Episode 70: From CRM to Fire Risk Management Software with JP Werlin, Co-CEO at Pipeline
In the latest episode of Subscriptions Scaled, we speak with JP Werlin, Chairman of the Board and Co-CEO at Pipeline.
We learn how JP took Pipeline to success, all about his next business venture—Pyrezo—and so much more.
Keep reading to learn more about the episode.
Pipeline
Founded in 2006, Pipeline is a CRM for small and midsize businesses. It’s designed to empower sales teams across various industries to build game-changing relationships. More than 18,000 customers in 60 countries use Pipeline to gain visibility into their sales, drive opportunities, and close more deals.
Pipeline was started when Ruby on Rails CRM was one of the only options available for businesses. JP and his partner, Nick Bertolino, looked inside their own business problems when they were running an online marketing agency. From there, they decided to focus on the e-commerce retailer space and CRM, and Pipeline was developed.
The company was 100% bootstrapped for the first eight years. Pipeline grew as revenue grew and the team hired behind the income, not in front of the revenue. It took off and continued to grow and grow.
Nick and JP sold Pipeline after 16 years, and the branding and vision have been kept very much intact.
Working several jobs
When Pipeline was first established, JP and Nick were working two jobs. They were still running the marketing agency as they had clients to work with.
JP also worked with a family business out in New York in the e-commerce space in consumer electronics. He worked there three days a week, so he had two days a week to build Pipeline. The situation was similar for JP’s business partner, Nick.
At some points, Nick had to take customer service phone calls for Pipeline at lunch while on-site consulting clients. JP also had two kids under two when he started Pipeline.
Essentially, JP did all the things people say not to do when starting a business. JP credits his wife, who helped enable it all and helped look after the children while JP worked a lot. JP would work from 8 pm to midnight while his boys were asleep, to build Pipeline.
Nick’s story was very similar, so starting Pipeline certainly had its challenges. And that’s how the two built themselves out of a service-based business and into a product business.
Selling Pipeline
After 16 years, JP and Nick were ready to sell Pipeline after thinking ‘what’s next?’ for the company.
The selling of Pipeline was a very successful and fun exit, to a company that saw the brand as JP and Nick did, and wanted to keep the vision and team intact. JP and Nick didn’t run a process or anything, the company simply called out of the blue and it seemed like the stars aligned.
JP is proud to have worked with a fantastic group of people over 16 years who helped build the business. He credits his amazing customers and the journey of Pipeline.
Pyrezo
JP’s next business venture in the industry is Pyrezo. The software enables users to identify, measure, and prioritize fuel mitigation efforts. Pyrezo gives people the most current status of their fuel risk profile, to know how to protect their community best.
Pyrezo is looking to tackle a growing problem worldwide, driven by climate change, around wildfire fuel risk assessment. There’s not a lot of proactiveness in this space at the homeowner level currently.
Many homeowners are waking up with uninsurable or massively expensive fire insurance, especially in certain parts of the world. These areas are known as the Wildland Urban Interface (WUI).
This is a massive problem if you have a property in the WUI. How do you get insurance? How do you protect your home?
Pyrezo helps with these problems with three main objectives: save lives, protect property, and improve the environment.
The target customers of Pyrezo include universities, resorts, power companies, railroads, and anyone who needs to understand the risk around a fixed asset that you can’t move during a wildfire. It’s a recurring revenue subscription-based business.
Pyrezo is looking to narrow its focus, initially working with insurance companies who either aren’t insuring anymore in WUI areas, or forward-thinking insurance companies who may be willing to provide data.
These issues relating to wildfires strike close to home for JP. He’s already had two family members lose homes in wildfires in Colorado and California, so this is an issue he really wants to tackle.
As well as this, JP’s father-in-law lives in an area that recently had a huge fire. He can’t afford his homeowners’ insurance anywhere, because he lives in the Wildland Urban Interface.
JP plans to monetize Pyrezo using data. If you think of the risk profile of a landscape, it’s dynamic. Trees grow, bushes grow. Right at its core, it’s vegetation management.
There are very discreet, clear things you can do on a given property to mitigate risk. JP and his team see an opportunity with various interested parties, whether in the public or private sector.
These different opportunities help them quantify that and show improvement or degradation over time. This is a highly dynamic space, so the risk profile is aligned with the recurring nature of the business.
The future of Pyrezo
Currently, Pyrezo is building technology and building relationships. The team will soon be looking to go out and raise some seed capital. But right now, it’s focusing on building bridges with many fire agencies and wildfire prevention authorities in the western USA.
If people need help assessing risks, the team knows how to do that on the ground.
JP and his team are still learning, and currently, he wants to function like a sponge and learn from the decades of wildfire prevention experience in the industry. To learn and build are JP’s two objectives this year.
With plenty of experience in the subscription software industry and a passion for helping people living in areas prone to wildfires, we can expect JP and his team to thrive in his next business venture.
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