430: Bantam Bagels, Shark Tank, and Lessons in Entrepreneurship with Founder and Author of A Shark Ate My Bagel, Elyse Oleksak

Marketing Today with Alan Hart

Elyse Oleksak is the author of A Shark Ate My Bagel and co-founder of Bantam Bagels. Elyse has always been competitive and incorporated the concepts she learned as a D1 lacrosse player, such as time management, hustling, and perseverance, into her entrepreneurship. She began her career in advertising as an Account Associate at JWT. From there, she went to Morgan Stanley, where she learned how to navigate the politics of corporate America. After some soul-searching, a late-night idea came to her husband, and eventually Bantam Bagels was born. After googling “how to make a bagel," figuring out how to get the cream cheese inside, and developing a business plan, they came up with the recipe that they took to Shark Tank.

On the show today, Alan and Elyse talk about her rocket ship ride into entrepreneurship as the cofounder of Bantam Bagels, when they knew they had something real, her experience with Shark Tank, and how it changed everything for them. We also talk about her recent book, what inspired her to write it, and the advice she has for budding entrepreneurs that she learned from both failures and successes alike.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• How Bantam Bagels was born
• The benefits of being a Shark Tank brand
• Elyse’s advice to budding entrepreneurs

Key Highlights:

• [01:20] Experience of a D1 lacrosse player
• [06:00] How Bantam Bagels was born
• [12:00] How do they get the cream cheese inside?
• [12:30] When they know they really had done it
• [13:15] Why A Shark Ate My Bagel, and why now?
• [15:15] The Shark Tank experience
• [19:35] Major lessons learned
• [24:20] Success does not exist without failure.
• [29:30] Advice to budding entrepreneurs
• [31:10] The impact of a semester abroad
• [34:45] Advice to her younger self
• [35:40] The AI balance
• [37:45] Trends to watch
• [38:35] The speed of change

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