CoCo Member Bill Petrich, CEO of Suntava, (recently featured in the Star Tribune) will talk about his company’s breakthrough product: a natural substitute for Red Dye No. 40, made from Peruvian purple corn.

Bill will talk about the challenges he faces in trying to grow the business and ask for ideas from attendees.

We’ll even serve up some purple corn in the form of homemade “chicha” (a traditional Peruvian soft drink) and purple corn chips. Come learn about an innovative business model and offer your ideas!

This is a members-only event.

Register at Eventbite

Click to see more pictures on Facebook

Google Chairman Eric Schmidt paid us a visit on Nov. 30. We gave him a tour and he then held a round table discussion with three small business owners (plus Don and Kyle). Afterwards, he held a quick press conference, at which he praised the Mayor and the city for its tangible support of projects like CoCo.

During his visit, Mr. Schmidt met the Naiku crew, Dave Allen and Toby Cryns, Matt Woesthoff of The Foundation and Jason Burnett and Chuck Olsen of The Uptake.

Check out the resulting media coverage (or see the page CoCo member Joseph Rueter put together using his cool megablogging platform Rifr!):

• USA Today: “Minneapolis as a tech center? Start-ups say yes”
• WCCO TV: “Local Business Owners Meet with Google’s Eric Schmidt”
• KSTP TV: “Google Chairman Brings Encouragement, but No Jobs to MN”
• KARE 11: “Google boss stops in Minnesota”
• Minnesota Public Radio: “In Mpls., Google boss reiterates free services and slams online piracy bills”
• Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journals: “Google Chairman Schmidt lauds Minneapolis entrepreneurship”
• Downtown Journal: “Rybak hosts roundtable with Google chairman at CoCo Minneapolis”
• Finance & Commerce: “Key to growth? Google exec says it’s Google”

Verizon is playing Santa and bringing some mobile goodness to CoCo.

Stop by over the lunch hour for a chat about the future of mobile gadgetry and for some ideas on what gadgets to give for the holidays, whether you’re shopping for a mobile geek or a mobile grandma. Albert Maruggi will host the conversation in his inimitable style.

Verizon is springing for lunch (thanks!). There will be tables with the latest Verizon devices and accessories. And you’ll have a chance at winning a 4G LTE smartphone as well as CoCo day passes.

Register at Eventbrite

(Please register so we have plenty of lunches on hand!)

Have you heard of Tech Cocktail? It’s a national global tech blog that hosts events across the country, including cities like Chicago, DC, Boston, San Francisco, Austin, Boulder, San Diego and Barcelona. Tech Cocktail is coming to Minnesota to help add fuel to the bonfire that is our growing local tech scene.

Join us for an evening of fun mingling with other technology enthusiasts, investors, bloggers and entrepreneurs as we showcase local technology companies and take a closer look at their latest achievements.

Register now

Tickets: $10 early bird, $15 standard ticket, $20 last minute

Tech Cocktail offers a handful of startups an opportunity to show off in an expo-style to the rest of the Minneapolis entrepreneurial community for FREE.  If you have a startup you would like to show off at Tech Cocktail Minneapolis please submit this form. The Tech Cocktail team (which sees hundreds of startups a year) will evaluate the entries and contact you if your startup is selected. Please note that space is limited.

Apply to demo your startup at TechCocktail Minneapolis!

Thanks to our co-organizers, the Ovative Group

Tuesday, March 8
5 p.m. until ?

That’s right, it’s a bus full of geeks working on new businesses as they the journey from Chicago to SxSW in Austin. And they’re making a pit-stop at CoCo.

Come meet the intrepid entrepreneurs and send off Minnesota’s own Andy Erikson, who will join the ride.

Full story at Tech.MN

Register at Eventbrite

You will learn about:

• Changing dynamics in B2B marketing and sales – including digital marketing, inbound marketing, sales 2.0
• The role of video in this new world - Why video creates a low risk/high payoff
• Video gone mainstream – Why every company can create video at a low cost
• Case studies – Real examples of successes with video from big and small companies
• Best practices and getting started – Suggestions to improve both sales and marketing with video

About Cliff Pollan

Cliff is CEO and founder of VisibleGains, a company whose goal is to help organizations harness the promise of online video for sales and marketing. In addition to a successful sales and marketing track record, Cliff has assembled an impressive board of advisors with whom he regularly interacts. Thought  leaders such as David Meerman Scott and Steve Garfield have helped Cliff develop a robust perspective on video in this new era of sales and marketing.

Hosted by and for emerging leaders, the Minnesota Rising 2010 Un/Conference asks, “Why wait to make your mark on Minnesota?” The Un/Conference will engage emerging leaders across the Twin Cities in an energizing day of learning, skill-building, and relationship-building with their peers.

