Tyler Churchill
"We love being trusted partners at the earliest stages - when things are hard and scary, that's where we thrive."
Ozark
Acquired, Invest Like the Best, Modern Finance
ESPN, Spotify
I love working shoulder to shoulder piecing together strategy and defining the underlying tactics that will make a company successful. It’s hard work for founding teams; having the opportunity to get in the trenches with them and take some of that work on is the best, most satisfying part of this crazy job.
I spent a summer in Wilmington, NC filming the fourth season of Eastbound and Down. Taking those stories to the grave.
I have been working with software startups at the intersection of product and go-to-market for almost a decade. I have operating experience shaping sales strategy from nascence to growth at EverString, a venture-backed predictive analytics solution for sales and marketing teams (acquired by ZoomInfo), and TechValidate, a bootstrapped customer intelligence company (acquired by SurveyMonkey). Both were exciting opportunities that had their own challenges. I seek to bring the lessons from those experiences to every team I back, helping them navigate the idea maze, identify early leverage, and see around corners to avoid setbacks and mistakes when possible. Getting in the trenches with these founders to work through hard problems and elusive questions, oftentimes with no “right” answers, is the best and most fulfilling part of this job.
Before entering the world of software, I worked across the Motion Pictures + Business Development teams at Creative Artists Agency, a place that helped me develop a service-centered approach to helping founders build a lasting business.
I attended USC for undergrad and earned an MBA from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business. I live in Seattle with my wife, our very mobile set of twins, and our 90 lb. Great Pyranese rescue with zero sense of spatial awareness or her size. I’m a die hard 49er fan who is tricked into believing “this could be the year” annually.
"Every founder needs an investor that's in the trenches alongside them. Someone with a pulse on the industry. Someone to share ideas with and get an immediate reply, whether it's first thing in the morning or last thing at night. Someone who can step in and fight when it's needed most. We're proud to be backed by Bonfire and incredibly fortunate to call Tyler a member of our team."
Gil Hildebrand, CEO & Co-Founder, Gilded
