Startup Weekend Vancouver Winners

Posted on July 14, 2013 by institute B

Before Startup Weekend Vancouver, Ailton Schoemberger approached a local web developer for help launching his business idea, Domastay (formerly Language XP). “Their quote was around $30 000, just for an initial website. I gave up on the project at that moment because I didn’t have the necessary funds.” Today, for the price of a Startup Weekend ticket, Ailton has a team of talented entrepreneurs pushing his startup to the next level.

Ailton joined Startup Canada as a member earlier this year. “I met with a [Startup Canada] volunteer, and she pushed me to attend different events and network. I attended a Lean Startup Meet-up at Launch Academy, where I met driven entrepreneurs.” He was so encouraged that he began seeking out other startup communities, chancing upon Startup Weekend Vancouver. He immediately registered to pitch his idea. “I could feel it was a tremendous opportunity.”

54 Hours of Non-Stop Innovation

Startup Weekend is a yearly event for entrepreneurs to launch a company in one weekend. Attendees with a wide range of skills and talents pitch their best idea and form teams, working at a frenetic pace to build a small business and a viable product or website over fifty-four hours. While all the teams benefit from mentorship and coaching over the weekend, an expert panel of judges declares a winner on the last day.

As an international student in 2010, Ailton was frustrated with the homestay and host family coordinating process. Later, as a marketing manager for an international language school, he saw that it was no less painful on the administrative side. Students are simply placed with any available host family; a great homestay experience for the student or the family is not built into the equation. “We believe there is a better way,” says co-founder Erik McNeill-Buettner. “And we’re out to prove it.”

An Overnight Success – Literally

Ailton, Erik, and the rest of their team hustled all weekend to build a working website and reaching out to exchange agents, host families, and students to create a user-friendly and functional homestay-matching service. “Our confidence was soaring,” says Erik. “We’d amassed 2,700 followers on our Twitter account in just over 24 hours; we’d built a functioning website, and already had one live homestay client.”

According to Techvibes.com , Domastay was a clear champion from the start, having already begun to establish a user base. “I have to say that I love to win,” Ailton says. “It is even better when you win with your team…Even if we hadn’t won, I would feel proud of everyone on the team.”

The Roadmap to Sustainability

Winning Startup Weekend is no easy feat, but it is far from the last step to enduring success. To ensure that the winning team achieves sustainability and viability in the marketplace, institute B offered its ChangeMaker Curriculum Course as part of the prize package.

One component, Hopscotch, takes entrepreneurs through an intensive short- and long-term business planning process, establishing company values and culture, measurements for success, and undergoing financial analyses. “When we entered the program, we were a group of young, cocky entrepreneurs, riding the high of the win,” says Erik. “It was a crash course in the realities of starting a successful business, and served to temper our expectations without squelching our passion. It was not an easy undertaking, but looking back at what it has done for our business, I can say with full confidence that as we evolve and pivot down the road, we will be constantly coming back to Hopscotch as the guiding road map for our company.”

For now, Ailton is looking ahead to more great things from the Domastay team. “From institute B we learned that a culture can build a strong team and it creates more than great results. It creates personal satisfaction with daily motivation to make it happen,” he says. “Of course, it is an evolution process but I believe we are on the right track. Our team is young, has a good personality and loves high-fives.”

Check out Domastay’s website here:

By, Casey Leung.