Q&A with Loren Lewin, Founder of Companion Candles
Meet Companion Candles founder Loren Lewin, and learn why she launched this pet-friendly candle line.
3 min.
This post is part of a series where we interview Chisos portfolio company founders.
Let’s get started with some fun facts.
Re-Nuble converts unrecoverable food waste into a platform of sustainable technologies for indoor growers, creating a positive financial and climate effect.
I founded Re-Nuble in March 2015. We’ve won numerous awards, including:
Re-Nuble has also been featured in a variety of publications, including Yahoo! Finance, Yale Climate Connections, FoodTank, NACD, California Ag Today, Envolve Global, UrbanLeaf, and more.
Once I was comfortable with my level of savings, and I’d figured out the business model enough to gain customer-market fit, it made sense to let go of hustling side gigs and consulting jobs. I had enough proof points (in my eyes) to take the risk.
I wished that I knew concepts such as manufacturability of a product, which is acutely different from product development as it relates to physical products. This would have allowed me to be far less dependent on outside support and/or team members during our embryonic stage.
Success for me is inclusive, consistent, and clear communication with everything that I do. Failure is when I have allowed any of our customers (e.g. team members, stakeholders, investors, and actual customers) to feel that they are unnoticed.
Getting over a brief but severe period of doubt that questioned the existence of Re-Nuble. By taking the time to clear my head and think about all of the minimum proof points that I needed to have validated in order to move forward was a great help. Ultimately, peace and time by myself to think was huge.
Starting a business is a marathon. Pace yourself. Also, always be a realist by creating markers that you need to personally and professionally validate in order to keep the momentum for yourself and your team. Compare your results in shorter time frames (e.g. quarter by quarter).
Jason Lemkin with Saastr.com is a gem of sales knowledge!
Funding from Chisos allowed us to move more quickly during a period of bootstrapping; we were still finalizing the product iteration during the highly uncertain early days of COVID.
In the early days of getting to know them and reviewing the term sheet, the Chisos team was very respectful of our time, efficient in process, and honored our needs - and they always have. The experience has remained very positive throughout.
