Small Business Series | Zach and Rock of Squadcast | Putting Community First and Making the Right Hires

08/22/22 • 42 min

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For this part of our Small Business Series, we'll cover a bit of podcasting and remote recording. Zachariah Moreno and Rockwell Felder (aka Zach and Rock) founded Squadcast in 2016 during the more early days (even though we're still considered early by some standards) of podcasting. Originally podcasters themselves, they found that remote recording solutions at the time were lacking and thought that it would be a growing need as the sector expands. Along the way, they've always managed to keep community first and help the people who use their products. Whether it's their Facebook group, free slack channel, "Squadits", guest exchanges, or giveaways, users of their services benefit from more than just the services themselves. They've also made some phenomenal hires in Arielle Nissenblatt and Alex Whedbee who are community experts! If you're a podcaster in need of a remote recording platform, I definitely recommend them (it was used for this very episode after all!) and you can check out the website here. Zach and Rock are also some great follows on Twitter.

If you'd like to catch more conscious business content, well of course you can! Links to our socials:

Episodes are released every Monday morning. This was part of our Small Business Series, where we dive deep into the world of Small Business leaders. Hosting and production done by David Loos, audio by Briana Reese.

If you'd like to catch more conscious business content, well of course you can! Links to our socials:

Previous Episode

David Bronner of Dr. Bronner's | Activism from a Personal and Business Perpsective

In this episode, I'm going solo on the mic and taking a deep dive into the life and leadership of a well known conscious business leader, David Bronner. Born into the family business of Dr. Bronner's, he took well after his eccentric father in many ways. David was arrested twice for his protests against cannabis and hemp prohibition, once in 2009 and again in 2012. Here's the 2009 video and here's the 2012 one. Since then, he's taken to using financial funding as a form of activism instead of his own personal record. In 2020, he directed the company to pledge more than $2 million dollars to the Oregon Psilocybin Therapy Initiative which successfully passed. And if that wasn't enough to paint an accurate picture of this man for you, just know his role is "Cosmic Engagement Officer" (not Chief Executive!). He's also led his team to add more products to their lineup while adhering to their core principles of clean and environmentally friendly ingredients and fair labor. Although the products are a bit expensive, they're well worth it when you consider the impact that they're able to make. You can see some of these here in their annual impact report.
Here are a few of the things I covered, with timestamps:

Dr. Bronner's story (02:15)
- Founded by Emmanuel and world-renowned for their long and eccentric label
- Starting out with soaps and slowly expanding to other hygeniene, cosmetics and cleaning products
David's story (05:45)
- Taking after his father and being arrested twice for protesting cannabis and hemp prohibition
- Adding more products to the company lineup while adhering to core principles
Lessons and takeaways for entrepreneurs (10:50)
- Take care of your people and they will take care of you. And your people's people for that matter. Impact > dollars
- Start out narrow and expand at a speed which can still carry core merits and principles of the business
- Unique businesses require unique leaders

If you'd like to catch more conscious business content, well of course you can! Links to our socials:

Episodes are released every Monday morning. Hosting and production done by David Loos, audio by Briana Reese.

Next Episode

Small Business Series | Chris Becker of Honey Bee Collective | Financing an Employee Owned Cannabis Company

For this part of our Small Business Series, we'll explore the cannabis industry. Chris Becker just co-founded the Honey Bee Collective this year with some colleagues in the space after working as a budtender and wholesaler at another company. Seeing so many frustrations in this space, he sent out an email to assemble the team and hasn't looked back. The Honey Bee Collective is unique in many ways such as: being employee-owned, sourcing cannabis grown regeneratively outdoors & in greenhouses, partnering with good (diversity, sustainability, etc.) growers to create white label products with royalties and last but not least: operating on a flat hierarchy/leadership structure. Chris walks us through how he did it all and gives some advice on what you can take away from his experience. The Honey Bee Collective's website can be found here and Chris can be found on Twitter @chris_honeybee. He's a great follow for those who want to follow the cannabis industry closely.
If you'd like to catch more conscious business content, well of course you can! Links to our socials:

This was part of our Small Business Series, where we dive deep into the world of Small Business leaders. Hosting and production done by David Loos, audio by Briana Reese.