Archive for Great Ideas – Page 9

A Whale of a Story — Vineyard Vines

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Shep and Ian Murray, CEOs and brothers (as they like to be called) created the now iconic clothing brand Vineyard Vines. The two brothers were working for in Manhattan in 1998 when they both decided to quit the corporate life to pursue their dream of living the good life hence their slogan “Every Day Should Feel This Good.” They say their story began with the reminiscence of their childhood on Martha’s Vineyard. Before quitting their jobs in NYC they signed up for as many credit cards as they both could (and used their health plan just as much, they like to say). With their credit cards they used all they could to personally finance their dream of living the good life.

July, 1999 the two brother began selling their ties off their old boat and out of backpack on Martha’s Vineyard. That summer saw the largest growth their new company Vineyard Vines (VV) had ever seen. By the end of the season VV moved to a small office on the island. By 2004, the Murray brothers’ company grew to multiple boutique shops along the East Coast. Between their expansion in ’04 and ’07 the new company’s revenue tripled. And, in 2015, VV christened its new 91,000 sq. ft. headquarters in Stamford, CT.

The story of the Murray brothers and Vineyard Vines goes to show that investing in yourself without a safety net is always the best motivator for any entrepreneur. Risk it all to get the best reward because “Everyday Should Feel This Good.”

Uncharted Power & Jessica O. Matthews’ Vision for Clean Energy

Jessica O. Matthews is the creator of Soccket — the soccer ball that develops power through kinetic energy. Jessica had a vision while traveling to visit family in Nigeria that she used to create what she calls her Image result for soccket ball“Anti-Silicon Valley” startup named Uncharted Power. Using her intellectual property rights to kinetic energy products Matthews used her initial capital to expand her toy product line. But she realized something bigger could come of her inventions. After unveiling her new power-generating products, Matthews told Forbes that she has been in communication with Disney to develop full-scale energy production in “light poverty” areas.

Matthews also talks about her experience as a female CEO and her “Anti-Silicon Valley” Energy Company. She talks about strategic location. Matthews says that she originally had Uncharted Power’s headquarters located in downtown Manhattan, but considering relations with lower incoming areas she moved her headquarters uptown to Harlem. 

Matthews, interestingly, noted that not only people matter but you matter. She gives her experience, or lack thereof, in the energy sector following her re-brand to Uncharted Power. Matthews says that she tried and failed to bring in experts in the field, that even though experts say they are “experts,” for her they did not get what she wanted done. After an overhaul of management and taking the reign herself, she says that less is more. Currently employing 17 people and 17 serving as advisers, Uncharted Power is working to accomplish great things for those who do not have clean energy.

Read more about Jessica Matthews and Uncharted Power in the link:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tanyaklich/2018/11/12/uncharted-power-founder-jessica-o-matthews-on-building-the-anti-silicon-valley-energy-startup/?ss=entrepreneurs#d13735e44ffa

Robert Nay – Bubble Ball

Robert Nay, a seemingly typical 14 year old, took the mobile game industry by storm back in 2010. He developed the app “Bubble Ball”, which is a physics-based game that involves a series of puzzles to solve and levels to beat. Robert only spent a month coding and researching before the game was introduced to the Apple app store. Within the first two weeks of its release, Bubble Ball was downloaded 2 million times. At the beginning of 2011, the app reached 16 million downloads thanks to the company Ansca Mobile, who chose it as its app of the week. At one point, Bubble Ball took the first-place spot from Angry Birds under the category of top free games in the Apple app store.

It is truly amazing how a someone so young executed on an idea he had that resulted in major success. Robert was not held back by the obstacles, but instead learned what he had to in order to bring his vision to fruition. This story sets a good example for anyone who thinks they want to pursue an idea they have but aren’t sure where to start. What truly determines if something will succeed comes down to taking action and taking on every challenge that’s ahead.

