Framebridge: Susan Tynan (2017)

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Hey, it's Guy here. And you know, one of the things I love asking entrepreneurs is When did you start to tell people about your idea? Because some people keep it a secret. But Susan Tynan?

She actually shared her idea for Framebridge with anyone who would listen, and some people actually told her, Oh, you know, I thought of doing the same thing. But Susan was the only person to actually go out and do it. It's an awesome story. We first ran it in November of twenty seventeen and if you've already heard it, it's worth a listen again. Enjoy! Oh. There were days I thought well

It is possible this thing doesn't scale. And it's possible we won't dig ourselves out. We can't keep up with the order. So the issue was not that you were framing them badly, but that just took too long. Oh yeah, we were framing them perfectly just took too long. We started to see really angry emails people saying like This was the very special gift for my grandmother's ninetieth birthday and you ruined it.

Oof. And It felt terrible. From MPR, it's how I built this.

about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements. they built. Guy Roz, and on today's show how Susan Tynan accidentally spent sixteen hundred dollars framing posters And then turn her sticker shock into a more affordable idea. called Frame Bridge.

So there are pieces of artwork hanging up in my house that cost a lot less than what it cost to actually frame them. You know, you drive to the store, you get the madding, you pick the frame, the glass, and soon enough You're down like four hundred bucks.

And so then if you're like me, you just stop framing stuff. You end up turning a closet in your house into like a photos and artwork storage center. And this is exactly the opportunity Susan Tynan saw about five years ago when she started to think about how to make framing cheaper and easier. Now, at the time, Susan was already a veteran of a bunch of startups that mostly failed, but through those experiences, she figured out how to raise money to start FrameBridge. But unlike a lot of the companies we've had on the show, Framebridge is still in its building phase, it's still working to become a sustainable company. And Susan is still working like crazy, still starting early and still staying late. And she says she got that work ethic from her dad, who used to run a small tugboat business on Lake Erie in Cleveland.

tug boats meaning the little boats that help big boats um and so it really operationally intensive business and our family really revered His job and s what When into providing for our family and that you know, we ate dinner at seven thirty because that's when Dad got home from work. That's so cool. Like

I've never met anybody who's involved with the tugboat business. Yeah. I there's something just iconic and awesome about tugs. So I you know, I certainly have um been on my share of tugs and I think my one sort of party trick when I got to be a teenager was if we were at an event downtown and there was a tug out on the water, you know, my dad would have'em honk their horn when they went by us. So your dad had and did you were you involved in the business at all? Did you Yeah, I mean we pinch hit. I remember, you know, if the receptionist was out, we'd go in and answer phones for my dad and that sort of thing. This again, like reverence for work and what it took that it didn't come easy.

You know, I can just imagine my dad on vacations on the phone or or the phone ringing late at night and i if something goes wrong in an in a business that operationally intensive, it's really gone wrong. So I remember that. Drama. Do you uh or did you grow up thinking

entrepreneurially, like I'm gonna be an entrepreneur because I J I mean we're around the same age and I don't remember that. being a big part of our culture as kids. No, I think I looked at my dad and I thought I was gonna be the boss, but but I didn't that wasn't like I'm gonna be the boss and great things come with being the boss. It was like and all the responsibility that comes with that. And so I

I I guess I had that vision of a business career. You but so you didn't think I'm gonna go to s to college and then become like a lawyer or or something like that. No, I didn't, and I certainly had a lot of ideas. None of which were great, like there should be a pancake delivery service. But You know, I I I was always thinking along those lines, always solving consumer problems though.

Susan went on to study at the University of Virginia, and then she got a degree at Harvard Business School. She dipped her toes into the startup world for a little bit, and then she went to work at the White House during President Obama's first term. But around two thousand eleven, Susan once again Caught the startup bug. So at the time some some guys I had worked with previously uh had started a startup In a hot new space called Daily Deals. Um, so the company was called Living Social, and I was watching them from afar.

I was just sort of jealous of I was exploding. Yes. That was the daily deal thing and they're still around. Yes. And y and you were seeing friends of yours who was and you were thinking I I gotta get into this. I gotta get on it. I am so jealous. Like truly, um I joke When when one of them called and asked me if I wanted to join, I sort of had like my desk packed up. I was like, I'm ready. Wow. So you pack up and you are like Great, I'm I'm gonna do this. And what did you do at least I've been doing it? Um so uh b how it worked was they sent emails with deals to local merchants and shops. And so uh they decided they would do some specialty ones, hired a guy to run travel, and hired me to sort of do anything else. So I did

You know, first uh family friendly deals and then home services. So like what kind of deals? Yeah, so deals for um you know, things like jimbery and child care services and things like that. Things that a family might be interested in, apple picking. And then it was just sort of like what else could we sell into what other groups? What was that time like?'Cause I I mean it was not that long ago. We're talking about like six, seven years ago. I mean I remember living social here in Washington D C It was huge. I mean, it just seemed like everyone was throwing money at it. What was it like working there at the time? It was really, really exciting. Uh you know, we were all really driven.

Uh we were all really bullish. uh we knew that speed mattered and in that case in that industry it really did. And so it was fun'cause we had to unlearn, I had to unlearn some things. I was coming right out of the White House. I mean you had to like this email doesn't have to be checked by ten people. We just gotta get it out the door. And uh And it was exciting. It was like a gold rush. At its peak, do you remember what Living Social was valued at? No, it was a couple billion.

