Inevitably, people often enter a city with preconceived notions of what it has to offer. Going into Grand Rapids, aside from the organizations I’d read about for class, I saw GR for craft beer, Art Prize, GVSU, and various bars and restaurants. After Detroit, it shouldn’t have been shocking to find a large network of startup and startup supporters resting right on the surface of the city, but it was.
We embarked for Grand Rapids earlier than we had initially planned and it was worth it. First, we spoke with Amanda Chocko of Start Garden about how it operates and learned that Start Garden is different (in a good way!) than anything we’ve seen thus far. The “experiments,” as they’re referred to, last 60 to 90 days and at the conclusion of that time, startups come back for Update Night to explain what they’ve been doing with funds received. She spoke of the changing model of Start Garden and the successes of previous businesses they’d worked with. They have right around the same amount of businesses in their portfolio as Bizdom and MATTER, which is when I really started to get the feeling that this wasn’t the same Grand Rapids I went to asa kid.
Amanda also spoke of the changing model of Start Garden and while I have very little experience aside from what I’ve seen in other communities throughout the past month, the future looks more than promising for Start Garden and, by extension, the entirety of the Grand Rapids startup community. While Start Garden does not have an industry focus (tech, health, etc.), the changing model brought up one of the main constants we’ve seen in all of our trips: technology. Amanda spoke of the “Internet of things” and how Start Garden was moving toward seamless integration of corporations who need things andstartups who can create them.
When Amanda rapped up, we heard from KevinMcCurren with GVSU and the Richard M. and Helen DeVos Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. His scope of knowledge about entrepreneurship in general was vast. He made some extremely good points about how a community comes to be a startup community and part of that is by first proving there’s a need for an entrepreneur community. Easier said than done, I daresay. We are also finally beginning to glean scraps of information about how accelerators/incubators end up having certain shared characteristics like co-working spaces, mentors, services, and relaxed environments, and in Start Garden’s case, they had actually travelled all across the country to see what worked best for other places in order to take pieces from each community in order to create the perfect fit for Grand Rapids.
Following Kevin was Deb Deters (along with Chris Gutek) from Grand Angels. They are a true angel investing firm with right around 50 actively investing members. She mentioned that all of these members invest out of pocket and hearing that really cemented the profound influence the startup community currently holds. Grand Angels is also going through a period of growth, adding a sidecar fund, more members, and closing new deals. It was just another clue as to the exciting things happening in GrandRapid’s future.
In a stroke of semi-bittersweet luck, our class did happen to see one of the last traditional update nights Start Garden is to have and we were the first group (well, us and the large amount of other people there) to see it in the new facility.I am continually surprised by how laid back things are and update night was no exception. We got to linger, have a drink, and chat with a few friendly faces before the event started. And start it did. It started with a good explanation of the new facility and then, as a type of christening it seemed, came an impressively good show of karaoke. And so update night began.
Before we knew it, update night had ended. 5 businesses went through their experiments, explained what they did, what results they received, and what would come from further investment on Start Garden’s part. Unfortunately, Start Garden did not choose to moveinto further investment with any of the businesses on the night we were there but did speak of routes for improvement and encouraged all of the businesses to come back again and again. The support system within the Grand Rapids startup community is strong, so I sincerely hope to hear success stories from those people further down the road.
Final thought of the day- everyone that we have met with thus far, in all of the different communities, have a constant strong opinion about what they don’t want for their community. They don’t want it to be a mimic of Silicon Valley. They want to focus on something that they can specialize in for their own special niche (e.g. Grand Rapids and the Internet of Things). What they do want, however, is similar. As the communities mature and move forward, there are a few constants within successful startup communities: everyone is accepting; and there are makers spaces and events that bring in people from all walks of life which, in turn, enhances community diversity. Things like this have set Grand Rapids on a trajectory similar to Austin, Texas. In doing these things, each community can find its own way to thrive and bring about more startups and jobs, better stimulate the economy, and usher in a new, amazing eras of creativity, innovation and change.
The Grand Rapids of the future, we can call it (for now).
