Author: Brett Atkin

The discovery that human tissues and organs share many similarities with pig tissues and organs has led to medical advances that have benefited many and even saved lives.  Because of these similarities, pig tissue is often used in medical devices to treat various injuries or conditions in human beings. The need for pig tissue, also known as porcine tissue, continues to play an important role in medicare and innovation.

Sherry (Ziboro) Mitchell, an Indiana native, started her career in student lending and software development before moving to a medical device company in Lafayette that uses urinary bladders of pigs. This is where Sherry learned about the importance of pig tissue. While she may not have a biology background, she took an interest in learning about where and how companies obtained what they needed. She quickly realized there was an opportunity to be a sourcing company for pig tissue so in 2007, Sherry founded Tissue Source.

“I was most inspired to start Tissue Source because our products heal people. These products give people a quality of life that they otherwise wouldn’t experience. Sometimes our products are life-saving,” Sherry says. “We’re using an abundant resource that, after it’s used for food, is often discarded, but the parts we use are not used in the food chain, so we are extending the value of that animal.”

Sherry started Tissue Source with one goal in mind: high quality, specialized, pig tissue sourcing. They are a boutique sourcing firm that focuses on providing high quality pig tissue for specialized uses. From nose to tail, different parts of the pig are used for different purposes. Tissue Source works with companies that need precision extraction of a particular pig tissue — this could be anything from a small organ being used for children or a specific kind of tissue used for research and development. 

Today, Tissue Source has grown to include over 250 customers. 

“We pride ourselves on understanding our customer’s end use of the pig tissue. Then we source it with the highest quality we can find,” says Sherry. “It was important to me to make sure we are raising the bar because of the delicate nature of how our products are used and providing the best outcomes.”

To support their continued growth, Sherry added Zach Morris to the team in 2020. Zach brings over 10 years of operations and production management expertise. He is responsible for the planning, scheduling, production and shipping of the Tissue Source product. 

In addition this past year, Tissue Source brought on Dr. Laura Lemmons, a licensed veterinarian, to direct the Tissue Source Quality Management System. Laura helps ensure applicable FDA regulations and ISO standards are maintained and continuous quality improvement initiatives are met.

Now that Tissue Source has more employees, they need a place to meet with customers, complete the many audits they must go through, and present a level of professionalism. They chose zWORKS because it is near their homes and use it every week for face-to-face meetings. It has become very important post-COVID.

“It was really important to me as we added staff that we have some face-to-face time. We established a collaboration day every week so that we can get together, discuss customer needs, meet with whomever, and strategize about our business,” Sherry says. “We love the location and the perks of being in the village and being close to everything is really nice.” 

Planning for the future, Tissue Source is looking for ways to improve logistics for production, shipping, and coordination. Now that some restrictions on traveling and events have been lifted, Tissue Source is  looking forward to conferences and tradeshows returning in an attempt to help grow important referrals and spread the word within the medical and research community. 

Ask any dog owner, and they’ll agree with the sentiment that a healthy dog is a happy dog. And a healthy, happy dog makes its human very happy, too.  

This is the fundamental idea behind the founding of King Lou.

A few months after losing his beloved dog Lou to Canine dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), a form of canine heart disease, Clayton Farris was surprised to see an FDA communication linking common ingredients in several well-known pet food brands to rising occurrences of DCM in dogs. 

“I was shocked to find out the condition that afflicted Lou was linked to the ingredients in some of the most popular dog food brands on the market,” Farris comments. “The sad reality is that most of these companies are more focused on volume and profit instead of creating products that are healthy for pets.”

Farris, an Indiana University Kelley School of Business grad, has a background in health and nutrition.  After working as a personal trainer through college, Farris built his career scaling brick & mortar sales for high-growth, startup CPG brands in the health and dietary supplements space. After an unexpected job change at the height of the pandemic in 2020, he decided it was the ideal time to take the plunge into full-time entrepreneurship. 

Hence, King Lou Pets was founded, named after his beloved, rescued, Labradoodle.

The Hoosier native and father of two young sons soon discovered something that many of us realize: it’s difficult to work from home, let alone launch a business, especially with young children at home.   

After relocating to Zionsville, Farris discovered zWORKS, which offered him an ideal opportunity to work in a coworking space among other entrepreneurs and focus on growing his company.  

“Having the ability to be surrounded by business people who are experiencing many of the same challenges was a motivating factor for me to pursue a place with zWORKS,” Farris commented.

