Torch Capital

I mean, look, I'll, I'll actually back this into a different-

John Kaadan is founder and managing partner of Torch Capital, where he's backed companies like Sweetgreen, Acorns, DigitalOcean, and Zocdoc.

We break down how he evaluates startups from the pain point up, what makes founders credible before there's much traction, why he passed on Sweetgreen twice before he invested, and how you can tell the difference between focus and distraction.

We wrap up with a 30-day experiment you can run while you still have a paycheck to find out whether strangers care about your idea before you go all in.

I really appreciate it.

Great to be here, Walter.

So when you're telling someone about Torch Capital, um, how do you describe the firm?

So I think of us as a fund that's really thinking how technology is reshaping people's behavior, and that can be people as consumers, but it can also be people as employees or business owners, uh, people managing their healthcare, their financials.