Eight early-stage startups led by diverse founders made their pitches to a packed auditorium in Google’s new Austin offices on Friday night. It was the culmination of DivInc‘s 12-week accelerator program.
We were there there to check it out. Here’s a quick look at the startups and their pitches.
“Travel with kids is hard,” Founder Sara Brinton told the crowd. “We all come home needing a vacation from our vacation.”
That’s why she launched a startup that creates personalized travel itineraries for families with kids. The packages include a travel box that teaches kids about their vacation destination and provides games and education for during the family’s travels.
Ashley Behnke said content creation continues to veer toward visual content and that many advertisers spend a lot of time and energy just trying to find locations for photo and video shoots. Her startup’s platform helps big brands, small businesses and social influencers quickly scout cool locations for a monthly fee.
Growing a garden isn’t as easy as it might look. There are endless recommendations and it’s pretty easy to get overwhelmed, Gardenio Founder Roman Gonzalez said.
He created a startup that builds gardening kits, as well as an app with content, that gives consumers a simplified way to get a DIY garden going. “In an age where Millennials are killing every other industry, we’re saving the gardening industry,” he said.
Wes Riddick is a big guy, and he’s proud of it. But big guys have a tough time shopping because many stores don’t have their size — or they have to go to one of the few big and tall stores out there.
So Riddick created Maximus Box, a subscription clothing service for big and tall men. He said he’s been building up a social media following and has partnered with Plus Model Magazine. He’s also talked with New England Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski about putting the well-known football star in a product ambassador role with Maximus Box.
Stress is a killer. And retreats are often part of the solution to a variety of health problems, Retreat Place Founder Stephanie Labay told the crowd. Her startup has a platform to help travelers easy find health retreats — and it helps instructors and health coaches be seen by consumers.
Yogi Patel, founder of iuzeit, said consumers spend hours researching reviews of electronics, such as smart phones, and that the industry has a 30% return rate. He saw that as an opening to launch a site that provides comprehensive and unbiased product data to help people find phones, TVs and other devices more quickly. The platform has about 40,000 users, he said.
FuzeU
As a first generation college graduate, Shambrekia Wise said she understands how difficult it can be for students to stay on the path with STEM education. Her startup, FuzeU, connects students with STEM professionals who can provide encouragement and career insight. Her goal is to drastically reduce the dropout rate among STEM freshmen.
“I know if you put the effort into it you can make a difference in someone’s life,” she said.
Airion Watkins-Clark couldn’t take his eyes off the awesome looking food and restaurants he saw on “Chef’s Table,” the Netflix series. And he realized he’s not alone — people love to see the food and the restaurant before they go. So he built a startup to help restaurants share great content and gather consumers’ photos and reviews — as well as provide the analytics to show the return on investment in that content.
