Julie De Angulo is the VP of Ecommerce and Digital at Bajio Sunglasses, a premium polarized fishing eyewear brand purpose-built for serious anglers, from saltwater flats to bass tournaments. Bajio combines patented LAPIS lens technology with hyper-targeted storytelling to serve one of the most gear-obsessed subcultures in outdoor retail. Julie leads the charge in turning that product obsession into a scalable digital channel, anchored in retention, merchandising, and cultural fluency.

Before joining Bajio, Julie spent nearly two decades in Ecommerce and digital marketing, scaling brands across home goods, pet supplements, fashion, and accessories. Her background in mass communications gave her a sharp instinct for message-market fit, one she’s since sharpened into a full-funnel skillset spanning email, SMS, SEO, and paid acquisition. At Bajio, she joined when the brand had little to no Ecommerce presence, and has since built a high-performing revenue channel from the ground up.

Whether breaking down how to tell product stories that resonate with niche audiences, mapping customer journeys from first click to long-term loyalty, or translating brand values into conversion-focused creative, Julie brings a tactical yet brand-led perspective to Ecommerce strategy. She shares what it takes to grow when you're starting from zero, why not all anglers are created equal, and how to build sustainable foundations that scale with authenticity.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:38] Intro
• [00:49] Focusing on a passionate niche audience
• [02:19] Building a scalable foundation for growth
• [04:31] Learning early that data drives everything
• [06:32] Repositioning a brand beyond wholesale
• [07:54] Tailoring messages to regional fishing niches
• [10:00] Hiring guides instead of paid influencers
• [11:18] Separating community from ad creative
• [12:37] Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, Reach & Zamp
• [18:59] Contributing to a mission-led product story
• [20:53] Scaling small brands with real impact
• [22:23] Balancing SKU simplicity with flexibility
• [25:03] Responding to viral demand with local supply
• [25:53] Forecasting smarter with predictive analytics

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Florida-based polarized sunglasses for fishing https://bajiosunglasses.com/
• Follow Julie De Angulo https://www.linkedin.com/in/julianadeangulo
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest
• Fully managed sales tax solution for Ecommerce brands zamp.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Jeremy Horowitz is the Managing Partner of Because Ventures and the creator of Let’s Buy a Biz!, a media brand and private equity-backed content engine built to make ecommerce M&A more transparent, data-driven, and founder-friendly. Because Ventures is a private equity search fund focused on acquiring and scaling Shopify brands and apps, while Let’s Buy a Biz! documents what it actually takes to grow Top 1% ecommerce businesses.

Before launching either venture, Jeremy worked across every layer of the Shopify ecosystem from scaling high-growth DTC brands like Lumi, to leading growth at top-performing Shopify apps like Gorgias. His on-the-ground experience gave him a front-row seat to what really drives retention, profit, and valuation. Now, through Because Ventures, Jeremy applies that knowledge to acquire and operate ecommerce businesses with sustainable margins and focused stacks.

Whether debunking the myth that “every brand needs subscriptions,” tracking the 84% adoption rate of email/SMS across $1M+ stores, or predicting which app categories will consolidate over the next five years, Jeremy brings a deep analytical lens to ecommerce strategy. He shares insights from crawling 103,000 Shopify stores, explains why most loyalty programs fail, and urges founders to simplify their tech stack before adding complexity. His story is a masterclass in using real data, not hype to guide business decisions.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:40] Intro
• [00:55] Scaling DTC brands to eight figures
• [02:03] Expanding beyond Shopify Plus assumptions
• [04:18] Filtering out inactive and duplicate stores
• [05:05] Highlighting the top 10 most used apps
• [09:08] Focusing on what actually drives growth
• [10:56] Comparing native vs third-party app adoption
• [12:23] Spotting analytics as a breakout category
• [14:11] Explaining why real CRO starts at $5M+
• [16:49] Spotting support as an underused category
• [18:29] Unpacking the subscription model myth
• [22:47] Auditing app stacks to save thousands

