2013 Startups To Watch

Founded 2012 City Lehi Employees 25  

Industry Purposed mobile device management Website www.mokimobility.com  

Founders Tom Karren, 43; Ty Allen, 43

What It Is A company that enables businesses to secure, manage and monitor iPads and Android tablets as non-personal devices in order to better engage with customers. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy The mobile device management market is thrillingly open, and MokiMobility has been early to power up, swipe and strike. 

The Big Break “The scalability of the market. We knew this was going to be a big opportunity, but turns out it’s bigger than we could even imagine.” 

Best Moment Ever “We raised $2 million in seed round with Epic Ventures and other notable figures in the Bay Area. That was big for us — it enables us to go after these large customer opportunities.”

Employees in Three Words “Hip. Motivated. 

Innovative.”

Starting A Business Is “So hard and so great. But it ruins you forever. We’re never going to be able to work for someone else again.” 

The Advice “It’s OK to make mistakes, just make them fast. Failure is not doing the wrong thing, it’s not realizing you’ve done the wrong thing.”

The Ultimate Dream “In five years, our company will be unrecognizable in its current form. Just think about where we were five years ago. For the majority of the population, there was no such thing as a smart phone or tablet. Innovation is going to accelerate, and it’s thrilling to think of where we’re headed.”

Founded 2010 City American Fork Employees 76 Industry Real estate Website www.buypd.com Founder Blair Poelman, 34

What It Is A company that buys and sells real estate-related products throughout the country.

Why It’s Watch Worthy A startup that’s a dominant player in a volatile industry and already ranking on our Top Revenue list? Sold.  

The Big Break “We never really had one big break. Lots of little but very fortunate ones — along with a couple small fractures, bumps and bruises every now and then.”

Best Moment Ever “Amid all the daily challenges, there are great moments. We are in a bullish real estate market and it seems nearly every day there is great news in the press related to real estate.”

Hardest Moment Ever “When you find out people lied to you. It’s particularly difficult when it’s people you are close to and had extended trust to.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Holding a property sales event and watching 60 properties be sold to hungry investors in just over two days.”

Best Bootstrapping Moment “In the early days when there were only a few of us, we would have to spend countless hours getting the properties ready to sell. Nearly the whole team pulled an all-nighter and watched the sun come up while still in the office.”

Employees in Three Words “Successful. Creative. Motivated.”

Starting A Business Is “A great way to create amazing relationships.”

The Advice “Make sure you are involved in something you are passionate about. Doing something you love gets you through the inevitable hard times.”

In 2016 “We intend to keep our headquarters here in Utah County, maybe move a little south. We’ll have hopefully opened a couple remote offices in some of the more active and populated markets where we and our clients own properties.”

The Ultimate Dream “Provide products and services that keep clients and customers coming back.”

Founded 2011 City Lehi Employees 11  Industry Daily deals Website www.veryjane.com  Founder Mike McEwan, 34

What It Is A blend between Etsy and Groupon, it partners with vendors to sell high-quality boutique goods in a daily deal format.

Why It’s Watch Worthy Our Pinterest-adoring culture loves itself some better-than-retail deals. So a company that provides fashion-forward finds all in one place, day after day? Very smart. 

The Big Break “We haven’t had any big breaks, but we really started to see growth when I hired an incredible marketer and an extremely talented developer.”

Best Moment Ever “When we profited $25,000 on one single deal.”

Hardest Moment Ever “My two partners leaving and having to fill in those gaps on my own.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Three dudes making button earrings for hours while watching old ‘Seinfeld’ episodes. If anyone ever needs button earrings, I can hook you up.”

Best Bootstrapping Moment “Figuring out deals we could run for free, on our first week, without having to pay for them out of our own pockets.”

Employees in Three Words “Dependable. Devoted. Sharp.”

Starting A Business Is “Exhilarating.” 

The Advice “Don’t give up. Be patient. Startups take time to grow and cultivate into a real profitable business. Work your face off, and surround yourself with people who are better than you. You’ll be there before you know it.”

In 2016 “We’ll be dominating this niche and having a fully functioning charity arm — doing good in our community and foreign countries.”

The Ultimate Dream “To become a household name trusted by customers and vendors.”

