Carlton L Bennett, founder of TeddyMozart,  shares his startup story with Area 31:Â
The Birth of TeddyMozart
I was born in Jamaica and I grew up listening to stories about how my grandparents met, the conversations they had by the river,  the dances they attended and often my grandma would sing songs to me that reflected these happy memories. Music speaks to us. It tells us stories when words can’t. It helps us grow, as it is the first language an infant learns. Did you know that music gives young children opportunities to practice math concepts and symbolic thinking skills?  Did you know that playing songs and using musical styles from children’s home cultures create continuity between home and the caregiving setting? (source: ZerotoThree.org) What does that mean? If you have been sung to when you were a kid, or even now as an adult, from a loved one, you know how great that feeling is and the bond it creates,
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Sadly, I missed the opportunity to record my grandma’s singing voice so that can later play it for my kids. But I don’t want families to experience this same fate. This is why we are creating a better experience for families and kids around the world.
- a solution that across geographies and time because family members are often in different locations or country.
- a solution that allows families to preserve their voice memories and store them forever because apps on the market today suck at this.
- a solution that creates a better playback and listening experience for kids.
As a result, we created TeddyMozart, a music streaming app with a bluetooth plush toy speaker.Â
The Business Model
The business model is straightforward with a price of $69 for the high quality plush toy along with a freemium app model which includes $5.99 for extra storage per month and in-app purchases of premium educational content provided TeddyMozart partners.
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How it works:
Using the uniquely built TeddyMozart app, a parent or family member, located anywhere in the world, simply records his or her voice, sings a song, melody or tells a story then creates a title, lists author, and saves. It is automatically stored in the cloud. The content creator then shares the recording with another parent or family member, who may be in a different location, who then receives the notification, connects to the TeddyMozart plush toy speaker via Bluetooth and plays the recording for his or her kids. Parents or family members can store content with longer duration forever, and as a result preserve the memories that are important to them in an organized way. The sharing of these memories through a plush toy will result in less screen time for kids as well.
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What changed since the beginning is that TeddyMozart also aims to add a public library of children’s songs, stories and educational content so that parents have complete music freedom to play their own created music memories plus play from a public library of children’s content as well. Actionable playlists are also curated to enhance kids’ listening experiences. A parent can play songs for bedtime, nap-time, bath time and more. This is great for busy parents who can take advantage of this feature to get errands or work done.
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What is unique about TeddyMozart is that we fit across three main connected toy categories: tech, education and family. What makes us different is that our secret sauce is our platform, which allows for rapid cloud storage of recorded content with Spotify-like playback features. In addition, we are the only company that is focused on posterity today – saving your content forever.Â
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One of the biggest lessons that affected the way I work is that there is never enough time of the day to do all that you want to do. You just go from one urgent matter to the next, every day. Now I’ve made it a priority to be more organized and disciplined. I plan out each day of the week and I’ve made more of an effort to get at least 6 -7 hours of sleep as I am more productive when I do. However, things don’t always go according to plan. As an entrepreneur you have to be aware of this.
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I am currently bootstrapping my company and now raising funds on Kickstarter.Â
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What is unexpected is how difficult it has become to raise money on crowdfunding sites. You have less chance of successfully raising funds if you only rely on your network. I would highly recommend that you have press coverage which usually drives the bulk of the traffic to your crowdfunding site.Â
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It’s always been a part of me to be an entrepreneur. Throughout my life I’ve always approach the world with a curious lens, questioning things and when I don’t find the answer I am looking for, I try to build it.
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My life as an entrepreneur in one word: intense.
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I believe the 5 most important attributes to have in order to become an entrepreneur are: passion, vision, humility, leadership and grit.
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My one advice for someone that is just starting out is: pursue entrepreneurship only if you are a 100% certain that you are the only one who could bring your solution into the world. Otherwise, don’t pursue entrepreneurship.
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The one thing that motivates me about my project is our vision:Â to share love and inspire growth in young children using music.
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If I could go back in time and advise myself for 15 mins, I would tell myself the following: create a story around the launch of your company. The launch of your company is not a story. A story involves showing what your product can do. For example: a storyteller could be anywhere in the world, e.g. in India, who then tells stories to kids in a hospital in New York. Show how this is possible with your product.Â
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