Archive for Millennial Entrepreneurs – Page 17

Stinky Feet Gurlz?

When I first came across the name “Stinky Feet Gurlz” I was like “Yes! Something that I can put in my track shoes for when it rains and they are smelly”.  Little did I know that this company had nothing at all to do with smelly shoes or feet at all.  Stinky Feet Gurlz is a business that was created by Asya Gonzalez at the 14 that involves apparel and accessory items.  These items are fun, simple, and cute clothes and accessories is designs based off of the 1940’s.  These clothes and accessories include t-shirts and a different variety of knitted hats.

Aside from the clothing and accessories, Gonzalez reaches out to people all over the country.  She speaks to large groups of students and teachers about following their dreams with Independent Youth; a peer-to-peer mentorship program that empowers today’s teens to become tomorrow’s business leaders.  She also is actively involved in being a teen radio host that gives teens advice and talks about almost anything.

Other than running her own business at a young age, talking to people about following their dreams, and speaking on a radio show, another thing that makes Gonzalez unique is that she donates a little bit from ever sale to her charity She Is Worth It!.  This charity is about bringing people aware of child sex slavery.  She Is Worth It’s goal is to “have an educational program in EVERY school across America exposing the dangers of trafficking, warning girls that these Pimps are calling themselves “boyfriends” and what our youth and our public MUST know to alert to the issues.”  I think this is so awesome because after recently watching that video about this topic last week, it is a true motivation to see that someone so young is supporting such a great cause.

If you think any of Asya Gonzalez items are cute, I think you should definitely invest in her products!  Not only are you supporting her growing business and getting cute items, you are supporting to the cause of raising awareness about human trafficking.  Happy Blogging!

Feverish Ice Cream

The Rewarding Advertisement – Kiip

Founder of Kiip (pr. KEEP), Brian Wong skipped 4 grades and started college at age 14. Graduated in 4 years at age 18 and

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immediately had a desire to discover Silicon Valley in order to understand “Nerdland”. During his trip he got a job offer to work at Digg (online news website) in Business Development. Since Wong, a Canadian from birth, wanted to work at Digg he got a working visa tied to Digg, but this proved complicated when he got laid off shortly thereafter. This forced Wong back home and forced him to forge a new path.

Wong got the idea for Kiip while walking up and down the isle of a long flight to Singapore. He observed many illuminated faces with games buzzing on the screens of smartphones. He thought their must be a huge advertising opportunity  in the gaming medium – and he found there was, however, it was basically the same format as the web (banner advertisements), just smaller. That’s when the epiphany hit. Revolutionize advertising during in app experiences.

The mission of Kiip is to reward moments of achievement in apps and games. The rewards range from free samples to coupons to virtual currency. They are dedicated to connecting brands to consumers at a time when the consumer is most receptive. (i.e. this is when they level up, complete an achievement or surpass a personal record)

Kiip is particularly inspiring to me because Wong challenged typical advertisement mediums by designing a new, better way to engage consumers. Even though Wong hasn’t been forced to pivot or make new iterations of his original plan he has been able to scale the idea much larger than he previously anticipated and is now helping to change the world, one advertisement at a time.

Pebble Smartwatch

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A native of Vancouver, British Columbia, Eric Migicovsky (25) is the founder and CEO of Pebble, a smartwatch which connects to your phone and displays information on the watch face. Pebble addressed problems that other smartwatches couldn’t in an already emerging market. Pebble was cheap and contained many useful functions, like a vibrating motor, accelerometer, and e-paper display.

Eric Migicovsky originally wanted to come up with an idea that would tell you who was calling your cellphone, but it developed into something much more than that. Migicovsky took his idea to a business incubator called Y Combinator in Silicon Valley. He developed his idea there but could only get $375,000 from angel investors, he needed more. He posted his product on Kickstarter and quickly became the most funded project ever on Kickstarter at Pebble-Magicovsky-1-050212280that time, bringing in over ten million dollars in crowd funding. The project initially was only asking for $100,000, and received that in only two hours.

