Last month at the Web 2.0 Expo, Tim O’Reilly, founder of O’Reilly Media, gave a sobering keynote about the vacuity of Web 2.0. After pointing out some of the most pressing issues facing our country, he chided that some of our best and brightest are working on web applications like SuperPoke and iBeer. O’Reilly went on to talk about companies that are leveraging technology to take on social and political challenges, while urging many more to ask the question of whether we’re working on the right things.

Here at Foodzie we’re working diligently to build a platform that provides every artisan food producer the opportunity to connect with their customer and make a living selling their food. 

Artisan producers and foodies need a better way to connect. There are thousands of small food producers across the country who are incredibly skilled at making their products. Their challenge, however, is marketing their product to a wide range of consumers while still maintaining control of the growth of their business. For many of these producers, selling their products through a retailer means scaling up production in order to facilitate retail distribution requirements. This is in direct conflict with the way artisan foods are produced: with extremely high-quality ingredients, in small batches, with a great deal of personal attention. Selling through a middle man also means that there is one more person between the producer of the food and its consumer, which doesn’t always allow the consumer to understand where it comes from, who makes it, and how it’s connected to the world at large.

We’re really passionate about the future of food and we hope that our impact extends beyond the web and into the lives of many independent producers and growers.

*On a side note, O’Reilly Media is organizing the 5th Annual Web 2.0 Summit. This year’s conference will focus on opportunities where the web meets the real world to solve some of our most pressing issues. Speakers include Al Gore, Lance Armstrong, Michael Pollan and many other thought leaders.

Please note: Foodzie isn’t hiring at the moment, but we want share an awesome opportunity for others to join the Boulder startup community.

100 software developers get an all expense paid trip to Boulder Colorado to interview with 20 startups. Apply here.

Okay - that was the hook. Now, let me explain it.

Even before Foodzie was accepted into TechStars, we knew that Boulder was an incredible place. At your fingertips you have some of the most majestic natural landscapes in the nation, providing you with world class rock climbing, kayaking, trail running, skiing/snow boarding, and my favorite: cycling.

After moving to Boulder we’ve seen a town with such a positive, balanced culture that it is hard to imagine a better place to live and work. Couple the backdrop I’ve just described with a fast-growing tech scene that is rich with exciting companies and you have one of the best environments for a software developer.

The innovation and collaboration within the startup community in Boulder is impressive. One of the latest examples is the Boulder Colorado Job Fair. 20 startups are banding together to fly out 100 rock-star developers, put them up for 2 nights to show them around Boulder as well interview for jobs with all 20 of the startups.

See below:

Every one of our sponsoring companies is looking for really smart developers and engineers just like you, so they’re contributing to a fund that we use to fly in up to 100 qualified candidates. We pay for your airfare, hotel and transportation. (We’ll also make sure you don’t starve while you’re here.) You’ll spend three days and two nights here in Boulder; one day will be spent checking out Boulder, another day will be spent meeting with all of the sponsoring companies, and yet another day will be spent following up with the companies you’re most interested in. In short, there is no easier (or cheaper) way to explore a really cool town, learn about a bunch of killer startups, and search for your next career change, all in one. Don’t wait to tell us about yourself.

TechCrunch weighs in.

Sometimes you come to the end of a week and wonder, how the heck did I cram it all in?? This week has been a big one for us. A quick recap.

Monday - Launched our first Foodzie “alpha” store - Seth Ellis Chocolatier. Matt Mullenweg, Founder of Wordpress happened to be visiting TechStars and was our first customer. Thanks Matt! Of course…the Foodzie blog is powered by Wordpress.

There are more pictures of our first sale on his blog. If you haven’t bought any, shame on you! But honestly, they are definitely worth a try. We are huge fans of their organic truffles.

Tuesday - More real customers. Hooray! Thanks to everyone that bought some chocolates from Seth Ellis and gave us great feedback about your experience.

