FF 010: Becoming Europe's Hottest Startup with Carl Waldekranz, Co-Founder and CEO @ Tictail

Carl Waldekranz is the CEO and co-founder of Tictail. With the vision of creating the worlds most used and loved e-commerce platform Tictail has been called the Tumblr of e-commerce and been celebrated as one of Europe’s hottest startups. The vibrant community now hosts more than 85,000 stores on their service. Due to this phenomenal growth Tictail recently closed a $22m Series B from Balderton, Acton, Thrive and Creandum.

Before Tictail, Carl cofounded and sold a digital agency called Super Strikers where he as an Art Director helped develop the brand identity for companies such as Spotify, Wrapp and Bambuser together with co-founder Kaj Drobin. Carl also founded Keyflow, a mobile guest list app company.

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In Today’s Episode You Will Learn:

1.) What were Carl’s entrepreneurial origins and how did Tictail get started?

2.) What does Carl’s idea creation process look like? How does Carl brainstorm?

3.) Tictail now sells 2m products on their platform but how did they get their first customers?

4.) At what moment in the Tictail journey was Carl the most worried or frightened?

5.) What would Carl say are the essentials for funding? How did Carl meet his investors? What is the difference between the different funding rounds for startups?

6.) Why did Carl pitch other startups before pitching VCs?

7.) Question from Daniel Waterhouse @ Balderton: How has Tictail maintained the magic company culture in Sweden, whilst expanding to NY?

8.) If Carl could start his time with Tictail again, is there anything he would have done differently?

Items Mentioned In Today’s Show:

Carl’s Fave Book: The Score Takes Care of Itself, My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh

Carl’s Fave Blog or Newsletter: First Round Capital Blog

As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC, Carl and Tictail on Twitter right here!

If you would like to see a more colourful side to Harry and a few mojito sessions, you can follow Harry on Instagram here!