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Five Startups Spin Out of ThinkHouse
Inaugural ThinkHouse fellows demo startups they built and traction they made in the living-learning community
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Filed Under: NEWS: Startups
Startup accelerators aren't new, but ThinkHouse gives new meaning to “entrepreneurial environment.” The inaugural living-learning-company building program hosted eight entrepreneurs in a renovated house in Boylan Heights since last December. Yesterday, we recapped the experience and talked to the ThinkHouse founders about the future of the program. Today, we highlight the five promising businesses either born or further developed during an intensive six-months of ThinkHouse residence. The fellows pitched their businesses at a Demo Day at HQ Raleigh last night, and ExitEvent sat in to get their take on a first-of-its-kind experience in the Triangle.
So here you go, the stories behind five startups we'll be watching in weeks and months to follow.
--Read On
Bringing Textiles Back to the Triangle
Redress Uses Eco Trend and New Technology to Grow an Industry
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Filed Under: NEWS: Startups
The Triangle area is a major hub for technology and sustainable businesses. But it used to be the center of a booming textile industry, before globalization sent much of manufacturing overseas. Now, three textile advocates are trying to bring it back—using the technology and eco-consciousness the region is already known for.Redress Raleigh is a for-profit S Corporation aiming to grow the eco-fashion and textile industry in North Carolina. It provides a network that connects local designers, retailers, textile manufacturers and industry leaders. A paid membership to the Redress community includes access to all other members' information, and the ability to develop valuable business relationships. Redress seeks to support the triple-bottom-line of not only increasing revenue, but also taking into account social and environmental criteria in a business's decision making.
But it wasn't always structured this way. According to Redress co-founder Mor Aframian (pictured right), who handles marketing and communications at the company, there was a long path to get to this model.
“In 2008, the three [co-founders] got together. We were interested in sustainable fashion, [and] wanted to promote and empower designers,” says Aframian. --Read On
How Bootstrapping & a Raleigh Accelerator Positioned Sweeps for Statewide (and Soon National) Growth
Sweeping, and profiting from, the odd jobs market
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Filed Under: NEWS: Startups
When Morris Gelblum started Sweeps in 2004 as a Brogden High School junior, he just wanted to make some extra cash. Ten years later, his business is thriving—without outside funding or mass marketing tactics.Sweeps is an odd jobs service that employs college students, and the first startup to graduate from the Raleigh-based StartupREAL accelerator program. More than 500 students have used Sweeps to find and then complete upwards of 2,800 jobs. The company won a 2013 Chapel Hill Business of the Year Award along with multiple service awards. And now Gelblum is ready to grow Sweeps nationally, starting with Charlotte and Wilmington campuses this summer. His goal is to make Sweeps the “best way to hire the right college student everywhere.”
Gelblum entered the StartupREAL program after the accelerator started up last year. He wanted mentors and experts to help him determine how to grow the company beyond the Triangle—and he didn't want to give away equity to do so.
StartupREAL co-founder Blake Callens invited Gelblum into the accelerator because he wanted to bring on a business with leadership who knew the basics.
--Read On