YouSaid · the spoken record

Greg Bettinelli

lines on the record
26
first
2016-08-22
most recent
2016-08-22
sittings or episodes
1
sources
podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

  1. “Yeah, I thought about that question for the users out there, we know some of the questions that are being asked by Harry, but I haven't been very good at celebrating my own successes, and I think that's part of what makes really motivates me to move forward, of all the things that from a work perspective, obviously, getting hired at eBay in 2003 really set everything off for me. That's where I did good work. I made an impact. I met great people and really understood what motivated me.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Yeah, so Dan Primax term sheet, which comes about seven o'clock my time here in California, it's definitely a must read. It's part of my 30 to 45 minute routine to really know what's going on in my business. He does a great job and always has unique perspectives, so that's definitely a must read for me.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Yeah, so I talked about dollar shave club, which is an example of an LA company before. But I think what Michael has done around building a brand organically in a very fun and innovative way, starting with that great video and then most recently is television commercials and new product launches and everything between. I love brands that are really disrupting the legacy provider. So in Los Angeles, for example, we have another company called Honest Company that's done a very good job building brand. They're both attacking the same company, which is Proc during Gamble. And you can see them responding by doing what big companies do, you know, creating grassroots quote unquote grassroots marketing efforts, challenging the claims of these innovative brands. You see them actually trying to do their own scientific research about the quality of the products. You see this dispersion of these brands. And so I think you know it's working when that's where the legacy providers.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Yeah, it's pretty boring, but the reality is I'm getting old, so I wake up about six o'clock. I probably read for 30 to 45 minutes, think current events, technology news, politics, sports, those type of things. And I spend probably another half hour just before the kids are getting up, really getting caught up with email and candidly dealing with the top priorities that probably kept me up from the night before. And so that way when I get to work after I drop off my kids about 8.30, 8.45, I feel like I'm not behind. So really those 60 to 90 minutes when I wake up kind of get me set for the day.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “I'm a little bit broader. So I'm a big Michael Lewis fan. And so I think obviously Moneyball blindside, Liars, Poker, that kind of that thought-provoking type of work that he does around actual real topics are the type of literature and books that I respond”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “I believe that there's plenty of capital out there locally, nationally, globally, and they're starving for great ideas and great entrepreneurs building great businesses. So the capital will find the great businesses. And you can just look at LLA, there are very few top 50 venture funds that don't have an investment in Southern California today. Some of the top investors, historically, whether it's Kleiner Perkins or whether it's benchmark or Sequoia, they all have multiple Los Angeles-based companies in their portfolio. So I don't think the capital will find the great businesses. I think we are just now getting the great entrepreneurs who may have been doing things in different categories or market segments to think about technology related businesses in Southern California.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “You have honest company, other commerce companies like Luke Crates that I think are doing very interesting things. And LA just kind of fits perfectly for those elements coming together.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “I'm obviously very bullish on Ellie. My career on it. And I think it stems from an element that I think the most creative people in the world live in Los Angeles. Twenty years ago, we thought about that from a Hollywood perspective, but now I think we think about it from not just Hollywood entertainment a la content, but I think about it from art. I think about it from food. I think about it from diversity. I think about it from weather and global proximity. And the unique thing about LA with that creativity component is it really with the core application layer being built, ILO, the technology to make the internet and mobile go is content, community, commerce, communication can all be built on top of that. And I think LA in particular is very good at doing that. So look at companies like Snapchat, obviously, which I think is one of the most exciting companies globally right now. You have SpaceX, you have 10.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “Yeah, I would say it's one of a handful. I think if you look at, especially like direct-to-consumer type of brands, I think my formula is a very large market opportunity that doesn't have multiple brand participants that can play in, let's say, high margin categories that have reoccurring purchasing characteristics, meaning this idea of I can build a direct-to-consumer brand in categories that have this. But the most important part of it all is you have a founder or a team that has some sort of unfair advantage and perspective in that category. And brand development might be one of those. I think we'll talk, I think a brand like Dollar Shave Club is an example of that where you wouldn't think that a brand could be developed in and around something owned by Procter Gramble via Gillette. But I think through some innovation, through a founder with a unique perspective, they're able to separate through the clutter and actually”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “I think there's actually even more. I think it's more of a changing customer, I would say. I don't like to use the term millennial because I think we're all changing the way that we are.