Wow. Yeah. It's a couple billion. And I remember even the business lines I was running. I got to launch them and I got to 80 million in sales like, you know, in a year and a half. So was it just insanely working all the time? Yeah, I was I was working a lot, but again I was coming from a job where I worked a lot. So it's clearly something I'm used to. Um, and also it's funny'cause I had, you know, a baby at home and it was a it's certainly a start up. party culture as well. Um and I sort of found for myself there a I I left, I sort of became sort of like a mentor aunt to a lot of people. Like I was aware I was a little bit older than you were in your thirties. Exactly. Exactly. When when did you start to see I don't know, things at Living Social kind of

Turn a little bit. Maybe this isn't going to work out the way everyone thinks it will. Well, I think Obviously you see

In the metrics, you see growth slow. And it makes you start to question certain things. Uh, and then obviously you see talent leave. And so when, you know, some people I admired started to leave just even the composition of the whole experience began to change. But I mean what happened to Living Social? I mean I I I know it still exists in in some capacity Uh, but what what actually went wrong? You know, I think it's a multi part answer, some of which was, you know, the

The exchange was really that local merchants would get loyal customers. And so that had to be the case. And I think in some cases it it that trade off didn't exist. And so some of the best merchants said not interested anymore. And so then the emails weren't as exciting and they didn't have the best restaurants and stores. And so then customers became less interested in the idea. And so it was a it when that uh cycle was reinforcing, it was unstoppable, but when it, you know, started to unwind, it got hurt. Did that I mean did that kinda give you insight into

Just that. Just the hyping of new things, new technology, new products, new apps, like I don't know, not to pick on Living Social or Group Owner or but but just I mean, there are tons of these examples where, you know, one day a company's valued at, you know, five billion dollars and then It seems like a year later It's sort of the Emperor's n

you know, Emperor's new clothes, everyone's like, Well what is actually what's the value here? Well, I think no doubt it led me to a business that I could touch and feel. Uh so I think yeah, I I I just learned g you know, some of those businesses are hard to uh hard to know whether they're going to be transformational or fleeting. So a at at what point did you decide to leave?

So growth was slowing and I think More importantly, I felt my personal development was slowing. And I thought, you know, I really I wanna run something. I just do, and I I was sort of just feeling that urge.

Um were you anxious about your future? I was. I don't think I was anxious about My future at that company, I was anxious about my future in general. I just wanted to get on it. And uh at at that time I had started to think about building my own business.

Um and and I w my head was going there when I got a job offer that sounded interesting. What was it? So it um was working for a taxi app. It was called Taxi Magic, that was actually had an iPhone app to hail taxis pre Uber. And so I thought, Well that'll s sort of scratch this itch. That'll be close enough to doing my own thing. Was it a well funded startup? So at the time it was, but certainly nowhere near living social. Living social was like free snacks and like yeah, yeah, yeah, everything yeah, the foosball, the whole thing. Um, you know, the company re sales retreats. Beautiful graffiti on the walls. Yes. Yes. So you y you were trying to convince taxi companies to adopt Taxi Magic's um app or whatever, and then you would click on the app and then you could order a taxi that was aligned with Taxi Magic that worked with you. Exactly. And how long did you did you stay there? I wasn't there long. I was there only about seven months because

А сун зига, а реаліз. Um I that I really wanted to do my own thing. That I just i that that feeling could not be stated In another way. Yeah. And so what

What did you start doing? Did you s start to kind of brainstorm possible ideas? Did you No, I had my idea. You had your idea. I did, I did. I had had this idea um for a long time um that someone should make custom picture framing better. How did you get the idea? The idea originates um truly back probably eight or nine years. Um I had

National Parks posters. um that I had bought on these annual hiking trips I went on with my sister. And I took them to a local frame store to be framed. It was just a terrible experience. It was really intimidating and really expensive. Like

More expensive than the posters, much more expensive than the three. Yeah, the posters each and uh the framing was four hundred dollars each. So I spent sixteen hundred dollars on frames. And so you're thinking, what, this has to somebody has to change this? Yeah, I just thought no, I first thought, well, I will never do this again. And so I just always had I like I had a mixed reaction even toward the the posters when I finally picked'em up three weeks later. I just thought like, how did that happen to me? I just started going about my life and I kept noticing things that I would like and I thought, Well, you can't have that, you can't frame it. So Just just pass her sake.

Because it this is I'm I'm having flashbacks to my conversation with the Warby Parker founders. Which it was similar, because glasses are so expensive. And they were asking why. I mean it's just plastic and You know, some hinges, right? And so why Why is the framing Why why is framing so much money? Yeah. So for a local store, um, they don't

store any inventory. They don't store any of their materials in their store. And so in or when you go in and you select from the thousand frame styles on the wall, um The The frame store is actually buying those materials for your piece when you place your order. So it takes weeks and it's really heavily marked up. They're buying from a distributor. Um so our innovation, which now doesn't seem like much of one was really like, well, why don't we choose frame styles we believe are beautiful? Invest in them and make it centrally. So you can't so so basically you have

Some options but not Not infinite options. You have f forty cells um rotate. Driven by trends, but we don't um You know, we don't overwhelm you with a thousand frames you didn't want anyway. And you have the inventory.

And we have the inventory. And the concept was that that you would roll up your artwork, mail it in, and then it would come back framed. Yes. That was the concept. The concept was for less than half the price of a retail store with very clear upfront pricing, you choose from a Beautiful selection. We'd mail you packaging, you'd mail us your art, we'd send it back to you in a couple days, ready to hang. So this idea was in your head, you're working at Taxi Magic. But if you had this idea for a long time, what was the

Spark that actually got you To do this, to actually Leave and Make a go for it. So it it's sort of multi steps at Living social, I sold a lot of framing deals. And so people I knew customers were looking for a deal on this category, but they didn't they still didn't like their experience in the store. And so that sort of validated it.

