Meet Jonathan Hermida | Co-Founder and CEO of Capsul

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jonathan Hermida and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jonathan, what is the most important factor behind your success?
It’s difficult to really answer this question without understanding what success means to me.

To me success is first and foremost an internal feeling. Do I feel happy? Am I at peace? If I don’t, what’s the point?

Second, am I healthy? Is my body functioning optimally? Do I have the energy and mental clarity to do the things needed to be done on any given day? I can’t possibly consider what I’m doing to be a success if I’m unwell or tired all the time.

Third, do I have time to do what I love with the ones I love? Family is everything to me. I have a beautiful wife, a 1 year old son, and an extensive community of humans I care deeply about. If I don’t have the time to enjoy life with them, again what’s the point?

Fourth, am I making life better for others? Is my life and my work helping people lead happier, healthier, and more fulfilled lives? Impact dictates every personal and professional decision I make.

And lastly, am I having novel experiences? I LOVE adventure. I love exploring new places, food and people. I love trying new things. A successful life to me is one in which I’m able to fill it with novel experiences.

So what is the most important factor behind my success? Making sure every thought, action, and decision I make align with the five points above. Having that clarity of what’s most essential has allowed me to build a life where I am consistently happy, healthy, and wealthy in the ways that truly matter to me.

And the two brands I’ve built, RisOn and Capsul, have been an offshoot of these same principles. The degree to which my brands have been successful has been the degree to which I’ve been able to not only embody what’s most important, but to make them the very reason why the companies exist in the first place.

RisOn exists to make inner peace accessible to the masses. Capsul exists to capture the essence and wisdom of a life fully lived.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
Our mission at Capsul, “to encapsulate the memories, essence and legacy of loved ones for generations to come”, comes from my own experience.

My mom died from cancer six years ago. When my son was born last year, one of the emotions I had that was mixed in with joy, was sadness. I felt sad that my son will never get to know his grandmother. That led me to reflect on all the families who lose their loved ones and all the people that never get a chance to meet those that came before them.

I knew that there was a big opportunity in the market to preserve what’s most essential in those we love while they’re alive so that the family and future generations can enjoy what makes them special, now and forever. |

So what we do is we interview loved ones, going into all aspect of their life: their childhood, their career, how they met their partner. what it was like starting a family, all the challenges and difficulties they had, the lessons they learned along the way and how they wish to be remembered, among many other topics.

These are long form interviews conducted in our downtown Miami studio. After the interview we then edit them into beautiful keepsake videos and deliver them in a “time capsule” box that includes a custom USB.

As a final experience, we invite the family to organize a watch party where they all come together to watch the interview and go deeper into their loved one’s life by asking them follow up questions.

I’m proud of everything we’re doing.

With the loved ones we interview I’m proud that we help connect with their life in an intentional way. They have the opportunity to be seen, heard, and honored while knowing that they’re creating something that their family will love and cherish forever.

With the family, I’m proud that we’re helping them connect with each other. How many times a year does the family come together? Thanksgiving? Christmas? The occasional birthday or wedding? Well this is another opportunity. They get to all come together in love and appreciation.

We have three core values that drive everything we do at Capsul. Family, connection, and beauty. Family represents the why. Connection represents the what. And beauty represents the how.

Family is the reason customers buy from us. Connection is what they get: loved ones connect to their life and family connect to each other. And beauty is how we deliver it, we make sure that every sound, every visual, every product, reflects the beauty of the person we’re honoring.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
if you’re in Miami for a week and have never been, the must see neighborhoods are Little Havana, South Beach and Wynwood. Having said that, my favorite areas are the Grove, Gables, and Key Biscayne, so I’d sprinkle those in if possible as well.

Here’s a shot at an itinerary.

Day One: Park at South Pointe Park, walk over to the beach and spend the day there. If we’re sticking to Miami Beach for dinner and drinks I’d say Joe’s for dinner and Broken Shaker for drinks.

Day Two: Stroll through Little Havana, get some cafesito at one of the ventanitas, eat at Old’s Havana, grab some ice cream at Azucar and go dancing at Ball and Chain.

Day Three: Get lost in the graffiti lined streets of Wynwood. Drop in to Gramps for some drinks and honestly grab food anywhere. There are a ton of great spots. Maybe end the night at Oasis and Dante’s HiFi.

Day Four: Can’t be in Miami without a boat day. Ideally we’d cruise out, pull into Nixon sandbar and spend the entire day there. We can close out the day by cruising through downtown and ending in Garcia’s for some fresh fish.

Day Five: Get on our bikes and cruise through the Grove. We can stop at Greenstreet or Monty’s. Ride through Kennedy Park and get some A.C.’s Icees. Run into some peacocks. Love just strolling through the area.

Day Six and Seven: Choose your own adventure: kayak at Oleta, walk through Fairchild’s, day trip down to Key Largo. Chill beach day at Crandon in Key Biscayne. There’s a lot to choose from! Depends on the mood.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Man, where to begin. I am because others have been. Every single person that has ever been in my life deserves credit for where I am because no matter how big or small the interaction I had with them was, they forged a little or a lot of the way I see the world and the way I show up.

I honestly wish I can shout them all out! Books also. I love reading. But for the purposes of this interview I want to give a special shoutout to my brother and the co-founder of my first start up (RisOn), Chris Gueits.

Chris has been a dear friend for many years. We founded RisOn together in 2018, and in so many ways that experience has shaped my leadership and business thinking today. He was and is a mentor for me. He introduced me to the Silicon Valley start up landscape. We’ve been in the trenches together doing the sometimes wonderful and often times excruciatingly difficult work of building a company together.

Because of our time together I had the clarity, courage, and conviction to start another company (Capsul) that I hope will have an impact in people’s lives for a very long time.

Website: https://yourcapsul.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yourcapsul/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathan-hermida/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/yourcapsul