Your Best Friends in Business

Stacie & Madie | Pod People

What happens when two best friends who’ve built multiple businesses together decide to stop keeping the good stuff to themselves? Join co-founders Stacie Staub and Madie Linder — the team behind West and Main Homes and a growing roster of businesses they’ve built from scratch — for the kind of conversations most founders only have behind closed doors. Each episode opens with a real-time business update (the wins, the chaos, the things that are very much still in progress), then brings in a founder who’s building for the long game for an honest, unfiltered conversation about the decisions that actually shaped their company. Part strategy, part survival guide, and entirely the kind of conversation most business owners desperately need, Your Best Friends in Business blends candid interviews, opinionated debates about what works and what definitely doesn’t, and the kind of practical takeaways that only come from people who are still in it. No TED Talk polish. No highlight reel. Just real founders, real decisions, and real talk. Come for the strategies. Stay for the honesty. Leave with a reminder that there’s no perfect way to build a business so just build it!

Episodes

  1. Sep 30

    Getting to Know You with Madie and Stacie

    No guest this week … just two best friends, nine months of business partnership, and a producer-designed game show built to test it all. To close out Season 1, Madie and Stacie turn the mic on themselves, going head-to-head in the Newlywed Game, Would You Rather, and a Guess That Guest trivia round pulled from quotes across the season. Along the way, they land on the real stuff: honesty over niceness in a partnership, why they'd always choose a loyal employee over a big client, growing "twice as sustainable" instead of twice as fast, and the zero-door, zero-budget, no-Plan-B mentality that built West + Main Homes from the ground up. Plus, the loser has to work a hostess shift at their new restaurant—and the winner gets to name the first flavor of "Big Cookie." It's a lighthearted, unfiltered look at what actually makes a business partnership work, and a proper send-off to a season full of incredible founders. In this episode: (00:00) Show Intro: Trivia Showdown (02:54) Round 1: Newlywed Game (11:33) Round 2: Would You Rather (14:25) Clients vs Unicorn Employees (24:25) Round 3: Guess the Guest  (27:20) Winner Announced: Big Cookie Reveal Show Notes: Your Best Friends in Business is produced by West + Main Homes in partnership with Pod People Stay Connected: Don't miss an episode! Subscribe NOW @Your Best Friends in Business Follow ⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠ on Instagram Follow ⁠Stacie and Madie⁠ on Instagram ⁠⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠⁠⁠

  2. Sep 16

    From Cop Car to Building (and Selling) Breakthrough Broker with Eric Sachs

    Eric Sachs spent 13 years as a Fort Collins police detective before trading his badge for a real estate license — and eventually building two companies he'd go on to sell. First came Infinity Group Realty, which he and his best friend grew to 40+ agents before an acquisition in 2010. Then came the real story: Breakthrough Broker, a free tool for real estate agents funded not by users but by industry partners, bootstrapped with Eric's police pension and grown to over 650,000 agent profiles before its own acquisition. In this episode, Eric opens up about turning down VC money, going through three failed acquisition talks before the one that stuck, why hiring the right acquisition attorney was the best money he ever spent, and how being "not desperate" to sell ended up being exactly what got the deal done. Plus: what 13 years in law enforcement taught him about trust, sales, and keeping perspective when the stakes in business just aren't life or death. In this episode (00:00) Show Intro (00:54) Group Chat Catch Up (02:50) Meet Eric: The First Exit (06:31) Building Breakthrough Broker (22:34) Founder to Founder: Cop Lessons (29:55) Mantra of the Week: My Daughter Hears This Often Show Notes:  Eric Sachs Follow Eric Sachs on Instagram Your Best Friends in Business is produced by West + Main Homes in partnership with Pod People Stay Connected:  Don't miss an episode! Subscribe NOW @Your Best Friends in Business Follow ⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠ on Instagram Follow ⁠Stacie and Madie⁠ on Instagram ⁠⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠⁠⁠

  3. Aug 19

    The Accidental Celebrity Who Reinvented Real Estate with Marguerite Martin

    Marguerite Martin has sold homes in Tacoma since 2005, but in 2015 she started a side project (a blog and podcast called Move to Tacoma) just to give people an honest, neighborhood-level look at a city most outsiders didn't know much about. That side project turned her into a local celebrity (and, at times, the accidental face of Tacoma's gentrification debate), and it changed how she thought about her own job. Instead of trying to do every deal herself, she became a matchmaker — connecting buyers and sellers with the right agent for their goals. Stacie Staub and Madie Linder talk with Marguerite about identifying (and saying no to) your ideal client, why AI search is the new SEO, and the mindset shift behind building a business that supports your life instead of running it. In this episode (00:00) Show Intro (00:53) Group Chat Catch Up (03:16) Meet Marguerite: She Reinvents Real Estate (15:46) Founder to Founder: Referral Fit and Niches (25:30) AI Search and Values (28:48) Mantra of the Week: Document Your Story Show Notes:  Marguerite Martin  Follow Marguerite Martin on Instagram Your Best Friends in Business is produced by West + Main Homes in partnership with Pod People Stay Connected:  Don't miss an episode! Subscribe NOW @Your Best Friends in Business Follow ⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠ on Instagram Follow ⁠Stacie and Madie⁠ on Instagram ⁠⁠Your Best Friends In Business⁠⁠⁠

5
out of 5
13 Ratings

About

What happens when two best friends who’ve built multiple businesses together decide to stop keeping the good stuff to themselves? Join co-founders Stacie Staub and Madie Linder — the team behind West and Main Homes and a growing roster of businesses they’ve built from scratch — for the kind of conversations most founders only have behind closed doors. Each episode opens with a real-time business update (the wins, the chaos, the things that are very much still in progress), then brings in a founder who’s building for the long game for an honest, unfiltered conversation about the decisions that actually shaped their company. Part strategy, part survival guide, and entirely the kind of conversation most business owners desperately need, Your Best Friends in Business blends candid interviews, opinionated debates about what works and what definitely doesn’t, and the kind of practical takeaways that only come from people who are still in it. No TED Talk polish. No highlight reel. Just real founders, real decisions, and real talk. Come for the strategies. Stay for the honesty. Leave with a reminder that there’s no perfect way to build a business so just build it!

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