How a Babson Graduate Built a Billion-Dollar Business Around Creators

Babson College has produced some of the biggest names in business, including Home Depot co-founder Arthur Blank, Ring founder Jamie Siminoff, and Toyota chairman Akio Toyoda.

A generation later, one of its graduates is building an empire out of something far less tangible: internet fame.

Andy Bachman started Creators Inc. in 2020 with a laptop and a single phone. Six years later, the talent and media company has done more than $1 billion in sales and over $300 million in EBITDA, and Bachman has become one of the most influential dealmakers behind the people who run your feed.

"People see a creator with millions of followers and assume they've made it. I see a company that hasn't been built yet," the Massachusetts native said. "My whole job is turning that audience into something that still pays them in 10 years."

He learned to think like that in Wellesley. Bachman graduated from Babson in 2006, from the program U.S. News & World Report has ranked number one for undergraduate entrepreneurship 29 years in a row. Before that, he grew up about 16 miles west of Boston in Wayland and graduated from Wayland High School.

The entrepreneurial itch showed up before the diploma did. As a student, Bachman co-founded Tatto Media, a digital advertising firm that got paid on results instead of impressions. By 2008 it was generating around $40 million a year and had cracked a global top-250 list of internet companies.

Since then, he's taken that same instinct into the creator economy. "Viral doesn't mean valuable," Bachman told LA Weekly. "There are creators with tens of millions of followers who are essentially running inefficient businesses. Attention without infrastructure is just wasted energy."

The proof is in the details. Earlier this year, Bachman negotiated a near seven-figure payday for wrestler Georgio Poullas in a single six-minute match. In February, he launched Creator Music Group, whose first release paired Alina Rose with Lil Pump on a track produced by Scott Storch. And in May, his label CI Swimwear hit the runway at Miami Swim Week with names like Sophie Rain and Piper Rockelle walking it.

Then there's BuzzStar, his app that lets fans book paid one-on-one video calls with creators. It runs on the same belief that powers everything else he owns. "Creators lose because they don't control how they get paid," Bachman said. "BuzzStar gives them that control back."

The roster taking calls has grown to include rapper Blueface, hitmaking producer Scott Storch, celebrity jeweler Johnny Dang, live streamer N3on, and social media star Cole Train. Bachman keeps a microphone running, too.

On his podcast, he's hosted Migos rapper Offset, Ray J, Blac Chyna, and newly crowned WBC welterweight champion Ryan Garcia. It's a long way from Wayland High School. Then again, nobody ever accused Babson graduates of thinking small.