NeighborFavor Review

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http://www.neighbfav.com/

It’s been a few years since we featured a site that lets consumers solicit help with their weekly errands, but recently we came across one that offers a slightly different twist. Now following in the footsteps of Sherrands, RunMyErrand and DoMyStuff.com comes NeighborFavor, a site that lets college students earn cash by helping each other with their shopping.

Focusing primarily on fast food and grocery delivery, NeighborFavor lets college students see where their friends are going shopping and then request that one of them pick something up while they’re out. Along the way, they must indicate not just what they need and when they need the items, but also how much of a “tip” they’re willing to pay for that convenience. Once a neighbor has accepted the request and delivered the needed items, payments are made via PayPal and neighbors can rate each other’s performance. A 3-digit PIN is assigned to each favor to ensure that payments are made accurately as agreed.

Apps for Android and iOS are coming soon, says CBZG Studios, NeighborFavor’s Massachusetts-based maker. A concept to bring to students — or other closely affiliated consumers — in your neck of the woods?

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How Tyler Johnson Gets Millions, Builing Wilderness Trails

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http://beatenpathtrails.com/

Business Model: Providing manual labor for building trails
Who Did It: Tyler Johnson
Capital Required: $0
How Much It Makes: $3.3 million a year in revenue

Getting to see nature is not an easy task if you cannot gain access to nature. If people don't get to see nature they may never get to truly appreciate it and the role that it plays in their lives. Trails are the paths that hikers and backpackers use to gain access to nature. These trails can however only be constructed without the use of vehicles or machinery according to the law and this has presented a difficult situation to many contractors. There is however a different kind of contractor that has achieved plenty of success building and maintaining these trails.

On the Beaten Path Trail Contractors only started early this year and has already acquired around 3.3 million dollars worth of contracts for the jobs done on the trails. 17 dollars for every hour was an attractive offer to many workers at the ski-resort whenever the season wasn't good for skiing and soon enough even college students started to come in during their summer breaks. In only its first year, On the Beaten Path Trail Contractors already has 63 workers in four states including Colorado and the company is not worried about government cut backs either. According to its founder Tyler Johnson, the support from government officials for both access to nature and job creation will ensure that the contracts keep coming.

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GSMNation

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http://www.gsmnation.com/

Business Model: Selling unlocked cellphones
Who Did It: Junaid Shams and Ahmed Khattak
Capital Required: $150,000
How Much It Makes: $35 million a year

The name GSMNation is one of the most synonymous with the mobile phones. GSMNation is a well known seller of mobile phones but this is not why the website has become well known. What makes the phones that are sold by this website so special is the fact that the phones are first unlocked by the manufacturers prior to being sold. GSMNation is the brainchild of one Ahmed Khattak, a Yale student who noted during a brief stay in London that in Europe, mobile phone users would use their phones without having to take contracts with the carriers of the service. This was in stack contrast with the American population where most users buy phones that come with contracts. This is more expensive than the services that come minus the contracts and this is the pitch that GSMNation is now using and has been quite successful so far.

Surprisingly GSMNation was started with nothing more than 150 000 dollars that Khattak and his friend Junaid shams had gathered on their own and from their families. They also got support from the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute. GSMNation was officially launched in 2010, two years after the two friends had started selling the unlocked phones online. GSMNation sells a wide variety of mobile devices including the popular BlackBerrys and iPhones. Apart from individuals, the website caters to a wide array of clientèle including agencies of the government. GSMNation currently employs 12 people and has already achieved sales in excess of 50,000 phones. The unlocked phones can be used with any carrier and although most of GSMNation's are from other countries, the U.S. based customer base is expected to grow in the years to come.

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uFlavor.com

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http://uflavor.com/

Mad scientists, rejoice: An Indianapolis startup is rolling out a make-your-own-soft-drink campaign its founders hope will become the YouTube of the beverage industry.

The idea is simple, even if the execution isn’t. Customers will be able to choose the ingredients for custom-made concoctions and design their own labels, then uFlavor will make and sell the drink—to its creators and the general public, who’ll be asked to rate the finished product.

“That level of mass customization is pretty intriguing,” said Jerry McColgin, founder of Carmel-based production and design firm Insight2 Inc. “Everyone wants something that is uniquely their own. They’re onto something there.”

Brown concurred.

“It’s one of the biggest trends out there right now,” he said. “There’s no reason uFlavor can’t be in the forefront of that."