Why should you be there? Why wait?!?!

WHO

Minnesota Rising is the network of emerging leaders in Minnesota. Made up of organizations and individuals targeting the emerging leader demographic and focused on leadership development and community-building, Minnesota Rising purports that the current rising generation has the passion, opportunity, and responsibility for continuing to make Minnesota a national leader. Launched in Spring 2009 as an online platform, Minnesota Rising has engaged 20+ emerging leader groups in the Twin Cities in its coordinating forum and collaborative efforts.

WHAT

Slated for Fall 2010, the Minnesota Rising Un/Conference will engage 100+ emerging leaders across the Twin Cities in an energizing day of learning, skills-building, and relationship-building with their peers. Organized by and for emerging leaders, the Un/Conference will provide opportunities for emerging leader groups to host workshops, for emerging leaders to highlight their talents and knowledge in a fast-paced show-and-tell style format, and for emerging leaders to dialogue about critical issues facing Minnesota in a World Café layout. The daylong event will feature an inspiring keynote speaker, leadership workshops, and an organizational fair for emerging leader organizations to raise their profiles. The unconference format, which contends that the best conversations at conferences happens in the hallways between sessions, allows for flexibility of breakout sessions offered, a low barrier to entry for an emerging demographic, and an event design in line with the latest trends in innovation and technology.

WHY

Much has been made of the Millennial generation; the most positive facets focus on the potential for it to be the next greatest civic generation and revel in its rise as Minnesota and the globe begin to face myriad issues. The question is, for this engaged and energized generation, why wait? Why wait until some appointed time at which society deems it appropriate for us to assume the mantle of leadership, when in fact, we are already aware of the issues facing us and that will continue to be exacerbated before we fully come to power? Instead, emerging leaders have begun to organize themselves in the areas of philanthropy, business leadership, nonprofit, environment, and much more. Given the intersections of many of these groups around engaging the emerging leader demographic with a focus on leadership development, there is cause to organize these organizations and other Minnesota emerging leaders. Minnesota Rising believes that accelerating the relationship-building and visioning processes for this generation increases its potential to realize a shared vision for the Minnesota it hopes to shape and develop through personal, professional, and civic contributions. With shared principles or a common agenda, emerging leaders and their groups can work to achieve a healthy, active, and thriving community.

Register at the Minnesota Rising site

Register at Eventbrite

Robert Dempsey, freelance coach and author of the Life of the Freelancer blog, will host a rousing conversation on what it takes to become a freelancer. Stuck in a workaday job and daydreaming about life on the outside? Or have you been laid off and you’re wondering whether freelancing is a viable way of life? This is the session for you.

Robert will discuss the financial, motivational and practical aspects of making the big leap, including:

• Can I afford to do this? (Can I afford not to?)
• What’s the right point to leave my job?
• What kinds of planning do I need to do before quitting?
• What kinds of support do I need once I’m on my own?
• How will I start to scare up work?
• How will I stay sane?

+++

This is the first in a series of free seminars on how to be a more successful freelancer, consultant or small business owner.

Be found today by local online customers
Online Search has changed. Too many small (and not-so-small) businesses are invisible to the local customers looking for them. In this seminar Dave Allen will give you some simple tactics you can use today to make a real difference in your business visibility, regardless of the state of your website. You will leave with a checklist for listing your business and prioritization of steps to improve your reputation as well as your findability.

About Dave Allen
“I spent over 11 years in IT management and technical sales. Then, I was a partner at Infinity AccessNET a web hosting and ISP in the TwinCities. I have been interested in SEO since 2004 and have been working full-time on SEO projects for SMBs and local businesses since the sale of of my hosting company, Infinity to VISI in 2008.”

Last week we put out a call for suggestions for new events and meetups. In addition to a couple of serious suggestions, the ever-opinionated Garrick VanBuren offered,

“How about I come in and just rant for 45 minutes? It could be the start of an ongoing series called: Soapbox.”

What a brilliant idea, and one definitely worth giving a try!

So, here’s how it works. Come by for lunch on Friday. We’ll take up a little collection and order some pizzas. We’ll have 3 ranters. Each one gets a 1/2 hour to pontificate on any subject they choose. We assume ranters will pick reasonably intelligent subjects, but who knows?

For Aug. 27, we’ve got the following ranters lined up:

• Garrick VanBuren (it’s his idea after all)
• Patrick Rhone
• Nancy Lyons The Unknown Ranter (actually, we don’t have someone lined up for this slot yet. Interested? Let us know!)

Attendance is free with a Social ($30/mo.) or other membership.