Nerd Street, CEO & Founder John Fazio | Founding Philly Ep. 45

Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal LIFT Labs.

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In this episode, I interview John Fazio, CEO and Founder of Nerd Street, a company dedicated to making esports accessible to everyone. Nerd Street facilitates competitive opportunities for gamers at all levels, including youth, high school, collegiate, amateur, and professional scenes.

John, a lifelong gamer and technologist, has merged his passions for video games, sports, and technology into creating Nerd Street. From reverse engineering video games in his early days to competing on Drexel University's D1 soccer team, his diverse interests have laid the foundation for his career.

Originally, Nerd Street aimed to revolutionize the traditional internet cafe model by focusing on competitive esports. This involved providing infrastructure that supports tournaments and events, thereby creating larger-scale operations with greater profitability and enhancing the gaming experience by cultivating a community around competitive esports.

While the digital gaming arena dream initially struggled to take off, John gradually developed the idea while running his first company, Jarvis Innovations, which evolved into one of Philadelphia’s premier bespoke software engineering firms. Within the Jarvis offices on N3RD Street, John and his team hosted competitive gaming tournaments for friends and the community.

After years of hosting events, John decided to scale this concept into a full-time business, revisiting his earlier vision. Officially launched Nerd Street in 2016.

Despite early traction and success, John and Nerd Street have faced challenges as they navigated a growing company and industry.

Nerd Street's partnership with Five Below, which initially promised significant expansion, ended abruptly as Five Below shifted its focus away from gaming. This termination forced Nerd Street to shut down all its stores, resulting in a major loss of revenue and significant momentum, leaving the company scrambling in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In response to these dire circumstances, John committed everything he had to keep the business alive, personally investing to cover financial shortfalls. Several investors also stepped in to support the company. Together, they managed to restructure and repay most of the company's debts, setting up repayment plans for the remaining obligations.

Despite these obstacles, Nerd Street has demonstrated resilience and adaptability, learning crucial lessons about market dynamics and strategic scaling.

Recently, Nerd Street announced a pivotal $6 million funding round led by $5 million from Konvoy Ventures.

This funding aims to pivot Nerd Street towards a business model focused on developing and operating esports programs on college campuses. This model leverages existing university infrastructures to reduce costs and accelerate expansion, setting a new direction for Nerd Street’s future.

In our conversation, John shares his story of building Nerd Street, discusses overcoming company and industry challenges, and outlines his vision for the future of esports.