Speaker 1: Af roa Tech Oakland, California. I'm in the main expo
Speaker 1: hall with Charles Hudson, managing partner at Precursive Ventures, talking
Speaker 1: about investing in early stage startups. So many companies get
Speaker 1: sold the idea that farming out technic contractors or all
Speaker 1: short developers undercut your opportunity to build something meaningful, that
Speaker 1: if you can't hire the talent in the house, that
Speaker 1: you might be doing this wrong. What does D say
Speaker 1: about that? So? I think a long time ago, most
Speaker 1: technology products built by tech startups were deeply technical. So
Speaker 1: if you're Intel, you're building chips and motherboards. A lot
Speaker 1: of the companies I meet today, I don't mean this
Speaker 1: to denegrate their products. The products they're building have really
Speaker 1: low technical risk. You're building a retail experience. You're gonna
Speaker 1: start on Shopify. Do you really need Google engineer to
Speaker 1: help you get started on Shopify? I don't think so.
Speaker 1: So the way I think about it is, if your
Speaker 1: product has relatively low technical risk, the most important thing
Speaker 1: is to get it felt, And if that's done by
Speaker 1: an agency or an a worker to get you to
Speaker 1: view one, I think that's totally fine. I'm Will Lucas
Speaker 1: Mrs Black Tech, Green Money. I'm gonna introduce you to
Speaker 1: some of the biggest names, some of the brightest minds
Speaker 1: and brilliant ideas. If you're black in building are simply
Speaker 1: using tech to secure your bag, this podcast is for you.
Speaker 1: Claren's Bethew is founder and CEO at ups, a technology
Speaker 1: company offering consumers an alternative when purchasing extended warranties for
Speaker 1: electronics like mobile devices and home appliances. He recently closed
Speaker 1: an eighteen million dollars Series A funding round, as Clarence
Speaker 1: about the counts of that. With several black owned startups
Speaker 1: announcing large fundraises recently Upsee among them, is there still
Speaker 1: validity to the idea that there's still so little progress
Speaker 1: to show for black founders raising sufficient capital to build
Speaker 1: and scale their businesses. Do I believe that that narrative
Speaker 1: has changed? No. I think oftentimes we look at when
Speaker 1: ye know Will has a show, right, or Clarence raises
Speaker 1: some money, or you know, this black black person does
Speaker 1: this one thing, and we started looking at the narrative like, look,
Speaker 1: it's getting better and and the truth is I don't
Speaker 1: believe that. Is it's it's gotten better for me, which
Speaker 1: is okay, it's great, But I'm also not I'm not
Speaker 1: in this game just for me. I'm in this for
Speaker 1: for all of us. So I think why I've been
Speaker 1: been blessed and lucky and fortunate, Um, it's we still
Speaker 1: have such a long way to go, you know. So
Speaker 1: we see like these winds that people like you just
Speaker 1: raised eighteen million dollars, people like Squire just raised a
Speaker 1: bunch of money, and there's there's so many more people
Speaker 1: who have raised money, both institutionally and even like with crowdfunding.
Speaker 1: And I wonder, like, what if you could give me
Speaker 1: like your you know, two minute, three minute state of
Speaker 1: black companies being funded, what would you say it looks
Speaker 1: like at present day? I think at present day, what
Speaker 1: we see is what Solange and I'm doing at the Squire, right,
Speaker 1: we see up see, we see what Steven and those
Speaker 1: guys are doing over at a kids company about like
Speaker 1: we see those moments, but remember those moments are like
Speaker 1: they're in tech Crunch, the Black Enterprise that you know
Speaker 1: that then all of these other things. And and I
Speaker 1: still hear so many stories every day of founders with
Speaker 1: great ideas, um, great businesses who are not getting funded
Speaker 1: at the rate of our counterparts again funded so ideas
Speaker 1: on the napkin or I haven't quite hit traction yet.
Speaker 1: And we know that our counterparts, like they get the
Speaker 1: opportunity to figure out traction and figure out go to
Speaker 1: go to market. Oftentimes we don't get a chance to
Speaker 1: figure that stuff out. And so I don't think we're
Speaker 1: any better off than we were two years ago. They're
Speaker 1: just there's more news around us because what happened with
Speaker 1: George Floyd anywhere happened without right. So there's it is.
Speaker 1: It is pretty cool to announce a black person's raise
Speaker 1: or black person show or a black person X right
Speaker 1: now because you're gonna get clicks. Yeah, And when I
Speaker 1: read your um and it's been well documented that you
Speaker 1: came through tech Stars program when you had this idea
Speaker 1: for this warranty business, and I wonder, you know, how
Speaker 1: did you go for capital first or did you go
Speaker 1: for customers first? If you went for customers first, you know,
Speaker 1: how did you get that attraction when you know, if
Speaker 1: you're selling warranties, that means you gotta have the money
Speaker 1: to be able to put it out if I break
Speaker 1: my device, right, Yeah, I got lucky in the early days,
Speaker 1: I had some former angel investors who put a little
Speaker 1: bit of money and some time and some built out
Speaker 1: our first kind of m v P, and so out
Speaker 1: of the gate I had, you know, we while we
Speaker 1: were going at the customers, we had a little bit
Speaker 1: of money in the bank of folks that could help us. UM.
