BrandBuilders

When children are taken into foster care, they usually have very little with them. It is a stressful, emotional time for the children, their biological families, and their foster families.

Four women in Charlotte have gotten together to create a “village” of sorts, to help foster children who are relocating with little notice and few belongings. Foster Village Charlotte starts with giving the children welcome packs — and then goes so much further. On this episode of the BrandBuilders Podcast, we talk with two team members, Becky Santoro and Sloan Crawford.

Starting a company can be hard work — envisioning everything from the direction, to the branding, to funding and human resources. It’s no different with a non-profit organization, even if the goals of a non-profit are more socially-minded than profit-driven.

Often on a shoe-string budget, they still need the same type of strategic planning, development, and support as a business. Our next guest on the BrandBuilders podcast is someone who helps them do that. Caylin Haldeman is Project Development Manager at Next Stage Consulting, a company that also launched an incubator program for new non-profits last year, called CULTIVATE.

By now most of us have heard of, or tried, virtual reality… the experience where you put on the mask or goggles and step into a whole different world. It’s young cousin, augmented reality, allows you to basically create a different world around you without the funny goggles. Our guest on the BrandBuilders Podcast is Ming-Chun Lee, a UNCC professor in urban design, and a fellow with the Knight Foundation. He’s helping build an exclusive Pokémon GO game — and then some — just in time for the September 30 Open Streets 704.

If you’re an outdoor enthusiast or weekend warrior, you’ve probably got a bunch of used gear in your garage that you hate to throw out. Ebay, Amazon, Craigslist, and even Nextdoor are all options… but they all have their drawbacks, too.

Enter father and son consignment shop owners from Charleston who thought there had to be an easier way — so they designed ReelTrail, a buying and selling website and app that also gives back to environmental causes. Ryan and Kirk Leaphart joins us on the Brandbuilders Podcast with The Dunstan Group!