I fight for the user * Co-founder TBA * Co-founder of Manpacks, + more *

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Episode Overview

Andrew's been building prototypes, testing theories, raising money and building startups for 14+ years. As a long-time entrepreneur, user-experience designer and developer Andrew brings a unique blend of knowledge in web-based mapping, ecommerce and social media.

Andrew ran an interactive consulting company for 11 years working on embedded device interfaces, web-based and mobile apps. He co-founded Rimrocked, a startup that brought real-time, satellite and mobile GPS data to web applications. Helped pioneer subscription e-commerce by co-founding Manpacks, raising funding from brand name Silicon Valley investors and scaling to profitability. And has enveloping himself in social media while building early-stage prototype products with HootSuite Labs.

“ [...] they brought us into the computer area and we're like 'we've got this new thing called the internet' (this was like 94-95) and I distinctly remember the one professor - he was the guy I really didn't like and it turns out that he was the guy I learnt the most from - and he said something to the effect of 'you might make a few dollars off of this at some point in your career'"

Some Of The Questions We Ask

0:53
Where are you from, what did you study and how did your passion for entrepreneurship start?

3:40
You’ve likened yourself to a “Reese's Peanut Butter Cup” combining both design and development skillsets to launch several startups and different projects, including Manpacks, Snapable, and Scratchpad. What do these 3 companies do, how did you come up with the concept, and where are they now?

22:57
Scratchpad is an awesome example of this. You hacked a prototype and got 3,000 number of users in 3 days (TechVibes, Smashing Mag, Hacker News)

27:05
You’re currently part of Hootsuite Labs dreaming, prototyping and launching new products. How big is the “Labs” team and what types of people are working there?

33:27
What’s your process for identifying potential new products/features to create, then how do you go about implementing them?

36:20
So we heard you’ve got something new cooking up that you wanted to share with us? What’s going on?

43:15
Can you share one funny or unbelievable story about yourself and/or your companies that very few people know?

44:19
What are you obsessed with apps/tools/books wise right now?

What You'll Learn In This Episode

• How Andrew learned to make money on this little thing called the internet.
• How going to country bars can result in both new customers and exciting stories.
• How to Andrew designs his prototypes to be easy to code and codes them easy to test.
• How building new products - even inside a startup - can be tricky.
• And more!

Important Links

Here are some of the most important links and resources mentioned throughout the show.

Twitter Handles & Websites

Andrew on Twitter
Manpacks on the Twitter
Manpacks on the Web
Hootsuite on Twitter
Tyler Copeland on Twitter
Franco Varriano on Twitter

Books & Apps

Slack