Speaker 1: But when we got into tech Stars. Tech Stars really
Speaker 1: turned me on too, like what venture was and what
Speaker 1: it is and what it can be. Because before tech
Speaker 1: Stars I didn't know how to raise that and raise
Speaker 1: one venture dollar. I didn't understand how you play the
Speaker 1: venture game. I didn't understand how you pitch. I just
Speaker 1: know I had a bunch of gumption to try to
Speaker 1: do this, but I didn't know the game there was
Speaker 1: in in tech Stars where like, hey, okay, you have
Speaker 1: all this possess in this charisma, now let us teach
Speaker 1: you how to actually play the game the way it's
Speaker 1: supposed to be played, so you can actually get money
Speaker 1: in the bank. So I would say we probably went
Speaker 1: for customers first UM and didn't learn how to raise
Speaker 1: money later. So let's talk about that tech Stars program
Speaker 1: because so clarance about here. Today. Let's say you are
Speaker 1: reviewing that Clarances application to tech Stars. Um, because you
Speaker 1: successfully got into the program. If you're reviewing your application
Speaker 1: as the reviewer, what is it in histories Clarence application
Speaker 1: that says, you know what, this guy's got something, then
Speaker 1: let's let him in. Because there's the thousands of people
Speaker 1: who apply to these pro tenies accelerators and boot camps,
Speaker 1: and you got in. So if you were reviewing your
Speaker 1: application from that day, what was it that said, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's somebody we want. I don't believe it had us
Speaker 1: getting in. It didn't have anything to do with our application.
Speaker 1: I think us getting in had everything to do with
Speaker 1: how bold I was walking into the program. Um, some
Speaker 1: of it was fake boldness because I didn't internally, I
Speaker 1: really didn't feel like I just I deserved to be
Speaker 1: and and and you're asking me to go back to
Speaker 1: a time before I know what I know now. But
Speaker 1: going into the program, we have people from Silicon Valley,
Speaker 1: we have people from New York. I was really really intimidated.
Speaker 1: I was. I was. My wife would tell you I
Speaker 1: was scared because I was, Wow, there's you know, there's
Speaker 1: a woman from Silicon Valley who was at HP for
Speaker 1: all these years and like had this network and was great,
Speaker 1: and I think I just had to be bold. And
Speaker 1: you know, you know, my story is well documented. Like
Speaker 1: I'm just a street kid, man. I come from the hood.
Speaker 1: I grew up, you know, doing all the wrong things
Speaker 1: that you bossibly can do. So in times of of
Speaker 1: of of being nervous and in times of like not
Speaker 1: knowing what to do, it's kind of the only thing
Speaker 1: that you can turn to is your confidence and being bold.
Speaker 1: And I would say that is what I was just
Speaker 1: bold enough to think, Yeah, I can come in, I
Speaker 1: can do this um and and it's worked out so
Speaker 1: far for us. So let's let's talk. Let's dig into
Speaker 1: your history a little bit, because I wonder what was
Speaker 1: that moment where you realized what Silicon Valley was and
Speaker 1: what venture capital was to be nervous walking into those rooms,
Speaker 1: like you said, you said yourself, you know, you were
Speaker 1: a street kid. So so many of us come from
Speaker 1: these backgrounds, and we and too many in our neighborhoods
Speaker 1: still don't know what silok and Valley is. What was
Speaker 1: your introduction to that world beyond you know, wanting to
Speaker 1: build something, which we'll talk about. What was your introduction
Speaker 1: to that specific world that says, you know, this is
Speaker 1: a little bit intimidating because this is could be my future.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm walking into a room that people who
Speaker 1: in many ways, not all of the ways, but in
Speaker 1: many ways hold the keys. Right. My first foray with
Speaker 1: the Silicon Valley was actually in Silicon Valley. UM I
Speaker 1: went to. I was in a program called Village Capital UM.
