy: Micah Rosenbloom

A “Fill-In-The-Blank” Investor Update Template for Busy Founders

There’s a lot of good advice on writing investor updates, but one of our portfolio CEOs recently wrote an update that was so good that I thought it could serve as a template for entrepreneurs everywhere. It’s B2B focused and largely positive in tone, but it’s easy enough to copy, paste, and customize for B2C startups or less upbeat news. Just swap out the [bold] content and you can keep your investors in the loop with almost no effort.

By: Micah Rosenbloom

Blessed are the “Boring,” for They Create the Billion Dollar Startups

“I need to find a industry or product I’m passionate about.” I often hear this from entrepreneurs and it frequently means wanting to start a business in a consumer space that they love—music or gaming, for example. It’s an understandable impulse. If you’re going to start a business that will consume your life for years, why not make it something you’re interested in?

4 Minute ReadBy: Micah Rosenbloom

Why “But Wait, There’s More!” is a Bad Way to Pitch VCs

We’ve been trained by infomercials that “But wait, there’s more!” is a powerful sales pitch. Not surprisingly, this approach is used frequently by entrepreneurs pitching their startups. Somewhere between slides 12 and 15, the passionate founders take a breath, clear their throats and declare “But the real opportunity in this business is …”

By: Micah Rosenbloom