1. Rocket City Perk
A Newsletter Highlighting the Perks For and By Small Businesses
and Startups in The Rocket City and Surrounding Area.
2. Table of Contents
Positive Motion and Art Acknowledgement 1
Small Business News and Events 2
Business Lead Focus...... 6
Classifieds....................... 9
Advertisering and Sponsoring
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“You can’t have something to look back at if
you never Build anything.”
Positive MotionA positive thought, phrase or concept to help shape your approach
from day to day
The art on the cover is provided by Christina Wegman of Christina Wegman Fine Art.
Illustrating an iconic scene from the new North Wing of Lowe Mille. This owner-run
small business is one of the prized downtown shops that has grown out of the Clinton
Row Project. Characterized by its bright and cheerful interior and its equally cheery
owner and art, the gallery is open six days a week. Focusing on prints and originals,
customers can also commission portraits of their pets, family, landscapes or even full
murals. Pricing can be found at the shop and at http://christinawegman.blogspot.
com/2012/09/pricing-and-commissions.html.
With her work gracing the walls of not just galleries, but local favorites like Sam and
Greg’s, her works ranging from abstracts with a modern tilt and portraits with a tra-
ditional base and creative twists blend together our Rocket City’s mix of varying back-
grounds. While she may not have been native born, having traveled not just across the
country but also Canada and Europe, she has been part of the art community here
since 2007. After completing her degree in German at the Rocket City’s own Univer-
sity of Alabama Huntsville she has become as much a native of the area through her
depiction of the people, places and views that are so unique to it.
4. Small Business News and Events,
SBN&E
A calendar and update about Special Events that went on and on the Horizon
This Past Month:
12/1 Pitch 101- At Hudson Alpha kicks back into swing with its competi-
tive coaching clinics for a brief period for the end of the year before taking
a break with everyone else for the holidays.
12/9 Rocket City Launch Award and Celebration Dinner-A Great turnout
to celebrate the receipt of the SBA grant and to talk about the next step as
an advanced manufacturing accelerator. Rob Adams let the night at Mind
Gear Labs as people reconnected and got ramped up for the next year.
12/11 Metabahn Pockyow 0.9 Release Party-With a little bit of direct as-
sistance from the staff and owners to counterbalance to moving dot from
Google Maps, they led an awesome talk about the software changes in their
open-source App development tool Pokyow, followed by a demonstration
and questions. It was topped off with the announcement of Ringside.IO
Beta release coming in the Spring ‘15, a service to not only develop the app
but also to help in marketing it.
12/12 Huntsville Open Tech - HOT Coffee is back from the first holiday
break with awards given for those whom have made real contribution to
the Small Business and Startup Community with awards going to everyone
of the 24 nominees and top awards in Social, Rocket Hatch, Private, Mind
Gear, for Rocket City Launch and Public, Downtown Huntsville for creat-
ing start-up spaces like Clinton Row. For the full story go to UAH’s site.
12/16 UAH Lunch and Learn- Marketing Your Brand through Linkedin.
Lead by Kellee Crawford of the Career Development Center was a break-
down of how to and the growing importance of marketing through Linke-
din and the tools necessary to develop a clear online prescence and brand.
5. 12/20 Lowe Mille North Wing Grand Opening-With a flurry of activity
and fanfare the opening of Lowe Mille’s North Wing drew in regulars and
newcomers alike admist the Solstice Market already in full swing.
Coming this Month:
1/1– New Year’s Day – Federal Holiday
1/7 – Larry Burger Retire. Cerem. (1400) – VBIII – Phil Patterson 955
1746
1/9-Huntsville Open Tech Coffee Returns-Spencer Hall
1/9 Huntsville HOT Bodies Service Professional Group-Biz Tech
1/12 – Mason Dixon Bakery & Bistro Open at 2358 Whitesburg Drive next
to Southerland Station for breakfast and lunch menu with dinner service
starting the 14th
1/15 NCMA Lunch ‘DCAA Issues’ (1130) – RFCU – Jonathan N. Hall –
www.ncmahsv.org
1/15-16 – PMINAC Dinner (17301900)/Bkst., Wkshp. (07301130) – loc.
