Me Against Myself – e51 – David Carpenter and Adam DeGraide – David Vs Goliath 

Adam DeGraide:

Coming up today on David vs. Goliath.

David Carpenter:

If no one in live entertainment has actually figured out that the Marvel audience base or the ComicCon audience base spends their money on the actual entertainment, it’s not me against the world. It’s me against myself. I am not competing with anybody else.

Speaker 3:

Welcome to today’s episode of David vs. Goliath, a podcast dedicated to helping small businesses, leverage technology to not only help them compete against their large competitors, but win. Your host is currently the CEO of Anthem Business Software, a three time Inc 500 recipient and a serial entrepreneur with a passion to help small businesses everywhere find, serve, and keep more customers profitably. Please join me in welcoming your host, Adam DeGraide.

Adam DeGraide:

Hey everyone. It’s Adam DeGraide with the David vs. Goliath podcast. Today, our guest is going to be David Carpenter from Gamiotics. He’s the CEO. We’re going to be discussing games, games, and more games again here today on the David vs. Goliath podcast, which is brought to you today by AutomateMySocial.com. If you’re a small business, you’re either spending no time on social media or too much time and money on social media. Automate 90% of your social media forever at AutomateMySocial.com. There you can take the tour of the software system and if you’re an agency or you are a social media manager for a business, and you want a software that can do most of the work so you don’t have to, and you can get all the credit, it’ll be our little secret, then check out, Automate My Social.

There’s also a 20% discount option available for people of the David vs. Goliath podcast. Go there, check it out. AutomateMySocial.com. Don’t forget to visit DavidVsGoliathPodcast.com. There you can apply to be the podcast and you can subscribe to our newsletter and to receive updates on the podcast as well. Visit DavidVsGoliathPodcast.com. Well with no further ado, let’s get right into it today with David Carpenter. Welcome to the David vs. Goliath podcast.

David Carpenter:

And my name is David, so this is perfect. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it, Adam.

Adam DeGraide:

The very first David I had on here, David, said to me, oh, so you named the show after me.

David Carpenter:

I would never be so presumptuous. That’s a good joke.

Adam DeGraide:

It is. It’s pretty funny. I was actually checking out the history of what you’ve done. You’ve been in theater for so long and you’ve been involved in theatrical productions and I love the name of your company Gamiotics, which I thought was fantastic. But for the watchers and the listeners, tell them a little bit about what you’ve done in the past. Actually, start with what it is today and then back us into how you got there and some of the experiences that helped you become the success that you are right now.

David Carpenter:

Oh, thank you. I appreciate that. As you mentioned, I’ve worked in live entertainment for about 22 years now. What I am doing right now is bringing a form of technology into the live entertainment sphere that quite really hasn’t been done before. And the reason why I’m doing it is because I grew up on video games and stories and adventure and all sorts of things that I loved in my home as a kid and reading choose your adventure books when I was seven years old and playing all the Sierra video games I could get my hands on back in the late 80s, early 90s. And video gaming and board gaming was always a side passion because when I left college, I pursued a career that led me to Broadway. And ultimately, I was a lead producer on Broadway of a show back in 2019. And there was always something about that. One of the things you do when you’re pursuing theatrical certainly is it is a passion.

You are pursuing a passion. It’s a really tough industry. It’s a small industry by the state of things and I was always very passionate about it, but I always had all these other passions and these interests. And about back in 2017, it’s just started to occur to me that I could bring these things together into the same sphere. And that’s where that journey began. To now, what I’m doing is helping bring the next generation of experiential interactive entertainment into the world. That’s literally what I’m doing right now is I’m birthing this whole new idea into the world about how it is that we interact in an entertainment realm with our customers and a lot of it is based on how it is that we’re telling our story and presenting our story. That’s what Gamiotics does is that it’s a platform and is a tool that is allowing me to say, there’s another way to go about how we talk to people. There’s another way to do it. And it’s crazy exciting and fun and really hard because no one’s ever quite done this the way that I’m doing it right now.

Adam DeGraide:

It’s funny that you talked about choose your own adventure. I haven’t talked about that probably in 20 years of my life, but yesterday, David, I am not kidding, I kid you not, I was just talking with one of my business partners and director of business development and we were talking about choose your own adventures. And one of the things we were doing, we were having a negotiation with a potential client. And I said, “Tommy, why don’t you go back and give them a choose your own adventure, so they could do option A, option B, option C.” And then we started talking about the books that we were reading when we were kids. What I used to love about those books is I choose my path and then I’d always go back and see what would’ve happened if I chose the other path. And I always ended up choosing the path typically that died right out of the gate.

