After five years as a director at Vend, yesterday was my final meeting.
I’ve written here about a number of milestones in the Vend journey to date: from the bike ride where I first got the pitch, the announcement of our first investment round, Vaughan describing the early history in his own words, notes from our recent visits to San Francisco, watching the team expand, and more recently the search for a “real” board.
So, I thought one final post would be appropriate.
It’s been a privilege to be part of the team from the beginning. It doesn’t feel like that long ago we were putting together cheeky advertisements and videos and hoping that people would notice.
A billboard concept. Probably better this never saw the light of day:
Steve, the potty mouthed, bigoted and small minded, crappy old 1980s cash register, finally meets his fate:
An early recruitment video:
Thankfully, people did notice. Suddenly we had retailers from all around the world using our software to run their business. And more and more of them over time!
As the team expanded, it was great to be able to spend some time in Auckland, Melbourne, San Francisco and Toronto with the local people who are working hard to make Vend a success.
We have also been joined along the way by some of the very best SaaS investors - from here in New Zealand and from Germany, Australia and the United States.
When you look back on this sort of thing it always seems like time is short. So, it’s easy, generally, to be motivated by negative FOMO - the fear of missing out. But, in this case, my overwhelming memory will be TOBI - the thrill of being involved. Thanks to Vaughan and the team for having me along for the ride so far. And, especially to Miki, Barry and (too briefly) Claudia and Sarah for your support as part of the board over the last couple of years.
Vend is in an exciting period as the team works to put the business on the right track for the next phase of growth. To everybody involved now, I remain an enthusiastic investor and will watch with interest to see where you can take it from here. You have a huge opportunity to be part of something special, and I know you’ll make the most of it!