Michele Romanow: I grew up out west in Calgary surrounded by resource companies – the Tea Room was a chance to test a truly sustainable business model. At the time I wanted to take on a typically high margin business and see if you could operate profitably with no consumer waste. Many of the initiatives we implemented were revolutionary; we would compost all of our waste with giant composters brimming with little worms that would transform our waste into a really rich soil, which we would then sell to farmers.

By the end of my first year at the Tea Room, I had caught the entrepreneurial bug and more importantly, I had met two other amazing engineers, Anatoliy Melnichuk and Ryan Marien who also wanted to start a business. The three of us have worked together for almost 10 years now. Throughout undergrad we would get together on a Friday night, crack open a bottle of wine and start playing our fa- vorite game, “What’s the next million dollar idea.” We went through hundreds of ideas, often getting up the next morning to call the competitors in that space to try to assess if our brainstormed ideas had any merit.

Did you come up with the Caviar idea during one of your Friday brain- storming sessions?

It started from an off-the-cuff comment by Anatoliy about farm- ing and that caviar was the most valuable item you could farm. On a whim we started Googling worldwide caviar production and discovered the worldwide supply of caviar had decreased by 95 per cent in the past 20 years. And with that staggering number, that’s what got things started.

Evandale Caviar was notably thwarted by changes in both the economic and regulatory climate but from there, you found yourself in the corporate world at Sears of all places. While in this role, how were you able to reconcile your entrepreneurial passions and what corporate lessons did you take from your experience on your way out the door?

2008 was a rough year – there were regulation changes in the Caviar industry, which changed Evandale’s business model substantially. However, I made the transition to working at Sears during a fascinating time. They were one of the largest e-commerce players in Canada and I was watching that market grow. I loved working in retail and was progressing quickly. A few mentors encouraged me to just spend “a couple more years getting corporate experience,” which although I was happy at that time, isn’t advice I would pass along to others.

My best career advice is to start now. Work hard and stop believing you needed a job title or a brand name on your resume before taking the plunge to do something on your own. The mindset that you need a certain educational or career path before you get started is so limiting. You have to bet on yourself and then go make it hap- pen. Society rewards great ideas no mater what background, age or gender they come from.

So I didn’t hesitate. I had a great experience at Sears, but it was time to start something else.

But you were late to the game starting Buytopia – Groupon, DealFind/ Teambuy had raised money already, plus the newspapers and media companies had entered the space. How did you survive when DealFind and TeamBuy had raised more than $50 million and massive companies like Rogers and Postmedia were starting their own? Today, all of those companies have folded, but how did you weather the storm?

Well there were certainly days when I was scared we’d end up the same way! I think everyone in the startup space overemphasizes
the importance of an idea and underemphasizes the importance of execution. Daily deals e-commerce platforms are a great model to both the merchant, who acquires new customers at a low cost and the consumers, who get an awesome deal. Our success was about our team “out executing” the competition. We were able to get deals with hundreds of top Canadian brands like Porter, Cirque du Soleil and Staples, which helped us attract and retain new customers. We’ve been able to save our 2.5 million subscribers over $150 million by negotiating great deals and executing.

So you started Buytopia with just $45,000 of capital?

Yes. Unlike some of our funded competitors who could afford to focus on a long-term breakeven, we had to think about every investment decision breaking even immediately. One example of using our capital for immediate breakeven was when we bought a $15,000 print ad with only $30,000 left in the bank. One of the secrets to our success was understanding our true costs to acquire a consumer, this was the metric we were obsessed with. If you can spend $100 on an ad today and make $200 in sales at a 50 per cent margin, you’ve immediately broke even on a consumer in 24 hours. Then after that initial transaction, whatever retention you have is profit.