In episode II of Divya Gugnani’s Founder Stories interview with host Chris Dixon, the two dive into M&A, a topic that both founders know well. Dixon’s company Hunch, was recently acquired by eBay and Gugnani’s company, Send The Trend was recently acquired by QVC.

On being acquired, Gugnani tells Dixon that she was approached much earlier than she had anticipated and it was a “really intimidating and scary” experience. She adds, “there were really two directions; do I go down this route and potentially distract myself from the base business that is growing … or do I just keep focusing on my business and have that kind of bravado that you know what, it is going to be worth so much more later?”

Gugnani came to the realization that the opportunity “to build a big business” within a larger organization was too much to pass up and says when “I was convinced it would work, I started putting the time and energy into that process.”

She says during the process ”we took every single meeting with every single decision maker as an opportunity to sell them on our opportunity and why they wanted to work with us and that ended up creating multiple champions at multiple levels for us – which I think had a network effect of how our transaction got done rapidly, efficiently and well.”

While Gugnani was fortunate enough to experience smooth sailing, Dixon notes he’s seen instances where lawyers get hung up on matters deep into negotiations and “people just fall apart in that process.” He adds “that’s scary because at that point you’ve probably spent months, spending almost all your time on this, you’ve disclosed everything about your business to them literally, every document.”

Gugnani agrees saying “a deal is not a deal until the wire goes though” and compares this situation to “standing naked in Times Square.”

Make sure to watch the entire video to hear more, including Gugnani’s and Dixon’s take on keeping things close to the vest during these deliberations.

Episode I of this interview is here.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring leaders from Tumblr, KickStarter, BirchBox, ZocDoc, Charity: Water and many other startups are here.

Divya Gugnani is the co-founder of Send the Trend, a New York based startup that was recently acquired by QVC, just a year-and-a half after launching in 2010.

Gugnani, whose founding team includes Project Runway winner Christian Siriano, describes Send the Trend as “an online destination that offers curated and customized woman’s fashion accessories and beauty.” Items are priced at $29.95, and every month users have the option to purchase everything from earrings to bracelets specifically tailored to their taste.

Gugnani tells Founder Stories host Chris Dixon, that the idea for Send the Trend struck her after she left a career in finance to become an entrepreneur. No longer armed with a budget to shop at high end retail stores and receive the personalized assistance that goes with it, Gugnani wanted to “create the Saks like experience, but have it be done online.”

She adds, “the reason I chose accessories is that accessories are light to ship, have a very low return rate and they are pretty much size agnostic so a woman who is 300 pounds can wear the same earrings that a woman who is 90 pounds can, and so the whole model works very cost efficiently because you don’t have very high returns and sizing is not a real issue.”

After wrapping the topic, the two go on to discuss issues surrounding the subscription commerce space at large, before Gugnani tells Dixon lessons she’s learned while building her business.

She says of paramount importance is having a strong technology infrastructure. Noting that had Send The Trend positioned itself correctly, the site may not have crashed coast-to-coast after being featured on the Today Show.

Make sure to watch the entire video to hear additional insights and be sure to catch past episodes of Founder Stories featuring founders of ZocDoc, TripAdvisor, Kayak, Tumblr and Instagram.

Part II of this interview is coming up.

In part II of his Founder Stories interview with host Chris Dixon, Kayak.com’s co-founder Paul English discusses why job applicants will be hard pressed to find job postings on Kayak.com, relays the lessons he learned from Kayak’s mobile app and tells Dixon the traits founding teams need to possess in order to impress him as an angel investor.

Having helped grow the company to roughly 150 employees, English says Kayak is somewhat unorthodox when it comes to hiring talent. “We don’t hire for open positions but we are looking for athletes, we are looking for star performers and then when we find someone great, we make a spot for them.” He adds, “I am always recruiting.”

In addition to beefing up staff, Kayak has expanded into mobile, which accounts for “almost 20-percent of our traffic” says English. Initially weary that its mobile platform would be a watered-down version of its website, English’s fears have been swept aside. “The team that we hired to build our iPhone product actually found a way to build the version of Kayak that has all the same power of Kayak but is expressed in way that was actually more simple than our website.” He adds, “I think the design experience we have learned on the iPhone, which is to force simplicity, because you have less real estate, has caused us to rethink how we do design on the web.”

