Networking Night: Meet the Investors
Naturally Colorado’s Networking Nights are the place to meet, connect and collaborate with 150-200 of the most passionate, pioneering leaders and companies in the Colorado natural products community.
Meet the Investors
When: September 9, 2019, 5:30-7:30 pm
Where: Crestone Capital, LLC, 1048 Pearl Street, Boulder, CO 80302
Subject Track: Finance
Different investors and firms have unique approaches to the size, stage and type of businesses they seek to support. At this networking night, you will meet principals from a number of active investment firms and lenders in the natural products space and learn about their investment approach. Join us to discuss how to find an investment partner that best fits your business’ age and stage!
Learn from the Experts
Duane Primozich – Managing Partner, BIGR Ventures
Megan Bent – Founder, Harbinger Ventures
Josh Holmstrom – Managing Partner, Ridgeline Ventures
Jay Hirsh – Managing Partner, Break Trail Ventures
Ben Fenton – Partner, BFG Partners
Miles Cooke – Senior Investment Analyst, Crestone Capital, LLC
Brandi Lipton – Business Development, CircleUp
Meet the Panelists
Duane Primozich
Duane Primozich currently serves as co-founder and managing partner of Boulder Investment Group Reprise. Duane began his career in natural foods 20 years ago. In that time he has served in management positions for several prominent natural foods companies, including Frontier Natural Products Co-op and WhiteWave. In 2004 Duane co-founded Pixie Mate, a specialty tea business, and from 2007 to 2015 he held several senior management positions for Boulder Brands, ultimately serving as the Executive Vice President of the Balance segment for Boulder Brands, responsible for 3 of the 6 businesses in the portfolio. Concurrent to this, Duane was the Managing Director of the Boulder Brands Investment Group from 2013 to 2015. Duane’s general business management and entrepreneurial experience make him perfectly suited to assist portfolio companies in their business operations, strategic planning and marketing and sales initiatives. Duane currently sits or has sat on the Board of Directors of Suja Juice, EPIC, Temple Turmeric, Primizie, Live Soda, Bonafide Provisions, REBBL, Bobo’s Oat Bars, High Brew Coffee, Soozy’s Grain Free and Thorne Nature Experience, a Boulder-based environmental education non-profit.
Megan Bent
Megan Bent is the Founder and Managing Partner at Harbinger Ventures. A lifelong investor and entrepreneur with deep expertise in consumer brands, Megan has spent the past decade working to identify and scale high-growth, early-stage companies in the consumer sector serving as a lead director, problem solver, operator, strategic thinker and confidant to emerging entrepreneurs. In launching Harbinger in 2016, Megan began also leveraging a model that emphasizes female leadership and fosters close collaboration among entrepreneurs and investors to accelerate value creation. Prior to founding Harbinger in 2016, Megan served as Managing Director of Revelry Brands.
Josh Holmstrom
Prior to joining Ridgeline Ventures, Holmstrom was most recently an Operating Partner at Samantha Brands Group (SBG), where he worked closely with several emerging natural food brands including Tres Latin Foods, Veggie-Go’s and Wildmade Snacks to rapidly accelerate growth and scale operations. Prior to SBG, Josh worked in a variety of marketing leadership roles across PepsiCo (Gatorade, Tropicana, Quaker Oats), WhiteWave Foods (Silk and Horizon Organic) and more recently New Belgium Brewing, where he was the VP of Marketing. Josh has a successful track record of developing marketing strategies to drive growth of existing brands, identifying new portfolio opportunities as well as optimizing and scaling operations for profitable growth. Josh has also co-founded two start-ups and has a passion for entrepreneurship.
Jay Hirsh
Jay Hirsh is the managing partner at Break Trail Ventures. BTV partners with entrepreneurs who are breaking trail in their industry, creating best-in-class products, and leading the way for future generations. They invest at the intersection of lifestyle/consumer products, natural products and innovative tech-enabled enterprise. Prior to BTV, Jay spent 8 years with Victoria’s Secret between the US and Asia in a variety of capacities ranging from inventory management to production and sourcing.
Ben Fenton
Ben is a Partner at BFG Partners, a Boulder based venture capital firm where he has worked since the firm’s launch in 2014. Ben currently sits on the board of Quinn Snacks, OHi Food Co and MALK Organics. Previously Ben worked at The Yucaipa Companies, a private equity and venture capital firm founded by Ron Burkle focused on middle market companies and growth capital. In addition, Ben spent 5 years working in New York for the hedge funds Hutchin Hill Capital and Oak Hill Advisors. He began his career in investment banking at UBS focusing on mergers and acquisitions. Ben was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA and attended Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, CT. Ben received his BA from Duke University and lives in Boulder, CO where he is also a competitive triathlete.
Miles Cooke
Miles Cooke is a Senior Investment Analyst at Crestone Capital, a multi-family office with over $2 billion in assets under management headquartered in Boulder, CO, USA. Crestone represents a diverse and sophisticated group of 84 ultra-high-net-worth entrepreneurs, CEOs, and multi-generational families. Miles joined Crestone in 2010 and expanded the firm’s footprint to San Francisco, CA in 2014. Miles co-leads the firm’s private equity and venture capital allocations, as well co-investments alongside fund managers. He is also active in other asset classes with asset managers across a broad range of strategies and geographies. Miles represents the limited partners on number of advisory boards of private investment funds.
Brandi Lipton
Brandi Lipton oversees Business Development in Boulder for Circleup Credit Advisors. CircleUp is a San Francisco based Fintech company powering the growth of early-stage consumer brands, through both an Equity and Credit division. Prior to relocating to Boulder, Brandi lived in both New York City and Chicago, having worked in Financial Services and Technology at companies such as Microsoft, Reuters, and Monster Mediaworks. Brandi has a B.A. in Economics from Vanderbilt University, earned an M.B.A. from Thunderbird, the International School of Management, and studied at The Sorbonne.
Registration
Members: FREE; Non-members $15.
Refund requests will be honored up to 48 hours before the event.