Breaking Out with Jared Lesar Jared Lesar

In the Season 1 finale, we sit down with Lindile Ndzaba, the founder of Khayelitsha’s Finest Wines, the newest addition to the wine scene in the Western Cape, South Africa.  By partnering with winemakers from across the Cape, Khayelitsha’s Finest Wines is aiming to bring the kind of high-quality wine you might find in Cape Town’s finest bars and restaurants to areas like Lindile’s home neighbourhood of Khayelitsha. For too long, communities like Khayelitsha have been underserved by the wine-making industry and Lindile is on a mission to change that.  

After starting out in the hospitality industry scrubbing floors and cleaning glasses, Lindile developed a love and appreciation for wine and the business of wine.  By 'stealing with his eyes', he learnt as much as he could about how to start a wine label and has now turned a side hustle into a truly exciting gem of a brand that is very quickly taking the wine-drinking scene in South Africa by storm.

If you want to learn how to manage a side hustle while holding down a full time job, or learn a little bit more about the wine industry in South Africa, this is the episode for you. Prepared to be inspired!

Jared and Lindile discuss a number of topics:


Starting a wine label (6:00)

Growing up in Khayelitsha and being exposed to wine culture (9:00)

The challenges of running a side hustle and learning along the way (15:20)

Disrupting the wine industry and changing perceptions about wine and Khayelitsha (27:15)

Upskilling oneself, building relationships and self-learning (35:20)

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On this episode, I sit down with Ezlyn Olivia Barends, the founding director of the South African chapter of the DreamGirls Academy. The DreamGirls Academy is a female mentorship and empowerment organisation which supports young women all across South Africa from economic dependency to self-sufficiency through education and entrepreneurship in the tech and innovation sectors. Before co-founding the DreamGirls Academy, as a young social entrepreneur, Ezlyn headed up the D.A.D Fund, an NGO started by her father which aims to develop future leaders.

Ezlyn is a career coach, mentor, speaker and blogger and has an impressive CV which includes an MBA, a certification in Impact Investing from Oxford University. She’s been recognised, among other things, on the coveted Mail & Guardian Top 200 Young South Africans list and named a World Economic Forum Global Shaper.

At a pivotal moment in her working career, Ezlyn made the choice to leave a corporate job to do NGO work with the D.A.D Fund and DreamGirls Academy. A major element of her career so far has been about following her curiosities to find purpose and meaning in her life and work, and she had many quotable words of advice to share about how to go about doing so!

Jared and Ezlyn discuss a number of topics:


The importance of education and choosing a career path (5:15)
Leaving Corporate and joining the D.A.D Fund (7:40)
Following your curiosity to find purpose in your work (10:50)
Founding the DreamGirls Academy in South Africa (18:00)
Making the decision to leave corporate and advice for starting your side hustle (26:40)
Leaning into your unique essence and dealing with burnout (36:00)

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On this episode, I sit down with South Africa's latest young export to the USA in the performing arts, Keenan Tyler Oliphant. 

Keenan is a Cape Town born theatre-maker and director currently in New York at the prestigious Columbia University in New York studying for his MFA in Directing for Theatre. In 2021, Keenan was named as one of the Directing Fellows for the Drama League in New York, putting him among other illustrious names like the late Chadwick Boseman. Keenan is also a founding member of Mixing Bowl Productions, a Cape Town based theatre company which produces music theatre and has directed productions at numerous festivals around New York, as well as being a performer himself and an accomplished vocalist and multi-instrumentalist.

Like so many people, Keenan's dream of going to study theatre directing in the US was nearly derailed by a lack of funding. After succeeding through the arduous interview and audition process to get into Columbia, Keenan needed to raise USD96,000 to demonstrate proof of funding to the US government to get his study visa. Unable to secure scholarships or grants, Keenan rallied friends and family to successfully raise funds through a crowdfunding campaign to make his dream a reality. 

If you'd like to find out more about the world of theatre and life as a performing artist, and whether to use crowdfunding as a platform for raising funds, this is the episode for you!

