Yas Grigaliunas, founder of World's Biggest Garage Sale and Soconomy, joins Pauline Fetaui for Part 1 of a Perspective X conversation about building a circular-economy company in Australia before the term existed. From a charity garage sale that did $15,000 in a day to a $4 million capital raise in four weeks, Yas unpacks the data discipline, the conviction, and the well-timed moments that turned "dormant goods for good" into a national enterprise — and the energy source that, after 30 years of people predicting her burnout, still hasn't run dry.
Chapters
03:13 - The cancer-charity origin and "dormant goods for good"
05:30 - The first World's Biggest Garage Sale: $15k in a day, 50 volunteers
12:58 - Scaling the events: $15k → $60k → $150k in a single day
18:06 - River City Labs, Steve Baxter, and "I'm not a tech founder, I'm a business builder"
24:55 - 168 hours in a week: time, data, and consistency
31:14 - Confidence, the seesaw, and falling in love with yourself
36:57 - Coining "Soconomy" before circular economy was a buzzword
41:29 - From events to a warehouse: building a real business
48:07 - Officeworks, "surprise chain," and the Retail Rescue the weekend COVID hit
49:54 - The $4 million raise and the "capital raise cave"
51:13 - Raising $4M in four weeks as a female founder
58:55 - Preparation, persistence, and watching who opened the pitch deck
Resources
Books
The Little Engine That Could, her all-time favourite
Who Moved My Cheese? (Spencer Johnson), on change
Eat That Frog! (Brian Tracy), on time management
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (Stephen Covey), on effectiveness, plus the "Circle of Concern / Circle of Influence"
Good to Great (Jim Collins)
Tools & platforms
Jira, ran the garage sale on Sprints (backlog / to-do / blocked / done)
Beautiful.ai, her first pitch deck
Gumtree, Facebook Marketplace, Shopify, COVID-era sales channels
Organisations, programs & ventures
World's Biggest Garage Sale → Soconomy (her company)
River City Labs and its B4/E4 accelerator
Officeworks (strategic investor, ~21% shareholder)
Smiling for Smitty / Mater Foundation, the cancer-research charity the first sale funded
BMI Group / Rivermakers (warehouse), DB Schenker (Officeworks logistics)
Video Pro (earlier employer), Circular Australia (inaugural Chief Circular Entrepreneur), Queensland Social Enterprise Council, TEDx
People mentioned
Steve Baxter (investor / Shark Tank / River City Labs)
Vu Tran (taught sales & BD at River City Labs; later co-founded the unicorn Go1)
Peter Ellis, Wayne Gerard, Lou Drury, Peter Laurie (River City Labs / mentors)
Wayne Swan (local MP who visited the first sale), Trevor Evans (then waste minister)
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