Kicking Down Doors: Kelvin Beachum on an Athletes Advantage in B2B Investing

Investor and Arizona Cardinal offensive tackle Kelvin Beachum discusses the importance of visibility, diversity, and investing across the B2B landscape.

Kelvin Beachum invests in startups, art, real estate, and cattle, alongside his career as an offensive tackle for the Arizona Cardinals. He’s taking calls on the training table, in between IVs, and after training for Sunday Night Football, discovering edges and advantages in the B2B, real estate, art, and cattle industries.

I sat down with Beachum after eight years of collaboration and friendship to discuss visibility across the investment space, the advantage of athlete investors, and how the history of investment capital should inform the present day.

We first met in 2017 when I was 26. I was working for Marc Gerson, and we had launched a mentor network program between high net worth individuals and pro athletes. Part of that program was executive coaching, like networking and financial goals. I wasn’t one of the high net worth individuals, but I was the one doing a lot of the early coaching with you both on the startup and personal finance side of things. Why the heck were you listening to me back then?

I hadn't received coaching to that extent, first and foremost. I'm a big believer that when you're doing something with somebody that is your peer, or somebody that you feel equal to, you have the ability to do life with them. That’s what we did back then. You knew some things I didn't know. I knew some things that you didn't know. We showed each other some of the best-in-class opportunities and learnings from our ecosystems, which has helped us both as we've continued to scale our careers.

And at that time, when you began to invest in startups, how did it feel being the person in the room who didn't know a lot, coming from somebody who was in the National Football League?

First and foremost, it was humbling. It's still humbling. There are areas and people I still don't know. There are rooms and conversations where, historically, athletes have never been in.

It’s as if I have to constantly improve myself over and over. That’s what’s so special about this particular industry: there is no pinnacle or particular destination. As one of my former coaches, Frank Gansz, would say, "Ongoing skill and technique development."

As I've spent more time in this profession, I’ve learned techniques and vernacular used in this industry, from how I add value to talking to customers, other investors, and founders. I get to reinvent myself, start at the bottom, and work my way up consistently.

How do you prepare for a meeting??

It’s a lot of diligence, back-channeling, and questions. I need to come with a prepared mind. I’ve never been able to just show up on a Sunday. I have to practice and prepare before a game. This usually means working on a scouting report, developing a game plan, and having some things in mind I want to accomplish. I also think about what I didn’t do well last time, and work to improve this time. If you can't get past these meetings like introductory conversations, you won’t be invited to the next, like a dinner or an invitation to someone’s home. It takes time to build up experiences and trust.

People tend to lose sight of how much work goes into becoming a mile wide and an inch deep.

Yes. And the work compounds over time. The conversations you and I are having today in 2024 are completely different from the ones we had running the streets in 2017. It takes time.

I try to find as much information as possible on the people I plan to meet. That way, I've done the work to earn that introduction to them or an introduction they’ll give me to somebody else. You'd be surprised how often people will help you when they see you’ve put in the work and taken a keen interest in their journey. Opportunities and doors will be opened just because of how curious you are.

So far, you’ve invested in several industries, which include cattle, real estate, and art. But most of your time is dedicated to investing in startups. Why?

I love being around people who want to break molds and barriers. They want to fight with their minds, hearts, and souls. There’s also something about starting from scratch that I really enjoy. As a professional athlete, I had to start from nothing. A lot of gratification is delayed until you get a scholarship to go to college, get drafted, or even enter the Hall of Fame.

When you look at startups, some founders and operators have been at a company that had to come down and start all over again, then hit the milestones again over and over. I enjoy being around that type of grit, curiosity, and hunger.

What's some advice that has stuck with you over the course of your career.?

Mike Tomlin once said, "The first rule of getting better is showing up." The stereotype for many athletes is that we don't show up. We don't show up over email, and we don't show up in person. If you look at the best investors and asset allocators, they show up over and over. Someone isn’t asking them to show up; they're showing up because they believe in what they're going after, the company, or the ecosystem. And look, athletes get access to capital, but are we willing to do the additional work that's required to earn the right to continue to have access? After the fizzle of your first investment, what do you bring to the table next? Can we actually impact their bottom line, consistently over time? If I can do that, then that's where the magic really starts to compound.

It's a long game.

Exactly. One of my coaches, Adrian Klemm, would say, "Kelvin, anybody can make it to the National Football League. Anybody.” If Jason Shuman wanted to make it to the National Football League, he can make it to the National Football League. The question is, “Can you stay in the National Football League?"

