How Co-Founders Without Tech Backgrounds Built an Enormously Successful Custom Platform Alana Branston and Ali Kriegsman didn't have tech backgrounds when they launched Bulletin, now a wholesale marketplace home to thousands of brands and retailers, but they shared a passion for independent brands and the world of content marketing, which helped fuel their company's 30% month-over-month organic growth last year.

Today, plugged-in retailers and brands are likely familiar with Bulletin: the beautifully curated wholesale marketplace featuring the hottest brands in clothing, handbags, beauty, jewelry, lifestyle and more. Bulletin's brands offer everything from CBD sleep gummies to playful fashion pieces; it makes it easier than ever before for retailers to discover and stock quality products, and for digitally native brands to gain essential real-world exposure.

It all started when co-founders Alana Branston and Ali Kriegsman met as deskmates at Contently and discovered they had a lot in common: Branston, a sales executive, and Kriegsman, a sales strategist, both came from families who'd run small businesses, and they both had a passion for independent brands, inspired by the world of content marketing and the relationship between content and commerce. Soon, they were spending their weekends together, scouring Brooklyn pop-up and flea markets for the latest in exciting brands.

"There were so many of these cool emerging brands we were seeing out in the world," Kriegsman says, "but we were like, "How would we discover them online?' They were on Etsy, but they were getting drowned out by all of these other sellers. They existed on Shopify, but Shopify didn't yet have its consumer-facing marketplace, the shop app. So we felt there needed to be a better way, an easier way to discover these incredible small businesses and emerging indie brands."