Memento: From Idea to Demo Day
At the end of June, I left my full-time marketing position to embark on a new adventure, founding Memento. Jeff Borders and I were accepted into University of Chicago’s Polsky Accelerator program. A 10-week startup bootcamp that included a creative workspace, dedicated mentors and a $10K SAFE agreement to help us and twelve other teams build out their ideas.
“It’s not the same as splitting a burrito!”
Cosmopolitan, July 2019
Over the summer, we completed 50+ customer discovery interviews, hired an incredibly talented team, legally incorporated our company, developed a brand, created a financial model, built out an initial prototype and more. On September 5th, we had the opportunity to celebrate this experience at Polsky’s Demo Day. Each of the twelve teams, our friends, had five-minutes to present their companies to over 200+ attendees. It was a day filled with nervous energy and excitement.
We want to thank some important people for supporting the journey: EJ Reedy, Melissa Byrn, Crissy Ritter, Greg Bunch, Cole Johnson, Katie Spoden, Heather Harper, Sarah Fuller, Lauren Colasanti, Ashleigh Mao and Caitlyn Tien.