She Went To A Taylor Swift Concert And All We Got Was This Lousy Sewing Machine

Chapter One – The Quest

Apparently Taylor Swift is a thing. She was in Denver this weekend on her “Eras” tour. I don’t think I belong to any of her eras because I couldn’t name you even one of her songs. But there’s a lot of them. And a lot of people are paying attention – emphasis on “paying.” Check out this from the Wall Street Journal:

https://www.wsj.com/story/the-week-in-numbers-june-25-30-68157c63?mod=Searchresults_pos3&page=1

$1 Billion tour gross. $400 Million net. According to Worldometer, that places her as the 178th most productive “nation” in terms of GDP (as of 2017 anyway).

About 6 weeks ago our daughter Aubrey decided she was going to make it her life’s mission to attend one of Ms. Swift’s concerts. The concert has been sold out for months & even took down the Ticketmaster site multiple times when tickets first went on sale. Probably the hottest ticket on the planet right now. Undeterred, she launched what became basically a full-time job searching all the secondary markets for tickets.

To increase her odds of scoring a ticket, Aubrey decided she’d expand here search to include both Denver and Kansas City. We pulled family in from both cities to aid in the search – without a lot of luck. Check out this screen shot sent by one of my brothers for one of the shows in KC. I was really tempted to grab a couple of those “Great Deal” floor seats at $7,000 a pop.

Day after day the story was pretty much the same – both in KC and here in Denver. We actually pivoted and decided to get tickets to one of her European shows coming up in 2024. Those tickets are just now going on sale (Ticketmaster crashed again) starting at about €500. If we were going to spend the kind of jack to attend a US concert, we might as well get a trip to Paris, Helsinki or wherever out of it.

But the US search continued pretty much 24/7 while we were thinking about a trip to the Old Country (which would have been my preference). And then – presto! About a week before the concert she found one – one – Ticketmaster verified ticket on Craigslist (remember them) for $175. No catch. The ticket was good & she went to the concert. One very, very happy girl. Sat by herself, but not really. 65,000 of her closest friends were singing & dancing along. An awesome night.

Chapter Two – The Multiverse

So when Jerry gets a concert ticket, he normally think about things like parking, the weather, is the car gassed up, etc. You know, normal human logistical stuff. Somewhere along the line I might even checking to see if I have clean underwear. But this is where am reminded of an entirely new parallel dimension in thought. It’s proof of a multiverse. Turns out, the only thing remotely relevant to consider when acquiring a ticket to Ms. Swift’s concert is WHAT AM I GOING TO WEAR????? It’s at this point where you have wormholed to Ms. Swift’s universe. In addition to owning this planet, she seems to have an entire universe at her disposal.

My crack research staff tells me that Ms. Swift has recorded 10 studio albums, 4 live albums and any number of EP’s etc. (no 8-tracks that I could find). Each of these albums features Ms. Swift dressed in one outfit or another, and it is the expectation (actually it’s probably a law in Ms. Swift’s universe) that concert goers will festoon themselves after one of these outfits.

So with only 7 days to go until the concert, the 24/7, 6-week search for a ticket became pretty much became a comparative and distant hiccup. We now had to come up with an outfit in the style of Ms. Swift’s 7th studio album – “Lover.”

(I’ve since discovered that there are sites pretty much dedicated to selling recreations of Ms. Swifts outfits. I did not know that at the time, but I’m pretty sure that ordering an outfit would be pretty much the same price as another ticket).

Much to their credit, mom and daughter decided they would make an outfit. As in measure, sew, hem, line, etc. an entire outfit. So they wormholed into the multiverse while I simply tried to keep the dog fed, the meals prepared, the dishes done and the bills paid. They were present but not accounted for for about 7 days.

I know there were a lot of trips to stores I have never been to. There was a frantic search for an old glue gun at one point. Discernable progress was being made. But then, with only abut one day to go – and you have already guessed this – the old sewing machine went kaput. It wasn’t mostly dead. It completely expired.

You can pretty much fill in the banks from here. At the 11th hour, a new sewing machine became this universe’s top priority. We got a new sewing machine. For which I shall be requesting reimbursement from Ms. Swift’s universe.

