Tommy Felts
Editor-In-Chief, Startland News
Tommy is editor-in-chief for Startland News, a Kansas City-based nonprofit newsroom that uses storytelling to elevate the region’s startup community of entrepreneurs, innovators, hustlers, creatives and risk-takers.
Under Tommy’s leadership, Startland News has expanded its coverage from a primarily high-tech, high-growth focus to a more wide-ranging and inclusive look at the faces of entrepreneurism, innovation and business.
Before joining Startland News in 2017, Tommy worked for 12 years as an award-winning newspaper journalist, designer, editor and publisher. He was named one of Editor & Publisher magazine’s top “25 Under 35” in 2014.
Recent Stories by Tommy Felts
BoysGrow teaches urban youth entrepreneurship through farming
BoysGrow, a mentoring program that teaches urban Kansas City boys entrepreneurship through hands-on agriculture, isn’t successful based on what the teens harvest, John Gordon Jr. said. It’s all about the soft skills they learn on the South Kansas City farm. “These boys are young,” said Gordon, founder of BoysGrow, noting the two-year program accepts students…
4 Techweek takeaways: KC can’t escape ‘cowtown’ (and shouldn’t try)
Kansas City shouldn’t run from its “cowtown” label, Techweek KC presenters said Wednesday. “We can celebrate agriculture, and we can also be hip and metropolitan,” said Kimberly Young, president of the KC Animal Health Corridor. Sitting aloft the rooftop deck at Travois in the Crossroads, a panel of experts gathered an audience interested in learning…
Wonder no more: Ruby Jean’s taking juice to Troost
Thirty years after Chris Goode’s grandmother helped drop him off for daycare at Operation Breakthrough on Troost Avenue, the entrepreneur is expanding the juicery that bears her name — Ruby Jean’s — to a site less than a block away. “It’s crazy how life comes full circle,” said Goode, Ruby Jean’s Juicery founder. “I’m 33 now…
With fund now slashed, LaunchKC alumni say MTC vital to early success
PopBookings probably wouldn’t be in business today without the early support — and more critically the investment dollars — of the Missouri Technology Corporation, Erika Klotz said. “It really allowed us to do more quicker,” the PopBookings co-founder and CEO said. “For any startup, speed is everything. It allowed us to get credibility right out…
Greitens eyes private investment dollars to fill MTC budget gap
A new, privately-managed innovation fund could replace a popular startup investment program that was dramatically slashed for 2018 amid Missouri’s budget crunch. The potential strategy change comes as a suggestion from the Hawthorn Foundation’s report to Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens, following the months-long work of an innovation task force charged with assessing the current state…
Prospect to prosperity: Blue Hills boosting neighborhood entrepreneurs (Video)
Economic development along Prospect Avenue requires a chain reaction across the community, Edgar Palacios said. “People need jobs to afford homes, so we need to create those jobs. We need to create some catalysts in this community,” said Palacios, Blue Hills Community Services executive director. “If we can have storefronts along Prospect, that attracts other…
On the menu: The Sundry tastes expansion with move to Plexpod
Moving The Sundry this month to Plexpod reflects the evolution and future of where people live and work, Ryan Wing said. And, of course, how they eat. A leader in Kansas City’s sustainable food movement, The Sundry plans to relocate its store from the Crossroads to a 3,300-square-foot space at Plexpod Westport Commons. It’s the…
Spanish-language business law class targets KC resource gap
¡Llamando a todos los emprendedores! Language isn’t a barrier to entrepreneurial spirit, Adrienne Haynes said, and it shouldn’t prevent Kansas Citians from finding business success just because they don’t understand the nuances of startup lingo or legal processes. “Whether you’re a black- or brown-owned company, whether you’re woman-owned, whether Spanish is your primary language, or…
With 42 KC evictions per day, civic hackers pinpoint action with data
Kansas City can be a leader on housing justice, Tara Raghuveer said. The details are in the data. Examining a Jackson County data set that included 173,720 eviction records spanning 17 years, Raghuveer, a Harvard-educated researcher and Shawnee Mission East High School graduate, confirmed a leading predictor of eviction in Kansas City: race. “It disproportionately…
Tommy Felts: How ruffled business feathers led me to Startland
My first attempt at entrepreneurship quickly ran afowl of reality. (Now before you assume the new guy at Startland doesn’t know how to spell “afoul,” please bear with me. I’ve earned my on-the-job Dad Joke credentials through hundreds of clever — some would say eye-rolling — puns that formed the character of my best headline…