Category Archive

  The next time you walk past the sparkling water aisle in the grocery store, keep an eye out for Liquid Death. Despite the name, and the fact that it actually looks like it could be an alcoholic beverage, these are actually healthy canned water drinks. First released through a website in 2019, Liquid Death has quickly crushed the competition to become one of the fastest-selling canned water drinks. With interesting branding and flavors, they have really set themselves apart from the usual sparkling water options you see every day. The sparkling water category had a sales total of $3.6 billion last year alone. That’s a lot of cash to go around. So, what led to the success of Liquid Death? How is it different from the other sparkling water brands? Let’s dive in and take a detailed look at Liquid Death, including the person behind these drinks and how …

  You can add Whitney Wolfe Herd, CEO of Bumble to the list of successful entrepreneurs with popular social platforms. However, unlike most of the startup founders in Silicon Valley, Herd is a woman. People often associate tech startups with the male gender. Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Jack Dorsey (Twitter), Joel Simkhai (Grindr), and Sean Rad (Tinder) launched some of the most popular social networks and dating apps. Whitney Wolfe Herd is giving these men a run for their money. Bumble’s initial public offering (IPO) was valued at more than $8 billion just last year. Wolfe Herd launched Bumble in December of 2014 with two former Tinder employees. Just eight years later, it’s the second-most popular dating app in the United States. Over 42 million people actively use Bumble each month to make connections, date, or find new friends. So, what led to the success of Bumble? How is it different …

In 2012, Sara Blakely joined an elite club of just 2,604 people in the world. That year, Forbes crowned her the world’s youngest self-made billionaire, and Sara was welcomed into the world of the Walton family, Carlos Slim, and Warren Buffett. Pretty good for a girl who once failed her audition for the part of Goofy at Disney’s Orlando theme park. It wasn’t the only failure Sara had experienced before she hit the quarter-century mark. In fact, nearly anyone else would have given up on success long ago if they’d faced as many setbacks and disappointments as Sara did. Sara’s story showcases two major themes — failure and grit. As a young woman, Sara got a major dose of both. It wasn’t that she came from a hardscrabble background. In fact, Sara grew up in Clearwater, Florida under an artist mother and a lawyer father. Her failures were her own, …

  Mashable is a media & entertainment company with over 48 million followers across a variety of social media platforms. Millions of users view Mashable content each day on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and the company’s website. If a news story is trending online, they likely have an article covering the topic. Mashable launched in 2005, a year after Facebook and a year before Twitter. Just 12 years later, it sold for close to $50 million. So, who is responsible for the growth of Mashable? How did the company become one of the fastest-growing digital publishers? Where does the company have planned next? In the following article, we examine the history of Mashable & the person behind its success.   Mashable Started as a Blog Written by a Teenager Pete Cashmore founded Mashable in 2005 as a simple WordPress blog. Four years later, Time Magazine voted Mashable one of the …

  Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream is one of the fastest-growing ice cream brands in recent history. The Columbus-based company has amassed a large following, including many celebs and politicians. From Lebron James to President Joe Biden, everyone seems to love the creative & original ice cream flavors. Popular options include almond milk cortado, pistachio and honey, and salty caramel (but can you really go wrong with any of the flavors?). The company was founded by Jeni Britton Bauer in 2002 & now Jeni’s has 47 branded stores and nationwide distribution at over 3000 retailers. You can find glorious pints of Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream at stores like Target & Whole Foods in addition to their scoop shops. So, how did Jeni Britton Bauer turn ice cream into a business empire? Let’s find out.     Making and Selling Perfume Leads to a Discovery The story of Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams …

  Slack is currently one of the most popular business communication platforms. It launched in 2013 and went public in 2019 with a market value of $19.5 billion. Slack is a lightweight communication tool that helps teams stay organized. Users can easily share documents, images, and messages in the workplace or across remote distances. With Evernote, Trello, Dropbox, and dozens of other business tools as competition, how did Slack manage to succeed? The success of Slack is a unique story that includes the rise and fall of two separate video game companies and the sale of one of the most popular photo-sharing tools. Here’s a closer look at how Stewart Butterfield & Cal Henderson built Slack.     Video Game Project Leads to Surprisingly Useful Tool     Slack was not the first successful platform developed by Stewart Butterfield. It’s also not the first platform that he originally designed as …

  Blavity aims to empower Black millennials and the proceeding generations by giving them a platform where they can share authentic stories. Launching a successful tech company is not an easy feat. More than one in five startups fail during their first year. 90% fail within a decade. Millennials lag previous generations in amassing wealth. A lack of funds creates more challenges for entrepreneurs with original ideas. The US tech industry is also disproportionately white, which often leads to additional barriers for people of color. Morgan DeBaun is helping to break down those barriers and give Black millennials an online platform where they can thrive. DeBaun launched Blavity in 2014 to allow underrepresented voices to share stories and news not covered by mainstream media. Four years later, the company secured $6.5 million in its latest round of funding. Blavity is now a massive online ecosystem that reaches over 100 million …

  Do you dislike soy or almond milk? And certainly don’t want to drink an entire glass of cow’s milk? If so, you’re not alone. The disdain and need for dairy-free milk led a food scientist from Sweden to develop something new: oat-based milk. OATLY was launched in 1994 and now generates over $200 million in sales each year. So, how did a Swedish scientist start a business that revolutionized the dairy alternative market? He created an alternative that actually tastes seriously good. However, there is so much more to the story than just great tasting vegan milk..     Academic Research Led to a Dairy Free Breakthrough   Back in the early 1990s, food scientist and chemistry teacher Rickard Öste was completing academic research on lactose intolerance. He knew that existing dairy alternatives were not very appealing to most people. He also grew up in Sweden, which is the …

  With a constant stream of social media apps, it can be hard to keep track of the latest rival to Twitter or Facebook. One app that has managed to stand out from the pack is Clubhouse. The audio-based chat app has quickly captured people’s attention, including some of the most powerful tech gurus and world leaders. Elon Musk recently invited Vladimir Putin to a clubhouse chat. The app launched in April 2020 during the early months of the coronavirus pandemic. By summer, it was valued at $100 million and had just 1,500 users. By the end of January, it was worth over $1 billion and had attracted over two million users. As it prepares to launch support for Android devices, Clubhouse is expected to dramatically increase its user count. So, who’s behind the latest chat app? Clubhouse is the brainchild of Paul Davison and Rohan Seth. Here’s the story …