Startup News

Cake pro leaves banking for baking

By Newsroom

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July 31, 2012

When Torie Hancock applied for a job bagging groceries in high school, she didn’t get it. Instead, she settled for a bakery job, where she bagged bread and prepped customers’ orders. Bored, she soon turned her attention to cake decoration. “I’d watch the cake decorators, and then go in and practice after they left. When I got the hang of things, I’d decorate the cakes and cookies for display cases,” she says. Despite attending college and entering the a career in banking, she never stopped decorating cakes, and eventually earned a degree in baking and pastry from the Art Institute of Cincinnati. “I learned a lot more than I thought I would – basic cooking skills, chocolates, sugars. The hands-on experience was priceless,” she says. On July 1, Torie quit her finance gig to develop her business, Go Ahead Bake My Day, full time. Cake is Torie’s specialty, and she says she’ll create nearly any design or flavor, with cakes, cupcakes and cake puffs (similar to a cake lollipop) her most commonly requested items. “I make everything myself at home,” she says, noting that her next step is growing her business and moving into a storefront. Although she honors requests for gluten-free, vegan and other specialty cakes, Torie says she most commonly creates sugar-free confections, and even has a neighbor unofficially assigned to test her new recipes. When she’s not baking, she enjoys Cincinnati’s foodie scene, and can be found sampling local fare at Roc-A-Fella’s Pizza, Sammy’s Gourmet Burgers & Beers, Pappadeaux Seafood Kitchen or Kabuto. By Robin Donovan

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Local entertainers launch talk-variety show

By Newsroom

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Entrepreneurship

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July 24, 2012

You might not know Dean Miuccio’s face, but you might just recognize his voice. The longtime Warm 98 DJ was laid off during recent economic troubles. Instead of sending out job applications or cruising toward early retirement, he gathered other, newly unemployed, local entertainment personalities and launched Cincinnality, a Cincinnati-based talk show. The show is filmed Friday nights at a studio at Newport on the Levee, and airs Sundays at 11:30 p.m. Miuccio says the show was conceptualized as an hour-long, daytime talk program and hopes it will find a weekday home on Fox19 soon. Miuccio, who seems almost embarrassed by the attention given to radio and television personalities, says his idea harnesses the power of familiar faces in the Cincinnati entertainment scene. “Look, talk shows have been around. I got the idea because my radio partner and I were downsized from Warm 98. I knew other people who had been let go from their TV or radio shows, and what better what to start a new talk variety show than with people Cincinnatians might already recognize or be familiar with?” To that end, he paired with Amanda Orlando, former host of a B105 morning radio show, and Randi Douglas, a fellow Warm 98 morning show host. Because it’s not syndicated, production costs for Cincinnality have been a challenge, Miuccio says. Syndicated shows, which run on multiple networks, are easier to fund because each station pitches in a fraction of the cost. Still, the show’s mix of mix of music, news items, hot topics and local points of interest caught Fox19’s attention shortly after its pilot was released. When he’s not working on Cincinnality, Miuccio is a videographer and producer through his company, Dean Miuccio Productions, LLC. Tickets for Cincinnality tapings, held Fridays at 7 p.m., are available from cincyticket.com. By Robin Donovan

Photo-sharing site launches at Bunbury Music Festival

By Newsroom

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Entrepreneurship

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July 24, 2012

College students are known for a variety of photo-worthy road trip experiences, but not all of these images are intended for future employers. At this summer’s Bunbury Music Festival, a new website, Capstory, launched with the promise of creating a safe online space for group photo sharing. The website was created by Mason native Suprasanna Mishra and his Ohio State University roommate, Dustin Studer, after their own road trip to California. Mishra and Studer are slated to be juniors at OSU next year, though they’re considering taking time away from school to work on their business full-time. They’ve already received an Imagining Grant from CincyTech and a round of funding. Unlike many cell-phone-driven products aimed at millennials, Capstory doesn’t require a smartphone. Mishra says this is a nod to groups of students, not all of whom can afford higher-priced data plans. Whoever creates a Capstory capsule must log-in to the company’s website and create a temporary password. From there, other participants are notified via email or text message, and can contribute photographs to the capsule simply by texting them in. Later, users log-in to the website to see the compiled media. Best of all, “the only people who can see it [the capsule] are whoever you invite,” says Mishra. Capstory is currently in beta testing after sparking interest at the Bunbury Music Festival, where a public capsule was set up to show attendees how the website works. Mishra says the product’s target demographic is college students, so he and Studer plan to keep Capstory free to end-users; a plan to monetize the website without charging users is under development. Most of all, says Mishra, “We hope our demographic finds Capstory useful and easy.” By Robin Donovan