I know some of you will be asking at this point “What KIND of sewing machine is it?” I do not know and I do not care. If there is harmony between our two universes (Ms. Swift’s and ours) I’d assume it is a Singer. All I know is that it did the job.

So Aubrey went to a Taylor Swift concert and all we got was a lousy sewing machine. And one very happy girl. And a proud momma & daughter that collaborated on the project. When it was all done, I may or may not have gotten a little misty. It was really cool.

But that still doesn’t mean that the next time U2 comes to town I’m gonna run out and buy a pair of Bono tinted shades.

One question? Who wore it better?

Pedaling Poverty

The 2023 Tour de France stared this weekend. Each year I unapologetically spend a lot of time in front of the tube glued to this event. 3 weeks of broken collarbones, European accents, strategy, scenery, history, Spandex, green jerseys, white jerseys, polka dot jerseys, yellow jerseys. I look forward to everything about the event (despite the doping years). This year I even broke down and purchased the Peacock streaming package now that NBC has pushed much of it over to that platform (it was $3).

Stage 2 is wrapping up as I write this. I got up at 4:30 am this morning to watch. American Neilson Powless was a warrior & accumulated most of the King of the Mountain points. The Cofidis team that hadn’t won a stage in sixteen years – yes 16! – crossed the line first today. A great day for both the Americans and the underdogs.

Bikes have been on my mind lately. Last week I wrote a post about a Girl Bike I recently purchased. While droning on about that, I made mention of what is probably my most favorite organization in the world: World Bicycle Relief. I have followed their story since 2018 and carry around 3 specific learnings from their work. Maybe these will resonate with you on some level.

Photo Courtesy Forbes

The first core learning – perhaps a hard truth – is for anyone like me that’s ever struggled with our predominant model of Western charity – specifically as it relates to poverty relief. What WBR found, as they tried to fit a square peg (well-intentioned Western relief to tsunami affected areas) into a round hole (a broken model of Western charity) is nothing new, but revolutionary at the same time.

“Philanthropy will help people stuck in poverty, but it won’t get them out. Economics will.”

FK Day – World Bicycle Relief

Let’s just leave this hanging here for a minute. But let’s couple it with a second core learning:

“Form follows function.”

Louis Sullivan (and many others in the desigh and architecture communities))

There’s nothing new about this second learning. It’s been applied in design and architecture for a century. But when applied to our broken models of charity, it can be revolutionary. Really. Revolutionary. If it’s willing, the charity industry can begin working itself out a job by organizing around more creative business models. Some form of social enterprise – say public/private partnerships (among others) – can be a starting point to begin breaking the harmful dependencies created by traditional Western charity.

As an example, one of the forms adopted by World Bicycle Relief was the creation of a for profit company that is wholly owned by a nonprofit. I’ve been studying this particular model for a few years (did some work on it at the University of Denver in 2021-2022) and, ironically, I now work for a company that is owned by a nonprofit. I’d love to nerd you to death about this, but maybe we could start with a coffee. I’m available.

The lesson learned by WBR: Philanthropy creates a never ending black hole of Western dependency. Economics provides sustainable solutions leading to individual prosperity and dignity.

Finally, one of the key disciplines that business brings to charity is a razor sharp focus on metrics. It’s the third of my learnings from WBR. It’s been my observation over the years that nonprofits and NGO’s do an absolutely dismal and inexcusable job of identifying and communicating their impact metrics. I have personally been guilty of this. Many of our charitable institutions really shouldn’t be supported simply because they don’t know the root causes and relevant remedies associated with the communities they are trying to serve. They do what donors support and makes them (donors) feel good. It’s so easy to fall into tracking what have become known as “vanity metrics.”

“Vanity metrics are those sneaky numbers that make you feel good about the work you’ve done, but don’t get you closer to achieving your mission. Because they show the illusion of progress, they prevent us from truly measuring impact and seeing what’s working and what isn’t. Especially when we fail to see the latter, we miss the chance to “pivot” (change our strategy) or throw in the towel on a method that simply doesn’t work.”

lean impact

And if there’s a model that simply doesn’t work anymore (if it ever did), it is Western charity’s approach to poverty. Including most religious charity. It is time for a pivot.

I invite and encourage you to visit WBR’s Impact page on their website. Click all the links. What they do should be a Harvard Case Study on how to measure and communicate impact. It is an outstanding model for nonprofits and NGO’s to adopt. I’m a big fan.

