It has been a year since the husband-and-wife entrepreneur-philanthropist team, Curt Gridley and Tracy Hoover, launched Groover Labs to support early-stage startups here in the Midwest. Their spacious 42,000 square-foot facility located in the historic Old Town neighborhood of Wichita, Kansas, is easily accessed by anyone navigating the I-35 north-south, Midwest corridor.
Enterprising individuals working in the immersive, collaborative environment of Groover Labs (name is an amalgamation of Gridley + Hoover), would do so under the guidance of a successful team of entrepreneurs and supportive technical professionals. Among its many amenities, Groover Labs is one of very few spaces in the Midwest that can also accommodate physical product prototyping, a major challenge for founders with minimal capital.
Startups greatly benefit from a network comprised of other entrepreneurial minded individuals, subject matter experts, economic development organizations, investors, and other supportive entities. Unfortunately, many ecosystems here in the Midwest lack sufficient connectivity. Thus, these systems lack the necessary network density to sustain a startup community of the thriving kind found in other regions of the country. Though much local entrepreneurial potential exists, it is less nurtured.
Many talented individuals will, consequently, leave to further their initiatives in more dynamic startup environments elsewhere. Sadly, with their departure go important job creation and economic development opportunities. Fortunately, there are those who will return to their roots in the Midwest, drawing from their success to further stimulate startup efforts here.
Curt is one such Midwestern talent who left years ago to further his education and realize his startup dreams in the Northeast. He and Tracy met at a conference for engineers in New Mexico. They married in 1992. And in 1994, Curt founded the hardware company, Amber Wave Systems. The team sold their startup two years later to US Robotics. In the wake of their entrepreneurial success, Curt and Tracy established The Gridley Family Foundation to support endeavors that would help others also achieve. Some years later, they decided to continue this support in Kansas (Curt’s heart is in the Midwest, so he was drawn to return someday). So, in 2005, their family moved to Wichita.
Curt and Tracy realize that the Midwest is rich in often unrecognized talent. And both believe that such talent would benefit from a community and the kind of networking that leads to fortune and opportunity similar to what they themselves enjoyed while in Massachusetts. Both initiated and uninitiated entrepreneurs would be drawn to reveal themselves in such an environment, and hopefully, would also be more inclined to stay.
Having a personal understanding of what could work, Curt and Tracy decided to coordinate fulfilling this need themselves. Rather than compete for external funding that could serve other community priorities, the two assigned resources from their family’s foundation to seed this vision of a thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem in the heart of Wichita. Curt further explains, “I remember when I first started working for a startup out of college, seeing the empowering moments that happen every day. Exciting opportunities exist for people in the startup environment. Someone could advance from waiting tables one day to directing marketing the next. Most of this takes place on the back of a community of like-minded individuals.
The combination of those two things, the local excitement of being a part of a startup and the larger scope and importance of having a network, which we certainly had in Boston, works. We see pockets of activity throughout the region, pieces that are needed to create a dynamic startup ecosystem but for whatever reason, are not connecting. We felt that here we could build such presence at a facility where people could come together more, concentrate their efforts, and start working…that is the philosophy that led to Groover Labs.”
The old Printing Inc. building in downtown Wichita was remodeled to create this envisioned space, a feat that Curt and Tracy were finally able to celebrate during Groover Labs Grand Opening last January. So much promise ahead.
Then just a mere 6-weeks later, the world as we knew it shifted. The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the novel corona virus outbreak, a global pandemic.
Individuals and organizations across the world, across America, plunged into a protracted state of uncertainty, forced to rethink how they should conduct business and survive moving forward. Open coworking spaces that encourage networking, sharing of ideas, spontaneous collaboration, and camaraderie – that provide an environment of support, all of which are considered key to startup community development, are all now under siege. Physical distancing, segregated spaces, and virtual communications have become the recent norm.
We know that startup culture is not static and that the entrepreneurial minded can adapt.
So, how does Groover Labs continue its mission during this age of corona? Mug.News had an opportunity to chat with Curt and Tracy. Here is what Groover Labs’ two inspiring founders had to say.
Thoughts on the pandemic
The pandemic has us all treading water. Is it better to hang tight and wait for it to be over, or dig in and try to take it head on?
We understand what startups are going through, as we have been there, so we too feel the pain.
We can do a lot despite the pandemic. If founders or employees from companies that are de-densifying, need a safe physical space to work in, we can keep them distanced. We have a huge facility, so could have fifty people working in the building who would never see each other. We can also do stuff virtually.
For those motivated to work with us, we adapt to whichever path they pick as opposed to sticking with one grand scheme. There is no formal structure. We value making stronger connections with a company. It’s about finding that right relationship to work on a broader scale.
This pandemic is going to change the way a lot of things work. It is going to disrupt lots of industries and that provides opportunity. So, in many ways this is the chance of a lifetime to start a company and look for those opportunities and for us to potentially help. Some of the best opportunities are the sort of mundane, boring ones – where you find a solution to a real problem.
Supporting the startup community
One of our strengths is not being specialists. We have a background in doing a hardware startup and getting venture funding. We can provide a lot of resources through Groover Labs, much like an incubator but without taking any equity. We have access to angel funds and seed funds and a network of consultants.
We have held a series of meetings with founders, present and past, from the local area to get them all connected and to create a core body to build from. We are starting with the founders and then will go from there to funders and then to the larger community.
We are uniquely experienced to help people develop physical products. Groover Labs is very interested in supporting startups that are developing products that need manufacturing. We are currently working with such early-stage startups in Omaha, Nebraska and Boston, Massachusetts.
Future opportunities
We hope to be working with companies who may not have the bandwidth in their manufacturing line right now to accommodate any innovation, but who could send a small team of engineers to Groover Labs to be in residence for three to six months to work on a side project in our maker space. It would be a great way to facilitate those collisions that are important for exchanging ideas and bringing individuals across the spectrum together It is a proactive way for companies to solve their weaknesses.
We have suggested the possibility of hosting two or three college age kids who are on coop, to come work with us for three to six months on their startup. They can live cheaply here and be totally focused. They would have high level access to everything we do. We would obviously be willing to be very flexible and so we thought we could provide them an opportunity to conserve their resources and just get a ton of stuff done here even if they may not ultimately stay. Of course, we hope that they will eventually.
Reach out to Curt and Tracy to find out how Groover Labs can help you realize your startup dreams.
All we wanted to do was create a facility, where we could be more actively involved in mentoring and helping people do startups. We have taken a leap to commit our resources and our lives to Groover Labs. We are asking people to take the leap with us. ~ Curt Gridley & Tracy Hoover
