Latest / Earn Your Leisure / Overcoming Funding Hurdles For Entrepreneurs

Transcript

Overcoming Funding Hurdles For Entrepreneurs · Earn Your Leisure

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: This episode is brought to you by P and C Bank.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: A lot of people think podcasts about work are boring,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: and sure they definitely can be, but understanding a professionals
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: routine shows us how they achieve their success little by little,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: day after day. It's like banking with P and C Bank.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: It might seem boring to safe plan and make calculated
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: decisions with your bank, but keeping your money boring is
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: what helps you live or more happily fulfilled life. P
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and C Bank Brilliantly Boring since eighteen sixty five. Brilliantly
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: Boring since eighteen sixty five is a service mark of
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: the PNC Financial Service Group, Inc. P and C Bank
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: National Association Member FDIC Erness What's Up? You ever walk
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: into a small business and everything just works like the
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: checkout is fast, the receipts are digital, tipping is a breeze,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: and you're out the door before the line even builds.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Odds are they're using Square? We love supporting business is
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: that run on Square because it just feels seamless. Whether
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: it's a local coffee shop, a vendor at a pop
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: up market, or even one of our merch partners. Square
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: makes it easy for them to take payments, manage inventory,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: and run their business with confidence, all from one simple system.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: If you're a business owner or even just thinking about
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: launching something soon, Square is hands down one of the
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: best tools out there to help you start, run, and grow.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: It's not just about payments, it's about giving you time
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: back so you can focus on what matters most ready.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: To see how Square can transform your business, visit Square
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: dot com backslash, go backslash eyl to learn more that
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Square dot com backslash, go backslash eyl. Don't wait, don't hesitate.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Let's Square handle the back end so you can keep
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: pushing your vision forward. I mean, we know the statistics.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: We hear about it, the percentages that minority founders you know,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: are able to have access to. What was that like
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: for you, obviously being being a woman a founder talk
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: about that.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: I really liked being an outsider in the sense it
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: was similar to when I just started to start the
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: business from NASA.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: At first, people were.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: Telling me, Hey, you've got to go with a pitch deck,
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: go to the valley, go to vcs.
• 2:17
  Speaker 3: But the vcs weren't trying to rock with me.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: They didn't think that there was a market for what
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: I was looking to do.
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: Business has been around for ten years.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: You're wrong, right, So one of the things that I'd
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: like to say is stop taking advice from people who
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: haven't done what you're trying to do with LINGO. I'm like, eh,
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: I don't think I want to raise venture capital.
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: I know what the stats are. They're terrible.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: How do I look at the model and how do
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: I flip the model on its head?
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: Because that's what I do.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: And when I looked at it, I said, vcs get
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: their money from family offices.
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: Why don't I try to hit up a couple of
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: family offices.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: Now I know why people don't typically hit up family offices,
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: but I was determined once again to try, and I
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: had the time, and oh, by the way, I had
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: the patience because I'm already running a business that's successful
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: that I've had for ten years.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: So let's try to figure this out. So I made
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: a list of.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: Family offices who were in businesses that I thought that
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: could be strategic investors. And the gamble that I made was, well,
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: if I can get a multi billion dollar family who
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: has the right investment mindset and is willing to support
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: me and understands the long term of what I'm.
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: Looking to do. Can I also bring in traditional capital?
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: And the answer was yes.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: So I did a founder led seed round where I
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: brought in a million and a half from a family office,
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: and then I went to the other vseas and said,
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: do you want to play?
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: How did that work out?
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: It worked out well because if I've already brought in
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: a million and a half and you're going to sip
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: in one hundred thousand dollars, that million and a half
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: is going to help your hundred thousand dollars.
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: So I basically de risked the round for you. And
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: that's one of the.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: Areas that I've been big on telling other minorities to
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: pursue was what I call friendly patient capital. I call
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: my investors like they're my dad. I'm like, hey, what
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: do you guys doing. Here's what I'm working on. And
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: part of the things that were not, you know, non
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: negotiable for this family was that you were going to
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: do good and you were going to do well right.
• 4:17
  Speaker 3: It's not just the dollar, It's about the legacy.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: And so when I tell them that kids in Ghana
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: are doing our kids have the video, love it They're like,
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: that's what you're supposed to do, right, go out and
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: make that impact, whereas some people who have you know,
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: domestic vcs are not necessarily as lucky to have people
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: who think in that way.
• 4:39
  Speaker 4: So, okay, so you raise the money that helps you
• 4:41
  Speaker 4: with infrastructure and employees. I'm assuming, So are you raising
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: more money? What's the goal?
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: Yes, you can definitely hit me up if.
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: You want to send a check. Check.
• 4:52
  Speaker 4: How much are you trying to raise?
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: I would like to raise about a million more and
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: pot path to our Series A.
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: And I'll tell you why.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: Some of our clients are big firms.
