self-taught builder who learns by doing. here's how i got here.
I built my first gaming rig at 13, a knockoff Alienware that got me hooked on Counter-Strike and basic scripting. That obsession led to wilder experiments: extracting chemicals from Home Depot supplies to make thermite, building rockets with homemade gunpowder, and growing a YouTube channel called "Parker the Pyro" to 13,000 subscribers by 15. At the same age, I heard Avicii and thought "I can do that." So I torrented Ableton and spent four years producing music and DJing parties, making up to $500 a night in high school.
I dropped out of FSU to join Delivery Dudes, where I went from flyering to leading product and design as we scaled to $73M in annual business. After the acquisition, I tried launching several startups (Rapture, Venu, MGMT, all failed) before finally learning to code at 28. Now I run multiple tech businesses: MAP (my health platform), The REX Firm (AI development agency), REX Media (AI education), and VAI (paid community). My approach is simple: break down complex tech into accessible pieces and build products that actually help people. From pyrotechnics to product management to AI, it's been 31 years of following obsessions wherever they lead.
Halfway through sophomore year, I left college. My sister's boyfriend was delivering pizzas, so I joined his company, Delivery Dudes. We started small, delivering steaks for fancy restaurants in Delray Beach. I was learning way more there than I ever did as a frat bro, so I stuck with it.
I got into design, flyering, and guerrilla marketing for Delivery Dudes. At 19, I was making strong $2,000 a month—huge for me back then. We kept growing, opening new locations and letting drivers franchise their own spots. As we scaled, we needed tech. I learned user experience design (didn't even know it had a name at first) and built our driver app. The first version was so bad I had to bribe people with gift cards to use it.
Long story short, we went from zero tech to supporting $73 million in annual business in a three-sided marketplace, all while dodging punches from Uber Eats and DoorDash. I handled everything: UX/UI design, graphic design, apparel, car wraps, some front-end dev, hiring engineers (onshore and offshore), sitting on the executive team, leading offsites with EOS.
The sale was messy. We upset DoorDash after calling them out at a conference—dumb move. They hit back, and our revenue dropped from $73 million to $47 million. COVID kept us alive, but after selling, I became the product leader at Waitr (the company that bought us). It was chaos. I convinced them to give me a $2.3 million budget for engineers, built a team, then bailed.
I'd pitched Y Combinator a few times—once flew out to pitch Paul Buchheit (Gmail's founder), but the idea was illegal. Then I made a course, Product Management for Beginners, to teach others and make some cash. I had a YouTube channel documenting my product manager life—daily videos during COVID from a dope office. Launched the course in Italy and pulled in nearly $20,000 in five days.
I worked with engineers from around the world on some products, but they flopped. Here's the graveyard:
After a year and a half, I was burning savings in Austin, so I moved back and got serious about coding. I'd tried at 15, 18, 21, and 25, but at 28, it stuck. Learned TypeScript and Next.js and built some stuff—nothing big commercially, just used AI as a tutor to learn.
I'm always open to conversations, collaborations, and new ideas. Reach out through: