The Insider Guide to Avoiding a Co-founder Breakup
The complicated art of finding your professional soulmate finally has a roadmap
The screaming match was so loud you could hear it from the conference room two offices away. Drybar CEO John Heffner was trying to close a multi-million deal with investors, but he had to embarrassingly extract himself from the meeting, walk over to his co-founders’ shared office, and ask them to hush.
The inspiration for the epic fight? Red wine.
Let’s be clear: No one was drunk. It was 2016 and Alli Webb, a co-founder of blowdry chain Drybar, was furious when she learned that the then-seven-year-old company’s new Las Vegas location — its 63rd outpost, and its first with a full bar — would offer red wine. She had specifically banned it from her other locations for one very good reason: It was too messy. Her older brother and co-founder Michael Landau, who tended to defer to his sister on all things creative and hair-related (he’s bald), didn’t understand the fuss. It’s a full bar, of course it has red wine, he thought.
“Somebody has to have the final word, and it’s mine,” yelled Landau, a former corporate marketer. Eventually Webb backed down. But even as her brother describes the incident some three years later, she can’t help but interject: “Let’s…
