Real People. Real Stories. Making a Real Difference.
When we first started this podcast, we wanted to go behind the scenes of what it's really like to be an entrepreneur.
We wanted to skip the glitz and glamour that's commonly associated with entrepreneurship and hear the real raw stories of what it's like to build a business, find clients, overcome adversity.
We wanted to highlight people who you've likely never heard of before because they're so focused on changing the status quo.
This is the TRUTH about entrepreneurship.
EnTRUEpreneurship.
Our Latest Episodes
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes chats with restaurateur Matt Fish, who is the Founder and CEO of Melt Bar and Grilled. Melt, which started as a single location in suburban Cleveland, has since exploded and now features 10 restaurants across the state of Ohio and generates over $20M in revenue. Melt Bar and Grilled has received numerous accolades over the years and has been featured on popular shows such as Food Network’s Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Stephen Shang — CEO and Founder of Falcon Structures, which specializes in taking large shipping containers and converting them into usable assets, such as living rooms, office spaces, storage facilities, and military training structures. Shang’s innovative company does more than $8M in revenue, has been featured on the Inc. 5000 list for 5 years, and is the latest endeavor for Shang, who had come off of (and learned from) 7 failed startup attempts.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes sits down with Susan Scott, acclaimed author and CEO and Founder of Fierce, Inc. — a multi-million dollar leadership and training company that teaches organizations of all shapes and sizes how to have meaningful conversations within themselves. On the podcast, Scott shares her inspiring story of overcoming hardship and discrimination and dives deep on what makes for “fierce conversations,” including both personal and professional takeaways.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes dialogues with Clint Greenleaf. Clint is a serial entrepreneur and Founder of Greenleaf Book Group — a publishing house that, under his leadership, grew to over $10M in revenue and landed on the Inc. 500 list for 7 years in a row. In 2014, Greenleaf Book Group underwent an acquisition, and since then, Clint has established several other ventures, including a family of brands which includes the fastest-growing peanut butter brand in the nation.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes speaks with Julie Allinson — CEO and Founder of eyebobs, the first-ever affordable designer eyewear brand. Since its founding in 2001, eyebobs has grown into a mighty 8-figure business and was recently acquired by a private equity firm. The sky is the limit for eyebobs, and the brand’s sights are set on greater expansion.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes sits down with Tim Hamilton — CEO and Founder of Praxent, a start-to-finish custom software firm based out of Austin, Texas. Praxent has been named one of the best places to work in Austin, has been featured on the Inc. 5000 list and works with both large and small businesses, including established companies such as Cisco and Keller Williams.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Mark Deutschmann — CEO and Founder of both Village Real Estate and Core Development. Village Real Estate employs over 300 agents and staff and operates out of its headquarters in downtown Nashville. Core Development — an offshoot of Village Real Estate — is an award-winning real estate development team focused on environmental stewardship and community revitalization.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Parham Parastaran — an entrepreneur and author who is living proof that fast success can be unhealthy. At a young age, Parastaran moved to the US from Iran and ended up building a $10M+ automotive business; however, at the peak of his success, he was nursing a $2,000 cocaine habit. Parham has since been delivered from his addiction by addressing the faulty foundation upon which his success was built.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes David Singer — President and Owner of Warehouse of Fixtures. Warehouse of Fixtures is a store that sells used office furniture, while offering a new (and better) customer experience. David birthed Warehouse of Fixtures by reviving his grandfather’s old store and has built it into a $10M company and 5-time Inc. 5000 award recipient.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Theresa Fette — Founder and President of the highly-successful and newly-acquired and Provident Trust Group. In the podcast, Fette gives an extremely vulnerable look at the oft-ignored reality of the entrepreneur’s “exit,” as she opens up about having to rediscover her own identity, apart from her company. Hear the raw truth of what it’s like to step out without knowing what’s coming next and gain some business wisdom along the way.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Robert Cornish — a Founder and CEO that had $300,000 stolen from him yet was motivated to launch an advertising agency that is now helping some of the world’s biggest and best brands craft sales journeys and tell brand stories. Cornish’s agency — Richter 10.2 — has been featured on the Inc. 5000 for half a decade and works over 100 companies on the Fortune 1000 list.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes welcomes Mathieu (Mat) Senard — Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Alter Eco, a consumer packaged goods company whose products range from truffles to quinoa to dark chocolate bars. Since launching in France and expanding to the US (and beyond), Alter Eco has amassed $20M in revenue and is featured at well-known grocers such as Whole Foods, Sprouts, Kroger, Publix, and many others.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes sits down with Evan Erdberg, CEO and Founder of Proximity Learning — an education tech company that exists to ensure that every student has access to quality teachers, no matter geography or social status. In a few years, Erdberg has grown the business from a 500-student operation to 60,000-student operation, and the sky's the limit for growth.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes sits down with Curtis Sparrer, Principal at Bospar PR — one of the top-rated boutique agencies of 2018, whose workforce is completely virtual. With this unique business model, Bospar has already attained national reach and has amassed nearly $5 million in revenue — all in three short years.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes interviews Cole Harmonson, CEO of Far West Capital — a small business investment firm that was started in July 2007. Since its founding, Harmonson’s business has financed over $6 billion worth of receivables for over 750 clients across 33 different states and recently announced a merger with Advantage Business Capital — a investment wing of Houston’s longstanding Central Bank.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes hosts Aleksandra Efimova, CEO and Founder of Russian Pointe — a dance apparel brand that has grown from a college dorm room operation to a multi-million dollar global enterprise. Efimova’s entrepreneurial prowess has gotten her far and is noticed by many, including Ernst and Young who nominated Efimova as a finalist for Entrepreneur of the Year in 2017.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes hosts Shauna Martin, CEO and Founder of Daily Greens — a green juice brand that has been an absolute hit, ever since it first landed at farmers’ markets less than five years ago. The success of Daily Greens is astounding; without major funding or brokers, this brand went from small Texas farmers’ markets to Whole Foods stores nationwide in the first two years of business and continues to grow in the midst of rising competition.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes hosts Shawn Burcham, Founder and CEO of PFSbrands — a wholesale food and equipment company. If you’ve ever shopped in a grocery store with a hot food section, you’ve likely had run-ins with PFSbrands, whose family of brands includes the likes of Champs Chicken and Cooper’s Express. Burcham has built a powerhouse — his company is featured in 1,300 stores nationwide, has generated $60 million in revenue, and has been featured on the Inc. 5000 for 9 consecutive years.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Chuck Thorp — CEO and majority owner of DoubleDave’s Pizzaworks — shares the story of how this company of humble beginnings has grabbed a slice of the pie in the ultra-competitive pizza industry. On the podcast, Chuck recounts this amazing journey, which, for him personally, started in a pizza delivery car.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes speaks with April Bernal-Cleek, President and CEO of EHR (Electronic Health Records) Concepts, a self-sustaining healthcare information technology company that has done over $10M in revenue, whose number one priority is the customer. Later this year, Cleek is also embarking on a new endeavor — Illuminative — a story brand company that helps women develop healthy beliefs about themselves through clothing.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes interviews Alan Solon, Chairman and CEO of Ecovest Capital, Inc., a real estate investment firm that evaluates opportunities by economic viability and environmental impact. Solon has also held executive positions at financial planning companies, real estate development firms, and a full-service marketing agency (which he founded).