Meetings with great mentors:
- Don Springer, Collective Intellect
- Jeff and Judy Herman, Fuser
- Dave Taylor, AskDaveTaylor.com

Session on Angel Funding with Howard Diamond, Tom Higley and David Hose.

Wednesday - We got started on the right foot with breakfast at The Kitchen with the Ice Box Bakery ladies (which had me craving their cookies for 3 days until I willingly gave in last night).

-Session/Field Trip to Photobucket on scaling your business
-Dinner at Frasca with Jason Mendelson (knew it would be good, but it totally exceeded all our expectations!)

Thursday - We took the advice from our first customers (yes we listen when you share!) and begin iterating on the product. These changes have been made and now our checkout process makes a little more sense.

-Chatted with Brad Feld via video chat (he’s working remotely from Homer, AK) and recruited him to be our artisan food scout in Alaska - more on his findings later!
-Session/Field Trip to Zoll Data on Bootstrapping with David Brown - very refreshing persective.

Friday - It started with a great meeting with the man behind the magic at Frasca - owner, Bobby Stuckey. He is the definition of a true foodie and is a brilliant man when it comes to food. We learned a ton.

-Met with Room 214 about some very cool potential partnerships with Foodzie
-Enjoyed a little Happy Hour of mojitos and guacamole, while meeting with one of the most passionate pork person we know, Chris Wand - who also happens to be an incredible lead mentor for us.

The weeks don’t technically “end” as an entrepreneur, in fact we are headed to the Boulder Farmers Market now to do our weekly shopping and do a video shoot with Current TV. Ahhh…the life of an entrepreneur.

We’re happy to announce that today marks the launch of our first “alpha store”! We’re honored to have Seth Ellis Chocolatier as the first artisan producer featured on Foodzie… you can check out the Seth Ellis storefront here.

You’ll notice that we’ve developed all of the core e-commerce functionality as well as the individual producer’s storefront. As we continue our development throughout the summer and into the holiday season we are going to build a marketplace, additional community features, and other ways for consumers to learn about and share the foods that they discover.

We’d love to hear your initial thoughts, so leave us some feedback in the comments!

A little while back I wrote a post about how I sent Tony, the CEO of Zappos, a direct message on Twitter looking for a little advice on customer service for Foodzie.

To my surprise, not only did Tony reply - but said he was more than happy to help. He put me in touch with Jane Judd, who manages their customer loyalty program. Jane and I had a pretty intense game of phone tag going until we finally connected Monday. We spent about an hour talking about what makes for a successful e-commerce business and killer customer service. So, in the spirit of Zappos (they are transparent and open about nearly everything with their business), I thought I would share the valuable insights Jane shared with me.

1. Build a business on repeat customers - These customers are dependable, loyal and help to grow the business. Make sure this number is consistently growing. Currently 72% of Zappos’ customers are the kind that keep on comin’ back.

2. Don’t underestimate word-of-mouth marketing online - This is no big shocker, many of us know how virally things can spread online. But Jane said most companies aren’t tapping it to it’s fullest potential. Use this to your advantage.

3. Don’t compete on price - For a long time Zappos tried coupons and promotions to drive more sales, but it only brought them one-time customers. They decided to cut out the deals and focus on offering the best selection of shoes and top-notch customer service. This strategy brought them repeat customers, which helped them to grow the business.

4. Look at customer service as an investment not an expense - This is pretty self-explanatory, but most companies don’t get it. A good chunk of the money Zappos makes goes right back into their customer loyalty program.

5. Start small and stay focused - Lot’s of companies fret about small revenues up front when they first launch and get off track trying to make that happen fast. Success isn’t always overnight, in fact it rarely is. Zappos has been in business for nearly 10 years - it took them awhile to get where they are today.

