Welcome to The Kurty D Show, a podcast presenting unique perspectives shaping the world. This week I'm excited to share my conversation with my friend, Adam Struck, the founder and managing partner at Struck Capital. A seed-stage venture capital fund based in Santa Monica, California. Struck is a next-gen venture firm supporting early-stage founders focusing on seed investments into companies led by visionary technologists and are quickly building a strong track record with not only placing super-smart bets but also rolling up their sleeves and actively helping their founders grow their businesses. In addition to their VC fund, Struck is evolving their platform with Struck Crypto, a $100 million digital assets fund that has been outperforming Bitcoin Plus in 2022. Prior to Struck, Adam co-founded Long Island Iced Tea brands with his brother Greg. Founded in 2011, the company offered premium bottled iced tea brewed with custom black tea leaves and reverse osmosis water. The brothers paired solid product-market fit with flawless execution to scale distribution to over 10,000 outlets. They sold the business to private equity firm Colin investments a couple of years after starting the company, and Adam parlayed his profits into Struck. This is a great episode, Adam gets real about growing up in South Africa, immigrating to the US, and some of his core drivers and philosophy for finding success in life and business. This show has a lot to offer anyone interested in tech startups investing crypto and digital assets and the Southern California tech market.
What we covered:
01:41 – Kurt welcomes to the show, Adam Struck and gives his background
04:50 – Adam shares his personal story about growing up in South Africa and immigrating the United States
09:04 – Adam talks about his background in law and how it helped him in business and gives him an edge in investing by helping his founders with legal advice
13:19 – Adam shares how he found the leverage to quit his job as an attorney at a prestigious law firm and striking out on his own to found Long Island Iced Tea Brands
16:47 – Adam talks about his journey as an early investor doing Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs)
19:58 – A walkthrough on Struck Capital from how the firm started
28:36 – Adam shares more about Struck Capital, including portfolio highlights and how the platform has evolved from core VC offering to Struck Crypto and now a Venture Studio
38:41 – Adam talks about the challenges he has faced
42:21 – Adam shares about how his parents feel about his decisions and about what he’s currently doing
43:07 – Adam talks about his brother Greg being his best partner
49:22 – Rapid-fire general interest questions
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Tweetable Quotes:
“And I sort of took that entrepreneurial spirit and decided how could I take my learnings and my success, and really share that with as many individuals as possible, and I thought venture capital and backing young founders is an amazing way to do that.”
“That chip on my shoulder, and that adversity that I that I've gone through, it has really given me an edge actually, especially when it's seed-stage investing. And it really is about sweat equity. At the end of the day, who is willing to show up first, and leave last, that's the mindset.”
“I feel very lucky in a very sort of young age, to get some very robust legal and operational expertise. And I take those learnings and try and channel them, to helping the founders that we work with to be as successful as they can be when they're trying to get from zero to one.”
“So, my advice to anybody listening is if you're going to bet on yourself, do it when you're young. Because you're in a situation where you can, you can fail, you can take a few falls, and you can get back up.”
“It’s both a privilege and responsibility to be the first money in seed investor. I'm proud to be an ally with the Founders. I think it says a lot about sort of our next-gen mindset and our ability to spot massive companies way before they become in vogue.”
“Life is tough, things are hard. Just continue to persevere and bet on yourself. And you'll hopefully find what you're looking for.”
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