English wraps the interview by telling Dixon key lessons he’s learned as an entrepreneur and offers what he looks for when investing in startups.

Make sure to watch the entire video to hear all his insights, and watch episode I of this interview here.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring founders ZocDoc, Charity: Water, Turntable.fm, Bump, Birchbox and many other companies are here.

Having recently posted its 2011 revenue numbers, Kayak.com’s co-founder, Paul English stopped by TCTV to tape an episode of Founder Stories with host Chris Dixon.

In part I of this conversation, English describes serendipitously meeting co-founder Steve Hafner (who previously co-founded Orbitz), speaks to the importance of striking the right business partnerships and offers insights into how Kayak tests its products.

English says Kayak’s origins date back to 2003 when he was introduced to his co-founder Steve Hafner through a mutual contact. He tells Dixon the two immediately hit it off, went to a bar and “an hour later decided each to throw a bunch of money in” to start Kayak. English and Hafner then put together a board that included ”the original founders of Expedia and Travelocity.” English notes this leadership offered Kayak additional legitimacy in the eyes of the industry, as did the opportunity to “take over travel search for the AOL portal.” And says the AOL deal “got us a lot of attention because … we had an anchor tenant with a lot of traffic.”

Speaking further to the AOL partnership, English tells Dixon, “It is hard to get those deals but it is a huge emotional win and PR win for the industry. I think to tell people that you are an unknown startup, but you are powering … travel management for some big company, it gives you cred that allows you to then ask for other things, so I think it was really key to us in 2004.”

Make sure to watch the entire interview to hear additional insights, and be on the lookout for part II of this interview which is coming up.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring leaders of FindTheBest, Kiva Systems, TripAdvisor, Warby Parker, ZocDoc and many other companies are here.

Having launched Runkeeper in 2008 with the help of “moonlighting engineers” before closing a $10 million Series B round in late 2011, RunKeeper’s co-founder, Jason Jacobs speaks from experience when describing the whiplash entrepreneurs face when stepping out on their own.

In episode II of his Founder Stories conversation with host Chris Dixon, Jacobs characterizes the adventure this way. “The day you leave your job and the hourglass starts turning upside down in your savings that is a really scary, awful, stressful, exhilarating, tremendously exciting feeling. And then that basically doesn’t stop.”

Emotions expressed, Jacobs describes his vision for RunKeeper.

“There needs to be this kind of central console that ties all this [health] stuff together … the way that Facebook did that in social networking.” Aiming to be this central console, Jacobs adds “we opened up our API six months ago and … we have seen 50 completed integrations so far, and several hundred others in development.”

Before the interview wraps, Jacobs extends this piece of advice to the next generation of founders. “Figure out what you really want because following the decision path to build a big game changing next billion dollar company is totally different than building a highly successful small company that either gets acquired quickly or can see you to a sustaining pace.”

Make sure to watch the entire video to hear additional insights.

Past Founder Stories episodes featuring ZocDoc, Reddit, Tumblr, TripAdvisor, Birchbox, Warby Parker and many other startups are here.

Episode I of this interview is here.

Jason Jacobs is the co-founder and CEO of RunKeeper, one of the initial 200 apps sold in the iPhone app store. The app allows users to record their jogging distances and times, and in partnership with other fitness focused apps/devices, manage a host of additional health related activity, such as weight loss and strength training.

Having recently raised a $10 million Series B round, the Boston based Jacobs dropped by our New York studio to tell Chris Dixon, how it all began.

Jacobs says RunKeeper’s genesis dates back to 2007 when he was training for a marathon. At the time he was searching for a “big important problem to solve.” Influenced by what he describes as Nike’s user friendly Nike + iPod, he wondered, “why are these guys the only one doing this?”

He jumped in the game.

Initially operating on a shoestring budget, Jacobs built RunKeeper with the help of “moonlighting engineers that were working for equity.” Using his savings as a safety net while generating a bit of revenue, Jacobs intentionally fended off investors for about 18 months, saying the more time Runkeeper could focus on building the product “the higher the caliber of investors we would be able to attract and the less of the company we would have to give up in the process.”