6. Be open, don’t worry about competition - Jane said Tony felt like way too many traditional retailers tried to protect their “secrets” and thus has little transparency. The culture at Zappos is just the opposite; they will share just about everything but financial statements with anyone - even their competitors. This strategy allows them to do what’s best for the customer. When a customer calls looking for shoes Zappos doesn’t carry, Zappos reps search online for other sites where they can buy the shoe and pass along the info to the customer - very cool.

7. Stay active managing company culture - Zappos’ culture is what really helps them stand apart. Culture fit is the most important thing they look for when hiring new people.

8. Be wary of so-called “experts” - Zappos spent a lot of money working with consultants to improve the business. In the end, they realized that their gut instinct was usually right and they just needed to look to themselves for the answer. Tony believes that you’re the only one that truly knows what’s right for your business.

When I think about the companies I am most loyal to (USAA, Nordstrom, Zappos, Whole Foods), I find that across the board they have won me over with exceptional customer service - ya know, the kind that was so good you have to tell someone about it. On two separate occasions this past week, I had incredible customer service at Whole Foods that I thought was worth sharing.

Example 1:

I was searching for a bottle of Tahini dressing, but couldn’t find the brand I was familiar with. A gentleman named Wilson walked up to me (noticing I looked perplexed) and asked if he could help. I told him I couldn’t find the dressing I was looking for, but grabbed a bottle that looked good and mentioned that I would try something different. Wilson replied, “Since we don’t have what you want and you’re trying something new, how about this one is on me? That way if you don’t like it, there was nothing lost.”

He slapped the Whole Foods sample label over the barcode (so the cashier knows not to make me pay for it) and said, “Once you’ve tried it, come back and let me know how you like it. That way if it’s great I can be sure to share with others.” It was a little thing, but it absolutely made my day. I ended up loving the dressing and the next time I was in the store I thanked Wilson and let him know.

Example 2:

Rob and I made a quick trip into Whole Foods to grab lunch and a few essentials. We were in between meetings and we were in a hurray to get in and out. We grabbed the shortest line (most were several people deep) and things were moving until the customer in front of us decided to pay with a check. She needed her drivers license to use the check, which was out in the car (of course…). We contemplated jumping into a different line, but they were all really long. So we stayed put hoping the lady would make it back quickly.

After about 4 minutes passed, we started getting really annoyed and antsy (remember we were in a hurray) and I could tell this was setting us up to be in a sour mood. Daniella, our cashier, must have noticed our antsyness or just felt bad and said, “Hey can I buy you a chocolate bar?” “Sorry you’ve had to wait so long”. Immediately Rob and I perked up, as she was pointing to the selection of Chocolove chocolate bars at the checkout (little did she know we both have a serious sweet tooth). We were so thrilled about the free chocolate bar (that only cost Whole Foods $2.50) that we completely forgot we had waited 8 minutes for the check lady to fetch her drivers license from the car.

In both instances I hadn’t outwardly expressed being upset with Whole Foods - but both Wilson and Daniella were keen to sense I was unsatisfied and went way beyond my expectations and provided absolutely outstanding customer service.

Rob, Nik and myself whole-heartedly believe that exceptional customer service is at the core of great companies. We look to Whole Foods and the other incredible companies I mentioned, as models for the customer service we’ll provide at Foodzie.

About a month ago, I came across a great post by Paul Graham that discussed great cities and how their culture affects the ambitions of the people within them.

Great cities attract ambitious people. You can sense it when you walk around one. In a hundred subtle ways, the city sends you a message: you could do more; you should try harder.

- New York tells you, above all: you should make more money.
- What I like about Cambridge is that the message there is: you should be smarter.
- As much as they respect brains in Silicon Valley, the message the Valley sends is: you should be more powerful.

Here in Boulder I would say that the resounding message is: you should be more healthy. It’s apparent everywhere you look; people are active, they eat healthy, and they have a keen focus on sustainability. But below the surface I think there is another message that is equally powerful among a smaller subset of Boulderites. Within the tech/startup community there is a clear sense that you should be more collaborative. The Foodzie team has been in Boulder for only a month, but already it’s clear how willing the people in this community are to help.