Laser-cut jewelry line draws interest from museum gift shops, boutiques

By Newsroom

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Architecture + Design

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July 17, 2012

As an architecture student at the University of Cincinnati’s prestigious College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP), Alicia Kravitz interned in Chicago at the famed Skidmore, Owings & Merrill – a firm known for designing Chicago’s Sears Tower and John Hancock Center. She gained a strong start as an architect, but couldn’t overcome her post-graduation dread of entering the field, especially with scant job offerings. Instead, she used a skill learned as an intern – operating a laser cutter – to launch her jewelry and home décor company, Dulcet Design. Her lightweight, architecturally inspired jewelry line follows her own simple, elegant, minimalist style. Aimed at women looking for something different and design-inspired, her easy-to-wear pieces are typically made of laser-cut acrylic, which is an inexpensive material that emerges from her machine looking sleek and high-end. She learned about creating her own business as a student in Springboard Cincinnati, the popular low-cost training program offered by ArtWorks that gives artisans tools to become business owners. As she travels the country to attend wholesale craft shows, whose sole attendees are retailers and retail buyers, she says, sometimes, she’s the only Ohioan among hundreds of sellers and crafters. “What I am continually thinking when I am at these national shows is that I am always the only person representing Cincinnati," she says. "With how centrally located we are, we can easily compete due to our reasonable cost of living.” Kravitz’ work is available at art-friendly locales, such as museum shops and boutiques around the country. Typically, she works with retailers to develop a line that fits their brand aesthetic, whether that means a subtle, sleek earring with a single bead atop a piece of black acrylic, or a turquoise and gold piece for a gallery at an boutique near Yellowstone National Park. Her target audience is fairly wide, and usually encompasses people who love good design. Kravitz says, “Everyone has their silver hoops, their hammered sterling; I target people who like simple jewelry but are always looking for something new.” By Robin Donovan

BudgetSketch charts projected expenses to tame overspending

By Newsroom

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Entrepreneurship

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July 17, 2012

“If you’re not paying for a service, then you’re the product,” says Bill Barnett, founder, BudgetSketch. He should know – his product, which he describes as the antithesis of the popular budgeting website Mint, helps people plan spending in advance, rather than tracking dollars spent after the fact. Like many of today’s lean startups and lean programmers, Barnett created the cloud-based BudgetSketch program for himself first, and tested it by rolling it out as soon as possible, then tweaking features and design for a layout that, he reports, currently gets rave reviews. But why use BudgetSketch instead of the larger, more feature-heavy Mint? “Most financial tools on the web are backward looking: what you’ve spent, what you’ve done, your history,” Barnett says. He cites American consumers’ habitual overspending as evidence that tracking money spent doesn’t work. Instead, his program helps consumers shift their focus to planning future spending; if you don’t plan to spend money in a given category, you don’t spend it that month. Talking to Barnett, it’s clear that he’d be a good financial advisor if he hadn’t chosen software programming as his second career (he was a mechanic for Delta Air Lines in years past). He hates to watch today’s “get it now” spenders rack up extra expenses by purchasing over-budget items, and says he’s changed his own spending habits, driving older cars while saving enough to purchase new vehicles outright. His advice for today’s hardship-driven spenders is offered in earnest. “The solution to your problems lies in the future. If you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’re going to keep getting what you’ve always gotten. Change your future behavior you’re going to end up in a different place and, hopefully, a better place.” By Robin Donovan

