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In this compelling episode of Navigating the Customer Experience Podcast, we speak with Jay Sapovits, a dynamic and resilient entrepreneur with a flair for reinvention. Jay’s journey began with a bold move across the country at age 18, setting the tone for a life rich in unconventional choices and high-profile experiences. With a knack for spotting opportunity in adversity, Jay has built a career rooted in innovation, grit, and human connection.

From Retail to Revolutionary: The Ink Stores Story

Jay is currently leading Ink Stores, a full-service promotional company specializing in on-demand webstores. Originally a traditional storefront business, the pandemic forced a dramatic pivot. In response, Jay transformed the company into an online powerhouse that builds, hosts, and fulfills custom merchandise stores for businesses—with no inventory, minimums, or upfront costs. This reinvention not only helped Ink Stores survive but thrive in a competitive, post-COVID market.

Real-World Impact: Swag Without the Hassle

Jay shares a powerful client use case involving a holiday employee gift initiative. Rather than requiring HR to manage sizing, style, and distribution of branded jackets, Ink Stores created a custom online portal. Employees could independently select sizes, styles, and colors, and orders were shipped directly to them—eliminating friction, protecting employee dignity, and freeing HR from uncomfortable sizing conversations. It's a prime example of how Ink’s model prioritizes autonomy, convenience, and a seamless experience.

Jay’s Must-Have Business Tools & Books

When asked about a tool he can’t live without, Jay simply answers: Email. He's responsive to a fault—often replying within seconds—and views this real-time communication style as a core operational strength.

Two books stand out in shaping Jay’s business philosophy:

• Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty by Harvey Mackay – A classic on proactive networking.
• How to Become a Rainmaker by Jeffrey Fox – Jay's all-time favorite sales book, packed with short, punchy insights on winning and keeping clients. He frequently recommends it to job candidates and young professionals.

Strategic Priorities in Uncertain Times

As 2025 unfolds amid economic pressure and political shifts, Jay remains grounded. His three focus areas:

1. Stay connected with customers
2. Follow industry trends
3. Prioritize team culture and employee well-being

Notably, Jay refuses to raise prices despite rising supplier costs. He views opportunistic pricing as short-sighted and is committed to rewarding loyal customers with price stability—or even reductions. His values stand in contrast to what he calls “price gouging” across many industries.

What’s Next? A Leap Into Tech

Jay is currently expanding his capabilities through tech and AI by interviewing candidates for data science and development roles—areas outside his comfort zone but essential for scaling customer experience. His willingness to push into unfamiliar territory speaks volumes about his growth mindset.

Words to Live By

Jay shares a simple but profound quote taped to his computer:
“If you promise someone something, keep it.”

He explains that success is a series of doing simple things right—choosing the next right action, over and over again. In Jay’s eyes, life isn’t about making mistakes unknowingly; it’s about consciously choosing right versus wrong. Stacking up the right choices, he believes, leads to a meaningful, impactful life.

Connect with Jay Sapovits:
🌐 Website: www.inkdstores.com
💼 LinkedIn: Jay Sap

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In this episode of Navigating the Customer Experience, we sit down with Fran Brzyski, CEO and Co-Founder of Hark, the leader in video and audio-driven customer feedback. With over a decade of experience in CX and Voice of Customer roles spanning startups to Fortune 50s, Fran brings a wealth of insight into transforming how brands listen and respond to customers in the modern age.

Fran’s journey to entrepreneurship wasn’t linear. He began in finance at a major bank but quickly realized the corporate world wasn’t for him. Driven by a desire to innovate and execute quickly, he pivoted into the startup world, embracing the highs and lows along the way. After working across sectors including biotech, risk and compliance, and e-commerce, he found his calling in software — drawn by the rapid feedback loops and opportunity for fast-paced innovation. Inspired by his supportive wife and parents, Fran took a leap of faith, second-mortgaged his home, and founded Hark.

