Setting the Table! How Mission-Driven Founders Navigate Relationships to Scale with Integrity

Bringing the right people to the table, and finding common purpose changes everything. What happens when three mission-driven founders, an operator of an ambitious startup, a venture investor from New York, and a legendary entrepreneur sit down to discuss the future of building impactful businesses at scale?

This interactive session unpacks the critical decisions that shaped Everytable, a social enterprise breaking barriers to healthy food access in underserved neighborhoods while scaling beyond 175 locations—navigating a highly competitive market while retaining mission integrity.

Through a live decision simulation—a structured role play—Everytable’s founder will rewind the clock, exposing high-stakes moments where he had to balance profit, impact, and funding strategies. He’ll bring to life difficult conversations with investors, the food lobby, and community stakeholders—revealing how the right “table setting” determined the company’s trajectory.

Because bringing people to the table is one thing—designing the table for lasting success is another.

Attendees will actively engage in these pivotal trade-offs through live polls, gaining firsthand insight into the challenges of scaling with purpose. While bringing people to the table is one thing, —designing the table for lasting success is another.

Our cast includes:
Sam Polk: Founder of Everytable,
Hap Klopp, the legendary founder of The North Face, bringing decades of experience and a blueprint for success in defining and achieving visionary business success, and
David Tswamuno,born in Zimbabwe, Founder of Fairbridge, a mission-driven early-stage New-York based VC backing founders using technology to address inefficiencies in the access to human progress. Fairbridge navigates these mission and margin decisions daily across its portfolio.

Together, we’ll examine how the art of “table setting” led by brilliant founders can position mission-driven companies for success—creating and shaping new markets, forging new alliances and strengthening alignment among capital, public, civic, and community stakeholders. This is the new recipe for scalable success in targeting stubborn societal problems at scale. .