My name is Allen Oelschlaeger and the box above provides a brief overview of my background. In case you are interested, here are some more details.

I grew up in the Northwest (central Oregon, Seattle) and attended college at Washington State University. I changed majors a few times but ended up with degrees in biology and pharmacy (cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, 1977), which led me to Philadelphia to participate in a hospital pharmacy residency program at Thomas Jefferson University.

I remained in Philadelphia for six years to practice as a hospital pharmacist and attend the Wharton School of Business (MBA, Kaiser Family Foundation Fellow, 1983). Then, for the next 12 years, my wife and I (and ultimately two great kids) lived in Indianapolis (Eli Lilly & Company), Seattle and Toronto (Physio Control), and Milwaukee (Marquette Electronics) as I ascended through various executive positions — primarily in marketing, strategy, and sales — in the medical device industry.

One of my most impactful accomplishments during this period was to help develop and lead the launch and marketing of the world’s first automatic external defibrillator (AED) in 1985. Since then, with millions of these devices now in service throughout the world, countless lives have been saved with this breakthrough product.

In 1995, I shifted my career from corporate environments to the start-up world, and over the next five years, I had senior-executive positions in three venture-funded medical device companies.

With that background, I decided to quit having a “real job” in 2000 and become an entrepreneur. Since then I have been a co-founder of five companies:

• Telaric — an intellectual property firm with over 50 issued patents that spun out two angel-funded startups and had an out-of-court patent-infringement settlement with Microsoft.
• The Straight Scoop — the business that supports my research on weight, nutrition, and fitness.
• Martial Arts Marketing Network — a digital marketing and consulting agency serving the martial arts school industry and publisher of The Bully Expert anti-bullying certification program.
• Goodlook Marketing — a digital marketing agency focused on helping clients be seen as the recognized authority in their market niche (the Packers Hall of Fame was an early client) and the developer of a SAAS private video hosting service.
• Vistelar — a licensing, training, and consulting institute focused on building safe and respectful workplaces (example client: Blackstone Consulting − the principal security provider for Kaiser Permanente).

Beyond my entrepreneurial experience, during the late 2000s, I was on the marketing faculty at the University of Wisconsin – Whitewater. In addition, I have published several books and have done a fair amount of professional speaking.

My first book, Finally, the Straight Scoop About Weight, Nutrition and Fitness was published in 2007, which led to ongoing research and writing about the prevalent myths concerning weight loss, eating well, and exercise and my BITE Method for never having to struggle with weight issues ever again.

I’m also the editor/author of several books and online courses in the Vistelar Confidence In Conflict series and the ebook, Local Business Internet Marketing.

Today I function as a classic entrepreneur with more interests than time in the day.