Speaker 1: They run a great program where they get the top
Speaker 1: two companies a hundred grad at the end of the
Speaker 1: program and their final the final piece of the program
Speaker 1: was in Silicon Valley and it was at this big
Speaker 1: law firm and then you moved to UM this like
Speaker 1: where all the Silicon Valley like investors meet up deal
Speaker 1: and I remember we had like eighty Silicon Valley investors
Speaker 1: there and it was a hard lesson for me to
Speaker 1: learn they didn't give a damn about me, Like it
Speaker 1: was clear that I was a nobody, that I meant
Speaker 1: nothing to them. I was just a black guy in
Speaker 1: the room. And I remember being like, wow, like nobody
Speaker 1: even even though I felt like I was, I was
Speaker 1: like I won the competition. So even though I felt
Speaker 1: like man like, like I know what I'm doing, that
Speaker 1: like I don't have it all figured out, but I'm
Speaker 1: figuring it out. And you know, I'm careiss mag I'm
Speaker 1: already saying that he said you want to be and
Speaker 1: it was clear, you know, that was two sixteen. It
Speaker 1: was like, now I don't believe. And I actually had
Speaker 1: the investor tell me. He said to me, Clai, I've
Speaker 1: never seen a black founder go to exit or I
Speaker 1: p o at like a billion plus exit. So I
Speaker 1: just have a hard time believing that a black founder
Speaker 1: can build a big company. So I'm just not interested. Um,
Speaker 1: and it was so great, So one can take that
Speaker 1: many ways. UM, you being the guy who you grew
Speaker 1: up being. When you have somebody put that kind of
Speaker 1: you know, stamp on you saying you know, I've never
Speaker 1: seen nobody like you, UM do this that A don't
Speaker 1: you like? What did your spirits? How you like in
Speaker 1: that moment? I'm gonna be that guy? Can we curse
Speaker 1: on this show? Um? Look, I'm a I'm a big
Speaker 1: chip on the shoulder type of guy. And so when
Speaker 1: people were telling me, especially earlier only in the journey,
Speaker 1: that I would never do this, I would never do that. Like,
Speaker 1: you don't have the background, you don't have the pedigree.
Speaker 1: That that's the word I kept hearing. You don't have
Speaker 1: the pedigree. You didn't go to Harvard, you didn't drop
Speaker 1: out of Stanford, you don't have the network. Man, I
Speaker 1: tend to say fuck you, like in my mind, right
Speaker 1: in my mind, I'm like, all right, okay, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: show you. UM. And I think at a certain I'm
Speaker 1: actually getting out of that phase now of this journey
Speaker 1: because UM, everybody seemed to believe that we can do
Speaker 1: what we can do now. But early on in the journey,
Speaker 1: I would use that as as motivation UM to just
Speaker 1: be like, all right, well you don't believe me, let
Speaker 1: me show you. What do you think happens in UM
Speaker 1: the tech space for black entrepreneurs. UM. Do you think
Speaker 1: not enough of us have that? Or do you think
Speaker 1: so many of us have that that maybe they're not
Speaker 1: getting recognized? Like how come not enough of us? As
Speaker 1: to your earlier point, and it is very well know,
Speaker 1: not enough of us are raising capital like at the
Speaker 1: levels that you have and that others that we've mentioned.
Speaker 1: Do not enough of us have that? Or is there
Speaker 1: are there other issues that UM keep people keep us
Speaker 1: from getting to the place to where we're even having
Speaker 1: the conversation at that level with an investor. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: see it both ways, to be honest with you. And
Speaker 1: then this is, yeah, this is always tough for me
Speaker 1: to talk about. There's one side of it from a founder.
Speaker 1: You know, you're a founder, right, Like we're founders where
Speaker 1: we're like like, we all think that we deserve money
Speaker 1: and that's cool and like, yes, we should be more
Speaker 1: bold than whatever. But on the other side of me,
Speaker 1: which is I'm out at True Ventures out of San Francisco.
Speaker 1: They want to top see stage firms. I also get
Speaker 1: a lot of inbound from black founders, and what I
Speaker 1: see a lot of times is we're not ready for
Speaker 1: prime time. And not only are we not ready for
Speaker 1: prime time because we have to fight and call and
Speaker 1: scratch and like have that kind of screw you mentality,
Speaker 1: we're also don't have our ears open here like what
Speaker 1: we need to hear to get to the next level.
Speaker 1: And I give you I give you a quick example.
Speaker 1: I was talking to a founder I don't know a
Speaker 1: few months ago and the we were going back and
Speaker 1: forth over zoomed and I was like, hey, like, and
Speaker 1: I'm not the one to give advice, but I do
Speaker 1: give you, like, here's what it worked for Clarence. Here's
Speaker 1: what I did to have success, and feel free to
Speaker 1: follow it or not. But there's just fundamental things you
Speaker 1: can't do in a pitch you can't do in the
Speaker 1: pitch jack, and just certain stuff you know, Like I
Speaker 1: mean you can probably say you have our phone call.
Speaker 1: Like and I was going back and forth with the
Speaker 1: founder and I said, hey, I really think you know
Speaker 1: you should try doing this, like like you don't talk
Speaker 1: about traction. I think I was talking about traction. You
Speaker 1: don't talk about traction anywhere. And he's like, well, I'm
Speaker 1: kind of pre revenue. I said, great, but you still
Speaker 1: have some traction points like how fast are you building
Speaker 1: your product or or how many UM people on your
Speaker 1: wait list do you have? Like all of that is
Speaker 1: considered traction in this game because dudes are raising millions
Speaker 1: of dollars off ideas on the napkin. So you show
Speaker 1: some traction, you can get it. And the dude literally
Speaker 1: looked at me and he was like, f you, you
Speaker 1: just don't want to see me when you want to
Speaker 1: be the only one in the room, blah blah blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. And I remember thinking like man like, like
Speaker 1: if you had just listened, I wasn't I wasn't here.
