Starting Up and Pulling Off the Creation of a Top Company

There are countless statistics suggesting Colorado has one of the most entrepreneurial ecosystems in the country. For proof, check out our top startup companies: Green Chef, Blinker and Choozle.

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WINNER

GREEN CHEF

Boulder-based Green Chef is a meal subscription service, offering consumers organic ingredients and recipes deliver in paleo, omnivore, vegan, vegetarian, carnivore or gluten-free options. The packages also contain step-by-step instructions designed to help the user prepare the meal in 30 minutes. The packaging is recyclable, reusable or compostable, and the organic ingredients have no GMOs, synthetic pesticides, irradiation, sewage sludge, antibiotics, growth hormones or steroids.

The company shipped its first order in October 2014, and since has grown to 800 employees delivering to about 97 percent of the U.S.

"The biggest surprise is that we actually pulled off creating a company as large as we did in a short time," founder and CEO Michael Joseph says. "I know it's happened out there, but it's a rare duck to grow something so quickly."

Green Chef says it is the first business in the industry to have worked with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to define what a certified organic meal kit company looks like. Now, the company says its advantage is selling the largest swath of certified organic foods in the direct-to-consumer space. The company has built economies of scale in organic foods, and it owns the data around its customer interactions with recipes and manufactured products. Green Chef plans to continue building out the brand while offering increased personalization around food.

FINALISTS

BLINKER

Blinker is the mobile app that allows anyone to buy, sell or refinance cars themselves, without going to the bank or dealership. Using patented image recognition technology, the process is as easy as snapping a photo. Since its 2016 launch, Blinker has generated more than 55,000 app downloads. The company has also established partnerships with CARFAX, Black Book and others to deliver an informative and streamlined experience within the app. The Denver-based company recently expanded into Texas and has plans to launch in other top markets this year.

CHOOZLE

Choozle provides a digital advertising platform that leverages detailed a consumer data to power real-time programmatic campaigns across display, mobile, social and video mediums, all from a single, simple interface. Designed for ad agencies and marketing departments, Choozle has democratized the ad-tech ecosystem with its simple, elegant and affordable solution.

The four-year-old company hosts a winter and spring summit where employees take a trip to Breckenridge for two to three days for meetings, plus skiing, massages, golfing and rafting.

ADVENTOS

​Two-year-old Adventos has a goal to impact 1 billion people through improved public safety. The Greenwood Village-based company provides a software service solution to law enforcement and first responders to be proactive in their impact on public safety and community engagement. The company offers SmartForce, law enforcement-specific software designed to connect agencies internally and to the communities they serve to manage proactive policing strategies, use-of-force reporting an other workflows.