How Kirsten Green Built Forerunner Ventures

The Peel with Turner Novak

Kirsten Green is the founder of Forerunner Ventures, a venture capital firm that focuses on understanding the mindset of the modern consumer. Kirsten started Forerunner in 2010, and was an early investor in companies like Faire, Chime, Warby Parker, Dollar Shave Club, Hims, Glossier, Jet, Bonobos, HotelTonight, and The Farmer’s Dog. This episode takes us behind the scenes of Kirsten’s two decade journey building Forerunner from scratch. She talks about her biggest mistakes, wins, and lessons learned along the way. Timestamps: (00:00) Intro (02:50) Doing market research at the mall (08:00) Her journey from public markets to venture (18:30) Lessons from her first investment going to $0 (28:51) How she raised her first $5m angel fund (31:11) Transitioning to a $41.7m institutional fund (43:20) Why she almost didn’t invest in Dollar Shave Club (sold for $1.1 billion) (51:05) How Forerunner thinks about fund size (57:05) How she led Faire’s Series A with a small fund (58:46) How Kirsten builds relationships with LPs (01:02:10) Is consumer investing dead? (01:15:00) Her unfair advantage as an investor Where to find Kirsten Twitter: https://twitter.com/kirstenagreen LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kirstengreen Where to find Turner: Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak Newsletter: https://www.thespl.it/