• 5:08
  Speaker 3: Talking Siemens General Dynamics.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: General Dynamics has been a customer's ours for the last
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: three years.
• 5:13
  Speaker 3: Microsoft buys from us. Right, we have big companies who
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: have engineers who buy from US.
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: What do they buy the software?
• 5:20
  Speaker 3: They buy the kids so they can teach employees, They have.
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: Their employees go into the schools, or they provide it
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: as capacity building for the schools that they sponsor. And
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: as I started to do this, we started talking to
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: school districts. Shout out to Syracuse School District. And I'm
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: realizing that this mission and this need is even bigger
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: than I knew.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: Like when I thought about it, I was like, oh,
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: we're just going to ship out.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Some kids, But it's really become about how can we
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: help make a district better?
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: And that is a problem of a much larger.
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: Magnitude and it takes more time. And we're also now
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: building custom kits, like we're about to drop three holes
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: space lessons. We got a climate satellite, we got a
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: buggy coming out. That buggy's a moon rubber, and we
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: also have a rocket launch. And in building all all
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: this content, I'm like, you know what, bo, we take
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: a little bit more capital, take our time, and really
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: do something that is going to move the needle.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: How many lessons are inside these kids? Because I'm thinking,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: and this was an elementary middle school and obviously high
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: school probably different, but it felt like they were just
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: for semesters, and so there was a semester with the
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: lessons and there was a new set of kids. So
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: forth semesters of kids in the grade every year. How
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: many lessons are inside of your kids right now?
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: So it depends on what you want.
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: And this is the beauty of it, because we designed
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: this to be flexible. You can have two to three
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: semesters worth in your kid if you want.
• 6:51
  Speaker 3: It's all about what you ask us for.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: So we developed content for every lesson for the classroom,
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: and you could teach that over semester.
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: You could teach it over too.
• 7:02
  Speaker 4: So school districts aren't really buying it for you. For
• 7:05
  Speaker 4: the most part. Is corporations as buying it.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: It's mostly been corporations.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: If you're out in the district, yeah, I mean, I
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: think the challenge right is there's a lot going on
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: in the district environment, and we've got some good connections
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: and we're making progress. But this is where I'm not
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: ashamed to say I need help. The people who purchase
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: from us, they love us. But I started to realize
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: what we were really up against when it comes to
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: ads and marketing and all that stuff. And that's really
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: why I was like, I got to go back to
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: the drawing board and raise more money because I did
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: not know how expensive it was to really advertise.
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: And read some of these people.
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: Is it a price point issue? Because I feel like
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: schools wet so much money on some of the most
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: ridiculous things, and they do it repetibly every single year,
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: And so when you're approaching schools or school districts. Are
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: they saying, well, it's the price point, we don't have
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: it in the budget this year. What is the resistance
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: you feel? Because every school has them, so I'm just
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: trying to fig what would be the resistance.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: So we actually do not see resistance once we get
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: in front of the right person. What I see is
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: the amount of money that I have to invest to
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: have somebody reach out, form the relationship, do the presentation,
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: put the proposal in front of whoever has to make
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: the decision, close the deal, and then get paid. Can
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: be roughly six to eight months, and that's really where
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: we have to support the operation until they can close
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: the deal. And so the challenge in my mind is
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: how can we do more of these deals and shorten
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: the time.
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: So what's the ultimate vision for the company.
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: My vision for Lingo would be to not only be
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: a global provider of immersive STEM experiences like I would
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: like to get to the point where some of our
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: boxes interact with Oculus, but to combine that with the
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: entrepreneurship thing. Because when I teach the Lingo Box in
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: the Bahamas, and I've had this camp for nearly ten years,
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: I couple it with entrepreneurship, and then I give kids
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: money to go out and try to run their business
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: because I believe that you don't have to have a
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: college degree to be a multi millionaire. You just need
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: to have entrepreneurship skills.
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: And it's like a muscle.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: The more that you exercise it, the stronger that you're
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: gonna get. So I want students trying to build their
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: first startup when they're twelve or their thirteen, because by
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: the time they're twenty, they're going to be beasts.
• 9:32
  Speaker 5: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
• 9:36
  Speaker 5: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from Al Salvador
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: accused of murdering a Texas man of Venezuelan charged with
• 9:44
  Speaker 5: filming and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just
• 9:48
  Speaker 5: some of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President
• 9:52
  Speaker 5: Donald J. Trump's leadership. I'm Christin Noman, the United States
• 9:55
  Speaker 5: Secretary of Homeland Security. Under President Trump, attempted legal border
• 10:00
  Speaker 5: crossings are at the lowest levels ever recorded, and over
• 10:04
  Speaker 5: one hundred thousand illegal aliens have been arrested. If you
• 10:07
  Speaker 5: are here illegally, your next you will be fined nearly
• 10:11
  Speaker 5: one thousand dollars a day, imprisoned, and deported. You will
• 10:15
  Speaker 5: never return. But if you register using our CBP home
• 10:19
  Speaker 5: app and leave now, you could be allowed to return legally.
• 10:22
  Speaker 5: Do what's right. Leave now. Under President Trump America's laws,
• 10:27
  Speaker 5: border and families will be protected.
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: Sponsored by the United States Department of Homeland Security,