Startup: The Puzzle Maker, with CEO and Founder Kaylin Marcotte

The Sydcast

Episode Summary:

As It Happens: Follow puzzle-maker Kaylin Marcotte as she builds her startup JIGGY during Covid – growing, pivoting, and getting her first big break. In two conversations over four months, we get an inside look at how Kaylin and her startup manage early growth while learning both what she needs to do next and who she is as an entrepreneur and a person.

Sydney Finkelstein

Syd Finkelstein is the Steven Roth Professor of Management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. He holds a Master’s degree from the London School of Economics and a Ph.D. from Columbia University. Professor Finkelstein has published 25 books and 90 articles, including the bestsellers Why Smart Executives Fail and Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent, which LinkedIn Chairman Reid Hoffman calls the “leadership guide for the Networked Age.” He is also a Fellow of the Academy of Management, a consultant and speaker to leading companies around the world, and a top 25 on the Global Thinkers 50 list of top management gurus. Professor Finkelstein’s research and consulting work often relies on in-depth and personal interviews with hundreds of people, an experience that led him to create and host his own podcast, The Sydcast, to uncover and share the stories of all sorts of fascinating people in business, sports, entertainment, politics, academia, and everyday life.

Kaylin Marcotte

Kaylin is the founder & CEO of JIGGY, a direct-to-consumer jigsaw puzzle brand on a mission to modernize and elevate the humble jigsaw, and support female artists around the world. Prior to launching Jiggy, Kaylin founded Village Strategies, a marketing consultancy, and was the first employee at theSkimm, running its community marketing, social media and Skimm’bassadors. Kaylin holds a BA in political science and economics from Barnard College. She lives in Brooklyn, NY and spends her free time doing jigsaw puzzles of course, and running a 30-day plastic-free challenge program with her sister, Mackenzie.

Insights from this Episode

• How JIGGY works
• What the science behind playing puzzles is
• The differences of between being a female founder and male founder \
• Kaylin’s entrepreneur journey and what inspired her to found JIGGY
• The community building process of JIGGY
• What the JIGGY Puzzle Club is
• Kaylin’s experience of being on SharkTank

Quotes from the Show:

• “[About entrepreneurship] I thought it was a much more straightforward process and that, you know, you have an idea, you wanna get something made, there’s these factories, they make it and you pay them and that’s that”- Kaylin Marcotte in “The Sydcast” [15:13]
• “[About Syd’s experience on a class called ‘Art & Money’] The ways in which the art market works are really unusual, and there’s a bit of wild west here”- Sydney Finkelstein in “The Sydcast” [21:57]
• “[About women in the art world] Gender representation it’s a big issue in terms of gallery space, museum space” Kaylin Marcotte in “The Sydcast” [24:33]
• “[About dealing with competitors in the market] As your business grows and people hear about you more you will have copycats, and what I’ve learned about all of this is that you can’t avoid people copying you and if you have to sue them to keep them away is a really bad way to live, you don’t have enough money to keep doing that”- Sydney Finkelstein in “The Sydcast” [26:05]
• “[About her experience on Shark Tank] The idea of just releasing control and not even knowing until it’s live on TV, what that edit is gonna be, you know, you don’t see anything before hand, it’s definitely nerve wracking” Kaylin Marcotte in “The Sydcast” [48:51]
• “[About the founder syndrome] What’s next, what’s the new shiny opportunity or what else should we do and finally I had an advisor and he was like yes of course like innovator die, always thinking of those things, but also like part of scaling is the less sexy, just you do what you’ve already done 10 times over ”- Kaylin Marcotte in “The Sydcast” [1:00:21]

Stay Connected:

Sydney Finkelstein

Website: http://thesydcast.com

LinkedIn: Sydney Finkelstein

Twitter: @sydfinkelstein

Facebook: The Sydcast

Instagram: The Sydcast

Kaylin Marcotte

Website: https://jiggypuzzles.com/

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/jiggypuzzles/

Shark Tank: Kaylin Marcotte on the Shark Tank

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This episode was produced and managed by Podcast Laundry.