The scenery may change, but the dream remains the same.
At least was the case for the co-founder and CEO of uJoin, Kory Payne, who had set out after college with an admittingly idealistic notion of helping “implement democracy reforms that would make the democracy function better.” He would do so by delving into the world of non-partisan, grassroots policy campaigns.
As Payne told me recently, he never really cared about politics.
“I wanted to implement solutions that were already existing problems that were just sitting on the shelf and not being used,” he said.
Although he never resided in Washington D.C., Payne worked in that space for 15 years.
“And that took me all over the lower 48 [states],” Payne said, “until I was so burnt out that I moved to Hawaii to go surf and eat coconuts.”
Payne moved to Hawaii in 2005 as the field director of an organization called Voter Owned Hawaii. In 2006, he met his wife — then started dating her in 2015, right around the same time that uJoin was being created. Before long, uJoin took part in a Hawaii-based accelerator with its beta version.
Payne had grown up in western Ohio town of Celina; his future wife was from Metropolis, Illinois, just northwest of Paducah, Kentucky. When their relationship got serious, she said she wanted to establish roots back in the Paducah area.
After a stop in Baltimore as part of a second accelerator, Payne and his wife landed in Paducah in 2018. Although he is in Western Kentucky, he actually began gaining connections in Frankfort when he attended an event at the suggestion of Warren Nash, executive director of the Von Allmen Center for Entrepreneurship.
“It was right away. I immediately got plugged into the startup scene,” said Payne, who recently gave a presentation at the January edition of Venture Connectors in Louisville.
One of the connections he made was with Sprocket, a nonprofit based in Paducah connected to GroWest — one of six KY Innovation hubs in the state.
At one point Payne coached early-stage entrepreneurs on a part-time basis for Sprocket.
“His ability to connect with others and assess needs stands out the most,” said Sprocket Executive Director Monica Bilak of Payne. “He’s personable and trustworthy. With that, he was able to engage regional entrepreneurs quickly and provide the support they needed. He helped us assess strategic advantage as an organization as well.”
uJoin, we all join
uJoin is a web-based, software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that helps its users gain “policy wins” by seamlessly influencing advocates and decision makers and connecting with the community built around those causes. The company also has a variety of proprietary technology and advantages that allow users to easily access U.S. Congress members and other key political figures — as well as a large database of contacts.
Users — 85% of whom work for traditional policy-oriented nonprofit organizations — can access uJoin through three tiers. The “grassroots” allows for basic access for $149 a month. The “grassroots pro” allows users to also do click-to-phone call actions, as well as formulated Twitter actions, for $199 a month. Lastly, the “enterprise” tier caters to larger organizations who have “massive networks” of people involved for $1,200 a month.
The uJoin website states the platform has served thousands of users in several countries since its founding in 2015.
From day one, Payne has been working with a co-founder, Alyssa Reese, a Colorado-based user interface/user experience expert.
“I just knew that having a design for our company was a really quick way to get a competitive advantage,” Payne said. “To me, it was very obvious that design can really help you win the day in a super cost-effective way.”
When it came to financials, Payne preferred to keep many of his cards close to him, but he did say that from 2018 to 2021 his company doubled in revenue. He has also said the company has been operating in the black for several years.
Currently, uJoin — which was the first Paducah-based startup to take part in Awesome Inc.’s fall cohort in 2022 — is in the process of raising a $400,000 seed round, all of which will go directly to sales and go-to-market strategy efforts, Payne said. So far, the company currently has received a $50,000 investment from Keyhorse Capital.
Going forward, Payne hopes to keep uJoin’s headquarters in Paducah — while finding local talent to power it.
“I don't have the crystal ball. All I know is that this is Paducah is where I'm anchored,” he said. “It's where I'm going to raise my family. It’s where I want to anchor this company.”
