Ten $50,000 grants for startups who move to St. Louis
archgrants.org
archgrants.org
The City of St. Louis is a separate entity from St. Louis county. When I last checked the employee map for a 150 engineer software company, there were two employees living in the City of St. Louis, (a receptionist, and a newly divorced man in an apartment) the remainder where in St. Louis County, St. Charles County, and living on the "east side" in Illinois (but far enough to clear East St. Louis).
The City of St. Louis has a 1% payroll tax for people that work in the city, plus another 1% for people that live in the city. That may not be important for a startup, but if you are looking to long term employ a lot of highly paid people you have to ask yourself if you want an extra 2% margin or not.
There has been a fair amount of redevelopment in the city itself in recent years, and probably a large amount to come, so you can find a nice place. Make sure to check for a grocery store nearby. Public transit is next to useless. Prepare to drive.
The radial highways in and out of the city are in pretty good shape these days. Check the actually commute times, but 20 miles in 30 minutes wouldn't be outrageous.
Frankly, I don't mind paying it. The city is entering a tricky time where it's got some momentum going with a lot of young people, a up-and-coming arts scene, more and more local businesses. If it puts the money to good use, there's hope for revitalizing the city core.
New York gets away with this because it's NYC.
But STL competes with bigger, better cities that have no city earnings tax: Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, Kansas City KS, Overland Park, Des Moines, Memphis. The only nearby cities that have earnings/income taxes are KCMO and Indy.
City taxes baffle me.
What seems likely to happen here is that adverse selection will allocate these grants to companies with poorer prospects than the total pool of startups, thus creating a track record of failure for the area.
Maybe a better approach would be to offer the grants to any startup nationwide, with the proviso that they employ N people in STL.
I wouldn't be surprised if NYC does it. I think if you funded 40 companies at 250k each in grants then you could easily get a class as good as YC with the right people as judges, and considering they are already pumping 2 billion dollars into this Cornell Technion thing it seems likely that something like this will eventually happen.
Disclaimer: I entered an app into the BigApps competition, so I'm partly biased in publicising it.
I don't know that I've seen it attempted before.
More generally, I think this is a very interesting development. As developers move into the cloud, staying in places like silicon valley requires a burn that might not be necessary.
Verrry interesting.
I think the key bit in tptacek's comment is, "not for any amount we've seen spent to date". You probably could buy a startup scene. But not for a laughable $500k. Both pg and Brad Feld have written on such. The gist, from memory, is that it'd take a whole lot more money and a couple decades.
Having a community of entrepreneurs around, however, has been a struggle. I started an all night programming group that meets once a month (meetup.com/allnightlong) and a social network for entrepreneurs (startlouis.com) that have helped address the community problem, scratching my own itch. Funding environment is getting better here, too. But it's far from perfect.
At least, not for that amount of money. But maybe they can. The first step is to try.
You know what I'd love to see? States being able to set their own special immigration policies. I live in New York and am very happy here, but it's very difficult to create my own startup because I'm on a restrictive work visa.
However, if St. Louis had the ability to request a special exclusion for foreign nationals to create a startup in their city, you'd better believe I would be looking at it very closely. From talking to other people in similar situations, I doubt I'd be alone.
(Of course, if St. Louis had the power to do this then I suspect NYC would as well- and Bloomberg is a very vocal supporter of immigration reform. But still...)
The development of the tech community is how you entice entrepreneurs and technologists to your area. Entrepreneurs and developers flock to where there is a community of like minded individuals. Build the community and the people will come. Once the people come, the capital will come.
Look at what NYC is doing. They are building a tech community that rivals Silicon Valley out of the ashes of former investment banking software engineers. The city government is actively supporting groups like New York Tech Meetup and General Assembly. They are nurturing the tech community and encouraging them to grow roots in the city.
St. Louis needs to work on this rather than just throw money at the problem.
