Northeast : Innovation + Job News

ChangeX, the Dublin-based, technology-driven social enterprise startup, has yet to celebrate its second birthday, but it’s already looking to conquer its first overseas market: Minnesota. To mark its international launch, ChangeX held a (local) star-studded launch gala September 12 at the Pillsbury A-Mill Artist Lofts in St. Anthony Main. The event showcased remarks from CEO Paul O’Hara, St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, Ramsey County Commissioner Toni Carter, and Ben & Jerry’s co-founder Jerry Greenfield (ice cream from Ben & Jerry’s was also on hand).
 
ChangeX is a standardized platform, or more accurately a collection of local communities, operating on the same digital architecture that puts proven social enterprise concepts in front of local stakeholders, who can choose to adopt or not adopt them at their discretion. Think of it as a bottom-up approach to philanthropy and community building — or, less charitably, Craigslist for social entrepreneurs. O’Hara wants to put 100 social change concepts to work in Minnesota within a year — an ambitious, “but hopefully possible,” goal.
 
“It’s crazy to think that barely a year ago, we were just getting started, and now we’re getting ready to launch in another country,” O’Hara said before introducing 10 potential change concepts. Among them: Men’s Sheds, an established international organization dedicated to improving social connections and quality of life for isolated men around the world; Welcoming America, an American charity built to bridge gaps in understanding between immigrants and the communities they seek to join; and Coder Dojo, an Irish initiative that makes programming languages fun and accessible for children of all ages.
 
According to O’Hara, the company’s engagement rates grew by an average of 120 percent per month over the past year, albeit from a very small baseline. That kind of growth is almost unheard of, even in the tech world.
 
Still, the company’s experienced leadership, all too cognizant of the complexities of international business, remained reticent to move beyond its country of origin too soon. It took a decisive show of support by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Ben & Jerry’s charitable arm, plus a serendipitous encounter with the person who’d become their local leader—Jen Aspengren, a seasoned nonprofit leader most recently with Ashoka United States—to change the calculus.
 
“We chose Minnesota for a combination of reasons,” said O’Hara, including “a vibrant civic society, a thriving nonprofit sector and a variety of social issues” that the ChangeX team felt its platform could tackle. The linchpin, he added, was Aspengren, who has a big task ahead of her. She’ll play a key role in what O’Hara calls ChangeX’s “humble” goal: improving the lives of 1 billion people over the next 10 years. “Improving” is defined pretty broadly here, but even so, O’Hara readily admits he “has no idea how we’re going to do it.”
 
Nevertheless, local leaders are happy to have a new social enterprise kid on the block. “So many folks out there are creating these nuggets [of ideas] that can change the world,” said Mayor Coleman, adding that “the more dysfunctional our federal and state governments get,” the harder it is to achieve real change through traditional top-down processes.
 
Fittingly, ChangeX’s Minnesota experiment will sink or swim on the strength of the state’s greatest asset: its people. “This whole thing is pointless without you all,” said O’Hara, gesturing to the gathered crowd. “So please share your ideas, join other initiatives and spread the word about ChangeX.”
 
 
 

Player’s Health, a sports medicine startup based out of COCO’s Northeast Minneapolis hub, has made quite a name for itself in the short time it’s been in Minnesota. Last week, the company earned top prize at Google Demo Day, arguably the United States’ most visible startup pitch competition. Though the award itself doesn’t have a monetary component, more than 100 Silicon Valley financiers attend Demo Day each year, and the event is widely regarded as one of the world’s best places to raise startup capital.
 
Case in point: according to the Star Tribune, more than 100 Silicon Valley-based investment firms listened to this year’s 11 pitches.
 
Though Player’s Health hasn’t raised any funding off the award yet, there’s plenty of opportunity in the weeks ahead. AOL founder and former CEO Steve Case has pledged to personally give $100,000 to any finalist that raises $1 million within 100 days of Demo Day. Player’s Health has a head start: It’s currently in the midst of its first major fundraising push, slated to continue through the spring.
 
Founded by Chicago native and former pro football player Tyrre Burks, Player’s Health uses data to make youth sports safer for kids, less worrisome for parents, and less logistically challenging for coaches and school systems. The company’s signature solution is a HIPAA-compliant platform that builds and stores complete player profiles for youth sports participants.
 
These profiles contain a stunning breadth of information: not just personal health data, but also the type of field each kid plays on, the type of equipment used, where injuries occur and more. Over the long term, Burks hopes to tap an ever-growing body of injury data to produce targeted insights about where, how and why injuries occur. School systems and non-academic sports leagues can then use those insights to mitigate injury risk and ensure injured athletes recover properly.
 
“We manage not just injury, but record proper diagnosis and when patients can come back,” Burks told the Star Tribune. He saw his promising football career cut short by injury. “We need an app that collects this info to better understand the environment and how to make it safer.”
 