So this is the bike I’m pedaling these days. Put on a helmet and let’s go out for a ride.

EquityVest Launch – 2 of 3 The Valley Of Death

So, before we launch EquityVest’s full-on marketing campaign, I want to address a core question: Why EquityVest?

Here’s my response.

1. I (and many others) have come to believe that faith-inspired values are sorely missing from today’s businesses (Enron, and a misguided and pervading emphasis on shareholder primacy are but two examples).

2. I (and many others) also believe that faith-inspired business can uniquely work to provide much needed jobs that can lift people and families out of poverty (in the past century we’ve learned that no amount of bottomless church charity and institutionalized aid is going to lift families and generations out of poverty like the dignity of a job).

3. Finally, I (and many others) have come to believe that faith-inspired business can be a massive platform for the core Christian message: Love God, Love Others. In a post-Christian or post-truth or post-modern society (whatever you want to call it), our neighbors are abandoning churches like never before, but they all want to collect a paycheck. There is great opportunity for Christian mentorship from faith-aligned business leaders.

EquityVest was created to bring together faith-driven entrepreneurs/businesspeople with faith-driven investors. This is our primary differentiator from other equity crowdfunding platforms. We aim to focus on and elevate the role of faith-driven and virtuous enterprise.

Faith-driven ENTREPRENEURS often feel called to pursue a double bottom line: profit AND some sort of stakeholder impact (e.g. improvement in their stakeholder’s social, spiritual, environmental status).

Faith-driven INVESTORS are often seeking more than just a financial bottom line. They seek out businesses that can contribute to stakeholder betterment in tandem with receiving an acceptable rate of return.

Many examples of these types of businesses abound. I can give you a list. We want to inspire many, many more.

(Sidebar). On a large scale, my all-time favorite example of a faith-inspired business is Guinness, founded by Arthur Guinness in Dublin, Ireland (yes, that Guinness). If you’ve ever doubted that faith-inspired business can inspire virtuous society, get familiar with the Guinness story. If Guinness was started today, it would be called a unicorn (a $1 Billion+ valuation).

Unicorns are rare, and we’re not prioritizing them at EquityVest. Most businesses are small and are the absolute backbone of US and international commerce. But because they are small or new, they very often lack access to VC’s and angel investors as a source of capital (you may have noticed that VC’s – venture capitalists – are a little distracted these days anyway). Without experience or collateral, early-stage companies won’t get much traction with banks or the Small Business Administration either. This is commonly called the Valley of Death for new small businesses attempting to launch or existing small businesses seeking to expand. And this is especially and embarrassingly true if you are a minority or female owned business.

It’s into this space – the Valley of Death – that equity crowdfunding steps up. Our mission is to pull faith-driven enterprise from the Valley of Death.

Our core deliverables over the next 5 years are as follows:

• Launch or expand 150 businesses via equity crowdfunding

• Raise $50 Million in capital for these businesses

• Develop a community of 50,000 faith-driven investors.

If you, or anyone in your family, workplace, neighborhood, church, golf group, etc. has been working on an idea or company launch, you may want to start following us in the coming days. Get familiar with our approach and what we’re doing to address the Valley of Death. We may be a good fit for you.

If you, or anyone in your family, workplace, neighborhood, church, golf group, etc. is looking for a way to fold purpose or faith-driven goals into your portfolio of investments, you may want to start following us in the coming days. Get familiar with the businesses and entrepreneurs that can help you pursue your faith-driven investment goals.

In my next post, I’ll get you all the links to start following us AND will give you a brief introduction to some of the companies that are in the pre-launch phase on our site.

Thanks for listening.

Girl Bike

I bought a girl bike last weekend. At least that’s what we used to call them back in the last century. When we were kids. In the days of banana seats. And chopper handlebars on our 3-speed bikes. When we built jump ramps out of scrap wood from the barn.

And no one wore a helmet.

Girl bikes are bikes without a top tube. (I almost typed “tube top” in that previous sentence. That took me back a few years as well). Anyway, history tells us that girl bikes were designed differently than boy bikes to accommodate certain social norms about women and bicycles.

