Founder's Story

Daniel Robbins sits down with Sky Mitchell, Founder and CEO of Everwild Nordic Spa & Hotels, to unpack how getting fired 30 days into a senior corporate job became the beginning of her entrepreneurial life. Sky shares how she started with one Airbnb condo in Canmore, refinanced her BMW to fund her first deal, nearly went bankrupt multiple times, and ultimately built a hospitality and wellness real estate platform with hundreds of employees and nearly $1 billion in development. The conversation covers the rise of experience-driven travel, Nordic spas, retail investors, rejection, risk, intuition, family, fundraising, and why Sky believes the future of hospitality sits at the intersection of wellness, nature, and connection.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Cliff Nonnenmacher, entrepreneur, franchise expert, Co-Founder of Franocity, host of Pursuit of Profit, and co-author of Beyond the Brand. Cliff shares how he started making money at eight years old selling golf balls, launched a food delivery business at nineteen that was doing hundreds of deliveries a day, and eventually built a career across Wall Street, franchising, business acquisitions, and franchise consulting. The conversation covers hustle, fear, execution, buying failed businesses, why franchises fail, what industries he is bullish and bearish on, and how AI, robotics, aging populations, pet care, and the coming wealth transfer could reshape the future of business.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Peter Murphy, CEO of Pocket Prep, to explore the future of education, AI, bootstrapping, and what it really takes to build a company without outside funding. Peter shares why he worries about the rush to automate everything, especially teachers, how college is changing in an AI driven job market, and why human instructors still matter. The conversation also covers leaving a secure job at Lockheed Martin, building Pocket Prep from an $1,800 bootstrap investment into a multimillion dollar company, navigating platform dependency with Apple, using AI inside education, the emotional weight of being CEO, and why taking care of people became one of his biggest founder lessons.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Nicole Eckels, Co Founder and Creative Director of Sapphire Group, Glasshouse Fragrances, and Circa Home, to unpack how she built one of the most recognizable fragrance businesses out of Australia and brought it into the U.S. market. Nicole shares why she still struggles to say she has “made it,” how patience and experience helped her crack America, and why understanding the customer at the deepest level became her advantage. The conversation explores category creation, luxury consumer psychology, speed to market, AI in creative production, the cost of success, motherhood, work life balance, and why Nicole is not chasing an exit but still chasing the next level of growth.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Stephanie Wittels Wachs, co founder and CEO of Lemonada Media, to unpack how unimaginable grief became the foundation for one of the most meaningful companies in podcasting. Stephanie shares how the death of her brother Harris Wittels from a heroin overdose led her first to writing, then to the podcast Last Day, and eventually to Lemonada’s mission to “make life suck less.” The conversation explores addiction, grief, comedy, mission driven media, building a values based company, attracting major talent, navigating acquisition, and why the hardest parts of life can become the work that helps others survive.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Mark Pincus, founder of Zynga, to explore the emotional reality behind building one of Silicon Valley’s most iconic social gaming companies. Mark reflects on childhood, his complicated but ultimately repaired relationship with his father, the pressure of taking Zynga public, and the brutal shift from being named Founder of the Year to being publicly criticized as one of the worst CEOs in America. The conversation also dives into his new book, Life at the Speed of Play, why most founders should test demand before building, how AI changes the odds for builders, and why the best product ideas often start as instincts that need discipline, not ego.

Daniel Robbins travels to Detroit to meet Larry Brinker Jr., a mission driven leader, investor, and builder whose family company has helped shape the city’s comeback. What begins as a story about construction becomes a deeper story about legacy, Black entrepreneurship, community, resilience, and the power of believing in a city before the rest of the world does. Larry shares how his father moved the family and business to Detroit when others were leaving, how Brinker helped restore landmarks like Michigan Central Station, and why his mission is not just to build buildings, but to bring people together.

In this Founder’s Story episode, Daniel Robbins sits down with Vera Quinn, President and CEO of Cydcor, to discuss why she believes human-to-human sales still matters in an AI-driven world. Vera shares how a summer door-to-door sales job became the foundation for a decades-long career, why rejection became one of her greatest teachers, and how she rose through Cydcor to become its first female President and CEO. The conversation also explores immigrant work ethic, personal sacrifice, motherhood, ambition, leadership, learning the skills required to become CEO, and Vera’s work with Liberty Children’s Home in Belize.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Tom Sosnoff, founder of thinkorswim, tastytrade, and LossDog, to unpack the mindset behind multiple massive exits, building companies that buyers still value years later, and why Tom has no interest in slowing down. Tom explains why he hates the idea of work-life balance, why he and his longtime partner Scott never celebrate exits with “high fives,” and why the best companies are built because the founder is obsessed with building—not because they are trying to sell. The conversation also dives into employee pay, wage gaps, tokenized private markets, prediction markets, financial media, daily shows, and why giving employees life-changing checks may be more meaningful than buying any luxury toy.

Daniel Robbins sits down with Lee Rossey, CTO and Co-Founder of SimSpace, to unpack the new cybersecurity risks emerging from AI agents, cloud coding tools, autonomous systems, and multi-agent environments. Lee explains why people should assume anything they put into an AI system could eventually leak, how AI is changing both offense and defense in cyber, and why the next major challenge is testing whether AI agents can safely act on behalf of companies. The conversation also traces Lee’s journey from 15 years at MIT Lincoln Laboratory to bootstrapping SimSpace, building military-grade cyber ranges, and helping governments and enterprises prepare for a future where automated attackers face automated defenses.