AVVAY Grabs $1M Seed Funding

AVVAY, a startup that helps content creators find and book locations for their projects and events, is announcing its $1M seed round (SEC announcement set for Sept. 13). The round is led by Zero G Capital, based in Denver, with participation from Matchstick Ventures, SpringTime Ventures and Service Provider Capital, among others.

AVVAY is an online marketplace, in the vein of Airbnb, helping creatives book locations for photo/video shoots, recording sessions, workshops, performances and other creative events. Locations include everything from commercial studios and venues to hidden gems in city lofts, farmhouses and other eclectic places. AVVAY's mission is to serve the rapidly growing community of content creators by allowing them to tap into resources previously only available to insiders or a select few.

AVVAY currently serves the Nashville, Portland, Chicago, Dallas and Houston markets.

AVVAY's inception lies in the creative backgrounds of its founders. While on the road touring with Paramore as a guitarist, AVVAY co-founder and CEO, Jon Howard, was also busy producing records.

"I was making a solo record for Paramore's drummer at that time – and the plan was to find interesting locations in each city we went," Howard said. "Unless I was knocking on doors or knew someone, there was no way to access these places. AVVAY was born out of trying to solve these problems for ourselves."

Along with the rest of the AVVAY founding team, Howard spent three months in Boulder, Colorado, as part of the prestigious tech accelerator, Techstars. They returned to Nashville in May, and with the closing of their seed round, the team is ready to continue AVVAY's growth.

"One of the benefits of being accepted into the accelerator program is gaining access to the Techstars Network, which has provided us with incredible mentorship," said Howard. "We spent three months taking a deep dive into our vision and processes, and now we're excited about closing this seed round and continuing to bring our vision to fruition. Content creators are massively underserved and we are addressing their challenges head on."

Howard says not only does AVVAY expect to be in additional markets by the end of the year, but they will also be announcing plans that provide solutions for other issues content creators face.

The AVVAY team includes founders Jon Howard, Nick de Partee, Josh Colbert and Nick Dominguez, early team member Mike Johnson and new addition Liza Kawaller.

"We are looking forward to creating really cool, interesting tech jobs here in Tennessee," said Howard.

AVVAY was founded in 2016 and is headquartered in Cool Springs at 106 Mission Court, Suite 103B, Franklin, Tenn. For more information, go to www.avvay.com.