20 VC 063: What It Takes To Standout In A Crowded Market with Ezra Galston @ Chicago Ventures

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

The Twenty Minute VC

Finance, Venturecapital, Tech News, News, Siliconvalley, Technology, Investing, Startups, Business

4.4 • 637 Ratings

🗓️ 17 August 2015

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ezra Galston is a VC @ Chicago Ventures, where he focuses on consumer facing and marketing tech investments and is actively involved with Blitsy, BloomNation, Kapow Events, Luxury Garage Sale, Shiftgig, SpotHero, and Zipments. Ezra’s thoughts on startups, have been published in the Wall Street Journal, TechCrunch, VentureBeat and Re/code.
Prior to Chicago Ventures, Ezra was a Young Entrepreneur at Foundation Capital. Before business school, Ezra served as the Director of Marketing for CardRunners Gaming – the parent company of CardRunners, Hold’em Manager and DraftDay – and before then earned a living as a professional poker player. If that wasn't enough he is also the author of one of our fave VC blogs www.breakingvc.com.

In Today's Episode You Will Learn:

How Ezra became a Poker Player and then transitioned to the world of Venture Capital?
What is the mission with Chicago Ventures? Average ticket size? Preferred sector?
How important is it for startups to be close to their investors, geographically and relationship wise?
For marketplace startups, what metrics does Ezra really deep dive on?
With the likes of Instacart raising huge rounds, why are we seeing this huge increase in food tech?
In hugely crowded markets, how does Ezra sort the wood from the trees?
What advice would Ezra recommend to individuals looking to enter the VC industry?

Items Mentioned In Today's Episode:

Ezra's Fave Book: The Little Prince

Ezra's Fave Blog or Newsletter: Stratechery by Ben Thompson, Carpool.vc

Ezra's Fave Productivity Tools: Rapportive, Bitmoji

Ezra's Most Recent Investment: Luxury Garage Sale, Attendant

Bill Gurley: 10 Factors To Consider When Evaluating Digital Marketplaces

HungryRoot: Charlie O'Donnell, Brooklyn Bridge Ventures

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Ezra on Twitter right here!

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	What's up, everybody? You're listening to Episode 63 of the 20-minute VC with your host, Harry Stebbings.
0:06.5	And on today's show, I'm so excited to welcome Ezra Goulston. Ezra is a VC at Chicago Ventures,
0:13.5	where he focuses on consumer-facing and marketing tech investments. He's actively involved
0:19.3	with Blitzy, Bloom Nation, Kapau events, shift gig,
0:23.9	and Zipments, just to name a few. Ezra's thoughts on startups have been published in the Wall Street
0:28.8	Journal, TechCrunch, Venture Beat and Recode. And prior to Chicago Ventures, Ezra was a young
0:34.9	entrepreneur at Foundation Capital, and before business school, Ezra served as the entrepreneur at Foundation Capital and before business school,
0:38.5	Ezra served as the director of marketing for card runners gaming, the parent company of
0:44.1	card runners, Holden manager and Draft Day.
0:47.4	And before then, he earned a living as a professional poker player.
0:51.2	If that wasn't enough, he is also the author of one of my favourite VC blogs,
0:55.6	BreakingVC.com. But before we delve into today's amazing episode with Ezra, Steve Jobs once said
1:02.4	that great things in business are never done by one person. They're done by a team of people.
1:07.4	And that's why it's so important to get the right people around you in your business that's
1:11.9	why you've got to check out hiring screen they help me find my assistant jacky and since then i've
1:17.4	never looked back it's a must so check them out at www.hiringscreen.com or find them on twitter
1:25.4	at hiring screen r h three two one or find them on Twitter at Hiringscreen RH.
1:32.4	You have now arrived at your destination.
1:37.0	Ezra, welcome to the 20 minute VC.
1:39.2	It's an absolute pleasure to have you on the show.
1:42.3	It's an absolute pleasure to be here. Now, I'm really curious to
1:46.1	hear about how you got into the technology industry and then made your transition into the
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Twenty Minute VC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of The Twenty Minute VC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.