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Doing a million a month. So we had huge growth, but Nordstroms was doing $10 billion a year, right? And just the sheer enormity of having a store's business, an online business, and then they acquire businesses like Hotbook. So just the understanding of what it takes an organization to truly scale, putting stuff in boxes is very different in say my eBay or Stubhup date is more of a marketplace business and you really never saw what you're selling. But Nordstrom, you saw everything that you were selling. This is sheer magnitude of the products being moved in and out was pretty impressive.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “Yeah. So I learned a tremendous, as much about the consumer themselves, but I learned a lot about brand loyalty. There's always great stories about Nordstrom, how they were, they had the best return policy anywhere. And that you could return shoes that were worn for three years and bring them back and get your money back. And a lot of the stuff that was actually was mostly folklore where they didn't actually do everything they said, but the perception of the brand was that of great customer service and the importance of that and the value of that to the company I really underestimated. So just the earned customer loyalty and really what lifetime value literally means, as in my mother shops has shopped at Nordstrom for 50 years or 40 years. So I think that was important. Scale was another thing I learned. I mean, when I was at HotLook, you know, we would do, we got to a point where we were doing, say, $25 million a month of sales before I left. And we had started.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Of the world or even markets of the world, I put everything into the world into a department store to kind of identify different customer traits. In the middle, you have a Macy's and a Nordstrom and on the lower end you might have a pennies or a Kohl's. And they all serve different purposes to different markets.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “No, because I think curation is important. I think the reality is not all brands can afford to distribute product directly at scale to their customers. I believe that similar to wine, fashion needs someone to tell us what looks good. And maybe it's not going to be so much the department store anymore, but it might be an influencer or something else. But I do think those aggregator brands and styles are important. It's why liquor stores exist to tell us which are the fifty wines we can choose from. I think Nordstrom's role is no different in that the certain styles and types of products that we'd be interested in. So I think it will definitely change. You're already seeing things like private label brands and other things really to drive margin in the stores changing. And the reality is we talked earlier, there are just very different types of customers now. You have the high-end customers think of like the Barney.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “Being a better business than Nordstrom's business. That's why you see HM Zara's businesses be better than, say, Macy's business or GAP's business, is I think you're just seeing a shift of the customer to value. Think of Costco, think of places like that. So I think that's more of a broader shift. And then you do have what I call the urbanization of the consumer. Not necessarily just from a geography perspective where people are moving into cities, which is obviously slightly true, but the malls aren't as cool as they used to be. The very commoditized shopping experiences aren't well received by consumers anymore. So I think those are all adding to really the change and clearly technology plays a part, but isn't the only thing that's driving Macy's to have a poor sales quarter.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “Nobles is out of business because of Amazon, and Blockbuster is out of business because of Netflix. That was more because the content itself had transitioned from a tangible product to a digital one, I would say. But I look at more in retail as an example the most successful retailers today in the United States have very little e-commerce. So think of Home Depot, Lowe's, TJ Max, Costco, dollar store, Zara, H&M, even Uniclo, their e-commerce businesses are sub three percent of total sales, yet TJX, which owns a company called TJ Maxx and Marshalls, has a $50 billion market cap, and they do zero online, right? So I think it's really towards a bigger macro shift what's really happened, I believe, is consumers are shifting to price, value, and convenience providers in away from, that's why you see Nordstrom Rack's business actually”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  17. “Yeah, so I think it's kind of an interesting question. So I used to work for Jeff at eBay and actually now serve on a board with him, a company called Walker& Company, then Intrisson led around after we had done a deal with an entrepreneur named Tristan Walker. So I think I don't disagree with his macro thesis. I think there's a little too much the sky is falling theme to that. The reality is, I would say businesses and categories evolve over time and retail isn't any different. You're not in the US, but if you grew up around here, you would hear your parents, your grandparents talking about brands like Woolworths or Montgomery Ward or Sears or Kmart or even Circuit City. All those retailers are no longer in business and had absolutely nothing to do with Amazon, right? So the reality is I think there's more of a consumer characteristic change going on that's being accelerated by technology. Clearly,”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  18. “Yeah, I think it depends. I think for me, definitely not. But in general, I think the reality is I would take a great team in a very good market over a decent team, in a great market, because I think at the end of the day, end of the day, the great team has the flexibility insight to really move into great markets. And so I think if you narrowly say, hey, I'm looking for a company that fits X, Y, and Z, you may force yourself into a decision just because it was the only thing you found and you might settle for an investment. And I don't think you can ever settle for investments in venture capital.