He joined zWORKS in January 2021 and soon after brought a partner on board. zWORKS allowed him the chance to set regular office hours and dedicate the time necessary to kickstart his vision into a growing business.  King Lou Pets officially launched in August 2021.

What sets King Lou apart from other brands in the space are the core values:

• Real, clean pet nutrition: all of the ingredients are top quality whole food, human-grade, without preservatives or filler ingredients
• Sustainability: as a 100% USA company, all of the ingredients are sustainably-sourced from family farms in the USA, and the packaging is made from post-consumer recycled material
• A healthy dog is a happy dog: King Lou products are designed to help dog’s live longer, healthier, happier lives

Aside from living the core values for King Lou Pets, Farris is proud of starting his business in the community where he lives, too.

“It’s exciting to launch a CPG brand in the area,” says Farris. “There’s a great deal of hometown pride in Zionsville, so I’m excited to launch a local brand with the potential to scale to a national level.”

zWORKS also provides an opportunity for Farris to have a flexible schedule so he can focus on other important things when he is home, like his children and the dogs. Clayton and his family can often be found enjoying time in the great outdoors.  

There are few things we love to see more than watching the zWORKS’ mission play out right before our eyes. That couldn’t be more true as we witness the growth and success that our friends at AERIFY.io have achieved. What was a small idea with humble beginnings at zWORKS turned into a growing business.

Co-founder Aaron Toops worked in IT managed services and saw first hand the frustrations customers experienced with their IT services. As with most great ideas, Aaron and AERIFY.io’s other co-founder, Rob Michels hatched an idea over a few drinks. Between Aaron’s background in IT and Rob’s background in operations, business development, and marketing, they founded AERIFY.io. The company was founded with the idea that technology should be simple, safe, and fast. Computers should just work, and when they don’t, an expert should be available to fix it quickly and efficiently.

But how do you turn an idea into a startup? You join zWORKS. Aaron and Rob credit zWORKS with providing a foundation to turn their idea into a reality.

“Having an actual place to go to work on our business was what made it real from day one,” says Aaron. “We couldn’t possibly take on the risk and long-term commitment of renting a space, but rather zWORKS allowed us to invest our resources in things that really mattered when getting started.”

As AERIFY.io grew over the next few years, the COVID-19 pandemic really shed light on the need for cloud-based technology in order for companies to maintain business continuity. That certainly helped propel AERIFY.io even further to more growth, but being involved in a co-working community had its fair share of benefits.

“Our business growth is heavily dependent on referrals and networking,” says Rob. “So we stay connected and talk to people at all of the co-working spaces.”

Aaron adds that it is more than just help with generating leads. There’s so much to learn from getting involved at a co-working space like they have at zWORKS. With such a wide variety of members and partners working together at zWORKS, they were able to tap into expertise they didn’t have on their own.

“Everyone we have come across is happy to help. You just have to be brave enough to ask,” comments Aaron. “We knew starting out there were things we didn’t know. The hardest part is that we didn’t know what we didn’t know!”

The AERIFY.io team took advantage of leveraging all of the shared experiences of other startups and using them as a sounding board when they needed some perspective on how to approach a business challenge. Another advantage that they say was important to their success was the programming and events that zWORKS facilitated for members. These resources brought people together and kept the conversation going among fellow entrepreneurs.

“You get out what you put into it when you join a co-working space,” says Rob. “Take advantage of the programing, lean into the idea that you have to get in there to get the most out of it, but also be an open book and help others.”

AERIFY.io has recently graduated from co-working and moved to their very own office space, right around the corner from zWORKS in Zionsville. But that doesn’t mean they are abandoning their zWORKS membership. They plan to stay involved.

“We’re maintaining our membership, but we feel strongly about giving back to the community that gave so much to us,” says Rob. “We’re planning to still attend events and get to know our fellow entrepreneurs. There is still a lot left to learn.”

AERIFY.io is looking forward to continued growth. Future plans include expansion and being able to replicate what they have started in Zionsville. They are always on the lookout for good talent, especially in the tech space. Keep an eye out for their next move!

Join us for a walk down memory lane for a minute and think about the days of summer right before beginning your senior year of high school. If you were like many incoming high school seniors, you were soaking up the final days of summer and hanging out with friends. If you were a band kid, you were probably preparing for Indiana State Fair Band Day. Shout out to those band kids – Indiana summers can be unforgiving! You might have had a summer job that gave you a little spending money. But if you’re one local teen and fellow zWORKer — you’ve got other things on your mind.

