David Pedelty

Venture Architect & Full-Stack Operator. Partner at BraveHart.
Developing National Brands (IHG, Choice, Scooter's, Hawaiian Bros) across the Heartland.

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

@kidpakerot Warmr

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

The businesses winning with AI right now don't have the biggest budgets.

They have leaders who can answer one question:

"What's the process that eats your team's time and still gets screwed up?"

AI doesn't fix what you haven't diagnosed. Start with the pain, not the tool.

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

@HartTroy @bvonnahme

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

We started a hotel development company in late 2019.

Three partners: 🏨 Third-generation hotelier 🏦 Former bank COO with a Master's in Finance ⚙️ 20+ years of operational experience

Within weeks, 7 projects in the pipeline. A meeting at one of the largest hotel chains in the world.

Then COVID hit. 🧵

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

The timing was catastrophic. The team wasn't.

You don't get to pick the timing. You get to pick the people you build with and the speed at which you adapt.

We picked well.

Full story → https://t.co/x10isyT9y6

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

The first post on The Ground Up — our company blog — tells the whole story:

https://t.co/a0s52NCWMd

The full builder's story: https://t.co/5jTjl0Xxmu
See the site: https://t.co/6WOPYebMcQ
The AI platform: https://t.co/HpkIcEqCAK

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

We had 4 websites for one company. None of them talked to each other. Catering leads lived on sticky notes. Investors got PDF attachments.

So I killed all four and built one site with a brain. Here's what happened:

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

Phase 2 (launching soon): a custom catering CRM built directly into the site. No Salesforce. No HubSpot. Just: who called, what do they need, and did someone follow up.

Phase 3: full investor portal. The invest page is live now. The portal with login, docs, and tracking is next.

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

Good managers hit their numbers.

Great managers rent a U-Haul at midnight.

Go Illini. 🏀

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

Illinois just made the Final Four for the first time since 2005.

Watching that game brought back a story I've never shared.

I was the GM of Best Buy in Champaign, IL — Fighting Illini country.

Back to school was our Super Bowl. 🧵

[David Pedelty @dpedelty]

Made it back to Champaign by 9 AM Friday. Product on the floor. Ready to sell.

24+ hours awake. No one in corporate knew. No one sent help. No one told us to do it.