Frank Growth

Episode #219: Wade Lowe — Why GTM in the AI era is a Rubik's CubeThe business takes on the personality of the founder. If there are problems, look at thyself.For founders running $5M–$50M companies trying to crack go-to-market when the playbook keeps changing.Wade Lowe is a 3x co-founder with two exits, focused on bootstrapping, AI, and mindset. He's led revenue at two Inc 500 companies (ranked 72nd and 23rd) and now embeds with founders as a co-founder on demand. Jason and Wade get into how to diagnose a stalled growth motion, why the operating model is the first thing to fix, and how to play where the smartest people aren't — equipment rental, construction, fuel. Wade is direct about the trade-offs he made to be present for his kids and the hard truth most founders resist hearing.What you'll hear Why acquisition has to come before retention and expansion when budgets are tight How Wade diagnoses the operating model first in every $5M–$50M company he embeds with The Google AdWords inbound engine behind two Inc 500 companies — and why being first to a keyword segment was the unlock How to evaluate talent quickly using soft-skill signals: response time, commitments kept, and whether someone proposes solutions or just critiquesChapters 00:00 — Cold open: the business goes as the founder goes 03:01 — GTM in the AI era: test, test, test 06:22 — Playing where the smartest people aren't 12:13 — What Wade diagnoses first in a $5M–$50M company 17:17 — The hard truth founders resist hearing 20:29 — One operating principle for cracking GTMLinks & resourcesGuestWade Lowe — 3x Co-Founder | 2x Exit | Bootstrapping | AI | MindsetLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason

Episode #218: Pashmina De Shon — Why Friction Is The Moat In Craft ChocolateHow a bootstrapped founder built a $3M+ craft chocolate marketplace by owning the operational pain everyone else outsources.For e-commerce operators, bootstrapped founders, and brands weighing the jump from DTC to physical retail.Pashmina De Shon is the founder of Bar and Cocoa, a curated marketplace for craft chocolate featuring 1,200 SKUs from 60 makers across 30 countries. After a decade running the business purely online, she recently opened a physical store in Greensboro, North Carolina. In this conversation, she breaks down why she runs her own warehouse instead of using a 3PL, how owning fulfillment keeps her waste rate at 2% versus industry norms of 10-12%, why the subscription model forced early clarity on curation, and what actually changes in the P&L when you move from DTC to brick and mortar.What you'll hear Why "even Amazon doesn't ship chocolate" became both the warning and the opportunity How owning fulfillment, FDA compliance, and temperature-sensitive shipping creates a moat competitors can't copy The plateau that hit at scale — and the boring, decisive fixes that got Bar and Cocoa past it How to think about retail economics as a marketing and retention channel, not just a sales channelChapters 00:00 — Cold open and Frank Growth intro 02:45 — The thesis: why the easy e-commerce business is the shortest-lived 07:12 — Owning fulfillment and a 2% waste rate vs. the 10-12% norm 11:53 — Moving from DTC to physical retail: what changes, what stays 14:10 — Educating the craft chocolate market while selling 17:04 — Lightning round and three takeawaysLinks & resourcesGuestPashmina De Shon — Founder, Bar and CocoaWebsiteInstagramLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions. Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois Subscribe / Follow Jason

Episode #217: Jeff Bishop Hill — How Swiss Army knife operators scale marketplacesWhat breaks first when a marketplace expands into new markets.This episode is for founders and operators balancing growth, ops, compliance, and enterprise sales at the same time.Jeff Bishop Hill breaks down what it takes to scale marketplaces when one operator is covering multiple functions at once. Drawing on his work across Soothe, Mercato, and Roo, he explains how to sequence market launches, what metrics actually matter, how to win enterprise accounts from the bottom up, and when to build compliance versus prioritize growth. He also shares where operators get expansion wrong, why supply is usually the first thing to break, and how Roo limited launches to about five markets per quarter to avoid doubling investment on failed rollouts.What you’ll hear Why supply-demand balance and customer satisfaction matter more than a stack of dashboards How Jeff sequenced new market launches using household income heat maps, logistics, and provider density Why picking markets for “sex appeal” and expanding too fast leads to expensive mistakes How to win larger enterprise accounts by starting with local users, proving value, and building up to procurementChapters00:00 — Why glamorous market selection fails01:49 — Scaling marketplaces across multiple markets and countries04:01 — The only metrics that really matter (supply, demand, CSAT)05:14 — Fixing expansion strategy and sequencing markets09:02 — Winning enterprise accounts from the bottom up15:05 — Growth vs compliance and scaling tradeoffsLinks & resourcesGuestJeff Bishop Hill — Marketplace operator at RooLinkedInAbout Frank GrowthFrank Growth is a podcast about how companies actually grow—real operators, real constraints, real decisions.Hosted by Jason Shafton.Promotional links Work with Winston Francois: https://wf.team/podcast Subscribe / Follow Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonshafton/