MEET THE LOOPERS: FROM RETAIL EMPLOYEE TO RETAIL TECH STARTUP
After being a part of Proxloop for about a year now, it’s time for me to share my story. My name is Ingvild and I’m Øistein’s co-founder, his partner in crime, and of course — a Looper. I’ll start off by stating that this past year has been amazing. Not only do I get to work on solving a problem I’ve been dealing with for years myself, but I also get to work with great people. Those are the two aspects that makes this journey worthwhile for me.
I get to use my existing experience, acquire experience in the fields I’ve studied, learn new skills and work with talented people that we’ve handpicked. I don’t think I can put enough emphasis on how important the combination of those things is to me, especially in the startup world.
So how did I get here?
My journey started when I finished my bachelor’s degree in leadership, innovation and marketing in the spring of 2015 from the University of Tromsø — The Arctic University of Norway. Only a few days after handing in my thesis, I got on an airplane to San Francisco. In addition to studying and extracurricular activities, I had spent my last five years working part time in a clothing store, including the five previous summers. This summer I had something else planned: The Norwegian Entrepreneurship Program. Three months with entrepreneurship classes at UC Berkeley and an internship in a Silicon Valley startup. I was over the top excited.
During that summer, I learned a lot about startups and emerging technologies. Some weeks before my summer was about to end, a friend of mine, Øistein, texted me the exciting message about him coming to Silicon Valley — he was going all in with his newly started company. Just a few days later, he was in town and crashed in our apartment until the day I had to travel back to Norway.
When I got back home, I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do so I decided to continue working for the clothing store. A couple of months later, fate stepped in and dealt me a sweet card: Øistein asked me to come back to SF and join him in his startup. Øistein and I had been working together in a national management team for a student organization the past years, and I knew that we made a great team. It was a no-brainer. The day after we were already setting dates and plans.
Did I think the journey would be anything like this? I don’t really know what I was expecting, but I guess as part of the startup life you can never really predict the future. All I know is that I am extremely lucky that I get to apply my knowledge and interest in retail into something as exciting as Proxloop.