Founded 2011 City Provo Employees 18  Industry Consumer electronics Website www.braven.com Founder Warren R. Osborn, 48

What It Is A provider of portable Bluetooth speakers that double as a noise-canceling speakerphone and serve as a portable power bank for on-the-go device charging. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy Have you heard? BRAVEN’s got speakers (the first HD speakers to double as a mobile phone charger, to be exact), it’s got style (product quality is No. 1 — even if it means taking a loss on inventory not up to its high standards), and it’s got smarts (founder Warren Osborn is a serially successful entrepreneur).

The Big Break “Though we’ve enjoyed amazing success, including having our BRAVEN on the Top 10 best selling portable speakers for 2012 and setting sales records on QVC, we are still waiting for the big break.”

Best Moment Ever “Getting the product on a national television segment with two hours of air time — without paying a dime for it.”

Hardest Moment Ever “Scrapping (literally throwing away) hundreds of thousands of dollars of first-run products that did not meet our quality standards, even when customers wanted them as-is. The brand stands for high quality, and we had to retool and rebuild to meet our own expectations.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Changing the name of the company from SPAR to BRAVEN. We literally considered more than 20,000 names before changing our name to BRAVEN.”

Employees in Three Words “Incredible. Dedicated. Game-changing.”

Starting A Business Is “Way harder than you think, takes more capital than you think, and takes more time than you think. It is a good thing you don’t know up front how hard it really is because when you summit, you will look back and be glad you did.”

The Advice “Build your business as accurately as possible mentally, spiritually and visually. Then build it for real. You can save dozens of failures by doing so.”

The Ultimate Dream “To be the world’s leading portable speaker company.”

Founded 2010 City Lindon Employees 45  Industry Beauty/direct sales Website www.jamberrynails.com Founders Adam Hepworth, 33; Christy Hepworth, 33; Lyndsey Ekstrom, 28; Keri Evans, 37

What It Is A designer and manufacturer of DIY nail shield wraps that are sold in a direct sales party model. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy High-quality, high-fashion products partnered with a direct sales party model has led Jamberry Nails to become a multimillion-dollar company that has its stylish finger on the pulse of the nail industry. 

The Big Break “Realizing we needed to sell our products directly through consultants. We’re the only ones selling nail wraps this way, and it directly changed the course of our business.” 

Best Moment Ever “Seeing how our business has changed our consultants’ lives. It’s incredibly motivating.”

Hardest Moment Ever “Managing growth and production. We are happy to report it hasn’t eaten us alive.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “When we sold more than $2,000 worth of product at a women’s expo — before we even had any inventory! It was when we first realized the interest and opportunity.”

Best Bootstrapping Moment “In the beginning, Adam slept in the garage for a couple months so he could print our products all night long.”

Starting A Business Is “A wild ride.”

The Advice “Identify your strengths and your weaknesses and put together the strongest team imaginable.”

The Ultimate Dream “Without question, our dream is to be the top recognized brand in the nail art industry. Everything we do works toward that goal.”

Founded 2011 City Orem Employees 5  

Industry Golf/technology 

Website www.foreUPgolf.com Founders Joel Ragar, 26; Evan Teshima; Joel Hopkins

What It Is A cloud-based B2B software solution for the golf industry. It services golf courses with an electronic tee sheet, Point of Sale, e-mail/text marketing, websites, custom mobile apps, etc. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy With golf courses clamoring for a technology hole-in-one, foreUP is swinging and winning with top tech and industry know-how. 

The Big Break “Our company’s biggest break was and is the mentorship we receive. We are a team of hard working, passionate entrepreneurs, but we are smart enough to admit what we don’t know. We have leaned on our network time after time.”

Best Moment Ever “When we switched over a course from each of our top competitors. Not because we charge any less, but because our product was ‘beyond compare better’ than their past solution.”

Hardest Moment Ever “Seeing our servers crash in the middle of a busy business day and then watching our phones light up from questioning customers. It turned into a fantastic learning experience. After that, it only took us a week to have our whole back-end redone. We now have amazing servers and are ready for massive scaling.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “We lost every startup/business competition we entered (and we entered a lot). Each time our feedback was, ‘Great idea, but tough to make happen’ or ‘You need the right team and more employees’ or ‘It will take you too much money and is not believable.’ We want to offer a sincere thank you to every doubting and lack-of-vision-in-foreUP panel judge; you helped fuel our motivation. Our favorite memory from year one was looking back at our success and noticing we had out-performed almost every single business we lost to. It helped us realize no one could judge our potential but ourselves.”