And then When I got his taxi magic, I thought, gosh, you know So many smart people are competing in this category, and I have a category I am just so eager to make better. And nobody's thinking about it, so

I should. Huh. So you you started to to tell people about this idea? Yeah. I did. Because a lot of people are secretive at the beginning, right? They think I don't want to tell people my idea, they'll steal it. But you you d you told people about this idea you had? I did. And it was essential I did because

you know, I needed to know, would people actually use this? Did people think it was a good idea? And so I started talking to everybody about it. I can think about, you know, truly an image of me at a cocktail party or at, you know a friend's baseball game and and just thinking about, you know telling people the concept, and then I kept hearing these same stories about either me or my partner. You know And and the story was always involving six hundred dollars worth of framing and I bet I wouldn't believe it. And I'm like, I do believe it. That's why I'm gonna fix it.

But everybody presumably was like saying to you What an awesome idea, Susan. Yeah. But like, let's just be honest here. A million conversations like that happen every day. So to this day, at least twice a month, someone says, You know, me and my friends we were talking and we were Coming up with that same idea. We had an idea for a framing

Well here here's here's I guess a sort of a meta question here, which is Is is an idea enough? Because a lot of there are a lot of really awesome ideas out there. Now and ideas. really not worth much at all. I mean I so as at least in our story it's worth

Almost nothing. Um, it's all the hustle. I mean and so were you like financially secure enough to take this leap to actually You know. Believe your job and try this?

No. So um yeah, we we we're living a life that required You know. Yeah. Two hardworking parents and required two salaries for our mortgage and our two kids. They were w one and four at the time. Two little girls and obviously child care for them.

So yeah, it was kind of a crazy time to decide to start a business. And I think a lot of people Sort of wanted to tell me other reasons this couldn't work. So what was the first thing I mean, so the first thing you did is you start talking to people and telling them about the idea And what was the first like

concrete thing you did did you first like did you know anything about framing? I knew nothing about framing. Um so sort of most notably I signed up for a framing course that I took at a Hampton Inn. And so they actually take Yeah. bring small framing equipment into a conference room. It's not sponsored by Hampton Inn. It's just like somebody rent it out of Hampton Inn. No, someone It's like a tour of America. And um you can learn to picture frame. And really the advertisement is like Look, it's the highest margin business. Come learn how to frame. Wow, that was so so the class was learn how to frame, then you can start a open a shop because the margins are so high. Yes. And so it was really important for me to make sure I knew

what I was getting into on the production side, but also um Yeah, to make sure it was viable. Okay, so you You leave your job to I leave my job to learn how to frame.

And I go to a trade show in Las Vegas. Just to Just to check it out. Just to check it out. What did you see? I that was actually a little bit of a low point because I thought Yeah. What have I gotten myself into? I just was sort of wandering around looking at frame styles. I I actually

Yeah, certainly. had opinions on on on what styles I liked and and and had some design learnings, but really I just thought like What am I getting myself into? Um I remember standing alone um on the Vegas strip, just sort of having paid my way there out of my own pocket, thinking, like, what am I doing? Like, am I ever gonna pull this thing together? W when was that trade shown? In twenty thirteen? The tree show was in twenty thirteen, yeah. So twenty thirteen and and w you were there to like take notes and to just

And what did you want to do with that information? Yeah, a lot was I was still in the let me make sure I'm not missing something phase. And then also like, well, gosh, I'm gonna have to get started. So I'll have to call these people up and tell them I wanna buy equipment. And wanna buy, you know, wood mouldings. Um So you were trying to develop context in the industry by going to that trade show. Yeah, and I have to tell you, there are a few folks I met there who are still vendors to this day, and I really give them credit for listening to me because I do think most people just Ignored me. Or didn't like it. Oh well absolutely didn't like it. And there's something I to this day I think I'm still trying to explain to people, it was really'cause of reverence for the end product that I started this business. So I actually think

Getting something custom framed is Really, really special. And so I believe that I just believed more people needed to access it. But presumably some of these frame folks were like

We don't want this kind of disruption. We don't want your Harvard business school degree to come in and make this thing cheaper for consumers. Yeah. Uh no doubt, no doubt. Which you can understand. Of course, of course. And so going on and building this business I have run into that a number of times, but I think it required someone out of the industry to be able to sort of plot it from the consumer's viewpoint. From the beginning.

And I think by this time I it felt like Too late to back out. And and so um at that point I started trying to pitch investors. Why did you decide to go to investors from the get go rather than

Just pool together Money from family and anywhere you could get. mm a little bit here and there and do it on your own. Yeah, I joke a little bit that we were somewhat unlean in the beginning. In that

We believed I believed that in order to actually Do this business well. It had to be done at such a high Polity.

And that was that the site had to look beautiful, the packaging had to be branded, you had to trust us enough to roll up a diploma and send it to us. And I really thought like there is no really minimally viable. product version of this business. It has to be done.

