An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
You cannot do it alone. This was by far the greatest lesson in my life. You cannot fight a battle on every front. Some people are great developers, others are great marketers. Simply put, you can run quicker with two legs than one.
As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Timofey Drozhzhin.
Timofey is the Operations Manager for Momsdish, a food blog focused on bringing crazy easy recipes to the masses. He oversees everything from the backend of the website to the general day-to-day operations required to stay relevant in the competitive creator industry.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?
I am a first generation United States immigrant. My family came to America when I was a child on refugee status. We were a poor Siberian family, who lived on $15 a month during the nineties. And yes, we really did have eight months of straight winter. In some miraculous way my family was granted citizenship in a country that changed my entire world.
My journey was different, because starting out in a new country from scratch is a nightmare. We didn’t have anything. Our streets were the poorest, my school was the second-worst in the state, and there was this lack of understanding about how anything functioned. Every step had to be a step into unknown territory.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
You’re not important enough to worry about what people think of you. It was a quote I picked up a long time ago somewhere on the internet.
This concept really resonated with me because a huge part of success is to step out of your comfort zone. You have to believe in an idea nobody else believes in, be different and sometimes make a clown out of yourself for a few years until the idea takes off.
Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?
Most of my inspiration came from seeing how difficult both of my parents worked. As kids, my brother and I also had to work. On the weekends, we would do custodial work at a local church. And during summer vacations we would pick berries on a farm and each make about $30–35 dollars a day. It was this experience that developed an urge in me to work harder and reach for higher goals.
Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?
People naturally tend to get the most ideas in the areas they least understand and have least interest in the areas they most understand. Struggling to translate an idea into a business may be a sign that you need to get more familiarized with the field. The first and the greatest step is to get plugged into the community and pair up with the people walking the same journey.
Start by joining a convention, conference or evena local meetup in your field. Every year, there are hundreds of different conventions and conferences happening in every single industry. You’d be surprised how much opportunity and help is given away for free.
Often when people think of a new idea, they dismiss it saying someone else must have thought of it before. How would you recommend that someone go about researching whether or not their idea has already been created?
I remember a time an acquaintance of mine launched a subscription based product after securing an investment. The entire company paused the production of their original product because they were so intrigued by this new idea. They were so fervid at the thought, that during the two years of development, no one bothered to check up on the competition.
I kid you not, on the day of the launch, the head of the project Googled the concept and lo and behold — they found two other companies that were selling the same exact product, only more polished and less expensive. Turns out that while the company was developing the product, their competition launched a much better product. That month, the entire company’s crew was reduced to single digits.
I would categorize the steps in the following:
- Start with Google and see what’s out there.
- Familiarize yourself with the industry. Plug into a community or a convention and start talking to as many people as you can. They likely know something you don’t.
- Interview your potential customers. Even if the same product exists, it might have been poorly executed or not very approachable.
For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through, from when they think of the idea, until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? In particular, we’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.
When launching your first product, we have to understand that every venture in life starts with “school”. Product manufacturing and patent filing is no exception. You have to accept the fact that your first steps will likely not make you a millionaire, but they will leave you with an education.
Most of the time when you start a product, be it book publishing, product manufacturing or placing products into major retailers, you’ll need to find an agency that is willing to take you on. It’s very likely it’ll come down to profit sharing and little to no profit in gains.
Alternatively, you can find an individual to partner within the industry you’re targeting. With the partner, you’re gaining experience and contacts. There are so many hidden industry-specific tips and battles that you need to overcome. Only a truly product-centric specialist can assist you with navigating the process.
I cannot advise much on patents, aside from saying this — over the years we naturally developed a much closer relationship with our attorneys. It helps to be able to personally call our attorney for advice prior to investing into any type of patent or trademark. This helps us avoid unnecessary spending.
What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?
- You cannot do it alone. This was by far the greatest lesson in my life. You cannot fight a battle on every front. Some people are great developers, others are great marketers. Simply put, you can run quicker with two legs than one.
