Libations on Location (LOL!) at Local 360

Lucas Schenck, Brian Gawthrop, Cathi Hatch, Ed Brennan, Supida Sanders,
Michael Roupp and Kate Holmes

Last night, a group of ZINO Society members and guests got together at Marcus Charles' Local 360 Cafe and Bar on First Avenue in Seattle for a ZINO Society Libations on Location! networking event.  It was my first visit to Local 360 and when I walked in, I realized that it is located in the old Flying Fish restaurant location.

Dr. Ben Conmy, Bernie Dochnahl,
Christine Gilbert

Cathi Hatch with Tim Narby,
:Note Bene Cellars

Karen Ducey, Mary Holmes,
Lucas Schenck

David Palmer, Carla Sanders,
Jeremy Ruby, Ricky Holm

ZINO Society plans several networking events such as this LOL! during the space of a year in addition to the eleven investment meetings and forums that occur every month except August.  These events give our investor members, our entrepreneur members (ZINOpreneurs), our sponsor/corporate members and our social members a chance to interact and connect.  It is always fun to see old friends and meet new ones at each of these events.

Ken Hatch, Randy Squires

Denny Dochnahl, Eric Blackstone

Local 360 provided delicious hors d'oeuvres including Bocorones and Soft Boiled Egg, Goat Cheese and Tapenade Crostinis, Rosti Potato with Smoked Salmon and Salmon Roe and my personal favorite, Pork Belly Rillette with Pickled Shallot.  The featured ZINO Society Wine Professional Member was Tim Narby of :Note Bene Cellars and he poured a selection of four of his wines which included his 2007 Syrah, and three Bordeaux blends; 2007 Abbinare, 2007 Miscella and 2008 Cheval du Ciel Vineyard.  Though I liked each of the wines, my two favorites were the Syrah and the Cheval du Ciel Vineyard blend which included a major component of Cabernet Sauvignon grapes.

It was a great party once again!  Thank you Marcus and Tim!

Featured ZINOpreneur of the Week: Kelly Ogilvie of Blue Marble Biomaterials

Kelly Ogilvie, Blue Marble Biomaterials

Our ZINO Society featured ZINOpreneur Member this week is Kelly Ogilvie, CEO of Blue Marble Biomaterials. Kelly presented his company at the ZINO Society Investment Roundtable Meetings in May, 2011. We asked him to share the answers to a few questions about his company.


What is your one-sentence elevator pitch? . . . Blue Marble manufactures specialty chemicals from plant material that directly replace petrochemicals from oil.

How did you come up with the idea for your company? . . . We saw the need to solve the "other oil problem," petroleum chemicals in all consumer goods. 

The word that best describes your company culture is . . . innovative.

How are you different from your competition? . . . We produce chemicals from bacteria and plants, not from petroleum. 

What is the biggest challenge you face? . . . Scaling is the biggest problem we face and being able to produce large quantities to an industry thirsty for change and sustainable solutions.
How much money have you raised to date? . . . $4MM.

If someone gave your company $3 million tomorrow, how would you use the money? . . . We would use the funds to commercialize our operation, invest in capacity, and hire key personnel to grow our business.
What is the oddest or most unusual things about your company? . . .The founders met on Craigslist.

What is one thing missing from your business? . . . A Chief Operating Officer.

Why will your company be successful? . . . We have a proven technology, and customers who want our product. We have to deliver molecules to market.

Featured Wine Professional Member: Jay DeWitt of Dumas Stations Winery

At our recent ZINO Society February Roundtable Investment Meeting, our featured winery was ZINO Society Wine Professional Member, Dumas Station Winery. Co-Owner, Jay DeWitt, was on hand to pour a selection of his current releases. I asked him a few questions about Dumas Station Winery that I would like to share with you here:


What is your position in the company? Jay DeWitt, Co-owner with Doug Harvey, winemaker and vineyard manager. I also do the dishes.

How long has your winery been in business? Our first vintage was 2003

How many total wine cases did you produce last year? 1,000 cases

What style(s) of wine do you produce? We are focused on Bordeaux, but also have made a little Syrah from time to time

What made you decide to get into the wine business? I have been involved with wine grape production for 20 years as a consultant and grower. But more importantly, I love great Cabernet Sauvignons, as does Doug. We made garage wine together prior to getting into this business.

What ratings have any of your wines received? And from which experts? Our wines have been very well received by the critics, the long list can be found on our website, http://www.dumasstation.com/. We are most pleased with the 93 point rating for our 2006 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon from The Wine Advocate; and 94 points from Wine Enthusiast for our 2006 Minnick Hills Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon.

