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I thought raising chickens was for idiots who couldn't do the math on how cheap eggs were at the store. Then I moved to Austin, got some land, and tried raising animals as a hobby. It engaged a different part of my brain. I had to think about their health, guard against their predators, and shovel their shit. All of it took my mind out of its rut. For months, I did the work and got no results. They didn't lay. I had to trust and keep doing the work. Now our kitchen counter is packed. My kids’ teachers get farm fresh eggs as gifts. So do my friends. My wife is overwhelmed, but proud. So what's my next challenge to be?

The people who make junk food for your mind are launching junk food for your kids’ bodies.

This guy used ChatGPT to bootstrap a $15,000/month software company. Bhanu moved into his parents' house to save money and start a company. It was tough until a weekend changed everything...

Steve Jobs’ former employee gave me the best parenting advice. Before working for Jobs, Chris MacAskill was a geophysicist. He traveled the world studying the Earth’s interior. Then he got an amazing dev relations job with Steve Jobs. He was there when Steve convinced Pixar to make its first movie. He watched Steve cry in front of Canon’s executives to get them to invest in NeXT. He saw Steve convince developers to make software for his platform. Anyway, I asked Chris how the hell he got into computers when he already had a successful career as a geophysicist. Here’s what he told me: "When our kids were first born, I went to a parenting lecture and the guy said, ‘Most parents try to get their kids interested in what they’re interested in. You don’t do that.’ He was wagging his finger around over the podium. ‘You get interested in what your kids are interested in.’" Chris’ son was into computers. So Chris took him to CompUSA to buy hardware. He helped him build a computer. He got interested in what his son was interested in. That new passion led Chris to learn so much about computers that Steve Jobs hired him at NeXT. Later Chris founded Fatbrain, the online bookstore that he sold to Barnes & Noble. Then he founded the incredibly successful photo-sharing site, SmugMug, WITH HIS FAMILY. I’ve been thinking about Chris a lot this week. I’ve been traveling all over Austin with planks of wood in my car. I’m trying to figure out how to cut them on an angle so my son can build a bench. My 7-year-old is into woodworking. I don’t know Jack about woodworking. I want to just give up on the whole thing soooooooo badly. But I keep remembering what Chris said in my interview: “You get interested in what your kids are interested in.” My son is over the moon with excitement about this project. So I’m in it with him. Now I have to figure out how to cut these planks.

I'm creating a cheat sheet to help you level up your conversations. All my best interviewing techniques. Condensed onto one page. Give me a 👋 in the comments and I'll DM it to you when it's ready.

I feel a little goofy sharing this here, but I love the workspace I created for myself.

Check out the slouchy way Dan started his interview with me. He didn't seem to want to be there. I called it out. Then I said, "how do I make this engaging for you?" He said, "Ask me something I haven’t been asked before." Fair. He's been on an interview tear. It's tough to say the same thing over and over. So I told him, "Alright. Let’s talk about the problems I have with your software." And instantly, he lit up and sat straight. That’s when the real conversation started. I told him that I didn't like Spiral, his software that turns recordings into social posts. It was bland and had none of Dan's introspection or taste. Dan's a guy who reads philosophy books. He uses ai to ask himself tough, probing questions. He analyzes things. Spiral had none of it. Everything it created was generic. The dude heard that and agreed. We got into a discussion about how AI development is so fast that it allows (demands?) the creator's taste. He recently relaunched Spiral. I love how its new focus is on taste. People keep telling me to just "let people talk" in my interviews. I don't think that's the right approach. Anyone can just talk on X, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc. Smart people want to be drawn out. They want to be pushed to think in a different way. (I'm going to run a test on this post. If you ❤️ it, I'll have Atlas/ChatGPT browser DM you a link to the interview with Dan. Let's see if it works.)

I'm starting a new company with Jesse! Being a life-long entrepreneur has been amazing, but it's also been pressure. At 25-years-old I was responsible for health insurance for my team's families. I always had to figure out the next step. To recruit. With Jesse I get an experienced partner who built multiple companies and cares about the business alongside me. As I wrote this, he texted me about the business 5 times. He also brings the full force of Gateway X, his venture studio. - His COO is obsessing on my needs, daily - His overqualified CTO is solving my problems - I have 2 GrowthAssistants working - We recruited ambitious pt college students - They're hiring a full-time creator I've never experienced a setup like this. LFG

I'm not Andrew Warner. I was born Shuki Khalili. I always thought I was the only one who struggled with an unfamiliar name. First day of class in high school, I said, “My name is pronounced SHOE-KEY.” A kid yelled, “Your name is SHOOT ME?!” At 23, I managed to get a potential sponsor on the phone. I said, “I’m Shuki and…” I could tell I lost him right there. I probably should have come up with a funny line to make the strange name feel more playful. Instead, I changed it to Andrew Warner. Instantly, the problem went away. But I was a bit paranoid about it. ~ What if people think I’m using a fake name and call me a liar? ~ What if they say “You don’t look like an Andrew”? ~ Etc. My solution was to bring it up and talk about it—but only after I got to know someone. Sharing a secret takes the pain out of it and creates a bond. Like I said, I thought I was the only one who dealt with this. But in our Sales Accelerator, the topic came up when Kay Azmat brought it up. Then others joined in. It's a real branding issue. I'm glad I changed my name to Andrew Warner, but I still dig it when people who "know-me know-me" call me Shuki. (But being called "Shoot Me" is one of the reasons I left NYC.)

