创业故事会里的生意经

    钱伯斯-普利斯在去年4月份的Entre-Slam中讲了一个故事，分享了她18岁在美国陆军里学到的一个教训，那就是，不要将任何伙伴落在后边。创业者也处在一个战场上，她说：“为了梦想，我们匍匐前进、奋勇战斗……我希望，我们彼此都能这么做，因为说到底我们同处一条战壕。”

    最近的一次聚会中，在安妮堡市中心的一间酒吧里，约20名企业家坐在老企业家的身旁。除了讲故事，那晚的活动还穿插了两家印度餐厅的咖喱品鉴活动、一名按摩技师和中场一个即兴表演团体的表演。有几位讲故事的人已经是第三次在Entre-SLAM登台。

    “从这些聚会中衍生出来的故事值得一遍遍反复讲述，”巴卢说。“我们期望建立一个繁荣的网上创业家社区，我们还计划推出一系列的图书。”

    巴卢和钱伯斯-普利斯为Entre-Slam设计了宏伟的蓝图。“我一直想象在日本建起Entre-Slam，”巴卢说。“我们完全有理由相信，它可以是国际性的。”

    但首先，他们计划在美国中西部培养起大批追随者：今年大部分时间，这两人将以安妮堡为重点，然后可能是芝加哥、得克萨斯州奥斯汀，或者密歇根州大溪地地区。在大溪地地区，已经有一个企业团体表示有兴趣引入创业故事大赛，活跃商界社交活动。她们已经争取了安妮堡-伊普西兰蒂商会(Arbor-Ypsilanti Chamber of Commerce)X一代和千禧一代的参与。

    10月份，这群20-30岁的人聚在一起时，故事主题是“即兴发挥”，我们听到了一些有意思的故事：为了给一桌12人晚宴制作适合的调味汁，一位美食品尝创业者不得不购买60颗鸭心。为了保证襁褓中的婴儿能够定时喂奶、尿布保持干净，一位音乐家转行搞起了无线电，然后是软件开发，最后花了3个月的时间完成了机器模拟原本两周就可完成的项目。建立起一家快速发展的绘画营销公司一年后，另一位创业者将公司交到了员工手中，然后选择了离开，原因是父亲患上了恶性癌症。“当艰难变成平常，平常就会变成简单，”获得当晚头奖的戴维•朗道说。

    Entre-SLAM的商业模式部分是基于企业赞助。迄今为止，大部分都是当地企业，包括一家月刊和一家旅游公司。最终，她们想获得谷歌（Google）、红牛（Red Bull）这样的大牌企业赞助。钱伯斯-普利斯说：“这是一种让创业者保持清醒的产品，红牛也很有趣。”

    Entre-SLAM也是如此，特别是如果你有一位朋友正在讲故事，或者你听到一个故事，让你想起一位老朋友。（财富中文网）

    Chambers-Price told a tale at an Entre-Slam in April, sharing a lesson she learned when she was 18 years old and in the Army, about the importance of not leaving any of your partners behind. Entrepreneurs are also on a battlefield, she said, "low-crawling, scraping and fighting for our dreams.… I hope that we all will do that for each other because at the end of the day, we're all in this together."

    At a recent gathering, 20-something business owners sat next to older entrepreneurs at a downtown Ann Arbor bar. Besides the storytelling, the evening featured a curry taste-off by two Indian restaurants, a massage therapist, and an improv group performance during intermission. A few of the storytellers were giving their third Entre-SLAM performance.

    "The stories that evolve from these gatherings are meant to be told again and again," Ballew said. "We envision building a thriving, online community of entrepreneurs but also we plan on releasing a series of books."

    Ballew and Chambers-Price have big plans for Entre-Slam. "I keep visualizing Entre-Slam in Japan," said Ballew "We have every reason to believe it can be international."

    First, though, they plan to build a strong following in the Midwest: The duo will focus on Ann Arbor for most of this year; then probably Chicago; Austin, Texas; or the Grand Rapids area, where a business group has expressed interest in the entrepreneurial story slam to reinvigorate its business networking events. They've already had the Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti Chamber of Commerce Gen X and Y group take part.

    With that 20- and 30-something group in the house in October, the story topic, "Winging It," brought some strange tales: A gourmet tasting entrepreneur had to buy 60 ducks' hearts as part of a quest to make the right sauce for a dinner party for 12. A musician moved into radio, then software development, and spent three months on what should have been a two-week machine simulation project -- all to keep his babies fed and in diapers. One year into building a fast-growing painting marketing venture, one entrepreneur left his company in the hands of his staff when his father developed an aggressive cancer. "When hard becomes normal, normal becomes easy," said David Landau, who later won the night's top prize.

    Entre-SLAM's business model is based partly on corporate sponsorships, so far most of them local enterprises such as a monthly magazine and a travel agency. Eventually, they'd like to land major corporate sponsors like Google (GOOG) and Red Bull. "It's a product that entrepreneurs use to stay awake. And Red Bull is fun," said Chambers-Price.

    So is Entre-SLAM, especially if you have a friend who's telling a story, or if you hear a story that feels like an old friend.