How a Forbes 30 Under 30 Founder Built a Company From a Beach House
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Welcome to Episode 203 of the Mile 40 Podcast! Bishoy sits down with Christian Brown, a Forbes 30 Under 30 entrepreneur and co-founder of Glewee, for a conversation about ambition, resilience, and what it takes to build a company in an industry that has changed rapidly over the last decade.
Christian traces his path from a small town on the North Shore of Massachusetts, where he grew up as an only child, to getting a working permit on his 15th birthday, running an e-commerce brand out of his college dorm room, and landing a full scholarship to study advertising at DePaul.
He talks about the early days of influencer marketing, the COVID call that sent him to a Florida beach house with his future co-founder, and how a business plan modeled on a high school paper became the foundation for Glewee, a platform connecting brands and creators.
Along the way, Christian opens up about the cease and desist that arrived on launch day, the philosophy of throwing as much spaghetti at the wall as possible, and the day he had to let people go on his 26th birthday.
Whether you’re an aspiring entrepreneur, social media enthusiast, or just love a story about turning setbacks into comebacks, this conversation offers inspiring insights and practical wisdom from a leader who’s building tomorrow’s digital marketplace today.
Christian Brown is a Forbes 30 Under 30 entrepreneur, Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer of Glewee, and a Creator Economy & Influencer Marketing leader with 10+ years of experience across entrepreneurship, e-commerce, technology, and digital marketing. After entering the industry at just 17 years old, Christian has spent his career building companies, working with creators, and helping brands understand how social influence drives modern consumer behavior. His perspectives on the Creator Economy have been featured in and contributed to publications including Forbes, Adweek, Digiday, Entrepreneur, and many more.
Christian Co-Founded Glewee in 2020 with a vision to build the infrastructure connecting brands and creators at scale. Today, Glewee is an all-in-one influencer marketing platform connecting 5,000+ brands with 50,000+ opted-in creators and influencers for influencer marketing, UGC, gifting, and affiliate campaigns across social media. Since inception, Glewee has facilitated and paid out millions of dollars in partnerships to influencers and creators while helping brands streamline how they source, hire, manage, pay, and measure creator relationships.
What started as an idea scribbled on sticky notes meant to solve a problem that both brands and influencers were both having around Christian and his network has quickly evolved into a technology and marketplace business supporting campaigns for emerging companies and global organizations including Volkswagen Group, Evian, Polymarket, Sony Music, and Guinness World Records.
As a member of the Forbes 30 Under 30 class in Marketing & Advertising, Christian has become a recognized voice on influencer marketing, social commerce, entrepreneurship, Gen Z, and the Creator Economy.
Today, Christian leads Glewee's go-to-market strategy across enterprise partnerships, sales, marketing, brand growth, and strategic expansion while continuing to build, write, speak, and share his perspective on the rapidly evolving Creator Economy.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction
01:29 Growing up in Danvers, Massachusetts
03:23 Being an only child and a startup household
07:39 Getting a working permit and a first job at 15
12:58 Where the fuel came from: early social media
21:20 High school business, college, and DePaul
27:49 Shots on net: handling failure
32:12 Running a brand out of a dorm room
36:19 The birth of Gluey
38:23 Covid, a beach house, and the first business plan
40:03 How the platform works
43:39 The biggest challenges: cease and desist and layoffs
48:09 What ambition means today
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