Durham SOUP- a Micro granting Community Dinner!

Based off of a similar model in Detroit, Durham SOUP events will feature four presentations from local early-stage entrepreneurs and/or community members with creative ideas. All attendees donate $5 (suggested) when they enter, eat dinner donated by local restaurants, and then vote on the best pitch. Whoever came up with the best pitch wins all of the proceeds from the dinner.

On April 11th, we hosted our first SOUP event at North Star church with around 40 attendants. We’re excited to be partnering with NCCU and the ReCity network to expand even further this year. Presentations can span art, urban agriculture, social justice, social entrepreneurship, education, technology and more. The only two rules are that the idea must incorporate Durham in some way and no technology can be used to present the idea.

We plan to have two student-leaders from NCCU and two from Duke running SOUP, working alongside other stakeholders in the community. In this application, we’ve outlined 8 different responsibilities that student leaders will have. Eventually, each of the four interns will be placed in charge of two responsibilities depending on interest and/or previous experience.