On this episode of the Bourbon Friday Show we talk with Gill Wagner, Publishing Partner at Global Village, about Innovate St. Louis.

Highlighting Startup Ecosystem Success

Innovate St. Louis is a new book published by Global Village in partnership with Gill Wagner and Scott Levine.

As the title may suggest, this book is aimed at highlighting the many success stories from the St. Louis startup ecosystem. And one of the best parts about this book is that nobody has to pay to be in this book, nor is there a requirement to buy the book.

“It’s not a pay to play model,” says Wagner. “Everybody that gets nominated that accepts the nomination gets two pages in the book for free—there’s no requirement that they buy a book, they absolutely don’t have to part with a dime.”

In fact, Innovate St. Louis is funded by donors (also called innovation enablers) in the community, which could be anyone from larger companies who can afford to buy books, to accelerators, mentors, accountants, coaches and the like.

The book is 131 pages and is filled with stories from the innovators around St. Louis. Each featured innovator is encouraged to tell their success story in a three-part manner—starting with the spark of inspiration, then the innovation, and what their success looks like.

All-in-all, this book is aimed at inspiring the current ecosystem as well as the next generations. Additionally, due to how well received Innovate St. Louis has been, there are currently plans to launch a second volume in the upcoming years.

If you would like to get a copy of the Innovate St. Louis book, you can buy one here.

Bourbon Innovation

As always, the Bourbon Friday team does their best to choose a fitting drink for the occasion.

The bottles this week are experimental releases from local distillery, StilL 630. When talking about innovation and entrepreneurial spirit in St. Louis, Dave Weglarz, Founder and Distiller at StilL 630, definitely hits the mark. Not only is Weglarz local, he releases a new spirit blend every month on First Fridays for free, in return for feedback on his experimental spirits.