Showcase Days are usually judged by what happens on stage: the quality of the pitches, the confidence of the founders and, ultimately, who wins.
But reflecting on our Foundervine Accelerator USA Showcase Day, I found myself thinking just as much about what had developed around the competition.
Over the course of the programme, this group of founders became genuinely connected. They formed relationships that I believe will continue well beyond the accelerator. What I particularly enjoyed seeing was that, even as things became more competitive towards the end, they continued to support one another. They listened, encouraged each other and, on Showcase Day, genuinely cheered each other on.
For me, that said a lot about the culture the cohort had created. You can compete and still want the person next to you to succeed.
I was also impressed by how willing the founders were to learn. They allowed themselves and their businesses to be challenged. They took feedback seriously, made changes and grew throughout the programme.
One founder spoke to me about the intentionality of the accelerator and how each part felt as though it had been designed for a reason. I was pleased to hear that because this is exactly what we want. An accelerator should not simply be a collection of workshops and events. Everything should contribute to helping founders build stronger businesses, make useful connections and leave in a better position than when they arrived.
There was another important part of this programme that should not be overlooked. This was never intended to serve founders from just one city. We brought together entrepreneurs from Washington, DC, Maryland and Virginia, creating a cohort that represented the wider DMV region.
Making that work requires commitment from everyone involved. Some of our founders and judges travelled considerable distances to join us on Showcase Day. Having spent more time in the region myself, I have also learnt that getting into Washington is not always as simple as looking at a map and judging the distance. Coming from London, where moving across the city is relatively straightforward, this was something I had underestimated. Washington’s early morning traffic certainly became a topic of conversation.
But people made the journey because there is value in bringing people together in person. You could see that throughout the day.
I was also struck by the range of businesses in the room.
Washington, DC is often described through the lens of government technology and defence technology. Those are clearly important parts of the ecosystem, but our cohort reminded me that they are far from the whole story.
We had founders building across very different industries and solving very different problems. If we want to support entrepreneurship across the DMV properly, we have to look beyond the sectors the region is already known for and make space for a much broader range of founders and businesses.
A huge congratulations to our three award winners.
New Village Braid, our Grand Pitch Champion, is tackling an important and often overlooked issue in the health and wellbeing of Black women through hair care. I was particularly impressed by the clarity of the problem they are addressing and the potential for meaningful impact.
Carrylug received our Rising Star Award. They are taking on the postage and luggage logistics market with an idea that could fundamentally change how people move their belongings from one place to another. I described them on the day as having the potential to become the “Airbnb of luggage shipping”, and I still think that captures the scale of the opportunity they are pursuing.
Zation received our Pioneer Award for building a platform focused on how universities engage with their students and how students engage with university life. It is a significant problem and one that affects both institutions and students.
What I like about these three winners is how different they are. Hair care and health. Logistics. University engagement. There is no single template for what an ambitious business from the DMV needs to look like.
Congratulations to New Village Braid, Carrylug and Zation, but also to every founder who completed the programme and stood on that stage. Getting to Showcase Day required a great deal of work, openness to feedback and commitment over the preceding 16 weeks.
The Showcase marked the end of this particular programme, but it did not feel like the end of the relationships created through it.
For me, that is one of the things a good accelerator should achieve. Of course, businesses should become stronger. Founders should learn and grow. But something else should remain afterwards: relationships, connections and a group of people who continue to be useful to one another long after the formal programme has finished.
That is what I felt we saw in Washington, DC.
A group of ambitious founders who wanted to succeed individually, without losing the instinct to support one another along the way.
It was a privilege to see it develop.