David Carpenter:

Yeah, everyone did. And they built those books specifically to do that. There is a methodology in creating because those books… If you actually look up what those books are, they’re actually called a game book. That’s their classification because it’s not Jane Austin. And the reason why it’s classed as a game book is because it’s a book that you play when you read it. It is a game. It is a puzzle that you are actively trying to figure out and they’re constructed in a way that fail out at the beginning, which if you think about modern video gaming, the idea that you die in the tutorial or at the beginning of a game is purpose built to get you more engaged because it actually raises the stakes of the experience that you’re having. Goes back to those ideas is if you fail out in the beginning, you’re like, wait a second.

That means my choice has a consequence. That means that actually what I’m doing matters as a reader. And that agency of experience is the thing that I’m pursuing now and that idea that you have agency in your experience and that the choice that you make in the experience matters to the experience as yourself is a really, really powerful, fundamental thing that we understand in small group board games. We understand in video gaming. And it’s just not something that we brought into the live entertainment arena yet. And that’s why I’m doing it.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah. First of all, that is truly a David versus Goliath concept and idea because now you’re trying to get live audiences to interact in a choose your own adventure style with the actual either A, performers or play or whatever the case may be. I have seen a lot of that over the years. One of my sales guys actually does something pretty clever, which is interesting. He gets to the end of his speeches and he basically asks everyone to grab their cell phone. And then he says, “All right, go to your messages.” And he says, “All put in this number.” They put in this number. And then he says, “Yeah, text me some little thing.” And then he holds the thing up and you hear ding, ding, ding, and the audience, they’re intrigued just to what’s actually happening here.

Little did they know he’s getting all their cell phones to be able to contact them afterwards, but they’re having a great experience because it’s something that’s unique and you’re starting to see more of the interactivity over the years, but you’re trying to take it to the next level. Now, I would imagine, David, that a lot of that stems from your experience in the live theater business and actually producing and promoting these large events. One of the things you did in the past when I was reading was you worked at Dreamworks. Dreamworks is a pretty big name for a lot of our watchers and our listeners. And you worked out was it Shrek? Was it a live performance of Shrek? Is that correct?

David Carpenter:

Yeah. I was part of the sales and marketing team that opened Shrek the Musical on Broadway back in, I want to say, 2008 and it was a really informative experience because you’re taking a piece of very well known IP by that point. I think by that point, the studio was on to Shrek the Fourth in terms of where the brand was and they were reintroducing the brand all over again, but within the live theatrical arena. Essentially, the story on stage was Shrek one and it was an attempt and the show is successful in terms of touring and licensing.

And I don’t think it was ultimately successful on Broadway, but I think the brand overall theatrical has been successful for them. It’s something that Disney does very well, but bringing younger audiences back and to introduce them to this IP and introduce them to this brand in a new and different way. That was one of the things I worked on from a media landscape perspective. It was a really interesting time. It was a very challenging job. It was a very, very challenging job. And it’s all [inaudible 00:10:05]

Adam DeGraide:

I can imagine. And you also did a stint in Australia. I was reading that.

David Carpenter:

Been to Australia. One of the things that I produced is this parody of the Harry Potter universe called Puffs. And Puffs is a story that, like I said, it’s a total and complete parody. But what it does is that it presents an alternative narrative about what it was like to be in the Puffs house in this world during the course of seven years, when you had a very popular boy wizard at your school. And our protagonists in this story were all very terrible wizards. And the lesson of the story is A, it’s anti what you learned in Potter, which was the lesson from Puffs was how to celebrate, how to be the hero in your own narrative, as opposed to celebrating other heroes. The original impetus that the author, Matt Cox, who’s a wonderful author had said when he wrote it is the original idea was all we’re hearing about is Mark Zuckerberg back then.

This just goes back to 2015. All we’re hearing about is Mark Zuckerberg, Mark Zuckerberg. What is it like for the person who sat next to Mark Zuckerberg in Harvard? What happened at them? And that’s how that story went into [inaudible 00:11:14]. And it’s very resonating and I got very lucky to take it to Australia, but it’s now the number two most produced show in the US, immensely popular within the fandom. And it showed me this power that you have within theatrical about producing content for a fandom and actually it going to meet them where they are, which is not what Broadway does. Broadway is the consumer meets us where… You go to Broadway, the consumer goes to meet you there. This idea that I started realizing on Puffs is certainly similar in film and television, and certainly video games, is gosh, how do I take this content actually do it for them and meet the consumer where they are?

