Accelerating WorkHound Week 12 — Winning Truck Tank

6 min readSep 1, 2015

The prep

Andrew chuckled when I told him I wanted to sign us up for “Truck Tank”, a pitch competition in Dallas at the Great American Trucking Show: one of the top trucking trade shows in the US. The competition was styled after TV show Shark Tank, with a trucking twist. The winner received $5K, mentorship, press and fantastic connections within the industry.

We survived the video submission and passed a phone interview to be selected as one of 10 finalists to pitch in Dallas. I was looking for an excuse to get down there to connect with trucking companies, so this was a perfect opportunity to go.

This was also a great avenue for us put our demo day pitch to the test after hours of rehearsal, as we’re presenting on September 10th in Omaha to conclude our Straight Shot accelerator experience.

Day of Truck Tank

I spent an extra few days in Dallas scoping out the trade show, connecting with folks from around the industry and squeezing in some extra pitch practice until Andrew arrived.

As the day kicked off, the team at CFFNation (the group organizing the Truck Tank event) organized the 10 finalist teams into a small room and individually brought members out to be interviewed on camera. They really worked hard to give this thing a reality TV-style vibe.

As we waited, Andrew and I met a few of the teams in the waiting area. The event truly went for variety of finalists, as the top 10 ranged from a children’s book author, patented engine systems, solar panels for the tops of trucks, clothing and our software among a few others. I got restless and left the waiting area to go chat with trucking companies in the area — the hustle never stops!

The pitch

The Truck Tank judges. Photo from Twitter by @BethanyAWill

As we waited to get called to pitch, we found out that we wouldn’t be making just a straight six minute pitch as practiced, but that the judges would be interrupting us during our pitch to ask questions or make comments. Of course they would, they want to make for a good show. We decided to stick with the format we had in place.

When we took the floor, we stood in front of four judges: two CEOs of trucking finance companies, an entrepreneur coach and the CEO of one of the 50 largest trucking companies in the US.

Despite a few interruptions and having to speak over the noise of the trade show, we owned the pitch. We concisely answered questions and almost every question led straight into the next slide’s talking point. The biggest challenge was differentiating from the existing competition and I think we did a great job demonstrating the importance of realtime feedback between drivers and their companies.

We left the presentation area to await the announcement of the finalists.

Final three

All 10 teams were called back for feedback from judges and a “tanking” of seven teams. Several teams were on the bubble for not taking enough action leading up to the competition and didn’t make the cut.

With a sigh of relief, we were called in the top three for one final challenge. Our competitors at this point were a trucker sleeve concept and proximity indicators to help truckers know if a car is in their blindspots.

They asked us one question: why did we deserve to win?

I’m proud of our answer, as Andrew and I both added to the winning recipe. I told them that we quit our jobs, that we weren’t paying ourselves and that we grind on WorkHound every day, including weekends — as that gives us an extra 38% capacity over the competition (thanks to Adam Griffin from Bodeefit for that stat!)

Andrew jumped in saying that “we are cheap to keep alive and five thousand dollars buys a lot of beer and ramen noodles”. I couldn’t help but smile.

After a few minutes of debate, the judges called us back and announced “WorkHound” as winners.

Thanking the judges after the win. From @DasekeInc on Twitter.

Andrew and I couldn’t help but grin, as four months ago WorkHound wasn’t even a company and here we were winning a business competition run by some of the top players in our industry. We took pictures, met with press, got our real, signed check for $5K, got connections to judges and others around the industry that offered to help and stopped to get a beer — that’s become a key routine for us — the celebratory beer.

Aftermath

No one ever tells you how awkward it is to carry a big ass check, but it’s awkward and beautiful — because we were those guys with the big ass check and trophy.

The $5K is a huge boost to our team, as we really can stretch that a few more months to get WorkHound to the next level. The future mentorship from the judges will be invaluable and the deeper connections to the industry will be essential to our future growth. We were featured in a great recap article in Overdrive, one of the industry’s leading publications.

The startup world is truly a roller coaster of emotions, but hitting high points like this one are the extra bit of encouragement that can make or break a company. Right now we’ve got strong momentum and we’ll keep on truckin’.

Quick Overview

(See Week 1 post for more details)

At WorkHound, we’re tackling a big issue in the trucking industry: the 97% driver turnover rate. We’re building a platform to allow drivers to share feedback with their companies. Companies then receive the aggregated feedback to improve the driver experience.

This is our weekly post highlighting our learnings and actions each week in the Straight Shot accelerator out of Omaha.

Other Updates:
Week 1 Update // Week 2 Update // Week 3 Update // Week 4 Update //
Week 5 Update // Week 6 Update // Week 7 Update// Week 8 Update//
Week 9 Update // Week 10 Update // Week 11 Update