Breakfast Clubbing #41

Week of Feb 3rd: We are ON in PDX, Wmsburg, Miami, Hamptons, SF, London, DTBK, Manhattan, Cincy and SOMa. Plus Camp Cultivate, BC Boulder, Vienna returns and plenty more....

Hi all,

Some one or another of the Breakfast Club community makes my week every week. Friday it was Gabriela Neves.

Per Gabi’s Post: “Last week Tuesday, I saw a post by Michele Martin about a Breakfast Club started by Ben Dietz happening in Miami the next day. I showed up, not really knowing what to expect, and ended up meeting Jeff Carvalho. The breakfast was wonderful—I got to connect with so many creatives in Miami and was blown away by the sense of community. Subsequently, Jeff invited me to teach at Istituto Marangoni yesterday, where I spoke to his Fashion Essentials students. Honestly, I never imagined I’d be teaching anything related to fashion, but it turns out there’s a ton of overlap when it comes to experiential, retail, entrepreneurship, and marketing. To top it off, I met Bradley Cummins, another professor, and I'm excited about the possibility of collaborating with him down the road. I cannot recommend the Breakfast Club enough and thankful for Michele's initial post. So grateful for this connected universe we live in.”

How cool is that?!

That’s what we’re here for, more or less - the embrace of intrepidity, the natural affinity of like minds, the serendipity of connection, the opportunity of community. Thanks Michele, Jeff and Gabi for illustrating the Breakfast Club philosophy in three easy (but bold, confident) steps.

I’m away at the inaugural Camp Cultivate event at Outbound Hotel’s Mammoth Lakes property this week - an idea born from Breakfast Club and propelled by BC stallwarts - so I’ll miss the weekly hang. But I’m happy to say that it won’t miss me, because it’s great whether I’m there or not.

That’s what makes new chapters in Boston, Seattle and Boulder so exciting. Not to mention the return of Melbourne (now fortnightly) and Amsterdam (likewise), Vienna and Lugano and Burlington (each monthly). And folks like NYC OG Alex Corporan stepping in to host Manhattan while Heidi’s out West with me, or Chris Gillespie holding down SF since he can’t join us.

Breakfast Club has become a whole much greater than the sum of its parts. And it’s only onward and upward from here. Looking forward to seeing you sometime soon.

Ben

---

The Breakfast Club Esprit de Corps:

* Everyone’s invited - especially you.
* Feel free to share, bring friends, colleagues, family, anyone.
* No agenda, no required buy-in, no need to RSVP. And no pitches.
* Everyone pays their own way.
* Everyone is welcome to subscribe. Join the Linkedin group here: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/14449223/

---

Breakfast Club Editions Around the World (cities added regularly):

Weekly:
Portland, OR [Tuesday]
Mexico City [Wednesday]
Williamsburg Brooklyn [Wednesday]
Miami [Wednesday]
The Hamptons [Wednesday]
San Francisco [Wednesday]
Downtown Brooklyn [Thursdays]
Manhattan [Thursdays]
SOMa, NJ [Fridays] 

Bi-Weekly:
Washington, DC [Thursdays] 
Melbourne [Fridays, alternating between Fitzroy and Victoria] 
Amsterdam [Fridays, alternating between locations East and West)

Monthly: 
Barcelona[First Wednesdays]
London[First Thursday]
LA (West):[Second Fridays]
Ibiza
Vienna
Milan
Lugano
Philadelphia
Boston
Portland, Maine
Burlington, VT
Panama City

---

Breakfast Club This Week:

---

Tuesday, February 4th

Portland, OR

• Co-hosted by Nina Sers

• 9a @ Proud Mary

---

Wednesday, February 5th

Miami

• Co-Hosted by Jeff Carvalho and Jesse Kirshbaum

• 8:30a @ Novella Cafe Social

Brooklyn (Williamsburg)

• Hosted by me and a gang of regulars [Note: I’ll be away this week]

• 8:30a @ Le Crocodile at The Wythe Hotel

The Hamptons

• Co-hosted by Mike Kilcoyne

• 8:30a @ Tutto Cafe

Mexico City

• Co-Hosted by Steve Bryant

• 8am @ Lardo

San Francisco

• Co-Hosted by Eve Lewis and Chris M. Gillespie

• 8:30am @ Terreene in the 1 Hotel

---

Thursday, Feb 6th

London

• Co-Hosted by Victoria Gates-Fleming and Aisha Al-Abdallah

• 9:00am @ The Café at Foyles, Charing Cross Road

Downtown Brooklyn

• Co-Hosted by Kat Popiel, Marina Garcia-Vasquez, Lynn Juang and Gavon O. Broomfield

• 8:30am @ Ace Hotel Brooklyn (Lobby)

Manhattan

• Co-Hosted by Alex Corporan and Heidi Hartwig

• 9am @ Eva’s Kitchen on Grand

Cincinnati

• Co-Hosted by Theo Erasmus and Emmit Jones

• 8:30am @ Mom and Em Coffee

---

Friday, Feb 7th

Melbourne (Fitzroy)

