Caroline Collective turns 2!

The Caroline Collective is celebrating its two year birthday today starting at 4pm at 4820 Caroline St., Houston, TX 77004. Anyone involved with startups, social media and the tech and creative community should come by and help them mark this incredible milestone.

It’s hard to believe that such a critically important part of the Houston community has only been in existence for two years. The original founders, Matthew Wettergreen and Ned Doddington as well as the core supporters, who really are more like co-founders, Grace Rodriguez and Monica Danna have a lot to be proud of today and deserve a huge amount of credit for making Caroline the central hub of community activity. All of the coworkers, supporters and volunteers who have shaped Caroline to what it is have a hand in this success.I’m sure that those intrepid individuals who showed up to clean and paint a disused old warehouse in a not so great part of town never really thought that they would end up turning it into the home base for countless incredible events where friends are made, ideas are hatched and a community is strengthened.

Caroline has followed the path of many successful startups. They first uncovered a demand and then found a way to serve their audience. Sure, they’ve had their share of common startup issues – founder disputes, cash flow problems and market education obstacles. In the end, the passion of the founders enabled the organization to learn, pivot and execute. What started out as an interesting social experiment has turned into a flourishing movement.

I am in awe of what the Caroline Collective has accomplished in two short years and I’m eagerly looking forward to many more in the future. Startup Houston raises a St. Arnold’s to the people that have made Houston’s grassroots startup community a reality.

P.S. I hear that Caroline Collective has a big announcement at 6pm tonight, so expect to be surprised.

UPDATE: The big announcement really was a big announcement – Grace Rodriguez, the founder of http://www.aynbrand.com and tireless supporter of the Houston community was given a full partnership of Caroline Collective. She was completely taken by surprised and the crowd burst into applause. She absolutely deserves this and the picture I sent out just afterwards says it all:

marc1919

This is @gracerodriguez right after she was surprised to learn that she’s now a full partner@carolineco – 100% deserved http://twitpic.com/25yxej