Jacobs shares plenty more insights, so be sure to watch the entire video to hear more. Episode II of this interview is coming up.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring leaders of FindTheBest, KickStarter, Flipboard and many other statups are here.

In episode II of Chris Dixon’s Founder Stories interview with Warby Parker’s co-founders, David Gilboa and Neil Blumenthal, the trio discuss topics spanning Warby Parker’s social responsibility efforts to the state of e-commerce.

Off the bat, Gilboa tells Dixon that Warby Parker strives to be an environmentally friendly organization focused on giving back to the community. In addition to being “100% carbon neutral” Gilboa highlights Warby Parker’s “Buy a Pair, Give a Pair” initiative where Warby Parker donates a set of glasses for every set it sells.

Speaking to setting up shop in Manhattan, Gilboa (who previously lived in San Francisco) says, “I was sort of brainwashed into thinking that if you wanted to launch a startup, particularly anything Internet based, you had to do it in the Bay area.” His views have since changed and Gilboa is now in lockstep with co-founder Blumenthal who says, “New York was the right place to be because we are a fashion brand, and New York is the fashion capital of the world.”

As other New York e-commerce brands like Birchbox and Fab gain popularity, Galboa is bullish on Warby Parker’s future. He tells Dixon, “When we started looking at the eyewear industry, less than 1 percent of eyeglasses were sold online, but we are huge believers in the fact that eyeglasses are going to follow all these other consumer product categories and more and more of that spend is going to go online.”

Before the interview wraps, Gilboa take a moment to offer advice to budding entrepreneurs. Make sure to watch the entire interview to hear everything the pair has to say.

Episode I of Warby Parker’s Founder Stories interview is here. Links to Founder Stories episodes featuring BirchBox are here.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring leaders from Reddit, KickStarter, Tumblr, TripAdvisor, ZocDoc, Charity: Water and may other startups are here.

If you’ve ever shopped for a pair of prescription glasses, you’ve probably seen first hand how expensive a set can be. Warby Parker’s co-founders are right there with you.

Both fed-up and puzzled over paying hundreds of dollars for a product that’s been around for hundreds of years, the Warby Parker team is shaking up the eyewear industry by selling prescription glasses online, at a price tag of just $95 a pair.

Having crafted their plan during business school, the foursome launched the company two years ago this month. Three weeks after the initial pair went on sale, co-founder, Neil Blumenthal says Warby Parker hit its sales targets for the entire year and adds “we sold out of our top 15 styles in four weeks”. The company has since ramped up to 60-employees.

Two of Warby Parker’s co-founders, David Gilboa and Neil Blumenthal recently stopped by TCTV to give Founder Stories host, Chris Dixon the backstory on how the company got started.

As lifelong eyeglass wearers, Gilboa tells Dixon the group couldn’t understand why “glasses cost more than an iPhone.” After doing some research they realized “there’s a handful of companies that control the entire supply chain.” Not content to roll with the status quo, Gilboa says the team set out to change the landscape by creating “our own brand of glasses …. so we could sell the same product that normally costs $500 for $95.”

However, because their product was only available online, the team had to figure out a way for customers to try on the frames. Blumenthal says their solution was to create a “first of its kind” program “in the US where you select 5 frames, we ship it to you free of cost and you have 5 days to try them on at home, with no obligation to buy.”

Gilboa adds that this process enables customers to receive feedback from people “they trust” (versus paid sales staffers) and as an added benefit, Warby Parker receives “millions of free impressions” from users who post tryout pictures to their social networking sites.

As the interview unfolds, Gilboa and Blumenthal share plenty more insights, so sure to watch the entire video to hear more.

Past episodes for Founder Stories featuring Jeff Clavier, Cyrus Massoumi, Stephen Kaufer, Mayor Bloomberg and many other leaders are here.

Episode II of this interview is coming up.

Because every VC’s inbox is overflowing with pitches, and because VC’s don’t take meetings with just anyone, SoftTech VC’s Jeff Clavier, (who just raised $55 million for his third fund) offers advice to founders who hope to cut through the clutter, schedule a meeting, and score some financing from prominent investors.

In his final Founder Stories interview with host Chris Dixon, Clavier says when trying to get a VC’s attention, “figuring out in the ecosystem, who is the right sort of referral point is super important. It is the difference between being at the top of the funnel and being sort of close to deletion.”