Best Bootstrapping Moment “The day we gained our first paying customer and realized we wouldn’t have to bootstrap forever.”

Employees in Three Words “Gosh dang awesome.”

Starting A Business Is “Self-fulfilling.” 

The Advice “Talk to as many successful business owners as you can. Most are completely happy to lend some wisdom.”

In 2016 “We want foreUP to be the industry leader in software solutions for golf courses within the U.S. Our goal is to have the solution sell itself, leaving no desire for a course to use anything else available.”

The Ultimate Dream “We want to supply small- to medium-sized businesses all the software tools necessary to run their company and increase revenues within 30 days. Technology has provided so many amazing advancements to even the least of businesses, and we want to help them capture that opportunity.”

Founded 2011 City Provo Employees 4   

Industry Software/social media Website www.turnkeysocial.com Founder Ryan Kell, 29

What It Is A provider of enterprise-level social media software for companies with multiple franchises and representatives. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy Social media isn’t going anywhere, so helping companies maintain and strengthen an online social brand among their franchisees and various reps? #genius

The Big Break “We are still working to get that big break, but we are well on our way. It will come when we have multiple partners in various verticals — and that isn’t far away.”

Best Moment Ever “Turning our product on for our first client. I didn’t sleep for three days leading up to the launch as I was working feverishly to get it wrapped up and ready. We launched it, I spoke in front of a big audience to show how it worked, and then I went back to the hotel room and slept for at least 14 hours.”

Hardest Moment Ever “I am going to have to refer to the last answer, because the best moments only come after the hardest moments.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Getting the ink finished on our deal with the investor. The best part of any business is having a huge task in front of you, but knowing it will be worth all of the work.”

Employees in Three Words “Intelligent. Capable. Hard-working. ”

Starting A Business Is “An incomparable thrill.”

The Advice “Find passion in what you do. If you aren’t passionate, you won’t make it through the long hours, headaches and real issues when starting a company. The second is to make changes fast — whether that’s an employee who isn’t a good fit or fixing something in the system that isn’t what it needs to be. In today’s world, speed is essential.”

In 2016 “We want to be working with hundreds of companies, providing tools for multiple thousands of reps/franchises in major industries all over the world.”

The Ultimate Dream “We want to be one of the only options large companies consider when making decisions for who to work with when handling large-scale company representation across hundreds or even thousands of social media outlets.”

Founded 2011 City American Fork 

Employees 8 Industry Marketing Website www.onesharpdesign.com Founders Matt Frisbie, 31; Camile C. Moyes, 28; Ryan Douglas Sharp, 38

What It Is A creative agency focused on marketing strategy and digital tool building.   

Why It’s Watch Worthy Talk about design intervention. Experienced leadership, sleek taste and stellar clients like One on One Marketing, Alpine Credit Union and AccessData have given this company one sharp future. 

The Big Break “It’s an aggregation of lots of little breaks. We have built this company completely on our own with no funding, so everything came from sacrifice and sales. We have great clients and are very grateful for their commitment to our studio.”

Best Moment Ever “Moving into our new studio. When we finally hung our awesome white boards, we took a look around with our wives and kids in the office — pretty special moment. We have plans to expand the space at the end of summer or early fall. We’ll have a little party and invite some folks out to hit our half pipe!”

Hardest Moment Ever “Seems like we keep having that ‘hardest moment’ — it’s actually my very favorite thing about entrepreneurship. I love me some refiner’s fire.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Our first company Christmas party. Ryan held it at his home, food was amazing and the company was grand.”

Employees in Three Words “Fully freggin awesome.”

The Advice “Given that I am still learning a ton I would say …be willing to learn a ton. The more I know, the more I realize how much I don’t know. I love networking like nobody else, and I have learned so much from my colleagues who have become great friends, regardless if they are competitors or not.”

In 2016 “We are planning to diversify our business model and look at running a couple operations. I love business and want to experiment with different business models. In an agency you sell time, I’m curious to look at new and exciting ways of solving problems.”