We took an unusual family vacation this summer: We went to a family sleepaway camp in Maine. It has everything you'd expect from camp: archery, kayaking, swimming, crafts, counselors, etc. It also had the right mix of family time and non-family time. In the mornings, the kids went off with their age groups while adults had time to wander. In the afternoons adults and kids went to the lake to swim, boat, and play. In the evenings all the families sat by a fire for activities like talent shows. All the meals and activities were organized by the camp, so we just got to play. I never went to sleepaway camp as a kid, so this was a fun way to see what it's like.

I haven't posted much here, but that's about to change. Let me reintroduce myself properly. I'm not really Andrew Warner. I was born Shuki Khalili. Try cold-calling someone when your name is Shuki – I learned real quick that "Andrew Warner" got calls answered way faster than "Shuki from... uh, that greeting card company." That scrappy name-change hack helped me bootstrap Bradford & Reed to $38 million in annual sales. Then I built Grab•com (Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway backed our billion-dollar jackpot – no big deal). After selling those, I created Mixergy and spent 15 years interviewing 2,000+ entrepreneurs including the founders of Airbnb, Dropbox, and Netflix. Here's what I'm up to now: → CEO of Bootstrapped Giants (partnered with Jesse Pujji) → Generated $277k in the first 2 months with our B2B Sales Accelerator → Moved from San Francisco to Austin (turns out I love manual labor now. Who knew?) → Still hosting Mixergy interviews and learning from founders daily What you can expect from me: Raw stories about building businesses without big funding, lessons from interviewing startup giants, and probably some behind-the-scenes chaos from growing Bootstrapped Giants. I believe the best business advice comes from stories, not lectures. Dale Carnegie taught me that – tell the story first, then draw out the point. Your turn: What's one thing about you that would surprise people here? Drop it in the comments. I'd love to learn about YOU.

After months of restricted activity, I hit a mental breaking point. The bad air outside is what did it. I haven’t run in days. I feel trapped inside. My head hurts. I don’t want to do any damn thing.

I'm creating a cheat sheet to help you level up your conversations. All my best interviewing techniques. Condensed onto one page. Give me a 👋 in the comments and I'll DM it to you when it's ready.

I thought raising chickens was for idiots who couldn't do the math on how cheap eggs were at the store. Then I moved to Austin, got some land, and tried raising animals as a hobby. It engaged a different part of my brain. I had to think about their health, guard against their predators, and shovel their shit. All of it took my mind out of its rut. For months, I did the work and got no results. They didn't lay. I had to trust and keep doing the work. Now our kitchen counter is packed. My kids’ teachers get farm fresh eggs as gifts. So do my friends. My wife is overwhelmed, but proud. So what's my next challenge to be?

I feel a little goofy sharing this here, but I love the workspace I created for myself.

Steve Jobs’ former employee gave me the best parenting advice. Before working for Jobs, Chris MacAskill was a geophysicist. He traveled the world studying the Earth’s interior. Then he got an amazing dev relations job with Steve Jobs. He was there when Steve convinced Pixar to make its first movie. He watched Steve cry in front of Canon’s executives to get them to invest in NeXT. He saw Steve convince developers to make software for his platform. Anyway, I asked Chris how the hell he got into computers when he already had a successful career as a geophysicist. Here’s what he told me: "When our kids were first born, I went to a parenting lecture and the guy said, ‘Most parents try to get their kids interested in what they’re interested in. You don’t do that.’ He was wagging his finger around over the podium. ‘You get interested in what your kids are interested in.’" Chris’ son was into computers. So Chris took him to CompUSA to buy hardware. He helped him build a computer. He got interested in what his son was interested in. That new passion led Chris to learn so much about computers that Steve Jobs hired him at NeXT. Later Chris founded Fatbrain, the online bookstore that he sold to Barnes & Noble. Then he founded the incredibly successful photo-sharing site, SmugMug, WITH HIS FAMILY. I’ve been thinking about Chris a lot this week. I’ve been traveling all over Austin with planks of wood in my car. I’m trying to figure out how to cut them on an angle so my son can build a bench. My 7-year-old is into woodworking. I don’t know Jack about woodworking. I want to just give up on the whole thing soooooooo badly. But I keep remembering what Chris said in my interview: “You get interested in what your kids are interested in.” My son is over the moon with excitement about this project. So I’m in it with him. Now I have to figure out how to cut these planks.

