Who The Hell Are You

Hey, if you're new here, let me introduce myself real quick…

I'm Parker Burr. I launched Promo Lacrosse at 18 years old and sold it 5 years later. Then I spent my entire twenties grinding on one thing: turning FeatClothing.com from a $0 idea into a $40M+ business. Not gonna sugarcoat it – those were some intense years.

After that exit, I started Bylders, a boutique retention agency. We don't do vanity metrics or pretty dashboards. We focus on two things: profits today and expanding lifetime value for tomorrow. Simple.

More recently, I launched Evana with one mission: putting millions of dollars back into the pockets of brands and their founders. Because at the end of the day, businesses live and die on cash.

Every week, I share what I'm learning, what's working, and what's not in this newsletter. The goal? We all win together.

Fair warning: I skip weeks sometimes. If I don't have something genuinely valuable to share, I don't hit send. You won't get filler content from me just to stay "consistent." Your inbox deserves better than that.

When you do hear from me, it's because I've got something worth your time.

Jump Ahead

1. Shopify's AI Play: The Chess Move Everyone's Missing

2. Why I Changed My Mind About Consultants (And You Should Too)

3. Upwork Should be Paying Me $10,000 for This

4. Discover Evana and Recover Your Import Duties

Shopify News

Shopify's AI Play: The Chess Move Everyone's Missing

I've been diving deep into Shopify's latest AI announcements, and I have to tell you—most people are completely missing the point.

Everyone's talking about the shiny new features. "Oh wow, AI can build my website!" "Look, it generates product descriptions!" But while everyone's distracted by the cool demos, Shopify just made a chess move that's going to reshape the entire game.

Let me break down what's really happening here:

This Lesson Took Me 14 Years to Understand

Why I Changed My Mind About Consultants (And You Should Too)

Let's be honest—consultants get a bad rap.

"They're expensive." "They just tell you what you already know." "Why pay someone when you can figure it out yourself?"

I used to think the same way. Hell, I probably said those exact words at some point.

But here's the thing: I was completely wrong. And it cost me—big time.

Let me tell you two stories that completely changed how I think about buying expertise.

In Case You Didn’t Know

Upwork Should be Paying Me $10,000 for This 

An important note: This is not a sponsored post. Upwork doesn’t even know I’m writing this.

This past month I was reflecting on the hundreds of employees and contractors I’ve had the privilege of working with since starting my first business in 2011.

So many incredibly talented people. Brilliant people. People much smarter than me. Any you know what stood out to me?

That’s it for this week.

Bang. We did it, another week. Hope this helps you build your empire this week.

Got a question? Hit me up. Reply to this email, I’ll get back to you asap

PS - Did you check out Evana yet? We’re getting one business ~$1,500,000 in import duty refunds. No joke. Straight to the bottom line. Hit us up to see what we can get your business.