Pebble is very open source friendly and encourages developers to create new watch faces which you can use on your pebble. Eric proved he could adapt to the market when he came out with his newest product, the Pebble Steel, a much more executive looking watch that appeases to the higher end market of smartwatches. Eric found an untapped market and was the first one to the game, since then smart watches have become a big deal with even Apple making one.

GoldieBlox: Construction Girls

Dana Sterling, age thirty one, is the founder of GoldieBlox, a toy company marketed towards girls.  GoldieBlox toys aren’t the everyday dress-up doll toys, though, they’re construction toys geared towards introducing young girls to the world of engineering.  Each toy comes with a picture book that tells a story about “Goldie,” and how she builds something, such as a carnival game or parade float, to solve a problem.  Dana’s goal is to show girls that they are capable of building and creating to help people and find solutions to problems.

Dana and her company are inspiring because even though she was told by other toy companies that her products wouldn’t sell and that girls don’t buy construction toys, she pressed on, eventually raising $285,000 on Kickstarter.  She saw that there was an absence of toys in the market that would teach young girls about engineering and problem-solving and filled that gap.  Dana’s company illustrates what it means to innovate, as she found a solution that was attractive to girls, the coloring and the story about Goldie, that also taught made them more aware of engineering at a younger age.

Dana is driven by her mission to inspire girls to become engineers, but that doesn’t hold her back from growing her business.  GoldieBlox received feedback that boys love the toys, too, so the company will be releasing three new products in the fall that will be in gender neutral colors and include male characters in the books.  She is not so focused on her mission that she is afraid to pivot her idea to incorporate a wider market of consumers.

Even before GoldieBlox came into existence, Dana used her entrepreneurial drive to raise $30,000 for economic and educational development in rural India, where she had gone on a mission trip.  Dana earned a degree in engineering at Stanford, but ended up as an entrepreneur in the realm of girls toys.

Shea’s Bakery

Shea Gouldd began selling from Shea’s Bakery when she was 14. She made a cake for a friend in 2008, and before she knew it, she had thirty more orders in a short period before Thanksgiving. From this point, Gouldd started selling her product as a true business. Recently she was voted the best bakery in her town, and young entrepreneur of the year from the Young Entrepreneur Foundation. Gouldd bakes a variety of sweet treats, such as wedding cakes, pies, cupcakes, cheesecakes, and even cake pushup pops!

Gouldd was recently interviewed by the National Federation of Independent Business. In her interview, she was asked to give her advice to others who may have ideas for businesses but who haven’t yet decided to take the next step. Gouldd unequivocally states that people should not be afraid of failure, and that her case is not an extraordinary one. She says that she doesn’t believe she was extraordinary in her idea; rather, it was because she decided to act on it that she succeeded.

She also said not to be afraid to work hard. She balanced this business in the midst of also completely highschool, and she had to forgo some social events to invest in her business. But she is now able to see the payoffs in the forms of her success. She has also enjoyed being able to contribute to the local economy by hiring employees.

You can click here to visit the webpage where the video of her interview is posted, if you want to hear more about Shea Gouldd and her young business!

Mate Rimac: Out of Nowhere

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See this car? Believe it or not, Mate Rimac (pictured) designed it at 21. Yeah, 21. And this slick cherry-red vehicle, the Concept One, goes from zero to sixty in three seconds. But why electric cars?

“It wasn’t about making the cars environmentally friendly, the performance is just much better.” -Mate Rimac

After years of testing a converted 1984 E30 BMW, he hit some spots of success. He began to work with his team on the Concept One, after being approached by a Croatian businessman on behalf of Abu Dhabi’s royal family. They wanted two cars, and so he set to work.

Hobby to Business

Rimac loved working on cars, but the passion quickly turned into something for which people sought him out. Today Rimac Automobili employs 22 workers. The company is small but it has certainly grown through trial and success. Early on, Rimac depended on seed money from his father–a shopping-center developer–and Abu Dhabi’s promise to invest. When the vehicle debuted in Germany, the industry was shocked. All of a sudden Rimac Automobili was offering quality super-cars that made BMW and Tesla scratch their heads and take a breather. Rimac had come out of nowhere, and he wasn’t going to be easy to catch up to in his fancy Concept One.

