Hey!
Welcome back to another eagerly-anticipated installment of the Grounded newsletter! Today, we're getting up close and personal - we'll be introducing the team so you can learn a little more about who we are and what makes us tick.
Sam Shapiro
Founder & CEO
Sam is the man that started it all. Inspired by his experiences of living in a self-made camper van and traveling through America, he wanted something better. When he couldn't find anything on the market, he decided to start a company that would bring all of his vanlife desires into reality.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: He lives in Detroit and doesn't own a car.
Favorite Grounded Moment: Delivering the first vehicles to customers.
Hobbies: Working at Grounded, running, reading, hosting movie nights, DIY projects.
Bucket List: Visit every national park in America.
Unique Accomplishment: Made a film in college that premiered at the New York Film Festival.
Favorite Food: Chicken Tikka at Charminar Biryani House in Detroit.
Nick Fitzpatrick
Co-Founder & Head of Design
Nick doesn't like talking about himself too much, and he finds it even weirder when he's writing about himself in third person. He moved from Edinburgh, Scotland to Detroit with the goal of creating amazing products that enabled people to be more adventurous. While he absolutely loves Detroit, he loves complaining about Detroit's car-centric design even more.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: He's lived in 5 different cities, in 4 different countries, across 3 different continents.
Favorite Grounded Moment: The road trip to Michigan's Upper Peninsula in the G2, especially the moment we realized the range was even higher than initially expected.
Hobbies: Formula 1, telling people he's going to start going to the gym, exploring Detroit, any live event - concerts, sports games, puzzle competitions, you name it!
Bucket List: Attend an F1 race live, bonus points if he gets to see Lewis Hamilton win.
Unique Accomplishment: Swindled his way into a US visa to build a startup.
Favorite Food: Salmon Nigiri. Honorable mention to Honey Bee's taco lunch deal.
Matt Nyrkkanen
Lead Mechanical Engineer
Matt joined us from YangFeng and has brought that experience into immediately overhauling our manufacturing process to help us scale up production. With his hands in virtually every pie, Matt is one of the hardest working people you'll ever meet, and he is critical in keeping the builds of every G2 on track.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: He played hockey for a long time, not so much anymore given his school/competitive time has ended. Now he keeps active with a more wide range of things such as racquetball, swimming, and rock climbing.
Favorite Grounded Moment: The satisfaction of finishing a long fought project successfully, especially the first G2 we built as that was his first involvement with Grounded.
Hobbies: Working, taking his GSP to run around the woods, designing and building things for work and pleasure, eating and drinking with friends.
Bucket List: Make his 25 minute commute in 10 minutes.
Unique Accomplishment: Won a state championship in welding in high school.
Favorite Food: Sushi.
Anthony Miceli
Software Engineer
Anthony is our software guru in charge of the Grounded+ app, and he has also stepped up to also play a key role in the electrical engineering in our RVs. When he's not crunching code at his workstation, there's a high likelihood you'll find him chilling on the factory couch or whizzing around on the RipStik.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: His top 3 lifts (deadlift, bench press, and squat) were over 1000lbs combined.
Favorite Grounded Moment: Learning to RipStik in the factory. A less enjoyable moment was going down the ramp and falling flat on his bum, which hurt for two weeks.
Hobbies: Golf, crypto, working at startups, making music.
Bucket List: Buying a home in Puerto Rico to relax in warm weather all year round.
Unique Accomplishment: Knows more than anyone ever needs to know about crypto currency.
Favorite Food: Chicken Chipotle bowl.
Arthur Sanchez
Technician
Arthur joined us recently and immediately made a huge impact in our build process. He got stuck in and has been involved in every step of the vehicle building process, from milling our aluminum frame to bolting our furniture modules into place on final assembly.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: He still has all his fingers, which he says is rare for a technician! He's also been skydiving in Michigan and lived to tell the tale.
Favorite Grounded Moment: The first time getting Honey Bee (a Mexican supermarket near our factory that sells great food) with the team, because the food was great and the group all had fun conversations.
Hobbies: Golf, hanging out with family, video games, drawing, puzzles, forcing people to eat spicy peppers, watching people suffer.
Bucket List: Visit every continent.
Unique Accomplishment: Got to start up the engines of a jet plane.
Favorite Food: Cuban food.
Patrick Dunstone
Sales Development Representative
Patrick is the newest member of Grounded, and he's immediately gelled with the team and partaken in the crazy antics around the factory. He is now one of the main points of contacts with customers and future-customers, helping the design team understand what a customer wants in their RV so that we can build the perfect adventure vehicle.
Key Stats:
Fun Fact: Patrick eloped in Portugal.
Favorite Grounded Moment: The surprise habanero challenge that ended up blowing everyone's heads off.
Hobbies: Keeping chickens and eating their eggs fresh every morning.
Bucket List: Drive all the way down the West Coast, from Alaska to Baja, California.
Unique Accomplishment: Having multiple successful career transitions, from politics to software and then to hardware.
Favorite Food: Pad Thai.
Thanks for reading, hopefully you enjoyed meeting the team, and hopefully you'll join us on a livestream in future to see the team in action!
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