Sean Verdecia's office space is around 10,000 square feet in Ybor City and also houses two other startups. His company AbleNook is less than two years old and is in the very early stages of selling its product, a modular dwelling that users can literally put together themselves.
But that's exactly why Washington, D.C.-based think tank Revolution chose Verdecia for its Rise of the Rest tour.
"It's very surreal, obviously I'm so buried in work here. It's not like we’re aware of what's going on outside of the office," he said. "I had to look them up — that's typical of everything for me, even with sports," Verdecia said. "But it's amazing these people have an interest in Ablenook and want to see it."
The Rise of the Rest tour will go through St. Petersburg and Tampa on May 1, ending with a pitch competition where the winner gets $100,000. AbleNook is one of the earlier-stage startups on the actual tour, joining the Penny Hoarder, Inside Out Sales Lab and SOFWERX throughout the day. Embarc Collective CEO Lakshmi Shenoy suggested AbleNook to the Rise of the Rest organizers.
"The Rise of the Rest team came out and scouted out our warehouse and it was a shoe-in when they saw it; they were all in," Verdecia said. "I think one of the aspects that really grabbed them about our space was the humble warehouse in Ybor that used to be a great covered garage. We've got all this cool stuff in this one little building."
AbleNook started in 2017, originally to help disaster victims have easy, affordable housing. However, Verdecia's plan has expanded after learning his business needed a track record before being passed out by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
"That's still the arc of the story, still for disaster relief, but we realized it's nearly impossible to start from nothing," he said. "And sell to FEMA especially because they're like, 'What track record do you have with people living in these?' We realized there's so many markets to hit, and if we establish it as a high-end product, it will amplify the sense of pride people will get when shift to disaster relief [and are used in that capacity]."
While Verdecia anticipates an increase in demand after the tour makes its way through and the national media coverage picks it up, he has already begun to see the ripple effects on his business.
"Especially with Embarc, it's a tremendous honor that out of all the businesses they picked us; that's huge," he said. "And it's helped just the buzz within our initial group of investors. It already made them happy, no matter what the outcome is."