“It was a learning curve—we made mistakes, but eventually I realized we were doing something right: developing cars for a lot less money than big car manufacturers and managing to beat them in many fields. We have an advantage starting with a blank sheet of paper. There’s no heritage that we have to incorporate into the design.” -Mate Rimac

Tumblr: Blogging at its Best

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David Karp wanted something different in his blogging experience. Ironically enough, he was tired of sites like WordPress that made blogging difficult and anything but seamless. Bloggers were finding ways to be unconventional with their blogs, but it was difficult; hammering out a good-looking post took about an hour. The process was far too difficult for the average internet user. People were interested in the world of blogging, but the platforms were too complicated. They needed a quick, easy way to share posts–without having to type it all out on WordPress.

Personality

“The blogosphere was really pretty mature. It had matured, though, to a place that was really designed for editorial publishing.” -David Karp

The problem was not only that blogs were difficult, but they were designed more specifically for editorial publishing, as Karp mentions in a video interview with Chris Dixon (co-founder of Hunch). Karp, who doesn’t consider himself much of a writer, still wanted to share things online with his friends and family. He felt that people, whether or not they had the patience to learn how to blog well, wanted to share their personality online–and so he created a way to do that.

Better than Blogs

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In February 2007, Tumblr was born. Meshing together all of the things he wanted (and knew that people needed) in a personal site, he created Tumbr as a place to express and share music, videos, and statuses, making it far easier for individuals to express themselves.

Not to Harp on Karp, but . . . 220px-David_Karp_EBE09_(cropped)

Today the entrepreneur has a net worth over $200 million, and Tumblr has been valued at $800 million. His little idea has become huge–now, there are over 150 million blogs on Tumblr. The site showcases all kinds expression, and personality.

Origami Owl – A story In A Necklace

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Isabella Weems wanted a car, and her parents told her she needed to earn the money on her own by starting a company. At the age of 14, most kids would sell lemonade, but Weems ended up creating a huge business, Origami Owl. She wanted to create a business to allow people to express their dreams. Origami owl is an addictive site that offers customizable lockets and necklaces. A customer picks a locket  they would want to buy and then they selects from many different charms to customize their locket. People use Origami Owl to tell their stories, remember a loved one, or to celebrate all the big moments in their lives.

Origami owl now has thousands of independent consultants who host jewelry parties. In 2012, Origami Owl made $25 million. According to Forbes, the company hopes to reach $250 million this year.

Isabella not only created a huge company, but also started a fashion trend. Many people have copied her idea, and now when you go to any type of craft show or shop on Etsy, you can find hundreds of companies just like Origami Owl. I love Origami Owl and have spent way too much money on the site. I recently made a locket to remind me of my trip to Haiti and to help share the story of so many orphans around the world.

TOMS

The Texan

Sure, we might know what TOMS are, but who here knows about Blake Mycoskie?blake-bio-img-1

In 2006 Blake Mycoskie traveled to Argentina and realized an urgent need: children were forced to grow up without shoes. For Blake, Entrepreneurship came naturally. While in college, he started a successful campus laundry service which he later sold. And so, having the passion that he did for problem solving, he came up with a solution: to create a for-profit business that was sustainable and not reliant on donations. This is how the TOMS business was born.

One for One

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The TOMS business plan is simple, really. For every pair of shoes you purchase, a pair is given to someone in need. Not only then do people buy the shoes because they look good, but also to help someone. Over the first five years, the business was successful enough, but Blake realized another need–so he developed the idea for TOMS Eyewear. Just as with shoes, for every pair of TOMS Eyewear purchased, eyewear is given to someone in need.

The Revolution

Blake saw the need, and he developed a solution. Now TOMS even has a day on which they raise awareness–they call it One Day Without Shoes. The movement has become a revolution.

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