When Zionsville Community High School incoming senior, Izzy Branam, isn’t at one of his two internships this summer, he is working with his co-founders on their latest startup. We say latest because this isn’t his first foray into business. Izzy has done this before. In the sixth grade, he realized there was an opportunity to start a record label for aspiring DJs. There was an abundance of talent on the DJ scene, but many artists were overlooked by record executives because of their age. Izzy started Xygen Records and managed it throughout middle school. At the height, he’d signed over 150 artists.

By age 14, the business bug had bit. Not one to sit on his laurels, Izzy found another business opportunity. He realized he could make more money than his part-time job at Chick-fil-A by reselling a wholesale lot of sunglasses so he quit to focus on that. This quickly peaked his interest in eCommerce and digital marketing.

Izzy and his co-founders, Krishna Thiru and Emma Hamilton, created the startup Fia Recruit to make hiring more objective, efficient, and effective. Instead of playing a game of pin the tail on the donkey, which is oftentimes the traditional way of filling positions, Fia uses artificial intelligence and data-driven technology to help streamline this business critical process.

Their startup is grounded in the idea that finding the right fit for a company’s culture is a huge part of hiring as well as reducing the time and effort it takes to sift through the dozens, sometimes hundreds of applicants. In addition, there are inherently unconscious biases at play during the hiring process. There are other applicant platforms out there, but Fia takes it a step further by identifying applicants that meet both the job requirements and fit the company’s culture.

Fia identifies lacking perspectives and personalities in a company’s existing team and suggests applicants from the applicant pool that rounds out the team. Then the platform analyzes how the candidates’ personality and social styles align with the company’s unique culture and team. And finally, Fia analyzes the applicants’ education and work experiences to automatically sort out those that lack the necessary job qualifications. This method creates a more qualified, well-rounded applicant pool but also improves the talent acquisition experience by saving valuable time in the applicant review process.

The local teens have won several awards for their innovation. Izzy credits zWORKS as a place he can get the help he needs to be successful.

“It is such a great environment to put me in the right headspace to work on our startup,” Izzy says. “Sometimes we meet at zWORKS and just talk through things together and whiteboard ideas.”

It’s also a great place to leverage the collective community. Finding other people to give guidance as they launch their product has been advantageous. They don’t feel overlooked because of their age or the fact that they actually have very little experience themselves in talent acquisition.

“zWORKS is such a great place to talk to other people who have already been in our shoes,” Izzy comments. “Everyone has been so welcoming and other zWORKers are happy to answer questions. They take us seriously. They know we are committed to making our business work and they offer their connections and broader network to help us achieve our goals.”

Fia has concluded alpha testing and is now in the beta testing phase. They have several well-known Indy-based firms beta testing the platform and they are actively seeking more companies to sign on to the beta test. If any company is interested in becoming a beta tester, you can sign up on the Fia website.

Fun facts about Izzy:

• Even though he is busy and works hard, he loves to hang out with his friends like a normal teen.
• He loves watersports and tries to get on the water whenever possible.
• He’s looking at colleges and weighing his options for the future, but he knows it will involve his love for entrepreneurship.

zWORKS has always been about bringing people together for the benefit of the Zionsville community. You don’t have to look far to see the entrepreneurial engine at work whether that be the many small businesses that use the zWORKS spaces to host meetings and clients or the partners that offer their resources and expertise to help startups on their journey. That’s why we were excited when Monisha Mitchell decided to join zWORKS and bring her guidance on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) to our members so we can continue growing in a positive and meaningful way right here in Zionsville.

Monisha’s mantra is to engage, educate and expand. She carved this path over the years as a licensed therapist followed by work in nonprofit leadership roles and more recently in insurance. Monisha’s unique background and skill set has positioned her to be a positive change agent in the community.

“I come from a wonderfully diverse family that I feel gave me a deep appreciation for various cultures and experiences,” says Monisha. “The last year has been difficult for many people. It brought to light so much in terms of mental health but also in terms of diversity.”

Monisha strives to engage and empower whether on an individual level through therapy or an organizational level through engagement groups. She seeks to educate through community conversations about DE&I but also to bring awareness to mental health issues. In both instances, she aims to encourage people to expand their reach in the world and hopefully that results in people connecting with one another more inclusively and wholeheartedly.