Please list your current year wine labels.
2007 Minnick Hills Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon
2007 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon
2007 Estate Merlot
2008 Cow Catcher Red

Where can consumers purchase your wine? Several options including from our website, Pete’s in Bellevue, Esquin, Compass, West Seattle Wine Shop, and several restaurants.

What is the biggest challenge you face? The Weather. We are vineyard oriented and our farming practices are science-based and very precise. Adjusting practices to fit each year’s weather is always the toughest part. This is also the most rewarding part of the business for me personally.

What is your favorite wine to drink other than your own? I am an explorer when it comes to wine, and my item of interest changes 3 or 4 times per year. Currently I am in pursuit of big, soft, over-oaked (by today’s standards) Chardonnays. Any recommendations?

Featured ZINOpreneur of the Week: David Sypniewski of Skora Athletics, LLC

David Sypniewski

Our ZINO Society featured ZINOpreneur Member this week is David Sypniewski, Founder and CEO of Skora Athletics, LLC. David presented his company at the ZINO Society Roundtable Investment Meetings in February, 2011. We asked him to share the answers to a few questions about his company.

• What is your one-sentence elevator pitch? . . . Skora is striving to become the leader of lightweight performance footwear that helps promote injury-free running.
• How did you come up with the idea for your company? . . . The seed for Skora footwear was planted when the company founder suffered a year-long injury due to running in over-cushioned shoes.
• The word that best describes your company culture is . . . Free-thinking.
• How are you different from your competition? . . . We don't cling to doctrine new or old, or hold ideology over practicality.
• What is the biggest challenge you face? . . . The lightweight running footwear segment is red hot and Skora must enter the market as a Spring 2012 product offering.
• How much money have you raised to date? . . . $115,000
• If someone gave your company $3 million tomorrow, how would you use the money? . . . Introduce a women's running footwear line at launch; scale up marketing and enter key overseas markets.
• Why will your company be successful? . . . Company founder has been barefoot running since 2002.
  
  We have an authentic story, a strong team and retailers waiting for product. Our footwear approaches design and performance from a rational, honest and realistic understanding of a runner's real needs.

February 2011 Roundtable Meeting Programming

February 2011 Roundtable Meeting Luncheon, Bellevue

This past week, we produced two successful ZINO Society Roundtable Investment meetings on Tuesday evening at our sponsor host of the evening, Foster Pepper and Thursday lunch at Harbor Club Bellevue to showcase four entrepreneurs who were seeking capital, mentoring and referrals by presenting their businesses to ZINO Society  Elite Roundtable Members, Associate Roundtable Members and Sponsor Members.  The four  featured ZINOpreneurs included Mhairi Veolsgen of BroVO Spirits, Damien Wilson of MyTown Inc., David Sypniewski of Skora Athletics, LLC and Bill Kallman of Scayl.

Bob Toomey, ZINOpreneur Damien Wilson, Gary Wilson

At the Tuesday evening event, we also showcased keynote speaker, John Kueber, COO/Group Publisher for Tiger Oak Media, a provider of regional media including Seattle Business Magazine and over a dozen other major events, web sites, and media projects on the west coast, who shared with us some of the trends, predictions and pitfalls facing business today.  His predictions included Governor Gregoire being re-elected, Mayor McGinn being defeated, and the Huskies winning their upcoming season 8-4. 

Ken Hatch and ZINOpreneur Mhairi Voelsgen

And we also featured new ZINO Society Wine Professional Member, Jay Dewitt of Dumas Station Wines, a small, family-owned winery focused on creating Bordeaux-varietal red wines with grapes from their estate Walla Walla vineyard. One of the wines being poured was their 2006 Estate Cabernet Sauvignon which received 93 points from Robert Parker's Wine Advocate.

Featured Wine Professional Member : Freddy Arredondo of Cave B Cellars

Freddy Arredondo

At our recent ZINO Society January Roundtable Investment Meeting, our featured winery was ZINO Society Wine Professional Member, Cave B Estate Winery.  Winemaker, Freddy Arredondo, was on hand to pour a selection of his current releases.  I asked him a few questions about Cave B that I would like to share with you here:

