The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
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Victor Gutwein passes on The Pitch citing lack of unicorn comps
“As a venture capitalist, I don't really get excited about the potential for the more ad and subscription based revenue streams because I just haven't seen a lot of comps that have done really well. As far as, like, unicorn potential, which is, like, really whi…”
Homebrew backs single founders who reserve equity for future founding teams
“Well, of course many of the companies we invest in have, you know, founder teams of two or three people already together. We've also made investments where it's a single founder who is then going to build what they call a founding team around them, and is sett…”
Coder: Aunt Flow is raising $500,000 at a $5 million cap
“Yeah, so we're raising 500,000 dollars at a five million cap.”
Gulati: Passing on Aunt Flow as it lacks venture upside
“It's not quite there for me as a venture capital opportunity, so I'm gonna respectfully pass on the opportunity to invest.”
Moses McCall: VC pressure to grow exponentially is not what I want
“You know, it is that pressure that you have to grow exponentially, and I just don't want to do that. Like, the big risk, the pressure from venture capital firms, raising money, that's just not, like, what I want.”
Nadel: Many Forefront hardware portfolio companies shifted manufacturing out of China
“Our portfolio companies that, that sell hardware, many of them shifted their supply chain or their factory sources out of China when the tariffs went into effect you know, a while ago.”
RealKey's new product isn't live yet and launches in Q1
“New product is not live in the market. It's going out in Q one. So currently we actually have every, all of our current users are on the old platform.”
Laguerre: Fleeting charges $43/hour, pays drivers $27/hour, keeping 30% margin
“We charge our customers 43 dollars per hour, we pay our drivers 27 dollars per hour, and fleeting keeps a 30% margin.”
Yin: Hustle Fund offers $25K check for Fleeting on previous SAFE
“Well, I mean, if you would have me, I would be in for 25 K on that same safe.”
Nadel Passes on Spot On Over B2C Marketing Focus
“I'd be much more interested if you were focused strictly on the B to B. I'd love to see you doubling down on that and not the focus on direct B to C. So I think that for now I'm a pass.”
Pepper will spend $1M of its $1.5M raise on paid acquisition
“Well, out of the 1.5 million, we're thinking about doing one million that goes towards paid acquisition.
[407] Elizabeth Yin: Oh, wow.
[407] Jacqueline Fu: Yeah, and the rest would go towards hiring and inventory.”
Fu: Pepper prioritizes profitability over growth, even if not venture scale
“Our philosophy is it's not growth at all cost, and that might not be a venture Scale type of business because we might be growing a little bit slower, but for us, it's more important to be profitable.”
Hudson says Precursor Ventures strictly avoids tobacco and cannabis investments
“We've had a strict sort of no tobacco, no cannabis policy, a precursor, since I started the fund.”
Israel says Hava is contractually committed against taking Big Tobacco capital
“What we did in his advisory agreement, you know, we made it explicitly clear that we're a smoking cessation product and we will never take capital from big tobacco.”
Goldberg: Passing on The Cru Over Concerns Users Will Move Off-Platform
“And my concern is that you are delivering a ton of value on day one with the matching, but then it diminishes a bit post that. And I worry about some folks going off platform. So I'm going to pass.”
Flynn: Sun and Swell will focus on corporate offices next year
“It's definitely not our strategy in the near term but this year we've started going after the corporate offices and that's gonna be our main focus of growth over, like, the next 12 months.”
Mohnot passes on Sun & Swell over venture return profile
“It's not the return profile I'm looking for a venture investment. So I'm going to pass on investing, but would love to be helpful.”
Hudson: Ghosting Sun and Swell is my first broken commitment ever
“Historically, you know, this is, I think, in 200 some odd investments, probably the first time I can think of where we Made a commitment to somebody, had every intention of fulfilling it, and haven't been able to, and it's one of the things we pride ourselves …”
Hudson: 300 portfolio founders actively backchannel about bad VC behavior
“We have 300 founders in our portfolio, and I know sometimes they'll come to me and say, hey, I've heard this person, like, isn't good. I've heard that this firm isn't responsive. I've heard this firm, like, wastes founders time. That's coming from somewhere. T…”
Andrea Madho: Lab 141 held 70+ investor meetings without landing checks
“And I've had seventy-something VC angel meetings, but no one's gone out of their way to say, listen, we had an off-the-record kind of conversation, but I really like what you're doing. Let's talk about me investing. That hasn't happened either.”
