THE STORY OF A "RUG": FROOTS For those who don’t know me, I’m the co-founder of @frootsnft and today I'll share a story about my experience as a founder in the bear market. Let’s go back to mid 2022. Okay Bears mints out and brings a lot of new eyes to SOL NFTs. People are excited again, NFTs are mooning, the excitement is back. This marks the return of the brand meta. Tons of new projects start copying @okaybears’ marketing strategy, CT is flooded with giveaways, upcoming projects we’ve never heard of reach big followers milestones fast: 25k, 50k, 100k, 200k followers. Wow, this feels like 2021. But it isn’t. Trippin Apes, Shrouded Playground, Kings Of Da Streets, Great Goats, Trippy World, etc…are all over CT. 0 promises, 0 info about the projects, but the visuals are nice and traders just want a quick flip…so they sell out and most of them rug almost immediately. Lot of liquidity starts leaving the SOL ecosystem. People stop minting projects, nothing sells out anymore, people have nothing to look forward to, except for 3 projects: Duppies (y00ts), Claynosaurz (no ETA, no info yet) and…Froots. At the time, Froots stood out as one of the only upcoming projects growing organically, we were truly doing things differently. Good marketing, Captivating & Cute Art AND we were fortunate to be the first project to launch on @BlocksmithLabs Launchpad. Back then, CT was a different beast, dunking on founders and people trying new things was trendy, ez engagement. Shillin Villain’s spaces were popular and the toxicity was out of this world. We had an AMA scheduled 1h before our mint with Shillin Villain. The day before, Alex told me he didn’t know anything about Froots but that he’d FUD us to the ground during the AMA for entertainment. The AMA had its challenges but I managed. Tough mint but Froots sold out. CT was going crazy…FINALLY a project sold out. Good vibes all over the board. However, post-launch, while Froots initially did well, it soon became a target for a pump and dump. . Rumors about our involvement in orchestrating a PnD, paying influencers, etc...started coming in. None of it was true, but the brand suffered immensely. Suddenly, Froots was labeled as a "rug," a PnD, a cash grab. Traders moved on to the next shiny project. I mean, who can blame them, when everyone on Twitter is saying we're bad actors, that’s a pretty good reason to give up, even though all of those allegations were fake. So here we are, a damaged brand with angry holders. We were in a tough spot. We kept our head down and I personally addressed all the allegations 1 by 1. But that wasn’t enough, a lot of people didn’t care anymore. (Ex: If someone says you fck goats, even if you deny it and show proofs/facts, you’ll forever be the goat fcker in people’s minds.) When a narrative gains traction, even false ones, it’s challenging to turn the tide. "Froots is going to fail" "It’s a rug" "Team can’t do it" "Project is dead"…I’ve heard it all. Fck it, we kept working. This was a tough year, I empathize with those who stepped back from the space, with founders who felt overwhelmed. Building in web3 during a bear market, with demanding holders, is hard. We also had our fair share of fck ups. On top of that, a lot of unexpected things happened and we encountered a lot of obstacles which added to the existing delays. If you know me/spend time on discord, you’ll know that I always keep it 100. I share our fck ups, our small wins, keep it real with our situation, etc…One of our holders encouraged me to take this to Twitter as well to give people a better understanding of what’s going on with Froots. Hormozi says stories worth telling have lessons/takeaways for the listeners. I know what we’ve been through, our community knows it too. Time to stop feeling sorry about it. I plan to start sharing my thoughts, experiences, the things we've learned, the fuck ups, etc...on here. Didn't think people would care, but our holders proved me wrong. We’re still here and ready to kick some ass, I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished and I need to start saying it out loud. Stay tuned. Check our recent discord announcements for detailed updates. Not. A. Rug. 🧃

Reminder: If you're hosting an event at NFT NYC and want free @frootsnft juice for your attendees, lmk. I'll say it again for the people in the back. FREE COLD-PRESSED JUICE at NFT NYC. 🧃 Quantity isn't an issue, just DM me and we'll figure it out. They're delicious and go extremely well with alcohol.

READ THIS IF YOU'RE HOSTING AN EVENT AT NFT NYC This is for projects, communities, or anyone who likes to throw lit parties: Froots will supply your events with FREE @frootsnft juices, for all the people who are attending your event. Our cold pressed juices can also be easily mixed with alcohol to create fire cocktails. If you're interested, just send me a DM!🧃