Crowds packed the upstairs bar at Rockit Bar & Grill Thursday night as five young companies lined up to pitch at Built In Chicago’s August Launch event. The group was eclectic, ranging from industry veterans to those barely out of high school. Everywhere you turned, there was another budding entrepreneur bursting with a new business idea. With such ideas circulating around the crowd, it’s no surprise there are five new companies already lined up for next month’s launch.
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The highlight of the event, of course, was the pitch session, in which five companies took a couple minutes to share their concept and achievements, and to ask the crowd for support.
First up was Project Fixup, whose tagline “Great dates. Less work.” speaks to their desire to make meeting people fun and stress-free. According to co-founder Sarah Press, “Project Fixup is a better approach to dating where we fix up interesting people on awesome one-on-one dates over craft beer, dive bars, board games.” When they say less work, they mean it. The Project Fixup team finds everything from the time, date and location to the actual person they’re setting you up with. Having launched about a month ago, Project Fixup is now looking for users and hopes to have picked up some new ones at the launch.
“I promise, I’m not a Nigerian Prince.” That’s how Adam Ahmad, the 18-year-old founder of online trading marketplace Swapidy closed out his pitch. His point was that everyone on the Internet has, at some point, been scammed by a Nigerian Prince asking for--or promising--loads of money. This barely-legal serial entrepreneur, however, seeks to eliminate scamming by acting as a quality control agent and facilitating online swaps of video games, gift cards, cell phones and books. “I’m looking for an investment and already I’ve found some interested people, so that’s great,” Ahmad told me after his pitch.
Nihal Advani was next up, pitching his map-based travel planning site Georama. According to the ex-Microsofter, it can take 11 to 28 sites to properly plan a vacation, an experience that is far from stress-free. A few weeks after launching, Advani’s goal was to promote awareness for his product. “A lot of the stuff we didn’t get to talk about [on stage] we get to talk about after, so when [others] hear more, they’re getting more excited,” he said. Georama has gotten some BIC love lately for their innovative approach to trip planning, as well as their work with DePaul students to get off the ground.
The most entertaining pitch of the night came from Mike Lynch of Box Score Games. Lynch got the crowd laughing when he admitted that their first game, Pitch Count, is so easy, “People play at it stadiums, they play it at bars, they play it at home. I played it at church the other day.” That’s because the game literally requires guessing the number of pitches that will be thrown in any given MLB half-inning. Jokes aside, though, Box Score Games has already partnered with various local and national sponsors and is in the process of developing similar games for basketball, football and hockey. Currently, Lynch and his team are seeking talent--developers in particular--to help them expand.
Last but not least was Amanda Bryant, founder of HangItUp CHICAGO. After 11 years as a stay-at-home mom, Bryant drew on her interest in design, decorating and art and decided to jump headfirst into entrepreneurship on her own. “I’m totally new, so I’m feeling my way through the dark, in a way,” she said, “but it’s really exhilarating to do something from the ground-up.” Now, Bryant is looking for blank walls--in homes or office spaces--to decorate with pieces from local artists that are available for rent or purchase through her website. At the moment, Bryant is focused on building her online gallery in Chicago, but is open to expanding into other cities. In fact, someone from Bermuda has already expressed interest in opening a HangItUp.
For Thursday’s presenters, experience was not limited by age or work histories. The range of ideas was vast, and the variety in content and approach kept things interesting. Most importantly, the participants felt they gained something from the community. Box Scores Games’ Tom Darhake said new companies benefit from communities like this one because of, “the connection to ideas, energy, passion, talent and confidence--the confidence you get from seeing other [presentations], you just can’t imagine it. It’s coming to events like this that make you recognize it’s attainable.”
Connect with us at the next Launch, Sept. 5 at Rockit Bar & Grill.
