Lay of The Land

Our conversation this week is with Gordon Daily!Gordon is the founder & CEO of BoxCast which offers an end-to-end live streaming platform and is one of Cleveland’s fastest growing companies off the bat of a $20 million series A and series of strategic acquisitions. BoxCast simplifies the whole process of streaming and video capture which historically has been complicated, risky, and expensive for organizations wishing to connect with their constituents. We cover a lot in this conversation from building hardware, Cleveland entrepreneurship, the future of BoxCast, and the wildest streamed content Gordon has come across! It’s been awesome to see BoxCast’s prolific growth over the last few years and hear the story of how they’ve made it happen. Take a listen and learn!————Connect with Gordon: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gordon-daily-b47b8Learn more about BoxCast: https://www.boxcast.com/————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Our conversation this week is with Laura Steinbrink!Laura is the CEO and founder of Brilliency and managing partner at Emerald Built Environments where she's spent the last decade driving environmental change and ecological and  sustainability initiatives spanning heavy industry to retail housing, commercial, education, medical facilities and roads and bridges. We cover everything from the macro-level infrastructure work she's doing through Emerald Built Environments to the micro-level behavioral changes spurred on by Brilliency, bridging the gap between utility companies and consumers by giving people access to their own energy consumption data. Sustainability and energy consumption are some of those topics that truly affect everyone and our qualities of life — awesome to learn more about the important work Laura is doing here in Cleveland!————Connect with Laura: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-e-steinbrink-089340a4/Learn more about Brilliency: https://www.brilliency.com/brilliant-efficiencyLearn more about Emerald Built Environments: https://www.emeraldbe.com/ebe-home

Our conversation this week is with Ryan Cleary — co-founder & COO of FloatMe — on how they’ve helped save their users over $30mm in fees and boost savings via alternatives to the $46 billion overdraft and payday lending industries.Ryan grew up here in Cleveland in Lakewood, OH and graduated from Case Western Reserve University before getting his masters from Harvard. He ultimately ended up moving to San Antonio, TX where he co-built and managed a startup accelerator before pursuing his long-time passion for financial equity by starting FloatMe in late 2017 when he met his co-founder, Josh Sanchez, at a startup weekend event there.Today, FloatMe — co-located here in Cleveland and in San Antonio — has raised over $28mm in funding on its mission to make financial prosperity achievable for all Americans, focusing on the 78% of Americans living paycheck-to-paycheck to help them cover cash gaps and improve their finances.————Connect with Ryan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-p-clearyLearn more about FloatMe: https://www.floatme.io/————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Our conversation this week is with Justin McLoughlin — founder & CEO of airCFO — on building a bootstrapped company, scaling a professional services organization, the future of work, the importance of taking care of your employees, and finance!Justin McLoughlin is a midwesterner who fell in love with the tech startup scene and turned entrepreneur when he realized that when other people start startups, payroll, back-office management, account reconciliation, taxes, and general accounting is not what they have in mind.Justin started airCFO to deliver entrepreneurs and growing companies peace of mind by taking ownership of these accounting responsibilities — maintaining the books so they can focus on maintaining the business.Learned a lot from Justin’s unique perspective on company building — please enjoy!Connect with Justin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jmmcloughlin/Learn more about airCFO: https://aircfo.com/ ————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Our conversation this week is with Marisa Sergi — founder & CEO of Red Brands & chief growth officer of L’uva Bella Winery — who is a third-generation wine maker and studied viticulture and enology — the art and science of winemaking — at Cornell University before starting her first brand RedHead (now known as Red Brands).We cover starting a wine brand from scratch that is now available in over 3,000 stores nationally and levereging the success of her company to acquire her family’s winery, L’uva Bella Winery, the largest wine operation in the state of Ohio.Really enjoyed this conversation — Marisa is not only passionate about wine and spirits, but also the entrepreneurial spirit!————Connect with Marisa: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marisasergiFollow Marisa on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marisasergi/Learn more about L'uva Bella: https://luvabella.com/————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Our conversation this week is with Tom Lix — founder & CEO of Cleveland Whiskey — on pushing the boundaries of convention while building on tradition to artfully blend science with craft to create unique award-winning Whiskey.Tom is a serial entrepreneur — prior to founding Cleveland Whiskey, he founded Public Interactive which he sold to National Public Radio, he served as President/COO of Yankelovich Partners, and as you'll hear later, Tom has always been a tinkerer through and through.Lix spent some formative years in the US Navy where in addition to some early bootleg distilling; he was cross trained in nuclear physics and thermodynamics along with seawater/freshwater distillation. A college dropout who hitchhiked across the country, fought forest fires in Alaska at the age of 17, and founded the first University-sponsored Motorcycle Club in America. He later earned his Doctorate in Business from Boston University. Tune in for a spirited conversation!————Connect with Tom: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomlixLearn more about Cleveland Whiskey: https://clevelandwhiskey.com/————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Our conversation this week is with Mac Anderson — co-founder & CMO of Cleveland Kitchen (formerly Cleveland Kraut) — on creating world-class culinary fermented foods for all and how Cleveland Kitchen has grown from a side-hustle at local-Cleveland farmer’s markets to the #1 brand in sauerkraut with distribution at over 9,000 locations nationwide.Mac is a Cleveland native with a passion for business, good food, and good people. After studying Economics at Miami University, Mac started a career in finance and law before ultimately pursuing his longtime passion for business to help start Cleveland Kraut with his brother and brother-in-law.We cover a lot in this conversation from the history of fermentation, to the health benefits of probiotics, the transition from Cleveland Kraut to Cleveland Kitchen, starting a business with your family, and much more...I came away hungry for food but quenched with knowledge!————Connect with Mac: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mac-anderson-98500973/Learn more about Cleveland Kitchen: https://www.clevelandkitchen.com/————Learn more about Jeffrey @ https://jeffreys.pageConnect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter

