Networking Success Is Served with a Side of Eggs

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

[Music]

What's up, my friends? Let's talk about brunch. Now, I always have a hard time deciding between something savory and something sweet. I don't know if you ever have this problem. You're like, I'm gonna go to brunch, but what do I eat?

Well, that's why my favorite thing to do before a proper brunch, at least a proper legit weekend brunch, is to run at least five miles. Because when I do that, then I feel like I can have both. I'm like, I want the omelet and the French toast. I have been thinking about that all morning as I've been working on this story. Now, let's talk about brunch and making money.

So it's not just about brunch, it's also about the purpose of the show, which is to help you create a new source of income and do that without quitting your job. And the method that I use to do that is teaching through storytelling. So it's all about just telling you a story and looking at how this person did this. What can you take away from it? How can you apply this to your own idea?

Or perhaps if you don't have an idea yet, how can this get you thinking? So in today's story, a Wall Street broker serves up startup success with a side of eggs. She starts something called brunch work, combining two good things, brunch and work. Now this business goes from side hustle to mid five-figure revenue each month with a team of 25. Brunch is serious business.

Let's get ready to scramble. Here's a quick shout out to our sponsor. [Music]

Being part of the digital age means that millennials had a lot of great things going for them. Online gaming, the ability to track pizza as it makes its way to your house and the chance to connect with anyone right in their pocket. But as we're discovering, despite the ease of connecting through our various gadgets, there's been a decrease in organic in-person interactions.

This has a tendency to create isolation and it was something that a fresh out of the co-ed dorm Paulina Karpus was acutely aware of. The year was 2015. Although she had a stable career as a broker relationship manager for JP Morgan, Paulina found herself daydreaming of a reality far from the hustle and bustle of Wall Street. She was young and ambitious. What she really wanted was to create something of her own.

However, for a young professional raised on the power of Google, she didn't feel there were adequate resources for her to tap into. What she found was a gap in the market and a new side hustle. While there were an abundance of online communities and forums, those just weren't Paulina's cup of tea. She found them to be impersonal. She wanted a real life community that would allow her to connect with other young would-be entrepreneurs.

So what's a millennial to do when all the best brunch places in town have over an hour wait? Well, they whip up the brunch at home, of course. So feeling that she couldn't be the only one looking for more, Paulina decided to tackle the issue head on. She wanted to create a resource for people like her. So it made sense to model what she wanted after an educational in-person workshop with business speakers.

She would host them on the weekends because with her job, that was the only free time she had. And knowing the death grip that she and her fellow colleagues had on their cherished brunch traditions, she had to find a way to include food as part of the package. Paulina figured if she could somehow get the right venue, everything else would follow. She could work the price of the space in with the cost of the ticket, which would mean that she wouldn't have to pay much out of pocket. She started with a mission statement and poured everything she had into a little email that she sent out into the world.

Paulina was eager to meet with anyone and everyone who showed even the slightest interest in what she was creating. After two particularly successful meetings, including one with a behavioral scientist who ended up coming on as a partner and another that led to her getting that first venue for free, things were finally starting to fall into place. She called her new endeavor brunch work and the first event had a total of 30 people in attendance. It kicked off roughly four months after she had sent out that initial email. For the bulk of year one, Paulina and the growing brunch work team then offered one event a month for a cost of $40.

Starting this project as a side hustle was instrumental to their success because getting 30 to 60 people in a room together once a month wasn't really gonna pay their bills. Instead, that first year provided her with more of an opportunity to learn, grow her network and essentially level up. By year two, brunch work had leveled up to two events each month. It was around this time that someone mentioned to Paulina that adding a membership model might accelerate their growth so she considered what monthly rate would provide members with the most bang for their buck. She settled on a price of $70 a month for that membership option and threw in three guest passes so that members could introduce new people into the community.

The membership was set up with a six month commitment so she knew she could rely on that repeat income to keep her flush in hollandaise. Once the number of monthly events increased to four a month, she decided to offer more options including one for $140 that would cover unlimited events for members and guests. Now a lot has changed since that first year. We're about three and a half years into the story now and that number, that first 30 RSVPs a month has grown to over 1,000, 1,000 RSVPs each month thanks to some strategic expansion on the West Coast in San Francisco and LA. All of this growth has been gradual and self-funded which is something that Paulina is proud of and never really thought was possible.

Profits have doubled on a yearly basis. In fact, they tripled last year and the business now brings in mid five figures on a monthly basis. This also meant that last year, Paulina could say farewell to Wall Street and make the pursuit of business ideas and brunch a full-time job. Of course, it hasn't all been mimosas and eggs benedict. Planning events without your own dedicated event space involves a lot of moving parts.

Naturally, there's all kinds of issues that come up. Sometimes they've even gotten to a venue only to find that the bathrooms aren't working. Despite the challenges, Paulina finds it to be meaningful work. She still finds it hard to believe that 1,000 people have brunch each month at an event she first envisioned. After almost four years of hustling, she's learned a lot about building a community of like-minded individuals.

Once in a while, she even takes time to enjoy a brunch of her own. [Music]

Awesome, congratulations to Paulina and her team. I love the concept of brunch work, just like I love the concept of brunch. I mean, who doesn't? Now, as we are leveling up in year three, season three of the show, we're gathering a lot of specific lessons from the people that we feature in each episode.

So in this episode, we've got some brunch lessons from Paulina. It's actually more related to building community, which is something you can do across all sorts of different platforms and topics and ideas. It doesn't have to be brunch and networking. But Paulina recommends focusing on three things. Okay, number one, she says in reality, it's more important to curate your community.

You might have 3,000 contacts in your phone, but if none of them have expertise or connections in your industry, it doesn't matter. So curation is vital. Number two, find a way to connect with those people. Go wherever they are. If you feel you don't have any connections in the industry you're trying to work in, hit up events that have guest speakers or are focused around a specific activity.

Last number three, be kind and generous to others because it's important when trying to build relationships, but also be smart about it. So you should give without expecting anything in return, but be wary of investing too much of your time into someone or something that doesn't connect to your goals. So in other words, be intentional. Let's work on being intentional together this year. I'm excited.

I've got a bunch of goals of my own. I'll be sharing them with you in real time as we go along. I wanna make sure that I am kind of walking the walk as well as I challenge and encourage you each day. So stay tuned for much more in today's show notes, including links to brunch work, everything else I discussed. All right, sidehustleschool.com/733.

That is for episode 733. And as I sign off for today, I have an inspirational quote for you. Are you ready? This quote is from Ron Swanson of the great Clarkson Rec. He said, "There has never been a sadness "that can't be cured by breakfast food." Thank you so much for listening today.

You're a rockstar. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Sighthustle School. [Music]