And that was where we started out with Puffs. Unfortunately, Puffs can’t become a global show because of the IP and the parity laws are different all over the world. And so it’s not something I can export out of the US. It’s very well protected in the US, but outside of the US, it gets a little murky and frankly not worth the legal hassle that I’d have endure with Ms. Rowling because I had to endure enough of it in New York. But that concept of fandom is at the heart of one of the things that Gamiotics is partnering in right now because we’re in the midst of our first major product release that uses the Gamiotics software. And it’s this experience called the 20 Sided Tavern, which is creating a Dungeons and Dragon style gaming experience, an RPG style gaming experience on stage-

Adam DeGraide:

In a live audience. I was in a reading about that. I was reading about that. It’s funny that you mentioned fandom because I just did a project myself called Adam Music Project and I’m a huge gamer and I played this game called Apex Legends. And so what I did is I made a rock album. I didn’t know what to write about and I didn’t have a big fan base myself, so I wrote a rock album about the characters in this video game and it’s blowing up right now because you tapped into another fan base that already existed. And I don’t know if it would fall into the parody realm, but if you think about it kind of does.

It’s just a Serious parody. I took the character Serious and I made rock songs about him. It’s fascinating to see how that’s actually going. When you decided to start Gamiotics, a lot of entrepreneurs that watch this show, they have questions about how do you go about starting to write software? Did you fund this yourself? Did you bring it to some investors and get some seed money? How did you begin the process of developing it to get to the point where you’re about to launch it?

David Carpenter:

It’s a bit of a tortured journey, but I’ll take you through it quickly. Like any entrepreneur, it happened because I was trying to solve a problem, a problem that hadn’t been currently solved by anybody else. And back in 2015, I’d stumbled across a live show. It was essentially a branching narrative show. And I remember seeing it being like this concept is amazing. It was my first thought. I love the concept of what this is. And basically it was a rom-com. It was about a guy going on a date with a girl. And when the audience came into the theater, they were handed a four push button remote, RF frequency that was tied to basic educational polling software. It was only polling. And what the audience would do is that they would vote at certain points during the show about what the guy would do on his date.

And there were a dozen or so probably more choices throughout of it. And each choice was rated on a point system. By the end of the show, if the audience had voted 100% in favor for this guy, he’d sleep with the girl. And if they voted 100% negatively, then he’d throw himself off a bridge, and then 10 things in between, all these different possible endings. And I remember seeing how the audience was reacting. I remember thinking, I’ve never seen anyone actually execute this idea before and seeing how the audience really gets into it. Now, the show, that was not a scalable model in the live entertainment. This has been proven time and time again. You can’t hand the audience something when they walk in the door. They don’t want it. And so the first conversation started being like, let’s take that mechanism and let’s put it on an app. And I said, no-

Adam DeGraide:

Make it browser based, make it an app. Absolutely.

David Carpenter:

Well the app thing is the same thing as handing someone. You’re putting a barrier to entry to the consumer. And so again, from an entrepreneur standpoint, is all you’re doing is starting to thinking about the pain points to make the thing successful. Established all these pain points and said, look, this has to be browser based. You have to be able to get in. I always said back in those days, two clicks and in. Now, it’s one luckily because we’ve able to move it to QR code. And that’s where it actually really began. Just to put an end note on what that show, that show was terribly misogynistic, just terribly, terribly. This idea of this guy making all these choices, the thing just didn’t work. And ultimately, the author and I parted ways over it, but I was still struck by the concept of agency of experience. And I thought, well, I’m going to keep pursuing this idea because I really love this idea and I want to keep pursuing it.

Because at that point, I’d already been started developing the Gamiotic software. What started then was a series of pillars. And this was part of a previous production company that I had of how do you build an experience like this, where the audience is coming in and making these choices? How do you do this? Then that started about four years of going down blind alleys. And again, I think this is a classic story where it’s just like, I didn’t know what I had, for one. I didn’t know how it should work and I didn’t know how to use it whatsoever. It’s not a comparison, but one of my favorite success stories always comes down to Slack because I just find that just one of the most amusing stories in the world, which is Slack, which was originally a gaming company, raised $20 million, failed at their game, went to turn around to their investors and say, well, we can give you four or five million dollars back and call it a day.

And the investors said, no, spend the money and figure it out. And then it turned out that their internal messaging app was the thing. They just went down that totally wrong. And that’s so common. What I originally thought was a piece of software for a show ended up by the time I hit 2019, I was like, oh no, I have a platform. This is purpose built to do many, many different things. I need to focus on this as a platform plate. My strategy changed the thing. And then the previous production company I had, that whole thing broke up and blew up in an ugly way. But coming out on the other side of it, I retained control of the software company. And as a result of that in the beginning of 2020, I dedicated myself full time to saying, I want to figure out how to bring interactive experiences, interactive experiential events to the live marketplace. And this is what I’m going to do. And then COVID hit in March.