• Co-Hosted by Josh Gardiner and Celeste Blewitt

• 9am @ StandardX Fitzroy

New Jersey (SOMa)

• Co-Hosted by James Friedman and Evie Bear

• 9:15a @ Arties

---

Upcoming Breakfast Club Events

2.10: Burlington, VT 

2.11: Portland OR

2.12: Lugano, Miami, Hamptons, Williamsburg, CDMX, SF 

2.13: Boston, Downtown Brooklyn, Manhattan, Seattle, Washington DC

2.14: Amsterdam, SOMa (New Jersey), Los Angeles (West) 

2.20: Vienna

2.21: Melbourne

3.4: Boulder 

---

Breakfast Club Event Recaps [Last Week]:

Breakfast Club Panama City Report 1.28.25

Per Karla’s Post: The First Edition of the Breakfast Club @ Panama City

I find first times particularly exciting—there’s so much to be done! On this occasion, the first edition of Panama’s Breakfast Club exceeded all expectations.

We had a full house of entrepreneurs, thought leaders, artists, designers, musicians, architects, and lawyers—but above all, incredible humans!💫🫂

We gathered at Sassy Café (which, to be honest, set the perfect mood for the attendees). Over our caffeine fix, we had an energizing discussion about synchronicity, the importance of grit in maintaining clarity while pursuing goals, and how to navigate today’s overstimulated, stress-filled society. We also shared some of our New Year’s resolutions, agreeing that the first day of change doesn’t have to be January 1st—it’s whenever you feel ready to take the leap.🔋

Some attendees felt inspired to share their “words of the year.” Liberation and communication seemed to resonate strongly with the group.

Although the Breakfast Clubbers come from diverse backgrounds and professional fields, we all share a common desire for connection and community in a safe “third space.” 🫶🏽

It seems our breakfast crowd left the table smiling and convinced that the new Panama BC chapter is ON! ⚡️☕️

The Breakfast Clubbers: Carla Batista Jean-François, Daniela Virginia Jované, Jacob Larrinaga, Mario Rodríguez Céspedes, Mario Quiros R., Roberto Del Rosario, Diana Gómez, Rolando Rodríguez, Ana Mercedes Mellior Pérez Robert Spratt, Juan Manuel Castillero Annie Valdes, Thanaci Cho Bulgaris, Gustavo Santamaría Gonzalez, Ramon A. Poveda J., Ernesto Calvo, Diego Diaz, Cristina Siu and Virginia Soto

---

Breakfast Club PDX Report 1.28.25

Per Nina’s Post: Hot topics this week: Local politics, winter travel and Alaska Airlines' many direct flights to sunshine, Lizy Gershenzon'e upcoming talk at Creative Mornings, why this January has been so quiet for freelance work, Texas, support for LA fires, and how someone has to have a mouthful in every group photo from now on (among other things).

Great to see these faces this week: Lizy Gershenzon shannon holt Brian Mark Joseph Soutullo Sara Ravid Justin Davis Roland Gauthier

See y'all next week at 9am at Proud Mary

---

Breakfast Club Miami Report 1.29.25

Per Jeff’s Post: Breakfast Club Miami returns more proper weather. The sun and skies are back out after some storms and cold (dare we say cold when compared to our friends up North).

Back together again this week: Justin Elliott, Jason Brown, Sarween Salih, Danielle Salzedo, Walshy Fire, Arnel San Pedro, MBA, and Rachelle Elbaz!

---

Breakfast Club Classic Report 1.29.25

Per my post: At my end we talked about being late on account of dogs, dealing with loss, desert life, organizing creative conferences, skiing at Sundance Institute and at the World Economic Forum, courting high net worth individuals, consulting on government projects, interviewing ICE agents, McCarthyesque vibes, descending from historic communists, "Yes by Yes Yes," Camp Cultivate, Eagles versus Chiefs, Netflix’s push into sports, seeing Waxahatchee and Slowdive at the Brooklyn Paramount Theater, the DEEPSEEK situation, having data stored on Chinese servers, what ‘safe’ means, the NVIDIA pendulum, Jensen Huang’s management style, flat organizational style, ‘The Soul of the Machine’, business books written like thrillers, hashtag#holacracy, galaxy gas, development in downtown Vegas, health span vs life span, the Substack app, newsletter strategy, the TikTok to Substack pipeline, Hermès vs Walmart, and lots more.

The group today was me, Eric Korsh, Ian Edgar, Nick Bodor, Piers Fawkes, Randy Paul, Fanny Karst, Nick Cogan, Campbell Dietz, Leonardo Olafsson, Ariel Abramov, Alban de Pury, Natalie Gregory, Julie Stein, Paul Greenberg, Sam Boardman, Adrienne Elkin King, Ben Jenkins, Leann Abad, Arsie Jiwajinda, and Michael Farber

We do this every Wednesday at Le Crocodile Restaurant at 8:30am. Everyone pays their own way, there's no agenda or RSVP necessary. Come hang sometime! Everyone's invited, especially you.

