David Bell, co-founder and President, Idea Farm Ventures
David has been called the “guru of the DTC movement” and the “man who kick started the direct brand economy.” He is co-founder and President at Idea Farm Ventures (IFV), a permanent capital consumer and retail investment holding company based in New York City. David was an early investor in several iconic new economy brands including Diapers.com (acquired by Amazon for $545m), Jet.com (acquired by Walmart for $3.3b), Bonobos (acquired by Walmart for $310m), Harry’s (private), and Warby Parker (private), among many others.
Prior to IFV, David had a 20-year academic career at the Wharton School where he was a Chaired Professor, an award-winning teacher and researcher, and responsible for starting the first courses on digital marketing and e-commerce for MBAs and undergraduates. He is a recipient of the Frank M. Bass Outstanding Dissertation Award, POMS Applied Research Challenge First Place Award, WISE Overall Best Paper Award, three John D.C. Little Best Paper Finalist Awards, and two INFORMS Long Term Impact Finalist Awards, among others.
David speaks globally on digital marketing and e-commerce for clients including Alibaba, Google, Haier, Nike, and Ralph Lauren. He wrote of Location is (Still) Everything: The Surprising Influence of the Real World on How We Search, Shop, and Sell in the Virtual One, a playbook for how to win in the digital economy. His academic research is published in all major peer-reviewed journals, including Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Econometrics, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Management Science, Marketing Science, MIT Sloan Management Review and California Management Review.
David holds a Ph.D. (Business) and M.S. (Statistics) from Stanford University as well as a B. Com and M. Com (1st Class Honors) from University of Auckland.
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