We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Christopher Bent a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Christopher, appreciate you joining us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

I’ve always been entrepreneurial, and have always loved taking ideas, making them real and sharing them with the world. But it wasn’t until the age of 26 when I got my first corporate job that I realized this was also keeping me alive. Shortly after leaving the world of entrepreneurship for a stable, bi-weekly salary, benefits and a cappuccino machine did I not only realize that a corporate sales role was not a good fit for me… it was slowly killing my soul. This made me realize that entrepreneurship had been scratching my creative itch, and with little opportunity to exercise creativity in my work, I got curious whether I was the only one.
I soon found the Adobe State of Creativity report, which stated a staggering 69% of people also felt they weren’t living up to their creative potential.
This is when I decided to put the startup skills I had acquired through the years to make creativity more accessible to everyone, especially those not in the “Creative Department”

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

The seeds of entrepreneurship were planted in me early since starting a landscaping company at the age of 13. A desire for greater impact led me to start Crowd Solar in College which endeavored to crowdfund solar panels for community organizations and pay back individual investors as it generated electricity. Going through many business incubators and pitch competitions helped me hone the craft of developing products and bring them to market.
A short, demoralizing stint in corporate sales led me to start Piccles – a visual communication platform which gets its name from a combination of Pictures and Pixels. If you’re familiar with some of the other audience engagement tools, you can think of Piccles as a cross between a virtual whiteboard and polling tool.
Speakers, Trainers, Facilitators, Teachers, Team Leaders and Community Builders all use Piccles to lead deeper, more engaging discussions and create as a community, letting everyone play their part in the big picture.
There is a big problem with engagement right now. Big brands have spent billions figuring how to best maintain and monetize our attention. Without engagement, we quickly turn to TikTok, email or Instagram, so Piccles provides these leaders easy, simple and fun software to make their audience an active part of the experience, so they stop being an audience altogether, and transform into actors.
This has led me to develop skills as a public speaker and facilitator, along with countless collaborators, advisors and advocates who have helped along the way.

Have you ever had to pivot?

We built a product, and then started seeking out a target market (not a good idea). The biggest need we identified was to help build connection and community for kids in children’s hospitals. We pursued this for over a year, getting a pilot project at Montreal Children’s Hospital, but the complicated business model and red tape involved were indicating a long, uphill climb. Then the pandemic happened, and the meeting and events industry quickly shut down and moved online. A huge need arose for ways of fighting “Zoom fatigue” and delivering memorable moments behind computer screens, so we quickly pivoted to this industry and found quick wins and easier success.

Do you have multiple revenue streams – if so, can you talk to us about those streams and how your developed them?

We started as a SaaS product, thinking that subscription sales would be our source of revenue. But working in the events industry, we soon realized clients didn’t want to learn a new tool, they wanted the end product – what it could do. So we had to build a suite of services to accompany the software so they could ensure a successful experience without lifting a finger. Now, we’re building out our physical goods revenue stream, where all of the drawings captured from these events find their way onto shirts, mugs and hats to provide a unique souvenir – a snapshot in time of the people who gathered for the experience.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.piccles.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/makepiccles/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MakePiccles
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisbent/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/makepiccles
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX0XCjjdtE9X0nUqvBBHdfQ