Hey there! My name is Emily Siegel, and I’m the founder and CEO of Trek Gum, an all-natural chewing gum company that incorporates functional ingredients into every chew. My startup story originated when a childhood idea and a portable oral care dilemma decided to cross paths. As a kid, I always dreamed of having a gum that could clean my teeth on-the-go, because I was horrible at remembering to brush before school yet always had minty gum in my backpack that I tricked myself into thinking was effective. As college student, my oral care routine was the least of my worries while drowning in class work, at least until the cavities started to catch up with me.
Ecotone Renewables is closing the food-loop by recapturing lost nutrients and creating hyper-local energy production. Our cultures, identities, social outings and lifestyles have a lot to do with the food we eat. We prepare food elegantly for restaurant goers, present food regularly on network tv shows, spend billions on the production and transportation of food from farm to plate, and strengthen community and family ties over a shared meal at dinner. With food being so ingrained in our social lives, we can sometimes forget about the main purpose of food: to sustain life. As this simple fact slips our minds, we find people holding gold, oil, data, or other assets at a greater valuable; thus, food is also one of the most wasted commodities on the planet.
When I am asked why I invest in women entrepreneurs, I usually hear something like, “Wow, I can tell you are really passionate about this.” In truth, there is no other topic that gets me more fired up than why women need to invest in women entrepreneurs. I became an angel investor over four years ago when I joined Next Act Fund, the only angel fund in Pittsburgh dedicated to connecting women investors to women entrepreneurs. Since then, I have shared our message with anyone who will kindly listen, explaining why we must work to close the enormous funding gap between men and women. Today, while we are still reeling from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, that message is more important than ever.
Here at the Big Idea Center, we believe that entrepreneurship is for everyone. In support and observance of Black History Month, we're providing this helpful list of resources for Black entrepreneurs as a way to help connect them to organizations and programs that are known to support minority-owned businesses throughout the region! Please view our non-exhaustive directory below:
The Big Idea Center is an on-campus, inclusive innovation catalyst that develops a unique skillset valuable not only to those wishing to become an entrepreneur themselves, but also to those who are looking for a corporate job and simply want to boost their resume! Here are the top five reasons how we can make your resume stand out, no matter what your student level, course of study, or career goals may be.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had an impact on virtually every aspect of our lives. This is especially true of how we communicate with others. For the foreseeable future, much of our communications will happen over Zoom or other virtual platforms. So, as an entrepreneur, obviously this is going to change how you go about pitching your idea/company to others, whether that be investors, judges... you name it! Here are some tips to optimize (and nail) your virtual Zoom pitch:
Marty Bacik '18 (pictured) with his new startup boxd. Photo courtesy of Marty Bacik. In our next installment of our "Beyond the BIC" blog series, we're featuring Marty Bacik '18, a Pitt alum and Founder of Pitt spinout Ardoor and recent startup boxd, as he shares what major decision he had to make regarding his first startup and how that impacted his life now, what entrepreneurship lesson he learned from country music artist Kacey Musgraves, and the importance of being kind in the world of business.
“Whoever invented the burger was smart, but the person that invented the cheeseburger was a genius.” – Matthew McConaughey I’ve realized that inventing “hamburgers” is hard. So, during the past few years I have found myself keeping an eye out for the opportunity to put some “cheese” on a juicy “burger”. Towards the end of 2019, I began to pursue an idea that I thought might be a “cheeseburger”. I brought the idea to my teammate Kumar Vijayendra and we began working on our business venture, BestCity, five months before the 2020 Randall Family Big Idea Competition.
