I didn’t think I’d get to a post before Startup Weekend Iowa City, but sometimes I even surprise myself. I’ve been nose to the grindstone over the last month, but I thought I’d put in an update before the big weekend happens in just a few days. Startup Weekend Iowa City and Cider Finder have been the projects occupying most of my time, and I’d like to share what I’ve been doing over the last few weeks, in addition to a few other things.
As I’ve been talking about for the last few months, Startup Weekend Iowa City is coming up this weekend. It’s finally here! What this means for me is that it’s the crunch time to end all crunch times. I’ve been asking companies for sponsorships for the past few weeks, and the money is beginning to roll into our Startup Weekend account. If all of the free tickets given to sponsors are distributed, we’re going to have over 30 participants for the weekend – right inside that golden range of 25-50 people. We’re always on the hunt for more sponsors, but my team and I have done pretty well gathering up financial sponsors to fund the weekend, and in-kind sponsors for prize support.
The trick now is to make sure that all of our bases are covered. We have a facilitator finally – Ian has stepped up to run the weekend as the facilitator. We should have enough coaches for the teams, and we have all but one judge for the final pitches on Sunday. I’m going to make a run to the grocery store for the snacks and drinks for the weekend, and Ian is locking down all of the caterers for the big meals. Press releases go out this week to all of the major broadcast news outlets in the area, and I’ve already started doing interviews with some print journalists in Des Moines. Interestingly, I’ve heard nothing from any print journalists in Cedar Rapids, even though they’ve received the same information from me as the folks in Des Moines…
Since the hype for Startup Weekend Iowa City seems much larger 2 hours to our west than it does 20 minutes to our north, I’ve been invited to talk about the event along with pitching Cider Finder at 1 Million Cups in Des Moines on Wednesday. It will be my second time presenting in front of that crowd, and I’m really looking forward to seeing some friendly faces there. I’m still working out the last few details of the joint presentation and putting together the slide deck for Startup Weekend Iowa City. I want to make sure everyone understands the point of the event, but not talk down to people who have attended a Startup Weekend in the past. It’s a tough balancing act.
I’ve also been asked to present my story as a freelancer this evening at the Freelancer Happy Hour at Gravitate in West Des Moines. I was planning to make an appearance there anyway, so I could spend the night in Des Moines to avoid having to wake up at 5 am tomorrow. It sounds like that group usually has someone start the discussion with their story, and then the conversation takes off from there. Back a few months ago, I attended the first of the Freelancer Happy Hours, and it was a great experience. I’m hoping that the group has grown since then, and that there will be some new people that I haven’t met. It should be a lot of fun!
In an effort to stay sane and catch my breath a bit, I’ve been helping several different programs run this summer by The University of Iowa as a mentor and coach. I’ve had a chance to interact with most of the teams going through the JPEC Summer Accelerator, both as a feedback coach during their weekly presentations, and as a one-on-one mentor with some of the teams during each week. I’ve really enjoyed getting to know the teams and learning more about their ideas. From what I’ve heard, the teams that were selected are much farther along than the teams were last year. Most of them seem like they understand some of the basics of the Business Model Canvas and customer interviewing that some of the teams last year were lacking. This makes for a much more productive time for them in the accelerator, and my meetings with the teams seem to be more beneficial, with less time spent hand-holding the teams through the basics of startups.
I’ve also spent a bit of time working with the Mandela Washington Fellows as they visit Iowa from sub-Saharan Africa, and work on their businesses and ideas. From what we were told, the handful of people enrolled in this program were picked from 70,000 applications. We’re hearing from the cream of the crop, and their ideas are excellent. Most of the participants already having revenue-generating businesses – most of what I’m doing is helping the fellows focus on the one or two things that will help them scale up their businesses. One fellow I’ve worked with one-on-one has a dairy processing company in western Africa and makes a large range of products, but is having trouble connecting with consumers. Powdered milk is cheaper than fresh milk, so the other products he’s making – cheese, yogurt, and other traditional dairy products – might be the trick to earning the income to scale faster. Hopefully, he’ll stay in touch when he returns to his home country. I’d love to try some of the cheese his company is producing.
The development of Cider Finder continues moving along. All of the databases are finished, and now, I’m starting to wrap the interface around the giant pile of data. I’ve started interviewing people who might join the team and help finish the development of the app, so we can get this thing out the door and into the hands of cider makers and cider enthusiasts as soon as this fall. I can do most of it on my own, but it would be nice to have someone else on the team who knows the ins and outs of Google Play and the Apple App Store. Once Startup Weekend Iowa City is done this weekend, it will be full steam ahead on Cider Finder for the rest of the summer.
For those of you reading who have an idea and would like to practice your pitch in front of a friendly audience, we have openings starting in mid-August for 1 Million Cups Iowa City. I haven’t been pushing this message terribly hard since I’ve been advertising Startup Weekend, but now that the advertising for that is winding down, it’s time to buckle down and find some folks to present each Wednesday morning. Even for those of you who have presented in the past, or only presented in Cedar Rapids back when we had a joint chapter of 1MC, we’d welcome you to apply to present in Iowa City. On my trip to Des Moines, I will also be pushing people to consider presenting in Iowa City.
If I can make the trip to Des Moines to present, you can totally make it to Iowa City.
Now, I’m heading out on Interstate 80 to the west. I’m looking forward to seeing some of you over the next couple of days. Then, back east to finish out the last few things that need finishing before the Big Weekend. See you soon!