Like that that anything to just test whether the concept worked wouldn't work. We had to do it great, and we had to do it ourselves. So how did you how did you get the money to do this?'Cause because I have to assume you needed a lot of money to build an app to to get the materials to hire a team. Like you had to how much money were you looking to raise? Yeah. So Hilariously, I remember saying I was looking to raise fifty thousand dollars and initial investors saying you realize that's not going to be enough money. But no, once I really got into it, we decided we really we raised a million and a half dollars. So we were gonna r raise a real round, uh you know, a real seed round out of the gates. And what was your pitch to investors, by the way? Were you like a million and a half dollars valued at Ten million dollars. Like what'd you say to them? Did you even know what to say? No, I didn't I I didn't know any of those things and quickly learned and you learn because all the meetings start to sort of meld together. Um and you learn those things along the way. But the pitch was really clear and in a way I'm really proud of. We've built the business we pitched, which was, you know, I went in and said look, you know, it was just you at the it was just you at the time. It was just me. I say we because there were some people on the PowerPoint um pitch check who now have joined. Okay. But they were just like aspirational team members at the time.

Um So yeah, it was just you know, I said like hey, custom framing's too expensive and it's pretty big market. It could be way bigger. If someone made it less expensive and less of a hassle. And here's how I'm gonna do it. H how did you find people to even pitch to?

Yeah, so an investor at Living Social. And I met up for breakfast. He was actually wondering why I had left Living Social. It was just a sort of a social call. Um And I had no business pitching him at that time because it I was really not a strongly enough developed idea, but I told him, you know I pointed to frames on the wall and said, You know, those should only cost a hundred dollars. Do you know that

And he's he sort of leaned in and said, You know, you should do this and he's a really intense guy and so I thought, well, gosh, that was the reaction I wanted. You're like validated right there. Yeah. And so I Can you tell his name? Yeah, Tag Savage of Revolution Ventures. So so he's a in in the mid Atlantic a pretty well known investor. He is a well known investor.

Um and nationally, I guess. Yes. And he also calls it like he sees it. So I knew like this is not someone who would be just blowing smoke. So you're having a breakfast or lunch with this guy and he's like, Go for it, you've got to do this, Susan. He said this is a good idea. You're a good idea. And so great, we left, and about a week later he sent me a one line email, How far along are you? And I thought Yes, okay.

And it certainly it was not a promise of anything, but it was enough to make me think like He's in This is an idea. This we got it. I'm gonna build this thing. Yeah. So he said, Pull a few pieces together, come up with you know, what are you doing next and and how you get this thing off the ground and come Come we'll talk about it. We'll we'll pitch this thing for real. So I had a pretty good presentation I thought of

Of how I would pull everything together. And he was gonna be the first guy to give you the m the seed money? Yeah. And you were looking for a million bucks. Yep. And I went in and I went through everything in the deck and he said Huh. Huh. This isn't enough.

that we can make an investment this time. What like how did he go from saying, Go do this to saying Yeah, I don't I'm not feeling this. Like what what was it that he did not like about your pitch?

Uh I think he didn't like the certain t uncertainty part of it. Um We had You know. I I had ideas of how it would pull everything together, but You know.

It didn't have anything yet. And so I think he felt like I can't tur come back and say, I found this great early stage company, but they haven't done anything yet. And I remember walking home that it was the distance I needed a cab, but I walked home that night thinking like

Oh my gosh. I was Cressfallen. So that's done. Now you've gotta move on to the next. Yeah, and by this time I'm s you know, I'm spending money at a trade show, at a framing course. Out of your own pocket. Out of my own pocket. You are not independently wealthy. I am not independently wealthy and I am no longer um a salaried. Were you looking at your bank account and and thinking, Okay, there's a certain point where I'm gonna hit a limit like ten thousand dollars, twenty thousand dollars, thirty thousand dollars, and I'm gonna be in big trouble. Yeah. I remember actually having a serious conversation with my sister

In Uh January of fourteen. Um I was staying with her in New York'cause so many investors are in New York. And so I was staying on her couch and she was sort of like, I'm your big sister, I'm the one who has to tell you like eventually

You're gonna have to give up. In a moment, how Susan Tynan got off her sister's couch and into her own framing factory. I'm Guy Raz and you're listening to How I Built This. PR. Welcome back to How I Built This from NPR. I'm Guy Raz.

So when Susan Tynan's first investment pitches went Nowhere? A lot of people told her to Give up. But of course she didn't. She convinced some engineers to help with the website for Framebridge, and she promised that eventually

She would pay them. I'd really convince the engineers like, Oh, this is all happening. We're gonna get money, so start building. So they did start coding. We started building frame bridge. Um But I mean it's I mean you know, even at that point I think we were still refining what the name for Framebridge would be.

And yeah, so I started building as though it would be funded. Obviously anything that required a big check I couldn't Obtained. But otherwise, certainly I could get, you know, samples of materials and things like that. And so I just started proceeding as though it would happen. And meeting anyone who might be able to write a check. And just using using your own money for bits and pieces here and there. Using my money for bits and pieces. But at that point things started to pick up more. And I think again a lesson in just

if you're moving as though the business is gonna work, the rest is gonna happen for you. So at that point I had gotten connected to another investor I knew as well. In the D C area. In the D C area, um national investor, a Uh female partner. the at a venture capital firm Who and we had lunch and I told her the idea, and she said, You won't believe this. I was searching Last week.

For this solution not mine. And I know it d it doesn't exist. I looked for it. She said, I love this. I get it. I I know this need exists. And um She gave you money? Oh, it wasn't that easy. It was definitely a series of meetings and sort of show me how you're putting this together. And I think in the same way it was a lot of like, Well, show me more and then next time show me more.

