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Clark Landry

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35
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2015-02-18
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2015-02-18
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1
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  1. “And so they've solved what is kind of a real problem and they're growing extremely rapidly. I'll throw one more out there since it was recently Valentine's Day. Invested in another company called Bloom Nation. And they're disrupting the flower delivery business. So they compete against like 1-800 flowers. Instead of having pre-packaged Kind of flower arrangements that florists then have to do, floris can actually go on there and present their own arrangements. It's almost like an Etsy for flowers and the quality ends up being much better. It's a great company. Andreessen Horowitz is an investor and they're doing very well.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “They're in the ad tech space. The Black Tux is an interesting one. They basically, it's almost like Netflix for Tux rentals. Typically, if you're doing a wedding and you have a bunch of groomsmen, the men's warehouse experience isn't the greatest thing in the world.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Like the team a lot. So that was my most recent one. I say, you know, some of the ones that I'm most excited about right now, Trade Desk is one. They're doing exceptionally well.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “It's basically very, very high quality genes that they're selling online at very, very low prices basically taking a smaller markup than other companies in the space that are maybe a little bit more well known and spend more on branding. But I really met the team recently, really liked them. They're seeing some pretty amazing traction in the fact that I actually got hooked up with them through another investor friend of mine, Adam Lilling. He was posting about them, and I mentioned on Twitter that I don't think a day has gone by over the past year or so that I haven't worn a pair of their jeans. And so the CEO of the company favored that tweet and suggested I come in for a meeting. It was kind of funny how that came about.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “Most recent investment Most recent investment was in a company actually a little outside of the box for me. It's a company called Distilled. It's DSTLD. And they basically, I would almost describe them as like a Warby Parker for jeans. These guys are”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “Oh, the ones I've done a lot of investments in launch pad companies. They recently have changed their model a bit, and I'm not sure that they're doing kind of annual or biannual classes anymore, but the launch pad's great amplify a lot. Mucker is great. Making sure I don't leave any out before I get yelled at by these guys. I think those three are some of the top ones in town. There are a few others that are not immediately coming to mind that I like as well.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Oh, tech accelerators. I'd say it depends on the accelerator. And I know that sounds like I'm hedging my bets there, and I think I am. I think that there are some that provide a lot of value. And there's some in LA that I think definitely fit that model. Obviously, ones like Y Combinator and TechSron. Think useful for entrepreneurs. But I think a lot of it depends on.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “It's a classic not necessarily the easiest read in the world, but it's enjoyable. You know, another one I'm sitting here in my office at home and I just spotted another one that I like a lot called The Dark Fields. It's a novel. They turned it into a movie called Limitless. It's a page Turner. I don't know if I'd call it great literature or anything, but it's very entertaining”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Oh boy. Favorite book and why. I really like blood meridian by Cormac McCarthy I don't know. Very enjoyable book. I imagine maybe you're looking for like a business book idea. Not necessarily.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “Constantly changing. It's one of those things where in certain respects, I feel like I almost was more of an expert in ad tech back in 2000 than I am now just because I was so hands-on. Just so hands on back then. And so running these campaigns, actually calling up the sellers, monitoring the campaigns, figuring out what's going on and just doing that on a day-to-day basis, you learn a lot. And so at this point, my role at shifts and co-founder and executive chairman, and my role has really been much more on the overall strategy side, fundraising, recruiting. And it's been less hands-on, I would say, just with the day-to-day operations of the company, which are mainly managed by my co-founder and our CEO, James Borough.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “That's a good question. I say my portfolio skews pretty heavily towards ad tech just because that's the world that I come from. And so just my network of people who I know who really understand the ad tech space, and I know that's a pretty broad space. I tend to know a lot of people in the ad tech space. And so I tend to have more investments in ad tech. That said, ad tech is a challenging space to be.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Interviewed by major media outlets have been successful, either as entrepreneurs or investors in this world. And so you're not really, you're hearing the perspectives of the winners. There are a lot of people out there that have failed in their startups, and it's not a fun thing. I think that you learn enough lessons along the way. In a startup that you learn enough lessons along the way, I would say, where you are very much challenged. I'd say having to fail is not necessarily something that is a good thing necessarily.