Briago Labs

Coming SoonThe Problem

A while back on the internet I saw a picture of a young woman in tears at a restaurant table. She wasn’t on a date, she was surrounded by family. After reading the post it was clear the tears were indeed happy, not sad. For the first time in her seventeen years of living this girl was given a menu she could read; in braille.

Braigo Labs

Braigo Labs is a company which provides low cost blue tooth and internet equipped braille printers to help the visually impaired. Their goal is to help 50 million of the worlds population accomplish a task most of us take for granted. Being able to read independently is a struggle for the visually impaired. Typical braille printers cost around three thousand dollars. Braigo Labs product is sold for 82% less than competitors.

Founder

Braigo Labs is one of the most impressive entrepreneurial endeavors in existence. Its impressiveness is compounded by the age of the founder and its creation story. Shubham Banerjee is 14 years old. Braigo Labs primitive version was built with Lego Mindstorms EV3. The inspiration struck while brainstorming ideas for a seventh grade science fair project. Banjeree is not alone in his journey, as many teachers and mentors are encouraging and helping make the second version of the printer possible. Banjeree says the best advice they’ve supplied is; “Be humble,” and “Innovate for the right reasons — money is not one of them.”

 

Not Before Tea

Henry Patterson was quite an imaginative young man, even from a very young age. When he was 5 and wanted some new toys, his mom suggested that he sell some of his old ones to buy a new one. Henry’s budding entrepreneurial mind then began to expand as he not only sold toys by themselves but with other, seemingly unrelated toy, in one case he says, “I loved doing this (selling his toys on ebay) and got quite imaginative putting Ben 10 on a tractor and selling him as Farmer Ben 10!” From then on, Henry knew he wanted to run his own business.

But what could a now ten year old do? The ages of fancy new tech startup owners and cutting edge online real estate moguls usually hover around early twenties to mid thirties, Henry needed to find something that he knew well and could do better than anyone. Then one day, he found it. What Henry knew better than anyone was how to be a kid! Looking back to the days of selling his toys one ebay, Henry, with some help, started the Not Before Tea company.

Not Before Tea sells items for kids. Small toys like animal blankets, stuffed animals, and children’s book (written by Henry himself) are all sold by Not Before Tea. Items for parents with small children are also sold, items like diaper bags and changing mats. Even room amenities are part of Not Before Tea, things like rugs and playful wall stickers.

Henry’s young but determined entrepreneurial spirit shows us all how powerful the right idea can be if you’re passionate about it and are willing to see it through with all you have.

Jeff Smith Smule

Jeff Smith is a co-founder of the popular app, smule. Smule is a well known app that has taken the world by storm. It is a musical app that allows users to listen and play music as well as sing along with it. According to the statistics over 350 million people across the world have used the app in the past. Which is crazy because that is 4% of the entire world’s population. Jeff Smith has also been included in other app creations that all deal with music. The man is simply inspirational to young entrepreneurs.

Rich in a Snap: Evan Spiegel

I can guarantee almost everyone reading this has Snapchat installed on their phone right now, and that is thanks to visionary entrepreneur Evan Spiegel.  In 2011, twenty-one year old Stanford graduate Evan Spiegel founded Snapchat with his fraternity brother Bobby Murphy.  Spiegel created an app completely different from all the rest at its time, and it would go on to make him a billionaire.   Photo by Jae C. Hong/AP/REX/Shutterstock Evan Spiegel, Snapchat Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel in Los Angeles. Snapchat has agreed to settle with the Federal Trade Commission over charges that it deceived customers about the disappearing nature of messages they send through its service and collected users' contacts without telling them or asking for permission Snapchat FTC, Los Angeles, USA

Even with Facebook and Instagram trying religiously to copy Spiegel’s creation, Snapchat has reigned supreme as the best photo communication technology, averaging “191 million users” a day.  In 2017, Snapchat went public as Snap Inc.™, and twenty-eight year old Spiegel became the youngest CEO of a public company in American history.  Since going public, Snapchat has struggled financially.  However, Spiegel still refuses to give up his CEO position or sell his 18% of the company.  It is impressive to see someone stay strong and keep protecting their vision, even amidst much criticism and struggles.

