Over 40 Startup Weekenders create a lot of energy. But we don’t know what to do with it.
Then the pitches begin.
Roughly 30 startup pitches are refined to a dozen teams through a series of voting, and this is when the energy begins to get focused.
I’ve never made a living as an entrepreneur, so when I heard Startup Weekend was coming to Springfield, I wanted to check it out. A 54-hour competition to build a business from scratch? Yes, and it’s as intense as it sounds. Here’s my weekend as an entrepreneur Jan 23–25 at The eFactory downtown.
7 p.m., Jan. 23—“Halfbaked” ice breaker: Form a business idea from two random words. Ours? “Fabulous perspective.” We created something related to photography.
7:45—Sixty-second pitches begin. There’s a Good Samaritan app, Coastal Coasting long-board sales/rental and Kickdoor fashions. I didn’t intend to pitch, but it’s contagious and I throw out an idea for a top-notch miniature golf course in Springfield. On the fly, I name it Big Daddy Golf.
8:45—Teams organically form around the ideas with the most votes. I cast my support for a shipping system called Peanuted to send surprise packages and make donations to charity, a nonprofit to streamline the myriad paper applications for cancer patient resources and Hotelier, smart technology to automate hotel check-ins and turn smartphones into room keys. Mini golf got three votes, well short of advancing, and after the “speed-dating” round, I join the Hotelier team pitched by 20-year-old Damian Palmer.
9:15—Hotelier starts with six partners: Damian; Will Chiles, a musician and composer; Murat Canturk, a Missouri State University MBA student from Turkey; Fred Lawler, a software engineer with 40 Digits; Jordan Yang, a Parkview High student; and me. We spend the next few hours asking a lot of questions – to understand the Bluetooth concept viability, target market, value proposition, costs and monetization. Startup coaches walk by and stress two things: Focus on identifying and solving the problem, and on creating a minimally viable product.
Midnight—Our team assigns tasks for the morning. Mine: Interview hotel operators and travelers for proof of concept. Other teams are still tapping on laptops scattered around The eFactory.
8 a.m., Jan. 24—Teams arrive. Jordan, the high schooler, slept in a chair. The entire day is given to research. Will discovers Starwood already has Bluetooth technology developed to roll out in its W and Aloft hotels; we make our first pivot. Our attention turns toward the boutique hotel market, which is all about distinct guest experiences.
10—Event facilitator Max Farrell leads a customer development workshop.
10:30—When we regroup, Murat informs us he’s moving to another team. He no longer buys in to the concept and joins Peanuted at the workspace next to us. I continue to call on hotels and learn operators love the idea; they know it’s coming, but their budgets are limited.
Noon—Over lunch we brainstorm on a product name, Keynova, and a domain, MyHotelier.co.
1:34—Will finds competitors. I conduct consumer-side research, which further supports the demand. I also discover the HotelTonight booking service is no longer offering express check-in and keyless entry options on its app. After announcing a rollout plan last summer, we’re left to assume the door-lock changeovers were too much to take on.
4—The team is getting frustrated at the walls we’re hitting and decides to give our brains a rest on the Keynova product. Will asks me about Big Daddy Golf, and it unexpectedly turns into a major pivot discussion. We stay on the Bluetooth technology, but incorporating it into mini golf. “It’s gamification of a game,” Will says, hypothesizing how scores could be tabulated on smartphones and shared on social media. At this point, coaches get wind of a possible business plan pivot, and they huddle around. After challenging our reason, they throw out ideas for making putt-putt a repeat experience – think Foursquare, where social totems and discounted rounds are dished out for successful holes each day.
5:30—Damian leaves his day job and arrives to steer us back to Keynova. For cost concerns, we suggest the company front the cost to change door locks and create a license fee model: $10 per unit per year and 2 percent of the room rate at booking. I head out for a prior obligation and the heated discussion continues. Jordan leaves, too, and later texts Damian that he’s no longer participating in the weekend. The clock is ticking, and final pitches are in 24 hours.
1:13 a.m.—I receive a text from someone at The eFactory. The work, and some play, is still going strong.
9 a.m., Jan. 25—The eFactory is quiet on Sunday morning. I return to see our developer working at another station, and Fred informs me he lost confidence in the plan. He’s now developing for Our City Support, an app for local governments to connect with their constituents. That leaves us with three, and I’m the only one in the building.
10—Will arrives and updates me on the decision to license the equipment to integrate the hotel experience into the reservation system. The vision grows to encompass next phases where personal preferences, such as room temperature, down pillows and music playing, can be preselected in the app. This is huge, and we feel the weight of it. We’ve also rebranded as Bell, and Bell Express keyless entry is the first phase.
11:45—We create the tagline: Bell-Travel Well.
Noon—We begin preparing for the presentation, scheduled for 6 at the Fox Theatre. There are still unresolved issues, in part, because this concept and industry is so vast.
4—We begin rehearsing aloud with the slides Damian created. All three of us will present. We have more ideas than we have firm decisions, but we’ve got to move on for the pitch.
5:15—Walk over to the Fox for tech checks. The stage is a glow of green, and in the center is a video screen big enough to make Steve Jobs proud.
6:38—The first of eight pitches begin. Teams get 5 minutes, followed by a Q&A with the judges.
8:09—Judges announce the top three startups: 3. Peanuted 2. Our City. 1. SoHoHQ, a social website for the self-employed. The winning team had nine people on board and was the product of a merger.
Bell earns an award for most aggressive idea. It sure felt like it.
Springfield Business Journal Editor Eric Olson can be reached at eolson@sbj.net.[[In-content Ad]]