He continues, if you are lucky enough to get through the door, “the goal of the first meeting is to get to the second meeting, right, and so pitch the idea. We like to hear stories… we like founders to tell us how they came up with the idea, what they have done before, why this is a passion of theirs and the passion for us is something that we need to feel.”

Clavier also advises founders keep a sharp focus on the benchmarks they are trying to nail during seed stage so they are teed up for their A Round. If not, he says you “will discover three months before you are about to raise money that you are not ready, and you might have actually been able to fix that six months prior, if you sort of knew you were taking the wrong trajectory.”

To help avoid the issue he adds, “sync up with your investors or people who have an outside view who can tell you, look dude you are just veering off, this is not relevant.”

Before the interview ends, Claver offers suggestions on building the best team and above all else, creating the best customer experience.

Make sure to watch the entire interview to hear all his insights and make sure to watch episodes I, II and III Clavier’s Founder Stories videos.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring the leaders of ZocDoc, MeetUp, Tumblr, Reddit, TripAdvisor and many more startups are here.

At the top of this Founder Stories episode featuring SoftTech VC’s Jeff Clavier, Chris Dixon mentions much has been written about the “Series A Crunch.” It’s the occurrence of seed stage companies hitting the end of their initial funding cycle at roughly the same time and having to compete for big checks from a limited supply of VC. There’s just not enough money or VC interest to keep all entrepreneurs afloat for another round.

In an effort to prevent future founders from colliding into the Series A Crunch, Dixon advises startups set out to initially raise 18 months of funding, adding, “18 months effectively gives you let’s say 12 months of real operating, which gives you three iterations instead of one.” The more time to perfect the product the better.

Clavier agrees that the Crunch “is absolutely happening” and backs Dixon’s longer runway strategy.

Clavier also says consumer internet companies need to demonstrate more than ”just pure user traction” to whet a VC’s appetite. He tells Dixon SoftTech VC is moving towards backing “businesses” and trots out Fab as an example. “We’ve made money from Fab the day we launched the service, Why? Because it is transaction based.”

Make sure to watch the full interview for additional insights and make sure to watch episode I and episode II of this interview.

All Founder Stories videos including interviews with David Karp, Lauren Leto, Stephen Kaufer, Christopher Poole, Dennis Crowley and many other founders are here.

Jeff Clavier just finished raising $55 million for his third SoftTech VC fund and after closing it out, stopped by TechCrunch to tape Founder Stories with host Chris Dixon.

In part II of this Founder Stories conversation, Dixon surveys the seed stage landscape and comes away wondering if too many unproven entrepreneurs are running companies with unrealistically high valuations. He believes it gives pause to investors thinking about backing these budding startups.

As a micro-VC, Clavier says he manages this trend by clearly defining what he wants out of any partnership and if there’s not an agreement on the table he wastes no time analyzing the next opportunity. “We want a certain level of ownership and if ever we don’t get the ownership or it is too expensive we’ll just bid farewell.”

The two also discuss signaling risk, which is basically when a major VC invests in a startup during a seed round and doesn’t follow up with more funding. Rightly or wrongly, it signals to other investors to stay away. (If Accel or Greylock isn’t doubling down on the A and B rounds, something must be wrong with the company). Clavier shields his investments from signaling risk by telling outsiders that just because “firm x, y, z [is] on the cap table” it doesn’t mean they are the bellwether, especially if they only put in a token amount as an option to invest later.

Clavier also believes allowing multiple VC’s to fund a seed round sets the stage for “a disaster” and offers advice to founders who are considering bringing on a “brand name” investor. It can be great if there is true commitment, but too often it just raises questions later when they lose interest and drop out of future financing rounds.

Make sure to watch the full video to hear all his insights.

Part I of this interview is here. Episode III is coming up.

Past Founder Stories episodes featuring Mayor Bloomberg, David Karp, Dennis Crowley, Fred Wilson and Alexis Ohanian are here.

SoftTech VC’s, Jeff Clavier has edged his way from a true Silicon Valley outsider (born and raised in France) to the ultimate insider. Since moving to the valley a decade ago, Clavier has launched three funds and invested in more than 100 companies, the likes of which include Mint, FitBit, and Fab.

