5280 Magazine – May 2018

Courtesy of PopSockets

T

ime magazine might have named the selie stick one of the best inventions of 2014,

but the venerable pub missed an equally clever—and far less obnoxious—smartphone

accessory that publicly debuted the same year: PopSockets. he collapsible grips/

stands attach to the backs of phones, making them easier to hold in one hand for

taking selies or for scrolling through your Instagram feed. he brainchild of David

Barnett, a former philosophy professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, PopSockets

has increased its sales tenfold each year and delivered 35 million units in 2017 alone.

Its success story doesn’t follow the same plotline most modern startups do, though.

PopSockets has received no venture capital funding and done little in the way of tradi-

tional marketing. Instead, Barnett relied on old-fashioned hustle. He manned a booth at

the Consumer Electronics Show before connecting with buyers from Sam’s Club and T-

Mobile in his second year and landing PopSockets’ irst major retailer deals. hose coups

allowed him to hire people (like the former president of Boulder’s Kidrobot) with the

business acumen he didn’t possess. A little luck hasn’t hurt either: Early versions some-

how found their ways into the hands of celebrities such as Serena Williams and model

Gigi Hadid, serving as unexpected free marketing.

hat wasn’t the only happy accident in PopSockets’ brief history. Barnett’s initial

design—for which he ran a 2012 Kickstarter campaign—featured two separate grips,

like buttons on a snowman, around which users could weave earbud cords to keep them

untangled. But his students, an informal focus group of sorts, gravitated toward the grip

feature, so Barnett fabricated a simpler version instead. When YouTube stars discovered

the product, PopSockets capitalized, asking the social media inluencers to design their

Get A Grip

One of the country’s most popular—and useful—smart-

phone accessories is a celebrity-approved Boulder original.

own collections. Today,

the Boulder-based

company has relation-

ships with Swarovski,

Marvel, and the NBA

and ofers about 1,000

styles ($10 to $50).

Barnett recog-

nizes that PopSockets’

growth isn’t sustainable

and that the market

will soon be satu-

rated with competitors.

“New growth won’t

only come from adding

new colors,” he says. “It

will come from inter-

national expansion and

new products.” To that

end, a car-vent mount

launched in February

and a stick-on wallet

case with a PopSockets

grip will debut online

later this year. Maybe

Time will inally start

taking note.

—DALIAH SINGER

Percent of

net online

proceeds

PopSockets

donates to

nonprofit

partners

(Englewood’s

Craig Hospital

is the current

beneficiary)

10

BUSINESS

26 |^5280 |^ MAY 2018