Adam DeGraide:

David, hold on one second because I’m way over break. My producer is flashing the light at me right now. You’re way over. I need to take a break for a corporate sponsor. When we come back, we’re going to continue with that thought. And I definitely want to do that. You’re with David Carpenter, Adam DeGraide for the David vs. Goliath podcast. Here’s a special message from our corporate sponsor, AutomateMySocial.com. We’ll be right back.

Speaker 3:

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Adam DeGraide:

And we’re back with David Carpenter and Adam DeGraide on the DVG podcast. David, this is a very interesting story, but you still haven’t answered the question. The question was, how did you pay for this? Because people have ideas and they either are very wealthy and can do it themselves or they typically need to find investment dollars. If I’m hearing you correctly, you had another company that you were involved in and partners with that dissolved, but you got to keep one piece of it, which was the software side and then the other piece of it went somewhere else. Is that accurate? Or how did you fund the software?

David Carpenter:

Yeah, look, I’ve been a Broadway producer. I’ve been raising money for years. First things first, learn how to raise money. Learn how to raise money and never be afraid of it ever, ever, ever. Wake up, be excited to raise money every day. You have to put yourself in a positive mindset to do it. It is a thing that you need to do. I’m actually quite an experienced fundraiser and I have been for a long time. I was not an experienced fundraiser in tech, so that was new to me. The capitalization of that previous company, which did go under, initially provided some money to start getting Gamiotics off the ground. When that thing collapsed, and I settled with my former partners, I took that and I started a new company. I started going back to the investors and saying, Hey, I kept with the technology company. I want to keep going. When the pandemic hit, and I think this is actually the thing that’s really important, and live entertainment effectively disappeared from the global stage for-

Adam DeGraide:

I know. It was crazy.

David Carpenter:

… At least a year, it was terrible for everybody who worked in live entertainment, I moved all my operations on online. And what I did was I said, we have this opportunity right now to use this software to entertain people at home. Let’s set up a Zoom studio, which we did. And I gathered a group of friends together and said, Hey, we’re going to start figuring out how to write these things that use the software and entertain people on Zoom. The initial motivation was I got a lot of friends who are actors who are out of work, got a lot of friends who are writers who are out of work. I’m working on this new idea. Let’s try and figure this out.

And I got a little bit of spark money, really little bit of spark money to get it going. And part of it was the grit and the hard work of saying, I’m not going to give up. I’m just going to keep producing content. I’m just going to keep going. And I’m just going to keep learning, which is the most important thing, about what this is supposed to be. Got me about $500,000 over a course of about, I don’t know, say 18 months, in angel months, from my network of investors and a few new people who jumped in along the way.

Adam DeGraide:

I want to talk a little bit about that because this is important for the people that tune in every week. One of the things that we try to do here on David vs. Goliath is give them practical advice as to how you did that. You had a software, you had an idea, you had a concept, you had relationships, they knew you in the past. You were able to raise $500,000. Was that simply by phone calls or did you put together an investment deck? Did you put together a plan? How did you do that formally?

David Carpenter:

I must have rewritten that deck 100 times. I must have rewritten that plan 50. The plan that I had going back into 2020 versus what I have today, do not look this same at all. They are radically different. And really what it was is you start with one, you send it out, you get feedback. Everyone says no at first. And then you revise and you keep working on that plan. You keep working on that plan. You keep working on that plan until it starts making sense. And a big part of that was getting feedback from investors, getting feedback from people who have no interest in investing you whatsoever and saying, this is why your deck is terrible.

This is why your plan doesn’t make sense. The amount of rejection is insane, but that’s the grit part. And one of my investors, and then whoever this quote is attributed to, someone said Mark Cuban, but I guarantee that it’s not is every no leads to a yes. And then you just have to firmly hold that inside of you and say, just because the deck isn’t right today doesn’t mean I can’t make it right tomorrow. And so I did that.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s important. That’s really important. And if you’re watching right now and you’re listening and you have an idea that has been shot down over and over and over again, don’t give up on it, especially if it’s still burning inside of you. Just look for a different way to present it. Look for a different plan that you could put together that will start to resonate. Don’t be afraid of the nos, because no means you’re that much closer to your first yes. And that’s really good advice because people do quit. People give up, they get discouraged. And I think the message that you’re giving them right now is don’t give up, just keep trying to redefine yourself. And when you redid the deck, were you listening to negative feedback and positive feedback of things that you should do differently? Or was it just instinctual that you knew you had to change it?