And so she was the first to ac to actually sign up. And h how long did the process of when you started to raise money to when you actually raised the million or a million and a half that you needed, how long did that take? Meetings wise, it was you know Ten months but but really intensely, probably about four months. Um which felt really grueling, but I think is is

you know, as these things go sort of an easy run. That's fast. Yeah. Four months to get the the money. So you have uh like a little over a million bucks in your hand in your bank account, you're looking at those zeros. What do you do with that money? Yeah. First thing I did was hire my first Employee Um a woman named Tessa who had worked for me previously.

And so truly the day the wires hit, she quit her job and joined me. And and what'd she do? Everything. everything. Yeah. She runs merchandising and creative, but I mean we did Everything. We um began actually doing a lot of product sampling.

So we were sitting in this co working space and we were getting these boxes of you know, wood chips, wood mouldings being sent to us, um, which doesn't really go in a co working space. So they kept saying every night, you know, you have to bring your box you have to leave with your boxes. And so we would Uber home at night with boxes of of sample materials, but we just started Again doing everything on all fronts. Like meeting with packaging vendors, meeting with UPS. Like it was just a I in hindsight I don't even know what that work plan looked like, but we were just sort of doing every single thing at one time. And what was the plan? Like with that m with that seed money, the plan was to build an app, a website and launch? Yeah, so the plan was to build an app and a website and to find some framer friends.

to do the initial production. And I remember we said for the first nine thousand frames. I don't know why we said that, but the first nine thousand frames, we'll just find someone who'll do it for us. You mean like an outside frame company? Yeah. Okay. And I think that was a way to get our initial investors comfortable with the fact that we were had no experience on the manufacturing side, but you had to find a framing company that would do this. But they were expensive. Right, so we didn't you would So we didn't. So we started talking to to you know framers and to see if we could get them interested in what we were doing and We realized Um, I just a lot of qu like we couldn't control quality, we wouldn't be certain about anything, and both of us, um Are sort of sticklers for quality, for precision, and we just did not feel comfortable with it. So we realized in order to even buy materials, we would need a warehouse.

And so If we need a warehouse, we might as well get framing equipment and we might as well make the very first frame. And so I had to tell our investors like Congratulations. you're gonna own a frame factory. And we drove around, um

the D C metropolitan area, which is not really an area known for industrial spaces, but we found a space. and started building. So you ordered like equipment to make frames, which I guess is like what, like band saws and I what like what would what did you get? So we actually met a guy through our travels. We met a vendor who said you should talk to this guy who sells used equipment And he was a great guy, owned a frame store and said like Why don't I moonlight for you guys? And help you get this thing set up. And how did you how long did it take, like from the time you got your investment

And the app, how long did that take? we got money end of February. By April we signed a lease on a facility on a production facility. And um July we did a soft launch. It's pretty quick. Yeah, it was. But I mean

We felt under pressure. I mean we had a again a lease for a warehouse and not a functioning website. A lease for warehouse you which you were paying rent on. Yeah. And were your investors like okay guys, come on, the clock's ticking. Yeah, they definitely were I think every week Pre-launch. felt scary, both from an investor perspective and from just an unknown. I mean this was just a real

Field of dreams, right? This was a I bet customers really want this service. And until we launched We wouldn't know. So you're so you launch in July of twenty fourteen and how do you get the word out? Right. So hilariously we started with we it was a password protected site because we didn't want to be overrun. Um, which was not to be a worry. So we launched with with that little beta site in July, and then August we opened up and, you know, told our everybody we knew on Facebook.

Got a couple orders. Um but they were all sort of You know. one degree of separation, two degree of separation. I went to college with that guy type thing. And so we started to send out frames to To folks in the press.

And first couple months we got um Two big hits. Architectural digest and in style. Yeah, but not random. We were like what exactly would what frame style would this editor at this magazine like what is something about their life we can figure out so that the content of what we frame is interesting. You know, we were really thoughtful. And those those were really validating. Wow, and and so they wrote about you? They wrote about us. And w did that have a measurable impact? So it had a m i I mean, at that point we were selling so few anything was measurable. So it was measurable.

Um, but everything sort of manageable. And at the time we had said like we'll really be something if we're selling a thousand frames a month and we had told our head of production, be prepared. And he was in the framing industry and he was like, Good luck, girls, like you're not gonna get to a thousand frames a month. Um And so that was true of the first month or two, and then um late October Someone uh a home decor blogger wrote a blog post and we had our first real sales spike of a day. Um and that was the first day we thought, okay.

Like it's on. How many Order were you getting in a day? So at that point we were probably what felt overwhelming we're probably getting in fifty or sixty orders a day.

The four folks who worked in production were making the frames. But The team of us who were, you know, making the website and the marketing and everything, we're the shipping team. So at four PM every night, we Pushed aside our laptops and walked to the back of the factory and bubble wrapped and packaged up the boxes. Including you, the CEO. You better believe it.

You were you were like wrapping up and You better believe it. I had I truly remember an early board meeting, it was on the phone and I thought, Oh my gosh, they don't know that my hands are covered in paper cuts. Like they don't get it. It was just at a level of all hands on deck. Um So that continued okay, but we were approaching our first holiday. And Uh this guy this part time Head of production.

Came in one night and said And this was in early November of our first year, said like Mm, this is too much stress. You know, I sort of didn't sign up for this. I I would thought I'd get you guys started, but I don't need this. And I said, Yeah, we're about to hit our first holiday and things are picking up, like I need you. And he said, I'm happy to help make frames, but I don't need all this responsibility.

This is the guy who's running The production and he and he's like I'm out. I'm out. And you said

Well, I'm not sure I can say what I said. No, I said I think I tried to appeal with the like Please don't let me down. Um but there was really sort of he really was like I just You know, I I I took you this far. I'm out.

