Three days in Denver: the Denver Startup Week Ambassador Program
When I heard from a former co-worker about a fully-expenses-paid trip to Denver for three days to check out their startup scene, I normally wouldn’t have considered applying to a program like this. However, I was in a unique period of transition in my life. I just decided to leave my job at Elastic, where I made significant contributions as an early pre-sales engineer to growing the company from 70 to 1600 employees in 5 years, leading to a successful IPO in October 2018. I spent a month connecting with old colleagues and friends, talking to a lot of recruiters, and reflecting on what motivated me as I considered the next step in my career. I decided to join Apollo GraphQL to be a part of hopefully creating another startup success story.
I came to the realization that I found the most satisfaction and fulfillment in my job when I’m in situations where I’m forced to create something out of nothing. I didn’t want to join an organization where teams and processes were already well-defined. I realized I was addicted to startups. So when I received the email about the Denver Startup Week Ambassador Program, I thought this would be a great opportunity to network with and learn from like-minded people.
There are three aspects of the program and the experience I’ll cover in this admittedly long blog post:
1) The amazing group of people that made up the 2019 cohort of the Denver Startup Week Ambassador program.
2) My reflections on the transportation infrastructure Denver needs to implement to support economic growth and improving quality of life.
3) The inspiring company visits.
The 2019 Cohort
I had a bit of anxiety going into these three days. Were they going to be a super intense 72 hour period of constant socializing with really ambitious Type A personalities where we all pretend to get along, but after an hour of drinks, we find everyone to be really annoying and hate each others’ guts? Maybe this speaks to how good Conor Swanson is at his job as a recruiter but somehow he and his team of Ambassador Program organizers were able to take hundreds of applications and select a group of 50 accomplished yet humble individuals who reflected a diversity of gender, ethnicity, home base, and life experience that one could only dream of when building a team.
Most of the cohort came from San Francisco, New York, or Chicago, but there were also a few from Boston, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Seattle, Detroit, etc. What drew us all to Denver was a common interest in seeing people fulfill their life and career goals through building and growing new companies. One of the objectives of the program is to help people consider “Is Denver a city where I could either start a company or contribute to an existing Denver-based startup?” Despite reading numerous trend pieces about Denver being one of the main destinations for people wanting to escape the high cost of living and dominant tech culture in the Bay Area, I and many of my fellow cohort members were skeptical going into the week. I’m glad to report that many of us left the week pleasantly surprised!
Building the next great American city
The topic of transformation of cities to meet the needs of growing, changing, and diversifying populations is one of my main areas of interest outside my work life and this is one of the lenses through which I examined Denver during Denver Startup Week. Specifically in the context of this Ambassador Program, my main question was “Is Denver a city that is building the foundations to become a place of great economic and cultural significance?”
While there’s certainly a lot of room for debate about this, here’s what I would consider the “Big Four” American cities in terms of population, economic influence, and cultural influence in 2019: New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago. Denver is currently #19 on the list of top metropolitan areas in the US by population so it’s got a long way to go. I believe any city that wants to be economically and culturally relevant needs to aim to be in that conversation of “top” 4–5 cities in the US, even if that feels impossible in the near term. Until distributed/remote-first teams becomes standard practice for building companies, companies are going to naturally be drawn to cities with an established ecosystem for financial and human capital. This is why I believe building great cities that offer a uniquely high quality of life goes hand-in-hand with the emergence of the city as a place of economic significance.
Housing and walkability
One of the greatest challenges for cities like San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago is the rapidly increasing cost of housing. It’s really not a mystery why housing prices are becoming out of reach for many Americans in these cities though. Most cities have overly restrictive zoning policies that artificially keep housing supply low. For example, in California, much of the land around transit stations is zoned as single-family housing! The areas near transit stations should be places where we encourage high density of residential and commercial use so these people can live, work, and play in their neighborhood and other neighborhoods along transit corridors without needing a car. This seems like common-sense but sadly in the face of our housing affordability crisis and climate crisis, there is still significant opposition as seen in the struggles in getting SB 50 passed in California: https://www.citylab.com/equity/2019/04/california-affordable-housing-bill-sb50-single-family-zoning/586519/.
As Denver plans for growth, it needs to be very prescriptive in zoning for high density and resist opposition from residents who have an aesthetic opposition to high rises or believe they can maintain their current way of life at the expense of the greater good.
One good unscientific test of appropriate urban zoning is walkability to places of interest. As part of the Ambassador Program, we stayed for free for two nights at the Hilton Garden Inn Denver Union Station (thank you sponsors Southwest Airlines and Polsinelli!).
It’s in the LoDo neighborhood — a nice central location where I could totally see myself living in along with my wife and two school-aged kids. There were at least two large grocery stores (King Sooper and Whole Foods Market) within about a ten minute walk, in addition to plenty of coffee shops, restaurants, and bars.