McColgin, who has no connection to uFlavor, also praised the company’s slow-but-sure rollout strategy. Rather than immediately go to market with a product that’s new to consumers, many firms have had success generating buzz first.

“You want people waiting for it, watching for it,” he said. “But ultimately, your product has to live up to the expectations you create.”

Cloran and his partners have been working on uFlavor since 2009, when he pulled the concept out of his “ideas” folder. His original brainstorm came about 10 years ago: a vending machine that could produce any drink in the world.

“It was a crazy idea, too hard to build” said Cloran, 43.

Then he met Purdue University graduates Nathan Altman and Mike Mitchell, fellow entrepreneurs who met as members of Carmel High School’s award-winning robotics team. They thought they could pull it off, and they did.

A prototype was on display Thursday at DeveloperTown, which also invested in the project, but the partners decided it made more sense to build the online marketplace—and line up additional funding—before mass-producing the machines.

Home soda-making equipment already is sold at thousands of retailers. Market leader SodaStream, for example, allows users to choose their own syrup, bottle and carbonation. The partners say uFlavor breaks down the process even further.

“We really want to open up the ‘black box’ of the flavor industry—how different acids affect the tongue, how different tastes unfold,” Cloran said.

Cinnamon gives Coca-Cola its characteristic bite, for example, while Pepsi dials up the sweetener.

uFlavor’s founders worked with FONA to get a feel for how to blend flavors, and the company’s flavor scientists helped tweak the first three drinks to get them just right.

A single custom soda sells for $9.99 on uFlavor’s website, an eight-pack is $29.99 and a 24-pack is $59.99—all with free shipping within the continental United States. Once users start designing their own flavors, the company plans to use the Threadless model and give creators a share of the proceeds.

The partners hope to return to Indianapolis in two weeks with some sales in the books, which could help them line up additional funding. They declined to disclose financial details, but Verge CEO Matt Hunckler is chronicling the trip online.

“It’s always exciting in a startup environment when people pay you,” said Altman, uFlavor’s CEO and “prime minister of choice.” Mitchell is chief technology officer and “viceroy of variety.”

The men, both 24 and partners in DeveloperTown, will be working full time on uFlavor. Cloran, the chairman and “flavor emancipator,” will devote one day a week to the startup.

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ICUC Moderation - How To Make $40,000 A Year As Professional Forum Moderator

http://icucmoderation.com/

“GO F- -K YOUR SELF A- -HOLE, You are making me hate this site!!! F-G!”

If this comment is not enough to make anyone squirm, then they should work for ICUC Moderation. Chuck Dueck, a professional online moderator for the company, eats comments like these for breakfast everyday.

And he does more than eat it straight out of the can. With the mental poise of a Zen master, Dueck carefully deletes these comments and gives the commenters a bit of scolding on the forum. He even does it through email.

It doesn’t work all the time, though. There are occasions where he had to ban the accounts of repeat offenders, all the while deleting the cusses and swears of spammers, trolls, and haters alike. This goes on for hours; and after a day of careful pruning, Dueck has temporarily managed to restore civility among the volatile users of the Internet. That is, before he gets another comment from someone intent on annihilating the human species.

Free discussion and commenting have always been one of the main reasons why a lot of people are seduced by the Internet. But freedom of expression isn’t always served with good intentions. Online discussion can be a lethal combination, a concoction of anonymity, privacy, and safety from a secluded area of the world that brings out the repulsive natures of human beings—hence, the increasing need for moderators to act as online mediators and censors in the comment boards.

Dueck is among one of the 200 comment moderators employed by ICUC Moderation, a brainchild of Keith Bilous. He started the company in 2002 as a business that broadcasted text messages onto nightclub screens. The business expanded, and a year ago, ICUC cleaned up the comments on the Twitter and Facebook pages of the Boston Globe, Starbucks, and Chevron, earning them around $10 million in revenue.

Not bad for a company who makes a living out of raging hormones, bad hair d ays, and “colorful” obscenities.

Moderators, or "mods", typically earn from $40,000 to $80,000 every year—an acceptable figure to compensate for working with the vile and the obscene. Personal threats are not uncommon, as well as extreme bigotry, racism, and pedophilia. Even Bilous is not immune to them. There are moments he feels like he needs to spend two hours in the shower because the comments can be so disgusting.

And he’s not the only one who shares this sentiment. Many of his staff feels the same way, and there are some who finds it just one BIG pain-in-the-ass. In fact, a significant number of newly-hired employees with ICUC last for only about two weeks; and so to keep them longer, the company has devised a strategy where moderators work on sites in short shifts, alternating between malicious forums to light and fun ones.