App eases the headaches of instrument repair

By Newsroom

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Arts + Culture

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July 10, 2012

Here’s the more-than-horrifying process of a musician’s typical instrument repair: damage instrument, worry, call repair shop, drop off instrument for repair, wait indefinitely, leave a handful of messages for the repairer and, finally, pick up instrument. Because musical instruments under warranty must often be sent back to manufacturers for repairs, music shops face the unenviable task of serving as the liaison between the instrument owner and the manufacturer. With many instruments out for repair at the same time, and no industry standards on repair tracking (or even how long a repair will take), there’s plenty of room for frustration. Cue Stephen Cook, who’s experienced this problem many times as the owner of Cook Instrument Repair. After years of headaches, he tackled the problem himself, launching InstrumentLife and its eponymous app, which connects instrument owners to their maintenance records, and provides a link between repairers and worried instrument owners. The program is accessible online, where musicians can log-in, upload sales receipts, find retailers or repair shops and even play a game. Retailers and repair shops can log-in to the same interface and create listings. And each instrument is assigned an identification number, so that repair and maintenance can be tracked over time. "InstrumentLife addresses some current inefficiencies in the industry by allowing shops to track instruments as they move through the repair process," Cook says. More social functions are on the way, including a game and a platform which allows musicians to upload gig information. "What we’re tyring to do is make playing music cool again," Cook explains. "We’re trying to create an environment that makes playing music fun again and cool, so students get to celebrate their experience with the instrument." The app is mobile-friendly; it’s currently compatible with the Android operating system and iPhones. By Robin Donovan

Unstoppable Software helps manufacturers harness document creation, collaboration

By Newsroom

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Entrepreneurship

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July 10, 2012

If you’ve ever experienced the frustration of wading through a documents folder on your computer, then you have a small idea of what manufacturing companies experience. Typically dealing with thousands of documents at once, these firms can cut costs significantly just by making documents easier to find, fix and share. Manufacturing companies, industrial services firms and biotechnology organizations all function within regulated environments. Companies must prove that they are following industry standards for training, testing and manufacturing processes, often in great detail. Sam Schutte, founder of Unstoppable Software, says some start out trying to track everything using Excel spreadsheets, only to get bogged down by thousands and thousands of documents. Advances in technology mean that the price of managing documents efficiently is less than the cost of time spent juggling them without an organized system in place. “In businesses today, especially research companies, a huge proportion of knowledge workers’ time is spent dealing with documents: hunting to find them, working together to update them or generating them manually," he says. "Those are time-intensive problems we can help fix, so they can collaborate more easily.” The company often works with existing programs, such as SharePoint, to create customized, out-of-the-box software for manufacturers and industrial services companies that help them add more functions to a program. Some work almost like a plug-in: they can be “bolted” onto existing software to add functionality, such as creating contracts or service records, which can then be shared and tracked. Unstoppable also addresses workflow, security and keeping track of documents for regulation agencies. The company also automates some tasks, such as generating AutoCAD documents on the fly from various data sources. Quality management and regulatory systems require strict adherence to certain standard operating procedures. “It’s all about being able to say you’re a high-quality vendor," Schutte says."You’ve got to come up with a plan and stick to it, then you have to show what your plan is, how it’s been revised and prove that everyone read it and was trained on it.” Unstoppable offers cloud-based and software programs, with varying levels of customization. By Robin Donovan