- Do not jump to other ideas. Keep pushing and perfecting the same idea. I opened up eight companies by the time I was 19 and all of them failed. Sometimes it takes 3–5 or more years of pushing the same wall before you start seeing any results.
- Choose your surroundings. Surround yourself with people that you want to be. Our minds are built to blend in to other people. Your surroundings will transform the way you think, your routines and help you build up your first steps.
- Think less, do more. Don’t overthink a situation and start doing something. For our company, working in teams and having a set schedule has really resulted in less time spent pondering and more time trying to meet the deadlines.
- A little crazy is ok. Don’t be afraid to be yourself. Be real, be human, step outside your comfort zone, because nobody likes a boring perfectionist.
Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?
What is something that makes you crave a delicious recipe? Probably hunger. I’m sure Momsdish would not exist if people were not hungry. So first, determine if the market is hungry enough for your product.
Find 5 to 10 people you picture as ideal buyers for your product and go interview them. Ask them how much they are willing to pay for your product. Go a notch further, and secure your first customers. If they’re not willing to pay for your product, either they are not hungry or the product is not appetizing enough.
Second, go after a partnership and don’t be greedy. Are you a developer? Find and partner with the best sales skills. Are you a marketer? Find a partner with the best development skills in the industry. The 50% revenue share does not compare to the potential growth you can accomplish with the product itself.
There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?
Fun fact: Back when we first started our food blog, we used to share the food recipes that we thought were great and hoped they would miraculously go viral. Little did we know, there was an actual tool to list the recipes people are looking for. It wasn’t until we hired a consultant that truly helped us shape the way we conduct the research and publish content that our recipes began to perform stronger across the board.
That said, no one person should ever execute an idea on their own.
Ideas appear easier to accomplish than they really are. When most people see our food blog, they assume it’s just one person spending a few hours a day cooking and posting recipes. Little do they realize that it’s an intense industry which takes a full-time team of seven people and a bunch of contracted researchers, web operators, writers, social media strategists, marketers, photographers, public relations, and ad agencies to make things happen…oh, and let’s not forget the cooking.
I most definitely recommend a consultant, but before that, I recommend plugging into the community in the industry. That way you don’t just hire any consultant, but a one that is recommended by the industry.
What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?
I’m all for bootstrapping. I also don’t own a credit card — maybe there’s some correlation there?
When building up a business, my wife and I experienced greater value in developing a proof of concept than finding startup capital. Money doesn’t make business happen, demand for the product does. In most instances, it really shouldn’t take more than several willing people and a small budget to test the waters.
That said, venture capital is something you should only consider if you’re already sailing the waters, struggling to keep up with the demand for your product.
Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?
One thing nobody told us is when you run a food website, you automatically become a coach and a therapist. It’s not exactly what we signed up for, but it’s true.
It blows my mind to think of the number of messages we have received in the past from people going through anything from relationship issues to depression to struggles with their health. For some reason, food really opens people up and they feel comfortable to share what’s going on in their lives.
Today, my wife and I use our platform to love on people and be real with them. Any warmth that we pass along radiates into bigger circles. I think this alone makes all the hard work worth it.
You are an inspiration to a great many people. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
Before my dad passed away last year, he left one note that stayed close to me. He said — you cannot take anything with you, but just one thing, your actions.
Anything you do, any business you open, will leave a print on somebody’s life. Choose a business that not only makes financial sense, but will leave a better world for the people coming after you.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.
Sergei Guriev. He is probably one of the greatest economists of our time. He inspires me because of his integrity and willingness to confront corruption, while breaking down the economy into a language everyone can understand. Although I still use a dictionary throughout his lectures, I can sit through his two hour class and walk out feeling like I watched the greatest movie of all time.
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.
Thank you for allowing me to share my journey with you!
Making Something From Nothing: Timofey Drozhzhin Of Momsdish On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
