Joe Megibow’s Post

This Monday is the 10-year anniversary for Casper! Over my first 3 months, I've been blown away by the research and careful details we put into our products, and the loyalty we've earned with our customers. Like all startups, we've had our share of challenges and still face hurdles to overcome. But we have never lost our passion for what we do. With that, we thought we'd have a little fun with our amazing brand at our retail stores. Cheeky? Perhaps. We still sleep well at night.

I am excited to share that I am starting my next adventure, joining Casper as CEO. Looking back to 2018, when I joined Purple, there was only one competitor to watch, which was Casper. Casper had disrupted the category and built a brand with customer recognition we could only dream about. And here I am, 5 years later, with the opportunity to steward the best brand in the category and take it to new levels. I’m thrilled. Casper has built a heck of a lifestyle brand around something that matters a lot – sleep. And more importantly, has a following of very happy, well-slept customers. The more I dug in, I was pleasantly surprised how much joy there is with the product. Happy customers, great product, combined with strong sponsor support from Durational and new investment from strategic partners, Casper is finally set up for long-term success after some admittedly tough years. I’m looking forward to working with the Casper team that has demonstrated continued creativity and incredible endurance. A big thank you to Durational Capital and Casper’s Board for putting your trust and vision in me. Announcement: https://lnkd.in/gmDgNgFx

One of the perks of my job at Bright Cellars is working with incredible teams like the "Somm Squad". They work every day to make sure that we develop the best possible wine for every one of our customers. Finding one expert is hard. Finding three, who actually like and respect each other, is a rare thing. And they are taking us to all new levels of awesome. Keep up the great work, squad!

Over the last 15 years, I seem to have focused on consumer businesses that elevate some of human's oldest needs: specifically travel and exploration, clothing and sleep. As long as those have existed, there has been wine, which has brought people together for social and even religious reasons for thousands of years. Yet more and more, wine (and wine culture) has made it harder for the typical consumer to learn about, discover and enjoy wine. With that, I'm thrilled to announce my next adventure, in joining Bright Cellars. Their data-driven, inclusive approach, that allows anyone to find wines they will enjoy is long overdue. And just the kind of consumer obsessed mission I love. With a great management team, and terrific backing from Clara Sieg at Revolution and Jacob Shapiro at Cleveland Avenue, we are set up to succeed. Cheers!

When I was at a young startup enterprise software company, over 20 years ago (!), I learned the value of great customers. Our best customers told us what we were doing wrong, and what would be most valuable to them. Over time, they became advisors and friends to our company. They asked nothing in return, but knew that if they helped us, we would keep making things much better for them. It's harder in B2C e-commerce to stay close to your customers. Sure, you directly "own the customer" but that is more transactional in nature; and if you're good, maybe you have some data science on top of that. But that is not knowing your customer. In my career, I've relentlessly sought out ways to learn from our customers in more human ways: e.g. personally taking calls in the contact center, personally calling angry customers back, reading thousands of survey feedback (the comments, not the scores), focus groups, in home visits, and so on. With my teams we've produced countless millions of incremental gains by choosing to listen, and acting on what we heard. It's hard to run a successful business, and yes, the economics have to be viable. But getting the right value equation for your customer is almost always a winning strategy.  This is why I also try to give back to the brands I like, and I've reached out to many over the years. And it never ceases to amaze me how hard it is to provide feedback to companies. Many companies engineer ways to NOT receive feedback. Crazy! But I love it when I reach out to a company and they actually care. That's what recently happened to me with a startup focused on pool water monitoring. I reached directly out to the CEO and he responded, same day. It turned out he lived close to me and we got together for drinks. My wife asked, "you paid for their product, and you are giving them free feedback?" Why yes, I did. I recommend you do the same for the products you care about. His post below.

Very cool for Purple to be recognized as one of the top-10 fastest growing companies in Utah (based on total 5-year revenue and CAGR). Amazing product + amazing employees + amazingly happy customers = win!

It was such a pleasure to join the amazing Purple team and our terrific partners to officially open our massive new facility in Georgia. We’ve already added over 400 new jobs here and are just getting started. Combined with our Utah facilities, our over 2100 employees are now making thousands of mattresses, pillows, and seat cushions nearly every day. Love our U.S. labor force.

Our internal comms team has been diligently posting a question of the day, every day, which has been a fun way to keep everyone engaged with something other than our never-ending work to be done. Somehow the idea came up to ask me some of those questions. And where else to ask them, but in bed? With a comedian? So this happened...