Player’s Health’s platform won’t be fully operational until June, when it begins tracking player injuries as they occur. But that hasn’t stopped Player’s Health from lining up a host of clients from Minnesota and surrounding states — including Minneapolis’ Homegrown Lacrosse, a youth lacrosse league.
 

If you’re a regular on the yoga circuit, you know that most studios’ climate-control settings pay little or no mind to accepted indoor heating and cooling conventions. When you walk into your morning vinyasa class, you’re primed to expect a fetid sauna, frost-lined meat locker or something in between—or maybe, as your session progresses, all of the above.
 
Good news, perennially uncomfortable yogis. With help from 75F, an ambitious Minnesota startup that makes responsive, Internet-connected climate control solutions, two Minneapolis YogaFit studios are bringing predictability (and comfort!) back to the yoga routine.
 
The studios, in Northeast and Linden Hills, tapped 75F to remedy years of HVAC frustration. Each studio operates 24/7, with a mix of class and open studio time, and attendance varies widely from hour to hour. During cold-season peak periods, attendees’ body heat is often sufficient to heat each studio with little to no assistance from the HVAC system. When attendance is sparse, passive heating can’t keep things comfortable. The inverse (or nearly so) is true during the warm season: heavily attended sessions require nonstop AC on full blast, while unoccupied studios require little to no climate control.
 
Needless to say, the studios’ multiple non-programmable digital thermostats simply couldn’t manage this constantly shifting demand. According to a 75F case study, studio temperatures ranged anywhere from 73 to 90 degrees on a typical day. Instructors would arrive 30 to 45 minutes early to set the proper temperature for each class, and had zero control over the studios’ temperature during unoccupied periods.
 
75F’s solution was seamless and elegant: unlike typical programmable thermostats, its multi-zone thermostats integrated directly with the studios’ scheduling software, empowering instructors to set comfortable class and open studio temperatures days in advance. And the system’s detailed analytics enabled management to track temperature changes (and anomalies) in near real time. The result: more comfortable studio environments, and more relaxed instructors, around the clock.
 
“We needed a partner, and a solution, that could react to our business—not the other way around,” says Ashok Dhariwal, YogaFit’s Minneapolis franchisee. “75F delivered a customized solution based on our business needs, [implemented] it very fas  and has supported us every step of the way.”
 
75F’s smart climate control systems are also suitable for restaurants, retail outlets and offices of virtually any size. According to 75F’s website, the technology reduces customers’ heating and cooling costs by up to 40 percent.
 

Once you’ve become a limerick on “Wait Wait…Don't Tell Me,” the NPR news quiz, you’ve arrived, right?
 
On the March 12 show, Shanai Matteson and Colin Kloecker, who founded the Minneapolis-based social practice arts group Works Progress Studio, were surprised to hear host Peter Sagal and “judge and scorekeeper” Bill Kurtis source their new project, Water Bar, as one of the show’s weekly limericks. The surprising national exposure came hot on the heels of a Minnpost article about the couple’s art and environmental project that went viral, as well as other articles.
 
Why the explosion of attention? Especially because the Water Bar has already toured to several locations throughout the U.S., including Crystal Bridges Museum in Arkansas? “It’s a couple of things,” says Matteson. The Minnpost article “had a headline that was easy to share via social media and it kind of glossed over what we’re really about,” she explains. “But I also think people are really interested in water and it’s a hot topic for a number of reasons,” including climate change, drought and the water crisis in Flint, Michigan.
 
“People are remembering how important water is to our lives, communities, the places where we live,” she continues. “I also realized, looking at the articles, that water is an interesting mirror. When people hear about the project they tend to see things in it that we may not see.” The responses generated by the Minnpost article, for example, “became this mirror about anxiety related to economic development in Northeast Minneapolis--some people thought we were creating a boutique retail space selling 'artisanal' water, which is not what we're doing."
 
When the Water Bar and Public Studio, as the project is officially known, opens on Central Avenue off Lowry in April, it will be a collaborative public art project or an “art and sustainability incubator or hub,” Matteson says. “It’s a space where artists, designers, researchers and organizers can learn about water and how it touches various aspects of our lives and communities, and share work they’re doing.”
 
The studio may also show films about water, provide tap water testing, and offer space to artists and organizations that want to work through their ideas about art, water, sustainability and community with like minded people. Currently, Water Bar collaborates with the Holland Neighborhood Improvement Association, the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment, and the Healing Place Collaborative.
 
But the Water Bar also is a tasting room serving—you guessed it—water. Tap water. “We are not a business, even though we’re playing with the idea of ‘tap rooms’ since there are so many brewery tap rooms in Northeast,” Matteson says. “But we really will only have tap water. It won’t be for sale. It’s free. And we’re doing a lot more than that. We’re an art space.”
 
Matteson and Kloecker had intended on a quiet launch for the project, while they continued fundraising for the SIP (studio in progress) Fund. Now they’re planning a series of interactive events open to SIP funders first, then the general public; some pop-up Water Bars with guest bartenders; and a real opening during Art-A-Whirl in May.
 