The Ultimate Dream “Honestly, I have no idea. But whatever that is, I want to make sure we are having fun. I love fun and I love to work at having fun. I want this to be part of our culture no matter how big we get.”

Founded 2012 City Springville 

Employees 10 Industry Food service Website www.waffle-love.com Founder Adam Terry, 30

What It Is A food truck that serves waffles and travels from Mapleton to Lehi — and everywhere in between. Customers find out where the truck is at any given time by checking its Instagram (@waffluv) or the company website.

Why It’s Watch Worthy What’s not to love? Waffles? Check. Delicious fan following? Check. Driving online presence? Check, sweet, check. 

The Big Break “The wonderful people of Utah Valley rallying behind us. From the very beginning, we have had the most amazing followers. They talk about us, they blog about us, they post about us on Facebook and Instagram. They’ve stood in line for waffles at below freezing and more than 100 degrees. We’ve had to learn a lot by experience this year, and they have been so patient, positive and supportive with us. Their enthusiasm is the miracle that made us big.”

Best Moment Ever “I can’t pick just one. When I’ve done all that I can and need a miracle — I get one.”

Hardest Moment Ever “In the beginning, Waffle Love was a one-man show. In order to satisfy the Health Department, I had to singlehandedly convert a small insurance office into a commissary kitchen on a very small budget. This entailed finding a water pipe that was embedded deep within the concrete. I would bang into the concrete with my sledgehammer until my body wouldn’t go anymore. After two days, I had hammered through eight inches of concrete and finally found the pipe. It was a defining moment. After that experience I felt that no matter what I came upon, I was equal to the task.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Looking out the window of the waffle truck at our grand opening and seeing the people lining up, eating and enjoying. I remember thinking, ‘This is really happening!’”

Best Bootstrapping Moment “Driving an old FedEx truck with a bashed-in front window that couldn’t quite reach 50 mph and thinking, ‘I just spent the last $1,300 to my name on this thing.’ That, my friends, is now the big beauty we call the Waffle Love Truck (don’t worry, I’ve since replaced nearly every part).”

Employees in Three Words “Dedicated. Hardworking. Awesome.”

Starting A Business Is “Fulfilling.”

The Advice “Create something truly exceptional, pair it with great branding and marketing, and bootstrap it. It can be a slower way to start, but I sure enjoy the freedom of running my business without having to worry about pleasing an investor.”

In 2016 “There will be more trucks, savory waffles, and even more amazing employees and followers.”

The Ultimate Dream “Waffle Love Hawaii Style.”

Founded 2010 City Spanish Fork/Springville  Employees 115 Industry Vehicle care Website www.wiggywash.com Founders Brent Wignall, 33; Chris Hailstone, 46

What It Is The owner of full-service car washes and detailing in Spanish Fork and Springville. 

Why It’s Watch Worthy Driven by top-notch customer service and out-of-the-gate growth, Wiggy Wash has paved a road of expansion, expansion, expansion. 

The Big Break “Acquiring an additional board member who saw what we were trying to do and believed in us and the company. His knowledge and business sense are irreplaceable.”

Best Moment Ever “Being named 2012 Business of the Year by the Spanish Fork/Salem Area Chamber of Commerce.”

Hardest Moment Ever “Jumping through the financial hoops to get this project started at the peak of the recession.”

Favorite First-Year Memory “Our first huge service day. It was in the first six months of us opening. The shop was packed, we were running cars through the wash as fast as the equipment could go, and cars were still lined up out to Spanish Fork Main Street from the minute we opened until well after we closed. The employees were having a blast, and the customers were enjoying the experience. My partner and I just looked at each other and then hugged. We had crushed all of the goals we had set for our first year that day.”

Employees in Three Words “Customer-focused team.”

Starting A Business Is “The ultimate test of personal fortitude and guts.”

The Advice “Don’t listen to other people. Gather all the possible information about your endeavor and then study, ponder and pray. Make your decision and don’t ever look back. Like Dave Ramsey says, ‘Information is power.’”

In 2016 “We’ll have a business with a solid foundation and customer base. There’s also a strong possibility of the beginning of a third location.”

The Ultimate Dream “For our chain of car washes to be available to all customers who are looking for the best customer service, quality and experience in the country.”