I keep up with startups by listening to what they have going on. From there, I can run fast and execute on what they need. I'm not going to make this game super hard. Just this past weekend, I got an investor update from a company that's in the eSports world. They said, "Here are the 60 companies we're trying to get a meeting with." I knew three people on their list: one at NASCAR, one in FinTech, and one in food and beverage. Three intros over the weekend in their inbox. As long as we’re communicating, it allows us both to know exactly what we need and what we need to execute.

And at the end of the day, I just want to help the ecosystem. Capital may come back to me at some point. But for me, it's about giving to the ecosystem. I go back to Frank Gansz, who I mentioned earlier, who said, "What you give will grow. What you keep, you lose."

Should more professional athletes invest in startups?

More athletes should spend their time learning about what it takes to invest in startups. We do the same thing with the history of our sports. Books like Venture Deals by Brad Feld and Angel by Jason Calacanis are great starting places. You introduced me to Jeff Bussgang’s work at Harvard Business School. David York and I recently chatted, and he took me back to some of the early family trees of venture capital in the late 60s and early 70s. It’s about whether athletes are willing to go and study the history behind what's going on in the ecosystem. Are they willing to go study the history of KKR and Silver Lake??

WHOOP is probably one of the few consumer companies that you backed. Why are B2B companies more interesting for you to invest in, and why would a professional athlete add value to them?

Well, first off, I’ve simply had more success backing B2B companies than others. When I look at where my best returns have come, they've come from businesses that are either selling to other businesses or selling to large enterprise customers. Their product is also often something that's repeatable and consistent. I can see emotion that happens to take place, and for me, I just haven't had a lot of success on the consumer-facing front.

Now, if you look at every NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB stadium and the number of sponsors in and around those stadiums, there are hundreds of ways we can find a way to get introduced to one of those companies. To me, it’s about helping the companies that have helped our teams. The resources around us lend us the opportunity to be able to have a very interesting, organic and real-time dialogue with the people that are in the suites looking down on us.

You’re from Mexia, Texas. With a population of 6,893, the median income for a household in the town is $22,785. 22% of people in Mexia are below the poverty line. If you could snap your fingers tomorrow to help more kids from Mexia end up with a mindset like you, what would you do?

To be honest with you, my mindset is something I feel has only happened because I’ve traveled so much. The more I’ve been exposed to, the more I’ve realized what’s possible. Anytime I go back home, I try to inform young people that there’s nothing wrong with staying in Mexia, but the world is so much bigger beyond it. You have to leave. Once I realized that football was my way out, I leaned in and ran with it.?

After that, once I realized that football begets access, I took that and ran with it. And once I realized that access begets other access, and realized that once I get to the National Football League I have the entire globe to be able to leverage because of the NFL shield, I took that and I ran with it.

Is exposure the key to improving diversity in tech?

Without question. You can't be something you don't see. There’s diversity even in corporate finance. We have Ray Maguire, Bill Lewis, Fred Terrell, Clarence Otis, Robert Frank Smith, Chris Lee, Verdun Perry, and Ryan Nece. The list goes on and on. If you look at this new batch of individuals, they’ve had people to look up to in corporate finance, venture, and private equity. We have Aaron Holiday and Nnamdi Okike at 645, Ken Chenault Jr at Benchstrength, Kanyi Maqubela over at Kindred, Richard Kirby and Kai Bond over at Courtside, and Kobie Fuller over at Upfront.?

If I hadn’t heard what Ryan Nece, Ronnie Lott, Harris Barton, Steve Young, Brett Jones, and Joe Montana were doing for athletes that were transitioning into this ecosystem, I wouldn't have known that this was possible.

That said, I want to see more women in these rooms. Adina Tecklu over at Khosla is doing amazing things. Mercedes Bent and Megan Maloney, who used to be over at GC. Chelcie Taylor is at GGV, which is now Notable Capital. We have the ability to look toward where the world can be, seeing Mellody Hobson at Ariel and Leslie Robertson over at Benchstrength. Condoleezza Rice is on the board of Makena Capital Management.

Reginald Lewis’s book comes to mind—Why Do The White Boys Get To Have All of the Fun?—that helped people see it’s possible to be here. North Stars don’t start when you're 25. They start when you're five. That’s why a part of me still feels as if I have to go and beat down the door so fewer people show up on third base. That's why I wear boots, man. Sometimes I got to kick the door down.?

Want to watch our full conversation? Check out the full episode of Change Order on Youtube. Watch it here.