Speaker 1: I wasn't here too to hurt you. I was here
Speaker 1: to give you everything that somebody gave it to me
Speaker 1: at one point. And so I think we why, yes,
Speaker 1: there's a funding problem, there's also thattitude UM, and I
Speaker 1: had it at the beginning. I had to like, I
Speaker 1: got checked on it, and somebody sat me down and said, hey, man,
Speaker 1: you're not going to be your best stelf unless you
Speaker 1: learn to listen. And I was like, well, what do
Speaker 1: you mean that that? And that it's just like everybody's
Speaker 1: not out here to hurt you. Some people are out
Speaker 1: here to help you, and you have to decipher between
Speaker 1: the two. So I think that we have to UM,
Speaker 1: because we've been in a fight, in the struggle for
Speaker 1: so long. We have to understand that there are people
Speaker 1: out here to help UM and sometimes you gotta learn
Speaker 1: to just listen and then walk away gracefully and decipher
Speaker 1: and take what you need out of it. So how
Speaker 1: do you decipher through that? How do you know who's
Speaker 1: really trying to give you some game and the ones
Speaker 1: that are, you know, just saying whatever they got to
Speaker 1: say because they don't believe. Yeah, well, I mean, everybody
Speaker 1: to me deserves to be listened to. How I take
Speaker 1: it is up to me. So if you're giving me advice,
Speaker 1: and I may say, well, like man like, thanks for
Speaker 1: the advice. Man, I appreciate it, and I'm so humbled
Speaker 1: that you would even take your time out to give
Speaker 1: it to me, then it's my job to walk away
Speaker 1: and start to look at what you're saying and say, Okay,
Speaker 1: you know what, it's kind of full of it, but
Speaker 1: this a little this, a little timper cent that he
Speaker 1: gave me, it's gonna help my business go to the
Speaker 1: next level. Often times we walk away and we say
Speaker 1: if we don't agree with one thing that you say,
Speaker 1: we stopped agreeing with everything that you say, and I
Speaker 1: just don't believe that that's true. There's nuggets in in
Speaker 1: all of this advice that you should get um, and
Speaker 1: it takes a humble spirit to to to figure out
Speaker 1: that timper cent that you should be taking. You know,
Speaker 1: I wonder you're making me think about when you said
Speaker 1: the investors said, you know, I've never seen anybody you
Speaker 1: know exit at the billion dollars. I p o who
Speaker 1: looked like you and you talked about that that happened
Speaker 1: after winning a competition, and I wonder how much stock
Speaker 1: we should be putting into competitions then, because you know,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of diversity theater out here, UM and two. Now,
Speaker 1: checks can mean nothing to a lot of these companies.
Speaker 1: And it could be, hey, we had a black company
Speaker 1: with our competition. You know, they got this check and
Speaker 1: so apparently to that investor, you winning a competition was
Speaker 1: not enough to say this guy clears is onto something.
Speaker 1: How should we be looking at competitions, UM with a
Speaker 1: critical mind but also one you know, hey, I'll take
Speaker 1: the k But how should we also be looking at
Speaker 1: them critically and strategically as proof points that we're onto something? Right? Right?
Speaker 1: Great question. Competitions are great from the sampoint of you
Speaker 1: get up, get up in front of most time a
Speaker 1: live crowd, and practice and be able to have the
Speaker 1: ability to understand what it's like to change in emotion
Speaker 1: in the room, because great founders can change emotion in
Speaker 1: the room. Great founders can make you like, here a
Speaker 1: business and you said, oh, that's stupid, and then get
Speaker 1: in front of it. You get up in front of
Speaker 1: the stage and the whole emotion in the room change,
Speaker 1: it changes. So I think they're good for that practice.
Speaker 1: But like you said, we can't put too much stock
Speaker 1: in it because oftentimes these conferences, these competitions are theater
Speaker 1: I need a black person, or need I need a
Speaker 1: couple of black people to do. Like literally, I've been
Speaker 1: reached out to where people say, hey, we want you
Speaker 1: to be in our twenty dollar pitch competition, and I
Speaker 1: send them a link to our article, to an article,
Speaker 1: and then like you didn't even doing the whole work.
Speaker 1: All you saw was that I was black. You know,
Speaker 1: there's somebody more deserving for this at this stage, and
Speaker 1: so I think there's a lot of diversity theater that
Speaker 1: plays into this. So I think we have to look
Speaker 1: at it for what it is. It is an opportunity
Speaker 1: to pitch, and whenever you have the opportunity to pitch,
Speaker 1: you should take it win loser, draw to get better
Speaker 1: because in order, like I keep telling people, in order
Speaker 1: to raise the money that we raise to day, you
Speaker 1: don't many bad pitches I've had. I've had hundreds of
Speaker 1: bad pitches in order to get to a pitch where
Speaker 1: it may step. So I would say do it, but
Speaker 1: understand what you're doing. We talked a little bit about
Speaker 1: your introduction finding out that Silicon Valley even existed, right,
Speaker 1: And and there's so many UM in our communities, the
Speaker 1: communities that we come from, that UM that still struggle with,
Speaker 1: you know, some of the issues that you said you
Speaker 1: did as you were growing up. And what do you
Speaker 1: find as a successful if we're trying to sell them on, Hey,
Speaker 1: there's this other world out here, the world of building
Speaker 1: really big companies. UM, what do you find as a
Speaker 1: successful narrative or a successful story that UM would get
Speaker 1: their attention to see that there's a viable path in
Speaker 1: this world that they may not have considered for themselves. Right.
