In this episode
In this conversation, Lucas Parry, CEO and Founder of Glow, takes us on his personal journey from recording music to working in fintech. He then explains how Glow helps artists, influencers, and brands engage their fans and communities in philanthropic actions. He discusses the power of community in democratizing philanthropy and how technology can make giving easy. Lucas envisions a future where communities are more educated and efficient in their philanthropy, leading to significant positive change. He emphasizes the importance of authenticity and transparency in building trust in the financial system.
Key takeaways
- Glow helps artists, influencers, and brands engage their fans and communities in philanthropy.
- The power of community in philanthropy can lead to significant positive change.
- Authenticity and transparency are crucial in building trust in the financial system.
- The future of philanthropy involves more educated and efficient giving.
Transcript
Rory Holland
Awesome. So we’ve got Lucas Parry here from Glow. So excited to have you here.
Lucas Parry
G’day mate. Good to be here.
Rory Holland
I’d say welcome to Austin, but you live here.
Lucas Parry
I do.
Rory Holland
Just like we do.
Lucas Parry
I do now, but, by way of Australia, born and raised.
Rory Holland
I was going to say, with your accent, I thought you might be from Texas, but …
Lucas Parry
I tell people I’m from the deep south. You know, the real south where our toilets flush the wrong way. But no, I’ve been here in the States for 21 years and been in Austin for the last three.
Rory Holland
And tell us a little bit about what you were doing before this. So, how did you get into fintech?
Lucas Parry
Yeah. So my story, I was a recording artist for 10 years and used to travel around, sing songs, tell stories, and raise money for nonprofits. And then, I started working for larger nonprofits churches, some of the fastest growing churches in America, and then stumbled into technology backwards. I was in California, I built my first technology, which was automated video branding, and that was a technology to help creators tell stories faster with branded video content. So, built some technology, got a bunch of patents, now we license that technology to media companies. And when that was sort of moving into a new phase of its existence, I thought you know, what problem do I want to solve in the world? And it had always come back to a passion for generosity and philanthropy for me, but also marrying my experience with artists and influencers and in today’s world they’re the biggest communities that exist on the planet, I believe the most powerful communities that exist on the planet. So Glow sits on top of artists and influencer and brand communities and helps them engage their fans and community in philanthropy, where everyone gives together, then they vote to give it away. So we think in the next few years, we’ll see some of these communities literally give away a billion dollars a year.
Rory Holland
A billion dollars.
Lucas Parry
A billion, nine zeros, yeah. I mean, if you look at what Mr. Beast just said the other day, now has 200 million subscribers on YouTube alone. So his community is probably in the billion range, right? So you think about that, and you’re like, gosh, can he get 2.1 million people to give 40 bucks a month? If he can, that right there is a billion dollars in one year.
Rory Holland
A billion dollars.
Lucas Parry
Yeah.
Rory Holland
Wow, that’s crazy.
Lucas Parry
So we like to ask what problems in the world could you solve or make a big dent in if you could give away a billion?
Rory Holland
That’s a big accomplishment. It can solve lots of problems with a billion dollars.
Lucas Parry
And I think, why should the billionaires be the only ones in the world that can give away a billion? We actually think that everyday people like you and I, we can give like billionaires, but we just have to do it in community.
Rory Holland
So that was the inspiration, though. What problem can I solve through technology to make the world a better place? Is that right?
Lucas Parry
Yeah, so when I was a recording artist I would travel around, do shows, and nonprofits used to pay me money to help raise money for them. And that was because a part of my story was when I was 17, I started traveling the world and at 17 I was in Zambia for my summer break and building a school for kids in the middle of nowhere. And it impacted my life so much and I said, well, I want to keep doing this. And then the next year I went to live with the Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert, they’re a tribe in Botswana that click, and bought food, medicine and clothing. And so my music and my stories were powerful and people would rally and I would raise money for other nonprofits. It was cool. But you fast forward to today’s world, I think if I was an artist back then and I had a platform like Glow, we probably could have given away 500 million. And I just, I thought, you know what, I want this platform in the world. I want my kids to experience powerful generosity, powerful philanthropy. And it didn’t exist in the world and I thought I had a little unique lens of being both on the artist influencer side and also on the technology side that may as well do it. And well, here’s the big kicker, our kids’ generation will inherit a hundred trillion dollars of wealth. So they literally could be the most generous in all of history, we just have to unlock them.
