Lu Cysewski is the Co-Founder & CEO of coolperx.
Tell us about your company. What inspired you to start it?
We provide conscientious branded merchandise to our corporate clients. It’s important for us to offer products that help our clients engage with their audience, make the recipient feel great (because isn’t that what gift-giving is all about?) and never end up in the landfill!
Who are your co-founders and what makes you a great team?
Our company was co-founded by myself and my husband. We have great reverence for each other and the abilities each of us brings to the table. We give more than we take and are extremely kind in the face of difficulty.
How is your company making a difference?
We are helping people unlearn obligatory gifting that often wastes money and resources, and never does a good job in connecting the gift recipient to the cause.
What are some of the challenges you have faced?
People have been trained to buy the cheapest thing possible…or buy 10 cheap giveaways a year. I’m trying to help people buy less and connect more. It’s a hard thing for anyone who has been buying swag for the last 20 years to grasp.
What is your biggest win?
This collectively has to be all the little things…the way people feel when they get a gift from me and immediately hug me, the gratitude our clients show by referring us up to their chain of commands and to their colleagues, the 200% growth we see annually just from word of mouth referrals.
Who is your role model?
Melinda Gates
What do you wish you had known before starting your company?
How to organize…anything
What is your CEO superpower?
Kindness. I am able to give myself and others kindness throughout all the hardships of life and business and that allows for forward movement!
