In the backyard with…Stuart Gardner

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Angel Investor, BACKED Community

In his own words, Stuart is a former ‘startup’er’ (founding team at Comufy, sold to King.com, the team behind CandyCrush). He’s now an angel investor. He’s sector and geo agnostic, and has invested in ~80 companies to date.

| My first ever job…

I used to be a paperboy for Georgie Best (sadly, not the footballer), my local corner shop owner. Child labour at its finest…but the copious amounts of penny sweets we were given made it worthwhile.

The youth of today will never know the pain of getting up at 5:30am on a wet and cold December morning, to lug around a ridiculously heavy bag of the Sunday newspapers.

| The last thing I geeked out about…

The new Mario Kart AR kit for the Nintendo Switch, which I saw this week on BBC Click. It has been added to my Christmas wish list. Mario Kart made up a large chunk of my wasted youth, and it looks like it’s about to continue into adulthood.

| I want to learn more about…

Psychedelics (shhh… don’t tell my mum!). The research and the benefits for conditions such as anxiety, depression, addiction, are pretty compelling, and I think we will see prescribed psychedelics within the decade. Not to mention all the pretty colours…