The Perfect fit for a Misfit
On the winding path of entrepreneurialism, Biro Florin's story stands out as a beacon of resilience, adaptability, and the relentless pursuit of value. His journey from a teenager in Romania facing financial hardships to starting Misfit Founders in the UK is a testament to what it means to be a true misfit entrepreneur.
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The Beginning: A Need to Provide Value
From an early age, Biro was driven by an insatiable need to provide value, a principle that has guided him throughout his life. Despite facing financial challenges, including wearing the same pair of jeans to school every day for a year, Biro's mindset was not of scarcity but of opportunity. His mother's pragmatic advice to work for his wants led him to his first job, which was not about toys, but about earning for his necessities, including cigarettes.
The Misfit Entrepreneur
The turning point in Biro's life came with the internet. While his peers used their computers for games, Biro saw it as a window to the world, a competitive advantage that he was determined to explore. His first venture into entrepreneurship was inspired by a gap he identified in the market for hair extensions, leading him to start his first company at 18. This experience not only marked the beginning of his entrepreneurial journey but also shaped his identity as a business owner, deeply influenced by his father's entrepreneurial spirit.
Biro's journey was fraught with trials and errors, from creating various SaaS businesses that didn't take off to making ends meet by developing his engineering skills on freelance platforms. Yet, these experiences were not failures but stepping stones, each teaching him invaluable lessons and edging him closer to his true calling.
Misfit Founders
The inception of Misfit Founders was serendipitous, sparked by his partner's observation of the immense value Biro provided through his mentorship to other founders. This led to a deep introspection and the realization that his personal brand and mission could be encapsulated in one word: misfit. This realization was a reflection of his own journey, marked by failures and a constant feeling of being out of place, yet always pushing forward.
Misfit Founders is not just a business; it is a manifestation of Biro's desire to share his learnings, to provide a platform for those who, like him, does not fit the traditional mold of entrepreneurship. It iss about creating a community where unconventional entrepreneurs can find guidance, support, and validation for their unique paths.
A Legacy of Impact
Today, Biro's focus remains on making a positive impact, leveraging his experiences and insights to empower others. His story is a powerful reminder that true value lies not in never failing but in rising every time we fall, in turning our misfits into our strengths. Biro Florin's journey is more than just an entrepreneurial success story; it's a narrative of personal growth, resilience, and the unwavering belief in the power of providing value.
In the grand tapestry of entrepreneurial stories, Biro's stands as a vivid thread, highlighting the beauty of embracing our misfit sides and the impact we can create when we channel our unique challenges into opportunities for growth and contribution. Misfit Founders is not just his legacy; it's a beacon for all who dare to dream, to fail, and to succeed unconventionally.
00:00:00:03 - 00:00:23:00
Biro Florin
I can get quite obsessive. I can't stand still if I spend a week without providing value. I'm losing somehow.
00:00:23:02 - 00:00:53:12
Biro Florin
I am, bro. Just bro like Oprah. I've been told this recently because I introduce myself as beer all the time and people say, Is it just beer like Oprah? No, I'm originally from Romania and I've been living in the UK for 12 years now. I started Misfit Founders in July. The reason why I started it. Well, first of all, it wasn't my idea.
00:00:53:14 - 00:01:22:13
Biro Florin
It was my partners idea. Since I started my business. I've been talking with so many founders, mentoring, advice, this stuff, and my partner, Nikki overheard a couple of times these Zoom calls. I said, Man, you're sharing and getting so much value out of these calls, knowledge and such. You should share that with more people. And then the whole misfit concept.
00:01:22:13 - 00:01:53:07
Biro Florin
I ran a workshop with my marketing team on my personal brand because I have all of these thoughts scattered everywhere. This compacted into a word in a sense that I can pursue as this meets my persona. And that word was misfit because, you know, I failed so many businesses and I've always felt that I'm out of place. So I was the perfect fit.
00:01:53:09 - 00:02:26:02
Biro Florin
My parents are divorced and we were living with my mum. My mum didn't had any money, so I would go to high school. It was like I was 1213 at that point with the same pair of jeans every single day for an entire year. My mum would would wash my clothes in the evening and have them dry out by morning for me to take my jeans to school, basically being in social networks and so on.
