IamA 22 year old Highschool dropout who pursued my dream

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Hey everyone!

I'm Matthew, founder of The Elevated Movement. I dropped out of high school at 16 and got my GED while working full-time, then went on to college for a semester before realizing that structured academics wasn't where I wanted to be.

I traveled on a cross country road trip to California, lived there for a year before coming back to travel the East Coast. I've been through periods of homelessness, staring over from scratch, and trial and error. It's been a very interesting time in the 6 years between leaving High school and where I am now. The journey is just beginning, and it feels good to be close to closing out the first major step in the process to creating a company that helps me pursue my passions.

The Elevated Movement creates lightweight camping hammocks. Maybe you've seen these kind of hammocks around. They are made of solid fabric as opposed to rope and have a gathered-end unlike the hammocks you see with the spreader-bars on the ends. The crux of this difference is that they are lighter and retain balance, meaning you won't flip over in them. Hammocks are becoming more popular as alternatives to tents for backpackers as set-ups can be more lightweight and generally more comfortable than traditional tent styles.

I've been hanging around and hiking with hammocks for a couple years and I wanted to innovate on what already existed and try to test the current business model.

My goals:

Break the mold from current hammock manufacturers and create hammocks made 100% here in the USA and not outsource production

Make my hammocks from 100% recycled materials and have a focus on sustainability and eco-consciousness in each aspect of production. (I'm creating a hammock, something we use to enjoy nature with, it should be made in a way that compliments its use and not counter to it)

Match the current price point of hammocks on the market.

Build my business solely through word-of-mouth and never pay for advertising or facebook promotions, adwords campaigns etc. I knew that in a niche market word of mouth would be the most beneficial form of spreading word and I could focus those expenses on creating the product.

Create something unique and find a way to truly add value to my hammocks in addition to creating them sustainably in the USA.

So far I have accomplished my goals and hope to continue adding to them.

Every hammock we make is made from 100% recycled plastic. Most of this plastic comes from plastic bottles that are turned back into polyester filaments. We're helping reuse and reduce waste instead of creating our hammocks from virgin-synthetic fibers that require twice the amount of energy to create and contribute to our use of a non-renewable resource.

We plant 2 trees for every hammock that we sell. This isn't just a hippie ideal, you need two trees to hang a hammock with, and it's our way of being more active in the reshaping of global landscape. Recycling is aweosme, but going one step further and replacing waste with trees is even better.

All of our hammocks are made in North and South Carolina. Everything about our process is local, I tried to keep all facets of production as close as possible to reduce carbon footprint that comes from shipping. Eventually I'd love to have my own bio-diesel or hybrid trucks that can transport my freight between production facilities to further reduce my footprint, but being 100% recycled and planting trees is a great start.

Every hammock has its own design printed onto it. We're the only hammocks that have this. All other hammocks come in solid color arrangements. I wanted to give everyone a chance to choose something more than a color. We have over 10 artists right now that have created some amazing designs, along with designs from the Hubble Telescope and some other basic patterns that a more pleasing that a solid red, for example.

Each artist receives 30% of the profit from every hammock sold as a way to foster more art and help bring art to new places. Our hammocks are a new way for artists to get their work seen in more and more places. The world needs more art, and people need to spend more time in hammocks.

By offering custom designed hammocks as well, I've opened the door up to a possibility of having schools and companies use them for promotional materials, or as something fun to have around campus. Imagine working at your startup in a hammock instead of a desk-chair. Now we're talking.

I've grown my Facebook presence to 4,500+ followers without paying for any advertising or promotional posts. A lot of my fans have come from seeing the posts made by the artists that we work with posting about our project. Without our network of artists we wouldn't be where we are today.

It's been a consistent journey of education, research, risks and trial and error. If you're thinking about starting something of your own and have questions, throw em my way! I'm buy no means an expert in any of this but I feel like talking things out can be the best way to resolve things that linger in your head.

I hyperlinked to it above, but here is the official Kickstarter page if you want to check out the video and see more about the behind the scenes process.

I'll be around all day, it's rainy here in Boston and I've got work to do!

-- Matthew

Comments: 104 • Responses: 40 • Date: 2014-04-26 20:28:32 UTCsource

allahspork21 karma2014-04-26 20:45:43 UTC

I think i speak (ask) for the majority of people here by asking you which is your prefered / go to version of Super Smash Bros and why?
Please could you also explain in around 1000 words what and why you are excited / interested about in respect of the upcoming 3DS and WiiU versions.

Many thanks for your time.

IamA 22 year old Highschool dropout who pursued my dream to create my own company. I'm a mod of /r/hammocks and a long time redditor / traveler. The journey to where I am now has been one I'd like to share filled with adventures, homelessness and ...