ryan porter

CO-FOUNDER & CEO, RETAIL EDUCATION TOOLS

Employee Training | Wednesday, November 10 @11:45am

Ryan Porter is a passionate and experienced entrepreneur focused on the customer. He enjoys taking on responsibility and solving problems from the trenches. Here is a little bit of his story.

I went to school for Criminal Justice but soon found myself launching a startup in '05 based on my passion for autos. It failed within a year.

In '07 I went to work for CarsDirect where we began acquiring web businesses. We went public in Feb of '08.

What I learned at CarsDirect taught me the skills needed to find an early opportunity as the Smart Car was introduced to the US and later sold my first website to Vertical Scope in '10.

In '10 I sold an e-commerce business to a leading auto-parts retailer.

In '10, I co-founded Herble.com, an education and reviews website for the medical cannabis industry. We didn’t get far before failing.

In '11, eBay gave me an award for Best Vertical Integration in the eBay Partners Network.

In '12 I went to work for the nation’s largest automotive retailer. At AutoNation, I had the opportunity to work with the best people in automotive retail.

I really loved my work at AutoNation but great opportunities only come around once a decade, and the recreational cannabis industry was just forming.

I knew there would be a multitude of opportunities in the space and left to form Grassworks Digital with longtime friend Rob Einaudi.