Our next Founder’s Brown Bag Round Table discussion is on June 19th, 2019 at 11:30am at Spaces in North Loop. Reach out to a current member or foundersbrownbag at gmail.com for an invite.
Information About Our Founders-Only Round Table Discussions
The original concept behind Founder’s Brown Bag was to do a round table discussion, for founders only, to discuss our most pressing issues in an accessible, safe environment. These are still happening and are one of the easiest ways to get involved!
No selling is allowed and we hold meetings over lunch to try to be as efficient as possible – we try to make sure that you get far more out of each meeting than the 90 minutes you put in.
Why attend?
Because you’ll get a group of smart founders with different perspectives and areas of expertise to give you sound advice on some of the biggest problems you might face. You’ll learn faster from those who have already been in your shoes – learn the shortcuts without making the mistakes.
Our goals?
To build a network of tightly-knit founders. To save you money and more importantly, time. To connect local founders with each other as well as industry leaders, growing startups, and amazing local events.
Who attends?
We have about 100 top-notch founders on the invite list. Our meetings are generally 15-25 people in size. You’ll see a diverse, but familiar set of faces as many people are finalists, semi-finalists and/or presenters drawn from the amazing entrepreneurial ecosystem that MN has to offer – including Minnesota Cup, Beta.MN, Minne*demo, 1 Million Cups and innumerable others that you might run into during Twin Cities Startup Week.
What’s the structure?
We start off with a little meet and greet – everyone has a chance to chat and then we kick off the meeting with a 60 second pitch on your business. From there, we typically break up into groups of 6-8 to ensure that the group sizes are big enough for productive conversation. The conversations are typically focused on ‘your biggest obstacle’ and the meetings are most productive if you come prepared with that in mind and a willingness to openly talk about it.
What’s the catch?
We are invite-only. To get an invite, you must be a founder. You must NOT sell to other founders within the confines of the meeting. There is no cost, though you are encouraged to make a donation if you’re benefiting from the group. This enables us to continue hosting events, reaching out to new resources, and providing the best service possible for the founder’s community.
How do I get an invite?
You can write me at darrin at foundersbrownbag.com. It REALLY helps if you have a recommendation from someone already in the group, so if you know someone, you’ll probably save everyone time if you can get them to recommend you!
How do we make this possible?
Mostly through volunteer founders, word of mouth and through the good graces of our early believers and sponsors. Even a small endeavor like this requires support and there were a select few who provided early space, food, and/or monetary support with no guarantee that it would create a return. Without them, we might not exist today: Fredrikson & Byron, Cloudburst SBC, Lurie, LLP, Gray Plant Mooty, New Lion Labs, Rambl, Catchwind Innovations, University Enterprise Labs (UEL), Fueled Collective, WeWork, Pantheon, and Mojo Coffee.
How can I support you?
We’re always looking for ways to do more for our founders. If you’d like to sponsor us or host a group of our lunch sessions (we require a commitment of 3 lunch sessions across 3 months) please write me at darrin at foundersbrownbag.com to see how you can get involved.
Thanks and good luck on YOUR founder journey!