David Wiener is a Park City-based entrepreneur and founder of David Wiener Ventures. He’s worked with big names including Ferrari, Nike, Ben & Jerry’s and the U.S. Ski Team.
Wiener recently published a memoir called “Accidental Madness: At the Intersection of Extreme Creativity and Entrepreneurship.” The book details his inspirational, yet hysterical, story.
The memoir includes events throughout Wiener’s life, including the story of a clandestine purchase he made in elementary school. Wiener said he often did things in secret because his father was tough and critical. As a third-grader, he bought a chemistry set and snuck it home.
“Then having to create my own Bunsen burner, my own version of one, and then lighting my desk on fire,” he said, during a recent KPCW “Local News Hour” interview.
In college, he majored in art, mechanical engineering and aerodynamics. He founded W2 Design, later renaming it David Wiener Ventures. Through Ventures, he created other companies and sold products around the world.
He also was a consultant for the U.S. Ski Team, Columbia PFG clothing, Ben & Jerry’s, Nike, Ferrari, Porsche, and many others, helping them develop iconic brands.
“We've done consulting for the U.S. Ski Team right here in town, back in 1999 when they wanted to do a total revamp of their brand, their image,” Wiener said. “They went hunting around the whole U.S. for an image consulting firm, and they ended up looking at us, and we rebranded them, and it was very successful.”
Wiener said the name of the memoir “Accidental Madness” came from the editor-in-chief of Fortune magazine, who read the manuscript early on. He said all of Wiener’s stories were madness. For example, Wiener was once asked to design an aircraft.
“A company came to us, said, ‘We've heard what you guys do. It sounds really interesting. We want you to design the logo for our new aircraft company,’” Wiener relayed. “We said, ‘Fine, come in. We'll meet.’ We sat down, an hour after telling them what we do, they said, ‘Forget the logo. We want you to design the aircraft. Can you do it?’ ‘Oh, yeah, sure, we can do that, no problem.’”
Wiener said he didn’t want to write a book until someone suggested it. The tome began as a self-help or business book but evolved into a memoir full of fun stories. He said he never thought people would want to read something he wrote, but one editor found it inspiring.
“When I heard that, I thought, ‘Wow, maybe the inspiration to really push yourself harder,’” he said. “You have to take risks. None of what I've done would happen without taking crazy risks, and a lot of people just don't do that.”
The memoir is now available on Amazon.