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Ecommerce Social Impact Fund because.ventures/index.html
• Insider analysis of the largest Ecommerce brands’ financials letsbuyabiz.xyz/
• Follow Jeremy Horowitz linkedin.com/in/jeremyhorowitz1

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Lucy Jeffrey is the founder of Bare Kind and Candid Founders, two purpose-driven brands built from a mission to make commerce more meaningful. Bare Kind is a bamboo sock company that donates 10% of profits to save the animal featured on each sock, while Candid Founders is both a YouTube channel and growth agency helping consumer brands scale on Faire, a leading B2B wholesale marketplace.

Before launching either company, Lucy worked in banking and began experimenting with ecommerce by selling reusable straws, t-shirts, and other sustainable products. Her viral turtle-themed content and strong brand mission helped Bare Kind stand out in the crowded DTC space and grow into a seasonal powerhouse, with 70% of revenue landing in Q4. But with a growing team and cash flow challenges, Lucy co-founded Candid Founders to help other brands succeed on Faire while smoothing Bare Kind’s revenue curve.

Whether scaling to 1,000+ retail accounts, turning her backend team into a profitable service business, or shutting off paid Meta ads to improve profit margins, Lucy brings a sharp, experimental mindset to Ecommerce. She shares insights on building sustainable DTC brands, making wholesale work, and running two businesses with her husband without relying on outside capital or paid ads. Her story is a masterclass in founder adaptability.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:40] Intro
• [00:55] Launching with purpose before product clarity
• [02:50] Choosing a name that allows you to pivot
• [03:40] Starting with dropshipping to test demand
• [05:37] Hiring help before scaling ad spend
• [08:09] Comparing traction between early SKUs
• [10:07] Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, Reach & Zamp
• [16:29] Avoiding traps in commoditized markets
• [18:48] Educating retailers to build trust fast
• [22:25] Listening to demand before launching services
• [24:07] Turning internal wins into client services
• [26:22] Plugging the DTC and wholesale channels

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Faire growth agency that helps brands thrive candidfounders.com/
• Comfy, vibrant animal socks that save the world’s animals barekind.co.uk/
• Follow Lucy Jeffrey linkedin.com/in/lucy-jeffrey
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest
• Fully managed sales tax solution for Ecommerce brands zamp.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Tyler Simmons is the founder and CEO of Elevate Sports, the company behind BucketGolf, a portable par-3 game that transforms backyard spaces into playable courses and brings a competitive twist to casual golf. Elevate Sports designs products that blend athletic training and outdoor entertainment, helping families connect and athletes sharpen their skills through hands-on play.

Before launching Elevate Sports, Tyler was a Division I college athlete and worked at a lacrosse equipment company. With no prior experience in product development or ecommerce, he started by building a lacrosse training aid from scratch. That early prototype sparked a journey into consumer products, culminating in the launch of BucketGolf, a category-defining game that hit $1 million in revenue before Tyler hired his first full-time employee.

Whether turning a homemade backyard game into a seven-figure business or figuring out paid media strategy through trial and error, Tyler brings a scrappy, product-first lens to brand building. He shares insights on launching without a playbook, designing products that go viral on video, and bootstrapping high-growth businesses without outside capital. His story is proof that you don’t need a perfect plan, you just need to start.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:37] Intro
• [00:53] Launching products that bring people together
• [01:46] Validating demand with zero research
• [03:53] Making mistakes instead of waiting
• [05:47] Building momentum before it’s perfect
• [06:44] Choosing action over endless planning
• [08:09] Learning to sell before scaling up
• [12:05] Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, Reach & Zamp
• [18:27] Learning paid media through trial and error
• [20:21] Boosting what already works organically
• [21:30] Standing out in a saturated market
• [25:27] Pushing through constant setbacks

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Elevate Sports for Lacrosse Training Gear elevatesportsequipment.com/
• The Ultimate Backyard Golf Game bucketgolfgame.com/
• Follow Tyler Simmons linkedin.com/in/tyler-simmons-771b5718a
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest
• Fully managed sales tax solution for Ecommerce brands zamp.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Tim Wilson is the Head of Solutions at facts & feelings, a consultancy focused on helping organizations put their data to productive use through clear thinking, aligned teams, and actionable insights. A seasoned analytics leader, Tim brings over two decades of experience across enterprise BI, agency strategy, and digital analytics to help brands translate complexity into clarity.