“Cultural competency and diversity has always been an important part of growing communities,” says Monisha. “My desire is that we have a community that is more welcoming and inclusive. That creates an opportunity for self reflection and awareness which is where my experience and services come in.”

Monisha draws upon her experience working as an individual in a private practice and found the greatest challenge was working alone and feeling cut off. She recognizes that a space like zWORKS is a wonderful way for innovators, who may otherwise be isolated in their own spaces, to coalesce and have a sense of community. It’s the sense of community and entrepreneurial spirit that inspired Monisha to join zWORKS.

Please join us for a free DE&I Lunch & Learn on June 25, 12:00 – 1:00 p.m. at zWORKS. Monisha will discuss the importance of employing a diverse workforce, what equity looks like, and how inclusion broadens your customer base and reaches new audiences.

Fun Facts about Monisha:

• She is the proud mother of three children ages 28-5!
• She loves to write; she published her first essay on cultural competence in 2005 and now blogs for Indianapolis Moms Blog.
• She first started visiting Zionsville as youngster to ride horses at Pleasant Run (which if our memory serves us right, is now Target!)

“If you are starting a business or even thinking about starting a business, then zWORKS is the place to be.”

Jeff Wraley is no stranger to startups or the Zionsville community. He grew up in Zionsville, before going to Purdue University and later living in Virginia. While there, he worked in construction engineering along with building a few startups along the way. They weren’t all successful.

“Sometimes you learn even more from failure than you do success,” says Jeff. “I have an entrepreneurial spirit and have pursued many ventures, each one helping me learn and grow.”

When he moved back to Zionsville with his family, he was searching for his next big idea. Determining what his next startup would be was a challenge of its own and Jeff tackled it by creating a bracket challenge. Through his bracket, he conducted several MVPs and pilots to determine which one of his dozens of ideas had legs. He narrowed down those 50 ideas to what would become his business today, Groundwork.

Groundwork is a software that is dedicated to helping contractors qualify their leads and find their ideal customers. Contractors get video walkthroughs from homeowners before the site visit so they know what they are quoting and can qualify good leads. Jeff’s engineering degree from Purdue University and his background in construction engineering led to the inspiration for Groundwork and helping companies in the construction and home improvement industries be more successful.

Prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, Groundwork was just getting its start. Jeff competed in zWORKS’ first Pitch Night competition, opening the door for him to connect with the wider zWORKer community. This opportunity allowed Jeff to meet other startups, connect with investors, and eventually hire a partner for Groundwork.

“That experience was so helpful simply to grow the business, but also enlightening,” says Jeff. “To see other startups and hear their challenges and solutions was a huge opportunity that I learned from and took away to implement at Groundwork.”

But COVID-19 challenged businesses of all sizes to adjust their tactics and business models. Luckily, the Groundwork platform was in the perfect position to show it’s value. Jeff expected it to take 5-10 years to get to this point of working virtually with contractors. Now, overnight the industry had to adapt to working virtually as much as possible. One contractor had over a hundred homeowners submit videos in just May of last year alone.

“The zWORKS community has been instrumental in making Groundwork the success that it is today,” says Jeff. “Not only did the exposure help bring our business to investors and partners willing to help, but it also gave me a community of fellow entrepreneurs to help navigate the surge brought on by the pandemic.”

With the huge spike in business, Jeff needed to bring on assistance. His LinkedIn post was shared with a zWORKer who had the perfect fit in his network for Jeff’s needs. Not only has zWORKS helped Jeff build the Groundwork team, it has been a source of support and connection with other startups. You can often find Jeff and Doug Wilcox of How’s Mom at zWORKS connecting to problem solve, ideate, and just chat, supporting each other through the highs and lows of entrepreneurship.

As Groundwork continues to grow, the team is looking to expand. While they are always looking for talented people, they are hoping to grow in Development, Sales, and Marketing.

Getting to know Jeff on a more personal level…

• Jeff attended Zionsville High School and may still hold some records for receiving for the football team. Go Eagles!
• Jeff and his wife sold their home in Virginia and bought a camper to travel for two months before moving to Zionsville. They drove 17,000 miles and hiked over 70 miles with the kids, seeing 9 national parks along the way.