For now, though, the Water Bar is “doing what we’ve always intended it to do,” Matteson says. “Spark conversation.”
 

Eureka Recycling, a homegrown, progressive recycling nonprofit based in Northeast Minneapolis, is upping its “zero waste” game. The company is sponsoring MSP’s first-ever Zero Waste Summit on September 18 from 12:30 pm to 6:30 pm.
 
Brave New Workshop, an all-purpose venue and gathering space in downtown Minneapolis, is hosting the event. General admission tickets are $20 for adults and $10 for students. Scholarship tickets, which include the cost of admission, two drink tickets and an admission scholarship for another attendee, are $100. Anyone who arrives by public or active transportation (bus, LRT, bike or foot) earns free admission to a future Brave New Workshop event of their choice.
 
“We want attendees to get information and thoughts from the people who really live the vision of zero waste,” says Lynn Hoffman, Eureka Recycling’s chief of community engagement and principal event organizer. “Equally important will be the time to connect and collaborate so we can take action while inspiration is still fresh in our hearts and minds.”
 
To that end, Eureka’s first-ever Zero Waste Summit features nearly 20 speakers, many of whom have close ties to MSP’s sustainability movement.
 
Amanda LaGrange works as marketing director for Tech Dump St. Paul, an innovative electronics recycling outfit that offers free, eco-friendly disposal services (to the tune of hundreds of thousands of pounds per year) and provides living-wage jobs for economically disadvantaged adults.
 
Eartha Bell is director for the soon-to-be-operational Frogtown Farm, an ambitious project that promises to be Minnesota’s largest urban farm (and one of the country’s biggest, as well).
 
Tracy Sides is director of Urban Oasis, a “sustainable food center” that offers healthy cooking education, small business training, catering with seasonal and locally sourced ingredients, and other sorely needed food services on St. Paul’s East Side.
 
These speakers and their organizations, and all the others represented at the Zero Waste Summit, live and breathe Eureka’s commitment to low-impact communities.
 
“Eureka Recycling is the only organization in Minnesota that specializes in zero waste,” says Christine Weeks, co-principal at Field Guide, a St. Paul-based boutique communications firm that caters to progressive clients. “The organization's services, programs and policy work present solutions to the social, environmental and health problems caused by wasting.”
 
“Zero waste is more than an empty garbage can,” adds Hoffman. “The way we consume accounts for almost half of the CO2 that threatens [our] healthy food, abundant resources, clean air and water, safe and reliable products, and healthy families and communities.”
 
 
 

Nordeast continues its growth boom with the addition of COCO. In June, COC) revealed the location of its fourth coworking space — 1400 Van Buren Street NE — in a century-old building that’s been almost totally remodeled and updated to meet the demands of the modern workspace.
 
COCO’s Northeast Minneapolis outpost joins locations in downtown Minneapolis and St. Paul, and Uptown Minneapolis. The Northeast location is also right around the corner from another Nordeast fixture that’s also in the midst of a growth boom: Indeed Brewery. Bauhaus BrewLabs is just across Central Avenue, too. Thirsty COCO tenants certainly won’t lack for happy hour options at their new digs.
 
COCO Northeast looks to be a bit cozier than the two downtown locations. According to the release announcing the move, the new space will feature 10 closed-door startup suites designed for two- to 14-person teams. These suites function as separate offices with all the benefits of COCO membership; rents are likely to be in-line with or lower than prevailing rents for standalone suites in Northeast.
 
COCO Northeast also has plans for six campsites, semi-open — literally tented, in some cases — workspaces designed for teams of four to eight. For “solopreneurs” and remote workers, the space will feature 14 standalone, dedicated desks arranged in a bullpen-style configuration. A mishmash of tables, benches and standing areas, all perfect for solo work in a social environment, will flesh out the main space. Off the common bullpen, COCO plans to make five meeting rooms available for meetings and group presentations. The common area is available for meetings, too, though privacy is limited.
 
Tours of the entire space are available on Fridays at 11 am. Prospective members are encouraged to register online; others should contact COCO directly for arrangements.
 
COCO’s new space has a tech-y pedigree: It’s the former home of Sport Ngin, an MSP-made software platform that provides comprehensive web publishing and management solutions for sports organizations. Sport Ngin vacated the space for larger digs a few blocks south, at the corner of Broadway Street NE and Quincy Street NE.
 
COCO’s move adds mass to an emerging tech cluster running along Central Avenue NE, from roughly 18th Avenue NE in the north to St. Anthony Main in the south — the heart of Nordeast’s startup scene. In addition to Sport Ngin, the area is already home to BuzzFeed, SmartThings and Code42, among dozens of smaller startups.
 

Visual, a Northeast Minneapolis startup run by co-founders Chuck Olsen and Taylor Carik, has an ambitious vision for “social VR,” a blend of social media, virtual reality and everyday experience. The company’s current app, an interactive social dashboard that hovers in an immersive, computer-generated 3D environment, will soon be available on two virtual reality headsets: Samsung’s Gear VR, an affordable consumer model, and Oculus’s DK2, a higher-end device ideal for gaming.
 
