Start-Up Companies That Are Changing The World
Due to their absurd profit margins and market values, almost all the business world’s attention is focused on companies like Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon. While there is no denying that these titans of industry have achieved incredible power and success, they aren’t the only important companies in the world.
There are plenty of smaller businesses that are capable of offering high-quality services that will almost never be mentioned on the news. You don’t have to be a billion-dollar company or make the Fortune 500 list to change the world.
Also, startup companies don't need a ton of working capital or outside funding from unicorns, venture capital firms, or venture funds.
These are a few start-up companies that have hit the market recently and have the potential to change everything.
Hippy Feet
Homelessness is a growing problem in the United States. For the fourth consecutive year, the total population of homeless Americans has grown. On one night in January 2020, more than 580,000 homeless were estimated to be without a home.
That number was before the coronavirus pandemic, so it seems highly likely that it’s only increased since then. Cofounders Sam Harper and Michael Mader noticed this growing issue years ago and launched Hippy Feet in 2016 to do their part to help the situation.
The Minneapolis-based startup was originally launched as a “buy one, donate one” company that manufactured socks. In their business model, for every sock that a customer purchases, they would donate one to local homeless shelters.
Socks are often not donated to homeless shelters and are a very important and often overlooked component of health. Even though the total donations reached over 20,000 pairs of socks and were greatly beneficial to the shelters, the founders of Hippy Feet felt they could do more.
They implemented a Pop-Up Employment program that aimed to create jobs for homeless youth or financially struggling young people. Since then, they have provided more than 150 young homeless people jobs in various areas such as embroidery, packaging, and screen printing.
In many cases, these transitional job opportunities have led to full-time employment elsewhere and permanent housing for the workers. The operation is still based in the northern parts of the Midwest, but the founders are looking to expand to cities all around the country soon.
BetterYou
With so many distractions in the modern world, it can be nearly impossible to create and maintain healthy habits. Going to the gym more often and losing some weight is a very healthy habit, but it can be challenging trying to stick with it.
The motivation for attending a gym is often very high initially and tends to diminish as time wears on. It’s estimated that nearly 80 percent of people joining a gym in January as part of their New Year's resolutions will quit within five months.
Even something as crucially important as sleep is often sacrificed in the modern age. It’s estimated that as many as one in three American adults are not getting enough sleep each night, and the real number might be even higher. Sleep is often taken for granted, but it’s a very important part of your overall health.
Not getting enough sleep can lead to a wide array of health issues developing pretty quickly. There are plenty of mental and emotional habits that can be healthy too. Taking time to meditate or spend time with your loved ones are positive habits that are often neglected.
That’s where the BetterYou app comes into play. This app operates an AI companion that will help you to create goals in four different categories relating to your overall wellness: physical, social, mindfulness, and educational.
The app will then work in the background to create a mapped report of spending your time. It will keep track of your progress and notify you when you are falling behind on your goals. You can set your own goals for different activities you want to participate in, such as going to the gym, reading, socializing with friends, or other activities.
BetterYou will begin to learn your habits and provide notifications to get you on track toward accomplishing your goals. Within 30 days, users have seen an increase of at least 30 minutes of sleep nightly, ten more minutes talking with the people closest to them, and an increase of more than 500 steps of exercise daily.
The app is even being used in some businesses and schools to help employees and students develop more healthy habits and stick with them long term.
Ad Hoc Labs
An unfortunate side effect of the progression of technology has been the dramatic increase of robocalls and spam. The current estimate is that Americans will receive more than 86 billion spam texts in 2021, a 55 percent increase from last year.
These spam calls and texts shouldn’t be taken lightly either. They are more than just annoying; they are potentially life-changing for victims. It’s estimated that nearly one in three Americans have been the victim of a phone scam within the last year.
The total amount of money lost to these phone scammers reached more than $29.8 billion for an average of roughly $500 per victim. Although there have been attempts to create legislation to help combat these scammers, the laws have largely been ineffective.
That’s where the mobile software company Ad Hoc Labs can come to the rescue. This start-up was founded in 2012 by Greg Cohn and Will Carter and is responsible for popular apps such as Burner, Firewall, and Dialed.
Each of these apps comes with similar features, and the primary goal is to block 100 percent of spam, robocalls, and any other unwanted calls you might be receiving. For similar apps, they will use a blacklist approach.
All calls will come through except numbers found on the said list that will be blocked. These numbers include common scam numbers or suspected scam numbers. However, spammers often circumvent these blacklists and bypass them altogether, so they are only effective for a little while.
Ad Hoc Labs decided to use a different approach: the whitelist approach. They use the opposite tactic to combat spam. No calls will be allowed through with the exception of the numbers on the list. After you install the app, you will select numbers that you want to receive calls from.
This usually includes numbers in your contact list and people that you know. Any number not on this list will be blocked and sent straight to voicemail. From there, you can use the feature to transcribe the voicemail and read the contents instead of taking the time to listen to it.
If the number is legitimate, add it to your whitelist, and it will be sent through to your phone. If it’s not, it will stay blocked, and you won’t ever know if it calls again.
The Takeaway
Change doesn’t always come overnight, and it will often come from places that are least expected. These startups might not have reached the levels of success that some companies have, but it doesn’t mean that their startup cultures haven’t impacted and improved the lives of a lot of people.
Whether it's through helping the homeless keep their feet warm and dry, helping people improve themselves overall, or by protecting your personal information from potential scams, these companies are working to change the world for the better.
SOURCES:
HUD: Growth Of Homelessness During 2020 Was 'Devastating,' Even Before The Pandemic