st-louis-founder
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David Karandish Learned to Take the Punch - Then Built for the Next One
A Google update once turned a $127 million acquisition unprofitable in two hours. The St. Louis founder answered with a lesson in controlled failure, patient reinvention and a second company built to outlast the platform beneath it.
Dalton Luka Learned the Map. Now He’s Rewriting the Reviews.
A rejected agency applicant taught himself the machinery of local search, built tools for thousands of marketers, and turned a recurring business headache into Unreview. His advantage is less glamorous than a growth hack: make the messy work repeatable.
Marc Bernstein Built Balto in the Five Seconds Before Regret
A forgotten sales lesson, an Excel macro, and 82 early demos gave Marc Bernstein the blueprint for Balto. His larger bet is that AI should carry the repetitive work while people handle the conversations worth remembering.
Ryan Maher Found a $22 Billion Problem Hiding in the Service Lane
A stale recall notice, a list of 42 VINs and one profitable experiment sent a third-generation dealer back to the car business - this time to make the software disappear and the appointments show up.