DC Startup: Stitchtagram; Design Your Own Instagram Pillows

by Kyle in DC
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Earlier this month we reported on Social Print Studio’s latest venture, printstagr.am. Social Print Studio, a San Francisco company, lets you print your Instagr.am pics on just about anything printable. Today we’re reporting on a DC area startup that actually lets you print your Instagr.am pictures on pillows.

This story comes to us by way of our good friends at Inthecapital.com (check that site out). Stitchtagram was started by the brother and sister team, Doug and Rachel Pfeffer. Of course with Instagram’s rising popularity, their new Android app and their $1 billion dollar purchase by Facebook, everyone is looking to get a cut of the pie.  Stitchtagram is probably one of the most innovative ideas to come as a result of the photo sharing phenomenon.

Doug Pfeffer told Inthecapital.com that the idea came about because he and his sister love taking digital things and making them physical. Doug has a background in digital advertising. His sister, Rachel, has a background in selling jewelry online. They wanted to find something to do together. After tinkering with an Instagram slide show screen saver they decided on pillows. They began selling pillows in November of 2011 and the rest has been history.

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DC Area Company: Cadre Looking To Change The Face Of The Network Mixer

by Kyle in DC, Startups
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I’ve been attending networking mixers for all of my adult life. In a previous life as a radio personality and then programmer I attended many conventions that had their own networking mixers as shoulder events. When I started founding my own businesses as “SMBs” before “Startups” were chic, I attended every chamber of commerce business after hours, every small business mixer, power breakfast and the like.

All of these events, and even the ones I regularly attend today for both of our sites, it amounts to a room full of people that get all clicked up into their circle of friends and the theme of the mixer is lost almost instantly as you walk through the door. Sometimes when you go to these things and try to be outgoing and meet new people, people look at you like you’re nuts.

I’ve recently started using discovery apps like Sonar, Glancee and Highlight to see if they would help in the networking mixer problem. In some ways they have but not by much. I’d find people I wanted to meet and they were already in deep conversations with the other people I wanted to meet about baseball, football or their latest deal.

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