, I wore overalls, hightops, and some gigantic hoop earrings. I didn’t look like your stereotypical CEO, but that was the point. I was there to talk about the edibles company my brother and I had co-founded. We were calling it “the Blue Apron of weed.”
Intentionally obscured on stage were the details of my personal life. I lived in a 900-square-foot apartment with three other people. The most regular emails I received were from my bank: “Account Alert, Balance Below $25.” I schlepped weekly to a warehouse in Rockaway, Queens to measure out flour mixes, pack boxes, and print shipping labels with a semi-retired Sky Chefs manager who smoked cigars and called me “kid.
Back in New York, I had to shove my clear-eyed revelations under the rug and get back to work: after all, I made myincome from freelance brand strategy: creating coherent and persuasive brand narratives for new businesses. I’d been selling brand stories for years, and I started noticing a daisy chain of disturbing similarities between myself and the mostly young founders I worked with.
I worked with countless founders like this, like me, who were obsessed with image: constantly tweaking the look, feel, and tone of voice of their companies; creating barely relevant blogs and expensive productions that were often abandoned at a whim , and spending more time on social media and taking press calls than actually managing their teams. Then they’d explain how important it was that their “community” understood that they were really buying into a “lifestyle.