True Founder: What No One Else Has the Guts to Teach You About Starting Your First Business, by Marc Lafleur is now available. The book is published with Forbes Books, the exclusive business book publishing imprint of Forbes, and is available on Amazon and via audiobook on Audible today.
As a young, Black entrepreneur
who built his business from the ground up, Marc Lafleur understands the demands of success. And in the age of social media, when people can baselessly proclaim themselves to be an overnight success or industry experts with a raving yet fictitious fanbase, Lafleur strongly cautions against the glitz and glamour of the modern success-industrial complex.
In True Founder, Marc Lafleur strips away the superficial hype associated with entrepreneurship to give his honest take on what went into building, scaling, and selling a business on his own terms – and how readers can learn from his experiences.
Rather than another memoir about a CEO looking back at successes that were realized decades ago, Lafleur treats readers to the boots-on-the-ground details of what an entrepreneur faces today. His book is not a straightforward success story – while he sold his business for $16.8 million at age 30, his exit came after two failed ventures and countless sleepless nights.
True Founder has something for entrepreneurs at every stage of their journey. Whether they’re just starting out, or already deep in the trenches, True Founder provides practical advice for finding success in the current market. Lafleur explores topics including hiring friends, finding angel investors, deciding on whether or not founders should work with agencies, growing an audience by jumping from niche to niche, acknowledging that as a founder the job is to become a professional problem solver, and mindsets that can carry entrepreneurs through challenging moments.
“No doubt you’ve had someone make a comment about how you work too much, or you need to take a break. As a first-time founder, you’re guilted for giving up your work-life balance. Yet anywhere else in life, sacrifice is encouraged,” Lafleur reflected. “Well, it’s time to stop feeling guilty – instead, it’s time lean into it. Your willingness to chase your dreams is what sets you apart. It’s your own personal competitive advantage, and True Founder is here to arm you with the strategies you need to double down on that.”
About Marc Lafleur
In 2016, Marc Lafleur founded truLOCAL, an online marketplace for consumers to order products from local butchers, producers, and suppliers in Canada. Over the course of five years—as cofounder and CEO—truLOCAL grew to over 60 employees. Following a successful pitch on CBC’s Dragons’ Den in 2017, truLOCAL became Canada’s largest D2C protein business, culminating with a $16.8 million acquisition in 2020.
Today Marc shares his hard-fought learnings on business with companies like Lululemon, Google, and the University of Waterloo, as well as through keynote talks at conferences across Canada and the U.S.