• How long has your winery been in business?. . . Our first vintage was 2001 and our tasting room in Quincy opened in early 2004
• How many total wine cases did you produce last year?. . . A little over 5,000 cases
• What style(s) of wine do you produce?. . . We produce a wide array of varietals and wine styles from big Bordeaux reds to more esoteric varieties like Tempranillo and Barbera and even off-dry and dessert style wines.
•  What made you decide to get into the wine business?. . . I got into the wine business by way of food. I was a chef in my prior career and working with food initiated my interest in wine. The more I worked with wine pairings the more my interest began to shift to wine production.
•  What ratings have any of your wines received?. . . I currently don’t enter wines into a lot of competitions. The one wine competition that I always enter is the Seattle Wine Awards. In the most recent Seattle Wine Awards competition we did really well, earning One Double Gold, two Gold, three Silver and two Bronze medals.
•  And from which experts? . . . The experts were the judging panel for the Seattle wine awards.
•  Please list your current year wine labels. . . . We actually produce a large number of varietals. Blanc de Blanc Sparkling wine, Chardonnay, Semillon Viognier, Cabernet Franc, Syrah, Tempranillo, Sangiovese, Barbera, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec, Riesling, Semillon Ice Wine and a few others.
•  Where can consumers purchase your wine? . . . We actually have a tasting room in the Seattle area at Urban Enoteca in Georgetown. So that is the best place to go for the widest selection of our wines. We also self distribute in the Seattle area and our wines can be found in many of the QFC stores, since they staff wine stewards.  We’re also in many of the specialty wine shops and many of the finer restaurants in Seattle.
• What is the biggest challenge you face?. . . I would say that my biggest challenge is trying to maintain a personal presence on the west side of the state while keeping up all of my responsibilities in the wine cellar here in Quincy.
•  What is your favorite wine to drink other than your own?. . . This is a tough question because my favorite changes with what it is that I’m eating. I am really big into food and wine pairing. There are truly so many fantastic producers of wine in the state so it is impossible for me to name one or even just a few.

Bringin' Home the Bacon!

Kristie Lanum,, Dave Lefkow, "Bacon", Justin Esch & Cathi

Last night at the ZINO Society Roundtable meeting at the fascinating new Urban Enoteca in SoDo, Chief Dealflow Officer, Kristie Lanum, and I had the fun duty of presenting the oversized check for $50,000 to the fund winners of our recent ZINO Marketplace Investment Forum, J&D's Foods Inc.as selected by the ZINO Angel Fund Investors!  Not only were J&D's Foods co-partners, ZINOpreneurs David Lefkow and Justin Esch on hand to accept the investment award, their mascot "Bacon" was there also!  ZINO Society members and guests in attendance had no problem identifying "Bacon" since he wore a ZINO Society nametag with his name prominently displayed.

Cathi, "Bacon", Ken Hatch

"Bacon" was hotly pursued for photo ops following the business session.

You may want to refer to this additional blog posting to see more details about J&D's Foods and the interesting story of their birth and growth.

Congratulations to Dave and Justin for bringing the "Bacon" and taking the bacon home too!

Entrepreneur of the Week: Torrey Russell of Offers Network, Inc.

Our ZINO Society featured ZINOpreneur Member this week is Torrey Russell, Founder & CEO of Offers Network, Inc. Torrey presented his company at the recent ZINO Society Roundtable Investment meetings on October 19th and 20th. We asked him to share the answers to a few questions about his company.


What is your one-sentence elevator pitch? . . .  We provide solutions for Real Estate Brokers to attract and maintain agents through the use of Smartphone Real Estate Shopping services we offer at http://iznvu.com

How did you come up with the idea for your company? . . .  After working with clients in the field and providing them Internet services it became clear to us that our clients, Real Estate owners, were struggling with providing services that keeps them relevant and useful in this fast moving Internet world. Our idea was to connect the Real Estate shopping customer with the Agent and have the service provided by the Broker, the owner. In this way, Customers are wedded to Agents and they to Brokers.

The word that best describes your company culture is . . .  Open to new ideas and honor and respect all players in the supply chain from customer to service providers to our company.

How are you different from your competition? . . . We are focused on helping the owners of Real Estate offices to recruit and maintain their sales staff (Agents)

What is the biggest challenge you face? . . . Making services easy and powerful enough for Agents to use and embrace our new and game changing technology.

How much money have you raised to date? . . . $250,000 in Friends and Family and Personally invested over $350,000

If someone gave your company $3 million tomorrow, how would you use the money? . . .  To build and develop a US and Canadian Sales and implementation/support team as fast as we can roll out the service

What is the oddest or most unusual thing about your company? . . .  That it is not really about the Smartphone app. This is simply a tool to help the Broker (owner of the business) to link his business in a way to the end customer who buys a home and help to maintain and attract the players in-between (Agents).

What is one thing missing from your business? . . . Large overheads and fixed costs such as offices and warehouses. Our service is run in the crowd, we deliver nothing but data is already created in the industry and sell in on a platform the user already owns.

