Protected: Lowe’s CONSTRUCT Demo Day | Future Of Consumer-Driven Merchandising

| 4 min readExecutive Summary Mike Maples, Jr., founding partner of Floodgate and one of Silicon Valley’s most successful seed investors, doesn’t play the conventional game of venture capital. He doesn’t look for small wins or safe bets. Instead, he seeks out what he calls “Thunder Lizards” — radical, future-shaping startups that redefine categories or create entirely new […]

| 4 min readWhy the real cost in retail isn’t operations — it’s making and moving products no one wants. Introduction: The Unspoken Cost Crisis in Retail In today’s volatile retail landscape, many leaders obsess over optimizing operations, reducing logistics costs, and streamlining marketing spend. But what if the biggest cost drain lies elsewhere? What if the true […]