In this episode of the Chicago-based Trep Life web series, Mark Achler of redbox discusses both his entrepreneurial and “intra-preneurial” endeavors.

From growing up as the son of an entrepreneur to starting multiple businesses himself, Mark gives insight into the challenges, hard work and passion it takes to become a successful entrepreneur.

Chicago startup accelerator and incubator Excelerate Labs announced its 2011 class Wednesday night—10 startups that will each receive a $25,000 seed investment, office space, legal assistance, and mentorship from Chicago entrepreneurs.

“In 2010 Excelerate itself was a startup,”said CEO Troy Henikoff. “We had to figure a lot of it out as we were going. Now with a successful year under our belt, we can build on what we learned from last year and do an even better job this year.”

Excelerate’s inaugural class last year raised a total of $7.2 million in venture funding and hired 65 employees since its demo day. This year, the program received hundreds of applications before selecting the 10 startups for its summer incubator.

The startups of Excelerate Labs’ newest class are:

• A Space Apart: This mobile app works to create local experiences and communities around specific places or events. A Space Apart was a an mVDEMO exhibitor at midVenturesLAUNCH 2010.
• BabbaCo: This startup creates functional and “super cute” products for parents and their children.
• Beyond Credentials: Beyond Credentials helps students create digital resumes. One of its unique factors is that it only allows students and alumni from a top 300 U.S. university to participate.
• Buzz Referrals: This startup’s server creates custom referral programs based on social media.
• CookItFor.Us: A website for sharing recipes and the winner of the midVenturesLAUNCH 2010 people’s choice award, CookItFor.Us is an attempt to connect fine diners with amateur and professional chefs.
• Exchangery: The Exchangery helps create regulator and technology-friendly commodities exchanges.
• Food Genius: A mobile app that provides dish suggestions and matching coupons.
• Joystickers: This startup focuses on creating products that help people interact with their touchscreens. Its big product is “Flow,” a paintbrush for touchscreens that already has some momentum on Kickstarter.
• MapDing: This newer Chicago startup is a location-based marketplace for smartphones that allows users to set notifications for when items they’re looking for become available.
• Power2Switch: A portal and dashboard that helps people manage their energy costs, Power2Switch finds users cheaper alternatives to their current electricity supplier by analyzing billing info and other data.

For more information about Excelerate Labs 2011, visit ExcelerateLabs.com.

New Futuro, a startup in Chicago focused on the Hispanic sector, will debut a new, online social community for Latinos this summer. They are currently hard at work creating what they believe to be the only one-stop resource with bilingual, culturally-relevant information about education for Latinos. Co-founder and Chairman, Martin Castro, was named Chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in January by President Obama.

We had a chance to talk to New Futuro Co-founder and CEO, Peter Wilkins, about the company’s direction and his motivation for starting this project.

midVentures: We’ve read a bit about your plans to help get Latino students into college. Which companies or non-profits are you partnering with? Will you be partnering with colleges? Can you describe how New Futuro plans to raise the Latino college admittance rate?

Peter Wilkins: Let’s acknowledge first one undisputable fact: Latinos, regardless of background, value education as oath to a successful and happy life. We are currently partnering with more than a dozen national and community-based Latino organizations and education providers including the National Council of La Raza, InstitutodelProgreso Latino, DePaul University, the Universityof Illinois Chicago, Get Schooled, the Hispanic Alliance for Career Enhancement and the Cristo Rey Network. Members of these organizations are also members of our National Advisory Board and the Chicago Advisory Council. These partners are helping New Futuro develop the information, programs, resources and dialogue that can help Latino families get their students into college and beyond. They will also be providing us with their expertise as subject matter experts on a variety of topics such as careers, financial aid, and critical tests like the SAT, ACT and PSAT.

mV: Between 1980 and 2008, the racial/ethnic composition of the United States shifted—the White population declined from 80 percent of the total population to 66 percent; the Hispanic population increased from 6 percent of the total to 15 percent. (http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2010/2010015/) In 2008, 26 percent of Hispanic 18- to 24-year-olds were enrolled (an increase of 10 percentage points from 1980), however only 13% of Hispanic adults (aged 25 or older) had at least a Bachelor’s degree–even though they’re the largest minority, they aren’t making the grade (so to speak). Where would you like to see these numbers? In your opinion, why are Hispanics struggling to attend and graduate from college?