Speaker 1: I speak at jails in prisons, especially before COVID. I
Speaker 1: do that a lot, and I say the same thing
Speaker 1: to them. I am no smarter, no more savvy, no
Speaker 1: more like my business acumen is not any better than
Speaker 1: any of their's. It's all about taking the time and
Speaker 1: just doing it. Like a lot of times, it's just
Speaker 1: about jumping into the game and being a voracious learner.
Speaker 1: I don't believe, but I think oftentimes we make founders,
Speaker 1: we make them feel like they're special like we are
Speaker 1: like we have the special innate because we we feed
Speaker 1: off the Elon musk, and it's the Steve Jobs kind
Speaker 1: of aura, and and and the truth is, I don't
Speaker 1: look at anything that we've done at ups as special
Speaker 1: or unique or anything like that. I look at the
Speaker 1: work that our team do on behalf of our customers
Speaker 1: a special unique. But as a founder, I'm like man like, like,
Speaker 1: there's nothing special about players. And so that is my
Speaker 1: message to anybody. Every time I go speak, I say,
Speaker 1: there's that special about me. All of you are smarter
Speaker 1: than I am. All of you are more savva than
Speaker 1: I am. The one thing that I don't know that
Speaker 1: you all are more than me is I'm gonna outwork
Speaker 1: you at every turn. And if you can outwork people,
Speaker 1: because look, I got a lot of white buddies with founders. Man,
Speaker 1: there are some of the laziest s O b s
Speaker 1: I've ever been around in my life. Yeah, but they've
Speaker 1: raised hundreds of millions of dollars. We can't be that.
Speaker 1: I can't be that. I gotta outwork you in order
Speaker 1: to get in the room. So my message I was
Speaker 1: just saying, you want to get in the room, you
Speaker 1: want to have a chance outwork everybody. So let's let's
Speaker 1: go step further on there, because let's say you sold Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know businesses, you know, an opportunity out there for somebody,
Speaker 1: but I don't really have any like brilliant ideas, Like
Speaker 1: there's nothing special about warranties. You know, it's a warranty, right,
Speaker 1: And so let's go a step further and say, Okay,
Speaker 1: now you've sold me that business. There's this viable path
Speaker 1: some way that um, I can find a different life
Speaker 1: for myself. But I don't know, like what now, what
Speaker 1: to do? I've in effective devalued my own idea. So
Speaker 1: what would you say to that to to that person
Speaker 1: just trying to figure out, like what do I do
Speaker 1: next with They don't they don't feel like they have
Speaker 1: an idea worthy of millions of dollars or market attention
Speaker 1: or et cetera. Google is a powerful tool. You You
Speaker 1: literally can start your business by googling how to start
Speaker 1: a business. You know, there's tools like Shopify. There, there's
Speaker 1: so many you know, big commerce, there's so many tools
Speaker 1: where you can just say, you know what, I want
Speaker 1: to start this thing. I'm just gonna set up a
Speaker 1: Shopify store and figure it out. And a lot of
Speaker 1: times again it goes back to my first comment. Sometimes
Speaker 1: you just gotta go and do it. Like it's gonna
Speaker 1: be all screwed up. This ain't gonna make sense. You know,
Speaker 1: I got many buddies who wants to start businesses. They're
Speaker 1: just like, but what I do next? Like, just go
Speaker 1: do it and guess what when you mess up, you'll
Speaker 1: figure out the right thing to do. A lot of
Speaker 1: this game is not in books and and and and
Speaker 1: all these other places that people want you to mind it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you gotta go do the work, mess up and
Speaker 1: figure it out. I want to talk about the milestones
Speaker 1: to actually raising as much money as you did. You know,
Speaker 1: I asked you this question from the perspective of like,
Speaker 1: how like if you're reading the Clarences application to get
Speaker 1: in the Tech Stars. What if I'm the VC and
Speaker 1: I'm reading um your inbound to raise this eighteen million
Speaker 1: dollars that you're eighteen plus a million that you raised?
Speaker 1: What if if you're the VC, talk to me about
Speaker 1: those indicators that you presented, and what is the VC
Speaker 1: reading that says, yeah, I want in on Clarences deal. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I believe that there's a couple of triggers that get
Speaker 1: vcs interested in your business. UM. One, I think traction.
Speaker 1: But if you can show that you're growing the business
Speaker 1: in a steady way, in a sustainable way. UM. That
Speaker 1: was one thing that that we showed. So if I'm
Speaker 1: a VC on the outside of like, oh, they they've
Speaker 1: grown the business dramatically, that's great. UM Too, I'm a
Speaker 1: big bet on team, and our Tea team is just smartest, brightest,
Speaker 1: hardest working folks I've ever been around. And so I'm
Speaker 1: looking at our team and I'm looking at you know,
Speaker 1: what they've done in the past and what they're doing now. UM.