Why will your company be successful? . . . I have been responsible for starting or re-starting 9 computer companies, many of which are still in business. Our service on the surface appears to be something that many large organizations will create, and that may be true, few will have the history of creating value for their shareholders in the face of hundreds of competitors. We have a history of innovation and the ability to adapt faster than our competitors.

Entrepreneur of the Week: Dwight Miles of Whirly Golf

Dwight Miles of Whirly Golf

Our ZINO Society featured ZINOpreneur Member this week is Dwight Miles, President/ & General Manager of Whirly Golf Limited.   Dwight presented his company at the ZINO Society Roundtable meetings on October 19th and 20th . We asked him to share the answers to a few questions about his company.


What is your one-sentence elevator pitch? . . .  The fun short-game chipping and putting device focused on bringing kids to the game of golf through game improvement

How did you come up with the idea for your company? . . .  While talking with golf instructors, representatives with The First Tee and golf retailers, we found that kids love hitting golf balls...they love hitting the ball hard, seeing the ball in flight, but they did not like working on their short game - which is, arguably, the most important facet of their game. So we thought, how do we make chipping and putting fun and allow them to practice in their own back yard with family and friends.

The word that best describes your company culture is . . . Family

In one sentence, how are you different from your competition? . . .  By focusing on kids and partnering with kid focused charities, we have an established relationship with our target consumer and thereby established a unique and differentiated position in the marketplace.

What is the biggest challenge you face? . . .  We have successfully produced a prototype that we are testing. Our biggest challenge is raising the final capital to get us to full launch for the PGA show in January 2011.

How much money have you raised to date? . . . We have raised approximately $800K

If someone gave your company $3 million tomorrow, how would you use the money? . . .

• Make the final payment for product molds
• Finalize product packaging
• PGA Show - January
• Product samples for the show
• Product seeding for charitable partners
• Website
• Advertising and PR
• Road show to see key customers
•  Full worldwide launch
• Displays/Merchandisers for retailers

What is the oddest or most unusual thing about your company? . . . Huge worldwide potential with unique focus on captive kids audience that is expandable beyond golfers.

What is one thing missing from your business? . . .The one thing missing from our company is final funding to have product launch for the January 2011 PGA Golf Show.

Why will your company be successful? . . .We will be successful because we have a unique position in the marketplace by partnering with key charitable groups that touch 5M kids. Our leadership team has extensive experience in start-up businesses and global sales and marketing experience in consumer packaged goods. We have a business model that provides tremendous profit margin while meeting retailer target margin from inception. And lastly, we also have experience in the golf industry and have received sincere interest from the top 10 retailers buying departments.

A Culinary Feast Courtesy of Dr. Death and Fairy Godmother Princess

Bob Cremin aka "Dr. Death"

Things have been hectic since my recent blog posting about Ken's knee replacement surgery in Napa Valley a week and a half ago.  Since then I have travelled to Portland for a two day meeting and Board Retreat for Pacific Continental Bank and attended two ZINO Society Roundtable Investment Meetings earlier this week in Seattle and Bellevue.  You can see my blog postings about both of those by clicking on the links above.

 Last night was a culinary treat because friends Bob Cremin aka "Dr. Death" and Patti Payne, who Ken calls his "Fairy Godmother Princess" since she was the one that finally convinced him to have the knee surgery, came to cook dinner and spend the evening with Ken and me.  Ken is still recuperating from his surgery so we decided it would be most fun to stay home for dinner versus the challenge and hassle of going out.



Patti & Bob




Bob showed up  in his chef's jacket appropriately labeled "Dr. Death" with two grocery bags of ingredients and Patti showed up bearing her homemade, freshly baked bread along with sweet Pepper Payne, her friendly and fluffy, Papipoo. 

Both (Bob & Patti, not Pepper!) proceeded to chop and slice and saute.  The outcome was divine!  We feasted on Bob's Yukon Gold potatos au gratin with freshly grated Emmenthaler and a wonderful prawn and scallop saute with sweet onions, tomatoes, peppers, and garlic in a buttery sauce.  And we mopped up every bite of the delicious seafood saute sauce with Patti's absolutely incredible bread.

For dessert, Bob prepared Bananas Foster flambeed with brandy served over ice cream.  Yum!  Since we hadn't consumed nearly enough calories yet, I also served Brandy Ice, an adult milkshake blended with brandy, Kahlua and Creme de Cacao to accompany the Bananas Foster.

