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In this episode, we have two brothers, Emil Aite and Cassy Aite who’ve been passionately working on scaling an idea to a company that’s spread across multiple locations in Canada. The idea is simple – “how can we rethink happiness at work?”. And their answer? Healthy snacks!
They are so passionate about this, that they started working on it as early as when Emil was in college and Cassy was working. And when they needed money, they took a loan! In a world where everyone is looking at building their ideas in others’ money (think ‘equity financing’), what makes these two brothers take all the risk? Listen in, to this conversation about childhood, parenting, business, relationships, and of course how healthy snacks can lead to happiness at work!
Who are Cassy Aite and Emil Aite?
Brothers and co-founders Emil & Cassy started Desk Nibbles in 2016 with the thought that they can make work happier. Coming from technical, financial, and sales backgrounds they’ve worked on projects growing up with their skill set differences. Today they’re growing a business alongside the demand for changing workplace culture.
Here’s what the brothers have to say “We’ve been building different businesses and projects since we were 12 years old. We did a Kickstarter campaign for a piece of software, ran a hedge trimming company, created a sports data aggregation site, an early amazon affiliate site, and a few others.”
Why Should You Listen to Cassy and Emil Aite?
There are plenty of reasons why you should listen to Emil and Cassy Aite. Let me give the top 3:
- They’ve been doing things together as brothers from a very early age of 9-10. They talk about how their parents looked at it, and how they supported them.
- Emil started working on Desk Nibbles while doing his studies in college. He talks about how he managed to do it, and how his brother Cassy supported him.
- The two brothers have been going after a seemingly insignificant problem – office snacking. In this episode, they reveal the details, and you’ll hear why this is equally or even more important than many other areas in health or fitness.
What Do They Talk about in this Interview?
Here are some topics and questions we cover in this interview!
- Was it so obvious to you about the problem with snacks?
- Can you quickly introduce yourself and what you do?
- Were you always entrepreneurial? How early was it when you first did a business together?
- Did you influence your parents or someone to do something like this, instead of playing video games or something other kids of that age do?
- How did your parents react when you earned money?
- Why did you stop fixing bikes and move on to other businesses?
- What did you do differently with Desk Nibbles that you did not do with your earlier side-projects?
- Balancing work and studies
- Cassy – It’s hard to do two things in tandem.
- What does Desk Nibbles do today and how do you make money?
- How did you go about understanding exactly where the problem is, with office snacking?
- Getting stuff done. How?
- Do you have themes for every quarter?
- 2017 was the year of figuring out what problem to solve?
- Tell me more about that moment when you found that you had the right product for the right market.
- What was the point when you realized that this is the right product?
- Raising capital.
- Do you have people that you looked up to when you needed advice?
- How do you describe the culture at your company?
- What are some of your personal beliefs you think impacts a lot of the decisions you make on business and life?
- Decision making.
- What does success mean to you?
- Is there something you did really crazy to make your employees or customers happy?
- Do you have plans of expanding outside of Canada? Where do you see yourself at the end of 2019?
- What do you think your parents think of what you’ve done?
- You’ve decided to make a difference with what you do. Can you talk about that?
How Can You Listen?
Cassy and Emil Aite’s interview is available in audio.
Direct Link to Audio
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How to Get In Touch with Emil and Cassy Aite?
Twitter:Â @desknibbles
Instagram: @desknibbles
LinkedIn: Cassy Aite | Emil Aite
Website:Â desknibbles.com
Help Desk Nibbles Make A Wish Come True
Desk Nibbles is helping change the life of a critically ill child, and you can support it either by donating to the cause or by sharing it with your network. Here’s a link to the GoFundMe page of this campaign.
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But in just a few years, Facebook arrived and a lot of these businesses, including Jim, found themselves in a deserted place and had to literally start from scratch. Jim lost all his leads, customer contacts, and everything else he had going on, inside Myspace. This is bound to happen when you rent a place…like a social media platform, to grow your business and brand.
Here’s something I want you to consider. Take full control of your business and your brand. Bring your customers and leads to your own website. And you can do it all by yourself, without having to spend thousands of dollars on a web agency.
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