The Entrepreneur Experiment

In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox sits down with Colin Meagle, serial entrepreneur, venture builder, and founder of Continuous Ventures. Colin has built, scaled, and exited multiple businesses: from creative agencies to international tech ventures, and now operates out of Dubai, where he helps founders and corporates spin up disruptive businesses at scale.Colin shares his candid insights on what it really takes to spot opportunities, harness talent, and scale globally. From exiting Irish agencies to launching a venture studio in the Middle East, Colin talks about why saying no is a superpower, how to avoid AI-driven obsolescence, and why Ireland must think bigger if it wants to compete on the global stage.If you’re a founder, investor, or anyone curious about building in fast-changing markets, this episode is packed with hard-won lessons on talent, focus, and disruption.Show Notes – In this episode, we cover:🌍 Why Colin moved to Dubai and how it reshaped his entrepreneurial vision🚀 The evolution from running agencies to building a global venture studio💡 How to spot patterns, talent, and opportunities others miss🤖 AI disruption: which industries are safe—and which are already gone🔑 Why saying “no” is one of the most powerful skills for founders🏗 The difference between building vs. running a company (and why Colin prefers one over the other)📉 Why traditional VC is contracting and how venture studios are changing the game🇮🇪 Colin’s honest take on Ireland’s entrepreneurial ecosystem—and what needs to change⏳ The importance of 60-month windows when building ventures🧠 Why judgment, creativity, and EQ will define the winners in the AI era“Failure is a currency. You should be failing every single day. That’s how you develop the reflexes to succeed.” – Colin MeagleLinks & ResourcesContinuous Ventures: https://www.linkedin.com/company/continuousventures/about/Follow Colin on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/colinmeagle/—— Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

This week’s Mentor Moment dives into how Nadia Adan built her brand through bold, disruptive content, and why testing, learning, and finding a repeatable format is the secret to scaling on social media. Michael Corcoran shares why standing out often means doing the opposite of everyone else, and how brand storytelling, even with its raw ups and downs, is what truly connects with audiences.🎧 To hear the full conversation, search for Episode 396 of The Entrepreneur Experiment.🎟 Early bird tickets for EE Live @ The Sugar Club — November 30th: https://luma.com/6bwymzzt?fbclid=PAVE...—— Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?even...)

In this solo episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox takes us behind the scenes of the very first Entrepreneur Experiment Retreat — a transformative five-day experience in Marbella, Spain that brought together a select group of founders to focus on their body, brain, and business.Gary shares how a spontaneous idea in 2024 turned into a fully-fledged founder retreat, what went into designing the experience, and why moments of stillness, movement, and shared learning can create huge momentum in business and life.From sunrise workouts and deep-dive masterclasses to shared dinners and accountability sessions, this is a blueprint for any founder looking to reset, realign, and reimagine what’s possible. If you’ve ever thought about joining a founder retreat, running one yourself, or simply carving out space to think — this one’s for you.Show NotesIn this solo episode, Gary covers:🔁 Why “done is better than perfect” sparked the idea for the retreat🌅 The three pillars of the retreat: Reset, One Problem, Vision🤯 What even 24 hours in a new environment can do for your next 24 months🧠 The "Hot Seat" method for solving founder problems (without excuses)📍How Barry Napier (Cubic) set the tone with a €500M lesson in roadmaps⚡️ Why accountability, peer learning, and curated energy matter📈 The importance of becoming the face of your business📌 Why your retreat starts when you get home — not when it ends🥂 Behind-the-scenes moments from Padel tournaments to seaside visualisation exercises“Knowledge without action is useless. The retreat was about turning what we’ve all learned into real-world traction.” – Gary FoxResources & Mentions🎟 Early bird tickets for EE Live @ The Sugar Club — November 30th:👉 The Entrepreneur Experiment Sugar Club Event Tickets (Nov 30th)Barry Napier – CEO of Cubic📍Finca Naundrup, Marbella – Retreat location🧠 Visualisation Challenge – Write a letter from your future self—— Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1--- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