Visual’s app grew out of Futurekave, a far-reaching “virtual world platform” developed by Olsen and Carik. To help build it, the pair tapped Dual Reality Games, a group of talented app designers with members in MSP and Oregon. Users sync their social media profiles with the app, manipulating photos, posts, tweets and profile information using a keyboard or touchpad. Visual only works with Instagram at the moment, but other social networks are in the works.
 
Social VR’s time has come, explains Olsen. “Facebook is hiring 1,200 employees right now,” he says, “many of whom will be working on building a VR presence for the company.”
 
“But Facebook [and other tech companies like Apple] aren’t VR natives, like we are,” he adds. “That puts them at a disadvantage.”
 
As a small, lean startup, Visual is more nimble than Facebook et al. And as possibly the first independent social VR company anywhere in the country, Visual is uniquely positioned to take advantage of what Olsen and Carik believe will be a fundamental change in the public’s relationship with mobile computing and connectivity.
 
In the short term, VR is about to get a lot more accessible. Samsung is planning a big consumer push later this year for its $200 Gear VR headset, a goggled apparatus that syncs up with the Note 4 smartphone’s screen to immerse wearers in a 360-degree VR. Thus far, the Note 4 is the only piece of hardware that works with Gear VR, though (according to Olsen) that’s not as big of an obstacle as it seems.
 
“[Gear VR] is going to be under Christmas trees this year,” predicts Olsen. “If you’ve got a free phone upgrade, it’s not a huge commitment to get a Note 4 and then buy the headset.” And Samsung may tweak the Gear VR interface to work with other mobile devices, he adds.
 
Visual’s social VR app is also compatible with the DK2, a similar headset device from Oculus, the company responsible for many of the recent advances in VR interfacing.
 
In both cases, the headset experience is incredibly lifelike, with realistic sound, HD-quality video and just-barely-perceptible lag when the user moves his or her head. The big drawback, explains Olsen, is that VR is not yet interactive: You can move your head to look at different parts of the virtual environment, but you can’t reach out and manipulate your surroundings.
 
Visual’s social VR system could solve, or at least mitigate, the interactivity problem. Olsen and Carik imagine headset-wearing concert-goers using Virtual’s app to post real-time images and video with friends who aren’t at the event, or meet and engage with other social VR users who are present. While users wouldn’t actually be able to manipulate the performers or anything else about the environment, they’d be able to process and share it socially.
 
Olsen, Carik and the Dual Reality Games crew aren’t placing all their eggs in the headset basket, of course. Longer-term, they’re interested in the concept of augmented reality: a virtual, Internet-connected field of vision overlay, like a much more advanced version of Google Glass. They see Visual as a “hardware agnostic” app that can handle the social element of augmented reality, which some technology experts believe is the future of mobile Internet — the post-smartphone world.
 
“Imagine having your social dashboard in the corner of your living room, waiting for you to engage with it,” says Olsen. “That could really be powerful.”
 

A novel partnership between several local craft breweries and the students in a College of Design class at the University of Minnesota produced innovative tap-handle designs, and laid the groundwork for future collaborations between creative students and the Twin Cities’ booming beer industry. Sarah Sheber, a fabric developer at Target, taught the Product Form and Model Making class. Her intention was to give students a window into the workings of the small, creative businesses reshaping the Twin Cities’ economy.
 
“I pursued smaller [breweries] purposefully,” she says. “I wanted students to have a chance to learn as much about [the breweries’] brands as they could, to see as much of the business as possible and understand the different roles that go into producing local brews. With a large company [like Target], individuals own a small piece of the process. With small companies, each member of the team needs to be flexible, to know the business and the brand, and be able to wear a lot of hats.” 
 
Fair State Brewing Cooperative in Northeast Minneapolis participated in the project. So did Mighty Axe Hops, which produces high-quality, locally grown hops for brewers in Minneapolis, St. Paul and elsewhere; and Excelsior Brewing, a suburban taproom and brewery.
 
Students produced multiple tap-handle designs for each business, some attempting improvements on existing designs and others completely reimagining the brands’ ethos. Breweries had the option to purchase finalized tap handles, which otherwise remain student property.
 
The collaboration had two overarching goals. First, Sheber wanted to students to experience the creative freedom and creative expression that inform commercial design projects. “The idea was to act like a client, providing support and feedback as students worked through each design,” says Matt Hauck, Fair State’s director of operations.
 
Not every design was practical. One student incorporated powerful rare earth magnets into a prototype, recalls Fair State CEO Evan Sallee, making it impossible to detach and move. “There was a lot of trial and error,” says Sallee, “but it was great to be engaged with talented students who are passionate about design.”
 