Are you freaking out? Yeah. Oh my goodness, yeah. You know, he knew everything and so that was one of the you know, there are probably a dozen times where you say like Is this the end? I hope it's not the end. Yeah.

Yeah. And and then you think about everyone and like your investors who believed in you and then you believed in this Guy who said I'll just work part time and that was fine and how did we get into this? So what'd you do? So I immediately called a friend who had worked in operations for living social.

And so he put me in touch with another colleague of ours, so You know, this sort of mutual friend colleague, um, was in between gigs and said, This will be funny, I can do this, I can learn sign me up. And so truly within two days we had a new head of production um who had no experience in a warehouse but was

Good with his hands. And how long did that take? Oh, it was like two or three days. And he knew how to make frames? No, but he was sufficiently handy and um and really thought it would be fun. He just said, Like I can do this and we knew I mean His you know, super nice and super smart and day three he breaks his leg.

In the factory. So I was like, Okay, well we're out again. Um, and so then we just sort of The the four of us the original corporate team had to just stand in and and figure it out at that point. Um

He came back on crutches and we got through our first holiday. Phew. So you guys uh make it through that Christmas and then I guess a couple of months later you hit like another crisis, right? Yeah. Um we did a really clever Father's Day promotion.

Uh, where we asked about the style of your dad and had you know, unique craft paper designs. If you had a preppy dad or a hipster dad. Um and it was really clever marketing but broke our factory basically. It just required that they match um not only all the components of a custom frame, but also the right craft paper And we started to slip into

a production backlog. Wha what how many orders did you get? So we started it was really the daily issue in that we were um selling about a hundred frames a day and making about seventy. And um When we got into this Father's Day backlog and and That some the first Summer.

Um there were days I thought well. It is possible this thing doesn't scale, and it's possible we won't dig ourselves out. It won't scale because you you start to realize we cannot keep up with the orders. We can't keep up with the orders. I mean that seems like a good problem to have. Yeah, it felt like a good problem to have, except we were all so oriented to customer delight that we started to see you know, really angry emails, people saying like This was the very special gift for my grandmother's ninetieth birthday and you ruined it. And

It felt terrible. And I remember having this really intense debate about do we send the email to customers who think it's gonna come in three to four days that says it's gonna come in two to three weeks. So the issue was not that you were framing them badly, but that just took too long. Oh yeah, we were framing them perfectly, it just took too long. Um and and so that leads to the bigger question Can we get out of where we are today and can this thing even work? 'Cause you need to for it to work, it has to be as convenient and quick as going to like your local frame store. It has to be quicker. Our customers are internet shoppers, they care about Um you know

There on Tuesday they're getting ready for something they're doing on Saturday and we have to deliver. Tell me how how you were sort of organizing your I'm imagining You gotta talk to your investors, your board.

You've got A bazillion emails coming in. You're also like running the staff. W did you just ever want to just like scream and tear your hair out? Yeah.

And I remember h hosting a board meeting. um at our production facility at a at a like a rented conference room nearby. Cause I thought maybe I should bring them in on this backlog issue and they should actually take a tour of the facility and see what's going on. You know, maybe in this case honesty is the best policy. So I remember touring with them and they saw these like numbers on the board, like let me get this straight. You have that many yet to build and you're building this many a day. Like that that math isn't gonna add up. And so I at that point I just sort of had to

You can't You know, run two truths, you have to You have to Bring everybody in with what you're dealing with. So h how did you solve the problem? we hired a lot more framers. We got a talented head of production operations who knew how to dig us out. Um and really it required all of us just give up

weekends for a couple months. Um To get out of it. I remember one conversation where I said, you know We're not going down like this. and um a woman who runs product for us that we're not

And so it was like okay. We sealed that. We're not going down like this. I really was thinking I once read that like

how fast you can jump up from a burpee is correlated with your life expectancy. And I think that's a lot like a startup. It's really how fast like, oh, the production Manager quit, we got a new production manager. You like it's like the as fast as you can keep going.

So when did you start to see the the light at the end of the tunnel? We had sort of a um Euphoric. Next Christmas. So holiday seasons are really big for us. Um for uploaded digital photos, too. I mean, and it's just a great, easy gift. So we have a big spike at the holidays. And so I think once we had, you know, a a professional operations team and we lived through that crazy spike of a holiday season, we realized like we've got something here. So Framebridge is is uh like three years in now.

Is it is it like smoother sailing with the company or or d do you still have crises? No, we uh there's always a crisis. What what w has has any any impact recently? No, there really is and it's like it's always what you didn't see coming. So um relatively recently, at the beginning of this year, we were raising more money and You know? sort of at this stage in a in a um venture, it's'cause it's a job well done. We we've got a real business here. And so I had spent months on the road talking to investors, including my own and And

Sitch together. A round of funding. And I had been told I was to receive a term sheet. The funding the next day. It was a Tuesday. It was so I this is on Monday and I knew Tuesday I was getting a term sheet. And so was starting to feel a little bit of relief. Um,'cause it's a certain you know, my job is to Think strategically.

focus on the customer, but also to keep the business funded. And so Was feeling good, I was doing my job. We had a brand new CFO. He was three weeks in on the job and we were talking that Monday night and he said, You know, you're gonna kill me Said, Oh my God, are you taking a vacation?

We gotta get this thing closed. And he said no. I got another job. What? Yeah. Three weeks in. Three weeks in.