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Probably on the it's not necessary. I think you, I forget who said it, there's a funny quote about About failure I read recently, and again, I'm forgetting who said it, but it's very easy after you've been massively successful to say that failure is a great thing. And I think that it's somewhat self-selecting, right? Because the people who are inevitably being”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “Yeah, I mean, I backed first time founders, a lot of them. I tend to like people that have done it before. You know, even if the outcome wasn't fantastic, right? I mean, I think that there's, I mean, there's obviously value to investing with entrepreneurs that have done it before and have done it very successfully. I'd say I'm in a bunch of deals now with guys who did not fail in their first startups, but they weren't home runs or maybe even doubles, you know.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “I was just to say in terms of, yeah, so you said single startup versus single founder versus multiple founders, what were the other ones?”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “It's scary enough doing these startups with a co-founder or with co-founders, doing it alone, I haven't done a startup alone. I can only imagine that it's that much more, I mean, at least on the bad days, it could be demoralizing. It's nice to have someone there who can pull you out of your funk if you feel like things are not going great and to talk to someone and figure out how to get past the problems that you will always face.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Having been an entrepreneur and knowing how challenging it is, I mean, you have your up days and your down days, and I'd say it's really, really valuable to have people there with you that, I mean, literally that you can just talk to about these things.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Yeah, you know, I wouldn't really say I have any hard and fast rules. I mean, I much prefer deals where there are multiple founders.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “Well, I would say it needs to be an idea or product that seems compelling to me. So that's obviously a preliminary hurdle that you have to get over. But if you look at the business and you think, okay, or at least this is the way I look at it and you think, okay, this business has the potential to be successful or get to a certain point where investors would be happy. And then from there, so much of it is, again, at least for me, less about trying to poke holes in the business model or talk about kind of, you know, what are you going to do if X, Y, or Z happens? Because ultimately the people running these businesses know more about them than I do. And so I'm much more inclined to focus on backing people that I think will be able to solve the problems that inevitably come up.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “Know it's one of those things where I think with me in none of these comments are groundbreaking and are kind of cliches, I would say. I mean, it really starts with team, right? That's the most important thing for me is just the founding team.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “And really help support the investment that you made through more than just the money, but through other mechanisms as well, whether it's helping people to raise additional funds, making introductions where it might be helpful, giving advice whether solicited or unsolicited.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “Yeah, you just might understand it a little bit more. And I think also you want to put yourself more in a place of trying to help out as much as possible as opposed to sitting there and giving people a hard time. You know, ultimately, you realize that for the most part, everyone's trying their hardest or working in good faith and really trying to make these things work. And so even if you might be upset about maybe one of the companies you invested in, you know, how to bad quarter or a bad half or a bad year. And it doesn't make it any less concerning, but I found myself just trying to get more in the mentality of how can I help solve this problem? Where is my value add where I can really help these people turn a corner?”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “I think as an investor, having been involved as an entrepreneur, you knew it all along, but you realize how hard it really is. I mean, it's challenging.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “These guys are tough to deal with, and you some people get into the attitude of all PCs are the worst. And it's just not the case. I mean, VCs and angel investors are people just like entrepreneurs are, and they're trying to do as well as they can for their LPs, right? Or for themselves if they're investing their own money. So by doing by doing investing on your own, you start to realize that you have a lot of concerns and entrepreneurs, like it's great when entrepreneurs are very open with you and tell you about what you're doing and keeping you updated. So I say as an entrepreneur, you have a lot more empathy for your investors. Can you really get to the point where you want to do well by them? And that becomes a very, very high priority, if not your top priority.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “Sometimes when you just started a company for the first, second, or even third time, there can be a lot of thought of, you know, oh, you know, these VCs were shooting me down, left, and right, which happens to this day more often than not. As an entrepreneur, sometimes it can be easy to think like, oh, you know,”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “I'd say that the main thing is that you just end up having a lot more empathy for everyone in the whole ecosystem, right? Because you realize as an entrepreneur, you know, sometimes”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  27. “There's no shortage of interesting projects to work on and companies to invest in. And so I think that there's always that aspect of missing what you've played a hopefully a significant part in building. But at the same time, it's exciting to move on to the next chapter.