(ei) design launches living jewelry line

By Newsroom

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Architecture + Design

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June 26, 2012

It turns out that the longest amount of time a tiny, succulent plant can live in an equally tiny light bulb is about two years, according to David Nebert. The local artist’s company, (ei) design, specializes in nature-inspired jewelry and housewares, and the tiny terrariums that hold super-small plants are available as pendant necklaces. They’re also among his most popular wares. While a DAAP student, Nebert was drawn to create his own designs, along with what was assigned in class. His pieces started bigger, as decor pieces, and were scaled down to jewelry when he discovered the tiny light bulbs. The resilient plant he uses is called Mother of Thousands, Alligator Plant or Mexican Hat Plant, among others. "There are existing terrarium necklaces that one can find, but most often it's not an actual living plant, it's just dried moss or something," he says. The biggest challenge, he says, is not over-watering the plant, which can cause it to outgrow its makeshift home quickly. Nebert describes his overall aesthetic as "simple elegance," explaining, "I strive for a very simple design, using celebrated objects that one can wear and stick to one or maybe two pieces. It's not too busy, so the eye can focus on that beautiful object." Instead of envisioning his final product, he finds items that inspire him, gravitating toward natural seeds, leaves and basic materials such as clear glass, raw metals and stone in hues ranging from blues and grays to earthy reds and browns. While his dream is to create a retail space that would combine art installation and product design, Nebert says he also plans to expand his work into lighting. The terrarium jewelry and housewares are currently for sale at Fabricate and on specified dates at Crafty Supermarket; Nebert says he hopes to expand to more venues in Over-the-Rhine, downtown and the Gateway District soon. By Robin Donovan

Birth photographers share the emotions of labor

By Newsroom

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Arts + Culture

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June 26, 2012

Lifelong west siders Melanie Pace and Kelly Smith may have grown up in the same neighborhood, but the two photographers met online. After realizing they lived only about a mile apart, the two met in person, and found themselves chatting about natural lifestyles, yoga, raising kids and their work. They didn’t decide to open Beautiful Beginnings Birth Photography on a whim. Rather, after photographing the births of friends and family members, they started receiving requests from friends of friends. The business idea suggested itself, and with the help of referrals from a local OB/GYN office, the Bowen Center, they now accept up to five clients at a time. Women typically contact Pace and Smith when they’re between six and nine months pregnant. After an in-person meeting, they’ll update the duo on their progress, typically texting when they go into labor. “We typically go to the hospital when she’s pretty well-established in labor, and is about 6 centimeters dilated,” Smith says. And if the phrase “birth photography” conjures nudity or gore, consider that almost all of the photographs are modest enough to share with children. “It’s more about the emotion and the experience,” Smith says. Sample photographs on the Beautiful Beginnings website depict moms stretching, hugging friends, squeezing a spouse’s hand and, of course, snuggling newborns. Melanie agree. “People think birth is bloody and icky and painful, and to some moms it might work that way, but if you understand how your body works and that it was designed to do this, it’s beautiful.” Beautiful Beginnings charges by the session, which typically lasts about six hours. By Robin Donovan

Batterii software powers business creativity

By Newsroom

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Architecture + Design

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June 19, 2012

Chad Reynolds is an idea man. The DAAP graduate specialized in branding and design strategies as owner of design innovation agency Crush Republic, which is just one of many start-ups he’s been behind. If your company needed an infusion of creativity, he was the guy you’d hire. Soon enough, he realized that what companies needed most wasn’t an innovation consultant, but a way to harness their employees’ creativity. Reynolds launched Batterii two years ago and the company which started as “just me in a room,” soon drew in co-founder and programmer Nick Franceschina. The company’s first client was Nike Inc., and Batterii now employees 18 staffers and has raised $800,000 in seed funding from CincyTech, company executives and an undisclosed investor. Mike Venerable, CincyTech’s managing director of digital, information and health technology, explains, “Batterii’s approach gives companies wanting to innovate an entirely new tool for broad engagement in the development of new products, new markets and improved internal processes.” Batterii, in short, is a web-based, social-media-like, software as a service offered to businesses small and large. Having already tapped Silicon Valley executive Kevin Cummins to serve as CEO earlier this year – Cummins invested $250,000 of his own money into the venture – Reynolds says he also hopes to lure companies from Cincinnati’s burgeoning portfolio of tech start-ups. “What we’re doing is taking the creative energy of employees and giving them an opportunity to build their passion and personal interest into something that helps the company succeed,” Reynolds says. The platform is also a way of conserving employees’ creative energy. Instead of locking a designated creative team in a conference room, companies can sign up all of their employees, create measurable, goal-driven challenges and pull points of interest and inspiration from staff and consumers (think social-media charged focus groups). So, if a company’s goal is to develop a new product, it can present this as a challenge, and use employee-gathered points of interest (which can be loaded as photos or tagged online) to define its next steps using a community-driven approach. By Robin Donovan