Start Garden Growing Traverse City Ideas

A one-year-old Michigan seed fund is pretty keen on northern Michigan’s entrepreneurial spirit.

Start Garden is a $15 million startup fund and investment incubator founded last spring by Grand Rapids businessman Rick DeVos, grandson of Amway founder Richard DeVos and founder of ArtPrize.

Here’s how the fund works: Each week it invests $5,000 in two ideas – one chosen by staff and one chosen by popular vote. Each idea gets 60-90 days to do an experiment using the funding to validate if the market likes the idea. Then these aspiring entrepreneurs share the results and Start Garden decides if it’s ready for the next level of investment. (Read more about the investment agreements here.)

The Ticker tracked down three area entrepreneurs to hear about their Start Garden successes:

ERG! Bars
Traverse City resident Dennis Bean-Larson had already founded a company and had a product: an all-natural energy bar named after a measurement of power. He had brand identity and had tested it in the local market (check website for retailer listing). His next phase: increasing his production capacity to expose the product to a wider market. That’s exactly what the $5,000 Start Garden investment helped him do and success is what he found. Last month, Start Garden investors approved him for the next funding level of $20,000.

“Successful projects are ones that can be built into viable businesses,” says Bean-Larson. “You prove that it’s feasible to produce at a larger capacity and do it profitably.”

How is he differentiating his energy bars in a crowded field? “You don’t need to be a chemist to read the ingredient list. It’s all natural, and free of gluten, GMOs, dairy and soy. It’s not a processed product.” There are currently five flavors available with a sixth, Lemon Blueberry, being added this week, and another six flavors ready to go.

Mello&Co.
Local mom Sue Kellogg is a toy inventor, but she never imagined she’d be a business owner so fast. Thanks to Start Garden funding, her first product – Nawgum, a food-grade silicone all-in-one baby teether – will soon be available across the country.

The $5,000 funding she received in January launched field-testing, prototype production and cold calling potential buyers. Like Bean-Larson, that experiment was a success and she, too, was approved for the next level of $20,000.

“That $20,000 allowed me to start manufacturing, stock store shelves and fulfill purchase orders,” says Kellogg.

Kellogg, who previously was a physical education teacher, had no business experience whatsoever. She had never tried to write a business plan – and still hasn’t.

The website (Melloandco.com) will be live by mid-July. Look for Nawgum soon on these local store shelves: The Princess & The Pirate in Suttons Bay, Sweet Pea and Hazelnut Kids in Traverse City, and The Princess & The Pea in Elk Rapids.

Silikids
Stacey Feeley founded Silikids in Los Angeles with a friend and fellow mother – both discouraged by the toxic chemicals prevalent in baby products. So in 2006 they launched a line of items made from silicone and available in 250 boutiques nationwide and internationally.

After Feeley and her family moved to Traverse City last fall, she was encouraged by a business advisor to check out Start Garden while investigating how best to scale the company.

Silikids received the initial $5,000 investment last October to test market a new line of feeding accessories for children. Now, with additional Start Garden funding they are in the prototype-production phase.

While the move to the Midwest was primarily for personal reasons, Feeley says it’s been incredible for the business because of the entrepreneurial spirit that exists here.

“What’s awesome about Start Garden is that it’s very innovative, both in the way they think and their approach to entrepreneurship in general” says Feeley. “California is very stale, very techie. No investors wanted to touch consumer [products]. I had no idea it would be so supportive here.”