00:02:26:02 - 00:02:53:16
Biro Florin
I really wanted to fit in and be able to afford things to buy. The other reason was I was a smoker and my my mum knew that I was smoking and she would give me a ration of cigarets Cigarets And I kept on saying, Can you give me more cigarets? And she she told me, if you want and need more cigarets, you need to go get a job.
00:02:53:18 - 00:03:07:09
Biro Florin
So that was, you know, some people have these stories. They're like their parents send them to work in order to buy toys. My mum sent me to work to be able to buy myself Cigarets.
00:03:07:11 - 00:03:42:01
Biro Florin
The internet was just kicking in at that point of just starting. So I bought a computer. Eventually, after a couple of salaries from my warehouse job, my friends would use their computers for video games and then they would just go out and party and have fun. Teenagers, right? I was on my computer 24 seven, and I felt that I had a competitive advantage to a lot of people in my groups, in my network, my friendship networks and so on, because I was going deep into the Internet.
00:03:42:03 - 00:04:19:24
Biro Florin
I found Alibaba dot com and at that point I had a couple of friends of mine, girls that were telling me about this hair extensions thing, and I thought, interesting. So what would you pay for that? Well, I pay around €200 for for a set. I was like, okay. So I went to Alibaba and I started searching. How much does it cost to import like a strand of hair, like one piece, one product, and it was $30.
00:04:20:01 - 00:04:41:15
Biro Florin
So I thought to myself, this seems like a brilliant business for me to do. And then as soon as I turned 18, I opened the company. And I remember I was so proud, like because in my country they would give you the stamp to this company stamp. And I remember just playing with that stamp. It was such a proud moment for me.
00:04:41:17 - 00:05:13:20
Biro Florin
My dad has been an entrepreneur and like he owned stores and I grew up seeing my dad dealing with money and doing business and going on business trips and so on. So I think that kind of instilled that image in my head where as soon as I started doing business and I opened a company and I had a stamp and everything, I felt like I was in a sense my dad psychologically right.
00:05:13:20 - 00:05:37:10
Biro Florin
I felt that I was a grown up now. At one point I realized I should probably put together a website for my brand because it was it was growing. It was getting significant. I started seeing all of these e-commerce shops happening and I'm like, How hard can this be? And that's when I started getting into BHP, my school.
00:05:37:10 - 00:06:16:08
Biro Florin
How can I have more intelligent features on my website? It was very exciting for me. So I learned doing that and that was my gateway into into technology. When I came to UK, I went to Scotland to Oban first. I had a couple of friends that were living there and I just slumbered out for four, six months. They were my friends were living at a hostel and I was making beds and cleaning the hostel for for a bed per day and breakfast.
00:06:16:10 - 00:06:45:24
Biro Florin
I said, I'm going to continue to develop my engineering skills because I liked that area and I'm going to become an engineer. I found out about Freelancer, Dotcom, Upwork or whatever it was called back then and I realized, I can actually list myself as an engineer on these websites and make money. So then I started doing that, and then I had an opportunity to move into London.
00:06:46:04 - 00:07:13:04
Biro Florin
I had a closet size bedroom, so I didn't had any place to work on my computer and so on. So I occupied like a round table in the living room and I would have my computer there. And I spent three years trying to start and grow SaaS businesses. I've tried to chat widgets, social media widgets, hosting companies. I've tried everything.
00:07:13:06 - 00:08:05:08
Biro Florin
And then eventually I decided I'm just going to get a job. I was working in London. I've done that for four or five years. After three years, I met my current life partner and we decided that it was a good time for us to start our own little thing. But it was this failure to get a job to starting the business that I started that got me and my partner on makes it, which in turn allowed me to double down on this, have an impact in the world type of attitude that I have today with misfit founders.
00:08:05:10 - 00:08:35:10
Biro Florin
I can get quite obsessive about topics that I'm interested in. I can't stand still. I feel like if if I spend a week without providing value, I'm losing somehow. Today, what motivates me is having a positive impact in the world and seeing others benefiting from from something that I had, something to do with.
