The 43North Foundation's storytelling platform went live three months ago.
From local startups cresting $100M in revenue to ex-pats making meaningful reinvestments in Buffalo, we look back at the stories that found an audience.
Series B[uffalo] was born at Golisano Children’s Hospital of Buffalo on Jan. 12.
Well, at least it would have been, if media/marketing platforms were delivered at hospitals instead of digital launch events.
Either way, this storytelling initiative has now been alive for approximately three months. It’s hitting all of its developmental milestones. Its height and weight are within the appropriate percentiles. Sometimes it even sleeps through the night.
The 43North Foundation created Series B as a civic storytelling engine to drive a coordinated message about high-growth innovation in Buffalo. It is based on best practices across the country, from Silicon Slopes (Salt Lake City) to Techpoint (Indianapolis) to the Technical.ly platforms dotting the northeast and mid-Atlantic.
The idea is an engine that carries the message to specific audience groups (in no particular order: Buffalo’s existing business community, ex-pats, regional college grads and national investors), while hosting authentic and grassroots stories about the great things that are happening here.
The 43North Foundation underscored its marketing methodologies and goals with extensive research about Buffalo’s story. We found that Buffalo has many great things happening – from a handful of funded startups 15 years ago to hundreds now, with the support and investment infrastructure to launch scalable new companies.
But that story is not well-understood, inside and outside of Buffalo. We’ve been punching below our narrative weight. People don’t identify strongly enough with the movement that’s afoot.
Thus, Series B, or Series B[uffalo], depending on context. This omnichannel platform averages approximately one new story each day on our website, amplified through LinkedIn and Instagram, and summarized in a weekly column via email newsletter. We’re running social media advertisements on Meta platforms and LinkedIn, and we have some creative marketing ideas that are going to create even more noise about what’s possible in Buffalo, NY.
Example No. 1: Eric Wood is “drafting” Buffalo-based startups to the Series B team in an April 23 event that is free and open to the public.
It’s hard to believe it’s only been 11 weeks since this bundle of joy entered our lives. But we’ve already managed to be the venue for a lot of great stories. Here are the Top 5 Series B articles when measured by active users.
$100M Club: The quiet explosion of Buffalo-based Azuna
Azuna has kept a relatively quiet profile in Buffalo over the years. So it was a surprise to find a company that expects to eclipse $100M in revenue this year, expand into retail stores across the country and start meaningfully planning for an exit. The company now occupies an entire floor at Seneca One Tower and employs about 60 fulltime employees in Buffalo. Founder and CEO Scott Dancy has mostly grown the business organically, outside of early investors that included Launch NY, S2, Dion Dawkins, Jack Greco and Samantha Bonano.
High-growth startups in Buffalo bringing commercial spaces back to life
Proving that real estate will always drive the most eyeballs in business news, Series B’s helicopter ride through the innovative companies who are investing in growth in downtown Buffalo found everything from funded software startups such as Centivo to fast-growing CPG companies like Top Seedz to relocating corporate firms such as Ingram Micro
RadEmploy already hiring in Buffalo as conversational AI platform scales
Series B wrote well-received profiles on each of the new 43North portfolio companies, but our feature on RadEmploy and its immediate plans to build a team in Buffalo found significant traction.
Brian Sacca keeps coming back to Buffalo
Ex-pat profiles are a tricky game, but a successful Hollywood writer and actor (whose brother is a famous venture capitalist) struck a chord. Brian Sacca’s feature-length film, Buffalo’d, was not universally popular locally. But as the film production industry finds its footing in Buffalo, Sacca sees a compelling proposition to invest more in his hometown.
FoodNerd raises $7.5M, prepares expansion to 800 retail stores across U.S.
The very first Series B scoop was an exciting story on FoodNerd, a 43North portfolio company which closed on seed funding that will allow it to continue outfitting its new factory in Newstead while scaling its nutritious baby and toddler snacks across the country. FoodNerd later announced that it was rolling out its products in Sprouts markets across the U.S. this year
