Category: NWEN
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Social Entrepreneurship at NWEN: Doing Well by Doing Right (via Flexcar)
Lance Ayrault, CEO of Flexcar, gave a great talk at the Northwest Entrepreneur Network (NWEN) Venture Breakfast at the Bellevue Harbor Club yesterday on the topic of social entrepreneurship (a topic near and dear to my heart … and blog). Flexcar is an interesting exemplar of a non-traditional social venture, in that they are a…
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Co-promotional Considerations: Customerization and The Brand “Us”
Peter van Stolk, founder, president and CEO of Jones Soda, gave an energetic, inspiring and irreverent presentation at this month’s NWEN Venture Breakfast on being relevant and real to, for and with your customers. The official title was "Creating Meaningful Relationships with Customers", but the unofficial title might be better expressed as "Marketing in a…
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Working with Angel Investors: It’s the Relationship, Stupid!
Susan Preston, Of Counsel at Davis, Wright, Tremaine, LLP, and Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, shared her insights and experiences on how entrepreneurs can build and maintain successful relationships with angel investors at yesterday’s Northwest Entrepreneur Network Venture Breakfast. Sue started out by presenting a number of statistics on angel and venture capital…
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eBay: I Think I Get It
I always go to the Northwest Entrepreneur Network (NWEN) Venture Breakfast Meetings; even when the topic doesn’t really excite me, I never fail to make or renew valuable connections with wonderful people during the earlybird networking. And, I am sometimes pleasantly surprised by a topic and/or speaker(s) being far more interesting than I expected, as…
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Eclipse Aviation: Redefining the Value Proposition for Jet Travel
Vern Raburn, President and CEO of Eclipse Aviation (mantra: "fly in the face of convention"), gave a rousing presentation at Friday’s NWEN Breakfast, describing how his company is redefining the value proposition for jet travel by making private jet travel — via a new generation of very light jets (VLJs) employed as air taxis —…
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Public Relations, Branding, Integrity and Passion
Parker LePla offered insights and experiences on The Essentials of PR and Brand Management at an Northwest Enterpreneur Network workshop this morning. They characterized a brand as a "sustainable differentiator" that represents the intersection of what you do well, what your customers value and what is sustainable over time, embodying the vision, mission and core…
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Business Plans and Angel Investors
I attended two extremely helpful — and mutually reinforcing — entrepreneurial events last Thursday: a free (!) Business Plan Writing workshop offered through the Northwest Entrepreneur Network (NWEN) and a seminar on "An Entrepreneur’s Perspective on Angel Investing: Plan, Present and Negotiate" offered through the MIT Enterprise Forum of the Northwest. The former provided some…
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CineVend: An Innovation for Enabling Impulse Buying
Greg Kriegler, president of CineVend (mantra: "Take the experience home"), gave an impressive 5-Minute Forum presentation yesterday at the Northwest Entrepreneur Network Venture Breakfast. He gave such a concise description of his business, I’ll simply quote it here: Cinevend develops, owns, operates and sells innovative vending machines with a focus on media vending. The company’s…
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180solutions: Working on a 180 Degree Public Relations Turn
I was eager to hear what the founders of 180solutions had to say at this morning’s Northwest Entrepreneur Network Venture Breakfast. I haven’t closely followed the controversy surrounding the company, with respect to their software being associated with botnets, worms and other elements of the "dark side" of the net. Some have raised issues about…
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NWEN Entrepreneur University 2005: Passion, Endurance and Speed
Last year, Entrepreneur University 2004 provided my first glimpse into the world of entrepreneuria. I wasn’t sure I was going to attend again this year, since I know so much more about that world now [I note, somewhat sarcastically]. But I’m glad I went to EU 2005, as I learned many new things, relearned some…