Before co-founding facts & feelings, Tim led analytics practices at multiple agencies, advised Fortune 500 companies on digital data strategy, and built out BI infrastructure at a $500M B2B tech firm. He’s also the co-author of Analytics the Right Way: A Business Leader’s Guide to Putting Data to Productive Use and co-host of the long-running Analytics Power Hour podcast.

Whether clarifying what “success” really looks like before a new feature launch or helping teams choose the right level of analytical rigor for a given decision, Tim focuses on making data work for the business, not the other way around. He offers a practical framework for leaders overwhelmed by dashboards, and a philosophy for analysts who want to be more than just report generators.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:39] Intro
• [01:15] Shifting from in-house roles to agency work
• [02:16] Highlighting the cost of overbuilding tech stacks
• [04:36] Pushing back on data-only decision making
• [07:13] Avoiding narrow ad metrics that mislead growth
• [10:08] Using AI to scale low-effort interactions smartly
• [12:38] Translating ideas into testable hypotheses
• [19:02] Differentiating high-credibility opinions in UX
• [20:00] Using split tests to validate costly changes
• [21:14] Skipping tests for clear conversion blockers
• [23:32] Filtering user recordings for CRO opportunities
• [26:13] Using logic when data can’t prove causality
• [29:39] Measuring what actually matters in performance

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Intelligent business consultancy obsessed with less and better factsandfeelings.io/
• Data and analytics podcast analyticshour.io/
• Follow Tim Wilson linkedin.com/in/tgwilson

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Samantha Rose is the founder of Endless Commerce, a commerce enablement platform designed to help multi-channel consumer brands scale more efficiently through better infrastructure. A multi-exit founder and investor, Samantha brings deep operational experience across design, technology, and logistics to build systems that support sustainable, scalable growth.

Before launching Endless Commerce, Samantha built and exited several consumer ventures, including GIR, an acclaimed kitchenware brand acquired in 2021, and Mvnifest, a full-stack operations and 3PL partner acquired in 2024. Alongside running Endless Commerce, she leads Hologram Capital, where she specializes in turning around distressed consumer brands with strong fundamentals but structural challenges.

Whether rebuilding underperforming brands or designing the tech stack she wished existed, Samantha focuses on enabling commerce teams to grow beyond DTC into wholesale, retail, and omnichannel with confidence. She offers a playbook for founders who want to scale without losing operational grip, and a framework for tech partners who want to plug into brands at pivotal moments of inflection.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:42] Intro
• [00:59] Building software from firsthand founder struggle
• [01:45] Solving problems with curiosity and play
• [03:13] Validating ideas with zero market research
• [06:42] Executing better instead of chasing new ideas
• [07:45] Turning demand into a real business plan
• [09:26] Developing software to solve real-life habits
• [10:24] Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, Reach & Zamp
• [16:46] Differentiating in a commodity-driven market
• [17:23] Building with no modern Ecommerce tools
• [19:11] Navigating growth without today’s tech stack
• [19:45] Going omnichannel to build retail resilience
• [23:31] Boosting perceived value with smart bundles
• [24:12] Shifting from operator to tech builder post-exit
• [25:31] Reinvesting in brands that need a second life
• [27:30] Building features from real-world friction
• [29:28] Avoiding early over-specialization in teams
• [33:47] Explaining the rebundling era of commerce stacks

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Modular, AI-powered commerceOS endlesscommerce.com/
• Follow Samantha Rose samantharose.co/
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest
• Fully managed sales tax solution for Ecommerce brands zamp.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Derrick Emsley is the co-founder and CEO of Tentree, a purpose-driven lifestyle apparel brand that plants ten trees for every product sold. With a background in environmental stewardship, carbon markets, and sustainable business strategy, Derrick leads Tentree’s mission to make regeneration scalable through consumer action.

