Gautam Gupta’s entrepreneurial ambition sparked at a young age, inspired by both his maternal and paternal grandfathers. By 2nd grade, Gautam was buying packs of colored pencils and individually selling them to his classmates. His love for creating things from scratch led him to attend Babson College, an academic haven for aspiring entrepreneurs. During his time at Babson, Gautam interned for two and a half years at General Catalyst Partners, a Boston-based venture capital firm, and met his best friend and NatureBox Co-Founder, Ken Chen. Upon graduation, Gautam joined General Catalyst Partners full time, focusing his career on early stage consumer investing. He played a key role in several major investments including GoodData, PlumDistrict, BigCommerce, Shareaholic, Honest Company and FriendBuy — seeing firsthand the huge potential within e-commerce. Gautam began brainstorming opportunities, and in November 2011 the concept for NatureBox was born, reuniting Gautam and Ken as Co-Founders. Over the next several months, Gautam worked tirelessly to bring NatureBox to life and launched the company in January 2012. In its first two days, the snack subscription business was met with 100 signups, forcing Gautam and Ken to hand-pack each box from their shared apartment in Mountain View, CA. Soon, Gautam identified a fulfillment partner and from there the business skyrocketed — shipping 50,000 boxes in 2012 and 1 million boxes in 2013. Gautam resides in San Mateo, CA, a short drive from NatureBox’s San Carlos headquarters. When he is not working, Gautam dedicates time every weekend to speak with three to four aspiring entrepreneurs, believing deeply in the power of mentorship. As Gautam puts it, it is his way of paying it forward for the many important people in his life who provided with him guidance and inspiration. Gautam also remains actively involved in the consumer market, as a personal investor in FriendBuy, CompStak, Dunwello and the Haystack Fund.