PW: The Latino community still lacks the access to information, resources and social capital that will help them navigate a successful path to college education. The information is most certainly out there and thanks to the Internet easily accessible, but not all of it is available in Spanish and what is available doesn’t necessarily meet the informational needs of Latino parents. At the same time, both parents and their students do not have access to the social capital –whether in the form of school counselors, Latino professionals and experts- that can assist them in the process. That is why I strongly feel that the future of America rests in our providing the Latino community the tools they need to pursue a successful college and professional career. And by “our” I not only mean New Futuro, I mean all Americans. We are all stakeholders in this matter.

mv: How are you different than LatinosinCollege.com? Do you have any plans to partner with them or do you see them as a direct competitor?

PW: I think Mariela Dabbah is awesome. She has done so much for so many Latinos. We’re a platform that LatinosinCollege.com can use to reach more Latinos.  We definitely see them as a partner.

mV: Talk a bit about your neighborhood outreach programs. Will you be engaging directly with Latino students or is it purely an online or mobile resource? Smart phones are pretty pricey.

PW: We will not only be engaging directly with Latino students and their families online and off-line but we will also provide key stakeholders the resources that will allow them to engage directly with these families. We are launching a Chicago program which consists of a series of boot camps at diverse community centers for late summer culminating with a major education summit in the fall. New Futuro will, alongside its community, education and corporate partners, provide attendees with key information on financial aid, the college planning and application process and careers as well as give them the opportunity to interact one on one with subject matter experts. We plan to expand this program to the rest of the country next year via a national mobile tour targeting some of the key Latino festivals and events.

mV: What about once Latinos graduate from college? Does New Futuro plan on helping with finding Latinos a career?

PW: We’re not a career placement services (maybe in the future). Right now, our primary focus is to inspire and motivate students to focus on meaningful careers through education attainment.

Your father was a huge influence on your passion for New Futuro. How did he guide all seven of you to graduate from college? What lessons did he teach you that you will bring to this organization?

PW: Wow! I probably could talk for hours about this one. I get pretty choked up just thinking about. I’ve done a few things in my life, but it is the men and women like my father that do the amazing stuff.  I want to help those fathers and mothers that struggle to help their kids achieve the American dream. I want to make it easier for them.  I know my dad could have used the help when he was dealing with bigotry, working multiple jobs and raising seven kids without my mom (she died when I was 10). He never, ever complained. He knew he wanted a better life for his kids. So to answer your question in a round-about-way, I bring my dad’s passion, commitment and heart to this organization, which is a pretty good place to start.

mV: If New Futuro is not a non-profit, how does it plan on bringing in revenue?

PW: As a purpose-driven for-profit business, New Futuro will generate its revenue through sponsorships and advertising opportunities with corporations and businesses. We believe New Futuro provides these corporations the opportunity to feature their Latino leaders, diversity initiatives and community programs in a positive light. They are, after all, also members of the Latino community. At the same time, these companies can feature their products and services aligned with the Latino community as well as provide them the opportunity to network with potential employees that could meet their human resources needs. With their advertising support, corporations and businesses help ensure that the services we provide Latinos and non-profits remain free.

mV: Tell us a bit about your background in business. How long has New Futuro been in the works?

PW: Prior to launching I worked with KKR Capstone (KKR’s operations group) as the President of PRIMEDIA Healthcare. There I managed to turn around the organization from record losses to record profits, building one of the premier online physician communities. In fact, the seed for how New Futuro would reach out Latinos via technology were planted there. Before PRIMEDIA, I served in senior sales and marketing roles for two technology start-ups that collectively sold for more than $2.8 billion. I conceived New Futuro in 2008 through my consulting company, The Omaxen Group, and in 2009, I teamed with Sterling Partners, a private equity firm with $4 billion under management, to incubate New Futuro. AP Capital Partners’ recent investment in our company has positioned our company for success. AP Capital will offer their tohelp guide us to rapid growth while placing an emphasis on developing strong client and employee relationships. New Futuro is a Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) and a member of the National Minority Supplier Development Council

mV: As a woman who is half Cuban, and whose father refused to teach me Spanish, I have always wanted to learn, but never had the time or resources. Will New Futuro work at all towards teaching half (or full) Latinos Spanish? Surely this will be imperative in the future.

PW: We won’t be teaching Spanish in New Futuro. But we WILL provide Latino families content in both English and Spanish.

mV: How will you approach a Cuban population compared to a Mexican population or Colombian population, for example? Each population or demographic must have different needs.