Lay of the Land’s nineteenth conversation is with Manoj Jhaveri — co-founder & CEO of Hyr Medical — on transforming the healthcare staffing industry by empowering clinicians to find the best freelance opportunities while simultaneously offering more flexibility for hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare employers.We cover a lot in this conversation — from how to build healthcare marketplaces, to solving the growing clinician shortage. Manoj is on a mission to transform the $18B healthcare staffing industry and enable an elastic, on-demand workforce.Prior to Hyr, Manoj was a mechanical & industrial engineer at several Fortune 500 companies. He then spent 10 years as an innovation strategy & product development management consultant. Manoj was also a faculty member at Case Western Reserve University where he taught innovation management and marketing strategy.————Connect with Manoj: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mjhaveri/Learn more about Hyr Medical: https://www.hyrmed.com/————Connect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Lay of the Land’s eighteenth conversation is with Cullen Naumoff — co-founder of Farm Fare, based in Cleveland, Ohio — on why local food is better food and how Farm Fare allows family farms to compete in a world built for economies of scale. Local food is better food, and our world is hungry for a more principled system that stands for people and planet as well as profit. But agriculture in the middle cannot compete against a highly consolidated industrial food system without the tools to match its efficiency. Farm Fare is offering those tools and believes we need to recreate the food supply chain entirely.Hailing from the agriculture-rich lands of Ohio’s densest dairies, Cullen spent a decade before Farm Fare learning and working in NYC to West Virginia, gaining a better understanding of the dynamics of local economies. Upon her return to Ohio, she saw an opportunity to grow a local food economy through starting and managing a food hub. Her engineering background shed light on the obstacles to scalability a single food hub faces while highlighting how collaborating strategically with like-minded businesses could yield an entirely different scale of impact.————Connect with Cullen: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cullen-naumoff-717baa2/Learn more about Farm Fare: http://www.farmfare.io/————Connect with Jeffrey on Linkedin or on TwitterFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter 

Lay of the Land’s seventeenth conversation is with Anthony Hughes — co-founder and CEO at Tech Elevator — on their recent acquisition to Stride, the future of education, unlocking people’s potential, and software development.Tech Elevator is a coding bootcamp based in Cleveland, Ohio with physical locations across the Midwest. Their programs are oriented around rapidly teaching students to become software developers while helping them build necessary professional-readiness skills so they can have more meaningful careers.Founded in 2015, Tech Elevator has placed nearly 2,000 graduates into software development roles in over 400 companies nationwide. Anthony’s passion for helping individuals find fulfillment and realize their career potential is more than apparent in this conversation.