The places outside the Valley that have succeeded have all done so because they have nurtured and embraced the entrepreneurial and tech community. St. Louis and elsewhere should do the same.
How do congress-people fit into this? There seem to be lots more of them...
So Missouri actually has two senators, McCaskill and Roy Blunt. "Congressmen" are usually members of the House of Representatives, and a state might have anywhere between 1 and about 50 or so.
For legislation to pass, it has to be passed by both houses and signed by the President, who's elected separately. If the President vetoes it, both houses can pass it over his head with a 2/3 majority. Constitutional amendments require a 2/3 majority and then some. And it's not like a parliamentary system where the whole party always votes the same way. The House in particular has often attracted idiosyncratic candidates who can only get elected in their particular district, and almost never vote with their party--guys like Ron Paul, James Traficant, and Zell Miller. Though of the three, only Ron Paul is still in office, and he's retiring soon.
The House and the Senate have different rules and regulations and traditions, and each can do things the other can't, but that's basically how it works.
My take has been to mimic the entrepreneur community infrastructure represented by an NYC on a smaller scale here. Building community here has been my biggest priority.
The community is here. It's small, but it does exist. And the capital--also small, but it's coming. I don't think $500k is really that impressive. One company should burn through that much on their way to VC, let along a myriad of startups...
"Once the people come, the capital will come." We are in complete agreement. Now we want some more people--how does $50k sound? ;)
I always say that St. Louis is a nice place to be from. It's a nice place to raise a family. But I'm never going to move back. Or under extreme protest if my wife decides she wants to move back to be by family. There's just nothing interesting about St. Louis. White flight ruined the city in the sixties and highway 70 divides the majority black population (north) from the majority white population (south). So it's basically a segregated suburbia wrapped around a lifeless inner core. No one lives in the city. They drive there to work, drink and watch sports. Period.
I certainly wouldn't want to start a tech company there.
Well, that's a little terrifying.
As 2mur explains, it's a great place to grow up and awesome for families. That said, there are significant issues with the area that ruined any chance of me starting my company in St. Louis. Beyond the in-your-face social issues, there is an insularity to St. Louis. Outsiders generally are viewed quite skeptically, and trying to recruit to St. Louis was a significant non-starter for me.
This isn't intended to bag on St. Louis, but it's just not a fit as a technology hub. Compared to Seattle, the Bay area, Boston, Research Triangle, etc. the difference couldn't possibly be overstated.
Wait, where'd you go to high school?
To those not from St. Louis, take heed: you're measure in "class" is determined by your answer to this question. If you're an outsider, you're relegated to lesser-than status.
By the way, CITY MUSEUM?? Come, on!
But seriously, I wouldn't say there's a ton to attract someone here, but (1) if you're serious about your venture and this capital would make the difference, you can make it here--and I'll help you! and (2) there's more going on here than you think. Not an overwhelming amount, but enough to make a real run at it. This sort of grant program just adds to the mix.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/marketshare/2011/12/06/st-louis-...
As for St. Louis as a tech start up location, I know there's a growing biotech scene bubbling up. St. Louis actually has the highest concentration of plant scientists in the world, and both Monsanto and WashU really pioneering some pretty incredible crop research.
Similarly, WashU is doing some truly extraordinary biomedical research, such as the newly opened Genomic and Pathology Services, where physicians from around the US can send cancer tissue samples to have genomic data read for prognostic and diagnostic purposes (http://www.gps.wustl.edu/).
To help catalyze the biotech spirit, the university offers a biotech Entrepreneurship pathway integrated with its biomedical/biological sciences PhD program which runs joint with the business school.(http://dbbs.wustl.edu/curstudents/SpecialEmphasisPathways/Pa...).
All that said and done, I can't imagine moving a tech start-up to STL. It seems like a company might organically grow out of existing work...
I don't know what you're talking about - it's really not that bad.
