Tank Talks
Tank Talks By Ripple Ventures
Corey Holmes of Popup on Why Entrepreneurship is Such a Powerful Drug!
0:00
Current time: 0:00 / Total time: -1:07:50
-1:07:50

Corey Holmes of Popup on Why Entrepreneurship is Such a Powerful Drug!

Episode 127

There are many vices but few things can match when you create a business that changes the world. Our guest today, Corey Holmes Co-Founder of Popup, knows that feeling and has literally been around the globe to chase that high. We caught up with him in Dubai to discuss Popup, a no-code platform designed to empower new e-commerce experiences as well as his addiction to entrepreneurship.

About Corey Holmes:
Corey Holmes is the Co-Founder of Popup. He started his path as an entrepreneur as a flipper on craigslist in his tweens and teenage years.

When he was 22 he dropped out of university a week before class began and launched an Auto and Marine Detailing business. Then he moved to Uganda to start a nutraceutical company and one of the fastest-growing fitness classes in the country at the age of 23. He learned to code, won an app development award, and placed first in a provincial app development competition.

With that experience, he and his wife started building e-commerce stores and joined Shopify together. After that, he started a successful content creation company, and a dropshipping company which turned into an 8-figure commerce portfolio company (Viceroy Group) comprised of several brands selling in over 100 countries.

In this episode we discuss:

(00:01:00)  News roundup with John Ruffolo
(00:19:50)  Corey Holmes’ early path to entrepreneurship

(00:20:35)  The influence of his parents on him
(00:23:21)  Advice for people who move a lot
(00:25:11)  Why he dropped out of school — twice
(00:27:29)  Deciding to start his first business
(00:29:52)  How Corey’s fear of failure drives him
(00:31:41)  His early days as a Craigslist flipper
(00:34:28)  Corey’s time in Uganda
(00:38:40)  Is it better to not know what you’re getting into as a founder or to have experience
(00:38:57)  Lessons from working at Shopify
(00:45:51)  His journey as a content creator
(00:51:41)  Co-Founding the Viceroy group
(00:55:21)  How Popup became his first Venture-Backed Startup
(00:57:28)  What Popup is and the problem it solves
(01:01:21)  The long-term vision around Popup
(01:02:21)  Popup’s recent $3.5M pre-seed round led by Accel and investors like Seedcamp, Harry Stebbings 20VC, and a group of executives from Shopify, Hopin and others

Fast Favorites:

  1. 🎙- Favorite Podcast: The Game

  2. 📰- Favorite Newsletter /Blog: Morning Brew

  3. 📲- Favorite Tech Gadget: Apple products

  4. 📈- Favorite New Trend: Talking to ChatGPT

  5. 📚- Favorite Book: How to win friends and influence people

  6. 🤔 - Favorite Life Lesson: Define what you value and build your life around that

Follow Matt Cohen and Tank Talks here!

Podcast production support provided by Agentbee.Agency


Discussion about this podcast

Tank Talks
Tank Talks By Ripple Ventures
Join your host, Matt Cohen, Founder & Managing Partner at Ripple Ventures for weekly conversations with leaders in the startup ecosystem discussing the truth about investing, building and running startups.