Andy Dunn
Founder & CEO, Pie. On 3 shows, 6 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
founderexecutiveinvestorauthorhost@dunn ↗burnratebook.com ↗Wikipedia ↗
Andy Dunn is the co-founder and former CEO of Bonobos, which was acquired by Walmart in 2017, and an early-stage investor through Red Swan Ventures. He authored the memoir Burn Rate and currently leads the social app Pie.
3shows
6appearances
85statements
17resolved
10supported
2contradicted
59%fully supported
8said about them ↓ Everything Andy Dunn said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Hypomania is nearly indistinguishable from an entrepreneur who is 'on'
“I think that hypomanic state is almost indistinguishable from an entrepreneur who is quote unquote on, right?”
Startup volatility often masks clinical bipolar mood swings in founders
“It's easy to explain away The mood swings you might experience as a person with bipolar disorder, if you're also an entrepreneur, as being due to the fact that you're an entrepreneur, when there's something else that you need to be dealing with as well, that i…”
Dunn: Going into business with friends completely sublimates the friendship
“What I realized is once you get into a business partnership with a friend, the friendship gets totally sublimated to the business partnership.”
Dunn: Opening a Bonobos engineering office in Palo Alto was catastrophic
“You know, we opened an office in Palo Alto, and it turned out to be a catastrophic error.”
Dunn: E-commerce platforms will vertically integrate proprietary brands just like Netflix
“The future of e-commerce was going to look a little bit like the history of Netflix. That a platform that was streaming other people's content and distributing other people's content would vertically integrate and start to develop their own proprietary content…”
Pie halved its team from 23 to 12 due to AI efficiency
“Well, at one point the team was 23, and the age of AI it's now 12, and we've seen what you guys are talking about, which is just a massive collapse of product design, engineering, and even go to market, where people can do so much more, and so, you know, we di…”
Dunn: Chicago has never built a $100B enterprise value tech company
“We've never had a hundred billion dollar enterprise value tech company built here in Chicago.”
Dunn was hospitalized for bipolar disorder while Bonobos generated $100M+ revenue
“When we were nine years into building Bonobos, the cliff notes on my story were we had over a hundred million of revenue. We had 600 plus employees and I ended up in the psych ward of Bellevue because I had untreated and unmedicated bipolar type one.”
Dunn: Warby Parker and Harry's succeeded by price-disrupting incumbents
“If you think about why, why did something like Warby Parker work or Harry's work? It's because they price disrupted Luxottica and Gillette respectively.”
Dunn: Competing with those who care more signals you are in the wrong lane
“When you're bumping up against people who care about something more than you do, that's just a good sign that you haven't really found your swim lane yet. You should be swimming in a swim lane where you feel like you can go the fastest and you want to go the f…”
Andy Dunn: Over 80% of retail spend remains in brick-and-mortar stores
“The truth is that 80% plus of retail is still spent in brick and mortar stores.”
Dunn: Curved waistbands had not been meaningfully used in men's pants
“And that was this genius insight that actually the way to do this is to make pants with a curved waistband, which would bring in the pant around to your waist in a way where the overall shape looks, looks great. And that hadn't really been done in a meaningful…”
Dunn: Bonobos was a 50-50 partnership, creating decision-making gridlock
“Because we were fifty-fifty partners. You know, I had the title of CEO, but Brian had a ton of business acumen, and so it really was a partnership of equals, and it becomes difficult to figure out who makes the call.”
Bonobos was eight days away from missing payroll in early 2009
“We had enough cash in the bank, I thought, to make payroll, but then we had, I guess, promised a supplier through a letter of credit, and we were about Eight days away from not making payroll, which is not an inspiring moment for your employees.”
Lead investor Joel Peterson walked away after Dunn sent a condescending email
“The second angel round that we raised. We raised it too high of a price, and actually, Joel was pretty upset about this. I, actually, I think I wrote the email to Joel that Was a condescending email in some regard around supporting the company, and it was the …”
Andy Dunn: Opening Bonobos' Palo Alto office was a catastrophic error
“You know, we opened an office in Palo Alto, and it turned out to be a catastrophic error.”
High-SKU apparel retail operates best as zero-inventory showroom stores
“And so the incredible insight was, you don't. You don't stock it. You create a clothing store that has no clothing.”
Andy Dunn: Bonobos could be built on $20M-$30M in hindsight
“I can't go back in time and do this company on 20 to thirty million. Which is what I think it would take, knowing what I now know”
Andy Dunn: Backlash to Walmart acquisition subsided after 72 hours
“For 72 hours, there's a really big reaction and an availability bias of the most vocal people. And then business returns to normal. The vast majority of people don't think about this stuff that much every day.”
Dunn: Curved waistbands were a novel breakthrough in early menswear design
“And that was this genius insight that actually the way to do this is to make pants with a curved waistband, which would bring in the pant around to your waist in a way where the overall shape looks Looks great. And that hadn't really been done in a meaningful …”
Dunn: Retail is a bundle of physical products and customer service
“Retail isn't just physical products. It's a bundle of physical products and customer service, and those two things together create the experience that drives customer enthusiasm.”
Dunn: The Bonobos board initially rejected his request for additional founder equity
“They said no at first. And, you know, said, hey, like, you need to work for the shares that you've got. And then, you know, ultimately I just wore them down, and I got some alternative perspectives from people in the venture capital backed company space, and s…”
Dunn: Knowing what he knows now, building Bonobos required only $30M
“I can't go back in time and do this company on 20 to thirty million. Which is what I think it would take, knowing what I now know”
The other half of the tape: Andy Dunn's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 8 times in 6 episodes across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Guy Raz 7Joel Clark 1
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
How I Built This 8
2026 1 mention in 1 episode
2021 5 mentions in 3 episodes 2 per episode
2020 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Andy's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HOW I BUILT THISLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Pie | 4 | 62 | 70% 7/10 | full record on How I Built This → |
 TBPNLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Pie | 1 | 13 | 33% 1/3 | full record on TBPN → |
 STARTUP IDEASLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Pie | 1 | 10 | 50% 2/4 | full record on the Startup Ideas Podcast → |