Rory Holland
Yeah. And how does Glow, as the technology you’re using, how does fintech, I guess in some ways power that or built on that maybe wasn’t possible a decade or two decades ago?
Lucas Parry
Yeah, the payment processing transaction, that’s been there. I think what’s unique about what we do in the fintech space is that it’s the power of community. We want to make giving safe. So SAFE is an acronym that stands for social, authentic, fun, and easy. A lot of technology in this space, to help nonprofits raise money, it’s clunky, you’re four or five clicks deep. It feels transactional, and it doesn’t feel authentic. So, as a platform, we thought let’s just make what we call giving delightful for the donor. And that, as of yet, it doesn’t exist. And I think if you are a generous person, or if you give money anywhere, it’s often not a convenient experience. People often say, well, aren’t you crowdfunding? I’m like, well, in a crowd, you’re a transaction. No one knows you, but in a community, you’re known. And so, we think it’s much more compelling to give in community than just with a random crowd.
Rory Holland
Yeah, so just maybe unpack that a little bit, because my head goes to that too, I think naturally maybe folks do to crowdfunding. It’s not that.
Lucas Parry
It is in part.
Rory Holland
I mean, it is in part.
Lucas Parry
It’s the next evolution of crowdfunding. Crowdfunding has been amazing, and we’ve seen incredible results with crowdfunding. But crowdfunding, the negative side of crowdfunding is it’s created a lot of mistrust. And I’m sure we’ve all been a part of a campaign where somebody had an incredible story and they needed $50,000 and they raised $450,000. And you’re left wondering, well, what happened with the rest? Where did that go? Because beyond the transaction, there was no accountability, there’s no transparency. And what happened is that person actually got the money and they probably bought a house and then had to pay tax on that income. So, we want to flip that script. We want to say, hey, if a community is giving away resource, we make sure that the money is focused, the stories are told directly back on the platform. Every nonprofit on our platform goes through a 35-step vetting process. So every nonprofit gets a Glow score. Again, it comes back to making giving delightful for the donor.
Rory Holland
So you actually are able to see one part of the community, which I want to pause there, can you describe for us an example of what that community might be? You mentioned artists, and whether that’s the Beast is one version of that, but then maybe some others that I think you and I talked about at one point, there’s some known artists that might be interested.
Lucas Parry
Yeah. So in the fall we’ll be out on tour with artists and it’ll look like this, the artist will, at some point during their set, they’ll share a story that’s authentic to them. Maybe they’re interested in foster care and maybe it’s a part of their story or maybe adoption, and they can just share with their community and say, “Hey, you know, this is a big part of my story and we want to make a difference. And what if we could all combine our resources together?” We all give however much you can give, five, 10, 20 bucks a month and then, together, they vote to give that away. So at a concert; you’ll see a QR code come up as a part of their story, you just join, and then the artist can then reward the people for participating. So they might get discount merch, they might get early access tickets. There’s any number of ways the artist can actually inspire and motivate their people to continue to participate.
Rory Holland
Yeah, that’s massive.
Lucas Parry
That’s pretty cool.
Rory Holland
That is really cool.
Lucas Parry
I mean, think about this, like for a brand, Patagonia, for instance. I mean, if I go climb the Himalayas, I’m taking a Patagonia jacket because I’d trust it’ll keep me warm and I like what they do for the environment. So Patagonia could start a Glow community and they could invite all of their customers and say, “Hey, if you give five bucks a month, we’ll give you a $5 coupon every month.” It’ll drive brand loyalty, I think it’s going to actually increase sales, which will improve over time, but think of the impact.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, massive. Yeah, you and I had talked at one point about Lauren Daigle, and she’s got her crew. We’re involved with her crew, we’re actually going to go see her tour this year. And I could see, yeah, just so many meaningful ways that the artists could utilize Glow to make that impact.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, and I think if it’s authentic to the artist then it’s just an extension of them being authentic with their community and then inviting their community to participate. I think we’re all sick and tired of the, you know, we get a press release and it’ll say, oh, such and such person gave $5 million to this cause. And on one hand, you think, well, that must be nice, but if you can afford to give five million, you probably are making 100 million, right? So, in our minds, we think that’s nice, but it must be nice to be you. In this new world that we’re building, the future of philanthropy, we think it’s the power to the people, right? So we’re democratizing philanthropy for everyone, and we can all participate in the benefit of actually deploying significant capital to make a change.