Some designs eventually solved problems of which Hauck and Sallee weren’t even aware. “The students we worked with put a lot of thought into the ergonomics of their final designs, something we’d never even considered,” says Sallee.
 
Sheber and her students unveiled the final tap-handle designs during a December 16 happy hour fueled, naturally, by free beer from Fair State and Excelsior. Sheber is already planning to bring back the collaboration for next year’s class, possibly with new brewery partners.
 
“We’ve had interest from brewers of all scales,” says Sheber, some of whom urgently need updated branding.
 
At Fair State, Sallee and Hauck may take a pass on using any of last semester’s designs. But they’re open to future collaborations that keep their branding fresh and distinctive.
 
The local craft beer community is largely chummy and supportive of new entrants, says Sallee. “But positioning among other breweries’ tap handles at bars is still important,” he notes. “You want your design to stand out in the right way.”
 

You no longer need to bike to the boutique to find the latest in Twin Cities fashion. With HOTROCITY, a Minneapolis-based e-shop run by model, blogger, event promoter and fashion guru John-Mark, you can shop for local designs in the comfort of your living room. Still, you may want to pedal over to Public Functionary on Friday (October 17), where HOTROCITY will be featured during an open-admission launch party.
 
HOTROCITY launched at the beginning of October, drawing inspiration from (among many others) local artist Jesse Draxler, “the exquisite personal style” of Twin Cities’ fashionista Sarah Edwards and the collaborative fashion blog MPLSTYLE, which John-Mark ran with locals Drew Krason and Savanna Ruedy.
 
HOTROCITY specializes in such items as pendants, bracelets, earrings and bags, made right here in the Twin Cities. Featured local designers include East Fourth Street, Silver Cocoon and Objects & Subjects. Some items are instantly memorable, like Silver Cocoon’s “Moon Rabbit Rice Pack Draw String” and Objects & Subjects’ “Bullet Bracelet” (yes, those are shell casings).
 
“At HOTROCITY, we have a very unique relationship with each individual designer,” says John-Mark. “It's been so much fun getting to know [them all]. We're pretty flexible with our designers and do our best to accommodate wherever they're at in their own journey as artists and business people.”
 
Though the focus is on local artists, HOTROCITY also curates designs from creatives in L.A., Chicago, Seoul and Shanghai. And John-Mark is always on the hunt for new looks, wherever they’re found.
 
“We have an intensive checklist of standards to ensure that we're providing our customers with high quality product, manufactured with care,” he says. To keep things fresh, he adds, HOTROCITY will add to its lineup on a monthly basis and “do an aggressive turnover of store product bi-annually.”
 
HOTROCITY launched after a year of “brainstorming how I could foster a greater impact on the local design community that extended beyond blogging,” says John-Mark. He paired with Irv Briscoe of VON91, a web design agency based in downtown Minneapolis, to craft an arresting website and e-commerce platform: “something notorious,” according to the website.
 
John-Mark expects the “relentless creativity” of the Twin Cities to seal HOTROCITY’s success. The region isn’t known as a fashion hub, but there’s enough inspiration here to support a locally focused fashion boutique.
 
“This is an easy job when I see all the talent we have in the local design community,” he says. “Starting a business can be scary, but I've seen enough positive growth in our design community to be confident in the sustainability of HOTROCITY.”
 
John-Mark is a big fan of the buy-local concept, too. “Most women make the pilgrimage to Uptown, the Mall of America or the Internet to buy clothing or accessories at least once a year, if not more,” he says. “Wouldn't it be great if that shopping also supported local artists?”
 

The third edition of Spinning Stories, a bi-monthly “place-based storytelling series” that transports cyclists to its stories’ settings, takes place Saturday, September 27. Departing from Northeast Minneapolis’ Recovery Bike Shop at noon, the free and open-to-the-public event features three yarns from three notable Twin Cities storytellers: Amy Salloway, Javier Morillo-Alicea and Heidi Arneson.
 
According to a release from Spinning Stories, the event covers up to 15 miles at a languid “muppet pace,” says organizer Brian Fanelli. “We’re only as fast as the slowest rider.”
 
The three storytellers all have deep connections and street cred in the Twin Cities. Salloway is the founder of Rock Star Storytellers and Awkward Moments Productions, among other groups, and has previously won the SlamMN! and Moth slam events. Morillo-Alicea, who is president of the Service Employees International Union’s Local 26 by day, has won two Moth awards. Arneson produces one-woman plays that explore life in the Upper Midwest, and has garnered recognition from TC Daily Planet and members of the local comedy and storytelling communities.
 
Fanelli is keeping the subject matter of the stories close to the vest, but he will say that one features a particular parking space on University Avenue—a seemingly mundane setting for performance art. “It all comes back to this parking space,” he says. “Stories happen everywhere, even in the negative space of a parking lot.”
 
Previous editions of Spinning Stores have attracted about 40 people. The initiative got a big boost in July, with its participation in the city-wide, week-long Pedalopolis event.
 