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  28. “I think before you do a startup, you always envision that there's this moment where everyone is jumping up and down and celebrating. And at least in my experience, it's been obviously very exciting to be involved in a company that gets sold, but it's a long and drawn out process. So by the time you're actually done, the feeling that I've had more often than not is relief. Absolutely. And excitement to move on to the next thing. You know, I mean, I think that...”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  29. “And To be perfectly blunt, I love doing startups. I love investing in them and being involved as an entrepreneur. But, you know, ultimately I would say it's more the former because I view it as kind of a means to an end. And ultimately, the goal is to build something that you're excited about that creates value for users and of course for investors and hopefully founders as well. And so I think having been through a few exits, I'd say the feeling is more relief. I think a lot of other entrepreneurs would probably say the same thing just because you get to a point, especially going through due diligence process, which is Which is challenging, right? Yeah,”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  30. “So there's actually a lot more in between So, Travit Marketplace was really my first Angel investment. I put some of my kind of very limited funds at the time into the company and saw a nice return and thought, hey, I kind of like this angel investing thing. After working at Traffic Marketplace for a little while, after the acquisition was involved with a company called Tagworld, which was a social networking site that I started with, co-founded with a few other partners. This is back when MySpace was really the dominant player in the social networking space. And so MySpace was significantly larger than we were. So we were playing in that space, did that for several years and then ended up selling the company to Viacom.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  31. “You know, I mean, I wasn't running the show at iWin. I was one of the more junior people there at the time. So, you know, I think, I mean, look, there were meetings that were had internally where there were discussions of IPOs for IWIN and a variety of other things. And so in that sense, I think it did affect me and the company in the sense that just people's expected valuations for these things went way down and the IPO window closed as well for a pretty significant period of time. But that said, the exit for the founders and investors, both Iowan and traffic marketplace were very good. Couldn't complain out well.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  32. “And then I went in Traffic Marketplace, both got sold actually after the bubble burst in late. They were both sold in late 2000 to a company called Uproar that was in the process of being sold to Vivendi back when they were doing their internet roll-up.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  33. “So it was kind of amazing. So I went to my boss at the time and was showing this to a bunch of other guys that we were working with. And they had seen similar things and said, look, why don't we start something, another company that takes advantages of some of these opportunities and perhaps use kind of all the ad bind that we were doing through that to build out one of the early online ad networks. And that's what we did. The company was called Traffic Marketplace. The CEO is a guy named Evan Rifkin, who more recently sold his company Bursley to Apple. He's been a very good friend since then.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  34. “It was an absolutely fantastic opportunity and experience just being able to go out there, really learn about how online media buying and selling worked, how ad tech worked at the time, obviously very, very different world now versus back then. But it gave me an opportunity to really learn that side of kind of internet advertising on a really hands-on way. So, while I was there, was seeing all these really interesting arbitrage opportunities. I mean, at this point, you know, if you want to try and do internet arbitrage, most of the most successful guys are using, I mean, borderline Wall Street style like black box trading system. Back then, you could literally go on a commission junction, you know, grab a CPA affiliate offer, buy some ads on Washington Post on a CPM basis and actually make money doing it on a one-to-one basis.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  35. “I joined IWIN. I want to say in December of 1999 as a manager of business development, which didn't really mean much of anything. Basically, it was part of a crew over there, actually mostly younger kind of examing analysts and consultants just brought on to do a variety of things. After about a month, I was approached by my boss at the time and he said, Clark, you're now our media buyer. That's funny. I don't know anything about media buying. He's, I know, but we need a media buyer and I think you'll be able to learn it. You know, we've got a substantial budget that we have to spend. You're going to make mistakes, but I want you to be an expert in this thing within a couple months.”

    2015-02-18 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20 VC 012: Angel Investing, Accelerators and AdTech with Clark Landry · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source