Women-Led VC Fund, Springdale Ventures, Onboards Marissa Epstein as Third General Partner | News

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AUSTIN, Texas, July 14, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) – Springdale Ventures, a leading venture capital firm investing in early-stage transformative consumer brands, today announced the appointment of Marissa Epstein as its third general partner. Epstein, with expertise in health, wellness, and nutrition and a broad network in the consumer and technology industries, will help deepen the company’s ecosystem, find potential investments, serve on the boards of portfolio companies, and make donations for to raise the second fund from Springdale Ventures.

Springdale Ventures was co-founded by the operators, investors Genevieve Gilbreath and Dan Graham. As entrepreneurs, you founded Springdale Ventures with a mission to build an entrepreneur-centric company that leverages their background and industry relationships at critical early stage consumer business growth points to help teams succeed. An active natural products entrepreneur since 2002, Gilbreath was Managing Director of the Accelerator Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) SKU before founding Springdale Ventures. Graham, co-founder of Build-A-Sign, successfully left his company and founded Notley, a mission-oriented organization that aims to empower communities through social innovation. Together, they see Epstein as an important addition to the team as their expertise in nutrition and deep understanding of rapidly changing consumer behavior will help brands meet the challenges of today’s marketplace.

As a registered nutritionist, Epstein has spent nearly a decade working with business leaders to build innovative brands since she drove nutrition initiatives at the White House, where she was assistant director of the Let’s Move! Campaigning for former United States First Lady Michelle Obama. She then led health education technology and services at Stanford Health Care.

While at Stanford, Epstein developed and taught the Food and Nutrition Entrepreneurship course at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Most recently, she was the director of The University of Texas Nutrition Institute, where she developed programs and courses that guide early-stage food and beverage entrepreneurs from brainstorming to product market viability through iterative, consumer-centric design. She advises several companies in the food & beverage sector, many of which were founded by former students.

“We are very happy to welcome Marissa to the team. She adds a new perspective, has extensive experience in nutritional innovation, deep insight into what drives the success of products in the marketplace, and knows how to leverage public and private research to help our portfolio companies scale, ”said Gilbreath.

Graham also said, “Marissa’s has an excellent understanding of how consumer brands can better address the challenges of today’s rapidly changing consumer landscape. We are proud to have her as part of our growing team at Springdale Ventures, and we know she will help us outperform other consumer-centric VC companies. “

Epstein added, “Genevieve, Dan and I share a passion for working with inspiring entrepreneurs to scale brands that make people’s lives better. Springdale has built an exciting portfolio of exceptional teams on their way to legacy brands and I look forward to joining the team to accelerate their growth. “

Epstein has advised Springdale Ventures for the past two years. As General Partner, she will continue to contribute to the growth of Springdale’s 23 portfolio companies, which currently have an average revenue growth of five times across the portfolio and nearly half of which are led by underrepresented founders. With her appointment, Springdale Ventures joins the ten percent of VC funds that have two or more female general partners.

The addition of Epstein also marks the addition of Springdale Ventures’ second fund, which continues its current investment thesis and builds on the successful track record of its first fund. Headquartered in the CPG hotspot Austin, Texas, Springdale Ventures is geographically and strategically positioned to add to its initial momentum by partnering with entrepreneurs to support the growth of consumer goods companies.

For more information on Springdale Ventures, please visit https://www.springdaleventures.com/Springdale Ventures Press Kit

About Springdale Ventures

Springdale Ventures is an Austin, Texas-based venture capital firm that works with visionary founders to accelerate the growth of early-stage transformative consumer brands that are both digitally native and retail ready. The $ 27 million fund is led by successful entrepreneurs and operators and has a team of over 30 years of experience valuing values ​​and combined more than 150 years of CPG experience and has invested in a group of outstanding brands in a variety of categories , including food and beverage, lifestyle, personal care, and wellness. To date there are more than 20 portfolio companies under Springdale Ventures, including Caraway, KOS, Judy, BeatBox, Literati and Canteen. https://www.springdaleventures.com/brands/

Springdale Ventures General Partner Biographies:

Dan Graham Dan Graham co-founded BuildASign.com in 2005, growing it to a over $ 100 million CPG ecommerce business that was purchased by Cimpress (VistaPrint) for $ 280 million in 2018.

