Sandro is the founder & chief executive officer of Sanzo, the 1st Asian-inspired sparkling water. Sandro graduated from Villanova University with a degree in chemical engineering and began his career as a nuclear engineer at Exelon Corporation. He previously worked on the credit derivatives trading floor at J.P. Morgan and most recently served as head of growth and then chief-of-staff at Bombfell, an online personal styling service. He launched Sanzo in 2019 with a mission of bridging cultures by connecting people to authentic flavors.

Key Takeaways

01 When building a brand, invest in communities

When beginning to build a brand, Sandro explains one of his approaches was to focus on building communities and putting in ‘sweat equity’ - that by investing in people and communities, they might just invest back into him.

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02 Understand that being a founder doesn’t mean doing everything yourself

One of the earlier lessons that Sandro learned was how to lead as a founder without doing every task. At first, he juggled several roles to get Sanzo off the ground before realizing he needed to build efficiencies for the long-term scalable growth of the company.

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03 Find peers who understand your successes and challenges

Sandro discusses the importance of working with people you can commiserate with and finding mentors that can keep you looking up and ahead at what the growth path might look like.

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04 Stay true to your values and continue to invest in communities

One aspect that Sandro focuses on is how to stay grounded as a team and as a company, to not get caught up in hype, and to make sure to stay true to values in order to keep your brand moving forward and growing stronger.

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05 Look towards methods and paths that stand the test of time

In making sure to not get caught up in short-term hype, Sandro discusses looking at the long-term success of other brands and how to build connections through community and emotion that will stand the test of time.