This Mentor Moment with Mary Sadlier (from Episode 398) dives into why digital is the great equaliser for entrepreneurs. Mary shares the art of getting products on and off shelves, why persistence matters, and the hard truth that nobody’s coming — unless you ask the right questions. A powerful reminder that value creation and resourcefulness win in business.—— Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox sits down with Paul Buckley — the fiercely honest and deeply reflective founder behind C2O Group. From nearly going pro in golf to blowing his savings in a poker room, to scaling and selling one of Australia’s fastest-growing engineering companies, Paul shares his rollercoaster journey through ambition, burnout, and bold reinvention.You’ll hear how Paul built EPS Group Australia from the ground up, scaled it to $84M in revenue in just three years, and exited in a major acquisition — only to find himself mentally and emotionally depleted in the aftermath. What followed was a two-year reset, a $14M relaunch, and a second act that’s bigger, sharper, and backed by one of the world’s leading private equity funds.If you're a founder who's exited (or wants to), this episode is your blueprint for navigating what comes next — the highs, the regrets, and the resilience it takes to start again.🧠 Show NotesIn this episode, we cover:💡 Starting with Nothing: From selling Christmas trees out of a van in Cork to leading billion-dollar infrastructure projects across Australia🏌️‍♂️ Sliding Doors: What it felt like to lose to Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry — and walk away from golf for good💸 From Broke to Boardroom: Blowing $30k in 7 weeks... then managing 30+ workers on a $3.5B desalination project in Victoria🚀 Scaling Fast: How Paul co-founded EPS Group Australia and scaled it from $0 to $84M turnover within 3 years🧨 Burnout After the Exit: The emotional toll of selling his company and staying on through a high-pressure earnout🧱 Rebuilding From Scratch: How Paul raised $14M to acquire two businesses in the US and Australia — and build C2O Group 2.0🧭 What He’d Do Differently: The tax incentives, legal lessons, and partnerships he wishes he'd understood the first time around👨‍👧‍👦 On Legacy: Why he won’t hand the business to his kids — and what succession means to him now“It brought me to the lowest point in my life by far… I was totally broken, barely able to stand up. It probably took me 12 months — probably 24 — to get my feet back underneath me properly.”— Paul BuckleyLinks & ResourcesC2O Group: https://c2ogroup.com/Follow Paul Buckley on LinkedIn—— Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox sits down with Rory, the 22-year-old founder of Shirt in a Box, the mystery jersey startup on track to hit €10 million in revenue. What began as a lockdown side hustle selling vintage shirts has exploded into a full-blown e-commerce machine — with 200,000 shirts sold, 2,500 US subscribers, and viral moments like a surprise shoutout from Gary Neville on the UK’s biggest football podcast, The Overlap.Rory breaks down how that single moment led to a 5x revenue day, why influencer marketing only works when it’s authentic, and how he's pivoted from student entrepreneur to full-time CEO building a creative agency within his business to produce 400+ ad creatives a month.From boxing mishaps and marketing fails to future expansion plans in the US and new sports like basketball, this is an unfiltered look at what it really takes to build and scale a modern DTC brand.“That Gary Neville shoutout was probably worth £150,000 to us… and we didn’t even ask him to do it.”🧠 Show Notes – In this episode, we cover:📦 How Shirt in a Box works — and why the mystery model taps into childhood nostalgia🎯 The Gary Neville effect: a €150k shoutout from The Overlap💥 The power (and problems) of viral growth: stock delays, customer service chaos & staff turnover🧠 Why managing people is the hardest founder skill to master🇺🇸 How Rory identified the US as a key market & grew subscriptions 100% from Ireland👕 New sports, new supply chains: launching mystery basketball jerseys🎥 Why they now produce 400+ pieces of ad creative every month🧪 The best performing ad formats right now (including “fake podcast” ads)🔄 From TikTok to Meta: what’s working (and what they’ve given up on)🏪 Bricks & mortar dreams: future pop-ups and immersive retail experiencesResources & Links🎽 Shop Shirt in a Box🎧 Listen to Gary Neville mention the brand on The Overlap📚 The 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss ——Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

When everyone else is chasing trends, mentalist and hypnotist Keith Barry goes the opposite direction. In this Mentor Moment, Keith reveals how leaning into long-form content—when everyone else was focused on short-form Reels—helped him go viral and land major event bookings. He also shares how he uses platforms like LinkedIn in unconventional ways to connect with decision-makers and why valuing yourself, your energy, and your unique approach is key to standing out.🎧 This bite-sized insight is taken from Episode 397 of The Entrepreneur Experiment Podcast, where Keith shares his full journey and business lessons. If you want to hear more from Keith, listen back to the full episode now.————Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo (https://www.youtube.com/redirect?even...)