For example: the STLJS meetup just started less than a year ago and had over 50 people at our last meetup. Granted - it's not SF or SValley, but it's not the hell hole you make it out to be. There are some of the most genuine and kind people I've ever met that are here in STL.
We're not a bunch of dumbfucks. Hell - WashU is ranked the 14th best university in the country. I'm not one that thinks a great school is equivalent to intelligence, but c'mon - there are people here that think. A lot of them. Just not the same way a bunch of HNers do.
It's just a different culture here. People are much more corporate and family-focused, which isn't a bad thing to a lot of people.
With that being said, StartupWeekendSTL was here a few weeks ago, and there were too many people to fit in the place we had. It was awesome!
Think what you want, but if you really think St. Louis is that bad, then you're just not reaching out for the culture you're looking for, sorry.
I'm sorry you haven't found more than a couple people who "enjoy thinking", but with that kind of arrogance it's more likely they're just avoiding you.
One person responded by saying St. Louis is "a city like any other", and that's misleading. There is no baseline to compare to. I've lived in a half dozen cities for long enough that they have very different cultures, and people living there have different priorities. San Francisco, for example, is much more intellectual, much more lively, and much more exciting than Columbia. Here in South Carolina most people like predictability and routine.
But not everybody. For example, I know one high school teacher who just flew his students out to Stanford for a math competition. The cocky bastard believed they have a chance of winning -- and after seeing them in our local competition I believed him. I have met some interesting people, and people who have some intellectual interests, and there is no way that "there is no intellectual scene" in St. Louis or in any other city bigger than 1,000. It might well be smaller, more marginalized, or less intense, but it will be there.
But that said, some cities are definitely more conducive to intellectualism, entrepreneurship, and having an exciting life than others. If I wanted to start a startup, I would do it in the Bay Area or maaaybe Austin, Madison, Raleigh/Durham, Boston, New York, or Boulder. If you have a choice, then you should go to the best place for the best opportunity. Why wouldn't you?
Whenever I meet people that come to STL to study, I find they rarely leave the immediate campus area and if they do they usually only go downtown or to the big college spots like the Loop. The city has the worst of the urban elements, and if you go too far out into South county, you can get the country-folks stereotype. North County is pretty desolate these days as well - but there are a lot of good areas here too. "STL" means more than the city proper and a lot of people live in the counties. We're spread out. Where exactly did you live in the area?
Reminds me of the Onion article about Saint Louis adding 4 Million jobs: http://www.theonion.com/articles/us-adds-4-million-jobs-but-...
I also live in St. Louis (moved here about a year ago after six years in SF), and I'm quite fond of thinking. Shoot me an email if you want to meet up sometime, if nothing else I can probably introduce you to at least one other person here who is into quantum mechanics.
A) I've never been, but a good friend came from there. He was back and forth on the quality of St. Louis, but he's a damn smart guy. That said, he's not there anymore.
2) Consider that your post was chided in the comments, but it wasn't being downvoted. That's how you know if you're facing disapproval versus loud conversation.
Lastly) The problem of finding no compatriots is not a unique one. I face the same problem where I live, rural Georgia. But it's not a matter of no one here being worth knowing, it's just a matter of getting to know the right people in the appropriate context. That's harder to do sometimes. And it's not a problem easily solved for everyone. Your post did come off as angry, but I'm not going to judge the validity of that anger. Just know that, well, like I said. It's not unique. Many people feel that way, many of whom are right and wrong about their situation. Realize that if you assume the outcome (that no one there is worth knowing) then you may be looking at the wrong problem (how to meet them) and just become jaded that you never see the solution.
Agreed -- that was primarily why I redacted myself. I was being an idiot.
It would be pretty amusing to walk around the local campuses aimlessly repeating "Hi I'm Shawn, I'm looking for someone who thinks Quantum Mechanics is cool!" ... maybe it would even work. Who knows.
How can anyone reasonably predict where their N-month old company is going to be in 3-5 years?