---

Breakfast Club SF Report 1.29.25 Report

Per Chris’s Post: At breakfast club we discussed tech poltergeists and …

Bureacracy. (Bureau-cracy = rule by writing desks. Not even people. Desks.) Cultural singularity. Flooding the zone. Newsy narratives. Longform journalism. All that’s left. LA., of course. Filters for the flood of context. Digital watering holes. An ethnographic analysis of your YouTube explore page. Making the algorithm work for you. An AI trained on your text likeness being kinda bitchy. Self vs soul self. ChatGPT as a parenting coach. Difficulty. Untranslatable words from Vietnamese and French. Language-native social hierarchy. Parent-led culture. The wisdom of trees. Natural wisdom in general.

With the indomitable Arno Hesse, Magali Charmot, Graeme Lindsay, Lien Nguyen, Shamrina Oshana, and Eve Lewis

---

Breakfast Club Amsterdam 1.30.24 Report

Per Sheila’s note: “We had a really nice morning with Amy last Thursday. You are right. She brought so much energy!”

Then, Per Amy’s post:

[Thursday] Gratitude for two epic co-hosts for Breakfast Club x Amsterdam Gemma Jones & Sheila Guo

And such a wonderful group of humans who came along to chat & connect.

Hortense Koster, Neil Schambra Stevens, Rosalie Anne Post, Demetrios Tsakiris, Alexa Chirnoagă , Jasemen Nassab, Rochelle Blokland, Johanna Wohlrab, Moe N. Alana Tara Singh, Bodil Jurg, Isabelle Reman, Michell Zappa, Michelle Arrazcaeta, Shachar Bechor, Amy Brown, Ayelet Heimann, Matt Resnick, Jurjen Semeijn, Pernille Kok-Jensen, Toby Kiers & Alessia Balducci

FOMO?

A nudge…

There is ALOT of chatter about where to find & discover “culture” - my nudge ALWAYS is go play outside (better yet, play with others).

Get geeky in their geek.

Reframe your thinking with their rabbit holes.

Don’t skip brain dance breakfasts - it’s the most important meal of the day for a reason.

AND

If your “culture” agency is not keen on you playing outside - especially with your “competitors”

RUN.

---

Breakfast Club Downtown Brooklyn Report 1.30.25

Kat’s Post:

Today we covered:

• - American train travel

• - The rising price of oxtail (remember when no one wanted to buy it?)

• - Reconnecting with old colleagues at Breakfast Club

• - Art programs for kids and how to make our own

• - Why being your own boss is the best

• - Cross-country road trips

• - That moment when an idea moves its way into a business proposal

• - Moving to Jersey City (is it time to break up with Brooklyn soon?)

• - The people and places that make up your community

• - Finding global destinations that haven’t been taken over by tourism

Also this month has been the longest, is it September yet?!

Thanks to everyone who gathered today - Jordan Leschinsky Aviva Grinnell Berton Ridley Jennifer Rusk Delaney Strittmatter Jenny Cavaioli Greg Donnelly Matt Cohen Nicole Nejati Thomas Murphy Peter Gaston NICHOLAS ROUTZEN

Join Lynn Juang Marina Garcia-Vasquez & myself next week with Gavon O. Broomfield as our guest host - we're there every Thursday at 8:30am inside the lobby of Ace Hotel / Atelier Ace Brooklyn.

---

Breakfast Club Manhattan Report 1.30.25

Heidi’s Post Breakfast Club Manhattan was a wonderful gathering of NYC’s creative community. There’s nothing better than coming together over good conversation and coffee. Hope to see you next week everyone’s welcome, especially you! This week we had CeCe Chin Tim Griffin Alex Corporan Elijah Torn Jonathan Schenk Matthew Lief Ben Dietz Marcus Bleecker Wen-Jay Ying Matt Lenski Heidi Hartwig Thomas Bert, Justine Herz

---

Breakfast Club Cincy 01/30/25

Per Theo’s Post: Today we talked about legacy media, Cambodia, Executive Orders, Art, bread and puppets, HipHop, activism, meditation, drinking bleach, book stores, banana republics, economics, humor and the oligarchy, book prizes and Robert Eggers.

Calcagno Cullen , Jeff Kobberdahl, Denianne Gardner , Emmit Jones, Erika NJ Allen, Stacy Sims, Rhys Watkins, Jason Zwolinski, Xavier Jones, Dana Dubay , Ben Dietz, John Young

---

Breakfast Club SOMa 1.30.24 Report

James’s Post: Today Breakfast Club SOMa was all dudes. Where are the women at? Saw several friends of BC at nearby tables having meetings or hangs…

We talked about professional second acts in the arts, ansibles, listening to Ice T and PE as a child in South Africa, experimental music performances at the Met, steamed cheeseburgers in Connecticut, the whereabouts of The Fader staffers, not wanting to hear about somebody’s interest in Tantra, Rebecca Black, getting paid in custom drum kits from Germany and more

Join us next week at Artie’s before we switch things up and move to a new spot in South Orange!

=====