Learning the Fundraising Dance

Episode Summary

Erin Carpenter grew up focused on becoming an entertainer with classical training as a ballerina. Along the way, an embarrassing uniform mishap as a young dancer and continued frustrations throughout her career drove her to embrace an entrepreneurial fire that led to starting Nude Barre.  For this professional dancer, learning the fundraising dance was a struggle. After 10 years of bootstrapping and failing to raise money, she finally figured out the steps and eventually raised Seed capital from the likes of Serena Williams, Whitney Wolfe Herd, Jason Calacanis, and Freestyle Capital.  

Listen to learn what helped her find the way and launch the next phase of growth in her business.

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Topics Discussed

• Early childhood entrepreneurial instincts
• Wanting to be an entertainer
• Her embarrassing moment
• Seeing an opportunity in her personal problem with dance tights
• 10 years of bootstrapping
• Pitching Serena Williams and Whitney Wolfe Herd
• Joining Jason Calacanis' accelerator
• Closing funding from Freestyle

Resources Mentioned

• Check out nudebarre.com for bodywear essentials in all shades
• Adamant Ventures
• Fundraising Fieldnotes Newsletter

Follow Us

Erin Carpenter

• Twitter: @mserincarpenter‍
• IG: @_erincarpenter_

Nude Barre

• Twitter: @nudebarre
• IG: @nudebarre

Funded

• Twitter: @fundedpod
• IG: @fundedpod

Jason Yeh (host)

• Twitter: @jayyeh
• IG: @jayyeh

Contact Us / Misc

• Reach out to us on social or email me directly at jason@fundedpod.com if you have any questions or would like to share your story with us!
• Subscribe to the Funded newsletter at fundedpod.com/newsletter
• If you’re fundraising, make sure you send your materials via a document sharing tool. Even if they weren’t our presenting sponsor, we’d still recommend you use DocSend - www.docsend.com/funded    
• Vanta helps maintain SOC2, HIPAA, ISO27001 compliance by integrating directly into your systems and automating a lot of the time intensive process. Get $1000 off at vanta.com/funded

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