That said, St. Louis isn't impossible. Strangeloop STL is one of the hands-down, bar none, best conferences in the country each year; Slicehost did quite well for themselves from there; Jack Dorsey goes back home all the time (a co-founder of Square is from the Lou, and the swipe-powered dongle technology comes out of Wash U); and it's not like Chicago's all that far away.
By the time you move a team you may exceed $50,000 in expenses.
Anyone who is really serious will not take $50,000 to move to St. Louis.
And of course there are exceptions, like someone who has family in St. Louis, or someone who does know investors there etc.
2) this is especially true living in a part of the country with a reasonable cost of living. Somewhere like Missouri, $50k is two reasonable years of runway for a single 20-something (even in a metro area like St Louis, you'll be able to rent for ~$400 .)
3) it's pretty ridiculous (and arrogant) to assume that nowhere else in the country can you get investors.
It's really not a bad idea to set up a business model with a set of variables defined from which you base your projections. When I do this, I make it very easy to drop in actuals and have the projections auto updated based on the collected metrics over the original projected ones.
That said, business plans can be useful and help the founders solidify their business model, predict costs, etc. If anything, it helps you get a vague idea of what to expect a few years down the road instead of just the next 60 days.
I would guess the vast majority of tech entrepreneurs would disagree with the implication that business plans are generally useful.
I think generally it's good to think about these things because the process is more valuable than the plan itself.
Yes technology is impossible to predict but they want to see that you've given it more thought then, we don't need revenue Google buys us in year 2!!!1!
Finally, please know that St. Louis, like any other place, contains diverse people with diverse goals. I have my own combination of concerns and confidence regarding Arch Grants. But bottom-line, it's a good thing and not a bad one. I'd love to chat about the concerns too. There's plenty of legit ones out there :)
Best case, 10 startups pop up all at once as a result of these grants, and more follow. I think this is actually a reasonably good try at jump-starting a startup culture.
The nice thing about a web startup is that, aside from "culture" and government regulations, there aren't really any reasons you couldn't run your startup out of a cabin in remote Alaska with a satellite internet connection.
Of course, it does go deeper than just an initial seed. There also needs to be a government with policies that won't restrict the growth of startups.
For all the complaining in Maine about college graduates leaving the state, I would love to see them try something like this.
So $50k in cash as opposed to $50k of investment for 33% of your company can be two very different things.
FWIW, half my family is from STL and there is definitely a difference in culture between the west coast and mid-west.
I've talked to them about next year incorporating Lean Methodology. Executive Director is open to it, but for now, they're off and running with plenty to do.
Contact via profile here.
I've lived in St. Louis my whole life (other than collage) and recently went to Startup Weekend St. Louis as well as php and code till dawn meetups. I know only a few people, angel investors from Startup Weekend, community organizers and others who are really trying very hard to get something started here. But it's a very VERY tiny tech community. However, there are angel investors, mentors, startup weekends, and The Founders Institute just came to town so you'll probably get lots of attention. I call these passionate people "Queen Bees" because they are very generous and dedicated to turning St. Louis into a tech center.
However, the problem I see over and over again in St. louis is are the lack of "Worker bees". These are the people that actually build companies and startups and do the work. There are very very few of them. And that is where the flaw of the St. Louis startup scene becomes very apparent. The Queen Bees here like the Arch Angels, Jay Delong, Brian Blanchard, Israel Vickers, & dozens of other community organizers are the warmest people you'll meet. They are amazing. They really want to lead this kingdom towards glory but for this whole "Tech Scene" to work there have to be worker bees and that's exactly what St. Louis is missing. It's like trying to build a Craigslist for Antarctica, or trying to build a Farmers Market in Death Valley Arizona.
So in the event that your startup does grow, good luck finding talent. The mentality here is different. I went to PHP meetups a few times a while ago and the developers there literally didn't give a single "fuck" about any startup ideas, from anyone. They'd gather up every month, talk about stupid shit that "happened this one time..." then at the end ask each other what they should do the next meetup because chit chatting is boring. The idea that they could work on a startup that could change the world is completely over their head. They are oblivious to their own possible greatness.