David Carpenter:

Well, I always knew whenever I’d finish a deck, I’d be right back at it in a week. I knew that whatever I finished was never going to be good enough. Even to this day, the deck that I have is like, oh gosh, it could be better. I think that part of it is, and you hear this a lot when people talk about building decks and they talk about doing this, part of it is learning how to craft the story. And I am a seasoned, experienced person who works in entertainment in storytelling. It did not mean I knew how to tell a story in a deck. It didn’t at all. I literally had to learn-

Adam DeGraide:

It’s totally different.

David Carpenter:

… How to do that. Totally different,

Adam DeGraide:

It’s totally different because money people look at different things.

David Carpenter:

And so you have to learn how to put yourself in that mindset. And you have to understand that at the end of the day, this investor who is going to look at your thing for 10 minutes, you have a very narrow window of time to tell them how they’re going to get a five to 10X return on their money in five years. And that’s, I think, the thing that ultimately ended up being a really good lesson is saying, oh no, I need to really understand the market opportunity. And the thing is, if you can’t figure out how your product, especially in tech, is going to get the five to 10X in five to seven years, then you probably don’t have something that you can sell to an investor.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, Definitely. Definitely right.

David Carpenter:

And I’m not saying that every product is going to do it. We all know most of them don’t, but if you can’t tell a convincing narrative that is believable, that is rooted in truth and numbers, that can deliver on that idea and the investor who can smell out bull, if you can’t get past their red flags and their warning signs in terms of looking at decks, then you might not have a sellable product. But to your point, if you really believe that your thing’s going to be big, you really believe, then find your way to make that math work. And then there is another part of it, which is that repetition of pitch, that repetition of saying it over and over again, you learn how to hone that language. And I’ll tell you exactly what happened to me, which is I’m seed funded now, which is amazing.

And it’s been fantastic that this happened because I’m getting funded, I’m doing a lot of amazing stuff with Gamiotics, but at the end of the day, it really comes down to being able to deliver a very simple, straightforward phrase that the investor finally says, yeah, that’s it, you got it. You understand what you’re doing. And I was on a call and this was not quite a year ago, probably about 10 months ago, nine months ago where the investor said yes, but I didn’t get the seed fund. The negotiations then went on for a while after that. And I’d been talking to this investor for months and I basically said, what I figured out, what I’ve created is a two way communication device between audience and content. And that statement, which I had been saying for about a month to other people, but hadn’t talked to this investor, I’d gotten it down to that simple sentence. And the investor said, that’s it.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, you boiled it down. You boiled the complicated down to something simple. You have to.

David Carpenter:

You have to. And when I said that, the investor immediately said, “That’s it, that’s the smartest thing you said since we started talking in April.” He’s like, “I’m in, let’s do it.” And that was it. And it was a great moment because when I hung up that phone, I shouted to the rooftops and my husband came running upstairs like “What happened?” Because he’d been waiting downstairs to hear how the call went because a lot was riding on that call.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome.

David Carpenter:

And it was just like, I figured it out.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome.

David Carpenter:

And that simplicity in delivering your message is something that investors really look for. When I talk about 20 Sided Tavern-

Adam DeGraide:

I do have a question about that. Because as I’m listening to what you’ve built, I’m thinking in my own life experiences that I’ve had with software and one of the softwares that I really loved because it took a live environment and put it in the cloud was, I think it’s called Jack in the Box TV or something like that. Basically what they did was you’re on a couch with eight people, you got a TV screen, and you’re all able to play a game together through your browser. It’s similar yet different. Did you use those illustrations that people may or may not have known to help get it be simpler when your presentation? Are they a potential competitor of yours?

David Carpenter:

No. No. I’m in the live entertainment marketplace.

Adam DeGraide:

Are you a potential competitor of theirs?

David Carpenter:

I don’t know. I don’t think they know anything about in person entertainment, so probably not. I think this is a very tricky marketplace that I live in to begin with. And certainly that’s one that’s high risk, but insanely profitable. If you know anything about live entertainment. We’re talking anything from music to concerts to museums, any type of place where people gather live, that you want to create an interactive interaction.

Adam DeGraide:

It’s a very risky business.

David Carpenter:

But it’s a very lucrative-

Adam DeGraide:

I’m an investor in a past live show. I’m an investor in a live show that did not succeed.It was called the Rock and Roll American… No, it was called the American Soul Rock and Roll Choir. It was awesome.

