CATEGORIES

Founders Project Beauty Insiders

Jaime Schmidt got her natural deodorant and toothpaste onto the mass-market shelves of Walmart and Costco before selling to Unilever in 2017. Now she advises Hero Cosmetics co-founder Ju Rhyu, who’s about to go big with her skin-care business.

What Happens When A Wildly Ambitious Young Startup Decides To Work With The Military?

There were hoodies. Robots. Free drinks. Young founders milling around a loftlike, concrete-floored space.

How I Built Businesses On Both Sides Of The Border—and Why We Shouldn't Have It Any Other Way

Ricardo Mora is an El Paso, Texas–based telecom entrepreneur, restaurateur, tech investor, and startup evangelist. His various ventures straddle the U.S. and Mexican markets, and give him a uniquely informed perspective on border politics. Business is better for everyone, he’s found over the years, when companies— and people—on both sides of the border work together.

How I Proved The VCs Were Wrong

When Tope Awotona founded Atlanta-based online scheduling startup Calendly in 2013, he ran into a common problem for black founders: securing VC funds. The experience taught him to stretch every dollar so that he’d never have to rely on outside funding. He credits his family in Nigeria for showing him the way.

HR Technology: The Hidden Secret Of Great Organizational Cultures

You need a great culture to land the best employees in a talent seller’s market. Technology can help.

Opensports - Organizing Pickup Games Isn't A Contradiction In Terms.

In 2014, James Gibbons was building BlackBerry apps while living with a friend who had couch space in New York City.

&Pizza, Robots & The Future Of Dining

Meet Michael Lastoria— the unlikely pizza mogul who’s quietly reinventing his industry.

Wrestling With ESPN

How The Brothers Behind The Scrappy Startup Flosports Are Going Big By Going Small For Now, At Least

Going Global A Founder's Big Bet

Eyal Levy thought Yogibo would be big in Japan. How could he best expand the brand?

They Persisted

THEY HAD GAME-CHANGING IDEAS. THEY TOOK ON ENTRENCHED INDUSTRIES.Designing a high-tech solution for a thorny problem: making bus and train travel as effortless as flying

The Warby You Don't Know

Why Warby Parker’s Founders Are Doubling Down On Deep Tech And Retail Stores—Really—To Vault Their Beloved Startup Into Its Next Phase.

Plugging Into The Grid And The Source-And Playing Ping-Pong For Keeps

“We hire and retain people for their soft skills. We look for someone who is professional, communicates well, has a positive attitude, is a team player and a hard worker, and takes a collaborative approach.”

Spread The Wealth - Helaine Olen

Bracing for (Some Sort of) Regulatory Impact Washington is creating unprecedented uncertainty. How should you react?

Treating A Water Bottle Like Art

WHEN S’WELL FOUNDER Sarah Kauss locked in a distribution deal with Target, her first reflex was to make sure someone on her team actually toiled through the vendor’s phone book–size guide for new partners. It’s not all that surprising, considering Kauss began her career as a CPA at Ernst & Young and then got her MBA at Harvard Business School. “I’m so organized, it drives everyone nuts,” says Kauss. “Really, I’m a recovering accountant.”

How I lost An Arm-Then Regained My Purpose

Lots of people become entrepreneurs because of an unexpected career shock, such as a corporate acquisition or layoff. Dawn Halfaker’s military career was ended by an explosion and a catastrophic injury, in Iraq, in 2004. Yet Halfaker would eventually recover and form Halfaker and Associates, an Arlington, Virginia based contractor in data analytics, cybersecurity, software engineering, and IT infrastructure for the federal government, including the Navy, the Department of Transportation, and the Department of Defense.

Balance Spending Now With Saving For Later

Get ready for big life expenses, including retirement, with these tips

Gary Vaynerchuk

Why I Can’t Stop Starting New EnterprisesOnce you’ve mastered the fundamentals, your passion will lead you to the next venture

8 ways to avoid misunderstandings, communicate better, and get more done at work

8 ways to avoid misunderstandings, communicate better, and get more done at work

Mail Champ

Ben Chestnut and His Team at Mailchimp Built an Amazing Business and Became Inc.’s Company of the Year. It Only Took Them 17 Years

How Synbio Will Save The World

Reprogramming microbes so they eat toxins and CO2? t’s not science fiction. It’s happening right now.

How I Beat Cancer— While Still Running My Company

Saundra Pelletier Evofem Biosciences - Evofem Biosciences is a pharmaceuticals startup that makes products supporting women’s reproductive health.

The Art Of The Pitch

Asking for money for your business is always time-consuming, often fruitless, and inevitably stressful. But there are ways to make the process more productive and maybe even a little bit enjoyable— beginning with how, and to whom, you make your pitch. To start, “keep it short,” advises Barry Schuler, the former America Online CEO and chairman turned high-profile venture capitalist at DFJ. He’s one of several top investors Inc. recently asked to share their pitching advice for entrepreneurs—based on their experiences vetting thousands of founder pitches, managing billions of dollars, and backing companies including Tesla, Uber, and Twitter. So while there’s no one right way to make the money ask, you can get ahead of the game by consulting these investors’ secrets for making successful pitches.

Discovering The Beat Of A Business

Matt Fiedler was a product manager at a tech startup when he and his roommate, Tyler Barstow, had a very analog idea for a company: vinyl records. In 2013, they launched Vinyl Me, Please, now an e-commerce site that, for $29 a month, sends curated records to subscribers, from the vintage (Black Sabbath’s Paranoid ) to the obscure (Watch Out! by 1970s Zimbabwean band Wells Fargo). But, in 2015, Fiedler made miscalculations that led him to an emotional breakdown—and the near-unraveling of his business.

A Tribute To The Women Who Made Him What He Is

Jarrett Bauer co-founded Health Recovery Solutions with Rohan Udeshi and Dan Priece. It seeks to reduce hospital readmissions through a platform that helps patients, and family members, monitor their recoveries. What he learned from his grandma and mother made it all possible.

Your Employees Want More Financial Transparency. Now What?

Advice from the founders of America’s fastest-growing private companies.

Inc. 500

The founders of this year’s Inc. 500 have already scaled great heights. Now they’re reaching for the next big summits

Making An Impact

North Carolina’s Bogue Banks is home to Transportation Impact, whose 66 employees get time off from work for pursuits such as caring for their waterfront community.

Mastering the Mobile Wallet

Payment apps are hot. How to know if they’re right for your business—and if they can strengthen bonds with your customers

The Bling Machine

Diamond Foundry is reinventing the fine-jewelry business

"I'm Doing It at 37, and I Hope to Be Doing It at 57".

And by his high school years, he had mastered the 50-50 grind and the rock ’n’ roll.