So anyone who's ever worked for a business knows that people watch what the CFO does. 'Cause I mean you're like, what's going on there if your CFO leaves? So I immediately knew like this is gonna spook the hell out of everybody. Everyone's gonna think you're You're in trouble. Yes. And Most importantly, it's gonna spook these investors. And so my first thought was

Shut up. Why did you tell me that? Because it's one thing to leave, but like if you leave me right now, I have this knowledge and I have to tell people. And so he you know, to his credit, he had been in the running for a public company CFO job, really big job, it was his dream job. Those things happen, but the timing just could not have been worse. So I left the building like a ghost. I remember a couple of colleagues asked me about minor things and I like couldn't even answer them. And he went for a run and it was sort of like

What do I do I just get the term sheet, close the funding, and then say, Oh, surprise, this guy's leaving. But you can't. But you can't. And so I went on and sort of like just sort of frantically called all the members of my board to try and get out ahead of what I knew would be really Yeah, sort of an explosion. Wish it was. They reacted by saying A mix of things. This is really bad, you know that, yes. Um but we'll get through it. How big was this round, by the way, that you were that you were trying to raise it was seventeen million. It's a lot of money on the line. And so you can't

You know. People. wanna believe seventeen million dollars is going to a g you know a good company. You can't blame them. If if this all star and he was really an all star CFO. And I remember I'll never forget a one of our board members, they said, Oh he's on vacation, but he'll try and call you and he called me and I could hear a steel drum band in the background. And he said. We're just gonna have to do so well, this guy feels sick.

And I said, Okay, you're right. That's what we're gonna do. And so then they s everyone s started to come around. But I had to do sort of like you know, sports psych with everybody to say, like, Come on, you believe in this business, you believe in me, we got this, we're gonna do this, this can't throw us off. I mean I really had to like bring everybody together like it was the beginning of the company. And so you got the money, but we live to fight another day. And this happened relatively recently. It happened relatively recently. So I mean the the difference between your company and so many companies we've featured on the show is that you're still in the thick of it.

Yeah. You are not Like Able to just sit back and say, We're in the throws. Yeah. Like what's gonna happen with our major competitors? Like are they gonna try and launch stuff we're doing probably. Um, you know, will we get to be a sustainably you know, healthy business. Yeah, it looks like it, but you know, but it's really um

requires sort of a commando crawl still. And and still crazy amount of work all the time? Yeah, it's it's a crazy amount of work all the time. Like I said, there are just so many talented people now to share it. But I can't help myself. Like I

do always wanna be skimming, you know, customer support tickets and things like that. How much to this point have you raised? We've raised thirty seven million dollars. I mean at some point all these investors Oh yeah, they want something back. They want something back and so they're gonna either send and and there are two options. It's either you go public or you sell to somebody else, right? Are those the only options? Those are probably the two most likely options. Yeah. The good options. Um Do I think we can be a big enough company to go public? Absolutely. And I think we can be a fundamentally good enough company to in an understandable enough and a forecastable enough business to go public. Yeah, I believe that. Um, I also believe w all of those things that make us interesting. would make us interesting. Um

As a partner of another business. Does it I mean obviously you couldn't do what you've done without those investors in that money. But does any part of you kinda think, hm, I I wish I could have figured out how to do this without taking in money? Yeah, I've given up a tremendous amount of ownership. I think people would be shocked by how much. Um So at some point I I bet I'll reflect on that, but really I think a lot about the fact that I don't think it would have worked unless we had done it in this really

full way, this really high quality way and the money allowed me to recruit truly the best people, these terrific people, and use very good materials and, you know, have th a very open liberal return policy and everything that has to go into building a great company. And so I I just don't think I could have done it another way. I think a lot of people I think a lot of people hear thirty seven million dollars and and just assume that you have thirty seven million dollars. But uh I mean, of course that is that that's not the case, right? No, and I'm not the highest paid member of the team by any stretch. Um so that is interesting. I think that's very confusing to people. There's a lot of you know, this thing is real. We employ a lot of people, um We are growing really rapidly. Those are, you know, real But you are not like swimming in money and throwing it up in the air. No. Um that is a funny thing. Um we still have, you know, cash strapped conversations.

Do do do friends of yours just assume that you're like rolling in cash? Yeah, I laughed because I started to get a lot of things from like all the schools I went to. A lot of like, Oh yeah, I know you're a big donor. I'm like Yeah. But the thing is is that there's a a very high possibility that you will. This will make you very rich. If this turns out the way your investors imagine, you imagine He can make you into a very rich person. How important is that to you? Right. It sounds cute, but it cannot be my focus. It truly, if I take my eye away from the ball at all. on what we're delivering. it will crumble. I strongly believe that.

Has to be finally the hardest thing you've ever done. Oh. It is so hard. I laugh about You know, saying, Well, I worked at a lot of startups. Like that has nothing to do with this. It has nothing it is like barely even preparation for this. It is extremely hard.

I mean it's just it's like in some ways I almost think like come at me like I I'm I have I'm emerging s so much stronger. Like I like you could throw anything at me. Susan, I know that y you guys are still in the in the building mode

Um but this is a question that I ask, you know, pretty much everyone on the show, which is Do you think that so far, you know your success and the success of Framebridge is because of your hard work and intelligence or Or is a lot of it just luck?

Yeah, of course a lot is luck. Truly all my early team was plucked from different jobs. And so um a lot was really pull a everything together and and like I s it's really a windsy road. A lot is luck, um but a lot is hustle. And I think I think a lot about the intersection

I guess luck and belief. I I believed in this idea. I believed I could do it. I still believe it will be a big business and I think that Translates to luck. Ам, солат із лак, і ждена.