In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary sits down with Alan Andrews, the unapologetically honest founder behind Old Barracks Roastery and Guji Coffee Bar. Known for his bold social content and Ireland’s most controversial coffee shop (no kids allowed, dogs welcome, €15 cups of coffee), Alan lifts the lid on the real cost of starting and scaling a successful hospitality business.He breaks down the myths that plague the coffee industry — from delusional €10K startup budgets to the glorification of hustle culture — and explains why €100K is the minimum buy-in for building a sustainable, profitable coffee business. Alan also shares the deeply personal reasons behind his adults-only policy, how he prioritises family without sacrificing growth, and why honesty (not trends) should drive your brand strategy.This episode is a masterclass in branding, business modelling, and living by your values — one cup at a time.Show Notes:In this episode, we cover:☕ The Real Costs of Starting a Coffee ShopWhy €10K won’t cut it, and what you actually need to spendHow Alan built a coffee bar in Limerick for €100K — and what that buys youThe weekly turnover benchmark every shop needs to survive: €10K📈 Sustainability in HospitalityAre you building a job or a business?The industry’s problem with low-barrier entry and poor planningWhy coffee deserves the same pricing architecture as wine or steak🔥 Polarising Branding & Standing OutThe €15 coffee that sparked national debateAdults-only cafes: creating intentional spaces for deep connectionWhy Alan doesn't care if everyone likes him — and how it’s his superpower🎯 Transparent Social Media MarketingAlan’s viral TikToks on coffee costs and customer misconceptionsHow to win on social in 2025: go real, go niche, get honest"The customer isn’t always right — sometimes they’re just not your customer."👨‍👧 Entrepreneurship & FatherhoodThe hidden reason Alan created a kid-free cafeHow divorce and co-parenting shaped his time philosophyThe ultimate goal: build a business that doesn’t cost you your family💬 “You didn’t even buy yourself a job — you bought yourself a trap. You’re working 14 hours a day, making no money, and calling it entrepreneurship.”Links & Resources:Visit Old Barracks Roastery (Birdhill): https://oldbarracks.ie/Follow Alan on TikTok: @oldbarracksroasterySubscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Enterprise Ireland: https://bit.ly/EIreland Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

In this Mentor Moment, Gary Fox speaks with Sahil Bloom — investor, writer, and creator — about how his definition of success has transformed. Once focused purely on financial outcomes, Sahil now measures success through time, people, purpose, and health, seeing money as a natural byproduct rather than the goal.He also shares a refreshing take on imposter syndrome, reframing it as a sign of growth and a tax on personal progress, and explains why asking “Why not me?” is the mindset shift every founder needs when stepping into bigger rooms.This is a short but powerful conversation packed with perspective shifts to help you redefine success on your own terms.To listen to the full episode, go to episode number 401. ----- Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners: Enterprise Ireland: https://bit.ly/EIreland Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo

In this episode of The Entrepreneur Experiment, Gary Fox sits down with one of Ireland’s most recognisable business voices, Bobby Kerr — founder of Perk, former CEO and Chairman of Insomnia, investor, broadcaster, and champion of Irish enterprise.Bobby shares his remarkable journey from starting his first business at 39 — remortgaging his house with a newborn at home — to building Insomnia into over 800 locations across Ireland through smart partnerships, relentless drive, and a willingness to bet on himself.He reveals the lessons learned from navigating the arrival of Starbucks, the power of merging with competitors to scale, and why focusing on multiple revenue streams saved the business more than once. Bobby also opens up about selling in 2018 after a cancer diagnosis, the freedom he’s designed for himself since, and the businesses exciting him today, from Bread 41 to Irish tourism.Whether you’re an early-stage founder or a seasoned entrepreneur, Bobby’s story is a masterclass in vision, resilience, and knowing when to play the long game.Show NotesIn this episode, we cover:☕ How Bobby spotted Ireland’s coffee culture shift before it happened🏪 The first Perk café on Grafton Street — and why a turnover-based rent deal was a game-changer📉 Surviving Starbucks opening next door (and why it helped sales)🤝 The three-way merger that became Insomnia — and why owning 30% of something bigger was better than 100% of his own📈 Growing from 5 cafés to 200+ shops and 600 convenience store locations💡 Creating three revenue streams: high street, concessions, and convenience retail🛑 The importance of multiple revenue streams to de-risk a business⚡ Why Bobby sold in 2018 after recovering from cancer🍞 Why Bread 41 is his “most exciting” current project🌍 Opportunities in Irish tourism and the bakery market🎯 What he looks for when backing founders (and why it’s “the jockey, not the horse”)📚 Bobby’s top book recommendations, daily habits, and best investment adviceLinks & ResourcesBread 41 – Award-winning Irish bakery: https://bread41.ie/Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred LansingThe Spider Covenant by Brian Klein----- Subscribe to our newsletter for weekly inspiration on Business, Brain and Body, as well as exclusive events, courses and more, straight to your inbox. It's free! https://www.mrgaryfox.com/subscribe-1 --- Visit my partners Enterprise Ireland: https://bit.ly/EIreland Azure Communications: https://bit.ly/azureEE Nostra: https://bit.ly/3HHwSMo