Lee: Rooted's Customer Retention Is Currently a Challenging 15% to 20%
“I think customer retention solving for that long-term and bringing that up to 60 to 70% and not the 15 to 20% that we have right now.”
Mohnot passes on The Black Travel Box over travel-only product frequency
“For me, the sort of travel piece within multicultural CPG, I think is, is too hard for me to like wrap my head around. People don't travel that often and for them to buy a specific product that is different than the product they've been buying just for travel.…”
Yin passes due to a narrow pre-travel marketing window
“How do you then target the travel market? You know, it happens so infrequently, and people only really think about their trips when they're about ready to go on their trips, and they don't really plan, you know, months in advance, and for that reason, it feels…”
Tot Squad is raising a bridge note with a $15M valuation cap
“So the bridge note has a fifteen million cap.”
Fox: NFL Stars Baker Mayfield and Patrick Mahomes Are Earbuds Investors
“Baker Mayfield invested in our last round. Patrick Mahomes is coming in this round.”
Nadel: Max valuation cap I would invest in Hostfully is $6M
“I would invest at five or even six, but I don't think I'd go beyond that.”
Schmorak: Hostfully will not accept a valuation cap below $7M
“I don't think I'd take anything less than seven.”
Meng sets a strict $12M valuation floor for his funding round
“We're definitely not going below twelve million.”
Shulam: WeDo tracks micro-actions to build a map of human behavior
“Today we're helping students build and maintain healthy routines, and then we use that data to also help them track daily tasks and stuff like that. This is all in the effort of tracking micro actions people take to building a map of human behavior.”
Charles Hudson passes on WeDo over disconnect between problem and product
“So I totally identify with the problem, but I'm having a really difficult time connecting the problem statement to the product, so for me, this one's gonna be a pass, but I can tell you have real enthusiasm and energy about solving this, but for me, it just do…”
Zahar: Hykso targets women aged 25 to 40 for fitness
“Right now, the target market when it comes to the users is actually women between 25 and 40 years old. They're the big market when it comes to fitness.”
Diamond: Passes on Hykso over narrow total addressable market concerns
“To me, I worry about, like, the, like the total addressable market, like the TAM. I think for me, it's a little too narrow, so I'm gonna pass.”
Zahar: FightCamp is self-funding growth and not raising capital
“No, I mean, like it's a, again, it's a, we're in a lucky position where, you know, we kind of self-fund our growth right now.”
Charles Hudson passes on Samaritan due to institutional venture return thresholds
“And so if I were an angel investor, I would invest in your company because from my personal angel investments that I made before I had my fund, I was able to set my own return threshold. I could say, if I get my money back on this investment and I get a chance…”
Jonathan Kumar says Samaritan will pivot to non-profit if VC path fails
“And if we fail, but we're, it's still worth keeping Samaritan around, then we'll do the donor route.”
Feedback charges $99 per month for restaurant pricing SaaS
“And we're charging for this SaaS product right now 99 dollars a month.”
Michael Hyatt rescinds his offer because Feedback isn't working yet
“It sounds like what he's doing isn't working yet. That's fundamentally why I haven't invested.”
Jillian Manus commits $100,000 of her personal capital to Shift
“And I'm gonna put a 100,000 of my money right now.”
Brandel: Hearken approaches $1M ARR across 150 newsrooms and seeks $3.5M
“So my company Harkin is about three years old now. We're in about a 150 newsrooms, and we're just about approaching a million ARR, and are here to raise 3.5 million for our next stage of growth.”
Brandel: About $200K of Hearken's $1M ARR Is Foundation Subsidies
“About 200,000. Subsidized, yeah.”
Husk admits CultureForce's custom Shopify build is not a technical differentiator
“We've, I've built custom code on top of Shopify. So the platform itself is not something that is going to differentiate us right now.”
Nadel passes on CultureForce, doubting its venture-scale potential
“I just have trouble getting really excited about it and trouble seeing it become, becoming a really large scale company. So for the reason I'm going to pass, but I really commend you on the journey that you've taken and your commitment to this business.”
Brownridge: DogSpot generates $15K MRR across 65 units in 14 states
“We've got 65 of these across the United States in 14 states creating 15,000 in monthly recurring revenue today.”
Manus: Commits $150,000 personal investment to DogSpot
“I'm going to come in. So I'm thinking for me right now, 150,000.”
Nadel: Offers DogSpot a $300,000 investment
“So I would like to invest as well. You know, I'm not sure what the final number will be, but it's usually 300,000.”