For the past decade, Dan has been an investor in the CPG and tech startup community with over 100 early stage portfolio investments. Dan also founded Notley with his wife Lisa in 2015. He has received a number of awards including the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2013 Central Texas Award, the Austin Business Journal 2012 Best CEO Award, and the Austin Under 40 Austinite of the Year.

An Austinite native, Dan personally gives back to the Austin community through Notley and serving on the boards of numerous philanthropic organizations. He also acts as a mentor to aspiring young entrepreneurs working with Capital Factory and SKU, and is a member of the 2016 Class of Henry Crown Fellows and the Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute. Dan earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science and philosophy from the University of Texas at Austin (2003) and a JD from the University of Texas from the Austin School of Law (2005).

Genevieve Gilbreath Genevieve Gilbreath is a Co-Founder and General Partner at Springdale Ventures. She serves on the boards of four portfolio companies: JUDY, KOS, Tiny Organics and Gooder Foods. Gilbreath has been an active investor and entrepreneur in the consumer goods industry in Austin and around the world for the last 15 years. Her career in consumer goods began with the founding and development of two global import / export companies for nutritional supplements. For much of this time she lived in India, where she continued her nutritional supplement business while developing and running Princeton University’s international, cross-cultural Bridge Year Program India. She was previously an Associate Professor of Health and Wellness at Baylor University.

After completing a successful deal with one of her dietary supplement companies, she wanted to advocate the endeavors of other consumer products entrepreneurs. From 2016 to 2018 Genevieve was Managing Director of SKU, the first and leading Consumer Products Accelerator in the US, bringing brands such as Epic Provisions, Siete and Austin Eastciders to the national stage.

Passionate about the success of consumer branded entrepreneurs in Austin and beyond, Genevieve became a founding member of the board of directors in 2019 and served as President of Naturally Austin, a nonprofit that supports CPG entrepreneurs, for more than two years. During her tenure, Naturally Austin grew to over 500 members, gained more than 75 sponsors, and successfully launched a number of CPG educational courses and an accelerator program that supports more than 77 BIPOC founders across Texas. Genevieve is also on the board of Naturally Austin’s national umbrella organization, the Naturally Network, whose mission is to accelerate and increase the power and impact of conscious business practices in the natural product ecosystem.

Marissa Epstein Marissa has worked with emerging brands to create innovative products, technology, and services for over a decade, since she led nutrition initiatives at the White House, where she worked directly with Michelle Obama to develop her Let’s Move! Campaign for a healthier life.

Marissa developed and implemented an innovation curriculum at Stanford University that provides executives with the consumer-centric, scientific, and regulatory criteria needed to assess the investment viability of early-stage health and nutrition brands. She also built the first consumer-centric healthcare technology of its kind at Stanford Health Care, home to one of the top ten hospitals in the country, bringing digital products to the healthcare system’s patient population.

Most recently, Marissa was the director of the University of Texas Nutrition Institute, whose mission is to combine nutritional science with food and health. She worked with academics and entrepreneurs to commercialize and develop early-stage concepts in food and beverage, restaurants, and CPG. She led the development of nutrition education experiences to provide scientific guidance for better lives to hundreds of consumers, health professionals and entrepreneurs. She teaches courses on nutritional innovation, food and drink, and CPG entrepreneurship at McCombs Business School.

As a Registered Nutritionist, Marissa holds a Phi Beta Kappa degree from UT with degrees in Nutrition and Plan II Honors. She is a Truman Scholar and received her MBA from Stanford University.

CONTACT: Douglas Yu douglas@springdaleventures.com

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