Johannes le Roux · Entrepreneur coach, Cape Town
Not a coach. An operator who coaches.
Fractional co-founder · Pitch decks · Fundraising
I've built six brands over the past decade, mostly by learning the hard way. Now I take a co-founder seat in a handful of businesses, a few hours a month, and help wherever it's stuck.
- Get Lucky Golf · 2025
- The Duchess · 2016
- DOPE Drinks · 2019
What I've built
My Ventures.
What I offer is lived operator experience — the same hands that built and shipped the brands below. The path hasn't been linear, and most of what I've learned came the hard way.
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01 Golf-techGet Lucky Golf
Co-founder · 2025 — present
A golf-tech business running the Hole-in-One Challenge across 30+ premium South African courses. AI shot-tracing, video capture, R1m grand prize, Indwe Risk Services on as headline sponsor. Currently scaling globally from a South African base.
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02 BeverageThe Duchess
Founder · 2016
The world's first non-alcoholic gin & tonic — built brand-led from Cape Town in 2016. 10M units shipped across 10+ countries, 50%+ of revenue from export. Backed by ZX Ventures (AB InBev's VC arm) and an RMB-led consortium.
Read: the deck that raised → -
03 CannabisDOPE Drinks
Founder · 2019
Cannabis-infused beverage brand built for the US market — 5mg THC + 5mg CBD per can, micro-dosed for the cannabis-curious adult. Funded at Summit at Sea, launched at BevNET New York. Now shipping into 42 US states. "Born in Africa. Made in America."
Read: Cape Town to America → -
04 WineCape Spritz
Founder · 2022
A wine spritz built for Cape Town summers. Easy-drinking, low-alcohol, ready-to-pour. The proof point that ready-to-drink premium wine has a place on the SA shelf.
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05 RumSuncamino
Co-founder · 2017
Premium rum out of Cape Town with Caribbean roots. Built on what The Duchess had just taught me about premium spirits brand-building and getting onto international shelves. Now on the advisory board.
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06 BrandyBrannas Draught
Founder · 2012
A South African brandy brand — the first venture out of the gate. Where I learned how brand-led FMCG actually works: the trade, the pricing, the bottle on the shelf.
Read: the Brannas × KWV story →
By the numbers
Results,
not slogans.
Coaching is downstream of operating. These are the brands the coaching draws on.
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0
Multi-million-dollar brands built
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0+
Countries we've launched in
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0M
Units sold globally
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$0M
Raised across the brands
Coaching
One seat.
Or one sprint.
I'd rather be in the business than advising it from outside. So there's one seat, one bounded sprint, a free call to decide between them, and hours for everything else.
- 01 10, 15 or 20 hours a month · 6-month seat
Fractional Co-founder
From R20,000 / month
Not sessions. A seat. I join your business as a co-founder for a set number of hours a month and help wherever it's stuck that week: the deck, the model, the first customer abroad, the sponsor who won't sign, the hire, the week you can't carry alone. No lane. The business decides where I go.
- 10 hours a month for R20,000, 15 for R27,500, or 20 for R35,000, inside your business, on whatever is stuck
- One list, one weekly call. You put what's stuck on it, I take what moves the business most
- WhatsApp in between, same day
- The first 90 days: the deck, the model and the first three customers or partners, whichever is the bottleneck
- Monthly retainer, invoiced in advance. 90-day review, clean exit either side
For: Founders with a real business and no co-founder: one person doing three jobs, who needs an operator next to them, not another advisor.
- 02 30 min · once-off
Founder Clinic
Free
A short, no-fee call to figure out together whether you need a co-founder, a sprint, or neither. Bring whatever you're working on — early-stage or scaling, polished or messy.
- 30 minutes of straight feedback on whatever's stuck
- A written 3-bullet next-steps note within 24 hours
- No obligation, no upsell at the call
For: Anyone weighing up whether to work together at all. It's the way into everything else.
- 03 3 sessions · 2 weeks
Pitch Deck Sprint
R15,000
We rebuild your deck from narrative up. You walk out with an investor-ready story you can defend. The bounded alternative to the seat, for founders who need one thing done.