The South Platte River is just a short walk away which has a nice path for running, cycling, or e-scootering:
We were also steps away from Coors Field (love it when stadiums and arenas are located downtown instead of the suburbs)!
It’s great to find highly walkable neighborhoods in cities besides the ones people typically think of when considering places they can live car-free! This is only possible with higher density zoning.
When you hear complaints about why a city doesn’t have the same variety, quality, and diversity of restaurants and shops that SF or NYC does, they should consider how dense their cities are — there’s very little incentive for small businesses with unique, inventive offerings to open up in neighborhoods that don’t have enough immediate demand via foot traffic to support it.
It looks like Denver is doing a lot of construction of both residential and commercial buildings in the LoDo areas and that should be a hopeful sign for anyone who wants to see Denver flourish!
Transit and mobility
You cannot have conversations about housing policy and its relationship to a city’s dynamism and growth without also talking about transportation and mobility. While walkability within a neighborhood is critical for vibrancy and quality of life, people don’t just stay in the same neighborhood all the time. The places we work are often in a different part of the city from where we live, but so are friends, family, museums, stadiums, restaurants, etc.
The current status quo for how people travel within an American city is the automobile. Jarrett Walker, author of Human Transit: How Clearer Thinking about Public Transit Can Enrich Our Communities and Our Lives makes strong arguments for why the primacy of the automobile is incompatible with the geometry of the urban landscape.
Cities like Denver that aspire to be progressive, high-growth cities must avoid the mistakes other cities are making in not moving fast enough transitioning to car-light or even car-free streets.
I spent my three days during the Denver Startup Week Ambassador Program intentionally getting around downtown Denver without a car. I tried getting other Ambassadors to join me but I clearly didn’t do a good job selling it. :) I don’t fault others too much for reverting to what they feel comfortable with, which for most is getting in a car, but it points to how our systems and culture need to change so people don’t fear for their safety when riding e-scooters and bikes on streets alongside cars.
Denver has been aggressive in rolling out e-scooter share through Lime, Bird, and others. While the rollout of e-scooters in cities around the world have been met with mixed response, our cities desperately need more geometrically-appropriate mobility options and it’s worth experimenting even if we’re uncertain whether it’s the best long-term solution.
Not everyone wants to get on a bike or scooter and that’s perfectly fine. Mass transit options like bus, light rail, subway, commuter rail, etc. must also be available. One bright spot in Denver’s street planning is their 16th St Pedestrian/Bus Mall. According to Wikipedia, it opened in 1982 — Denver was ahead of its time in converting a car-oriented street to a people-first street!
The buses that operate on the 16th St Mall are completely free which eliminates a significant hurdle for people who find it difficult to take public transit —even if people have no problem paying the fares, the user experience of having exact change, the right fare card, or the right transit app is often poor. Denver needs to consider transitioning more of their streets to look like the 16th Street Mall.
Taking the train from downtown to the airport was also really easy — much better than New York City where none of the three major airports have direct train access!
In order for Denver to become a top 4–5 American city that creates an environment conducive to economic and cultural innovation and growth, it needs to continue to aggressively encourage and implement efficient and green forms of mobility in the form of lightweight vehicles like bicycles and e-scooters, build safer streets to encourage adoptions of those forms of mobility, and build out high frequency public transit infrastructure to all parts of the city.
Company Visits
We had five great Denver-based companies host us at their offices: Catalyst HTI, Pie Insurance, Evolve Vacation Rental, Guild Education, and Ibotta. To be honest, I hadn’t heard of any of these companies prior to Denver Startup Week, but I was super impressed with each of them. The biggest thing I appreciated about these pre-IPO companies was their desire to develop innovative products and services for the average person. Pie Insurance is trying to make workers comp insurance as easy and affordable as possible to small businesses. Guild Education makes it easy for companies to offer education benefits to their employees. The mission of these companies reflects the pragmatic, down to earth spirit of Denver as a whole.
I also appreciated how many of the employees of these companies, especially those who moved from other cities like San Francisco, New York, and Chicago, placed a high value on maintaining a health work-life balance by enjoying the wealth of outdoor activities available in the area: skiing, cycling, kayaking, hiking, fishing, etc. It’s a refreshing change of perspective from the work-obsessed cultures of San Francisco and New York.
Thank you!
Thank you to the sponsors of the Denver Startup Week Ambassador Program, Southwest Airlines and Polsinelli Law Firm for introducing me and ~50 other leaders, entrepreneurs, and startup addicts to Denver and the culture that’s being created here to foster innovation.
Also a big thank you to Conor Swanson, Lacey Hyde, and all the other volunteers who made the Ambassador Program and Denver Startup Week a success! I had a wonderful experience getting to know the city and look forward to telling others how amazing Denver is!