Speaker 1: And I'm betting on that team because they're that good. UM.
Speaker 1: And then three, I would say that the space the
Speaker 1: industries forty eight billion dollars now supposed to grow to
Speaker 1: be sixty seven billion, about two seven in the United
Speaker 1: States alone, UM, a hundred sixty billion dollars globally. UM.
Speaker 1: I'm looking at that space and say, Okay, they don't
Speaker 1: have to get everything right to win MCAU. I think
Speaker 1: those I think those are hard spaces going when you
Speaker 1: gotta be right a hundred cents a time, you know,
Speaker 1: we could be right a quarter percent of the time
Speaker 1: and still still build a multibillion dollar business. So go
Speaker 1: in there, because I don't hear a lot of people
Speaker 1: talk about that. So get some education to that point there,
Speaker 1: Please on. You don't have to be right all the
Speaker 1: time to to find success. Yeah. So so they when
Speaker 1: I look at some people businesses, they're like, well, if
Speaker 1: I'm right, this is what happens, right, And I actually
Speaker 1: don't believe that those are the best business We've seen
Speaker 1: those businesses work out and multibillion dollar businesses. But I
Speaker 1: didn't want to be in the business where I had
Speaker 1: to be one right in order for this thing to
Speaker 1: be a rocket ship. And what I mean by that
Speaker 1: is other players like that's why I can continue to
Speaker 1: do what they do. It hard to continue to do
Speaker 1: what they do. Um, some of our startup competitors that
Speaker 1: are on the B two B side can continue to
Speaker 1: do what they do and UPSET still could be a
Speaker 1: multibillion dollar company. Well, I don't believe that this is
Speaker 1: a winner's take off deal. Um, And it's showing itself
Speaker 1: up because you know, those companies are thriving, We are thriving,
Speaker 1: and we're all kind of doing what we do right
Speaker 1: now in the market more often than not, I personally
Speaker 1: even and I'm sure this is a sentiment you know
Speaker 1: that's mainstream. I see warranties has in like an unwanted
Speaker 1: like up sell, you know, like, hey, you bought some
Speaker 1: Q tips, you want the warranty Like, so like like,
Speaker 1: how do you get over this consumer like sense about warranties? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean so, first I would say, that's what so
Speaker 1: exciting about our space, right it's a space of where
Speaker 1: like you hate warranties or you don't want to hear
Speaker 1: about warranties, and we're trying to put this fresh new
Speaker 1: look that warranties are valuable to you, you know it.
Speaker 1: I always go back to the stats about where we're
Speaker 1: at in this country. Over forty percent of consumers don't
Speaker 1: have four hundred dollars in their bank account. If something breaks,
Speaker 1: we need to be replaced. And almost seventy consumers don't
Speaker 1: have a thousand dollars in their savings account. So when
Speaker 1: you look at where this country as as a whole,
Speaker 1: you know, the next iPhone that comes back, it's gonna
Speaker 1: cost We no longer can say, um that the iPhone
Speaker 1: is a luxury. It was a luxury and two eight
Speaker 1: when they launched it is no longer a luxury. It
Speaker 1: is a necessity. Um. If I bet you, if you
Speaker 1: look around yourself right now, you have four or five
Speaker 1: devices around you that keep you connected to your world,
Speaker 1: whether it's your laptop, tablet, your phone on whatever that
Speaker 1: that may be. And so when we're looking at ups,
Speaker 1: you were saying, well, we want to make it more affordable,
Speaker 1: we want to make it more transparent, and we want
Speaker 1: to make sure that we are servicing the hell out
Speaker 1: of our customers. And if we can do those three
Speaker 1: things and stay true to who we are, then we
Speaker 1: can carve out our own little niche in this space,
Speaker 1: which would end up being a yeah, a big thing
Speaker 1: for consumers. So, um, yes, warranties are not sexy, you know.
Speaker 1: We we we we we say that all the time.
Speaker 1: But it is valuable for most of Americans. But sometimes
Speaker 1: it's it's not even about the value, it's about the
Speaker 1: experience of dealing with customer service, you know. So it's
Speaker 1: I may be sold on hey, you got this iPhone,
Speaker 1: but I know if I call, they're gonna be running
Speaker 1: me through eight different you know, prompts on the phone.
