After an hour and a half of building rapport, presenting, fielding questions, and introducing our start-up, Textworks, it's time to drop the line: "Well, we hope that we have piqued your interest today, but in order to get this service to the market, we need a quick infusion of capital to get V1 in the air. As you know, we are in our friends-and-family round of financing to raise a minimum of $100,000, and, as entrepreneurs, we wouldn't be doing our job if we didn't ask you if you would like to invest. We are selling 8 percent of the company, at a $2.5 million valuation with a minimum investment of $10,000. Would you like to invest in Textworks?" That constitutes our Fridays and Saturdays.
Even as I write about this right now I can't believe how far we have come. The one thing about being a college entrepreneur is you are young, fresh, and full of ideas, but given your lack of experience you are always at a disadvantage. But, that's almost what makes this so fun and invigorating. We're always a little bit hungry, always on our toes. Nonetheless, in nine weeks we have made over 25 presentations to potential investors, raised $90,000 in seed financing with another 30 to 50 on the way, retained a lawyer for 2 percent of the company, and continue to present to venture capital firms, some of whom sat on the panel of the Boston College Venture Competition where we took second place. (I highly recommend the BCVC as a starting point if you are interested in entrepreneurship).
We have learned valuable lessons throughout this process: (1) Fund-raising is a difficult process and will take a lot longer than you think; (2) Even though some people will become very excited and say they will give you the money, never count on having that money until it is actually in the bank; (3) Some people will be very helpful and introduce you to connections, but other seemingly helpful people are of no use; (4) If someone doesn't invest, always try and get another contact out of them; (5) No appointment is wasted because you will always learn something or figure out that a part of your business plan needs more attention; (6) Networking is just as important as raising the money; (7) Don't give up if the first 15 people don't give you money. Instead, you should be happy because you are getting closer; (8) Sure, there will be some downtime, but to launch a company is to change the way one lives.
Spring Break
