The first Prairie Fire conference on October 24, in Bismarck, brought a unique group of entrepreneurs to a conference that claims to be “the first of its kind.” Gov. Jack Dalrymple, Brad Feld, Kristen Hadeed, and Shark Tank’s Daymond John took the stage throughout the day.
NDSU student Cooper Bierscheid road tripped to Bismarck to attend the event, and we asked him to share a few of his takeaways. Turns out there were a lot of surprises, whether it was the extent of Daymond John’s introduction to the entrepreneurial history of Gov. Dalrymple’s family!
The first thing we (Cooper and Kyle) did in Bismarck was drive around in awe at the slight hilly contour. We’re from Fargo. Once at Prairie Fire, the event kicked off with an awesome waffle buffet.
During the social, my friend and I were quickly introduced to a 16-year-old entrepreneur by his mother. We could see he was little shy, so we invited him to come sit with us. We all took our seats and dialed in on the success and failure stories that were ahead of us.
North Dakota Governor Jack Dalrymple began with the story of his family legacy of entrepreneurship. When faced with challenges, his grandfather, father, and himself had to innovate by utilizing the leading technology, studying the economics, and seizing market opportunities. He reminded us that North Dakota is the place to start a business due to its copious resources such as incubators, InnovateND, grants/loans, internship program, and others.
The next speaker, Brad Feld, a distinguished entrepreneur, author, and venture capitalist, spoke to us via Skype. He delivered 30 minutes of motivation and fielded 30 minutes of questions, all on his free time (he specified that under the give-before-you-get mentality, he wanted to do this for free).
Feld shared his four main points of the Boulder thesis: leaders have to be entrepreneurs, think with a 20 year viewpoint, be inclusive to everyone that wants to engage, and host activities and events that bring the communities together. I, the college dreamer, was able to ask Brad a question about his experience funding Makerbot 3D printing which later was acquired for $403 million. Brad’s speech was by far the most open and interactive.
Kristen Hadeed shared her adventure starting Student Maid as a 20-year-old college student. From selling fake finger nails in grade school to cleaning houses to afford jeans, she reminisced on her journey thus far. It wasn’t until 26 failed attempts at a bank loan, a cease and desist letter, 45 of 60 employees quitting on the first day, that her business practice began to catch on. She shared her strategies of crafting a desired work environment, especially being able to cater millennials’ needs. (Speaking of which, I think I would have liked to see more #hashtags during this event.)
Last, but not least, was the one-and-only, self-made, fashion mogul, philanthropist, motivational speaker, this-and-that, Daymond John! It wasn’t until a scripted introduction by the MC, video of his awards, personal DJ, and walk-up song, that we’d been fed enough credibility to learn who was going to land the keynote speech. I think you get the point. I seriously thought for a second that he was going to read us his resume of achievements. Aside from that, his well-rehearsed talk left the crowd with a few key lessons. His SHARK principles will help set up entrepreneurs on path towards success. You’ll have to buy his book, which I did, to learn what each letter represents in his SHARK acronym.
Not to forget, he penned a message in that book at his book signing stating, “Fargo, All the Best – Daymond John.” If you’re going to be on Shark Tank anytime soon, he stated how they, the sharks, invest in people first and then scalability potential second.
The Prairie Fire Conference reminded me how awesome it is to be an entrepreneur in the state of North Dakota. The city of Bismarck may have been quiet that morning, but the buzz of information flowing at the conference was enough to be heard in the Silicon Valley.
The most impactful takeaway for me was being able to mentor a new friend. The young boy we met at the beginning was no longer shy, and was starting to reach out to others at the end. We left the conference reminded that there is no criteria to being an entrepreneur: no shape, no title, no age. Just passion, and whole lot of dedication.
[Cooper Bierscheid is a senior at North Dakota State University, and is currently building out a company he co-founded called Protosthetics. Protosthetics designs and manufactures 3D-printed prosthetics and sells them for tens of thousands dollars cheaper than average price. His goal is to get these prosthetics to low income families that need them.]
Photos courtesy of Prairie Fire.
