we were college kids trying stuff.
hi, richard & kevin here (co-founders at strivehouse). a couple years ago, we were two college kids at UPenn tinkering on ideas. we built an app for restaurants to digitize their menus, a social media platform for political figures, a newsletter aggregation platform, and a nonprofit to help musicians find playing opportunities. we were pretty good at building the actual ideas, but we didn't really know what to do after that. how do you get product-market fit? how do you get early users? when is the product "good enough" to show people? it was kinda like swimming in a vast ocean without a sense of direction.
we realized that we are not alone.
turns out, there are a lot of college kids tinkering. college is one of the most exciting times to build random sh*t, see if it works, and fail without consequences. and yet, we were all in the same situation - swimming in the same vast ocean without any sense of direction. and sure, there were some folks who struck gold and dropped out to pursue their ideas full-time, but 99% of college kids give up on their ideas within the first year.
why is this happening?
ideas don't fail because college kids aren't good at building. in fact, building the actual idea — whether it's an app, service, website, etc. - is usually the "easy" part. the hard part is that there is no good community to build in. there are no coaches to help you set goals for your startup. there are no similar founders who you can talk to and grow with. it's almost impossible to get outside feedback on what you're building in the early days. and there are certainly no experienced founders who have "been there done that" to give you guidance when you think all hope is lost.
maybe we can change this
what if we could build a home for college kids to work on + grow their ideas? ...that's how strivehouse was born. we are building the community that we wish we had as college kids. a community where you can set goals every month to consistently improve your idea. a community where you can meet other college founders in your shoes. a community where you get real-time feedback on the most critical aspects of your startup. and a community where you can learn from successful founders (Forbes 30u30, Money Magazine Changemakers, etc) to get some directions in the vast ocean.
our mission is to help those who are different
if you're a college founder, you probably feel slightly "different." you probably daydream about your idea when you should be paying attention in Psych 101, burn the midnight oil to code your project, miss out on traditional career fairs, etc. whatever you're doing, we wanna tell you that being different is not only accepted, but it's actually a good thing. building a startup is one of the only areas where being different is almost a necessity to succeed. strivehouse is a place for people who dare to be different and walk the road less traveled. so no matter what you're building and what "stage" you're at (idea, MVP, making money, raising capital, etc.), this is your home to build.
oh, and one more thing
strivehouse is not just another random community of founders — it's a place to get sh*t done. we will keep you accountable towards your goals, challenge your assumptions, battle-test your ideas, and set you up for success. this is the place where your idea becomes real. what are you waiting for?
strivehouse 2023