Community & Guest List

Jon is currently the CEO of YouNow, a top-50 social media app by revenue. He is a turnaround and growth specialist who was previously the CEO of Finder US, which he steered from infancy to 8-figure revenue, and SVP at Chicken Soup for the Soul, where he spearheaded their social media audience growth from 300,000 people to over a billion. He was also a director at 1-800-flowers, where he completed 17 M&A transactions and grew the international business from $1 million to $40 million in revenue, and he was the general manager for Allmenus, which he led from having 1,000 restaurants to over a quarter of a million. He has also written and published two books, and still finds time to go snowboarding during the winter.

Robin Rinearson is a retired optometrist who specialized in developmental disorders. She has opened an ice cream parlor employing around 20 individuals who are differently abled along with several conventionally abled people. The business model recognizes that it sometimes takes help from a job coach or a team member to get things done. The entire staff is expected to learn all of the integral pieces of working in this business.

Rob Pitingolo founded Trip Hacks DC to share his best tips and travel hacks with Washington, DC visitors. He hosts the Trip Hacks DC podcast and YouTube channel and is a tour guide who loves to show travelers around the nation’s capital once they arrive. Trip Hacks DC tours has hosted over a thousand guests since it launched.

As an accomplished strategic business development, marketing, and operations professional, Kim Bryden has focused her expertise on the food & beverage industry, and supporting small business growth at-large, for more than a decade. Her management experience ranges from working in and alongside governmental agencies, to increasing sales as Top Fortune 200 retail management, to deploying agile, innovative marketing and partnership strategies at food tech start-ups. Since founding Cureate LLC in 2014, Kim continues to build out this multi-sector, public-private partnership approach. Whether its working with Anchor Institutions in Baltimore City on localizing procurement, to reimagining retail experiences for corner store owners to grocery chains, to developing educational entrepreneurship curricula for economic development agencies, Cureate takes a 360-degree approach — and that growth mindset comes from Kim and her passion for learning.

Chris is the Founder of Lionshare Partners, a trusted financial planning firm. He draws on a decade of multidisciplinary experience to help high net worth individuals and small business owners solves their financial challenges. Prior to founding Lionshare, Chris help managed over 300 million dollars of individual and institutional assets and held senior roles at multiple globally-recognized investment firms.

An entrepreneur, speaker and media personality, Chris has been featured in several news outlets such as CNN, Huffington Post, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post. He is currently a Board Member of the non-profit organization, Strive LA, a mini-campus for Los Angeles inner-city youth. He also serves as a market analyst for the iHeart Radio podcast, “City Watch on the Air.”