Warby Parker’s leap: From affordable glasses to AI game-changer

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Dave Gilboa is co-founder and co-CEO of Warby Parker, the eyewear brand that started with a pair of lost glasses while he was studying at Wharton Business School. In 2010, he and three friends pooled their savings and bought the company’s URL for $9. Almost everyone they spoke to said the idea would not work. Dave joins us to talk about the brand’s early days, being so frugal they practically refused to buy pens, experimenting with retail, handling rejection, raising more than half a billion dollars before going public, and staying focused on mission and purpose. He also shares new details about Warby Parker’s partnership with Google to develop AI-powered eyewear, and why he believes smart glasses may finally become a reality.  Topics discussed: 00:00 – Introduction02:05 – Dave Gilboa’s early life: from Sweden to San Diego03:01 – From pre-med to management consulting at Bain04:48 – Working in finance and realizing he wanted more meaning05:35 – Losing his glasses and discovering a billion-dollar idea07:23 – Turning frustration into the Warby Parker startup08:36 – Why glasses are overpriced and ripe for disruption11:01 – How “Warby Parker” got its name from Jack Kerouac’s journals14:40 – Bootstrapping with friends and pooling $120K in savings16:04 – Spending every dollar wisely: the three-spend rule18:07 – Launch week chaos and the 20,000-person waitlist25:27 – Rejection at Wharton and early pushback on pricing32:20 – Fundraising journey: from seed round to Series G32:49 – Taking Warby Parker public through a direct listing33:57 – How to raise capital the right way and keep control36:13 – Protecting the mission by walking away from wrong investors37:34 – The “Buy a Pair, Give a Pair” program: 20 million glasses donated40:15 – Home Try-On and inviting customers into their apartments41:05 – The yellow school bus pop-up tour that drove national buzz44:02 – Scaling brick-and-mortar retail across the U.S. and Canada45:04 – Expanding into contacts, exams, and full-service vision care45:39 – Partnering with Google to bu