Date: 2026-10-12 (2:30 PM EDT) Attendees: Michael Houck (michael@ryevalley.co), Ben Ornstein (ben@foundingjourney.com) Granola: https://notes.granola.ai/d/3bd0080a-edd5-4d39-85d0-e54651fc41c5
Summary
- Ben’s transition: this is Ben’s last normal week; he starts a new role next week. Megaphone campaigns handed to Rina with Looms, process docs, and the creator pricing spreadsheet. Newsletter UI built with Michael/Hermes is in good shape; Ben flagged beehiiv automation limits (AND/OR logic works at the automation level, not inside individual emails). Both expect beehiiv to lose ground to newer platforms.
- Ben stays on part-time for light tasks: Trendspotting and Viral Examples (when Hermes tags him with templates), the monthly invoices email, and ongoing Augment video work. SparkLoop is mostly self-managing; Ben does a final pass on the partner list.
- Rye Valley state: Hockey Stick launches in the newsletter tomorrow (Oct 13), alongside the Company Brain offer. The Adam Gillman build points to a small dev-shop line of business. JOLT at 6 active clients; Emma joining formally to run Lore, splitting time initially. Megaphone: Draper expanded, Mantis expanding in ~2 weeks, some churn elsewhere; Michael restarting his own posting for leads.
- Velocity: GitHub commits 251 in the 75 days before July 29 vs 4,349 in the 75 days since (Hermes).
- Long-term structure: once each unit reaches a target monthly profit, cross-sell services across JOLT, Megaphone, Lore, and Hockey Stick (aggregation-layer bet).
- GovGrid data opportunity (Emil) mentioned as a short-term funding play; talks with labs underway.
- Both leave the door open to working together again, possibly including the fund.
- Personal updates exchanged (owner-tier notes in Owner tier).
Decisions
- None new. Newsletter point of contact after Ben leaves is still open (Blake Stewart leading candidate).
Action items
- Ben Ornstein: send a voice note on the dream Megaphone campaign dashboard in the Megaphone channel (features, layout, examples, what must stay manual) so Hermes picks it up
- Ben Ornstein: final pass on the SparkLoop partner list
- Michael: scope a simple Megaphone campaign UI with Hermes when the next campaign (Metal) comes up
- Michael: decide newsletter POC after Ben transitions (Blake Stewart leading candidate)
Notable transcript excerpts
Michael on the dev-shop signal:
“We probably have like a little mini dev shop on our hands here, which is nice.”
Michael on the cross-sell structure:
“Jolt will create TikToks for Blake and for Emma, and Emma will create, you know, SEO geo content for Jolt and for Megaphone and Hockey Stick… the bet is basically that the aggregation layer, these different services, you know, they’ll be able to cross-sell into each other too.”
Ben on the shift:
“Now, whereas before it felt random… but now I can, I can feel it, you know what I mean?”
Michael on leverage:
“It’s just been because I’ve been able to get more leverage on my time.”
Full transcript in Granola: https://notes.granola.ai/d/3bd0080a-edd5-4d39-85d0-e54651fc41c5