BY JULIA PAULUS, STAFF WRITER
BETH DANIELS, Around the Table Games
When Beth Daniels quit her job in the occupational therapy department at Washington University to take care of her ill son, she observed a trend. Families were so busy that the dinner table was becoming a thing of the past.
So in 2006, Daniels created a portable conversation game to encourage interaction among families who are on the go.
Today her company’s offerings include Family Talk, her original game for parents and children; Buddy Talk, for elementary school kids; Teen Talk; and Grandparent Talk, for children and their grandparents. Around the Table also offers iPhone applications, and Daniels is planning Spanish versions as well.
“There are endless possibilities with the game,” says Daniels. “I am amazed to find out how the games are being used: icebreakers at school, family night at prisons and teaching verbal communication.”
Her goal is to make her games attractive to next tier toy companies, but it’s challenging. “We’re still a small shop,” she says. “Managing all the aspects of a rapidly growing business is difficult. We are building an infrastructure for growth.”
DAVID SITEMAN GARLAND, The Rise to The Top
David Siteman Garland was having a conversation with a friend when he was struck with an idea. His friend, a graphic designer, was saying that there was not a great resource that taught entrepreneurship in a lighthearted, effective way. Garland, an entrepreneur-speaker-writer-consultant hybrid, decided to tackle the problem by creating The Rise To The Top, a television show and web resource, through which he advises companies on marketing, social media, online strategy and building brands on the web.
Garland says The Rise To The Top has an “entrepreneurial swagger,” which makes it unique. “The swagger comes from not taking ourselves too seriously but delivering how-to information from down in the business-building trenches,” he says. “If I can make you laugh, learn and take action, then I’ve done my job.”
His goal is to inspire 1 million people to create a business worth a minimum of $1 million and, more important, be happy and excited every day when they go to work.
Garland says it is challenging for him to act on the right ideas to inspire entrepreneurs. “The right shows, the right product line, etc. is going to be crucial in the future,” he says. “The other challenge is patience. I lack it.”
Garland’s ability to inspire innovation and happiness in the business community may come from the balance in his own life. “Bottom line, though, is family first,” he says. “If my family is healthy and happy, then so am I.”
SETH BURGETT, Yurtopia
When Seth Burgett was training for a half-Ironman triathlon in 2007, he noticed that after a six-hour workout, because of his earbuds, his ears hurt worse than the rest of his body.
So in 2008, he founded Yurtopia to provide custom-fit earbuds, called yurbuds.
Yurbuds are designed so they won’t fall out, are comfortable for hours and provide top-notch sound quality. “I researched consumer dissatisfaction and fixed existing problems with design and sizing by creating prototypes,” Burgett says.
He and his partner, Richard Daniels, who runs marathons, tested the prototypes to come up with the best buds possible. The product launched Sept. 17, 2009, at a Dayton, Ohio marathon, and with an overwhelming response hit Best Buy shelves in November. Yurbuds can also be ordered online through yurbuds.com; if you send in a picture of your ear, the company will custom-design a pair.
Burgett’s goal to scale the company is well within reach, and Yurtopia has already added five jobs at its Prairieville, Mo., fulfillment center. Burgett expects to hire 30 more employees in 2010. “We’re in the position to create value for the marketplace,” he says. “If things (the economy) turn around in 2010, it will exceed our expectations.”
LEO SHMUYLOVICH & JOSH SALCMAN, Virtual Nerd
After years of tutoring high school and college students, Leo Shmuylovich began to notice problems with traditional private and group tutoring.
He says students were consistently asking the same questions, making him feel like individual sessions were inefficient. He also charged $80 per hour, which many students couldn’t afford.
So Shmuylovich and Josh Salcman, an industrial designer, created Virtual Nerd, giving students access to hundreds of interactive, step-by-step video tutorials at a fraction of the cost of tutoring.
The pair developed based on two keys. “No. 1, when students are confused, you can’t ask them why because they don’t know,” says Salcman. “A student can say to a tutor, ‘I am stuck on this,’ and the tutor has to further diagnose the source of confusion. They needed to be able to access content without having to self-diagnose. No. 2, students needed to be able to ask questions like with a tutor.”
Shmuylovich and Salcman created a prototype in fall 2008 and ran a pilot program at Chaminade High School. They discovered that students took advantage of the site at the most critical points in their studying. “The only downside was that they wanted more,” says Shmuylovich.
The pair’s main challenge today is to find people who are passionate about math and science and want to get involved with Virtual Nerd.
BRYAN COOLEY, LangLearner
After traveling to more than 70 countries, Bryan Cooley concluded that there was no practical and affordable way to learn a language. Existing software was expensive and catered to one learning style.
In 2006, after spending 10 months abroad, Cooley decided to do something about the issue. He created LangLearner, an interactive web and mobile platform for learning languages. LangLearner offers 10 languages and plans to add five to 10 more in the next six months.
LangLearner set itself apart from the competition by having four native speakers work on each language application and by catering to visual, experimental and audio learners. The platform offers photos, games, reading tools, multimedia flash cards, the ability to chat with other users and custom content for reviewing vocabulary. And Cooley has developed iPhone and iPod applications, ideal for business travelers or backpackers learning on the go. “We’re pushing the edge of new techniques and technologies,” says Cooley. “It’s fun, practical and efficient.”
Cooley focuses on the travel market and has an international office in Hong Kong. “In the next five years, I will try to sell the company off,” says Cooley. “Separate from that, there needed to be a good model to help people communicate, and I’m excited I can give that back to the world.”
THERESA WILSON, The Blessing Basket Project
In 1999, Theresa Wilson went through a personal crisis that led her to start her nonprofit organization, The Blessing Basket Project®. During her crisis, friends and family gave Wilson letters of support, which she placed in a basket. Later, she was asked to speak to groups of women about overcoming trials. “I would tell them about my ‘blessing basket,’ and everywhere I spoke women wanted a basket,” says Wilson.
She began to buy artisan baskets made in various villages in Ghana and Bangladesh and sell them in the United States. She pays what she calls Prosperity Wages® to the artisans and sells baskets through 140 small retail stores; Whole Foods, the Internet; and her second project, Seeds of Blessing – a direct sales model through which American women can sell the baskets, start their own careers and provide income for their families.
Wilson is at the point of graduating many of the 2,000 weavers she supports. “If you research poverty reduction, exit is never talked about because it’s not done,” says Wilson. “We’ve accomplished it with individuals, and now we need to set up a model for it and become an example.”