Hi. I’m Marc.
I’ve been building companies and mentoring founders for 23+ years. I’ve made every mistake you’re going to make, at least twice. And yet I couldn’t think of a better purpose in life.
The path is never straight. Nor is it filled with people who can help you through this journey. The beginning is full of excitement for the potential, but it’s the middle where you encounter the most pain. It’s where all the hardest problems arise and where learning to lead takes its most difficult form.
And yet the middle is what I love the most. If you are on the founder / CEO journey, I’d love to help.
My Journey
My founder story was on accident. Mom said be an accountant, it’s a safe job. I made it to first week in my 5th year of Tax and quit to start what would become Contour Cameras. I couldn’t take it. 23+ years later I wouldn’t have traded this journey for anything.
Played College Soccer (being an athlete is a lot like being a founder).
Started my own soccer camps (at 15 , couldn’t drive to my own camps!)
Won 3rd Place in a UW Entrepreneurship Program (this was the spark)
Founded Contour Cameras ($30M biz that lost to GoPro - best product does not win!)
Founded Hardware Workshop (5 year side project that helped +1K Startups).
Mentored a lot of founders (Techstars, Highway 1, UW, etc.)
Founded Moment (12 years and still going).
What We’ve Built
*I say WE because none of this was possible with out amazing people. Founders can be the spark, but not the flame without everyone else.
Founded in 2013.
Mission: Get more people to go more places and capture more moments.
Story: It started with a mobile lens for your phone and grew into a community of incredible creators who wanted to capture more, see more, create more.
The Business: It’s a DTC + Wholesale business with customers around the world. It grew with the rise of Instagram, crescendoed with Covid, and has to scale back down as the creator market returns to it’s pre-covid size.
Hardware Workshop
Founded in 2012.
Mission: Help hardware startups get their start
Story: It started out of my own struggles to build Contour Cameras. When I started, I had no idea that building underwater action cameras was so incredibly hard and without any resource to help I wanted to created an in person workshop series that could actually help founders.
The Project: We held 5x annual stops around the country, bringing experienced operators in each to teach 6-8 highly relevant subjects. This was hands-on learning along with local peers you could connect with
Contour Cameras
Founded in 2003.
Mission: Never made one.
Story: We were skiers and we wanted a simple way to record our riding. What started with a wired helmet camera became an all-in one, HD action camera. We were the first to invent everything, but what I learned is the best product does not always in the market.
The Business: This was pre-ecommerce, essentially a wholesale business that was driven by the invention of YouTube. As YouTube grew, people wanted more videos of themselves doing crazy and crazier things.