At the end of the day, however, it all comes down to the person who’s moderating the site. Commen t moderation is not just about mediation, conflict-resolution, and sensitivity, but also a unique detachment from everything and everyone. It also requires good common sense. It takes a special kind of person to do all of that—and the faint-hearted ones need not apply. Caterina Fake, co-founder of Flickr and a former community manager for numerous online comment forums sums it up in one sentence: “It’s art, not science.”

[Via - NicheGeek.com]

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Leprechaun Cider Co - How To Sell Cider In Texas

http://www.leprechauncider.com/

By the time Jake Schiffer was ready to incorporate Leprechaun Cider Co. in the spring of 2010, he had a business plan, enough funding to cover startup costs and an orchard lined up to provide the kind of apples he wanted and to handle the fermentation and bottling of the product.

All he needed was his parents' signature on the paperwork, since he was only 20.

“It's been a learning experience for all of us,” Schiffer says.

Leprechaun Golden Cider hit the Houston market in March, but only on draft. In mid-September, 22-ounce bottles of the sparkling alcoholic beverage went on sale at retail prices of $6 to $7.50 each in stores and around $9 in restaurants. It's available in San Antonio at Lüke and some liquor stores.

Next will be a drier product that Schiffer explained in a recent interview is more like the European ciders he was exposed to during travels while in high school and college. Both ciders will be available year-round; future seasonal releases could involve additions of such fruits as Fredericksburg peaches or Michigan cherries.

Leprechaun joins a U.S. cider market that, although tiny in comparison with the beer market, grew by 10 percent last year. A recent Reportlinker.com analysis attributed that to increased investment and marketing by Green Mountain Cider, the U.S. market leader, as well as growing consumer demand.

“The growth of premium regional draught cider products (many of them on tap) has mirrored the growth of craft beer, and these two segments share a somewhat similar consumer positioning,” the report said.

Schiffer said he was inspired to form a cider company while he was a student at the University of San Diego because he was dissatisfied with the ciders he found in the U.S. He approached his parents about taking the money they had set aside for him to attend graduate school and putting it into a business instead.

“I had to sell them first,” he said. “They weren't going to give me the $100,000 without a plan.”

His parents — both attorneys, although his mother has retired from corporate work to write a book — helped him refine that plan, secure the necessary licenses and purchase kegs, glassware and other items.

They also put him in contact with family acquaintances at Blue Mountain Cider Co. in Oregon. Schiffer flew up and liked what he saw at the 300-acre orchard. The company produces its own cider from handpicked cider apples, but now it makes Leprechaun under a separate contract based on recipes that Schiffer developed.

“Our cider doesn't taste like their cider,” he said.

Schiffer, who made his entrepreneurial debut while a junior at Memorial High School, selling skimboards to friends and classmates to use on flooded fields, said he decided to contract for the cider production because that would let him get a product more quickly so he could capitalize on the coming “cider wave.”

He noted that two other Texas cider companies, both based in the Austin area, have opened since Leprechaun went on sale.

Schiffer said he might one day plant an orchard and start making cider on native soil, but for now he is promoting Leprechaun's “Texas roots.”

He expects to have produced up to 11,000 gallons by year-end. Although not in the black yet, he said, Leprechaun already is generating cash that can be used to support the business.
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Sebastian Abondano And MyFunkyPlanet.Com

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http://www.myfunkyplanet.com/

What it does: Sells toys with virtual counterparts
Founder: Sebastian Abondano, 24
Website: myfunkyplanet.com
Based: Port St. Lucie, Fla.
Revenue 2010: $1.3 million
Revenue 2011 (projected): $2 million

Sebastian Abondano was fascinated by the success of Webkinz, stuffed toys that came with a corresponding online persona for kids to play with in a virtual world. In 2008, while a junior at Babson College, he started his own line of toys that bridge the physical and digital worlds. My Funky Planet sells remote-controlled cars and helicopters that come with codes to unlock virtual replicas in an online game. Targeted at boys aged 6 to 12, the toys are manufactured in China and sold through U.S. retailers such as Toys R Us, Sears, and Discovery Channel Stores. They retail for from $20 to $120 and come with virtual currency that can be used to soup up the online avatars. Though selling virtual goods is not a big source of revenue right now, Abondano expects it to grow as the user base expands and players can eventually interact with each other in a game world. Abondano says the nine-employee company has raised $400,000 in seed money and has been profitable since its first year.

