Scaling culture and leadership :The story of My Jewelry

Season 07 of Startup Pass-port by Frontwalker continues with Episode 21 – Vilmar Bliekendaal, Co-founder of My Jewelry. Vilmar Bliekendaal, Co-founder of My Jewelry, discusses how the company entered the traditional jewelry industry through direct-to-consumer e-commerce and benefited from the rapid growth of the online market. He reflects on how the business adapted as e-commerce became more competitive, moving into offline retail while maintaining a strong online channel, and how continuously reinvesting profits and adopting new marketing technologies supported the company's growth. He also shares how revenue grew from around €1.5 million to €5 million, giving them confidence that they were onto something. Vilmar also discusses building the company with a complementary co-founder, where each brought a different perspective and strength. He explains how the people a company needs change as it grows, moving from generalists to specialists and later managers, and shares his biggest lesson for founders: "hire slow and fire fast." He also emphasizes being more selective when hiring, saying, "you rather speak to 20 persons instead of two." This new season brings conversations with founders, innovators, investors, and ecosystem leaders shaping the future of entrepreneurship, recorded at the Upstream Festival in Rotterdam in partnership with Erasmus Enterprise. These conversations are powerful, inspiring, and game-changing, and we can't wait for you to hear them. Stay tuned! New episodes dropping soon!