Should We Go?

Elise Hennigan took a huge risk and left her high up position in a startup to pursue her own idea. She found inspiration in her dog, Emmet, because of how kind and loving he is. “Dogs light people up. They bring out this love and passion in people, and they connect us to each other. I started Should We Go? to honor this idea,” Hennigan says. Rather than jumping into the market with her own assumption of what would sell, she instead conducted research on Amazon. Figuring out which products were well liked and which ones were not, Elise constructed her idea: a hands-free dog leash. While she knew this was a great niche market idea, she also knew that these products already existed, so she did more research. After looking through the reviews of the existing product, she decided to switch up her design to solve these problems.

 

Elise says,“Everyone else is using the same criteria for product launches, so you really, truly need to think outside of the box. Like so many things in life, you should be aware of the rules so you can break them thoughtfully and with intention.” This type of innovative thinking perfectly exhibits a great entrepreneur: figuring out what everyone else is doing wrong and counteract it. With this incredible entrepreneurial mindset, Hennigan was able to branch out her brand by creating unique, handmade dog bowls on Etsy. With a company like Should We Go? there is now way to go except up. 

 

By analyzing the market rather than assuming what people want, Elise Hennigan shows her brilliance in understanding that marketing (and selling) is “Finding out what people want and giving it to them” (as Dr. Powell wisely says). I look forward to seeing more products flow from this lucrative company. Good luck Elise!

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A “New Story” for the Homeless

In many cases the world’s greatest technological advances are reserved for the rich until they slowly defuse into the mass market and if the poor are lucky, they eventually have a chance to utilize them. However, New Story, a nonprofit; has paired with ICON to give the poor an exclusive first dibs on some amazing technology.

New Story + ICON have developed the capability to 3D print houses and are using this technology to build safe, affordable, and comfortable homes for the homeless around the world.  They can print 600-800 square foot homes in 24 hours for less than 4,000 dollars. The impact this can have on third world is insane. It will create safer and cleaner communities where their residents can develop to their fullest potential.

Not only is New Story a crazy cool organization, but one of its co-founders and CEO is a millennial with a crazy cool story. Brett Hagler went to college pursuing all the wrong things in life. He wanted money, fame, and women. Instead he got cancer. His fight against cancer helped him to put his life into perspective and brought him back to his Christian faith. After beating cancer he decided to follow his new passion and start an organization that actually helps people.

 

2016 Brett was voted a Forbes 30 Under 30 Entrepreneur and in 2018 named Top 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs by Goldman Sachs. In 2017 New Story was called one of the “Most Innovative Companies In The World,” by Fast Company. This organization is small, but has shown stunning growth and continues on a successful path. In college as Brett chased the wrong things he gained a lot of entrepreneurial experience. He used these skills and a lot of hard work to create something amazing and it is changing the world in insane ways.

 

HANDSHAKE – the story behind these CSO emails we get so often.

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Whether you’re a Freshman or a Senior, you are definitely used to getting emails from the Career Service Office badgering you to sign up for Handshake. What’s so special about this company Grove City partners with?

Handshake’s mission is pretty relevant to anyone in this class since their expressed purpose is to help all students find meaningful careers.

This mission stems from their belief that talent is distributed evenly but opportunity is not. This problem frustrated Garrett Lord and a few of his classmates back in 2013, so they set out on a road trip to interview other college students frustrated by the unlevel playing field.  Their hypothesis was confirmed by these inquiries and today they’ve accumulated $34 million dollars since moving their offices to San Francisco.

Today Handshake connects 300k+ employers with 14 million+ students.

Even in the age of LinkedIn’s dominance, a young entrepreneur was able to design a solution to a problem he saw in the way people like him looked for the work they would find meaningful.