After dessert and more laughter and stimulating conversation, Ken was ready for bed, so Patti, Bob and I played a hotly contested game of Scrabble until almost midnight.  I think "smore" is a word meaning those graham crackers with melted marshmallows and chocolate bars.  Don't you agree?

Banshee Bungee stretched our minds!

One of the entrepreneurs who presented at the ZINO Society Roundtable Investment meeting this week was Kevin Veon, CEO of Banshee Bungee.  Banshee Bungee has developed a braided bungee that is used for horizontal sports to launch skateboarders, snowboarders and surfers at a 30 mile per hour speed.  See photo of Kevin and me above holding the Banshee Bungee.  The Roundtable members and guests were fascinated with his presentation and enthralled with the video he shared which you can see on their website.  Would you try this? 

ZINO Green Fund Winner - Virticus!

Last night at the ZINO Society Roundtable meeting, Joe Herbst of Virticus, was on hand to accept a giant check as the $50,000 fund winner for ZINO Green 2010!  Congratulations, Joe!

4 Entrepreneurs Featured at Recent Roundtable Meeting

This past week on Tuesday and Wednesday, ZINO Society hosted our Roundtable investment meetings at the Seattle and Bellevue Harbor Clubs respectively.  The featured dealflow presentations included iParse, Answers for Elders, Bluzinger and Smart Works.  See photo of the entrepreneurs each getting ready to answer the “burning question” that came as a result of member discussion following their presentations.  From left to right, pictured are Suzanne Perkins and Michael Carossino of Answers for Elders, Bob McCausland and Chris Beer of Bluzinger, Dan Diesso of Smart Works, and Rex Stevens of iParse.  Each company is looking for accredited investors to invest in their businesses to help them achieve their growth plans.

 iParse makes it fast, easy, and inexpensive for medium and small banks to provide mobile banking services to compete with the very large banks.

Answers for Elders is a boomers’ online community social site and portal to provide support, answers and expert resources in helping aging parents.

Bluzinger is building the first ever national location-based mobile advertising network, delivering paperless coupons to end customers.

Smart Works is bringing the “Smart Grid” inside facilities with network friendly circuit and device energy meters that improve energy intelligence.

Our “membership minute” was provided by Roundtable member, Skip Walter (top photo), and he shared tongue-in-cheek advice of 125 ways to lose money in the wine business.  Our keynote speaker was John Bookwalter, Chairman of the Washington Wine Commission and owner and Winemaker for Bookwalter Winery.  John did double duty on Tuesday evening, also pouring his wines as our featured vintner.  See photo above of John pouring wine for guest, Sandy Walsh.  He joked that we were probably expecting him to vacuum the room after the event in addition to his other two roles.  Also featured was Charles Finkel of The Pike Brewing Company pouring his excellent craft beers.

Gaming, Mortgage Banking, Online Investing & Shopping . . . Oh My!

The ZINO Society Roundtable Investment Meetings this past week showcased four excellent investment opportunities on Tuesday evening at the conference center at Davis Wright Tremaine and Wednesday at lunch at the Bellevue Harbor Club.  The brief keynote remarks were provided by Dan Greenshields of ShareBuilder.   Dan serves as President of ShareBuilder Securities Corporation and President and Chief Investment Officer of ShareBuilder Advisors LLC. Over the past 7 years, Dan has been instrumental in building ShareBuilder into the 6th largest online brokerage firm with over $2 billion in assets.  Shannon Jones of Hestia Cellars was our featured winemaker and Charles and Rose Ann Finkel, of Pike Brewing Co. were our featured beermeisters.

The four presenting entrepreneurs received a lot of investor interest following their presentations.  Pictured in the top photo above from left to right are featured entrepreneurs Stephan Roche of Kapitall, Dave Long of Exponential Entertainment, Mark Freedle of NetMore America and Ramu Ramanathan of Mobba.  

Kapitall is a new online investing platform designed to transform investing for the “Gaming Generation” with a rich application modeled on video games.

Exponential Entertainment is building HollywoodPlayer, a multi-platform online service that brings casual gaming, Hollywood content, and social networking together.

NetMore America buys the most secure and marketable mortgages in the U.S. and sells them at a profit.

Mobba is a new online marketplace that leverages social networks to form large groups of like-minded buyers.  Sellers then compete to win a big sale.

We are very happy to announce this week that our facilitated fundraising to-date has increased to $14.2 million.  I won’t be surprised to see all of these companies receive at least a portion of the angel funding they need as a result of their presentations at ZINO Society.  We take huge pride in the entrepreneurs that present through ZINO Society and hope to help each one with capital, mentoring and/or referrals.