All startups are born when an entrepreneur tackles an unmet need, but the most successful ones are born out of a passion and driven by experience to solve a problem in the marketplace. It is that passion for changing the face of communications between long-term care facilities and families that drove co-founders Doug Wilcox and Matt Prasek to leverage their shared experience and create the app How’s Mom by Safekeeping.

Traditionally, it has been difficult for family members to stay apprised of their loved one’s care information without calling a facility directly or visiting regularly. This is a major source of frustration and confusion for families. In addition, facilities lack the bandwidth to stay in contact with all families. How’s Mom by Safekeeping is an app designed to connect family members with their loved one’s medical information. The company partners with two of the largest Electronic Medical Record (EMR) companies in the industry, combining to serve 95% of the market.

Not only does the app ease the frustration and difficulty of gaining access to information surrounding your loved one, but it also serves as an operational efficiency tool for the facility. Providing instant and actionable information to family members is convenient and time-saving for the facility staff.

Rarely is entrepreneurship a straight line but often a winding road. Prior to meeting Matt and learning about his idea for How’s Mom, Doug worked in sales and marketing for fourteen years for several Fortune 500 companies. As luck would have it, living in Zionsville, Doug was introduced to zWORKS at its inception when asked to support it by zWORKS founder and long-time friend, Dan Moyers.

“Being an entrepreneur can be a lonely business,” Doug says. “Sometimes it feels like it is you against the world, but being around others in the same position at zWORKS brings a sense of shared community with others that understand the challenges and opportunities.”

Little did Doug know at the time, but joining zWORKS was pivotal in the next phases of his career path. Wanting to make an impact and “see the needle move” in his work, Doug found an opportunity with another zWORKS startup success, 120Water. Having known the Founder and CEO, Megan Glover, Doug joined the team, offering Sales and Marketing support. It wasn’t before long that Doug was faced with his own startup story.

While Doug was visiting his mom in a long-term care facility in Anderson, Indiana, he learned about How’s Mom, which was called Safekeeping at the time. Matt Prasek had developed the idea in college and was conducting a pilot of the app at the long-term care facility Doug’s mom was living in. Matt and Doug connected over the phone and, after several conversations, began working together to build and develop what would become How’s Mom by Safekeeping.

Doug’s experience with 120Water gave him the experience he needed to embark on a startup journey, but it was his involvement with the zWORKS startup community that has undoubtedly driven decisions that led to the growth and success of How’s Mom.

“The resources and community that are available and openly offered by being a part of zWORKS brings startups an opportunity that they can’t get on their own,” says Doug. “Sometimes just running into others who already have experience solving a problem you have is all you need to move forward.”

From the very beginning, Doug and Matt came to zWORKS every day to whiteboard and map out their business plan. The two created the working platform and earned their first paying customer. Safekeeping would go on to win the inaugural zWORKS Pitch Night opening the door to additional connections, investors, and resources. Now, operating out of their own zWORKS office space, Doug collaborates frequently with the zWORKS community. He credits the depth and breadth of the zWORKS community for support and mentorship, especially in the areas that he is less familiar with for guidance.

“Startups don’t have a lot of ancillary resources for office space and conference rooms, so having zWORKS and the space to think, create and meet was a tremendous benefit for How’s Mom,” Doug says. “We now have a dedicated space at zWORKS, but you will often find us in the common areas talking to others and trading advice.”

Unlike most businesses that were rocked by the COVID-19 pandemic, How’s Mom had an opportunity in front of them. Prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, the How’s Mom app was a “nice to have” feature. Then overnight, the app became a “need to have” tool. It was more important than ever for long-term care facilities to quickly and effectively communicate with the families of their patients. How’s Mom grew rapidly, conducting 8-10 demos of the app a day. Things have begun to normalize, but the fact remains, family members want to check in and find out “How’s Mom?”

How’s Mom is operational in facilities across 33 states and has thousands of people logging on every day. As vaccinations reach more people and the world continues to shift back to normal, the app is coming out with new functionality that will allow facilities to schedule visitations on the How’s Mom app. This will allow them to ensure safety protocols are met and help ease the transition.

The How’s Mom team is made up of Doug Wilcox and Matt Prasek, along with various contractors. The team is looking to expand with the support of a Sales Professional.

Getting to know Doug on a more personal level…

• Doug has been a cyclist for the last 12 years and has completed a race over 248 miles.
• One day Doug would like to bike through France or another part of Europe.
• His favorite place to travel to is Maui, and used to take trips there twice a year.