Stephan Serrano Email & Phone Number

Omaha, Nebraska

Like many founders without a team, in the beginning we did everything - product creation, customer discovery, marketing, etc. However, alongside my brother and co-founder, we focused on clarifying our purpose of community and establishing the values that enable our team to fulfill that purpose. Today, culture is our biggest strength and source of competitive advantage. It allows us to build friendships, and a space that is welcoming, warm, and vibrant for our customers. Our leadership development and resulting SOPs empower our team to oversee all aspects of the business, save finances which we continue to do ourselves.

Lincoln, Ne

Like 402, my primary focus was on building culture, establishing values, hiring, training and establishing a leadership development program. Alongside leadership, oversaw product development and codified into SOPs. I was also responsible for iterating the business model, including navigating a law change that prohibited indoor smoking. Ultimately, we were unable to find product-market fit after the law change and closed. It was a painful, fun, exceedingly educational ride.

Lincoln, Nebraska

Created and iterated multi-channel inbound marketing campaigns, including Facebook Ads, landing page and SEO, guest blogging, and optimizing free trial-period. Conducted direct sales through live demos.

Worked to change the way college admissions functioned from a top-down to a peer-to-peer model. My primary role was heading customer development, initiating multiple interviews, surveys and experiments to understand parents, students, principals and college admission officers. I also oversaw the expansion of our team from 0 to 45 Ivy League mentors. In early 2011 I left the company to my co-founder to open Hookah 402 with my brother.

When I arrived, the Netter Center was evaluating programs through a massive excel sheet and liberal use of pivot tables and VLookup. I built a relational database and utilized SQL queries to dramatically simplify and expediate the process, as well as unearth actionable data for use in grant proposals and management.I left the Netter Center to open Ivy Ally.