David Carpenter:

It’s tough title. Yeah.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah. But it actually made sense when you went and saw it. And it was a great show and it did relatively well. The problem is it’s tough to make money in it. It’s tough to keep it going and turn that huge return on investment over.

David Carpenter:

It’s not if you know what you’re doing. I always argue if you know your market, you know your product market fit, you know how to introduce stuff, you know your audience, you know your demographics. Actually, there’s tons of people who make a lot of money. They just didn’t talk about it a lot.

Adam DeGraide:

Oh they do it. No, I get it, but what percentage of live shows make it to Broadway or become profitable?

David Carpenter:

There’s no way to know. Broadway is a microcosm in itself. Broadway does not represent all of live entertainment. It is a small world. The thing about Broadway is that the costs on Broadway are extraordinary, but you’re literally talking you have 33. I’m sorry, is that right? 33 theaters that are considered Broadway theaters in New York. You have 33 places only to be able to present something that’s literally branded Broadway. That’s not live entertainment. That’s just Broadway. And that’s the restaurant industry, nine out of 10 things fail there. Doesn’t mean that they go back and become profitable on the road in touring, which is an entirely different way to look at. But it’s a model. It’s an economic model actually that doesn’t make any sense. Live entertainment in itself has a lot of different economic models and specifically Broadway. I could go on an entire other podcast.

Adam DeGraide:

No, that’s why I’m fascinated. I can tell that you know what you’re talking about. I’ve always been fascinated. I didn’t know if you knew of every 10 people that create a show, what percentage of them actually make money? That’s seems like it would be something that if I was an investor in Gamiotics, I’d want to know. Who’s your potential customer? What’s their ability to pay?

David Carpenter:

[inaudible 00:33:19] Gamiotics, you’re not investing in the shows. You’re investing in a platform that enables a type of entertainment to happen. You’re actually making a platform play, not live entertainment play. And that is a decision. Gamiotics is a B2B business.

Adam DeGraide:

Are your customers the show? Are your customers the shows?

David Carpenter:

Our customers are the content creators. We’re a B2B business. We’re not a B2C business by any stretch of the imagination. 20 Sided Tavern, which I am a partner in is a B2C business. This is direct to consumer which Gamiotics is the software platform that powers the audience engagement for this live RPG gaming experience and creating the interactivity in order to build this type of show for a specific fandom. Look, I did this with my partners because we knew exactly what we had and what we were doing. And we were looking at a first to market advantage like we’d never had before in all of our careers-

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome.

David Carpenter:

… To be able to connect with a fandom that is deeply underserved in the live entertainment arena. Back to the entrepreneurship thing, we were talking about bringing a product or bringing something to market. Thing about 20 Sided Tavern is and we talk about competition, it’s not even that there’s not competition because there’s competition within live entertainment. You’re always competing for ticket buyers. The thing about this product that Gamiotics is powering is that no one else is attempting to serve this category of consumer. They go see Peter. Yeah, they go see [inaudible 00:34:48]. But no one is saying I’m going to build content just for you and you are a billion dollar industry in yourself.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome.

David Carpenter:

No one’s done it. Marvel knows what they’re doing. Disney knows what they’re doing. But no one in the live entertainment has actually figured out that the Marvel audience base or the ComicCon audience base spends their money on the actual entertainment.

Adam DeGraide:

I got to tell you, I love it because it reminds me of what I did musically tapping into another audience and it creates a massive opportunity for something like yourself to actually create that love that they had in their basement, playing with their friends and now creating a larger experience where everyone can be involved in it in a live environment. I could tell it’s very passionate of yours. I think this is an important point. I do have to go to another break, but for the watchers and listeners, when you listen to David talk about his company and you listen to David talk about his product and his development. And even some of the tough questions that I was asking him were probably based out of ignorance.

I didn’t know what I was asking, but he gets these questions all the time. It didn’t prevent him from being passionate, convicted. And that is the number one thing as a CEO and as an entrepreneur and as a leader in your business, if you don’t believe it, nobody will believe it. And David, you clearly believe it. And when we come back, I want to talk about my favorite subject, which is courage. And we’ll be back in a second. Here’s another important message from another great sponsor on the David vs Goliath podcast. We’ll be right back.