How much does it matter what message a city sends? Empirically, the answer seems to be: a lot. You might think that if you had enough strength of mind to do great things, you’d be able to transcend your environment. Where you live should make at most a couple percent difference. But if you look at the historical evidence, it seems to matter more than that. Most people who did great things were clumped together in a few places where that sort of thing was done at the time.

No matter how determined you are, it’s hard not to be influenced by the people around you. It’s not so much that you do whatever a city expects of you, but that you get discouraged when no one around you cares about the same things you do.

When I read this, I instantly began thinking about our transition from Greensboro, North Carolina to Boulder, Colorado. Looking back on our time in Greensboro, I can’t say that I’m entirely sure what the message was, or even that there was one. As an early-stage tech startup we felt alone, and although we closely followed and reached out to founders, bloggers, and other techie-types in San Francisco, Boulder, and New York we still felt like a silo. We realized that although we were surrounded by many great people, very few actually shared our interests or cared about the things that we were passionate about.

So here we are in Boulder, Colorado… a hotbed of natural and organic foods, and one of the the most collaborative and exciting places for a young, tech startup. There’s no way to tell what the future holds, but we think we’ve found the right place for Foodzie.

In a little over a month’s time the Foodzie team has left our corporate jobs behind, sold a car, put a house up for sale and moved from North Carolina to Colorado. As we discussed in our post, Better in Boulder, the reason behind all of this is that we were selected to participate in a program called TechStars.

Without a doubt, TechStars has helped to change the trajectory of our company. Over the past month, we’ve had the fortunate opportunity to meet and work with some of the most proven entrepreneurs and business people in the country. As a result, we’ve been able to refine the concept behind Foodzie and accelerate the development of our marketplace.

I’d like to share this video that highlights many of the great moments we’ve had here at TechStars over the past 30 days…

I also want to take this opportunity to thank the other TechStars companies for all of the energy that they contribute, the TechStars directors and mentors for the tremendous insight they provide, and Andrew Hyde for capturing many of the great moments that we’ve all shared over the past month.

Michael Lopp has been prolific over the years. In 2006, he wrote about shipping software, “Shipping a 1.0 product isn’t going to kill you, but it will try”

I took out three particularly prescient excerpts that resonate with the Foodzie team.

Process:

Process is the means by which your team communicates. Whether this is via a wiki, email, or the hallway, any team larger than one needs to define a means to share information. This is not an argument for specifications, documentation, or a whiteboard filled with do’s and don’ts. You just need to agree how you’re going to share information.

When your second engineer decides, “Yes, I’m going to capture my design decisions in a wiki”. That’s process. When your third engineer starts tracking bugs on that huge whiteboard in the meeting room, that’s process. It doesn’t have to be good, it doesn’t even have to be universally agreed upon on, it just has to be stuck in a place where every can see it.

Release:

At some point, you’re going to need to fake being done. You’re going to need to release something which barely looks like your pitch because you don’t have product until a neutral party stares at something.

Fact #4: You don’t have a company until you have a product

Product is not pitch. Pitch is the three sentence idea which gave you the credibility to hire the people. The people argued about the pitch, they created process to refine and develop the pitch, and that changed it. The pyramid wobbled hither and fro during all of this… maybe it fell completely over and you scrambled to stack those layers up again. Good job, there. You still don’t have product.”

Culture:

The hierarchy I describe is not a model for how to build a great product; it’s a picture that describes the culture of your company. That’s what you’re really building in 1.0. A lasting, interesting culture which, if you’re lucky, continues to produces great products.

Earlier this week, we had the opportunity to sit down with Brad Feld, a Director of the TechStars program and a great mentor to our company. At the tail end of our meeting, Andrew Hyde the Community Director for TechStars dropped by and posed a couple of questions to Brad about this year’s TechStars companies, and also asked us how the first three weeks have gone.

Check out the podcast, Brad Feld with Foodzie.