Ongoing support from Recovery Bike Shop and Re-Cycle (Fanelli jointly serves as Community Involvement Coordinator) has been “hugely helpful” as well. He credits both shops’ broad customer base— “beginner cyclists, veteran cyclists and everyone in between, including storytellers who don’t think of themselves as bikers at all”—with attracting diverse participants to Spinning Stories.
 
He notes that “bike shops supporting the arts is becoming a thing,” citing this year’s Artcrank series and ongoing exhibitions at One on One Bicycle Studio in the North Loop.
 
Recovery and Re-Cycle have also provided mechanical support for Spinning Stories’ riders and unspecified “in-kind payments” to storytellers, says Fanelli, and will do so for this event as well. “Their support means I'm able to put more time into the project than I might otherwise be able to.”
 
Fanelli also credits participating storytellers with generating enthusiasm for Spinning Stories. “The community of storytellers in the Twin Cities is this beautiful, thriving ball of energy,” says Fanelli, “and it's really a wonderful thing to be so welcomed by that community.”
 
For all three events, he has engaged with “local storytelling producers” to find stories (and tellers). Salloway has been “overwhelmingly helpful with connecting to other storytellers,” says Fanelli. Previous Spinning Stories storytellers have included local luminaries like Paul Canada Nemeth, Taylor Tower and Tristan Jimerson.
 
Saturday’s edition will likely be the last outdoor Spinning Stories event of the year, but Fanelli is slated to teach a month-long storytelling unit in an ESL classroom at Roosevelt High School this winter. “No one is doing anything like this,” he says, “and I'm incredibly excited to bring story arts into the Minneapolis Public Schools.”
 
Outdoor rides will begin again in the spring, though Fanelli hasn’t yet set any dates. He does plan to incorporate the “youth voices” from his stint at Roosevelt into next year’s programming, though.
 

Local musicians who value realistic, earthy sound quality have a local source for their equipment: Northeast Minneapolis-based Northeast Cable Company (NECC).

Founded in 2012, the company designs and handcrafts reference cables for instruments, microphones and amplifiers. Its wares can be used in live and studio settings. According to Jake Gilbertson, NECC’s operations manager and an engineer by training, the cables are designed for musicians who need “unique, durable, and flexible” cables that won’t wear out with regular use.

Unlike many larger companies, NECC focuses exclusively on these cables – it doesn’t manufacture accessories or other equipment. NECC takes a bespoke approach to its products, creating each order to customer specifications and executing a thorough inspection—“by a real human”—before shipment. Additionally, the XLR (microphone) cable is made to avoid tangling and the patch cable made rigid for stability.

Reliability is a key objective. Larger manufacturers take a quantity over quality approach to cable manufacturing, forcing musicians to go through cables faster and make needless replacement purchases. By outlasting their inferior counterparts, NECC’s cables significantly reduce a major expense for prolific musicians.

Even patch cables, which are notorious throughout the industry for their tendency to wear out, get this treatment. Gilbertson and his colleagues took the “time to figure out what would make these cables last forever,” according to NECC’s website, and developed “the most durable and reliable patch cable on the market.” Despite a higher manufacturing cost, musicians reap long-term benefits because they don’t have to buy replacements as frequently.

Sound quality is also essential. NECC’s cables are designed to minimize feedback and interference, creating a studio-quality listening experience even in sub-optimal settings. All of NECC’s products include features that make this possible, including double-Reussen shielding (which clarifies sound by allowing the cable to lie flat on the stage or floor) and a proprietary ULTRA-FLEX cord jacket that minimizes crimping when the cable is moved, stretched or wound back on itself. The cables’ contacts are gold, a superior material for the purpose.

NECC cables also aim to create a sound that’s as natural and “clean” as can be. “All of the properties of sound are tied up in each cable’s copper strands,” says Gilbertson. “By manipulating the individual strands, you can change how your instrument performs.” Whereas many cable companies sell sound- and even genre-specific cables—rock, acoustic, and so on—NECC’s products can be used by musicians of all stripes.  

And they are. Though still small, NECC already has a nascent, global dealer network, with outposts in Bend, Oregon; New York City; Brantford, Ontario; and even Japan. Up-and-coming musicians from Minnesota, Tennessee and California are regular customers. Twin Cities residents can find its stock cables at Twin Town Guitar in Uptown, American Guitar Boutique in Plymouth, and Lavonne Music in Savage, or order custom cables directly through the company’s website.

FOCI Minnesota Glass Center for the Arts based in Northeast Minneapolis, the state’s only nonprofit glassworking nonprofit, has launched an ambitious crowdfunding initiative to fund the purchase of a new “mobile hot shop.”

The project aims to raise $50,000 to fund the purchase and retrofitting of a vehicle that will carry a fully functional glass studio to schools, community centers and special events around the Twin Cities. Individual donations for this “mobile teaching facility on wheels” are tax deductible and can be made through FOCI’s Go Fund Me page.

