1/ Today we announce immi, a food brand we've been working on for 18 months. @kchanthasiri and I spent the past decade in tech and started over by learning the food industry from scratch. Here's why we're doing this, the $42bn food category we're tackling, and where we're going👇

2/ We met close to a decade ago working as product managers at a company called Kabam. We didn't know each other, but during a work trip in Vancouver one morning, we somehow arrived at the same noodle joint. We became the two PMs in our org. who bonded over noodles for breakfast.

3/ After Kabam, we stayed close friends and roommates, but both of us went separate paths. KChan stayed as a PM at a health-tech startup called Amino, and later went on to be a lead PM at Facebook. I went the early-stage venture route, most recently as an investor at @pearvc.

4/ Over our friendship, we discovered that we share similar family backgrounds in the Asian food industry. My grandparents are farmers in Taiwan and grow a fruit called a rose apple. KChan's grandmother ran a noodle stand in Thailand and his dad ran a Thai restaurant in LA.

5/ Our families immigrated to the U.S. so we could avoid working in the food industry. (Ironically, we've now come back full circle).

As we've grown older, we've noticed an alarming fact: our families are getting sicker due to chronic health conditions from unhealthy diets.

"Making money is bad, unless I do it and then it's fine" -The beating heart of left-wing populism

The real lesson that should be learned early on in life:

No one actually cares about "big money", "big tech", "corporations", or "Wall Street".

They want YOU to be dumb enough to, so they can take YOUR money.

Populism is holding a treat in front of a dog as you give it a shot while it's enamored.

Look at the "populists"

Ted Cruz: Harvard Law grad
Briahna Joy Gray: Harvard Law grad
Chapo Trap House: makes >$120,000 a year
Josh Hawley: owns two homes in different states, Yale grad
Bernie Sanders: owns 3 homes
Tucker Carlson: trust fund TV dinner fortune heir

Walker Bragman: lives in a mansion in The Hamptons, parents are rich
Meagan Day: heiress to multimillion dollar fortune, lives in a mansion, parents are rich
Donald Trump: archetypal rich obnoxious New Yorker

We recently hosted a workshop where our portfolio founders had an opportunity to spend time refining their brands with @jbosborne and Marni Kane (https://t.co/chIjEnevR6) from legendary creative firm @redantler. Here are some of the insights we gleaned from the session:

1/🧵

👶 Showcase your flying baby!

“Branding is an exercise in prioritization” was the most common piece of feedback shared with our portfolio. The Red Antler team fashioned a great heuristic to aid in this process – “If your baby can fly, lead with that!”

2/20

The point is to focus on what you do better than anyone else.

The one thing that your customers would *love* about your product.

In short, a single differentiated message is better than half a dozen banal brand promises.

3/20

“Focus” sounds like incredibly simple advice, but it’s easy for founders (or VCs) to get attached to the many benefits they want to highlight and not focus on the single problem they are solving for customers. Ruthlessly simplify your story until it resonates with buyers.
4/20

😃 You sell to customers, not companies

B2B and B2C sales shouldn’t be all that different – at the end of the day, you are still selling to a human who is moved by aesthetics and branding. (Sadly, they likely just have lower expectations in their professional context.)

5/20

The Board Meeting

The Board of Directors was caught in a deadlock situation. A secessionist state, called Freedom's Charter by its hard-bitten inhabitants, had somehow spawned almost overnight the month before.

It was causing the Societal Protectorate's Board of Directors no end of problems. The Board was still attempting to determine just how it had happened, but even more important was that it be ended.

And so they met, for the fourth time that month, in their dimly-lit conference room, with the various Directors seated around it, the walls lined with aides and functionaries of various levels.

The Board members had been deliberating for a little over four hours now, with no discernible progress.

One of the more junior functionaries started, almost imperceptibly, as his implant pinged, information scrolling up his vision.

Trained to rapidly assimilate such, the young man read and understood before stepping forward.

"We do have Marshall," offered the junior functionary. His voice was quiet, his tone a clear indicator of how well he knew the suggestion would be taken.

🧖🏻‍♀️How YOU can Build a 7 Figure Business in the next 3 Months by Copying this Thread

(FREE PRODUCT CASE STUDY)

//THREAD//

🧖🏻‍♀️Product:

Orthopaedic Pillow

Benefits: ultra soft & comfy, neck support, massaging effect on head, keeps your head cool, makes it easier to fall into a deep sleep, improves posture

AliExpress Price: $23.73 (free shipping)

Selling Price: $49.99 (free shipping)

🧖🏻‍♀️Potential Marketing Angles you could use:

⭐️ Help pregnant women to have their first good night’s sleep in months

⭐️ Quickly solves agonising neck pain

⭐️ Help people who live in super warm countries to sleep easier due to having a cooling pillow

⭐️ Improve Gamer’s Posture

🧖🏻‍♀️Brand tone:

Aim to portray a “Luxury” brand tone

This means you can have a high perceived value, and charge more for your products

