90 days in, Here’s the most important takeaway from Cofound Harlem.
They say ‘experience is the best teacher’ — and while I’ve always seen eye-to-eye with that — the past 90 days at the accelerator has brought a whole new level of depth to the saying for us.
The companies are doing well. Really well. Collectively, we have 1 seed round closed, 3 new products launched, and a ton of mistakes to show for it. We’re keeping our heads down, staying focused, and tuning out of the conventional jargon of what it means to be a successful startup.
Which leads me to the most important insight I can share. It’s not a growth-hacking trick or a long-lost metric. It doesn’t even have anything to do with being ‘lean’ or ‘agile’.
It’s the basic truth that whoever wants it the most, gets it done. It doesn’t matterwhat obstacle they face, ie biz model, product/market fit, sales, etc. “All obstacles must eventually give way to the entrepreneur with a relentless desire.” click to tweet Finding great people, having technical skills, and being deliberate are of course important — but they all come secondarily and as a natural byproduct to strong desire.
Croissant, the single monthly membership for workspace access across NYC, has been a great example of that. A team that originally began as an HR benefits platform has gone through countless twists and turns to arrive where they’re at now. It would have been easy to throw in the towel after their first idea simply didn’t stick, but they kept their chins up — determined to make it happen. Now they have a phenomenal product that people want, paying customers, and cool little side bonuses like being invited to the A-Tech Festival in Aruba to speak on their journey. As bigger corporations look to adapt to the 1099 economy, Croissant is positioning themselves nicely to be an enterprise level player in this new space.
Bandhub’s not so shabby either. Their culture of painstakingly detail-oriented, yet blazing fast execution has landed them a fresh seed round in the bank. With the tedious fundraising process finally over, the team’s excited to shift 100% focus back into stuff that matters. The product is now disgustingly engaging, with 20% of their 50k users spending nearly 2–3 hours a day on Bandhub. The Argentinian team will spend the next few months tackling a clear monetization strategy for the addicting product.
Things are looking up for the guys at Reveu.me. The seasoned team, who formerly ran the digital mag Papercut, have shown up since day one. The MVP was built and deployed super quickly, allowing them to re-iterate, re-iterate, re-iterate. Their third cofounder recently joined the team full-time at the office over from Fox (he couldn’t stand The Donald) which should add a significant push to their biz dev. Paying customers is always a great sign and recurring customers are even better. Thankfully, Reveu has both and now faces the challenge of fine-tuning the value prop so that it continues to resonate with their audience in a clearer way.
Lastly, we have Localtarian — the peer-to-peer, home-cooked meals delivery service. The young team chose a really tough problem to tackle for their first go around. They’ve been dealing with the common challenges of a marketplace (buyers vs sellers), the logistics problem of an on-demand service, and the legal troubles of a food-based company — all in one. Naturally, it can be discouraging and those who aren’t committed will quickly phase out. The young CEO however, has a cool head, even temperament, and the clarity to make tough decisions. They’ve gained decent traction despite the odds, managed to on-board a CTO, and are on to something with SMS based service. Success for these guys will mean settling on a model and executing from there.
As an organization, we’re slowly seeing our vision come to life. Our Uptown Tech Meetup is approaching 300 members and meeting twice a month, the portfolio companies are maturing, and day-by-day Cofound is positioning itself to make deep, long-lasting impact in the village of Harlem. Maybe even to the ‘accelerator’ industry as a whole.
Most accelerators end in 3 months. Thus, everything beyond this day is uncharted territory — ours to discover.
JH
