Cameron Crazie for Toilet Paper

I apologize for missing the blog last week – I was home on break for Thanksgiving! But don’t think that means that these past two weeks were not chock full of activity. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and I wish everyone happy holidays in the next month.

Let’s go all the way back to last Friday, when my Computer Science lab was cancelled, giving me no class until 3:05. You know what that means – Star TP all morning! I was able to catch up on extremely important phone calls as well as talk to my brother before he made his trip down the Bahamas. We were able to assure each other of the work we would be able to get done before the break started. I was also about to prep for the long week ahead as I had to ensure I got everything done in Durham I needed to before heading home.

After a productive weekend, on Monday I drove over to Raleigh to meet with Jen Martin of Shop Local Raleigh. We had a fantastic conversation and special thanks to her for taking the meeting and helping discern some important aspects of shopping with small business. And another thanks to Anthony Pompliano for connecting us. Check out the Shop Local Raleigh website for some very interesting stats on the importance of shopping with small businesses during the holidays!

Monday was also an important day to catch up with Jordan as he got back from his trip to the Bahamas. Any business requires constant communication amongst leaders, and without talking on the phone for 48 hours, we definitely had a lot to catch up on!

Tuesday was an exciting day as I finally was able to break free from schoolwork and head home for Thanksgiving break. When I landed in NY, I opened my email and right away saw an email from the Duke Startup Challenge. I immediately opened it up and saw that we were 1 of just 6 finalists in the fall portion of the challenge! This entails 20% voting by the general public and 80% voting by judges. Voting closed this past Tuesday and we could not have gotten to the point without all of you. Your continued support has been incredible and I definitely gave thanks this Thanksgiving to all of you!

On Thanksgiving day, my family was lucky enough to be graced with my delicious banana bread. It is a Thanksgiving staple in my family, along with the cranberry bread that my brother makes, that is far inferior to my banana bread (obviously…). We had three great things that make up Thanksgiving: family, food, and of course, FOOTBALL!

Throughout the break we were asking people to vote for us via email, direct messages, the Star Toilet Paper Facebook page, and many other avenues. Once again, thank you to everyone for the incredible support all of you have given us throughout all of these competitions. We will need the continued support in the future as well so keep your eyes peeled!

After a great Sunday of victories by both my fantasy team (sorry Michael…) and the G-Men (sorry Packers fans…), it was time to head back to school Monday morning. I arrived to LaGuardia to find an hour long security line. They should have a separate line for people who work in the toilet paper advertising industry, don’t you think? It was back to work immediately on Monday, as I had a lot to catch up on!

This past week was full of calls. Calls that I had unfortunately scheduled during the break. I would have made them, since all time is work time for a startup, but these businesses aren’t even open! So this week has been a thrill of making calls as I had two weeks of calls to make in just a few days.  And just so everyone knows, on Tuesday my intramural soccer team made the Greek league semifinals and won! So we have the finals and I will absolutely update you guys on that.

And now we go onto Wednesday, which was extremely busy. It started with class, then calls for an hour and a half, squeezing a quick lunch in, then more class. Then I got to experience K-ville for the first time! That night we played Ohio St., the #4 team in the country. Because it was such a huge game, people had been waiting in line since Sunday night. My group started waiting at about 8:30 in the morning for the 9:30 PM game. I had my 3 hour shift where I did, of course, Star Toilet Paper work. Luckily my computer battery died just as my shift was ending! (We ended up beating Ohio St. in an incredible game, for the box score look here). And where do the Cameron Crazies get to sit? Of course in the best seats in the house! Check it out:

Check out the incredible atmosphere that the Cameron Crazies bring! Hope they are prepared to see ads on toilet paper soon!

After more catching up on Thursday, I finally finished my book that I have been reading for about two weeks – Seth Godin’s Unleashing the Ideavirus. Although it was written a little while ago (hence the constant references to Hotmail, AOL, and fax machines), it certainly has some incredible points. Godin alludes to the necessity of an “ideavirus” being able to spread in different ways than physical goods. Rather, an ideavirus is something that is intangible, be it a website or simply a viral idea. What I found to be most interesting was how he was basically laying out the foundation for how social media, specifically Facebook, functions today. He constantly stressed the importance of being able to find “sneezers” who would spread the idea for you. Can you say Facebook fans? I absolutely recommend this book to anybody interested in marketing and how companies look to increase their reach to the general public. In fact, towards the end he wrote his email address down and said to email him. Of course, I did – so let’s see what his response is!

Part of the Duke Startup Challenge was receiving feedback from 39 different judges about our executive summary and video that we entered. We would not be where we are today without critiques and guidance, so if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions for us, please do not hesitate! Comment below, like us on Facebook, or email me at bryan@startoiletpaper.com to express anything you would like about the company. And remember, Don’t Rush, Look Before You Flush!