Fund Me KC: Lume Lifestyle

Who: Waira Mungai, Founder and CEO of Lume Lifestyle

What: Lume Lifestyle is a lifestyle brand, aiming to merge fitness, fashion and technology. We invented a new product called “Lume Smart Leggings.” They feature a patent pending pocket that has been specifically designed for smartphone interaction. Our pocket has a special mesh that offers touchscreen functionality. It is sized to safely fit every phone on the market from the iPhone 4-6+. Our leggings help integrate technology seamlessly into active life.

[pullquote]“Start off strong by leveraging your personal, and social networks. Multiply that effort by getting your friends to leverage their’s.” – Waira Mungai
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How much: We hope to raise $10,000 in 30 days. The $10,000 will go toward our first full production run, and order fulfillment.

How it’s different from other campaigns: We really focused on keeping our Kickstarter video clear and to the point to showcase the possibilities of our product, and communicate the Lume brand, subtly, through actions of the individuals in our video. We chose to separate our story video from the actual Kickstarter video to heighten intrigue for the product.

Quirky or fun facts about the campaign: Lume Lifestyle has been created by students at the University of Kansas. We are all proud of where we’re from. We chose $17 and $38 as our first perk price levels as a way to represent where we’re from, and recognize the World Series winning Royals.

Advice on crowdfunding campaigns: Launching a Kickstarter campaign is a very time intensive, and detailed, process. In order to be successful, every aspect of the campaign needs to be well thought through, designed and tested by people who represent the target audience of the campaign. Start by knowing your product and the target audience.

As the founder of a company, or inventor of a product, it is easy to get lost in the details of your product. It is easy to get lost in a single perspective of the product, and focus on non-essential components of the story and product. For that reason, it is important to have consistent non-biased feedback to ensure that all of the essential features and messaging gets across through your video, description, photos, and story text in a way that is appealing to the audience in which you are targeting.

Plan ahead
Timing can be one of the most important aspects of your kickstarter campaign. Events going on in the external environment can be the biggest determining factors of a successful Kickstarter campaign.

We chose to launch before Thanksgiving to take advantage of changes in temperature and consumer spending behavior leading up into the holidays. We knew it was important to have product validation before Black Friday and Cyber Monday, in order to lead to the highest conversion in the press.

Build a team
It is very essential that you have a team of people willing to help you launch your campaign.  Start off strong by leveraging your personal, and social networks. Multiply that effort by getting your friends to leverage their’s.

Involving more people creates more surface area for “luck.” It just so happened that one of my friends knew a former writer for Mashable.com. That connection led to dozens of articles in the course of the last thee days and likely many more.