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Adam DeGraide:

And we’re back with David and Adam on the David vs. Goliath podcast. David, it’s interesting, and I really want to just reiterate to the watchers and listeners how much I’ve enjoyed hearing your passion for what you’re doing and how you’ve taken your life experience, and really are trying to do something that’s building a market that doesn’t exist. And I think that vision is so lofty in such a Goliath vs. David mentality. I love it. And I can’t wait to see your success continue to grow as we go through that. And I just wanted the watchers and listeners to know that’s the number one thing, man, passion. Where do you get that passion from? Because it seems to be an educated passion, but there also seems to be something that is in you that you can see that others haven’t seen yet. And it’s so clear to you that it just burns inside of you. Tell us a little bit about that.

David Carpenter:

I think it’s after a tough career in entertainment, a tough career in entertainment. Broadways is not an easy place, not a nice place really, not a forgiving place by any stretch of the imagination. And when I was in college, that’s all I wanted to do and I did it. And I’d say when I was in my early 40s, I’m still in my early 40s, but I reached this point where I was the lead producer of a Broadway show. And your viewers probably don’t understand this, but that actually is something of distinction within the industry. There are very few people. If you ever go to see a Broadway show and you’re looking at the Playbill program, that first producer name above title, that very first name is usually what we call the lead producer. That is the person who is the CEO, who is in charge of that production.

And they are holding the [inaudible 00:39:37]. They will have partners on this, but that first name is actually really key. And I got there. And there are not many people in the world who have done that when you take a step back. And I did it and I was like, gosh, I’ve been chasing this for 20 years and I’m not happy. Because it was also in the midst of my former partnership breaking up. It was a really tough thing that happened. I was like, this is the thing I’ve been chasing for 20 years. And this is what it feels like? This is it? There’s a little bit of that. And that’s when I made that decision to pursue this idea as someone who loves gaming and video games and board games and fantasy and sci-fi and all these things and saying, what if I take that and try and put that into my live?

Because I don’t want to leave live entertainment, but I don’t want to do this anymore. What happens if I do that? And this has been the hardest three years of my life, bar none. This has been the hardest three years of my life. When you are the CEO of a startup and you’re sitting there on a Sunday night and saying, I got to make payroll tomorrow and I don’t know how that’s going to happen. And you have to get up out of bed Monday morning and make it happen. Those are unforgiving moments that age you, but the fact that I get to do this now, that I get to pursue this, that I get to pursue this idea and that people believe in me and they believe in my leadership and they’re giving me money and they’re giving me validation, and they’re saying, Hey, go with this idea, you’re really onto something helps fuel that passion.

One thing I want to say about passion, because this is something that’s happened to me several times in the money raise where especially out of Silicon Valley dudes, no shade towards Silicon Valley dudes, but there is a level headedness and calmness of tone that I have encountered with a lot of people who’ve done startups, with a lot of people who’ve raised money. And there is something about that passion that is a little bit looked down on because there’s a judgment on it that says you’re passionate. Have you done the numbers? Do you believe in this? And I get that. I think that can be true, which is you’re really passionate about this, but have you actually really sat down and made sure that this thing works? And I have. I know, but I still will find myself in meetings where at the end of it, and I know it’s going to be a no, where the investors says, well, you’re sure very passionate about this. And it comes in a condescending tone. What I learned is they’re not actually commenting on my passion. They’re doubting my math.

Adam DeGraide:

I was just going to say, so really what it is, what’s happening, David, this is a great point. I will, as a person, take passion over a plan nine times out of 10. But what they’re telling you is that the plan is not matching your passion. That is the disconnect. They feel it, but they can’t touch it, taste it. They can’t really see it in the numbers and that creates doubt.

David Carpenter:

And then it’s not for them, but that’s the thing. If they can’t find that touchstone, then it’s not for them. And that’s not necessarily about me. I always have work to do after a call, but it’s about, they just don’t get it. And again, was my story right? Did I present it right? Are these things matching up? Go back and do the evaluation every single time and look at how I did this. I will not apologize for being passionate and excited about what I’m doing, but it took a long time to learn that when someone says it to me, that isn’t what they’re actually saying to me. They’re not actually condescending my passion. They’re excited about my passion. They just don’t believe me because I have not provided a trusted narrative to them yet. And I think this is very true when you’re trying to do something that no one else has done before.

Adam DeGraide:

Correct.

David Carpenter:

And one of the things that we know coming out of Silicon Valley is that it’s so much easier for someone to exit, to raise their next round than the first time. You’ve had a successful exit, people will throw money at you and be like, here’s poop on a plate. Let’s go. They’re like, great. You’ve done this before. You know what you’re doing. Because you have that instant trust of saying, well, you made somebody else a whole bunch of money. Let’s give it a shot. There’s that news article coming up with the guy from WeWork. And everyone’s like, oh, I can’t believe you just got $350 million.