Jared and Keenan discuss a number of topics:


Studying and working as a theatre director in New York (3:00)

His journey to Columbia University (14:15)

Crowdfunding to realise your dreams (23:15)

Pursuing a career in the performing arts (35:35)

The business of theatre and lessons learnt (40:30)



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Building the latest new disruptive start-up these days is something glamorous and often celebrated. But what happens when your business fails? How do you pick yourself up after setbacks and start over as you continue to pursue your mission? 

On this week's episode, I chat to Arthur Attwell who is on a mission to change the book publishing industry. Arthur is the co-founder and MD of Electric Book Works, a Cape-Town based book publishing innovation company that is helping bring book publishing into the digital age. Arthur is a Shuttleworth Foundation fellow and serial business starter - apart from Electric Book Works, Arthur is also the co-founder of Book Dash, an organisation devoted to improving youth literacy, Bettercare, an open-access healthcare publisher and Paperight, an award-winning experiment in distributed print on-demand. 

After founding Paperight in 2009, Arthur set out to disrupt the book publishing and distribution model by making print on-demand a key part of the print media distribution chain. Despite receiving widespread acclaim for their work, Paperight unfortunately closed in 2014. But that wasn't the end of the journey for Arthur - by returning to his creativity, Arthur regained his confidence and continued his mission with his other ventures. If you've experienced setbacks in building a business and want to find out how to rebuild, or would like to learn more about the book publishing industry, this is the episode for you!

Arthur is also the host of his own podcast, How Books are Made, where he speaks to book-making leaders about the art and science of making books.  Go ahead and check it out!

Jared and Arthur discuss a number of topics:


Getting into Book Publishing as a Career (3:30)
Being a serial entrepreneur and founder (5:00)
The Paperight Story - disrupting the book publishing and distribution industry (8:00)
Starting over after when your business fails (19:20)
Electric Book Works (23:00)
Book Dash and the mission of bringing new books to every kid in South Africa (33:30)
Advice for anyone looking to start their own business (39:00)



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Before you listen to this episode, make sure you first listen to my full interview with Allan van der Meulen - The Power of Choice and Destroying Stereotypes: The Zlto Story!

On this bonus episode, I chat to Allan van der Meulen, co-founder of Zlto, about a pressing problem for impact ventures and impact investing: reporting. For a corporate or impact investor, being able to quantify and accurately measure and report on the impact of their investment is crucial to justifying an investment to funders. The way that Zlto has overcome this on their platform is genius and I wanted to find out more from Allan about this. 

If you're an impact investor, are looking to build your own social enterprise or just want to find out more about Zlto, this bonus episode is for you!

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In this special Youth Day episode, I sit down with Allan van der Meulen, the co-founder of Zlto. Zlto is a fintech start-up that has designed a platform that uses blockchain tech to incentivise positive behaviour and deeds amongst youth by rewarding users with digital currency that can be used to buy things like groceries, electricity and airtime and in doing so, helping reduce unemployment by allowing young people to develop skills and work experience. Allan co-founded Zlto as a teenager but his journey started out after a happy accident looking for a jazz cafe led him to RLabs, a non-profit innovation lab which empowers the youth through teaching tech skills. Growing up in Mitchell's Plain on the Cape Flats in Cape Town, an area notorious for poverty, gangsterism and drugs, Allan's story encapsulates the difficulties faced by many young people in South Africa but also illustrates that it is possible to break out one of the most problematic walls that many face - circumstance. 

By surrounding himself with the right people, constantly learning and actioning his desire to change his community, Allan and Zlto are restoring dignity to the young people of South Africa by giving them the most valuable gift: choice. Too often youth from areas like where Allan has come from are stereotyped as not being capable of achieving something greater than where they've grown up, but Allan and Zlto are helping young people shatter those stereotypes. There are lots of quotable moments in this interview and you are sure to be inspired!      

Jared and Allan discuss a number of topics:


What is Zlto and why does it exist? (3:10)
How Zlto gave hope during the COVID-19 pandemic (10:00) 
Looking for a jazz cafe and finding a future - the founder story of Zlto (15:30) 
The limitations of growing up on the Cape Flats and gaining a greater perspective of the world outside (27:15)
The power of choice in breaking out of poverty and circumstance (35:20)
Destroying stereotypes while at the same time embracing them (41:45)

Be sure to check out a special bonus episode for additional content from my interview with Allan! 

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