Matt Bakke of Fair Share Data on Getting Paid to Make Friends
We're tellin' you, it pays to be an Innovate Arkansas firm and an ARK Challenge alum.
Ex.Pos.Ure.
Matt Bakke (right) of Bentonville's Fair Share Data (right) writes in Arkansas Money & Politics about how the spirit entrepreneurship can lead to making new friends.
A sample:
Being compensated for making friends has been a very exclusive club for a long time. It’s an arena reserved for 007 types sauntering up to a bar and striking up conversation with a mark, or beautiful models at trade shows, or corporate lobbyists. Not exactly company I ever expected to find my decidedly un-James Bond like self in.
Then Airbnb and the sharing economy exploded onto the entrepreneurial scene. The premise is that people who have an extra room in their houses can rent their unused bed out to travelers from around the world. It sounds like a simple exercise in efficiency (Person A needs a place to stay; Person B has a free room) until you start opening your home to complete strangers...
...I’ve met food truck operators on their way to Florida’s warm weather for winter, entrepreneurs hoping to hit it big by selling into Walmart, bohemian types floating their way around the country, visiting academics, and hard rock bands. We share breakfast at the table and talk about life. They tell me they didn’t know Arkansas was this beautiful, what I should do when I make it to their neck of the woods, and how thankful they are for my opening up my home.
A day of two after every stay I receive a notification from Airbnb when the rental fee is deposited in my bank account. Every time I smile to myself, remembering friends well made.
Read the full post here.
Earlier this week, we posted a link to IA client and ARK winner Spencer Jones' piece in M&P on "The Mindset of an Entrepreneur."
Good stuff from a couple of the state's up-and-coming entrepreneurs. More to come...