- Three 60-min working sessions (Zoom or in-person Cape Town)
- Investor-ready deck (10–14 slides) — narrative, traction, ask
- Two rounds of async feedback on revisions
- Investor-shortlist guidance for your stage
For: Founders going into a pre-seed, seed, or angel round in the next 90 days.
- 04 60 min · pay as you go
Custom Hourly
R2,500 / hour
Already know what you need? Book single hours of coaching or business consultancy for whatever sits outside the seat and the sprint.
- 60-min sessions, on demand
- Coaching, consulting, or sounding-board work — your call
- Notes / written follow-up where useful
- No package commitment
For: Founders I've worked with before, or anyone with a bounded one-off problem.
New AI workshop
Claude for
entrepreneurs.
Three hours, eight people, your own laptop. You leave with Claude running one job in your business — not a folder of notes about it.
Three hours, in person in Gardens, for business owners and executives who are tired of hearing about AI and would rather just use it. Eight seats, because everyone brings a real job from their own business and we get it running before you leave.
- Duration
- 3 hours
- Seats
- 8
- Where
- CHIPS, Gardens
- Per seat
- R3,500
Things you could make
- A 5-year cashflow model with real COS and channel margins
- An automated sales funnel — lead in, researched, followed up
- KPI tracking that chases the team for the number, not you
- A custom dashboard for your venture, live on your own numbers
- Your month-end pack, rebuilt from the source spreadsheets
Plus a 14-day group call and a 30-day review — both included.
How it runs
Four steps,
start to deliverable.
Simple on purpose. You always know what's next and what it costs.
- 01
Discovery
Free 30-min Founder Clinic. We figure out whether you need a co-founder, a sprint, or neither right now.
- 02
Scope
Calendar invite + a short pre-work brief land within one business day. For the seat, the first session sets the hours tier, the money and the first 90 days. For the sprint, it sets the deliverable.
- 03
In the business
One list, one weekly call, WhatsApp in between. In person in Cape Town or over Zoom. I take what's stuck that week and move it.
- 04
Results
A deck that raised. A first customer abroad. A sponsor signed. A week that isn't yours alone to carry. Reviewed every 90 days.
Client work
Founders I've
worked with.
A few of the brands I've helped this year, with what my own ventures taught me.
Journal
Field notes
from the road.
Long-form when the topic deserves it. Pitch decks, fundraising, scaling, the things nobody warns you about.
- Interview 12 Aug 2026
kykNET's Prontuit: where drinking is actually going
kykNET put the sober-curious question to me on national television. The honest answer isn't that the world is going alcohol-free — it's that 92% of the people buying alcohol-free drinks still drink. That distinction is the whole business.
Read post → - Field Notes 29 Jul 2026
Not a developer. 17 things shipped since March.
What I actually use Claude for as an operator — 32 branded club storefronts, a WhatsApp agent that handles first contact for Sold Direct, and feasibility models in Excel that used to take a finance team.
Read post → - Playbook 02 May 2026
Building a deck that raises: lessons from The Duchess
What I learned building the deck that brought ZX Ventures and RMB into The Duchess, and the three slides I'd remove today.
Read post → - Field Notes 20 Apr 2026
Founder's Fatigue: the version nobody tells you about
Burnout in founders doesn't look like burnout. It looks like working harder, spending more, and slowly becoming the bottleneck of your own company. Three tells, drawn from being it twice.
Read post →
Talks & keynotes
Honest learnings
from real ventures.
Three signature talks based on lived operator experience. Conferences, accelerators, corporate offsites — South Africa and abroad.
- 01 90 min
How to build the perfect pitch deck
Many great ideas never launch because of a lack of funding. Over the past decade I've developed a formula for building pitch decks that actually attract investment. This talk teaches your audience how to build one.
- 02 60 min
Learnings from my business failures
There is more to learn from failure than success. In this talk I share some of my catastrophic failures in business and the key learnings — the ones I wish I'd known earlier.
- 03 60 min
Scaling brands globally
Some of my best entrepreneurial stories come from scaling South African brands internationally. This talk shares insights and cultural learnings from launching across America, Europe, and Australia.
Free · 30 minutes · No upsell
Book the
clinic.
30 minutes. No fee, no sales pitch. Bring the venture — early-stage or scaling, polished or messy. If it makes sense to keep going together, we'll figure that out as we go. If not, you'll still walk out with a clearer next step than when you walked in.