Justin Winter
I build growth engines for founders and the brands they bet on.
Product-minded growth executive, founder, and operator. Fifteen years turning product decisions into revenue, from bootstrapped zero-to-$22M to venture-backed scale. Currently VP of Growth at A Pup Above.
Worked on projects with growth and ops teams at
What people say
100+ consulting calls with founders, operators, and growth leaders. A selection of what they said.
“Justin was awesome to speak with in a number of areas relating to ecommerce & marketing. It’s a given he is brilliant with marketing, social media, etc., having grown Diamond Candles so quickly. However, he also has a very strategic approach to marketing and gave some great insights into product marketing channel fit. Got a heap of ideas on virality & marketing tools. What can I say — one of my best calls on Clarity.”
“Best call I’ve had on Clarity (and I’ve had some good ones — never given that superlative before). Very ethical marketer standing up for what he believes in and has a terrific mind and enthusiasm. Specifics: (1) the sheer number of new tools he introduced me to, (2) helpful clarifying the big idea I had around traffic generation, (3) novel ABM stuff.”
“Any early-stage venture is inherently risky, complex, and challenging. It takes serious intellectual horsepower. An entrepreneur needs to think through decision trees, game theory, scenario planning, etc. Justin has the intellectual stamina to work through key strategic issues. I’ve talked with a lot of really smart people on Clarity. The call with Justin was one of the best.”
“If there was such a thing as a sorcerer in residence for e-commerce problems, Justin would be it. There’s a lot of noisy data and signals in e-commerce, and Justin helps cut right to the heart of your problem and figure out the best way to attack it.”
More from short consulting engagements
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“Best call on Clarity ever. Justin is an e-commerce rock star and I wish I had his advice years ago. He took the time to review our site beforehand and had a plan for the call so that our time was 100% productive.”
Amy Rodbell -
“This was BY FAR the best phone call I have EVER had! Justin is the most informative and knowledgeable individual I have ever talked with about my business. I HIGHLY recommend speaking with him as he can definitely point you in the right direction.”
Griffin ThallPura Vida Bracelets -
“Justin was super sharp and gave us very actionable advice. Great guy and incredibly helpful.”
Justin Maresco-author of Traction -
“Excellent call. I wish I had talked to Justin 6 months before. There are 1,000 paths in front of us to reach our goals, and which one we take creates a totally different story. But how do we know which one to take? Well, ask the guy who has reached there already. Justin is the guy. Actual actionable strategic steps that need to be implemented immediately.”
Murali Sajja -
“Friendly, helpful, and an expert in his field. Very refreshing to speak with someone of his caliber. The notes I took during our conversation made it look as if the sticky note monster threw up all over my office.”
Mark Stuart Brown -
“Justin quickly understood our primary challenges and shared thoughtful and relevant insights along with an actionable game plan. He was able to quickly adapt to new hypotheticals so we could rapidly explore the opportunity set and the corresponding implications.”
Scott Barnett -
“So incredibly helpful, I cannot say enough great things about our call. He brought up many things to help me which I didn’t know about, and gave me plenty of inspiration I really wasn’t expecting. Don’t wonder about him — he’s the real deal.”
Allen WaltonSpyGuy -
“Absolutely awesome. You can tell within seconds that Justin really knows his stuff. He took the time to understand my business to then give extremely specific and actionable insights.”
Mark PatchettGrowth Gurus
- “Dude is legit.”Paul Jarrett · Bulu Box
- “Justin is a superstar. I always finish my calls with him with a to-do list and a feeling of… Clarity.”Richard Hopen
- “Justin is an idea generator extraordinaire.”Patrick Casey
- “Brilliant & actionable business strategy.”Shawn Mixan
Outcomes, not a résumé
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VP of Growth
Leading digital commerce, full-funnel DTC growth, Amazon, and subscription strategy for a premium dog nutrition brand distributed nationally at retail.
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VP of Growth
Led GTM and demand generation for a retail media SaaS platform powering grocery retail ecosystems.
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Head of Cloud
Owned product strategy and cloud infrastructure for a consumer media preservation platform managing 2.9PB of customer content used by over one million families.
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Interim COO
Doubled revenue in under 90 days by rebuilding digital funnels, ad performance, and growth systems across a five-location outdoor recreation company.
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Head of Marketing
Second full-time hire at a venture-backed beauty ecommerce spinout of Deliverr, acquired by Shopify. Led growth strategy through product-market fit phase.
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Pendleton Places
Founder & CEO
Built a short-term rental management company to 40+ properties and $2M+ in annual revenue using a shared-operations hotel model in the Raleigh-Durham market. Self-taught interior designer across the portfolio.
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Co-founder & CEO
Built a VC-backed B2B SaaS platform for DTC customer support operations. Scaled to $25K MRR and 100+ customers including Allbirds, Bombas, Reformation, Peter Millar, and Supergoop. Angel-backed by Jason Calacanis via LAUNCH.
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Co-founder & CEO
Bootstrapped the largest online home fragrance brand in the world from zero to $22M+ in annual revenue with a team of 50+. Built on a $2K credit card.
Advising & investment
Selected relationships across consumer, media, and technology.
- Boll & Branch
- Cora
- SumAll
- ProcessOut
- The Pour Over
- Bizzy Coffee
- Essio
- GiveForms
Open to limited advisory engagements with consumer brands and growth-stage SaaS. Get in touch →
On how the best companies are built
A series on composing specialized, proven primitives across the value chain.
Off the clock
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Save71
Co-founder
Alumni-led advocacy organization pushing for governance and leadership accountability reform at Liberty University.
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Summit Church
Community group leader, Durham, NC — roughly a decade
Hosted a weekly in-home gathering. Mentored newer members and peers through major life transitions: marriages, new parenthood, career pivots, losses. Coordinated community service projects and built long-form, intentional friendships across the chapter.
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Service projects in India
Team lead
Two trips to Madhya Pradesh in support of local non-profits doing community development work. Led the second team: five people, two weeks on the ground.