A coffee shop that recently earned the title of best in Ohio and an alum of the prestigious Techstars accelerator program are among the latest to receive grants from Main Street Ventures, an Over-the-Rhine-based nonprofit and entrepreneurship support group.
Mom ‘n ‘Em Coffee, with locations in Camp Washington and Madisonville, and TinnCann, a tech startup that allows 1-on-1 video chats with athletes and experts, were among 10 projects to receive leap and launch grants, respectively.
Main Street Ventures awards the grants each quarter. The organization said it received a record-setting number of applications for this round.
Launch grants provide emerging, pre-revenue businesses at the prototype or product stage; they must show clear evidence of direct customer engagement validating the business model and product. Grants are in the amount of $5,000-$10,000 of equity-free funding to increase the odds of reaching the market entry-stage and beyond.
Leap funding, meanwhile, provides revenue-generating businesses with $10,000-$30,000 of equity-free funding to scale their community impact and increase the odds of survival.
The companies receiving a launch grant include:
- Bosa Life: Bosa is a digital platform that integrates productivity tools to easily collect all your tasks in one place and connect each task to the right resource to help you get the task done. Bosa participated in Ocean Accelerator’s most recent cohort.
- Koinage: Koinage is a platform and mobile application to help redefine the experience with loose change for both consumers and retailers.
- TinnCann: TinnCann is an online marketplace where anyone can access the undivided attention of some of the world's most extraordinary experts. TinnCann graduated from Techstars Chicago in October 2021.
The companies receiving leap grants include:
- Lulu’s Sweets Boutique: Lulu’s Sweet Bites creates gourmet cakes, cupcakes and macarons.
- Mom ‘n ‘Em Coffee: Mom 'n 'Em is a coffee and wine shop opened by the Ferrari brothers for their mother Theresa to serve as a “third place” for the community. It was recently named by Food & Wine as the best coffee shop in Ohio this March.
- Product Refinery - Cleanup Cart: Product Refinery created the Cleanup Cart — a freestanding mobile cleaning unit that can be used by community organizations to clean up their neighborhoods in a modern, engaging and simple way.
- Qlicious: Qlicious creates premium handcrafted bubble tea and pastries.
- Rekkie: Rekkie creates augmented reality goggles for action sports like skiing and paintball.
- The Passion Plate: The Passion Plate provides healthy, well-balanced meals that are flavorful and nutritious and will help people live a more sustained life.
- Untold Content: Untold Content created Narratize, a software as a service solution that leverages natural language processing and artificial intelligence to help busy professionals create high-impact documents and stories.
In total, Main Street Ventures awarded $206,000 in equity-free grant funding this quarter. It did not disclose individual amounts.
Main Street Ventures, as an organization, provides capital, connections and education for entrepreneurs with a particular focus on women and minority entrepreneurs who have been historically under-represented in the startup community.
In terms of impact, Main Street Ventures says 77% of its grant recipients are considered underrepresented. More than 267 local jobs have been created by grant recipient companies. And 92% of all its grant recipients are still in existence and have raised more than $8.5 million in follow-on funding.