Not bad for a guy who claims to have jumped “into venture by accident.”

Having just raised $55 million for his third fund, which will invest on average “$400,000″ per startup, Clavier sat down with Founder Stories host, Chris Dixon to discuss how he built his business.

Clavier tells Dixon by 2004 it had become financially feasible to back “customer internet companies.” He says what used to cost $5-million had been reduced to half-a-million. So, “for three-and-a-half-years I sort of built my dealflow, and sort of my footprint in Silicon Valley by doing angel investments.”

While not a major player at the time, he notes, “I was still a VC and I could help entrepreneurs with the financing and figure out how to structure an investment, how to look at term sheets, how to pitch and so on and so forth, and so slowly but surely I sort of built that initial presence in the valley.”

Having helped guide the growth of scores companies and learning just as many lessons along the way, Clavier tells Dixon “you can’t have any pride as an investor because you need to be able to help in anything you can.” He concludes, “you are not running the company, you are just supporting it, the point of view is you don’t give orders.”

Episode II of this interview is coming up. Past Founder Stories episodes featuring leaders of ZocDoc, TripAdvisor, Charity: Water, Turntable.fm, Bump and many other startups are here.

You need a doctor and you need a doctor who takes your insurance. Instead of having to fumble through antiquated lists complied by your provider, ZocDoc seeks to expedite the process of locating care by displaying physicians in your area who are available for immediate and long-term appointments.

Doctors pay a fee to join ZocDoc, which has secured $95 million in funding, spread to more than a dozen United States cities and has hired 200+ employees since 2007.

In part II of Cyrus Massoumi’s Founder Stories interview with Chris Dixon, Massoumi tells Dixon why he thinks ZocDoc found a following and offers advice to other entrepreneurs.

Massoumi attributes ZocDoc’s success to hitting the nexus of easing friction for both patients and doctors. Patients save time booking appointments and doctors easily fill vacancies, including vacancies in the “hidden supply of health care” formed from last minute cancellations.

He calls it a “win-win” situation.

While ZocDoc found a recipe for success, getting there wasn’t easy. Massoumi tells Dixon his team caught a lucky break in 2008 when it won $100,000 for “the top small business in America” and continues, ”had we not won that money we didn’t have enough money to actually expand to our next market.” He believes the expansion silenced doubters who didn’t think ZocDoc could flourish outside of New York City.

As the interview winds down, Massoumi offers of several pieces of advice. In particular he recommends entrepreneurs to pay attention to “one of the old adages of fundraising [which] is never raise money when you need it.” Having previously worked at a company that ran of money, he speaks from first hand experience.

Massoumi shares plenty more insights in this interview, including why he thinks the financial downturn helped ZocDoc. Be sure to view the entire video to see why.

Past episodes of Founder Stories featuring Mayor Bloomberg, Charity: Water’s Scott Harrison, TripAdvisor’s Stephen Kaufer and leaders of many other startups are here.

In 2007 Cyrus Massoumi ruptured his eardrum on a flight to New York and turned his distasteful experience of trying to track down a physician into ZocDoc – a service that enables customers to quickly book appointments with doctors and dentists online. In a relatively short time, his streamlined offering has attracted considerable interest from both consumers and investors. Supported by doctors who pay a fee to be listed on the site, ZocDoc is now available in more than a dozen United States markets, claims 200+ employees and has tallied $95 million in funding.

In this episode of Founder Stories, ZocDoc’s CEO and co-founder Cyrus Massoumi tells host, Chris Dixon how ZocDoc was built.

Rewinding to ZocDoc’s origins, Massoumi says after landing in Manhattan with one healthy ear, it took him four days to secure the services of a medical professional. He search was hindered by the substandard list of doctors compiled by his insurance company – so inadequate were the choices that “one doctor was actually deceased” he says.

Disgusted with the status quo, Massoumi rounded up two co-founders and went to work building something better, but tells Dixon those early days weren’t easy. ”We had no website, I was literally taking a power point page and walking into these doctors offices and trying to convince them that online booking was the future of healthcare.” He continues, ”in one case I literally sat in a waiting room of an office for six hours and then I got three dentists to sign on.”

