Conversations with Brandon Afari

Today we’d like to introduce you to Brandon Afari.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
To start, I’m CPA by trade but an entrepreneur at heart.

As a teen, I’ve always had this entrepreneurial spirit to create and invent new products. I went to the University of Southern California, earning dual degrees in Business Administration and Accounting and continued on to earn my Master’s in Business Taxation. Throughout college, I tried and failed numerous times, attempting to create innovative solutions in the world of tech. I was lucky enough to surround myself with a group of friends that were all young and hungry entrepreneurs because we helped each other push through those experiences of failure in order to get one step closer to success.

After graduate school, I worked at Deloitte and got a taste of the big corporate life, thinking that it would assist with my future projects and passions. However, it took me a very short period of time to realize that corporate America was not for me. I left Deloitte and entered the world of manufacturing and technology. I ended up running one of the largest privately owned packaging manufacturing facilities in the west coast, National Packaging Products, where I started to create and invent sustainable materials that never existed in the North American markets. We had our products in the largest brand names stores such as Wal-Mart, Target, Walgreens, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, and more.

I left manufacturing at a time when the shared scooter and bike concepts started to explode, and I saw an opportunity for the same QR code scanning concept but for something more applicable to people in today’s world: phone chargers. I partnered with one of my best friends, Ryan Levy, who had very complimentary skillsets in sales and fundraising. From there, chargeFUZE was born, and we were off to the races.

Today, chargeFUZE allows people to locate our stations anywhere in our network, where users can scan a QR code, rent a portable charger, and drop it off at any station. Today, our company is nationwide working with some of the largest partners such as Westfield, Simon Malls, ASM Global, Live Nation, and more. In Los Angeles, we are in some of the most marquee locations, such as Crypto.com Arena, Sofi Stadium, Banc of California Stadium, Century City, and the Beverly Center, and we are also in numerous bars and restaurants around the city.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It definitely has been quite a journey.

Personally, I went through many ups and downs prior to chargeFUZE, as this was definitely not my first venture. There was no guarantee that this would be successful, and having to bootstrap the business at 25 was definitely not something that was easy to do. At the same time, I was fighting for approval from those around me, while also trying to convince people that this concept would even work.

To top it off, we actually launched our company a couple of months before the pandemic, with our debut being at the Rose Bowl. Two months later, the whole world flipped upside down, and we quickly realized we would be going through some difficult times. Seeing that the whole world shut down and having our business predicated on events and nightlife at the time, we were essentially paralyzed. We couldn’t place our stations anywhere because most locations were closed, and people wouldn’t use our products because of the lockdowns.

Altogether, we scaled back our growth and spend, with the focus solely on preparation. We kept our heads down and made sure that when the world opens back up, we would be ready. And that’s exactly what happened.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I am the co-founder of chargeFUZE, a revolutionary IoT-backed consumer tech company that merges hardware and software to create on-the-go mobile charging for restaurants, bars, shopping centers, stadiums, casinos, events and more. Similar to shared scooter models, we allow users to locate our autonomous stations anywhere on our app, where they can scan a QR code to rent a portable charger that they can take on the go and drop off at any station in our network.

We power over 50 sports teams, with partners like Madison Square Garden, Allegiant Stadium, Crypto.com Arena, SOFI Stadium, American Airlines Center, Gillete Stadium, and have also launched portfolio rollouts with Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Simon Malls, Live Nation, ASM Global, and more.

We also have had success in the event space, having done events such as Indian Wells, the US Open, Formula 1, EDC, Bottle Rock, Outside Lands, Rose Bowl, Daytona 500, NFL Pro Bowl, UFC 270, and the NHL Winter Classic. We have also branded with sponsors such as JP Morgan Chase Bank, Verizon, Ticketmaster, Zig Zag, and more.

Overall, what I am most proud is how quickly our company has actually scaled. Over a year ago, there was only a handful of us, and today we have teams all over the country scaling our product.

I think what sets us apart is the fact that we strive to innovate and develop according to our customer’s needs. We aren’t just pushing products just because we have them; instead, we are also taking the feedback of the business owners, event producers, and users to create new solutions based on their actual needs.

Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
First and foremost, my co-founder Ryan Levy deserves the most credit. We went through all the ups and downs in this business together, and he has been my other half from the very beginning. From a business standpoint, this partnership was a match made in heaven, and I credit him for single-handedly teaching me the importance of partnering with the right person. On the personal side, it is rare to be able to partner with someone that’s also your best friend, and the truth is with our dynamic, it works perfectly. Throughout this journey, we always had each other to lean on, and our strengths have always been very complimentary, so in the end, I’m grateful for both his partnership and friendship.

I also would like to give credit to my father, Ben Afari, who actually taught me what it means to build a business that has real value. Both from an operations standpoint and also from a psychological standpoint, he showed me the essence of business management, and he has been a mentor of mine since the very beginning. Through him, I learned the right analytical skills that even help me in my daily decision-making today.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.chargefuze.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brandonafari & https://www.instagram.com/chargefuze