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes interviews EY Entrepreneur of the Year, Phyllis Newhouse, CEO and Co-founder of Xtreme Solutions, a nationally-recognized IT provider and cybersecurity firm that did $149MM in revenue in 2017. Newhouse has also taken her place alongside NFL Hall-of-Famer Ray Lewis as Managing Partner and CEO of the Legend 52 Ventures Opportunity Fund, which helps create ownership opportunities for minorities and women within the professional sports, technology, and media and entertainment industries.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, we speak with Chris Mann, CEO of Guayaki Organic Yerba Mate. Yerba Mate is a beverage native to South America that — as described by Chris — stimulates like coffee, heals like green tea, and gives a chocolate-like euphoria.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, we welcome Wes Moss, acclaimed author and radio personality and Chief Investment Strategist at Capital Investment Advisors in Atlanta, Georgia. In a seemingly uncreative industry, Wes’s passion for content creation has grown his small investment firm into a powerhouse, with well over $2B in assets under management.
On this episode of The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes speaks with Dr. Rob Douk, whose resume is extensive and whose story is truly remarkable. Dr. Douk is the founder and chairman of Behavioral Health Works (BHW), co-founder of the global non-profit organization Hope Out Loud, founder of healthcare software company ClinicSoft, and founder of Douk & Co., a growth investment firm focusing on social entrepreneurship. Douk is also an acclaimed author.
This week on The EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast, Wes talks with Jillian Bridgette Cohen, CEO and Co-Founder of Virtual Health Partners (VHP). VHP is an online wellness mobile platform that partners with wellness specialists to offer patients a one-stop-shop for appointment scheduling, live classes, nutritional advice, wellness plans, and much more.
On this week's EnTRUEpreneurship podcast, we welcome Wade Barnes, CEO and co-founder of Farmers Edge, a leading precision agronomy firm that offers integrated data solutions to farmers to increase their yields. From a humble family farm in rural Manitoba, Canada, Barnes and co-founder, Curtis MacKinnon have grown Farmers Edge to become one of the world's leading ag-tech firms, with an estimated revenue of $75MM in 2018. Farmers Edge’s processes are used on nearly 25 million acres of crops – more land mass than the entire country of South Korea.
This week, on the EnTRUEpreneurship podcast, we welcome Debra Wetherby, CEO and founder of Wetherby Asset Management, one of the leading independent investment advisory firms in the United States, with over $4 billion in assets under management. Since starting her company in 1990 Deb has been recognized as a Top 100 Women Advisors by Barron's and has been named a “Woman to Watch” by InvestmentNews.
Deb is joined by Justina Lai, Wetherby's Director of Impact Investing. Listen in as she and Deb discuss the values that differentiate their company from others in the business of providing objective financial advice, how that philosophy guides the day-to-day operations of their business, and how being different is ultimately a good thing.
On this week's EnTRUEpreneurship podcast, we welcome Brendon Schrader, Founder and CEO of marketing and consulting firm Antenna. After stints in the corporate world (including 3M and the NBA) Schrader grew his company from a one-man operation to an Inc. 5,000-listed firm with over $10 million in revenue and a pool of talented experts at-the-ready to handle clients' marketing and leadership needs.
Brendon, a former Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year finalist, shares what it's like to scale a company while starting a family, what it takes to leave a comfortable corporate career and the future of the gig economy.
This week, the EnTRUEpreneurship podcast welcomes Matt Reynolds and Scott Leonard, co-founders of fair trade and organic fashion company, Indigenous. Founded in 1993, Indigenous was one of the very first B Corporations, certified to meet standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency. Today, Indigenous partners with over 1500 artisans in Peru and pays them a living wage for their work producing handmade garments for both men and women.
Matt and Scott explore what it means to use fashion as a force for good. They reflect on the unique challenges they've faced in their more than 20 years they've been in business together, the notion of “fair trade,” and how they can provide economic opportunity to marginalized communities while respecting native culture and also turning a profit.
More on EnTRUEpreneurship.
Episodes
Go behind the scenes and learn useful tidbits and takeaways from some of the world's best entrepreneurs on how they scaled their business.