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http://MrBeer.com

“Not bad. In fact, my first home brew wasn’t as good as this.”

That was Garrett Oliver, Brewmaster of Brooklyn Brewery, and what he had to say when he gave a MrBeer beer kit a try for himself. And believe us—he wasn't drunk when he said that.

Oliver described the “Mr. Beer Process” in three steps: "We sanitize, we brew, and then we bottle."

And how much did it cost him to make a 2-gallon beer?

It took him $40 for the complete kit—and a 2-gallon beer worth $.25 cents to $1, depending on the size of the bottle that’s being used.

That's not bad, considering it tastes good. Comedian Andy Dick once had a test run of the Mr. Beer as well, and all he had to say was: "That's smooth. That's probably the smoothest beer I've ever drank." And unlike those that have been shipped and exposed to outside air, Mr. Beer’s aroma is more intense because it comes straight from the plastic beer keg.

Mr. Beer has been in the business of creating the world's easiest home brewing systems and supplies since 1993. They use barley, wheat, and hops for their malts, and are brewed on their modern facility on South Island NZ. They use a complex process of cracking, heating, and separating grains and then adding in hops to produce the color, balance, and flavor that beer is known for. However, the difference is that with Mr. Beer, all the excess water is removed, and the concentrated malt extract that’s left would be canned for shipping.

Their most popular product is the Premium Edition Mr. Beer Kit, which comes with a 2-Gallon Fermenter, first batch of beer (Standard Booster Recipe with Hopped Malt extract, dry brewing yeast, and No-Rinse Cleanser), eight amber-colored bottles with caps and labels. These bottles are designed to accommodate carbonated beverages, and are FDA approved.

Other Mr. Beer products also include Cider Kits a nd Root Beer kits—and they taste good as well.

With such high-tech procedures, does it guarantee perfect beer all the time?

Not necessarily. It depends on how you brew it.

"It's a little bit sweet and needs a little bit more carbonation." Oliver observed, after tasting his first batch of beer.

But here’s where he made a teeny-tiny-itsy-bit mistake: he didn’t wait long enough for the beer to ferment.

A good way to avoid this is to let the beer sit longer than a week to reduce its sweetness. The longer it ferments, the less sweet it becomes.

As with everything else, patience really IS a virtue when it comes to brewing your own beer. According to Drew Vics, a.k.a "The Brewologist", you can have home brewed beer in two weeks, but if you want it to taste its best, then wait for four weeks—or three and a half, if you can't wait any longer.

A good solution for that "le ss head" or "less carbonation" problem so often encountered by first-time brewers is to dissolve no more than 3/8 of a cup of sugar or confectioner's corn sugar into 1 pint of hot water and then let it cool. Then divide them evenly among your bottles instead of adding each sugar in each bottle (as what the direction says). This results in better and more even carbonation.

Really, it doesn’t get any simpler than that. Vics put it succinctly: "Mr. Beer makes a good beginner home brewing kit, and it is a great kit to keep around and reuse, even for the more advanced brewer. This is a great way to get your feet wet, and learn the basics of the home brewing process."

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[Via - Offbeat News]

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TaskRabbit Review

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http://taskrabbit.com

That was the help-wanted note new mom Rachel Christenson posted a few weeks ago at online marketplace TaskRabbit Inc. Neither she nor her husband wanted the "gross" job of dealing with an overflowing compost bin, so she clicked her mouse in search of someone who would do her dirty work.

After about 11 hours and a few crazy questions like, "Are your worms nice?" Ms. Christenson, 27 years old, found a taker. Douglas Ivey, a 45-year-old research scientist, drained the "worm juice" from the bin, put back the compost, mixed in newspaper and hosed it all down. The price? $31. "That guy was bold," says Ms. Christenson, of San Francisco. "He just jumped right in."

"It was completely disgusting," says Mr. Ivey, who added, "I don't mind. Actually, I find the really gross jobs pay pretty well."

A new crop of websites and smartphone applications are allowing people to farm out chores to a growing army of temporary personal assistants. These micro-employees are taking the division of labor to once-unthinkable extremes.

One recent advertisement on TaskRabbit sought someone to play a joke on a friend who's a customer-service representative. "It's his bday today, and we need someone that will make a prank call multiple times each hour for a 4 hour time period," read the ad. "The goal is to keep him on the phone as long as possible."

