Photo courtesy of the Minnesota Cup
MN Cup_2016
MN Cup 2016 runners-up, sisters Caroline and Isabel Bercaw of Da Bomb Bath Fizzers, pitch their idea at last year's Final Awards Event. This year's event will be held on Oct. 9 at 7 p.m. in the McNamara Alumni Center.
The Minnesota Cup (MN Cup) is a statewide competition well known in adult entrepreneurial rings as a way to gain exposure, experience, networking opportunities, and seed money to kick-start their venture.
MN Cup added an under-18 youth division in 2016. This year, more than 70 youth teams have been whittled down to 10 division semifinalists. Each team has the summer to produce a 10-page business plan, a 15-slide business pitch, and a one-minute video. Besides a special workshop day for the youth division, requirements for MN Cup entrants are the same, whether the company is run by a 12-year-old or a 60-year-old.
“We’re trying to show young people that ideas are ideas,” says Melissa Kjolsing, director of MN Cup. “It comes down to the execution. It comes down to the entrepreneur and the hustle. And these young people have hustle—that’s for sure.”
Here’s a look at two semifinalists in the running:
G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K.
G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K. is a team made up of three 12-year-olds who came together to create the Eye on Walleye app, which helps the DNR track fish populations to combat overfishing. Meghan Barton is in charge of business; Abby Polen, coding; and Paige Meierhofer, production, but they all help each other (even if it means Polen sometimes has to redo their coding mistakes).
Photo courtesy of G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K.
G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K._Eye on Walleye
Barton had gotten involved with Technovation, a program that teaches girls to code and challenges them to create an app with a community impact. She knew overfishing was a problem at her grandparents’ cabin on Lake Mille Lacs, recruited a team from her homeroom to compete in Technovation, and got cracking.
G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K.’s outcome at Technovation didn’t get them a pass to the program’s world pitch stage, but it did give them a bye to MN Cup’s semifinal round.
Peacebunny Island
Caleb Smith was already running a rabbit education nonprofit when a northern Minnesota barn fire left four big, fluffy Angora rabbits homeless. While he didn’t hesitate to invite the Angora rabbits into his four-pawed family, they also sparked a new idea.
Photo courtesy of Peacebunny Island and STEM Bunnies
Caleb Smith_STEM Bunnies_Peacebunny Island
Angora rabbits need their fur trimmed four times a year, and while the material is valued in fashion, it has met resistance because of unethical suppliers. For his new business, Peacebunny Island (and its product, HEARTfelt yarn), Smith and two of his cousins built a network to happily house the Angoras between their “hare-cuts” and their visits to senior citizen homes, where they make excellent therapy pets. He then reached out to fashion industry buyers to create contracts to buy the Angora material.
“My team has worked really hard figuring out a way to more humanely care for the rabbits and to scale up slowly over the past two years,” Smith says. “This is creating a whole new commercial model, and that means visiting with animal scientists and farmers, lots of reading, and then working with the rabbits personally.”
Diving headfirst into uncharted territory seems to be a common occurrence among the semifinalists. Polen, whom Barton calls the app coding “mastermind,” only learned coding after joining the Eye on Walleye team. She spent hours watching YouTube tutorials, and largely honed her skill through trial and error. Same with their four-minute video for Technovation—although Meierhofer was interested in videos, this was a first for her as she and the team put it all together.
“I’m excited to see how far we go and to see if this is what we’re going to do for the rest of our lives, or if it’s just a step to see what we could do,” Meierhofer says.
Either way, G.I.R.L.S. can H.A.K.’s app and business are growing, including an expansion to iOS software (Polen plans to learn Swift) and the addition of more lakes. Eye on Walleye can currently categorize five fish for five lakes. Barton is hoping to add five more lakes by the end of the year.
“We have, like, 10,000 to get through and more!” Meierhofer laughs in response.
“11,000,” says Polen with a wry grin. “I looked it up.“
Finalists will be announced Aug. 25, and the Final Awards Event will be held Oct. 9, 4-7 p.m., McNamara Alumni Center, 200 Oak St. SE, Ste. 100, Mpls., carlsonschool.umn.edu.
