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When 2023 Under 30 lister Bunim Laskin told me his startup Swimply raked in $25 million in revenue last year renting private pools by the hour, I couldn’t help but ask, “But how does your business survive in the winter?”
He cited a growing number of indoor pool rentals as one strategy. But more importantly, he’s diversifying. Last month, he launched pickleball and tennis court rentals, along with home basketball court rentals–thanks to more than $50 million in funding from investors including Mayfield, Norwest and GGC Ventures.
“Our slogan since day one has been, ‘Every passion needs a space.’ We do have ambitions of expanding into every space that people are passionate about, whether it’s music studios or volleyball courts or art studios,” Laskin says. “Anything that’s awesome, but owned by few and desired by many.”
He’s not the only Under 30 lister with a seemingly seasonal business. Dylan Gastel, who appeared on our 2022 Under 30 Manufacturing & Industry list, sells portable ice-skating rinks that can be assembled in an hour, without tools, on any surface—just add water. But his company, EZ ICE, unsurprisingly saw the majority of their $13 million in 2022 sales during the winter season.
In the summer, he focuses on hiring, training and improving software. And, much like Laskin, he’s looking toward creating other products in the outdoor sport and recreation space.
“[The spring and summer] are like our playoffs and Christmas and the holidays are our Stanley Cup. And the week before the playoffs, if you tried to practice and get better, you would lose in the first round,” Gastel says. “It takes preparation the whole off-season. It takes training and practicing your skills and practicing your plays, and that’s what we’re doing this time of the year.”
The 2023 Halftime Report: The Biggest, Best—And Worst (So Far)
Mid-way through 2023, Swift, Musk, Nvidia, Zelda and Johannes Vermeer are all big winners. The slasher flick Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey and Texans, laboring under a record-breaking summer scorcher, are among those who definitely are not.
On Our Radars
-Zoltar, a fortune-telling machine that seemingly uses powerful magic and mystery to deliver fortunes to its customers, is making way for Co – Star, a tech company with a new AI-powered personalized horoscope machine. The machine, located in New York City, uses birthdate information and a selected question imputed by its users to spit out original horoscopes. (New York Times)
-Although only human artists have won Grammys thus far, songs with AI elements will now be eligible to win Grammys. However, purely AI generated songs will not be considered in any category and no AI category will be added. (AP News)
-TikTok is working on a marketplace, called TikTok Shop, starting with Indonesia. The products are sold via TikTok livestream, and the Shop is expected to hit $20 billion in gross merchandise value by the end of this year. (Bloomberg)
Lister Lowdown
-For-profit coffee shop with a cause, La La Land Kind Cafe received a $20 million investment last week, which it plans to use to expand the chain. Founder and CEO Francois Reihani, who appeared on our 2021 Social Impact list, estimates his employees—all former foster children who have aged out of the system—say “I love you” roughly 2 million times a year to customers across his 11 locations in Texas and California, and with this investment, they will be saying it more.
–Augmental, a start-up that designed MouthPad^—a custom-fit, 3D-printed mouthpiece that lets users control digital devices hands-free—won the 2023 Cannes Lion Grand Prix in Innovation: Early Stage Technology category and won Silver in the Health & Wellness: Consumer Products Promotion category. The awards are given to celebrate ground-breaking ideas. Corten Singer and Tomás Vega, Augmental’s cofounders and 2023 Social Impact listers, created the invention to empower people with hand impairments to live more independently.
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