This is the enterprise seat at an AI-first loss-prevention platform that turns a retailer’s existing cameras into real-time theft, fraud and safety detection. It pays $125K–$150K base against $250K–$300K OTE on a true 50/50 split, remote anywhere in the United States with New York preferred, reporting to the founder and CEO. Pricing runs about $6,000 per location per year on a land-and-expand motion: a 30-location retailer is a ~$180,000 deal, and a 150-location rollout is ~$900,000. Customers already include a 120-location global retail brand. The seat rewards a seller with real retail-tech or loss-prevention credibility and disqualifies a generalist fast.
Not the right location or comp? See the other roles I’m filling.
What is this role, exactly?
The product rides infrastructure every retailer already owns: their camera network. The platform layers AI detection — shoplifting, unscanned items, fraud, watchlists, safety — on top of installed cameras, or ships as an integrated platform for new deployments.
Pricing is per location per year, so the motion is land-and-expand: pilot a handful of stores, prove the detections, expand across the chain. Deal size is set by how many doors the retailer has, not by how hard you push on price.
Every AI company in your feed claims “AI-first.” Here it’s the actual wedge, and the clearest evidence is that the incumbents can’t answer it.
Why is this different from a normal retail-tech sales job?
The budget already exists. Enterprise retailers are paying legacy camera and VMS vendors today. You’re not selling a category nobody budgets for.
It layers on instead of ripping out. The product works with the retailer’s existing VMS or replaces it outright. No forklift migration in every meeting.
A territory you can know cold. Enterprise loss prevention is a tight community. One strong customer reference travels. For a seller who already knows this world, the first 90 days are warm conversations, not a cold list.
A founder who wants to hand it off. The CEO has been the sales engine and is explicit about the gap: he wants a closer from the industry, someone who knows what FPS means because customers will test you on it, to turn founder-led wins into a repeatable enterprise motion. That handoff is the whole job, and a founder can’t hand you a playbook he never wrote down.
How does this compare to other Founding Account Executive seats?
You get a harder domain bar and an easier territory, which is close to the inverse of the usual Founding AE trade. Most Founding AE seats ask you to find the buyer; this one asks you to already know them. For the wider checklist, what good Founding AE roles look like is the frame I use.
| Typical Founding AE seat | This role | |
|---|---|---|
| Proof it works | Founder-led deals, often under $2M ARR | Founder-led revenue, including a 120-location global retail brand |
| Your risk | Product-market fit may not exist | Pull is real; the enterprise motion is untested at scale |
| Base / OTE | $100K–$175K / $200K–$350K | $125K–$150K / $250K–$300K |
| Buyer universe | Thousands of accounts to map from scratch | A tight community where one reference travels |
| Competition | Often a category nobody budgets for yet | Legacy camera-and-VMS vendors — the budget already exists |
| Domain knowledge | Usually teachable in the first two quarters | Non-negotiable — buyers expect to learn from you |
If you’re benchmarking the number against other offers, what a Founding Account Executive actually earns has the market ranges.
A weekly newsletter for founding AEs selling before the playbook exists.
Mostly the craft of the job; sometimes the career around it. Five minutes a week.
Where is the upside in this role?
Land-and-expand pricing means one logo compounds on your ledger instead of resetting every quarter. A 30-location pilot that becomes a 150-location rollout moves one account from ~$180,000 to roughly $900,000 without a new logo. You define the enterprise playbook, the qualification bar and the pilot-to-rollout path, reporting to the CEO.
Who is this role actually for?
A hunter with 5–15 years of B2B closing and genuine retail-tech or loss-prevention credibility, the kind that survives a technical buyer. Someone out of video security, VMS or retail analytics, selling camera systems or store analytics into retail today, who wants to sell the AI-first product their current employer can’t build.
Who it isn’t for: a generalist enterprise seller without retail or physical-security domain who planned to pick it up on the job. The buyers will test you in the first ten minutes, and the company will too.
What would I push on before signing?
The first-year definition of success, and how targets account for building pipeline from scratch. This is a hunting seat at a seed-stage company: nobody hands you a book. Revenue is real, and the enterprise motion is untested at scale. That’s the open field and the open risk in one. I’ve worked directly with the founder to define this role, and I’ll walk you through both honestly on a first call.
The questions worth asking before you sign covers the rest of what I’d bring to a first call.
The same company is hiring a Mid-Market Account Executive in New York, covering retailers with 5–30 locations. See that role here.