PW: First and foremost, I strongly believe that the education gap in the Latino community affects all Latinos equally regardless of nationality. Having said that, I am also aware that the Mexican-American experience is far different than the Cuban-American or even the Puerto Rican one. What makes New Futuro such a powerful cultural tool is that, first and foremost, the other user will speak about his/her own personal and cultural experience in our different social media platforms and community events, no matter where his parents and grandparents are from. I personally believe that our users will see themselves reflected in those experiences. At the same time, we will feature a section on our website called Latino Perspectives which will address some of these cultural issues in an engaging way.

Poggled — Fastest growing nightlife website in the US operating in Chicago.

Launched in June 2010, Poggled began their startup in Chicago, and planning on continued growth and just announced securing $5.6M of Series B funding led by New Enterprise Associates.

Poggled is a free social commerce service that offers exclusive discounted drink deals and party packages to users. Connecting to consumers hugely discounted drink deals and party packages to bars and nightclubs, this Series B funding will support the company’s continued growth and market-by-market rollout in the coming weeks and months.

“Poggled’s intelligent business model brings a new approach to a traditional value network…We are excited to be working with Poggled, which offers a remarkable opportunity for business owners to interact with their customers in a fresh new way.”  -Tom Grossi, Principal of New Enterprise Associates (NEA)

Poggled interface is simple.

Users can access deals online at Poggled.com, or through their iPhone app (plans for Android app) and the user receives a special code they redeem onsite.

“Poggled’s compelling business model will change how consumers and business owners approach nightlife,” said Joe Matthews, co-founder of Poggled.com. “This investment from NEA shows great support and validation for our business and enables us to accelerate toward our main objective: To establish and cultivate the social commerce category for nightlife, for customers, business owners and partners.”

Users

Poggled users save money, and with more money, you can buy more drinks.  Adding the social element as users can also post deals to their friends through Facebook and Twitter, furthering the social experience and organically expanding Poggled’s reach.  Poggled outlines their steps and check-in procedure & refund policy

Business

Poggled collects money from the consumers and send the local bar one check.    deals are during specific times, so you don’t hurt their existing business, and local bars can sustain consistent, long-term business.

Sponsors

Poggled has partnered with many Chicago bars and clubs to offer customers unique savings and social opportunities. Working closely with partners in the beverage alcohol industry, they design and execute social media marketing campaigns, tasting events and engage consumers.  Through these target marketing partnerships, Poggled is generating critical data about local demand, drive awareness and generate sales.

For more information, visit www.poggled.com.

Follow Poggled on Twitter: @PoggledChicago or Co-Founders Joe Matthews,  @josamatt & Sean Strother, @strotown

Chicago-based web startup Logolance launched its new website, Logolance.com, publicly today. Designed to combat the problems of design crowdsourcing, Logolance.com offers a new and improved tool for linking businesses with top freelance logo designers.

“Right now much of the professional design community simply doesn’t operate online, and rightfully so,” said Michael Siegler, Founder of Logolance. “The web is flooded with inexperienced designers willing to work for next-to-nothing. It’s an extremely competitive market, and it’s very difficult for legitimate designers to differentiate themselves and prove their value. But the market for quality design still exists, and now we provide a way for great companies to find talented designers and the tools to ensure the design process is successful.”

In Logolance’s hiring model, clients will use a process similar to that of many Fortune 500 companies: they’ll be able to create an RFP (Request for Proposal), review designer portfolios, and then hire several freelancers to come up with creative logo designs for their project. In contrast to the “spec-based” logo design websites made popular during the recession, Logolance builds a direct and private relationship between designers and clients; rather than working for free, designers have the power to control and negotiate their intellectual property.

“Our goal is to connect uncompromising companies with the world’s best freelance logo designers,” Siegler said. “Great designers don’t work for free. Crowdsourcing and spec-work are not going away, but now we provide a better option for successful businesses that are serious about their identity.”

Valuable market research technology plays a key role in Logolance’s process. Through the market research module, clients collect data and ask questions of stakeholders, clients, and associates, so they can make informed decisions about finalizing their design and taking it to the market.

According to a recent press release, Logolance has already “received positive early response from many within the design community,” hinting that this new networking tool is definitely on to something.

For more information on this Chicago web startup and its new site, visit Logolance.com.

Edited by Meagan Lopez