The people who make junk food for your mind are launching junk food for your kids’ bodies.

This guy used ChatGPT to bootstrap a $15,000/month software company. Bhanu moved into his parents' house to save money and start a company. It was tough until a weekend changed everything...

I'm starting a new company with Jesse! Being a life-long entrepreneur has been amazing, but it's also been pressure. At 25-years-old I was responsible for health insurance for my team's families. I always had to figure out the next step. To recruit. With Jesse I get an experienced partner who built multiple companies and cares about the business alongside me. As I wrote this, he texted me about the business 5 times. He also brings the full force of Gateway X, his venture studio. - His COO is obsessing on my needs, daily - His overqualified CTO is solving my problems - I have 2 GrowthAssistants working - We recruited ambitious pt college students - They're hiring a full-time creator I've never experienced a setup like this. LFG

How do you manage your family's expenses? I keep all our expenses in QuickBooks. I go through each line item once a month. I manage to remove 25 bucks here and there, but I never cut anything substantial. Our biggest expenses (school, mortgage, groceries, etc) can't seem to be changed. And the small ones don't seem to be worth my while to care about. After years of using QB, I'm wondering if I should even bother anymore. Thoughts?

I'm not Andrew Warner. I was born Shuki Khalili. I always thought I was the only one who struggled with an unfamiliar name. First day of class in high school, I said, “My name is pronounced SHOE-KEY.” A kid yelled, “Your name is SHOOT ME?!” At 23, I managed to get a potential sponsor on the phone. I said, “I’m Shuki and…” I could tell I lost him right there. I probably should have come up with a funny line to make the strange name feel more playful. Instead, I changed it to Andrew Warner. Instantly, the problem went away. But I was a bit paranoid about it. ~ What if people think I’m using a fake name and call me a liar? ~ What if they say “You don’t look like an Andrew”? ~ Etc. My solution was to bring it up and talk about it—but only after I got to know someone. Sharing a secret takes the pain out of it and creates a bond. Like I said, I thought I was the only one who dealt with this. But in our Sales Accelerator, the topic came up when Kay Azmat brought it up. Then others joined in. It's a real branding issue. I'm glad I changed my name to Andrew Warner, but I still dig it when people who "know-me know-me" call me Shuki. (But being called "Shoot Me" is one of the reasons I left NYC.)

We took an unusual family vacation this summer: We went to a family sleepaway camp in Maine. It has everything you'd expect from camp: archery, kayaking, swimming, crafts, counselors, etc. It also had the right mix of family time and non-family time. In the mornings, the kids went off with their age groups while adults had time to wander. In the afternoons adults and kids went to the lake to swim, boat, and play. In the evenings all the families sat by a fire for activities like talent shows. All the meals and activities were organized by the camp, so we just got to play. I never went to sleepaway camp as a kid, so this was a fun way to see what it's like.

After months of restricted activity, I hit a mental breaking point. The bad air outside is what did it. I haven’t run in days. I feel trapped inside. My head hurts. I don’t want to do any damn thing.

I haven't posted much here, but that's about to change. Let me reintroduce myself properly. I'm not really Andrew Warner. I was born Shuki Khalili. Try cold-calling someone when your name is Shuki – I learned real quick that "Andrew Warner" got calls answered way faster than "Shuki from... uh, that greeting card company." That scrappy name-change hack helped me bootstrap Bradford & Reed to $38 million in annual sales. Then I built Grab•com (Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway backed our billion-dollar jackpot – no big deal). After selling those, I created Mixergy and spent 15 years interviewing 2,000+ entrepreneurs including the founders of Airbnb, Dropbox, and Netflix. Here's what I'm up to now: → CEO of Bootstrapped Giants (partnered with Jesse Pujji) → Generated $277k in the first 2 months with our B2B Sales Accelerator → Moved from San Francisco to Austin (turns out I love manual labor now. Who knew?) → Still hosting Mixergy interviews and learning from founders daily What you can expect from me: Raw stories about building businesses without big funding, lessons from interviewing startup giants, and probably some behind-the-scenes chaos from growing Bootstrapped Giants. I believe the best business advice comes from stories, not lectures. Dale Carnegie taught me that – tell the story first, then draw out the point. Your turn: What's one thing about you that would surprise people here? Drop it in the comments. I'd love to learn about YOU.

This is 100% real. In case we're forced to take it down, download the episodes on your fav podcast app. The Mixergy team helped Connor launch a podcast that takes My First Million up a notch. Do you think Sam & Shaan should be upset?

Which podcast cover do you like? We're producing a podcast for Connor Tomkies. It's aimed at founders who sold their companies.