Connect Ann Arbor

Attention women in business. You may want to attend our NEW Monthly Inforum - Women’s Networking in Ann Arbor. The first event is this Thursday, June 26 from 4:00 - 6:00 PM at Bar Louie at Division and Liberty in Ann Arbor.

This is the first Inforum Women’s Networking group in Ann Arbor, and a new venue for meeting women in business. Come on out for a drink and some apps. There is not cost to attend, drinks are on your own. It should be a good time, and good networking as Inforum members are smart, and successful women (and some men) in business.

Tell a friend and see you on Thursday!

Derek

There is something Big coming to Ann Arbor on June 20. Startup Weekend is an event where you form a company in one weekend. You come up with the idea, you name it, your file paperwork, and you get crackin on creating something wonderful.

Startup Weekend has been huge in cities like Portland, San Francisco, Boston and LA and now it’s coming to A2.

The Ann Arbor Startup Weekend will gather 100 bright, talented people from the region to develop and launch 10-12 companies in a single marathon weekend.

Startup Weekend recruits a highly motivated group of developers, business managers, startup enthusiasts, marketing gurus, graphic artists and more to a 54 hour event that builds communities, companies and projects.

The event will be held in the lower level of Liberty Square, 510 E. Washington, Ann Arbor. Parking is available at the Liberty Square structure ($2 flat rate, free on Sunday) or at the Thompson Street structure (80¢ an hour, free on Sunday).

The event runs Friday, June 20 from 6 to 11 p.m., Saturday, June 21 from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m., and Sunday, June 22 from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m.

This isn’t a series of classes or speakers, it’s a bunch of people rolling up their sleeves and creating companies with the help of a facilitator.
Here’s an excerpt from the Startup Weekend Page on 10 Reasons to Attend Startup Weekend:

1. Be a part of your local tech community, help build it and connect people.

2. What did you do last weekend? Experience an amazing energy, it could change your life.

3. Meet brilliant, amazing, motivated people. Find people that you know can work hard, finish projects and work well with an unknown landscape. Find a cofounder.

4. Be a part of something bigger, get excited.

5. When is the last time you had a challenge such as launching a company in 54 hours with 100 or so strangers? When is the last time you saw your company on the front page?

6. Grow as a person and as a professional, see different parts of a company, feel free to join different groups and learn by doing.

7. Learn a ton.

8. Crazy idea + brilliant people + passion + drive + talent = (you have to come to see). It might just be what your city needs.

9. Get some cool swag.

10. Over 1000 have had an amazing experience. You can read about some feedback here.

For more information on the Ann Arbor event visit: http://annarbor.startupweekend.com/

To register, visit http://startupweekendannarbor.eventbrite.com/

On June 10, 2008 Ann Arbor will host our first ever MotorCityConnect lunch. The event will be held at Vinology at 110 South Main Street in Ann Arbor. Lunch will cost you $20 (cash is preferable), payable at the event, and will include a selection of Vinology lunch specials. Lunch runs from 11:00 - 1:00 PM.

The schedule works like this:

11:00 - 11:30 Open Networking
11:30 - 11:45 Formal Introductions and lunch delivered to your seat
11:45 - 12:15 Topic Discussion over lunch
12:15 - 12:45 Share (best practices, table discussions, business tips)
12:45 - 1:00 Specific Asks

I will be the official host of the MCC Ann Arbor lunch, though Terry Bean and Charlie Wolborg will come out to kick off the Ann Arbor event, and make sure we know how to run things proper. This lunch will take place the second Tuesday of every month in the Bubble Room, downstairs at Vinology.

From past lunches I can tell you this is pretty intense networking. You need to come with a specific ask for what you need. And it should be very specific for that matter, including the name of the person, the company, and every detail you have.

MotorCityConnect is Networking 3.0 and it’s for business owners, members of companies, people looking for jobs and connections. The people who come to MotorCityConnect meetings share referrals, and really go out of their way to help people.

MotorCityConnect also sponsors blood drives for the Red Cross and supports other charities. So if you live/work/play in Ann Arbor come out to our first MotorCityConnect lunch and meet some friends. The food will be tasty, and you can meet some very interesting people.

Hope to see you there! Derek Mehraban

Today at LA2M - Lunch Ann Arbor Marketing - we discussed how we could help our lunch host Furrokh, owner of the wonderful restaurant Eastern Flame on Ashley in Ann Arbor. Here are the thoughts and ideas of the smart crowd of 11 marketers:

1. Charlie Kondek - Invite all the local bloggers out to eat the food, review it and write a blog post about their experience. We all like this idea and plan to do it. If you’re a blogger who would like to participate, please comment. Bloggers may want to come out for the new lunch buffet starting May 20.

2. Dee Davey - Network with other like groups to get them to host their lunches or dinner events at Eastern Flame. LA2M has had such good service and food from this restaurant, it’s perfect for other small networking groups.

3. Steve - Eastern Flame needs a new web site, with an interactive menu. Steve and Andy Ross may connect to build this site. Stay tuned…

4. Andy Ross - Volunteered to design the site. Plus suggested we need Belly Dancers at Eastern Flame to liven up the atmosphere. Not a bad idea?!?

5. Jason - Furrokh needs a cart on the street so people can smell all the great smells of bbq chicken, kebabs, and fresh falafel when they are walking through A2. We talked about Cart Mafia and how it’s hard to get a cart in A2.

6. Jamie - Since Jamie is a 3D modeling guy, he thought it would be great to have an Interactive experience showing what it’s like to walk into Eastern Flame. Love the idea. Especially think we should film w/ belly dancers and live music to increase the excitement.

7. Derek Mehraban - I had two ideas. First, invite a friend to LA2M so they can experience the great food and camaraderie we experience at Eastern Flame first hand. And two, Build out a social media presence using Facebook and Twitter. This effort has already begun.

8. Ross Johnson - Email list to send people updates on the lunch specials of the day similar to how Cafe du Jour does it. Also suggested getting out to Taste of Ann Arbor. Furrokh was all over that one already.

9. Nicole Burguess - Suggests we need to Audio Podcast from LA2M lunches. Live from Eastern Flame. I personally dig this idea. Have thought we need to capture the witty banter of our marketing lunches for some time. Must bring mic and laptop to next meeting.

10. Daniel DeMoss: Fan Page on Facebook. Done. Also, we need T-shirts w/ Furrokh photo to do some viral marketing. Who wouldn’t want an Eastern Flame t-shirt?!? I want one right now.

11. Peter Sabbagh - Use a digital campaign to connect w/ teen crowd. Neutral Zone partnership. Heck, Tabbouli and Hummus is healthy for kids. Eastern Flame can provide healthy after school snacks to the teens. We will not allow ordering of Fries of Lebanese coffee to keep the health factor up.

12. Do you have some more ideas…Comment here.