TBD – PM Lessons Learned – David Barnett – sharness2000@hotmail.om
1/19– Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Day – Federal Holiday
1/22 CoC Ann. Mtg. (11301330) – VBCN – Pammie Jammar –
6. www.hsvchamber.org
1/27 – NCMA: ‘Team. Agree’ – location TBD – Jeff Roth –
www.ncmahsv.org
1/28– 3DPAMA Lunch – details TBD
1/28- UAH Student and Alumni Job Fair- UAH Fitness Center
1/29 15th Ann. DA Civ. Ldshp. Summit (13001600) – The Summit –
AUSA 4 www.ausaredstone.org
1/29 Inventors’ Ball (1800) – S&RC – celia.lee@spacecamp.com
1/30 – ACCRedstone ICE (Details TBD)
1/30 – NAITA Annual Meeting (1130) – Westin – Dr. Tom Cunningham
-www.naita.org
If there are any events I have left out just send me a mes-
sage and I’ll be glad to add you or put in the last month.
7. Business Lead Focus
An Interview on a Company or Event thats helping to Shape the Small Business
Environment
From a distance Rob Adams may seem like and imposing man but his
ready smile and enthusiastic nature quickly shines through. One quick
look around both MindGear Labs over on Madison Blvd or his new loca-
tion over in the North Wing of Lowe Mill shows his creative and engineer
spirit. Yet, to give a full picture of the current man one must know a bit of
who he was.
As an Engineer schooled in Astrodynamics, he stands as an expert in his
field with nearly twenty years of experience. With projects ranging from
SpaceHAB for STS-91 at Boeing and as Principal Investigator for SBIR with
International Space Systems as a System Engineer, then as an Adjunct Pro-
fessor teaching over 8 years of engineering students at UAH and then on to
working for NASA as Advanced Propulsion Technologist on various proj-
ects ranging from advanced launch and landing vehicles managing teams
up to 100 people Rob Adams has a truly inspiring resume even before
meeting his fiance Tia.
It could be said that even while he admits to, like many others, having been
drawn to the idea of starting and owning his own business, the actual push
came from his Tia. It is from that spark and much research into fab labs, or
independent fabrication laboratories MindGear Labs started to take form.
Beginning in 2012 Mind Gear Labs is the first independent Fab Lab in the
area and has already made deals with various local partners. With what
Adams described as a “Happy Accident” Rocket City Launch, a Non-prof-
it additive manufacturing accelerator, has progressed better than he could
ever expect and is his “most rewarding experience” professionally since
8. starting out on his own. Between winning competitions on the State and
Federal levels Rocket City Launch definitely is getting ready to take the
stage in building the small business and startup ecosystem in the area.
When asked about his hardest moment or his “throw in the towel” moment
he said that he hasn't reached quite “that” point. Yet he did admit that his
biggest challenge so far has been marketing. It is regrettable however be-
cause just one look around either facility feels people with the urge to cre-
ate.
While 2014 has been a full and crazy year for many of us, Rob has truly
had crazy one with the culmination of Rocket City Launch, the opening of
the New Media Arts Institute and the secondary lab in Lowe Mill's North
Wing and working on growing the brand of MindGear Labs with its very
projects and classes. To top it off his partner at The New Media Arts Insti-
tute, Leon Burnette, took his team out to Hollywood as part of the Hunts-
ville to Hollywood program. With all these projects coming together Rob
and his team definitely have their hands full on top of the upcoming launch
of their Kickstarter campaign on February 1st with their product line of
connectors that allow building with regular drinking straws. This is on top
of the Additive Manufacturing Conference planned for later this year and
the revamp of their site and launching of new product lines.
So to send everyone off on a great note for the beginning of the year, I have
these words from Rob Adams. “Success comes from a dogged determina-
tion over anything else and to use it to never give up.”
9. Classifieds
At 10 cents a word Small Businesses and Startups can advertise their
openings and needs to one another.