In the past, FOCI has done mobile glassworking demonstrations at the St. Cloud State Lemonade Festival and the Swedish American Institute. According to Bryan Ethier, FOCI’s board chairman, the new shop would be a closed trailer with several benches to accommodate glassworkers and an open design to accommodate crowds of spectators.

The mobile hot shop would replace a smaller, less user-friendly mobile shop that contained a single furnace and “glory hole” for reheating glass. Outside spectators had to stand around it or use seating provided by the demonstration venue.

Ethier expects the initiative to enhance FOCI's visibility and reach. The organization’s old State Fair headquarters was demolished to make room for the Heritage Square project. FOCI’s now-defunct satellite shop at the Renaissance Festival formerly anchored its outstate presence.

“The only way we can provide demonstrations now is with a mobile studio,” says Ethier. FOCI’s 120 members, who are proficient in the art of glassworking, typically monopolize the company’s main location.

The new mobile shop will also solve accessibility challenges at FOCI’s headquarters. “We’re located on the basement level of a building with a non-functioning elevator,” says Ethier, making handicapped accessibility impossible.

The organization’s location in an industrial area of Northeast isn’t convenient for visitors without cars, so the shop will facilitate demonstrations in more transit-friendly locales. Eventually, FOCI would also visit suburban and rural schools whose students can’t afford to travel to Minneapolis.  

Michael Boyd, FOCI’s artistic director, started Foci as a private studio in 2004 and converted the organization to nonprofit status in 2010. Foci now provides educational services for students and glassworking novices of all ages. It also rents space and supplies to its member artists. In addition to the mobile hot shop, FOCI plans on opening a new studio space at the State Fairgrounds’ West End Market project.

Indeed Brewing Company, Northeast Minneapolis’ biggest craft brewery by volume, is partnering with J.J. Taylor Distributing Company—also based in Northeast—to expand its distribution footprint across Minnesota. The partnership, which officially began on May 1, will see Indeed enter or expand in southern Minnesota markets like Rochester, Owatonna/Faribault and Mankato.

According to Indeed marketing director and co-founder Rachel Anderson, Indeed will be available in virtually every major Minnesota market by the end of the year.

The J.J. Taylor partnership represents the last big link in Indeed’s in-state distribution chain. Dahlheimer Distributing already sells Indeed beer in east-central Minnesota, and D & D Beer Company handles distribution for points north of St. Cloud. Indeed also self-distributes in Duluth and Hudson, Wisconsin, the only out-of-state market currently served, and has no plans to stop. According to Anderson, the company envisions a hub-and-spoke network that penetrates deep into Minnesota’s vast rural hinterland, with self-distribution representing a key strategy for ensuring coverage.

Indeed’s partnership with J.J. Taylor, and two recent expansion initiatives, are born out of necessity. Indeed has roughly doubled its production capacity during the past year, from 6,000 barrels to between 11,000 and 12,000 barrels, and it’s still not at capacity.

“We could make more,” says Anderson, “but we’re trying to grow responsibly.” The brewery just finished adding production capacity, in January, and plans to expand its capabilities again this summer, with the installation of a new fermenter.

As appetite for craft beer grows among suburban and rural drinkers, Indeed expects to utilize this spare capacity. “There’s still a lot of growth left in the state,” especially in smaller markets that are just getting their first taste of Indeed’s products, says Anderson. “We’re not yet at the point where we don’t have enough beer, but we do need to build volume in those territories.”

Indeed is currently Minnesota’s 5th or 6th biggest brewery, behind Summit, Surly, Fulton and Lift Bridge. Long-term, the company is interested in developing out-of-state distribution partnerships that could raise the company’s regional profile, but no concrete plans or timetables exist yet. For now, Indeed is focusing on filling in the gaps in its footprint and further boosting business at its already bustling taproom, which is open Thursday through Saturday and is “busy all the time,” says Anderson.

 

Got big plans for April 26? Lu Lippold, the local producer for One Day on Earth’s “One Day in the Twin Cities,” has a suggestion: Grab whatever video recording device you can—cameraphones included—and record the audio-visual pulse of your neighborhood.

On the final Saturday of April, the Twin Cities and 10 other U.S. metros will host the fourth installment of One Day on Earth’s celebration of film, culture, and all-around placemaking. Founded by Los Angeles-based film producers Kyle Ruddick and Brandon Litman, One Day on Earth (ODOE) has a “goal of creating a unique worldwide media event where thousands of participants would simultaneously film over a 24-hour period,” according to its website.

The first event took place on October 10, 2010 (10-10-10); 11-11-11 and 12-12-12 followed. ODOE skipped 2013, but its organizers weren’t about to wait until 2101 for their next shot. Instead, they selected a spring Saturday—both to accommodate amateur filmmakers with 9-to-5 jobs, and to give participants in the Northern Hemisphere longer daylight hours to work with—for a bigger, bolder, slightly revamped version of the event.

