About

Hi. I’m a former startup guy (Zappos, etc.) and early-stage VC (VTF Capital). Now I’m focused on industrial real estate and long-term operating companies.

I live in a triangle between Austin, Raleigh, and Northwest Montana.

You can email me at zw at zgware dot com or DM me on Twitter. Here are some of my favorite readings.

I write my friends occasionally (sort of but not really monthly) to share what I’ve been up to, get it here.

Now

Work

Founded and lead Freehouse Partners, a real estate private equity firm that acquires and develops industrial real estate, developable industrial land, and assets that power American industry across the Industrial Heartland.

Co-owner of Kollective and Apres Whitefish.

Occasional startup investor. Portfolio

Not Work

Competitive hybrid athlete.

Uncle, aspiring river guide, wakesurfer, skier, certified freediver, hunter (there’s a pattern here).

Health, longevity, and biology nerd. More on that here.

In The Past

Venture Capital

VTF Capital Managing Partner. ~85M AUM seed-stage venture fund focused mostly on ecommerce tech. Select investments include: SpaceX, Mizzen + Main, Stedi, Zipline, Ring, Asana, and more.

Real Estate

Downtown Project Las Vegas. Acquisition and mixed use redevelopment of a 41-acre urban core area. Co-founded alongside former Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh. Led real estate development and government partnerships. (NY Times, Fortune, Wired)

Here’s a walking interview I did about it and a LONG talk I gave at Google (I was painfully hungover)
Zappos.com. Developed the the 4.5 acre, four building Zappos.com LEED Gold HQ in Downtown Las Vegas. (BI profile).

Startups

Head of Product at Zappos.com (acquired by Amazon). Led product management for our full tech stack, plus site content development and business operations.
CEO of NYC-based Pilotworks. Provider of shared commercial kitchens for food co’s across six states. Join as turnaround CEO in 2018.
Founded Shift, a Las Vegas transportation startup in partnership with Tesla. We shut it down in 2015. (Washington Post)
Co-founded multi-unit coworking company Work In Progress (acquired by Let’s Rally).

Way Before That

Led retail and ecommerce at The Republic of Tea.
Led sales and distribution in the Southeast US for a DC-based gourmet food importer and distributor.
Economics and computer science at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, TN, high school at Woodberry Forest School in Virginia.
Held lots of random jobs including working at Starbucks, managing a convenience store, being an electrician’s assistant, picking tobacco on my family’s farm and working in a Walmart meat department for two days.

Old Media

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