Find the Perfect Venue with EventUp, 1st Startup Launched by Science Inc.

Zach Davis Feb 7, 2012 Tweet

Eventup, the first startup from Science Inc., the technology studio founded by ex-MySpace CEO Mike Jones, launched earlier today.

Anyone who’s been to a Tech Cocktail mixer knows first hand that the quality of a venue makes plays a major role in the quality of experience. We pride ourselves in digging through your city’s top locations to find the ideal fit. Doing so, however, requires a lot of work (right, Julia?). Eventup aims to ease this process.

“Everyone talks about how they spend so much time and effort trying to find the right venue. Often hours are wasted with location visits to spaces that aren’t quite right, or that aren’t available for booking during the event’s time frame. That is the problem we are solving with Eventup – allowing people to find amazing, unique venues online quickly and easily, while creating revenue for under-utilized and under-monetized assets.” – says Tony Adam, Eventup Founder and CEO.

I caught up with Adam to learn more of the inspiration behind his newest venture.

Tech Cocktail: What was the inspiration for Eventup? Did this idea stem from a frustration in planning an event (or events) yourself?

Tony Adam: I’ve thrown events myself and been involved in organizing conferences, so I know how painful it is to find a venue for an event. I also have heard so many people from soon-to-be married couples to other event organizers that the venue-finding experience is extremely painful.

Many times people talk about not finding exactly what they wanted or not having access or knowing where to access unique venues that would be the perfect venue for their event. When it comes to weddings or birthday parties or other personal gatherings, everyone wants a special location that will be memorable, something out of the norm.

There are tons of amazing event spaces from hotels to bars to galleries that are empty many nights because people aren’t throwing that many corporate events or parties – and it’s likely because we’re all still worried about the economy. At the same time, we’ve come across hundreds of private properties and estates that are sitting on the real estate market, and Eventup presents home owners with an opportunity to not only make money renting out their spaces for events, but it’s another avenue to market the property to prospective buyers.

Tech Cocktail: What sort of resistance has your business received from event planners?

Adam: There is always going to be resistance to new business ideas. That said, I don’t think that we have received much resistance from event planners. In fact, we work very closely with many of the top companies in the industry, have focus groups, and constantly look for their feedback on how to make the product better for consumers and planners.

Right now, we are purely focused on venues and launching in Los Angeles, but, in the future, we will definitely look at how we help planners as well. Most have already told us that they could envision using the marketplace to review more locations for clients, while saving everyone time and energy. If this cuts down on their travel time location scouting, it gives them the opportunity to take on more clients. We see this as a win-win for everyone.

Tech Cocktail: What role has Mike Jones/Science Inc. played in Eventup’s early on? Has the assistance been more than financial?

Adam: If you think about Science as a technology studio akin to a Hollywood studio, one that develops ideas in house, one that pairs talent and resources with ideas brought in, then Eventup was an idea we all generated together in-house when I started out as an entrepreneur-in-residence. They have been extremely helpful in the growth and work hand-in-hand with our team daily to create an amazing product and consumer experience. We could not have done this without them and I knew that going into it. I’m excited about being the first Science company to launch and to be working with Mike Jones and Peter Pham again.

Tech Cocktail: What learning lessons are you taking with you from your work at Myspace?

Adam: I think my experience in tech, digital media, and my experience working at some of the top Internet brands, PayPal, Yahoo!, and Myspace (as you mentioned) have all been a huge benefit to me. I was really able to showcase my ability to drive traffic at Myspace and working with a platform of that size, while in a period of decline and being one of the few growing traffic channels, if not the only one, provides me great experience in growing traffic and user acquisition for Eventup.

In Los Angeles and planning an upcoming get together? Check out Eventup to jump start your venue search.