Shawn D. Nelson is the founder and CEO of Lovesac, repeatedly recognized as the fastest growing furniture brand in the US for over a decade. Lovesac is publicly traded on Nasdaq, ticker “LOVE,” and is projected to exceed $1 billion in annual sales over the next few years leveraging its rapidly growing fleet of more than 270 Lovesac branded retail locations. From humble beginnings, Shawn founded Lovesac in 1998 making Sacs by hand for neighbors and friends while in college. He graduated from the University of Utah in 2001 with a BA in Mandarin Chinese before opening Lovesac’s first retail location in his hometown of Salt Lake City shortly after graduation. In 2005 Shawn won a million-dollar investment by Richard Branson on his prime time hit reality TV show, The Rebel Billionaire, and was named acting President of Virgin Worldwide for a time. Shawn later achieved his master’s degree in Strategic Design and Management at the world famous Parsons, The New School for Design in New York City and continued on as an instructor there for a few years.