So, what is Hark? Fran explains that Hark was born from a realization that customer communication was evolving rapidly. While people freely share stories on social media, brand interactions remained stuck in outdated forms and text-based surveys. Hark changes that by enabling customers to share feedback via audio, video, screen share, and text — creating a multimodal, emotionally rich experience that makes people feel truly heard.

Hark not only captures more meaningful customer stories, but also analyzes them to extract trends and insights across departments. The platform facilitates faster feedback loops and deeper cross-functional collaboration — turning traditional customer feedback into an engaging, action-driven experience that transforms how teams operate.

Fran shares powerful use cases where Hark has driven real change. In one example, a beauty brand identified a pump issue that was initially thought to be a product defect. Through Hark’s insights, they discovered it was actually a fulfillment problem — saving time, money, and improving the customer experience. Another eyewear company revamped its NPS strategy, using Hark to elevate promoters into champions, fostering brand loyalty in ways they’d never seen before.

When asked about tools he can't live without, Fran points to ChatGPT, noting its versatility in helping him brainstorm, optimize operations, and make strategic decisions — effectively serving as his go-to AI business partner.

Books that have influenced him? "The Four Agreements" by Don Miguel Ruiz stands out for helping him tune into what truly drives personal happiness and freedom, a mindset he carries into both life and leadership.

What’s Fran excited about right now? Both professionally and personally, a lot. He’s energized by the accelerating pace of AI innovation, especially how it’s reshaping product development and testing. Personally, raising three young kids under six keeps him grounded and present, giving him fresh perspective every day.

On staying motivated, Fran emphasizes self-awareness, structure, and support. He prioritizes sleep, exercise, and quality time with his family. He also works with a coach and practices meditation to stay mentally clear and present — knowing that founder life is a marathon, not a sprint.

His favorite quote? One from his mom: “This isn’t a dress rehearsal, this life.” It’s a reminder to be bold, stay grounded, and live intentionally — a philosophy he carries with him into every business decision.

Connect with Fran:

• Fran Brzyski on LinkedIn
• Hark on LinkedIn

Tune in to learn how Fran is disrupting customer feedback

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In this episode of Navigating the Customer Experience, we’re joined by Eric Karofsky, an award-winning expert in customer experience (CX), user experience (UX), and employee engagement, and the founder of VectorHX, a human experience agency. Eric shares his professional journey—from decades in agency and consultancy work with major brands like Michelin and Royal Caribbean, to leading UX at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, and now building his own company focused on creating seamless customer interactions across digital and physical touchpoints.

Eric discusses how AI is rapidly reshaping the customer experience landscape, emphasizing that it’s a powerful tool—not a solution on its own. He shares both the promise and the current limitations of AI, particularly in customer support scenarios, likening poorly designed chatbots to frustrating call center loops from the 1980s.

A major theme in the episode is understanding customer behavior through cultural, situational, and demographic lenses. Eric cautions against forcing users into preferred communication channels and instead advises companies to map the ideal journey for different personas and optimize each channel for a frictionless experience.

He offers a powerful case study from the pharmaceutical industry, where AI is being used to transform labor-intensive literature reviews—cutting timelines from six months to potentially two weeks. This not only boosts business efficiency but also accelerates drug development, delivering life-saving treatments to patients faster.

Eric also touches on:

• AI leadership and how it should drive business strategy by identifying areas for efficiency and innovation.
• Tools he can't live without, like Claude AI and Notion, which he uses to manage his business and ideas.
• His excitement about no-code tools like Bolt.new and Lovable, which allow rapid prototyping of full-stack apps without technical skills.
• The enduring value of classic books like Getting to Yes and The Design of Everyday Things, which shaped his thinking around negotiation and customer-centric design.
• The importance of motivation and resilience, fueled by the exciting pace of innovation and meaningful human connections with clients and team members.

He closes with a favorite quote by Benjamin Franklin:

You’ll leave this episode with fresh insights on CX, AI strategy, and how to build human-centered experiences in a rapidly evolving digital world.

🔗 Connect with Eric Karofsky:
🌐 Website: www.vectorhx.com
🔗 LinkedIn: Eric Karofsky