Bullish

At Bullish, we get asked constantly about what it takes to grow a brand. We are uniquely situated to weigh in on this given our model that combines capital, creative, and consulting services to our portfolio companies and clients through our fund and agency. This story by Sarah Drumm for Thingtesting gives a great download for anyone interested in how exactly new brands are focusing their growth efforts. It's especially cool to see our portco Bandit and Nick West interviewed as a brand doing it well. Worlds colliding in the best way. https://lnkd.in/gjV8WdDk

In Issue #36 of The Brief: - Have consumers become mean? - Daisy raises Series B - Fall Office Hours are open - Updates from Bullish HQ Read and subscribe: https://lnkd.in/gBZsbiNd

Rosenthal & Rosenthal, Inc. is excited about our upcoming three-part Financing Bootcamp 101 Series in collaboration BeautyMatter. Part 1 "The Fundamentals of Financing" kicks off September 19 @2pm EST, John Cafarelli will be speaking with Rosenthal & Rosenthal, Inc.'s Andrew Barone and Bullish's Michael Duda about the basics of everything you need to know about raising capital, managing cash flow, and how to capitalize on opportunities as they arise. Sign up today! #beauty #wellness #business #financing #equity #debt #cashflow #retail #wholesale #d2c #inventory #fundamentals #rosenthalinc #beautymatter

Today marks 1 year with Bullish. I'm grateful to Michael Duda and the team, our stellar portfolio founders, my peers in venture, and the broader consumer community in NY and beyond who I am so lucky to spend my days with. The more time I spend in my role, the more I feel like my career journey has led me here. Being able to hunt for and evaluate exciting consumer companies as an investor while leveraging my marketing background to build the Bullish brand really feels like I am bringing my full self to work and that I am learning every single day. I'm excited to see what year 2 brings. Reminder that if you're an early-stage founder building in consumer products and services we are actively deploying and we'd love to meet you. #BeBullish

We've been spending a ton of time in women's health and fertility over the last few months, from CPG products and physical spaces to digital platforms and more. So we've made it the focus of our September Bullish Office Hours. If you're a consumer founder building here, we'd love to meet you. Refer someone or sign up here! https://lnkd.in/eNVMubhz

As part of our ongoing 2024 Bullish Office Hours series, we've released new dates for the Fall. Bullish Office Hours are for US-based founders (or aspiring founders) of consumer companies. We welcome builders in the following categories and locations to join us. September 24, 2024 - Women’s Health and Fertility October 23, 2024 - Seattle-based founders November 14, 2024 - Education and Kids December 11, 2024 - DC-based founders Learn more and sign up here: https://lnkd.in/eJC_Muni

Some (more) great reporting from Malique Morris and The Business of Fashion around how to manage through the talk of an eComm slowdown. If you have a read you'll see I think it's about fish...

Last night we co-hosted a dinner with Brex for early-stage consumer founders and investors. Everyone brought the most amazing energy and thoughtful conversation (and of course, plenty of hot takes). I'm always grateful to spend time with folks who are equally Bullish on consumer. Shoutout to the best co-host! Erica Wenger ???

A friendly smile can help brighten someone’s day, but less than a quarter of folks will show their teeth due to insecurity. The dental services market was valued at $146 billion in 2022, and is projected to grow at a CAGR of 7% through 2030. Even so, many Americans struggle to practice sufficient oral hygiene at home and others avoid the dentist due to financial stress or general anxiety. Over the years, new concepts have emerged in the areas of at-home and in-office dental care that are worth paying attention to. Kailani Liu, a student at NYU Stern who worked with us this summer as a Miura (Bullish intern), wrote about opportunities in consumer dental. Read more here. https://lnkd.in/eFjbD3zZ

“We’re still experimenting to find who our ICP is.” If you’ve ever said this out loud, your brand is probably spending too much money with the Zucksters and/or the Googlie-Booglies. Over the last two weeks, we’ve shared some of our best practices for how founders can release CAC-killing Creativity from a recent webinar titled “Living that Low-CAC Life” that we put on for our portfolio companies at Bullish. Here is the third and final part… Part 3: Be your most creative with the people who matter most Sounds cool Brent - where does that work begin? I’m so glad you asked! Cultivate First-Party Data: Never let a medium or merchant stand between you and your hard-earned or should-be customers. Know who they are and what they want (not just need). And don’t limit “Data” to things that are quantitative by hiding behind databases, surveys and screens. Get outside and into their lives. Have a conversation with the people you want to engage. Be human. When you do that, the creativity will come rushing forward. Identify Your Pioneers: Not Innovators, not Early Adopters. Pioneers: real people who love your brand that other people turn to for their genuine opinion - 15% of a population. (FULL DISCLOSURE: "Pioneers" are a cohort that we have been developing and activating for years at Bullish.) In a world where there is no shortage of choice, people turn to other people to cut through the clutter. Once you know who your Pioneers are, find creative ways to activate them on your behalf and you'll unlock a growth hack that creates "virality loops" wherever you sit in consumer goods and services. Surprise and Delight: People talk about things, for better or worse, when there is an incongruity between an experience and an expectation. Be unexpected. (SIDENOTE: If you are asking your team to “make the brand go viral” you should keep that front of mind when they show you something really “unexpected”). Getting creative about how you can subvert the norms in your category, or in how you do something generous for a customer - either can pay dividends in both the short and long term (doing both will make it rain). Every company started as an idea - they aren’t math problems. You need to keep making leaps of faith that feel remarkable in the eyes of the people you aim to engage - if you want to bend the growth curve up: 1. Make creativity a team sport 2. Don’t limit your creativity just to advertising 3. Be more creative in customer service and surprise people It’s not easy. But, if you do it well it will make managing CAC a lot less difficult. We hope you and yours found something in this little three-part series helpful. As always, all feedback is welcome. If you are interested in hearing and/or doing any of this, we hope you reach out. You can catch up on the previous parts in the comments. In the meantime, be bullish! (It’s more fun) #CAC #Creativity #Advertising #brand #brandbuilding #bebullish #DTC #CPG #Ecommerce