The Charleston Startup Community has an amazing new resource in town that everyone needs to check out, and it's called Launch Pad. Launch Pad is a collaborative workspace and community of entrepreneurs, creative professionals, and freelancers – all building businesses together.
Launch Pad recently hosted a Startup Grind Charleston event, bringing local entrepreneurs to hear from Founder & CEO, Chris Schultz. Chris provided lessons-learned from his entrepreneurial journey and let us in on the vision for Launch Pad. Read our highlights below, and listen to the full interview here.
Collaborating for Success
One lesson Chris has learned over the years that has directly impacted the growth of Launch Pad is to value collaboration. "[with my first company] I was clueless. There were no accelerators, Startup Grind meetups... no programs that helped people raise capital. We never raised funding and were completely bootstrapped. One lesson I learned was to value collaboration. Some people get so worked up about their competitors. I call up my competitors and ask to take them to lunch. That is what led to our acquisition: building a relationships and collaborating for success."
Chris has instilled the same value of collaboration as one of the core concepts for Launch Pad. Launch Pad isn't just coworking space, “it's a community where entrepreneurs, creatives, and others can help one another grow their business”. Chris's vision for the future of Launch Pad is to use his model of collaboration to connect communities through coworking sites across the country.
Chris is also an Angel Investor and enjoys helping entrepreneurs succeed. During the fireside chat, Chris gave some obvious yet commonly missed advice regarding raising capital. "I commonly see great potential entrepreneurs with a great business idea that they should be doing but they are focused on pitching for capital when they should be pitching customers. Just go get revenue. Revenue is the cheapest and easiest funding for your business."
Startup Grind Charleston wants to thank Chris for not only hosting our most recent event but for also providing the entrepreneurs in the audience with so many great insights and advice on the startup journey.
Join the community and find our next Startup Grind Charleston event here.
Listen to the full audio from the Chris Schultz fire-side chat.
