Photo by tonx.

We had a great turnout for the first Phoenix OpenCoffee Club, which took place April 30th at Fair Trade Cafe. About a dozen people, both entrepreneurs and investors, attended and spent several hours getting to know each other over some great coffee.

We heard at least 6 ideas pitched and discussed during the 2 hours we were there. The assembled group wasn’t shy about asking questions and raising concerns of the entrepreneurs pitching their ideas either. I know everyone appreciated hearing the perspectives of entrepreneurs and investors alike. We hope everyone who attended found the meetup engaging and useful. We sure did!

Special thanks to Fair Trade Cafe for allowing us to host our event there. The May 7th Phoenix OpenCoffee Club will be held at Hob Nobs Coffee House. We’ll try to have OpenCoffee Club every Thursday, so it’s not a big deal if there are times you can’t make it. Hope to see you there!

At Flatterline, our stated mission is to help startups realize their vision. To that end, we’ve decided to help bring OpenCoffee Club to Phoenix.

What is OpenCoffee Club?

OpenCoffee Club is a weekly gathering of entrepreneurs and investors in an informal setting (a.k.a, a coffee shop). The goal is to bring these entrepreneurs and investors together to talk about projects, collaborate and get to know each other.

It was originally started in London by Saul Klein, a venture partner at Index Ventures. Since then, over 80 OpenCoffee Clubs have sprung up worldwide. You can read more about it on Saul’s blog or at ReadWriteWeb.

Why?

On a recent trip to Boulder, CO I attended an OpenCoffee Club facilitated by Jason Mendelson of the Foundry Group. It was really inspiring to see such a vibrant startup community meeting regularly to discuss ideas, share problems, give advice and, most of all, listen to each other.

We believe that Phoenix has a lot of talented, entrepreneurial people. We want them to have the best chance to grow and succeed and this is one small way we see that happening.

The first meetup will be on Thursday, April 30 from 8am – 10am at Fair Trade Coffee. Please let us know you’re coming.

In what other ways can we help the Phoenix startup community thrive?