Need a plumber? New to town and wondering about optometrists? Fidatto was designed to help you find a trusted service provider using your existing network  of Facebook friends. Fidatto is a free Facebook application which allows you to find and recommend local service providers like plumbers, dentists, hair stylists, roofers, etc. Instead of browsing through hundreds of recommendations by people you don’t know in Yelp, craigslist or the Yellow Pages, you can see who your Facebook friends are using. Fiona Schlachter, who started Fidatto with 3 partners,  had the idea after seeing  so many of her Facebook friends ask for recommendations  in a wall post and get dozens of responses. She thought a free app developed for Facebook would be a more efficient way to promote your favorite service providers and find new ones.

Fiona credits the amazing support of the Boulder startup community with giving her the experience and confidence to start Fidatto. She left her corporate life and spent about a year working with and attending events in the startup community (SnapImpact, Boulder Open Coffee Club, Girls in Tech, Boulder Denver New Tech, Ignite, Boco, Silicon Flatirons, and many more) and it felt like an entrepreneurial internship.  She learned so much that she and her business partners decided to tackle what  they saw as a significant  opportunity to improve the word of mouth experience for Facebook users.  The best part is that she is having more fun than expected.

Fidatto  went live in June 2010 and is growing slowly as planned. This is a bootstrap effort and Fiona is the only full-time partner today.  They want the tool to evolve in a manageable way and plan to introduce new features and functions as demand grows and the business becomes more mature.  The long term goal is for Fidatto to be a part of your profile, like your education or current city, so that Facebook can enrich communities by promoting local service providers.

Allow me to introduce myself:  My name is Warren Ng and I am one of Boulder’s newest entrepreneurs.  Having just begun my entrepreneurial career, you might call me an entrepreneurial virgin.  While my education and professional experiences have been peppered with elements of entrepreneurism, Napkin Labs is my first leap into the unknown associated with how to create a successful company.  While the idea was very much there, the execution needed help and in the few short months that my business partner and I have dedicated to Napkin Labs, we’ve accomplished a great deal because of the camaraderie and support of the startup community in Boulder.

Immediately, in many of our preliminary conversations to suss out the viability of our business, a few names who have been pivotal to creating the startup community I’m writing about came up which include Brad Feld, Andrew Hyde, and David Cohen to name just a few.  Through these contacts, we were quickly welcomed and assimilated into the diverse community of experienced entrepreneurs who approach business in a “pay it forward” sort of attitude. Each of the contacts we met with felt the need to help others as they had been helped early in their growing careers.  These sort of interactions happened multiple times a day and has resulted in success at a pace that would have otherwise taken many more months if not years to arrive at had the community not lent the support to Napkin Labs as it has.

For the support received to date, thanks goes out to all!  I look forward to the day that I too can pay it forward.

So what does all that mean.  If you are considering taking the entrepreneurial plunge or have just done so never hesitate to reach out.  Schedule as many meetings as you can to learn from those around you.  Don’t be afraid to reach out to those you’ve never met.  You will quickly find a welcome committee in response to your requests.

No longer should it be difficult to get time with VCs or advisors; remember it is you the entrepreneur that offers upside potential.  It’s VCs like Brad Feld who get this and know that with some advising they can help.  Thus programs like http://winterinthebunker.com/ where world class advising is offered for free and Entrepreneurs Unplugged where slice of life interviews are open to the public are popping up more and more across the entrepreneurial centers spread throughout the states.

The approach to entrepreneurism has been redefined and the barriers that have once prevented it have now dissolved due to the support of startups.  How do you support startups?

More about the author:  Warren Ng is the co-founder of Napkin Labs, a product innovation consultancy that utilizes a crowdsourced approach to innovation to enable breakthrough ideas to bubble up at the intersection of diverse thinking as consumers and experts in all fields.  For more information about the author or Napkin Labs visit www.napkinlabs.com or follow on Twitter: @warrenng or @napkinlabs.

Boulder.me ambassador Tara Anderson and mommyblogger-about-town Aimee Giese are hosting three ‘Get Your Social Media On’ seminars starting this Thursday, October 22nd at Gordon Biersch in the Flatirons Mall. To snatch up some tickets all you have to do is click here and give them (very little) money.

Back by popular demand we are hosting another installation of Startup Drinks.  Again we are partnering with our life-science brethren, the BioBeers crew, at Twisted Pine Brewing Company at 3201 Walnut Street in Boulder at 6:30pm.  Please spread the word (email, Twitter, Facebook, phone, carrier pigeon).  Looking forward to seeing you all there.

For more info, follow @startupdrinksCO on Twitter and read the Startup Drinks Boulder blog.

See you Tuesday!

(Late Friday edit: BarcampBoulder 4 is cancelled due to weather.)

Almost a year ago, I attended a session at BarCamp Vancouver ’08 called something like, “How does BarCamp apply to the real world?”

It’s a great question.  In my experience, the talking we do at an event like BarCamp is merely a part of — maybe even the start of — ongoing conversations that bounce around town, generate excitement, and spark new important/awesome/hilarious endeavors.

For example: At BarCamp Boulder 3 last year, Andrew Hyde held a little brainstorming session about how to get CU involved in the local startup scene.  He was having all sorts of trouble finding the right person or group to talk with.  We all offered ideas, and I bet most of us recalled that conversation now and again over the winter.

Some of us, it would seem, kept thinking about it and working on it.  Here we are on the eve of BarCamp Boulder 4, not even a year later, and CU is just finishing up its  first-ever CU Entrepreneurship Week.  Governor Bill Ritter is scheduled to speak this afternoon on campus about the “Entrepreneurial Ecosystem.”

As everyone reading this blog knows, Boulder has received national attention of late as an example of the entrepreneurial ecosystem.  BarCamp is one of the great watering holes of that ecosystem: Smart, engaging people come out, have a drink together, let their ideas mingle, and leave with new energy and plans.

It’s worth pointing out that BarCamp isn’t just about starting businesses or writing code: It’s about us.  It’s about living here in Boulder (or Northern Colorado, or the Rocky Mountains, or whatever).  It’s about things that we care about and work on, and connecting with others who care about or work on them too.  So if you have a topic that needs some attention, or an idea that needs some scrutiny, or a magic act that needs some volunteers, bring it.

BarCamp Boulder 4 kicks off tonight at 6 p.m. with beers (provided by Techstars), conversation, and maybe — by the looks of things — some snowy adventures.  Tomorrow morning we’ll have bagels and coffee (provided by Hop Studios) and start the sessions at 10 a.m.  Everything happens at 1375 Walnut, lower level.  Admission is free.  Sign up here so we know how many bagels to buy.

Looking forward to seeing you there.

(Not sure what a BarCamp is?  Wikipedia knows.)

Two events were just added to the Boulder Calendar:

Feld-Weiser One-on-One: Feld on The Entrepreneurial Ecosystem
@ Wittemeyer Courtroom, Wolf Law Building
April 15, 2009, 5:00pm
Register @: http://www.silicon-flatirons.org/events.php?id=611

April Entrepreneurs Unplugged: With Glenn Jones, Founder and Former CEO of Jones Intercable, Inc., and Chairman and Chancellor of Jones International University
@ Wittemeyer Courtroom, Wolf Law Building
April 15, 2009, 6:00pm
Register @: http://www.silicon-flatirons.org/events.php?id=480