After shaking hands and iterating for “two-and-a-half years” Massoumi says “everything clicked and we have been expanding ever since.”  He tells Dixon patients now have access to “40 different specialties” and “probably north of 6-million maybe even approaching 7-million available [doctor] appointments over the next 90-days.”

Massoumi shares plenty more insights in this video, so be sure to watch the entire episode to hear them all.

Past Founder Stories episodes featuring leaders of TripAdvisor, Charity: Water, Bump, Redditt, TurnTable.fm and may other start-ups are here.

Episode II of this interview is coming up.

After notching a spot on the NASDAQ, TripAdvisor’s Stephen Kaufer carved out a few minutes for Founder Stories, with host, Chris Dixon. In episode II of this interview, the two discuss their mutual disdain for the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and Kaufer offers advice to founders.

Highlighting a piece of advice, Kaufer tells Dixon a good way for “a consumer facing, web-based business” to capture what “your visitors really want” is to run a live test with a non-working link. Calling these “404-tests” he says “before you build the darn thing … see how many people click it. It goes nowhere, it says broken link to the user [but] your log file says how many people” checked it out.

While the marketing department may not love the practice, Kaufer says it “solves umpteen meetings worth of powerful debate and logical arguments.”

More advice follows – be sure to hear it all by watching the entire interview and watch episode I of this interview here.

If you missed a past episode of Founder Stories, you can get caught-up here. Guests include leaders from BirchBox, Foodspotting, GroupMe, DropBox, Tumblr and KickStarter.

Earlier today, TripAdvisor added its name to the list of companies publicly trading on the NASDAQ. After doing so, TripAdvisor’s co-founder Stephen Kaufer stopped by TechCrunch for a Founder Stories interview with host, Chris Dixon.

TripAdvisor offers user-generated reviews of everything from hotels to restaurants and claims “50 million monthly unique visitors and 20 million members.” Healthy numbers now, but dial back a decade and TripAdvisor was gasping for air. Kaufer says 18-months in “we had no clients, we had no revenue and we were running out of money.”

Realizing time was short, the team dumped their initial business model after recognizing a demo they released on the side “to showcase what someone else could do with [our] technology” was gathering steam. Leadership built a plan around the concept, added a “write your own review” button and was off to the races with what we now know as TripAdvisor.

Kaufer dives into additional detail on those early days, discusses Expedia’s acquisition of his company and voices concerns about Google as the interview unfolds. Make sure to see it all by watching the entire exchange.

Also be sure to check out Chris Dixon’s thoughts on the interview, the IPO, and issues surrounding it all on his blog, cdixon.org.

Episode II of Kaufer’s interview is coming up.

Past Founder Stories interviews featuring Mayor Bloomberg, David Karp, Dennis Crowley and many other leaders are here.

In Scott Harrison’s final Founder Stories interview with host, Chris Dixon, Harrison offers some suggestions to other founders and discusses how people can donate to Charity: Water.

Harrison says “one of the simplest ways to help is to give up your birthday.” By this he means “instead of throwing a birthday party, instead of asking or even accepting gifts, people just ask for their age in dollars.” Once Charity: Water has the cash in-hand Harrison says “every single dollar with integrity is tracked though the accounting system to the project that it actually funded.”  Charity: Water has collected “over $10-million” this way.

Offering advice to others, Harrison says “I think one of the key and very simple things is get lawyers to help you file for your 501(c)(3).” While the upfront costs may seem prohibitive, he believes spending money to hire a professional is well worth the expense.

Harrison also advises leaders to do themselves a favor and figure out how to clearly and simply communicate their message. He says people “can go on for 6 or 7 sentences, trying to expound on their mission statement, at the end you are like so what do you guys do again?” Before the interview wraps, Harrison shares a few more tips, so be sure to watch the full conversation to hear them all.

Episode I of this interview is here. Episode II is here.

Past Founder Stories episodes featuring Mayor Bloomberg, Billy Chasen, David Lieb, Drew Houston, Scott Heiferman and many other founders are here.

As the founder of Charity: Water, Scott Harrison has overseen substantial growth since launching his non-profit five years ago. He tells Founder Stories host, Chris Dixon that since 2006 Charity: Water has raised “about $50-million” and “helped 2-million people” gain access to clean water.