Have congruency across your whole funnel to portray trust by having your
emails, social media & website all giving off this “boutique” vibe

🧖🏻‍♀️Store Design:

Soft & professional colours (white, creme, light blue)

Fancy “luxurious” fonts

Clean layout (nothing spammy, no popups)

High Quality images with white backgrounds

Not crammed together- make everything spaced out, lots of white space (adds to the luxury vibe)

1/ Thank you to everyone who expressed support for our immi launch and we're so grateful for all of you. As I think back to the past 18 months of this journey, I want to share one of the hardest parts of being a founder that I struggle with daily. 👇

2/ Most founders start because we believe that we have high standards for what an innovative product can do for customers. But most of the time, sacrifices have to be made to get a first version of a product to market. These sacrifices slowly eat away at our mental health.

3/ @kchanthasiri and I grew up eating all types of instant ramen and we believe that we have the "taste" for what great ramen should be. We knew creating a healthier option meant a different taste & texture profile, but we didn't realize how different our v1.0 would end up.

4/ Food industry manufacturers (a.k.a. co-mans) have heavy capital expenditures in commercial equipment, and they produce product for multiple customers. It's not easy for them to alter their production processes for each eager startup founder.

5/ They need to consistently run their production lines and produce product in order to make profit for themselves. Every second innovating with a new brand and adjusting their standard processes negatively affects their bottom line.

Since I have received many questions and crazy accusations, on this last day of 2020 let me give you a random collection of thoughts to close out this year. 1/n

1. I miss Asia. It's awesome. Most countries have a sense that things are getting better and that opportunities exist. From people starting businesses to sending their kids to better schools, there is a vibrancy and optimism that is infectious 2/n

2. Americans are a whiny narcistic self absorbed lot that rather then get down to a task and make things happen are content to complain ad nauseum. The world don't owe you $#!+. Get down to it and get on with it 3/n

3. I was wrong about some key things about corona but also right about some key things. Compared to public health experts I'm probably about even. 4/n

4. I don't really identify with either party. I am pro-immigration and anti-death penalty. I am a foreign policy hawk. I am pro-market but believe anti-trust regulation needs more focus. Socially liberal but think wokeness is idiotic. My issue views do not align with either 5/n

Okay, as my discussion with @rahulroushan, an excerpt of which was tweeted by @digikarma, has triggered yet another debate on beef, I feel I must pitch in with my 2 paisa fwiw. (1/10)

As I clarified in the podcast, not eating beef is a non-negotiable as far as I am concerned, no questions asked. It is absolutely not allowed for Hindus in this yuga. (2/10)

However, I like to take the debate away from the religious to the political for two reasons. One, there is no practical method available to throw out from H society those who do not comply with this requirement. (3/10)

So, if you can't excommunicate a beef eater as modern H society has simply lost all coercive power over the unhinged individual, what good is getting indignant on Twitter about this degeneracy? It is better to work towards a national legislation banning beef incl export (4/10)

Two, quoting Vedas/Upanishads is a double-edged sword because there seem to be many places where beef-eating has been described. I am not a sanskritist, but many H scholars mention this. (5/10)

There were a few interesting Epstein stories this past October most haven’t heard of. Notable as they involve B Gætes

Truly terrible takes you can expect to hear a lot more of over the next 2 months based on painful experience of the climate discourse - a thread.

1. 'Hospitals are not actually being overwhelmed - look at this cherry picked data point I found.'

2. Hospitals are being overwhelmed, but it is OK because they are not being overwhelmed everywhere.

3. Hospitals are being overwhelmed, but we couldn't have possibly known this would happen or done to stop it.

4. Hospitals are being overwhelmed, we could have taken action to stop it, but that action would have cost too much - here look at my economic modelling (which is much better than your economic modelling).

I’m not going to litigate the SEC’s unproven allegations on Twitter, and as you can imagine, there are new considerations to what can / should be said publicly after the litigation process starts. However, I would like to address 5 key questions I’ve seen. 1/10

Q: Why didn’t Ripple settle with the SEC?

Can’t get into specifics, but know we tried - and will continue to try w/ the new administration - to resolve this in a way so the XRP community can continue innovating, consumers are protected and orderly markets are preserved. 2/10

Q: Did you pay exchanges to list XRP? When will it be relisted?

XRP is one of the most liquid (top 3-5) digital assets globally, and 95% is traded outside the US. Ripple has no control over where XRP is listed, who owns it, etc. It’s open-source and decentralized. 3/10

Delisting and halting are 2 separate things - most are halting trading. With 8 different govt agencies, each with their own (and sometimes opposing) views of crypto, U.S. market participants are facing conflicting policies and no surprise, some act conservatively. 4/10

We’ve moved from lack of regulatory clarity to regulatory chaos in the U.S. This is why regulation by enforcement is such bad public policy. With the new administration, we expect #DCEA to be reintroduced - common-sense legislation providing clarity to the entire industry. 5/10