You know, one thing we don't always talk about on the show is just the amount of personal sacrifice that it takes to build a company, right? Like you know, t time spent away from your partner or your kids, your family and You probably haven't taken you know, a whole lot of vacations over the past few years.

I is it still worth it? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And it's really It's the

People understanding this dream part that's worth it. It really is walking through our facilities and seeing what people framed. Like that is just amazing. It's like I believed you had this stuff and you did. And so it truly I'll see someone and they'll have like a scarf from the running of the bulls or Uh passes from Disney World. And I'm like, yes, like I believed you wanted to frame that stuff, and you got it, you understood what we did.

And you're doing it with us, and that is just a it's just a thrill. What is the uh what's the most unusual thing that you've been asked to frame? Oh yeah. We framed a lot of unusual things. Um we did frame A ponytail, which was fascinating. But

But sure, you know, we're up for anything. My favorite actually, one one of my favorite things we framed was a um cardboard um piece of a kids fort. And it had the rules of the fort on it. And these kids had done it when they were young and the mom had saved it. and framed it for them when they were in their early twenties. You know, they're framed rules of the fort, but they were really, really endearing, like be kind. Like the rules were really

You know it reflective of the way you should be. And um and the mom wrote us a note saying, you know, these kids get iPhones, like I give'em everything. And this like was hands down. The best of Christmas. And so I you know, that was like

You get it. That's Susan Tynan, founder of Framebridge. And you know how we kept mentioning the amount of money she's raised?$37 million? Well, that was almost two years ago. We just checked back with Susan and she says FrameBridge has now raised about eighty-two million dollars.

And that first investor she pitched, Tig Savage of Revolution Ventures. The one who encouraged her to start the company and then told her he wasn't ready to invest. Well, he did change his mind. He actually invested in Framebridge in every subsequent round. And today? He sits on the board. Hey, thanks for sticking around because it's time now for how you built that. And today we're updating a story we first ran about a year ago, and this story begins in South Florida, where Len Testa grew up. Every year, Len and his family would pile into the minivan to go to Disney World.

And he loved it, but Like everyone else, he hated waiting in those long lines. And the summer before I went to graduate school I took a trip to Disney World with my twin sister. And we waited for two hours in line for this ride called the Great Movie Ride. I was baking in the Florida sun and I thought to myself, you know, my God, there's gotta be a better way to do this.

And in fact there was a better way to do this, and Len was the right guy to figure it out. Because he was going to graduate school. To study computer science. And I went to my this advisors. And he said, I wanna write a computer program.

That solves this problem. And so Len decided to do his entire master's thesis on basically The most efficient way to visit Disney. Yeah, the first paper I ever wrote was 1997, this is 10 years before the iPhone. I said, you know, one day we're gonna walk through a park and we're gonna have these handheld devices.

It's gonna have GPS and something's gonna be feeding it the wait times. for the rides and it will optimize your route as you're walking through the Okay, so Len eventually worked at an algorithm that would help people breeze through Disney based on how busy the rides were at any given moment. And when the iPhone eventually, when turned that program? into an app. You tell the app the rides you want to ride and the shows you want to see and the meals that you want to eat. And the app will tell you the order in which

You should do those things to minimize your weight in line. Lens app first came out about eight years ago, and I actually stumbled across it and his company touring plans when I was planning my own family's trip to Harry Potter World. So when? Yes. So I have to tell you, I downloaded this thing and it worked. I mean it we would have been stuck for like hours And is that pretty typical? I mean d I mean how much time can like can an average family save if they use the app? So On a busy day, we can save you four hours in line pretty easily.

Okay, but here's the thing, if your app works like Waze, right? Uh I'm in a situation very often where I'm driving home and then Waze is like, no, quick, make a right turn here. And then I'm going through like this windy suburban street, and like but I notice there are like four cars behind me and four in front of me. They're also using Waze, and I'm like, this is This is the wasification now of driving. So what happens when everybody at the park is using your app? Does it stop saving you time? Right, so we uh we thought about that early on and here's what we do. We know when we're sending people to each ride and we know how many people each ride can handle in a given hour. Let's say you we send you to Dumbo at noon. and we know that it takes about three seconds for Dumbo to handle every person in line.

When we send you and your family of four to Dumbo, we will add 12 seconds to the wait time. So that the next family gets whatever the wait time was plus 12 seconds. And we're constantly adjusting that throughout the day. By the way, Lens app is free, but the company makes money by charging a$15 subscription for the other specialized data about when to visit Disney Parks and how to map out your trip. And recently, Len was able to take the technology from his app and spin it into another company that helps patients with diabetes figure out what drugs they should take. Meanwhile, he expects touring plans will make about one and a half million dollars this year. I mean, I tell people all the time I have the greatest job in the world. My job is to go to Disney World.

And make sure other people have fun doing it. Len Testa is the founder of Touring Plans. If you want to find out more about Len or hear previous episodes, head to our podcast page, howIbuiltThis.npr.org. Of course, if you want to tell us your story Go to build.npr. dot org.

And thanks so much for listening to the show this week. You can subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, and while you're there, please do give us a review. You can also write to us at hibt at npr.org, and if you want to send a tweet, it's at how I built this. Our show is produced this week by Rachel Faulkner, with music composed by Ramtine Arablui. Thanks also to Julia Carney, JC Howard, Noor Kutsi, Neva Grant, Sanas Meshkinpur, and Jeff Rogers. Our intern is Candace Lim.

I'm Guy Raz and you've been listening to how I built this.

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