Most innovative company in Seattle - Anonymous employee Every* Awards Employee Review

I worked at Every from almost the company’s inception and had a great experience working for the organization and under John Wantz as its leader. As a pioneering startup in the personal data/cryptocurrency spaces, literally no other company was tackling the incredibly important mission of trying to protect and monetize personal data on behalf of consumers and to create a global online marketplace that would empower consumers to trade their personal data – at their discretion – for financial reward with the brands and websites that require greater shopper insights to better serve their customers and develop more relevant products and services. It was this vision that motivated me to join the team and I loved working to help build the tech to enable it. The company was, from the jump, a bootstrap startup and absolutely everyone working there – from top to bottom – understood the inherent risks of working at such an endeavor where the struggle to survive is an everyday concern and where all resources must be dedicated to keeping the business moving forward. To that end, nobody on staff put in more hours in service of making the business a success than John Wantz. His overall vision and passion for the company’s mission inspired everyone on the crew, all of whom joined up out of a sense of equally shared passion. His communication with all members of staff about the evolving state of the company was regular and always transparent and nobody was ever misled about the company’s progress or state of affairs. I personally witnessed Wantz’ work ethic firsthand which drove him to work nearly seven days a week in service of the company much to the detriment of his personal/family life. He was always the first person at work at always the last to leave, often around 9pm or later. It was this unwavering dedication — an essential quality that all leaders of startups must possess – that inspired the staff on a daily basis and enabled the company to make such great strides in very little time. Also, it should be noted, just for the sake of accuracy and fairness, that the Tesla car referenced in the writing above was not owned by John Wantz. Someone saw him get picked up in a Tesla from work one day and an internal rumor started that he’d bought a Tesla but it was clearly communicated to everyone afterwards that it was not his car and that he did not own it. This was a very silly misunderstanding at the time and it was laughed off internally afterwards.

I also worked alongside the person who wrote the “I Feel Scammed” post here and, without getting into personal detail about the author, can attest to the fact that the writing above is not in any way reflective of the truth of the situation at Every and seems to be driven by some purely personal reasons that do not in any way align with the reality of the work situation. During the “I Feel Scammed” author's tenure at the company it was discovered that this person held some very seriously extreme personal views that were incongruous with those of the people around them, and society at large. Most egregious of these beliefs was their seeming sexism/racism, as evidenced by the following *direct* quote from a totally public post they made on social media: [DIRECT QUOTE ] "I don’t trust men. These days, I am staying as far away as I can get from white women and the men by their side … Their white egos blind them to the destruction and violence they inflict on others because they see themselves as somehow separate than the systems that oppress us. Call it shame, self-hatred or just plain old ignorance. Call it whatever you want, it doesn’t change the fact that if you are a white person at the center of a progressive or subversive space, the only person you are benefiting is yourself. I don’t trust white women who label themselves as intersectional feminists while centering whiteness. They’re usually the ones who are most problematic. They’re the most dangerous. Them and their white male allies. So incredibly dangerous. Because they don’t see themselves as a problem. As the problem. They refuse to accept that they are any other way than how they see themselves ... While they hold us back, they simultaneously hold us down.” [DIRECT QUOTE] Although I’m not able to speculate about the exact motivations or mental state of the “I Feel Scammed” author, the above quote from their public writing makes it clear that their unsettling personal belief system is a very extreme and controversial one which should be taken into consideration in assessing the validity and veracity of their writing posted here. I’m not someone who posts online reviews, but the extremely inaccurate and obviously personal attack above motivated me to provide a counterpoint that hopefully sheds light on the dubious nature of this writing and helps shed some light about what it was really like to work at Every.

Really enjoyed the people I worked with. The tech they're building is game changing.

Startup workload is always intense. Lots of hours and endlessly moving deadlines, but that's to be expected.