Speaker 1: Then they're gonna send me to Russia somewhere that I
Speaker 1: have to figure out how to explain to them that's
Speaker 1: something draw on my phone. So we don't really have
Speaker 1: good relationships with warty providers, right, and so it's like
Speaker 1: they're always trying to figure how to not pay to
Speaker 1: help me, you know, get my stuff renewed. How do
Speaker 1: you manage the customer service side of this experience without
Speaker 1: exposing yourself to people who just want to take advantage
Speaker 1: of the system. Yeah, I mean they're always going to
Speaker 1: be people who want to take advantage, right that. That's
Speaker 1: no matter what business you're in. But we have a
Speaker 1: very very clear rule inside of UPSET that's take care
Speaker 1: of the customer first, no matter what. We actually have
Speaker 1: a budget inside of UPC that is to take care
Speaker 1: of customer budget. I had a customer service. So in
Speaker 1: our business, things go wrong sometimes that's just the nature
Speaker 1: of the of the business. We're dealing with insurance companies
Speaker 1: who always want to not not not pay claims as
Speaker 1: much as possible, and we're like the opposite. We're like, no,
Speaker 1: you're going to pay claims, even if we have to
Speaker 1: pay the claim and so we have this budget that
Speaker 1: if you start to go through that process and we
Speaker 1: see you going through that process, literally, you'll get a
Speaker 1: phone call from us and say, hey, well, look we
Speaker 1: see you having a tough time. We just want to
Speaker 1: get you taken care of. I can't tell you how
Speaker 1: many thousands of dollard from her customer that have made
Speaker 1: us simply because they're like, well they actually care. Well,
Speaker 1: when you just got a warranty at Best Buy, they're
Speaker 1: not gonna call you and say, hey man, we see
Speaker 1: you having a tough time, let us take care of you.
Speaker 1: So what we've done we created this like loyalty with
Speaker 1: our customers that they say, look, even if I'm in
Speaker 1: the right, upset is always gonna take care of me,
Speaker 1: even when you're wrong. Like I got a buddy, We
Speaker 1: just sent them a brand new washing machine. We just
Speaker 1: didn't didn't didn't didn't talk to him, didn't ask for permission,
Speaker 1: didn't do anything. It just shows up at that house
Speaker 1: one day and like, holy moly, what's going on? Because
Speaker 1: this is what we believe in, You're gonna be taken
Speaker 1: care of. I dig it dig it um. You mentioned
Speaker 1: like the Best Buys and the targets UM, and you
Speaker 1: also mentioned there's some other you know, sharks in the water.
Speaker 1: I want you to like to level set like what
Speaker 1: the landscape looks like for the war team market and
Speaker 1: like is this a game where it's like a David
Speaker 1: and Goliath and you're like trying to figure out how
Speaker 1: to topple the big dragons or do you have to
Speaker 1: outrun your counterparts? Who are you know in the early
Speaker 1: stages to be to your earlier point, you don't have
Speaker 1: to be right, you gotta be right or thirty percent right?
Speaker 1: What has to happen to where you're fifty right? Does
Speaker 1: is it toppling the best buy the target? Or is
Speaker 1: it making sure that you know FLIPSI, you know buppsy
Speaker 1: is not you know, taking the market here, right, So
Speaker 1: there's two sides of our market. There is a B
Speaker 1: two B side. So that is the side when you
Speaker 1: go to the website, UM, like you go to you
Speaker 1: go to buy an e commerce skateboard or something, and
Speaker 1: there's a little box set that says, you know, will
Speaker 1: would you like to add a warranty to your checkout?
Speaker 1: There's that side of the market. Then there's ups that's
Speaker 1: it's always totally different side of the market, which is
Speaker 1: B t C. Like you won't we won't ever be
Speaker 1: at your checkout, but we will always be here. So
Speaker 1: when when you leave check out, you can come to upse,
Speaker 1: find your thing protected and move on. Um. So when
Speaker 1: you look at the landscape, there's like the Best Buyes
Speaker 1: of the world. There's square trays of the world, you know.
Speaker 1: Um there there is like the Assurings of the world.
Speaker 1: They all are sitting on that like B two B
Speaker 1: side where they want to be at checkout. They want
Speaker 1: to work with the retailers and and get that EG distribution.
Speaker 1: What we're saying is that we believe that the most
Speaker 1: important person in this equation is actually not the retailer,
Speaker 1: it's the customer. So we want to sit on their side.
Speaker 1: So which means you gotta give great pricing, you gotta
Speaker 1: make sure you're transparent, and you gotta make sure your
Speaker 1: service to hell a lot of your customers because if
Speaker 1: you don't, they're just gonna go back to the way
Speaker 1: it used to be done. And so for us, when
Speaker 1: we look at the landscape, we're always in a David
Speaker 1: Goliath type story because everybody only knows like the big
Speaker 1: box retailers doing it the way they to do, and
Speaker 1: I actually enjoy that because the way I'm built, I
Speaker 1: wanted to be David and Goliath, and I want to
Speaker 1: be the one throwing the rock. But then we have
Speaker 1: the other side where startups are coming out and doing
Speaker 1: the B B thing and we're like cool, like great,
Speaker 1: They're they're going directly after the best vice too. I
Speaker 1: think more people in the game helps us topple the
Speaker 1: big players. So I'm appreciative of kind of the players
Speaker 1: that are doing it differently. But from a startup a standpoint, Um,
Speaker 1: I would imagine, and I could be wrong because I'm
Speaker 1: I don't know your whole business, but I would imagine
Speaker 1: the warranties are like the face value opportunities, and that
Speaker 1: there's some rabbit hole to where you can build a
Speaker 1: stronger lifetime value of this relationship. Um, how do how
Speaker 1: do you get deeper relationships with your customers beyond just
Speaker 1: you know, ensuring their iPhone? So you would be amazed
Speaker 1: that the average household by seven new devices a year
Speaker 1: and has over fifty connected devices in their home. So
Speaker 1: when you look at how do we build a relationship,
Speaker 1: it is not just protecting your iPhone. It's about how
Speaker 1: do we protect your TVs, how do we protect your laptop?
