The BurntPi Pitch

As far as any type of public speaking goes, saying that I hate doing it is an understatement, but for my BurntPi elevator pitch I didn’t have a choice.  On Wednesday, our class had two to three minutes to pitch our ventures to a panel of three judges who then graded us and also provided some feedback.  I was pleasantly surprised that doing my pitch was much less nerve-racking than I thought it would be.  I can probably attribute this to practicing it to multiple audiences prior to the final pitch and being so passionate about my product because I believe it can sell!  Overall, I think my pitch went well and most importantly, I am glad to have it over with.  I also appreciate the panel of judges because they offered new insight into my venture with aspects I had not thought about before.  It is always good to have “fresh eyes” for new ideas to sprout and I’m excited to look into the different things that they brought to my attention.  If you’d like to get the gist of my pitch, you can find it below or if you see me in public, I can sell you my idea right then and there!

“Bubble” – (intro and anchor) - Here you are sitting listening to me talk, but when was the last time you cooked on your stove?  Was it for breakfast this morning or lunch this afternoon?  Are you 100% positive you turned it off?  If the answer to that is possibly no I have the BurntPi to introduce to you today!

 “Heart” – (a genuine, personal, intuition for why it must happen) - The idea for my venture came from my life in a sorority house, living with 40 other women.  We often have the issue of people leaving the stove on, even overnight sometimes.  This obviously is an extreme hazard for the safety of our house and the ladies living in it.  This pertains to my daily life, but after further thinking it applies to many other people as well especially the elderly!  As we grow older we get more forgetful and sometimes even suffer from Alzheimer’s or dementia and what’s worse than your parents or grandparents potentially being in danger because they have become more forgetful in their older age?  THAT is why my product is necessary in the life of many people.

“Mind” – (food for their intellectual, logical, and judgmental sides) - So at this point you may be wondering exactly what my product is… the BurntPi is a heat sensing, motion sensing piece of technology that will alert a person if they leave their stove on.  It actually has multiple purposes, for the sorority house, it will capture who is in the area when the stove is left on which allows the culprit to be identified to be more careful in the future.  For the elderly, when the temperature reaches a certain degree, a notification will be sent to remind the person that the stove is on and it needs to be turned off.  Most importantly though, the BurntPi is designed to keep all users safe!

“Imagination” – (the power to see themselves on your mission) – Statistically, if you look at Figure 1 (on handout) you can see that residential building fires are increasing every year and in Figure 2 (on handout) you can see that the highest cause for these fires is cooking equipment, such as a stove.  Further in Figure 2, you can also see how detrimental these fires caused by cooking equipment were by looking at the percentages of death and injury.  These statistics can be decreased and potentially even eliminated with the usage of the BurntPi because the user would be identified BEFORE it got to the point of a fire!  This product was created to keep users safe.  It could save a life and that’s why it is necessity in your home today!