Latest Stories

Ryan Langton, Plant Powered Community

Fund Me, KC: Vegan founder hopes to build Plant Powered Community from KCK

Editor’s note: Startland News is continuing its “Fund Me, KC” feature to highlight area entrepreneurial efforts to accelerate businesses or projects. If you or your startup is running a crowdfunding campaign, let us know by contacting news@startlandnews.com. Today’s featured campaign is from Kansas City, Kansas-based Plant Powered Community. Your name and title with the business?…

Dominique Davison, PlanIT Impact, gigabit app

KC Digital Drive: Kansas City companies win 3 of 21 gigabit app awards so far

Two Kansas City startups each recently earned $10,000 awards through a program promoting gigabit app development in the metro. A third firm won previously. OnTimeSocial and PlanIT Impact were among 11 companies honored this spring by US Ignite, which seeks to leverage networking technologies to build stronger smart communities. In Kansas City, US Ignite and…

1 Million Cups

1 Million Cups credits its six-year run to the strength of its volunteers, entrepreneurs

After six years, the connectivity at 1 Million Cups remains as strong as the coffee, organizers said. The Kansas City-born event series is celebrating the anniversary of its first pour 9 a.m. May 2 with the program’s trademark brew — two startups delivering 10-minute pitches to an audience with the intent to educate, engage and…

Duo creates app-based audio tour exploring KC’s history of segregation

Most Kansas Citians are uninformed on the area’s segregated past, Nathaniel Bozarth said. “To be quite honest, I’m convinced that this ignorance is by design,” said Bozarth, a Kansas City ethnographer and host of the Wide Ruled podcast. “White America does not want to deal with the sins of our fathers and our own sins…

Overland Park, Kansas

KC suburb ranked among nation’s best cities for Hispanic entrepreneurs

Strong purchasing power for Hispanics in one Johnson County community helped land the suburb on a new ranking of the best cities for Hispanic entrepreneurs. Overland Park, Kansas, cracked the list’s overall top 25, according to WalletHub, a personal finance website that examined more than 180 cities across the United States. The survey pool included…

East Aster Brewing

Fund Me, KC: East Aster Brewing hopes to heal Kansas City from the soil up

Editor’s note: Startland News is continuing its “Fund Me, KC” feature to highlight area entrepreneurial efforts to accelerate businesses or projects. If you or your startup is running a crowdfunding campaign, let us know by contacting news@startlandnews.com. Today’s featured campaign from Kansas City-based East Aster Brewing, which applies lessons from microbiology and microbrewing to gardening in…

Venture for America class comes ‘together like lightning’ for Friday job fair in KC

National fellowship program Venture for America is hoping to boost regional startups with an infusion of new talent. VFA, a two-year program for recent college graduates who want to learn how to build businesses, is planning one of its four regional job fairs Friday in Kansas City. The group — which launched in Kansas City…

Firebrand Ventures

Midwest VC, area startup vet join Firebrand Ventures following $17.7M fund raise

On the heels of smashing its fundraising goal, Firebrand Ventures has added a pair of new team members. The Kansas City-based seed fund is welcoming Cincinnati venture capitalist Wendy Lea as an advisor and Kansas City startup vet Maranda Manning as fund associate, said managing director John Fein. Lea brings a wealth of investment and…

Kansas City Coworking Alliance

Kansas City Coworking Alliance named world’s best at international Coworky’s

Scoring the title of the world’s best coworking alliance is a big win for Kansas City, Melissa Saubers said. “This is just another way that we can put Kansas City on the map to show that we are the most entrepreneurial city in America,” said Saubers, president of the Kansas City Coworking Alliance. “It’s verification…

Stand with Starbucks

Fashionpreneur to KC: Stand with Starbucks — close for bias training, avoid businesses that don’t

Editor’s note: Jordan Williams, founder of Kansas City-based fashion company Keefe Cravat, wrote the following in response to a recent national news story with local implications for members of the startup community. The opinions expressed in this commentary are the author’s alone. The arrest earlier this month of two black men in a Philadelphia Starbucks…