$50,000 grant for startups is a great deal for people who already live in St. Louis but a terrible deal for people who have a chance to move to the Bay Area. Getting a startup off the ground is hard enough, why make it harder by moving to a place where you have less oportunity and less people to make it happen?
In the end you need to do what's best for YOUR startup and YOUR idea, not what's best for St. Louis. A startup is like a child you are raising, and if you want the best for your child, you pack your bags and move to an area with better schools, less crime, and better collages. Depending on the situation, the best place for your child and most startups is Silicon Valley. People who try to convince themselves otherwise are the type of people who either don't have the balls to move (like me), or are emotionally attached to their city (New Yorkers, Seattleans), or don't have the funds to move. There's lots of stories of people outside the valley making it but I bet you if they moved to the bay area they would have made it farther and faster than in their home town. Silicon valley is not a "place" but a certain type of "people". They are very intelligent, not always educated, bat shit crazy and hell bent on building something great. And Silicon Valley is FULL of them. They will fuel your startup's success faster and better than anyone else can.
So if you're young and able to move, go to the Bay Area, if you're stuck in New York or St. Louis or Seattle because of family or emotional reasons. By all means take advantage of these deals and try to give back to the community so you can help others who are stuck in their home town too. BTW, check out the St. louis "code till dawn" meetup group for really chilled authentic developers.
I myself desperately want to move to San Jose. I need to do it, but I'm an overly emotional Atheist and also cannot have kids. Basically, I will never raise a family of my own so the one I have now is the last biological family I'll ever have and I don't want to let them go. If my parents were to pass away while I was gone out west, I'd never forgive myself. To me there's no afterlife so you have to love those around you as much as you can while they are alive because there's no second chances after that. Emotionally, I think I'm stuck in St. Louis for a while... ;_;
LOL. Chris, you're awesome. Even if you spelled my last name wrong. Your honesty is great. I know some people will consider it worthwhile to start something here in spite of these legit challenges that you raise, but that's sober truth...
For the record, Chris is an awesome, intelligent dude who tries new things. Every time I see him, he has a new invention or website built. Full of ideas. Knowing people like him is part of what I like here.
Yes, go to SV if you can. For those who can't...well, now you've got another option to consider.
Do you think that NYC or SF don't have their hanger-ons, dilettantes and blowhards?
What frustrates me so mightily about the overly-dour pessimism about the midwest is the total neglect for all of the things that do happen here, and a lack of recognition of all the awesome midwesterners who leave the midwest just to do awesome stuff elsewhere.
I grew up and went to college in Columbus, Ohio thinking that the tech scene was elsewhere. It wasn't until I had already graduated and made plans to leave that I learned that, actually, Columbus has a world class Ruby community I'd simply not yet heard about.
I am still trying to figure St Louis out, having moved to Columbia Mo, 6 mos. ago, but I am skeptical that the community that puts on Strange Loop every year, has had companies like Slicehost come up out of it is really the barren wasteland you make it out to be.
I got 2 replies from people in Central Florida that never materialized, 1 reply in St. Louis but the guy moved away to D.C. for a job. and I got FORTY FIVE ->45<- emails with resumes and portfolios attached from the Bay Area. Silicon Valley replies didn't even joke around, they didn't ask for equity or salary or anything, they just wanted to make something together. Those people where ready to go. And you just can't find passion or drive like that from "worker bees" out here.
I will admit, I stopped looking and just gave up. Deep inside I'm planning to move out west. I have to.
There's a reason why Google, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo, Twitter, Adobe, Cisco, Sandisk, Nvidea, Netflix, Symantec, Mcafee, Paypal, eBay, etc... all call the bay area home. If Microsoft were here, Windows probably wouldn't be so stagnant and stuck in the past.