Rory Holland
Yeah, where do you see this headed over the next five or 10 years of this when you think about as fast as technology is changing and society is so different now than it was two decades ago. With this democratization of philanthropy, I think that’s a wonderful way to look at it, where do you see it going from here?
Lucas Parry
There’s so many unknowns. But what I hope to see is that people’s consciousness of what they can do with resource will be awakened and then we will, as a community giving focused capital, we can actually help non-profits be more efficient and better at what they do. What I mean by that is… we’ve seen this innovation come in mutual funds, venture capital industries. This exists in other places, just not in philanthropy. But the truth is, when you have a large amount of capital to deploy, the people who need that money will do what they need to do to receive the money. And so I think we’re all, many of us are jaded by the nonprofit industry in general because it’s fragmented. You might see a million go here, a million go there to 200 different organizations and you’ve deployed 200 million, but really no major impact. I think what I see in the next three, five years is communities who are passionate about something, actually taking the most current research, pulling together the brightest minds, and actually deploying that capital in really efficient and focused ways and partnering with nonprofits to help them tailor their programs to be current and effective, not just the best storytellers get the money, which is kind of where we are today, right? A non-profit, if they tell a really powerful story, they’re gonna raise a lot of money, but it doesn’t actually mean that non-profit was effective in what they do.
Rory Holland
And actually, right, getting that money to work.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, so I think in five, 10 years’ time, I see us, the donors, being more educated, being more efficient with our philanthropy, and I hope we see some of the world’s problems begin to get fixed.
Rory Holland
Yeah, be addressed.
Lucas Parry
Yeah.
Rory Holland
What’s the biggest challenge right now for you and for Glow?
Lucas Parry
So we’re early. So, we launched proof of concept a year ago. So now we’re in our fundraising cycle, raising money. But really as we move into the fall, we come out of our proof of concept into our beta launch and we’ll be on tour. You’ll see it at the end of films, documentaries, whereas people gather, communities gather after seeing a powerful story and then they’ll start giving together. And we’re excited. We’re onboarding brands. So look, what do we need? If you’re an influencer, a brand, or you know people who have a social mission as a part of what they do and they want to unlock their customers or their fans, then hit me up because we want to help serve you to unlock your communities.
Rory Holland
Is there a way to use Glow that might not be the community of an artist, but a small community. Maybe it’s me and 10 friends that are going to get super passionate about something?
Lucas Parry
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. In fact, that’s where we started when we built our very first proof of concept my co-founder and I, during COVID, we thought, hey, we want to give back, what can we do? So we literally started a community of our friends, we called it a giving circle at the time, and we just had a bunch of our friends put money in every month, and then we voted to give it away. And that is where it started. A group of friends coming together, pooling some resource, wanting to make a difference during COVID. So, on a micro level, really, really cool. But also on a macro level, could be incredibly powerful.
Rory Holland
Yeah, I could see a lot of utilization for that too. Glow, question about the name. Where did that come from?
Lucas Parry
Good one. Yeah, actually, Glow is, we believe, the feeling you should have when you’re generous, you should feel good. And so we called the company “a feeling” because we felt like in the transactional nature of a lot of the technology, you don’t generally feel good when you give, you kind of feel like, okay, my pocket’s a little lighter. So if and when we’re successful, we want the world to glow; we want individuals to glow, and communities to glow.
Rory Holland
It’s too great of a mission I think for it not to be. So I’m gonna say when you are successful.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, no, I love it.