Speaker 1: And then how do we continue to get deeper and
Speaker 1: deeper in your life? So what happens on me? We
Speaker 1: got customers where they got fifty devices protected under us.
Speaker 1: Everything in their house is protected with upseat. And then
Speaker 1: where we see ourselves going is going vertical. Right. So
Speaker 1: auto warranties is another place where there's a big opportunity,
Speaker 1: twenty billion dollar industry in the United States where we
Speaker 1: think that eventually we're gonna end up playing that game too. Um.
Speaker 1: And then it's about latching on. Um, Hey you bought
Speaker 1: this iPhone, you can also get this specific case for
Speaker 1: your phone because we know everything about your device. Um.
Speaker 1: So we see all these different verticals going in the
Speaker 1: products where we play. But taking a step back, I
Speaker 1: tell investors all the time, we are extremely focused on
Speaker 1: being the best warranty selling company in the United States,
Speaker 1: and then we'll let this other stuff come, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of as as as a customer kind of pulls
Speaker 1: it out of us. You know, in your story, I
Speaker 1: was reading you used to work for a trucking company
Speaker 1: and is a time where you said you negotiate a
Speaker 1: new contract an increased revenue by two while managing ten people. Um,
Speaker 1: so you had chops right. And so this is before
Speaker 1: you started up obviously. And there are many people who
Speaker 1: are great at their jobs. They work for, you know,
Speaker 1: a big corporation or their own and upward trajectory in
Speaker 1: their career. They're not yet founders of their businesses, but
Speaker 1: they want to start businesses. But they're finding success. Those
Speaker 1: success indicators are apparent at what they do, um, but
Speaker 1: they're afraid to take that entrepreneurial leap. You weren't afraid, apparently.
Speaker 1: What do you say to those folks who are sitting
Speaker 1: on ideas? They're so good at delivering for their employer,
Speaker 1: but they don't know how to step out in being
Speaker 1: the employer. My advice to go back to what I
Speaker 1: said earlier. You have you gotta get out and just
Speaker 1: do it. It is scary, it sucks, it's um. You know,
Speaker 1: you gotta trim your life back to a to a
Speaker 1: place of where you're bare minimums. Um. You know you
Speaker 1: hear the stories about the ramen noodle diet a month
Speaker 1: entrepreneurs and like no cars like literally, my wife and
Speaker 1: I we like I had a nineties six seed bring
Speaker 1: the air conditioning and the heat didn't work. So in
Speaker 1: the wintertime in Minnesota, I would literally like have blankets
Speaker 1: in the car, but he's driving with blankets over me. Um.
Speaker 1: And in the summer, I would be stripped down to
Speaker 1: my undershirt and my underwear in the car until I
Speaker 1: got to my destination and then put my suit on
Speaker 1: when I got there. Um, like we were down to
Speaker 1: like bare mineral, no going out to eat, no vacations,
Speaker 1: no nothing, because we knew. We were like, we want
Speaker 1: to sacrifice now. I got this same either you're gonna
Speaker 1: sacrifice now or you're gonna sacrifice later. You're gonna do it,
Speaker 1: You're gonna sacrifice, You're gonna sacrifice. And oftentimes entrepreneurs were like, well,
Speaker 1: I'm at this corporate gig, I'm making six figures. Life
Speaker 1: is good. I got the house in the car and
Speaker 1: data die. But this entrepreneur game is one you have
Speaker 1: to sacrifice all of that if you want to do
Speaker 1: it the right way, Like you can't come out of
Speaker 1: that make a bunch of money and yeah and live
Speaker 1: the best life that you want to live. Um. So
Speaker 1: I would say, like, you have to do it and
Speaker 1: you have to understand you are going to sacrifice. But
Speaker 1: I can tell you if you ask my wife, if
Speaker 1: you ask my friends, like where we're at today versus
Speaker 1: where we made all the sacrifice, it was all worth it.
Speaker 1: I would do it again. Black Tag Green Money is
Speaker 1: a production the Black of the Afro Tech on the
Speaker 1: Black Effect podcast Networking My Heart Media is produced by
Speaker 1: Morgan Dubard, me Well lucas well at the SIP production
Speaker 1: support by Love Visa and Marissa Lewis. Special thank you
Speaker 1: to Michael Davis since the cars when you you know
Speaker 1: like the wine. Yes that's his real name. Learn more
Speaker 1: about my guests and other technis rup as an Innovatives
Speaker 1: at afrotech dot Com. Video version of this episode will
Speaker 1: shop to Black Tech Green Money on YouTube next week.
Speaker 1: It's up tapping enjoining Black Tech Green Money. Leave us
Speaker 1: a five star rating on iTunes. Go eat your money,
Speaker 1: Peace in love. M h m hm, m hm m
Speaker 1: hm