For the first time, participants get 10 questions to inspire their creativity and guide their storytelling, from “What is the best thing happening in your city today?” to “Who is your city not serving?” The goal is to create a multi-frame snapshot of “cities in progress,” one that doesn’t simply answer the who-what-where of the places it covers.

As One Day in the Twin Cities’ point person, Lippold supervises local filmmakers and pitched the project to dozens of partner organizations, including the Science Museum of Minnesota and Springboard for the Arts to visual media companies like Cinequipt and Vimeo. (The McKnight Foundation and the Central Corridor Funders Collaborative are the largest local sponsors.)

The upside? “[The event] is a great way to shine a light on all the hard work that our nonprofit community does,” says Lippold.

Lippold also works with a handful of local ambassadors, some of whom enjoy national acclaim. These include noted cinematographer Jeff Stonehouse, veteran documentarian Matt Ehling, and community-focused filmmaker D.A. Bullock. They’ll be contributing their talents—and stature—to One Day in the Twin Cities’ promotion and execution.

One Day in the Twin Cities could be seen well beyond Minneapolis and Saint Paul. Along with their counterparts from other participating cities, local filmmakers may see their work incorporated into a condensed, three-part series that Litman and Lichtbau will market to PBS affiliates around the country. No word on whether TPT will air the special, but TPT Rewire has agreed to publicize the event in the coming weeks.

The real stars of One Day in the Twin Cities, though, are its filmmakers. Even if you’ve never filmed anything in your life, says Lippold, you can contribute meaningful work. Thanks to an interactive map feature on ODOE’s main site, the work will visible to anyone who visits.

“If I were just starting out in video, I would see this as a huge opportunity,” says Lippold. Since all contributions are credited by name and location, each participant “instantly becomes a documentary filmmaker,” she adds.

Source: Lu Lippold
Writer: Brian Martucci

Lyft, a San Francisco-based ridesharing company that has expanded into nearly two dozen U.S. cities over the past 12 months, kicked off its Minneapolis-Saint Paul service last week with a stylish launch party at Northeast Minneapolis’ Public Functionary. Guests mingled to beats from DJ Sarah White and quaffed free brews from Indeed Brewing Company. Glam Doll Donuts and Maya Cuisine catered.

The beats and brews weren’t the only free items on display at PF. Lyft used the event to showcase its Lyft Pioneer program, which offers two weeks’ worth of complimentary rides—up to a $25-per-ride limit—for Twin Cities residents who download its app.

Lyft bills itself as “your new best friend with a car.” That’s actually pretty accurate: The company works with freelance drivers who use their own cars to move riders, who “hail” rides using Lyft’s mobile app, around a pre-determined service area. It’s basically a taxi service without a car barn, human dispatcher, or official licensing system.

This last bit has gotten Lyft in hot water with some local governments, including Minneapolis’. Officials fret that Lyft circumvents restrictions against unlicensed, “for hire” taxicabs. Lyft counters that it carries liability insurance worth $1 million per driver, far exceeding that of many taxi companies. For now, riders shouldn’t worry too much about the service’s legality—any liability falls on the shoulders of the company itself, not its users. And Lyft’s proponents contend that the progressive, even revolutionary potential of an on-demand ride-for-hire app is self-evident.

According to Tricia Khutoretsky, Public Functionary’s founder and executive director, such progressiveness drew the two organizations together. Khutoretsky got in touch with Nic Haggart—the point person for Lyft Twin Cities, although he’s actually based in San Francisco—through “mutual contacts,” she says, and the idea for a launch party at PF sprouted from there.

“[Haggart] thought Public Functionary would be a good fit” for the type of launch event that Lyft had already held in 20 other cities, says Khutoretsky. More so than many other galleries, Public Functionary has a diverse audience that’s heavily involved in the Twin Cities’ creative industry. Many members of the “Lyft community,” meanwhile, are hardworking creative types who either drive to make a few extra bucks or ride because they lack cars of their own.

Lyft and PF might be very different organizations, but they share a singular devotion to finding new solutions to old problems.
“We’re always thinking about how we communicate and share resources with an eye towards sustainability,” says Khutoretsky. As a company that promotes ridesharing, Lyft is nothing if not sustainable, and the launch party served as a means of “giving support for their concept, which we are totally behind.”

In return for the warm welcome and much-needed visibility, Lyft will be sponsoring PF’s next exhibition. As the organization looks for new ways to break the “stuffy” art gallery mold, it’s likely to host more mutually beneficial events of this nature.

Khutoretsky is careful to draw the distinction between this “sponsorship” model and the “space-for-hire” approach that many small galleries use to raise funds. Working with like-minded organizations is a boon, she argues, as long as it doesn’t compromise PF’s image as an accessible, progressive, occasionally subversive exhibition space that values small donors and community engagement.

“One of our resources is our space,” says Khutoretsky, “and we continuously seek ways of using it without diluting our identity.”  

Source: Tricia Khutoretsky
Writer: Brian Martucci