Since launching Tentree in 2012, Derrick has grown the brand into a category leader in sustainable apparel, helping plant nearly 100 million trees worldwide. Without relying heavily on paid media, his scaled impact through values-aligned partnerships, product storytelling, and community-powered growth. In 2021, he co-founded Veritree, a technology platform built to verify, monitor, and audit global reforestation with end-to-end transparency.

Grounded in climate impact and systems thinking, Derrick focuses on building businesses that convert everyday consumption into measurable environmental good. Whether guiding Tentree’s brand vision or driving tech innovation with Veritree, he offers a blueprint for founders' scaling mission with integrity, traceability, and long-term environmental ROI.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:48] Intro
• [00:58] Naming the brand after the mission itself
• [01:55] Pivoting purpose into a consumer brand
• [03:54] Partnering with retailers to gain early traction
• [05:49] Running mission ops while scaling the brand
• [06:22] Building tech to verify real-world impact
• [08:22] Responding to unexpected product demand
• [10:10] Connecting funders to verified outcomes
• [11:35] Embedding impact to boost DTC performance
• [12:53] Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, Reach & Zamp
• [20:15] Building a global supply chain from scratch
• [23:21] Balancing co-founder strengths from day one
• [24:10] Creating decision fatigue with too much choice
• [27:33] Leveraging impact as a growth advantage

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Earth-First, sustainably made apparel that plant trees tentree.com/
• Verified reforestation projects for your business veritree.com/tree-planting
• Follow Derrick Emsley linkedin.com/in/derrickemsley
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest
• Fully managed sales tax solution for Ecommerce brands zamp.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!

Celeste Hilling is the founder and CEO of Skin Authority, a direct-to-consumer skin health technology brand focused on merging cosmetic performance with immune-boosting skincare. With a background in research, marketing, and tech, Celeste leads the development of biotech-powered formulations that deliver visible results while strengthening skin’s natural defenses.

Since launching Skin Authority, Celeste has scaled the brand without paid media or a PR agency, leveraging strategic collaborations, emotional brand storytelling, and a rabid customer base to drive growth across North America and Europe. Her work has been featured on MSNBC, ABC, FOX, and in wellness circles as a fresh voice redefining beauty as part of whole-person health.

Rooted in a science-backed, customer-led model, Celeste focuses on building high-retention product experiences powered by habit, transformation, and trust. Whether mentoring female founders or licensing next-gen skincare IP, she brings a playbook for scaling with authenticity, resilience, and long-term brand equity.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:42] Intro
• [00:54] Exploring wellness through skin health
• [01:18] Bringing science into a vanity-driven space
• [02:06] Educating consumers with purpose and clarity
• [03:09] Reframing wellness as a real market need
• [07:06] Estimating costs and timelines realistically
• [10:27] Building momentum through word of mouth
• [11:58] Sponsors: Electric Eye, Social Snowball, Portless, & Reach
• [17:02] Bootstrapping growth with strategic partners
• [18:41] Investing in backend infrastructure early
• [20:18] Launching Ecommerce from day one
• [23:19] Collaborating early to build awareness

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Best Skin Care Products for All Skin Types skinauthority.com/
• Follow Celeste Hilling linkedin.com/in/celeste-hilling-8735a64
• Schedule an intro call with one of our experts electriceye.io/connect
• Drive revenue through affiliates & referrals socialsnowball.io/honest
• Revolutionize your inventory and fulfillment process portless.com/
• Level up your global sales withreach.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!