Of course he did. He built a big company and just because it didn’t work out doesn’t that Andreessen Horowitz is like, no, we actually still believe this guy. Whether he should be believed or not is not what the thing is. It’s that he has been successful and people tend to bet on success. Getting through that first door is really, really hard. And that is something they have to remember, which is you look at all these people, and I met tons of them who are really just so much easier for them to fundraising, but it’s like, well, they’ve had successful exits before, they’ve earned it. Or they had successful raises before they so they earned it.

Adam DeGraide:

I also don’t want to forget something and I also don’t want the watchers and the listeners to miss something that you said a few minutes back and it was in passing, but it hit me pretty hard. You got to the place in your career that you had always dreamed of. And you realized that pinnacle wasn’t the

pinnacle you were hoping it was going to be. And you knew there was something even deeper and more than that. And I think this is important. People ask even Tom Brady, he’s still quarterbacking. He’s won, what, six, seven Super Bowls at this point in time. It’s never what you think. I built and sold, David, three companies worth, at this point, close to 300 million in valuation.

It’s never satisfying the way you think it would be satisfying. And the thing that is satisfying for me is the growth and the progress in Adam, in who I am and what I can achieve and what I can do. And if I’m hearing you correctly, what gave you the courage to do Gamiotics was you came to that moment where your name was at the top. You had a great time, but it left you wanting more. Is that accurate to say that’s what helped you call out to the next level?

David Carpenter:

Let’s look at the name of your podcast for a second, David vs Goliath. And I think that the name actually is the heart of my story. First things first, I had that moment and I made a decision to change paths. That is a really powerful thing that you grasped on because I’m good at telling this story because I’ve told this story before. The truth behind that story is that moment actually took a year of my life. Through COVID, through everything to actually be able to come around the other side and be like, Hey, I had this moment. It was a year of going through the pain and the grief of thinking that I just threw away 20 years of my life towards something and learned to understand that I’m actually building on the first 20 years of my life and now going for the second 20. That’s one thing. But the name of your podcast actually, and this is actually the real lesson in that moment, was it’s not me against the world. It’s me against myself. I am not competing with anybody else other than myself.

Adam DeGraide:

I love that. I love that. As a matter of fact, TJ, my producer that has to be in the trailer. Don’t forget. That is right by the way. It’s you against yourself. And I talk about this all the time. There’s different Goliaths we fight in our lives. The biggest Goliath is the one that we fight internally. Then competitors come next and it’s never the other way around. And one of the things you have to realize when you’re starting your own business and what David’s doing as well, and I’m encouraged to hear you say that, is the real battle is between the ears and it’s in our hearts and in our minds as the leader and we have to believe, put effort, time, energy, and we got to slay that giant that we have. Now, David, how can people find you, as we wrap up here, if they want to get and learn more about your company?

David Carpenter:

Sure. It’s two easy ways, at Gamiotics.com. Pretty easy to find there because it’s my company. It’s still a small company, still small startup. I’m in the midst of a software overhaul. The release date is scheduled for October one for it being finally launched as a SaaS company, which is what it needs to do so that everybody can start using Gamiotics to be able to bring this idea into the world. And then The20SidedTavern.com is the partnership that I have in bringing a new type of experiential entertainment to the world. And either way, all those things come to me. And then LinkedIn of course, searching David Carpenter on LinkedIn, pretty easy to find me there.

Adam DeGraide:

That’s awesome. David, have you had fun being on DVG today?

David Carpenter:

I have. This is great. I love this. This is a good podcast. I love this. I want to hear more about you.

Adam DeGraide:

Yeah, it’s a lot of fun, man.

David Carpenter:

I know we’re not supposed to talk about you, but I wish we could talk more about you. I’d love to know your journey, but another time.

Adam DeGraide:

Listen, I plan on interviewing myself on the anniversary. I’m actually going to interview Adam, so my one year anniversary of the podcast. We’ve got a little over 12,000 subscribers now amongst all of our channels and it’s been a lot of fun and I love these stories. Will you come on in a year from now and give us an update?

David Carpenter:

Yeah, sure. I’d love to.

Adam DeGraide:

That would be awesome. David, you’ve been amazing. This is David Carpenter with Gamiotics. I’m your handsome host, Adam DeGraide for the David vs. Goliath podcast. It’s been an amazing week. We’ve learned so much. Tune in next week, you’ll never know what you’ll learn. You’ll never know what you’re going to hear right here on the David vs. Goliath podcast. Everyone have an awesome day.

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