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  19. “Yeah, well, I think a lot of it, I think at the beginning, I had some general market thesis about retail innovation and some consumer products categories. What I quickly learn is I'm much better off reacting to strong entrepreneurs who think they can do something with a market versus my own point of view about a certain market. So I think those kind of, that was a big early driver for the types of consumers.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  20. “Of this team, what's their unique advantage they have to conquer and develop a market? And so I kind of tie all those together.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  21. “Well, I think you can really talk about there are things that I try, I have filters that I put on things like name droppers, those people who over-exaggerate their titles and the work they've done. You know, when a 23-year-old tells me that they ran a $100 million budget for Pepsi Cola or something, I just find that very hard to believe in saying a lot of people may try and oversell themselves. You can also drive it around when people really give credit to their other team members or credits to their bosses for putting them in positions to succeed. There are just some elements of what people say and how they say it, as well as how they define the market opportunity they're going after. or something like that versus having realistic expectations about the products or services they can offer, I kind of use those and then back to, I use the term unfair advantage, like what is this person?”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  22. “Suster and other partners have similar backgrounds. Does that really respond to those type of entrepreneurs, those people who notice something, notice an opportunity and really try and parlay that into a large business success? And so I tend to have filters around those type of entrepreneurs versus what I call more of the silver spoon entrepreneurs. Again, I don't want to discredit anyone, but I think people who've kind of worked through and gotten themselves in a position to succeed probably have a greater likelihood of having a very successful outcome. So those are some characteristics I look for.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  23. “Yeah, so I really, the term I use is grit or moxie. I think those are two terms that I really look for in entrepreneurs because I think I was always that. I grew up in a small town. I was supposed to be a dairyman or much more of a different type. I thought VCs were the Viet Cong. I didn't know what a venture capitalist was until I was eBay when I was 32, I think. And so I just kind of, if you really look at those entrepreneurs that have built great companies, obviously there's a lot of people who went to Harvard and Yale and Stanford, but I think really the interesting ones or the ones that I think I'd like to follow and spend time with have a different kind of element. I don't want to say that hardship, but they overcame something they were underdog. They really took advantage and you'll hear me say this a lot of their own unfair advantage. And I kind of think that we're the type of firm actually that Mark”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  24. “Some angel investing in Southern California companies and Kantley National companies. I was a co founder of an accelerator here in Los Angeles called Mucker Lab with a couple fellow eBay colleagues that I worked with and really spent time getting to know what was going on here in Los Angeles, which I'm sure we'll talk about later. And during that process, really 2013 or so, I got to know what was then GRP partners, which is now up front ventures. Mark Suster and other partners here and really got excited about the idea of being part of the LA story. And then I coined the phrase long LA, which I still use. And if you see on Twitter and things, that kind of all came from some original ideas of me just being very bullish on what was going on in Los Angeles. And I thought Venture was a pretty exciting place to be when everything happening. And up front happened to have an opportunity and we spent a lot of time together. And I've been here for the last two and a half years or so.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  25. “Yeah, I have a pretty unconventional track record to be in venture capital. I think two things I'm most proud of. I'm pretty sure I'm the only current or former chief marketing officer who is also an investor. And I know I'm the only person who ever used to work at a horse racing track. And so I have a very different way that I got here. And it actually drives a lot of my decision making and the type of entrepreneurs I look to support. But the real story is I moved down here into Los Angeles in 2008 after spending a lot of time at eBay up in the Bay Area and eventually became the chief marketing officer at a business called Hotlook, which is a fashion e-commerce business that we sold very successfully to Nordstrom in 2011. And the truth is I was only a couple years into my vesting schedule when that acquisition. And so I continue to work at Nordstrom, but also had done pretty well through the exit and started doing”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  26. “Oh, yeah, I'm excited. It's great to be with you. Congrats on all your success. So I'm glad to be. Number 497 on the list.”

    2016-08-22 · The Twenty Minute VC · 20VC: Upfront Ventures' Greg Bettinelli on Testing For Founder 'Grit' & What It Takes To Build A Successful Consumer Brand Today · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source