It was time to shake things up a little bit at Startup Weekend Louisville (SWL).
That was the consensus among the leadership team after it decided to add three new organizers to help plan the event that is scheduled to take place from April 12-14 at the University of Louisville’s Health Equity Innovation Hub at 515 W. Market St.
Those new organizers are Jade Brown, who serves as a business coach at The Well Incubator in Louisville; Antonio Nunnally, a data analyst; and Colleen Reilly, a project manager at Metro United Way (it should be noted that Metro United Way is one of the event’s main sponsors, along with Amplify Louisville).
Brown — who also worked as an AI innovator and data analyst for the Future of Work Initiative, according to her LinkedIn profile — was a judge in the event last year before joining as an event organizer.
“I decided to be more involved this year because more people who look like me need to know about these opportunities. I advocate for entrepreneurship, and this is a great event for anyone even remotely interested in entrepreneurship,” Brown said in a statement.
Nunnally was a program attendee the last year, when it was held at the same venue, but in early June instead of April.
“I attended Startup Weekend last year to connect with like-minded entrepreneurs,” Nunnally said in a statement. “It was interesting to see how we started with an idea on Friday and developed the MVP [minimum viable product] by Sunday. It motivated me to continue networking with other individuals, and this is why I decided to join the committee this year.”
Kevin Gibson, the event’s lead organizer who is running SWL with the three new organizers, told me the leadership team had a “really intentional goal of giving more people the ability to host these events throughout Louisville,” when it chose to add the three new team members.
“Before you can be a lead organizer of an event, you have to have helped organize an event and once you’ve helped organize an event, you realize, ‘Oh, this isn’t really too hard to pull off. I can probably find a handful of people together and do this,’” Gibson said.
The event is now in its 17th running. As in years past, participants will arrive on a Friday with a “back-of-the-napkin” idea (in the words of its site), before creating a business plan the next day and finally give a pitch to a panel of judges, who will determine what founders will be rewarded a package of incentives to help grow his or her business.
The pitches will be judged by three founders who are no strangers to the local entrepreneurial ecosystem: Amber Fields from BlackUX Labs, Mac Wilkinson of Moolathon and Eddie Fieldhouse from The Kentucky Hug. All three judges run companies that have been named as one of our KY Inno Startups to Watch (with BlackUX Labs being named in 2023, and the other two in January).
Before presenting, though, attendees will find inspiration from a number of presentations from founders, including a keynote speech from Stevens Bonhomme, co-founder and CEO of Feedcoyote, who earned a KY Inno Fire Award in 2023.
The startup, which created a freelance collaboration platform, started its Kentucky journey in Paducah, Kentucky, before recently moving to Louisville after being named a winner at the Render Capital Competition and Vogt Awards. It was also named to Techstars Atlanta in 2023.
Tickets for the entire event are $15. They can be purchased online through Affinna, another Louisville-based startup that was one of our 2024 KY Inno Startups to Watch.
The price includes seven meals from local restaurants, as well as free and discounted tools for founders from sponsors.