Thousands of unemployed or underemployed workers have parlayed one-off job requests into part- or full-time work. The gigs are especially popular with stay-at-home moms, retirees and students. Workers choose their jobs and negotiate their own rates.

Erika Dumaine, 24, logged onto TaskRabbit this April and saw the following plea for help: "Buy me shoes ASAP. I stepped in dog poop." So Ms. Dumaine, now a full-time nanny, bought and delivered a requested new pair of navy blue Toms shoes from Nordstrom's to the poster, Guillermo Rauch. (Her payment: $17.) Aura Montano, a 21-year-old nursing student, stood on the Brooklyn Bridge holding an "I heart Anie Lewis" sign one Friday evening in August so she could attract the attention of Eric Lewis's wife and hand her flowers as she walked home from work. (She earned $19.)

Some investors see dollar signs. Zaarly Inc., an online marketplace for micro-labor and goods based in San Francisco, recently raised $14.1 million from Google Inc. investor and venture-capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Actor Ashton Kutcher and clothing designer Marc Ecko have also put in money. In October, Hewlett-Packard Chief Executive Meg Whitman joined the company's board.

After launching six months ago, Zaarly is processing more than 1,000 transactions a week for jobs that cost around $50 a pop. Chief Executive and cofounder Bo Fishback, 33, says about half the requests involve tangible goods, and the rest involve some sort of service. One of his favorites: a person who hired someone to buy a Michael Jackson-themed dog costume for a puppy.

Sometimes the situation can be dire. John Burks, a 30-year-old actor who also runs an arts organization in Chicago, accidentally dropped his keys in a sewer during a rainstorm over the summer. To replace all the keys—including ones to his home, office and Mercedes—could cost well over $100.

After Googling "lost keys down sewer" to see what tactics others had used, Mr. Burks thought he could recover his keys with a fishing rod and a magnet, but had neither. His girlfriend at the time knew someone who worked at Zaarly, so he posted the job on its site. Liz Langer, a 27-year-old neuroscience graduate student and top Zaarly "fulfiller," spotted the job and within an hour arrived with the needed tools. Fifteen minutes later, they fished the keys out of the sewer. (Price: $80.)

"It's like stranger than fiction," Mr. Burks says. "I thought there was a very small chance that anything like that can happen."

Mr. Ecko, founder of his namesake billion-dollar fashion company, posted a request for a cake resembling a can of Barq's Famous Olde Tyme Root Beer for his now seven-year-old son's birthday. His son got the cake "and I came off like a hero," he says. Mr. Kutcher, 33, who has received Hebrew lessons and cups of coffee through Zaarly, says every request he's posted—anonymously, he emphasized—has been fulfilled. "Companies like this are really tackling things like unemployment in an efficient, viable way," Mr. Kutcher says.

Some micro-laborers find a lot of little tasks can add up. Alanna Greenham, 56, was cash-strapped and unemployed in San Francisco. Then last April, while sending in her 30th job application, she came across a TaskRabbit ad.

After submitting an online application, completing a video interview and going through a Social Security number trace and a federal criminal background check, Ms. Greenham joined the San Francisco-based company's crew of about 2,000 "TaskRabbits." She does odd jobs via the service every day, aiming to clear at least $25 an hour. So far, she's completed about 250 jobs and has racked up around $1,500 a month.

Recently, Ms. Greenham drove a truckload of goods from San Francisco to a warehouse in San Bruno, Calif., where they were shipped off to the Burning Man Festival in the Nevada desert. Her cargo? A big silver tricycle, a batch of Jester clothes and a large, tent-like dwelling called a yurt. Her price? $100.

TaskRabbit won't disclose specific revenue per task, but says its average service fee is 15%, paid by the person posting the job.

Amazon Mechanical Turk, a service of Amazon.com Inc., lets people work from home, like virtual temps. Companies such as Microsoft Corp. and LinkedIn Corp. place jobs on the service, often to help them manage or categorize content, says Sharon Chiarella, vice president of Amazon Mechanical Turk.

About a year ago, Chris Berry, a special-education teacher in Granite Bay, Calif., began actively using the service, launched in 2005, in hopes of making extra money to support his wife and four children.

Mr. Berry, 39, earned more than $10,000 from tasks that paid as little as 10 cents a pop. He says he sometimes completed more than 1,000 jobs a day, ranging from writing golfing tips to doling out parenting advice.

"I don't see myself stopping any time soon," he says. "I could be on Facebook playing games or something, but this is kind of fun."

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[Via - Madconomist.com]

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