However, just eighteen months in things were a bit rocky. Harrison says the organization was dangerously off-balance and was “going to run out of money in five weeks.” Donors were supplying his non-profit with cash, but earmarking it specifically for water projects. Funding for staff was bone dry.

At the 11th hour, something unexpected happened. Bebo, founder Michael Birch and his wife agreed to meet with Harrison. Harrison says Birch “absolutely shocked me two days later by wiring a million bucks to the account with a kind of note, you know saying, here build the business.”

And build he has -

Harrison says Charity: Water has grown at “100% this year in a tough economy” but points out, “no one who works at Charity: Water is motivated by money.” He adds, “our shareholders [are] 8-year old school children in Bangladesh who aren’t in school because they’ve gotta get water for 4 hours in the morning and then do it again in the afternoon, so that keeps us going.”

Make sure to watch this entire video to hear more of Harrison’s insights and be sure to catch-up on episode I of this interview here. Episode III is coming up.

Past Founder Stories interviews featuring Mayor Bloomberg, Billy Chasen, Kevin O’Conner, Kevin Ryan and many other founders are here.

Scott Harrison is the founder of Charity: Water an organization he founded after waking up to the realization he was living a “dark, kind of decadent selfish existence” as a nightclub promoter whose life revolved around getting “people wasted for a living.”

After drenching himself in the party planning business for 10-years, Harrison sought out opportunities with a bit more substance, but tells Founder Stories host Chris Dixon he was ”turned down by every” humanitarian organization he applied to. Eventually he was accepted by Mercy Ships to volunteer in Africa – on the condition that he pay them $500 monthly, plus airfare.

During his two year journey as a photojournalist with Mercy Ships, Harrison says he ”learned that almost 80% of disease on the planet came from bad water.” The entire experience stirred something deep inside him and he tells Dixon at the age of 30 “I wanted to change the whole world and thought I could end the water crisis in my lifetime and I could also reinvent charity.”

Upon launching Charity: Water, Harrison notes he ”made the promise from day one to always use 100% of the public’s money to directly fund water projects and have a second bank account where I would kind of scrap to pay for our eventual staff, and our office and our operations.” He also made the promise to “never fund a water project unless we could be guaranteed to know that it existed.”

Guidelines established, Harrison raised his first “$15,000″ after throwing himself a birthday party that attracted 700 of his best friends who each paid a $20 cover. The funds went directly to Northern Uganda where he tells Dixon, “we built three wells in a refugee camp [and] we fixed three wells.”

Those wells were just the beginning of what has since become more than 3,500 Charity: Water projects around the world.

Harrison shares plenty more insights in this video. Make sure to watch the entire clip to hear them all, including his thoughts on building “an epic brand” and why he continued hitting the nightclubs at 4:00 am – long after leaving the party scene behind.

Episode II of this interview is coming up – until then check out past episodes of Founder Stories featuring leaders of Turntable.fm, Bump, Dropbox and many other startups here.

Having launched two companies that have gone in dramatically different directions; one’s secured $7-million in funding (Turntable.fm) and another ceases to exist (Stickybits), Turntable.fm’s Billy Chasen wraps his Founder Stories conversation by lending advice to other founders and discusses the biggest challenge he’s currently facing.

Chasen tells host Chris Dixon that finding and hiring those “A+ rockstars” is his toughest task. He says on the surface it seems simple, but “it is actually incredibly difficult and it takes a lot of time and it takes a lot of energy and you don’t want to make a mistake.” He compares the hiring process to dating, “you can’t be too forward, the other person if they are too forward it kind of scares you away, there is like this whole just kind of dance.”

Switching topics, Chasen says it’s key for founders to receive early feedback from consumers. His recommendation? “Try and get things out as early as possible. Figure out what your minimum viable product is and just get it out the door.” Hammering the point home he says, “whatever it takes, get that product out there.”

Make sure to watch the entire episode to hear additional insights, including traits Chasen says startups and employees share – and what founders should avoid when dealing with both.

Episode I of this interview is here and episode II is here.

Past Founder Stories episodes featuring Mayor Bloomberg, Fred Wilson, David Karp and many other leaders are here.