Background: Seedles started as a sidewalk stroll, evolved into a home science lab experiment, and started blooming as a Kickstarter project in April of 2014. Seedles are rainbow bright balls of seed, compost, and clay. Their mission is to inspire kids to grow one billion wildflowers to bring back the bees and ensure a sustainable food system for their future.
Challeges: Ei Ei and Chris Burley came to the SBDC after having raised over $11,000 in Kickstarter funds in order to start their company. Both with degrees and extensive horticultural background the two of them went into business in order to make a difference in the flower population in order to address the decreasing bee population. They needed a strong business plan process in order to increase sales and ramp up into a real company that offers local wild flowers that practically grow themselves.
Actions Taken: The SBDC helped them develop a solid business plan that outlined an approach to the market. In addition assistance was provided in developing an online sales strategy, manufacturing strategy, how to package the product and marketing.
Results: They are now featured on National Resource Defense Council website as well as have an article in the NYT and featured in a mini-documentary (http://youtu.be/3kydE9PW0H8). Their sales have increase by $7,000 over three months and they’ve hired two part-time workers.
