Kauffman Foundation’s 1 Millon Cups Heads To Georgetown, Delaware

1 million cups, Delaware, Kauffman Foundation, startups, startup events

The Wednesday morning coffee and networking event called 1 Million Cups, created by the Kauffman Foundation, has added its 10th location and its first northeastern city. It’s not New York, Providence, or Boston. Instead, the latest community to join the 1 Million Cups family is on the Georgetown, Delaware, campus of Delaware Technical Community College. Georgetown, Delaware, sits about 20 miles from the Delaware and Maryland beach resorts.

1 Million Cups began in April 2012 in Kansas City, the hometown of its founding organization, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. Kauffman Labs is a program of the Kauffman Foundation.

With its launch on the campus of Delaware Technical Community College in Georgetown, 1Million Cups is on target to expand its network to 20 cities by the end of 2013. Program leaders also plan to have at least one international city in the mix this year.

“We are thrilled to welcome Delaware entrepreneurs to the 1 Million Cups family,” Thom Ruhe, vice president of entrepreneurship at the Kauffman Foundation said in a statement. “Georgetown represents not only our 10th city overall, but it is our first Northeastern community and the first time 1 Million Cups has partnered with a community college. We expect to learn things in this new environment that can be applied as we continue to introduce the program to ever more diverse audiences and locales.”

The 1 Million Cups model is consistent in every market. Every Wednesday morning in each city, two early-stage startups present their companies to a diverse audience of mentors, advisers, and other entrepreneurs. Each founder presents for six minutes and then fields audience questions for another 20 minutes. The program is run entirely by local entrepreneurs who serve as community organizers.

Entrepreneurs, innovators, and interested community members from Georgetown and the surrounding region will meet at 9 a.m. each Wednesday at Java 101 in the Student Service Center on Delaware Technical Community College’s Jack F. Owens Campus. The college also hopes to attract attendees from its other two campuses in the state. The first week’s presenters will be Lead Your Way Solutions, a leadership and organizational development startup, and fast-casual restaurant go brit! fish + chips.

“We’re extremely pleased to be partnering with the Kauffman Foundation to bring 1 Million Cups to the College and to the citizens of Delaware,” said Dr. Orlando J. George Jr., president of Delaware Tech. “We look forward to hosting this very exceptional program at all of our campuses to support entrepreneurs statewide.”

Georgetown joins Kansas City; Des Moines, Iowa; Houston; St. Louis; Cedar Rapids/Iowa City, Iowa; Reno, Nev.; Chattanooga, Tenn.; Denver; and Chapel Hill/Research Triangle Park, N.C., in offering 1 Million Cups locally. Additional cities slated to launch 1 Million Cups in the next two months are Columbia, Mo.; Lawrence, Kan.; Orlando, Fla.; and San Diego.

1 million cups is great for startups everywhere else, so is this.

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uSwapia Trading & Bartering Even If You Don’t Want What They Have

Rehoboth Beach Delaware startup, uSwapia, is the latest to tackle direct and indirect bartering. Many sites have tried to replicate and improve upon the bartering model provided on Craigslist.com. uSwapia has found a way to barter, or trade, services and goods with someone even if they want what you have but don’t have what you want.

Rather than being stuck with a service or item you don’t want uSwapia has a better way as Kevin Clark the company founder explains:

“So I’m an acupuncturist, and have listed myself on the uSwapia site. I state that for 1 token, I will offer somebody an acupuncture service. Fred the baker pulled his back lifting a bag of flour and wants some acupuncture. I don’t want any baked goods, because I’m still holding onto a little bit of holiday weight, but that’s ok. Fred comes in, the site transfers a token from Fred’s account to my account after the trade is completed, and then I can use that token to go hire Suzy the personal trainer to help get me back into shape in time for summer. Tokens are really just placeholders for trades, and basically everything is traded for 1 token. (We find that most trades would retail for between $50-150, but by taking dollar amounts out of the equation, we are trying to shift the emphasis to building community in one’s neighborhood, while operating under the premise that sometimes we are ahead, and sometimes we are behind, but that it all evens out in the end.)”

In essence not only has Clark provided a new way to barter and trade online but also a better one that solves one of the main problems that people have with trading and bartering in the first place. When you take to Craigslist for example you see what everyone has to barter and what they want but sometimes you don’t have anything close.

Check out the rest of our interview with Clark below.

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