[Sidebar}. There is, in fact, a lot of interesting history written about women and bicycling. Just do a quick Google search. One of my most favorite organizations operating in the world today, World Bicycle Relief, is moving the needle in overcoming extreme poverty by equipping folks with bicycles. Especially girls. Check out their mission. Or just wait for a future blog post from me.

Here’s a depiction of a bike frame. Girl bikes don’t have the top tube.

Image: Century Cycles

I feel like I’m belaboring this point about the top tube. We all know what a girl bike is. Can we please get on with this….?

Yes. Let’s. We have a girl in our house (Aubrey – she rocks). But I didn’t buy the girl bike for her. I bought it for me. Bought myself a girl bike.

In one of an increasing number of concessions I’m making to growing older, my body doesn’t always feel like tossing my leg up and over a top tube to jump on a bike. So I bought a girl bike. Which we’ll call a “step thru” from now on. Cause that’s somehow more masculine sounding.

It’s been a little emotional giving up my old Trek. We’ve been good friends for well over 25,000 miles. But everything has a season.

Technical details. The bike is a Momentum Vida. Momentum frames are built by Giant (as are the vast majority of all bicycle frames in the world today (source: Mike at Mike’s Bikes). Cost: $760. If you check out the website you’ll see this is definitely a girl bike.

But there’s this. Vida is a Spanish/Portuguese word that means “life.” I like that. Cause bikes have given me a lot of life over the years. And I want to keep on riding. Right off into the sunset if that’s how God arranges it. Pretty sure there will be bikes in heaven.

So that’s it. Nothing profound or deeply philosophical about this. Just steppin’ thru to the next phase. I just want to keep riding.

Here’s to another 25,000 miles.

And at least I didn’t buy an e-bike. Yet.

P.S. – also thought about getting a recumbent bike. Just not really my thing.

EquityVest Launch – 1 of 3 Equity Crowdfunding

Over the past couple of years I’ve been working with my old friend Tom Bassford on a startup company called EquityVest. Tom and his Board of Directors laid the initial groundwork and provided all the heavy lifting on this during 2021 and 2022. I mainly helped to raise some of the $300,000+ in initial funding during 2022 and provided some volunteer effort in helping to get the thing launched. By God’s grace, we received our approval to launch from the Securities and Exchange Commission in August of 2022. I formally joined the company as a salaried employee in January, 2023.

EquityVest is an equity crowdfunding portal. Startup companies, early-stage companies and even well established companies use equity crowdfunding to raise capital for their businesses via the crowd. In this sense, it’s a lot like Kickstarter. Hundreds or thousands of everyday people rally to furnish relatively small amounts of money via an online platform to help someone launch their dreams.

Equity crowdfunding differs substantially from Kickstarter, however, in that the crowd is actually INVESTING IN, not DONATING TO the effort. Under Kickstarter, money donated is typically never seen again by the donor. It’s a gift. There is no return. Under Equity crowdfunding, the investor may never see their initial investment again (just like Kickstarter) OR may reap a return if the company takes off or grows. Because of the investment risk to everyday folks, all this is regulated by the SEC, so it took us couple years to get our approval to operate.

(Sidebar). Equity crowdfunding was not even legal until 2016. Obama’s JOBS Act of 2012 made it possible, and it took a few more years for all the rules and regs to be created that govern the enabling platforms. We are jumping into a pool of a couple dozen active platforms currently operating, the largest being Wefunder (you can check them out to see how all this works).

The average capital raise in equity crowdfunding (since its inception) is around $325,000. The average investor check is around $1,200, although investment amounts as small as $100 are allowed. The JOBS Act effectively provides for the democratization of private equity which, in turn, is becoming an increasingly important player launching companies, providing jobs, empowering entrepreneurs and providing access to capital for folks outside the purview of VC’s, Angel investors, banks, etc.

Malcolm Gladwell says it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in any endeavor. Tom and his Board have accumulated significant learning in this space, and I’m discovering daily how much there still is to know. Startup world is filled with unvalidated assumptions. Our learning curve has been steep and is ongoing.

So yes, challenges have been great. But our learning curve has been rewarding and fruitful. Since August we’ve been working hard on our marketing, building out our platform and identifying rock-star partnerships that help us deliver maximum value to the companies that raise funding on our site. We’re just about to the point where we’re ready to get much more visible with EquityVest. More about that in the next post.

Thanks for listening.