Rory Holland
Sooner than later.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, let’s go. 100%.
Rory Holland
Too good.
Lucas Parry
Yeah.
Rory Holland
What advice would you give to someone who wants to enter the field of fintech and what you’re doing for a living now to try to make a positive impact, what advice looking back on what you’ve experienced might you give someone today?
Lucas Parry
Well, as an entrepreneur, I just say number one: if you’ve got an idea, go for it. I think the universe gives people, you, an idea for a reason and we’re responsible to be stewards of that and if you don’t put it in the world, maybe no one else will. And so for Glow particularly, I mean, I’ve been wrestling with this idea since I was a recording artist. So, 15 years. And at the time I felt like I didn’t know what to do, didn’t know how to build it, and so here I am doing it. So I just think, okay, if you’ve got an idea, you’re wrestling with something, you’ve got a unique perspective about a customer problem or you can empathize with something that a customer is wrestling with, find a team, put together a proof of concept, and just give it a whirl. It’s one of the things I love about the American spirit, it’s just go get them. If you’ve got an idea, especially here in Texas, if you’ve got an idea, let’s just go do it. Put it in the world. Why not? That’s why I resonate with it. Love it.
Rory Holland
No, that’s great. It’s so true. I was going to ask you too, have there been any mentors or people in your life that have helped you along the way through this journey?
Lucas Parry
I mean, countless. I was the kid from age 16, where I devoured every book I could on leadership, on being an entrepreneur, so I would credit every book that I’ve ever read and every podcast that I listen to, and I devour a lot of podcasts too. But the folks who walk by me day to day, some of my closest friends who are entrepreneurs, I help run an entrepreneur group here in town, which you’re a part of and it’s just incredible folks who are on a mission to impact the world in some way, shape or form. And actually, I’ve been really lucky to have incredible investors who are wise beyond their years and who’ve done incredible things in the world and who get to help me along the way.
Rory Holland
Yeah, and it’s, like the group that we have, the founders group, be in community, you know, be in community. And like where we are today, we’re at the Fintech House, and there’s lots of voices downstairs, there’s a lot of people here, they’re in community and most are here for the same reason, to try to do good through the work that they do, and why I’m so excited about what you’re doing for Glow. And I’ve got a final question. This is one that’s been on my heart quite a bit, and it’s all around trust in our financial system. It’s so critical in this country and globally too, that we as citizens of this planet trust in the systems that govern our world. And the financial system itself has been under attack, going back to the Great Depression and then we had the fallout in 07, 08, 09. We’ve had a couple of hiccups along the way, and I think societally, from my viewpoint, some people have really lost trust in general. So in your mind, how do we, doing what you’re doing with Glow, how do we build trust back, would you say, so people can actually have faith in the systems that we’re trying to have them trust our brands to do work with us?
Lucas Parry
It’s a huge one. And I think you’ve nailed it. We literally live in a world where we don’t trust anyone except our friends. And we all have a select group of, or maybe a few, influences in our life that we would trust, right? So, I think the only way to build trust is to be authentic. Well, maybe not the only, but I think the first step is, if you’re a company building a product or a brand, you’ve got to be transparent, you’ve got to be authentic, be real. It’s almost like that’s step one to being human, be authentic and real. I think we’re tired of feeling like we’re being lied to or being used as a product. Now, that is challenging for us in fintech because we literally build products, but I think doing it in such a way that if you are genuinely solving a human need, helping humans flourish is a word we often use, then that’s a first step in doing so.
Rory Holland
Yeah, authenticity and I think delivering on your promise. You’re making a promise and where is that, what is the essence of what you’re trying to do? And again Glow, to me, glows literally in the idea that you’re trying to solve real-world problems using technology, I think it’s so exciting.
Lucas Parry
Oh, thanks.
Rory Holland
Can’t wait to get on tour with you.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, thanks, mate.
Rory Holland
Well, thanks so much, man. So good to see you, Lucas.
Lucas Parry
Yeah, good to see you. Thanks for having us.
Rory Holland
Thank you.
Lucas Parry
Cheers!
