Manolo Atala built his company Fairplay by navigating several industries, leveraging storytelling and a deep understanding of numbers.
Manolo Atala built his company Fairplay by navigating several industries, leveraging storytelling and a deep understanding of numbers. His experience highlights the importance of resilience, iterating until success, and mastering financial models for founders.
music it's equals to math and I love numbers and I love to crunch numbers to be able to learn music as fast as I needed because I got into a band that it was already created and they already have songs and I didn't know how to play an instrument so I need to learn extremely fast and that shape your head very differently and very creatively those two elements help me down the road in my career how I see numbers how I design numbers in my head it was because of the music [Music] all righty hello everyone and welcome to the deal maker show so today we have a really awesome founder you know a Founder from Mexico actually you know that he's done a lot of good stuff you know he's been an angel for quite a bit and now he's riding this rocket ship that we're going to be talking about but again praise yourself for talking about storytelling talking about how to master your numbers how to enter a
space that you have that you have no idea you know what's it about and having that humility uh and again tremendous story that we have ahead of us so without further Ado let's welcome our guest today Manolo atala welcome to the show hello man thank you very much Alex it's it's a pleasure and an honor to be here man thank you so it's our honor to have you with us so give us a walk through memory Lan because you were born in Mexico and raised there so how was life growing up for you well it was it was pretty regular pretty common uh I actually I really really like Mexico City I was born and raised here i' never you know live in any other city or country even though that I've been traveling a lot in the last probably 20 years I've been always here I mean the uh the ecosystem of Mexico you know is just it's just incredible I know that for you you know especially something that has helped you
as a Founder you know later on and perhaps also at at helping other Founders there in the in the region is storytelling at what point you know would you say that you really understood you know the importance of Storytelling and ultimately how that combined with trust you know could be magical that's that's that's an amazing question actually for me storytelling is extremely important throughout your career in general you don't need to be a Founder you you need storytelling for a lot of stuff even though you're I don't know part of a corporate business a big Corporation or whatever you are trying to say storytelling it's very very important so for me you know knowing how to effectively um sell yourself and what you are trying to accomplish by aligning your words with your actions that creates trust you know you need to be very very careful with what you are saying and doing because trust
is the the most important asset you need to have as an entrepreneur you know you need to be you need to have a lot of a very good reputation in the market because you know you're that's the way you're going to fundraise and do a lot of things a lot of people are going to are going to you know willing to jump into your company to follow your vision because they trust you or your reputation so the storytelling and the narrative you gave to the market and outside you know publicly it's very very very important so don't underestimate that I hear you on that I mean without trust Nothing Else Matters right so I mean trust is really the fundamental building block to any type of relationship now I think in your case you know too is 21 21 is when the Venture world started knocking on your door I mean how how did that happen that's quite early man that's 2021 you mean the the party year no for
everyone not the party year that was quite a party year when you were 21 years sold you know that's really when when it was time for you to to to take ownership of your own future yes so that that was the first time that at that age I started my my first business it was an advertising business that I saw in UK uh back in the 2000 and and basically I just jumped from you know starting and doing know University uh I was a Dropout uh I'm going to be extremely clear with you I was not a Dropout they actually expelled me from the University for bad behavior and and I I decided okay if I can study because I I was SP from the University I'm going to run a business I'm going to launch a business so I I just started that and that was like a that activated something in my head in my mind that I actually I I can't do this even though that it was a not a a great business or I needed to shut it down
the business that created this first Spark in my head saying okay I can do this I can do it again and again till I succeed right so that that was very important in my career I mean you you did it a few times you know before you went out with music full-time you know because right before music you were also on the creative side with a video production company which is not so sexy as perhaps what you're doing today but full-time music I guess one of the things that music gives you it reminds me you know to what Steve Jobs said that he would love to hire Engineers that have a music background uh for whatever reason you know I think it gives you an edge but I guess tell us about this music you know side of you that that chapter to in your life and and how do you think it helps you to see things differently I think that actually I enjoyed that uh stage of my of my life a lot because it gave
me like room like brain space to think about like what what I wanted for the future but at the same time it shaped my head mathematically you know it's it's like interesting because music it's equals to math and I love numbers and I love to crunch numbers and to be able to learn music as fast as I needed because I I got into a band that it was already you know created and they already have songs and I didn't know how to play an instrument so I need to to actually uh learn extremely fast and that shap your head very differently and very creatively so that those two elements help me down the road in my career like probably 15 years after I I I I see now that you know music helped me creatively and mathematically in in in my career how I see numbers how I you know design numbers in my head it was because of the music so so one thing here that is in incredible is you got a taste of
Entrepreneurship you got a taste of uh you know having your own destiny at your fingertips and and having control over that and then all of a sudden after your music stint you go at it with with with joining the corporate world I mean that that's quite the switch I needed cash I need you know a paycheck so actually it was it was very funny because uh when I was doing like full-time m music or musician full-time job um I remember perfectly going like you know from bar to bar asking for a for a job like you know in the in the door or in the bar or whatever like a waiter position whatever I just needed like some cash to survive right so I I remember looking for jobs uh at that moment and I said like hey this is unsustainable my personality asks for more like I'm I'm a very ambitious person and I said like isn't it GNA be sustainable to be a musician full-time or to ask for for these kind of
jobs so I need to go to the corporate world and and you know to maximize my skill set uh even though that I didn't have a career um I needed to maximize my my skill set in order for me to have a paycheck and then do whatever I wanted that was the the first like thought that I had back in 2004 2003 well well one thing that that that led you know one thing led to the next and and you ended up launching um there group on in Mexico you know one thing that really gave you a superpower which I think it it really serves a lot you know which is understanding people's motivations and ultimately how you can use that in order to hire the best so tell us about this experience of Groupon uh you know launching that going through that journey and then also really learning about people that's amazing man just going a little bit back to to after music full-time I got into a a b Corporation an advertising
Corporation actually it was was the biggest entertainment company in Mexico after this entertainment company I went to Yahoo uh for the sales team I was a sales manager in in Yahoo in 200 I think eight or nine and I had a I had a two people team like it was we we're just a three people team and it was very efficient it was very clear who needed to do what uh the responsibilities and everything and then suddenly I went from Yahoo to Groupon to launching Groupon in 2010 uh and you know my needs my people needs were for around 150 people so I then started to hire like you know like crazy uh at the very beginning when we launched and then I needed to learn how to do that because if you want to create a successful business it's impossible to do it alone there's a lot of people that thinks that oh I'm I'm I'm you know uh smart enough or capable enough to build this on my own and I'm just going
to have…