"When I was 13, I had a side hustle building websites for local businesses. This was the 1990s. Building a site meant weeks on a dial-up connection, hand-coding HTML line by line, and breaking layouts because you missed a single character. If I made $2,000 in a summer, it was because I gave up nearly every waking hour to do it. My income was capped by how fast I could work."
"Around that same time, my grandfather gave me advice that I still come back to: focus on building something people actually need. He had spent his life running a real business, serving real customers, and he had little patience for trends that didn't solve a clear problem. Years later, when I was exploring different product ideas, I ran them by him. Some were flashy. One was even sneakers. He listened politely."
At 13, built websites for local businesses on dial-up, hand-coding HTML and trading nearly every waking hour for income capped by work speed. A grandfather advised focusing on building things people actually need, grounded in running a real business and serving customers. Years later, chose air filters because they solve a persistent, clear need. Now running Filterbuy, a $260 million domestic manufacturer and shipper of air filters. That experience demonstrated that effort scales poorly while leverage compounds. AI represents a change in who gets leverage, shifting advantages toward practical, non‑tech businesses rather than primarily replacing workers.
Read at Fortune
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