flâneur

Founders: #181 Paul Orfalea (Kinkos)

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What I learned from reading Copy This!: How I turned Dyslexia, ADHD, and 100 square feet into a company called Kinkos by Paul Orfalea. ---- Founders Notes gives you the ability to tap into the collective knowledge of history's greatest entrepreneurs on demand. Use it to supplement the decisions you make in your work. Get access to Founders Notes here. ---- [4:23] I've never met a more circular, out-of-the-box thinker. It's often exhausting trying to keep up with him. [5:21] I graduated from high school eighth from the bottom of my class of 1,200. Frankly, I still have no idea how those seven kids managed to do worse than I did. [8:29] I also have no mechanical ability to speak of. There isn't a machine at Kinko's I can operate. I could barely run the first copier we leased back in 1970. It didn't matter. All I knew was that was I could sell what came out of it. [10:24] Building an entirely new sort of business from a single Xerox copy machine gave me the life the world seemed determined to deny me when I was younger. [13:04] The A students work for the B students, the C students run the companies, and the D students dedicate the buildings. [23:02] I learned to turn a lot of busywor

[00:00:00] Paul says to me, hey do you want to come out with me? I need some local information about rental rates. He grabbed me because I was a student and could give him some feedback about the student perspective on renting near UCSB. So I'm driving with him and Paul is just a terrible driver. There are two sets of realtors trying to follow us. Suddenly, he sees this black cat about 300 yards ahead of us. He screeches on the brakes, pulls a U-turn, and goes the other way. He will not let a black cat cross his path. Then we're driving along, and he sees Pardell Road, the site of the…

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