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For Lockshin '14, Start-Up Success Is All About Service
From raking leaves with Lion Laborers to helping Colorado farmers rake in profits, Ethan Lockshin ’14 is quickly finding success as a social entrepreneur.
As a junior at St. Andrew’s, Lockshin founded Lion Laborers, a group that organizes St. Andrew’s students to assist members of the community with yardwork and household projects, with donations going to St. Andrew’s partner school Christ Roi in Civol, Haiti. Lockshin said he was inspired by St. Andrew’s commitment to community service.
“St. Andrew’s is very community service-oriented, and I love business,” Lockshin said. “Why not do something community service oriented and make it a business?”
The enterprise was a win-win for students and community members—students could meet their service requirement while staying active and spending time with friends, while community members could have their lawns raked and doors painted and pay what they felt the work was worth, knowing the money would go to charity. By the time Lockshin graduated, Lion Laborers had raised $25,000 for Christ Roi.
His enthusiasm for entrepreneurship did not stop there. While studying public relations and international business at Regis College in Denver, Colo., Lockshin learned about Go Code Colorado, a competition that challenges teams to develop an app using public data that can solve a problem for a business decision-maker.
He knew he wanted to enter, so he connected with Daniel Ritchie, a previous Go Code Colorado winner.
“We met over tacos and talked about what problems are out there we could help solve,” Lockshin said. “We realized we both love food, both know healthy and local food tastes better and makes you feel better, and farming is one of the industries that hasn’t been touched when it comes to tech.”
Ritchie and Lockshin assembled a team of data scientists and developers and got to work on Magpie Supply, their submission to the 2017 Go Code Colorado competition. Using historical farmers’ market data, the team created a platform that small-scale farmers can use to identify markets where they’ll make the greatest profit from their harvest.
As the team’s “people person,” Lockshin estimates that he spoke with 150 farmers and 75 truckers about the challenges of transporting and selling local produce and how Magpie Supply might provide a solution.
One of his personal goals was to prove the model works by coordinating Magpie Supply’s first sale. That sale—15 lbs. of tomatoes and cucumbers—was served to the judges during the Go Code Colorado competition May 24.
“It comes back to wanting to give back. You want your work to have meaning,” Lockshin said. “Facilitating that sale, I really realized there is a need for a platform like this.”
Magpie Supply was named one of three winners, with Lockshin being the youngest person ever on a winning Go Code Colorado team. The team won $25,000 and traveled to Silicon Valley to meet with potential investors, entrepreneurs, and partners. Later this month, Lockshin will join Ritchie for interviews with business accelerators Boomtown and Techstar.
In addition to his role with Magpie Supply, Lockshin is working this summer as a customer support intern with the email service SendGrid, and is set to graduate from Regis next year. He credits St. Andrew’s with providing the mentorship and environment that allowed him to explore his passions.
“The teachers at St. Andrew’s, they gave me guidance on how I should go about finding what I love and I care about. It’s just a good place to be, a good place for a young adult to grow,” he said.
St. Andrew’s Episcopal School is a private, coeducational college preparatory day school for students in preschool (Age 2) through grade 12, located in Potomac, Maryland.