Gregg Fraley

I’ve been involved* these past two years with a creativity conference in Oklahoma, now called the State of Creativity Forum. This conference has energy to spare, it feels like an accelerating fire of innovative energy. Last year’s event (for a summary look at this post) exploded with dynamic speakers, cultural, and artist happenings. Even the governor, Mary Fallin, was there to support the notion that creativity and innovation is how Oklahoma moves forward. This year features Sir Ken Robinson and Peter Diamandis of X Prize fame — and that’s just the start. It’s all taking place November 13th in Oklahoma City. By all means, if you want a great taster, or even a major feast of creative stimulation, this is

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There is a new breeze blowing in the once troubled land of Derry-Londonderry, Northern Ireland. It’s a wind bringing a refreshing sense of posibility, energy, good ideas, youth, art, music and entrepreneurial spirit. It might otherwise be called Hope. Walk the new pedestrian Peace Bridge over the River Foyle into the walled city and you’ll find a vibrant core of creative talent. I don’t know enough to comment about the Troubles that existed here, but I think it’s fair to say that Derry has turned a corner and is moving forward into a new era. To a great extent the economic playing field has been levelled — and the result is an emerging regional center of excellence in the digital arts

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It’s a shame that the reshoring trend (of manufacturing back to the USA) will take years to be realized. I’m a fan of course, I’ve written about it here before. Like many trends, it’s emerging in dribs and drabs; and some dispute it’s even really happening. I know from personal experience how difficult it is to raise funds for new manufacturing ventures in the USA. It’s a sad truth today that VC’s are more interested in funding the next iPhone app than a start-up that actually makes something. It’s also not good that the most likely candidates for reshoring — high tech equipment intensive/low labour requirement operations — are very expensive to set up. The business case can be hard

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I find it amazing how much people are absorbed in “the news” and it’s political slant or bias.  All of it is pretty much useless to innovators beyond basic awareness of current events. The news I’m referring to is information that is relayed to us by the mainstream media; the TV and radio networks, and newspapers. Web news, such as you might find on Google or Yahoo also is in this category of general news providers. I’ve got no issue with someone who scans these outlets now and then to see what’s being reported, in fact, I think to be culturally literate, one must. But focusing on this stuff too much will clutter your brain with useless poop. News is

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Briefly noted: The New York Times ran an article this morning about how Starbucks is moving manufacture of pottery mugs to a small shop in East Liverpool, Ohio. This is notable because it’s another example of “reshoring” — that is, bringing manufacturing from China and other cheap (aka slave) labor markets back to the USA. This is how restoring the economy happens, one job at a time. Kudos to Starbucks for being a good corporate citizen, and doing something that is just plain smart as well. Sales from the mugs will help support Starbuck’s Create Jobs for USA Fund. I’ve blogged about both reshoring and the Create Jobs for USA program here before — nice to see it’s an active

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Birmingham Alabama — Monday May 14th, 2012, Gonzeaux #7 It’s an image that was so arresting and shocking at the time that I’ve never forgotten it. It stained my memory like indigo on fine white linen, never to be washed out. I was nine years old. I’m talking about the sight, on national television, of black people being attacked by German Shepard’s in the Birmingham, Alabama race riots of 1963. The high-pressure water hoses were cruel, but the dogs, those vicious dogs, made my skin crawl, and it flipped a switch in my head. From that point forward I was a social progressive. I’ve not ever visited Alabama. I’ve been to nearly every state in the USA, but never had

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Elizabethtown, Kentucky — Friday May 11, 2012, Gonzeaux #5. I’m sworn to secrecy. As I sit here in Ruby Tuesday’s enjoying a petite sirloin and free wifi, I contemplate the secretive nature of innovation. Open innovation is all the rage isn’t it? You hear all the time how much it makes sense to have a generous attitude about ideas. The paradox is, some innovations need to be kept secret, or, the innovator loses advantage. Or worse, loses freedom. Do you think Pixar is sharing early rushes of their latest movies with just anybody? Or is Apple giving us any sense of their new strategy? No, it will be a surprise when they announce something really cool. Pixar has never had

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Cincinnati, Ohio — Wednesday May 9, Gonzeaux #3 After one of the prettiest drives you can imagine through southern Indiana east into Ohio, I find myself this morning in the very urban, once blighted, “Over-The-Rhine” neighbourhood of Cincinnati. This is clearly an Ohio innovation success story, in more ways than one. I would not have predicted it. I nearly lost my life here. Flashback 1974: I’m driving my beater 1960 Dodge Valiant through this neighbourhood with my dog Peaches sleeping in the back seat. It’s early evening, and stopped at a red light, the Valiant stalls. It won’t start back up. I manage to push the car over to the curb. Before I can blink I’m surrounded by 5 guys.

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I’m in Cincinnati next week to help pitch a recycling business concept to investors. It’s an exciting idea — taking waste plastic and transforming it into high value-add products. This is not a social innovation business, it’s a for-profit venture that just happens to be clean, green, and job creating. The newco is called Integrated Green Technologies (IGT) and the good news is the business plan couldn’t be more clear or exciting. This business could make a great deal of money and in a fairly predictable, not-so-long time frame. In theory, it’s an investors dream, relatively low risk, high return, a chance for explosive growth (this is my opinion, investors get in touch with me — gregg@greggfraley.com — to see

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Readers of this blog know that I advocated for the passage of  the JOBS Act (Jumpstart Our Business Startups) in the USA. This is H.R. 3606. The good news is that the bill has passed the US Senate. It was amended to provide a bit more disclosure and safety for investors, but it’s done, and this is a very good thing. Here’s a nice summary of what’s happened from the New York Times. It still needs signed by President Obama, but he will, he was behind this effort. Can the right please refrain now from calling him a socialist? This is possibly the most “free market” law in recent memory. This is a very pro-business bill and it shows Obama

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