Before starring as the criminal mastermind, Wo Fat, in the CBS television series Hawaii Five-O, Mark Dacascos emceed the Food Network hit, Iron Chef America.  Though he probably never uttered the words himself, Dacascos will forever be associated with the iconic opening line “if memory serves me correctly …” that launched the Iron Chef brand into camp TV lore. 

If memory serves us correctly, it was a sage podcast that brought you the trials and tribulations of a travel startup in the post-pandemic epoch.  (Perhaps, it’s not an epoch yet, but if you vote this November like you did last time, it may turn into one.)  “Timing. Timing. Timing.” wasn't Failure - the Podcast’s finest hour, but none are.  Today’s episode is no exception.  Still, if it stands for nothing else, it’s that the pandemic offers succor to no business.

Welcome to the world of pick-up sports.  No, not leagues. We mean ad hoc pick-up sports.  Let us explain ….  Imagine you are a Gen X’er, in Canada.  Your pick-up volleyball games are routinely canceled for lack of attendance.  Sure, on Sunday, they told you’d they be there promptly at 5:30 p.m., the following Wednesday.  But hump day rolls around and nada.  No quorum.  No game.  Sure, you can practice your digs and jousts, but that’s not the same.

Flagging attendance got your game down?  There has to be a better way!  And, of course, there is.   It’s an app, and it’s by Bloxo, a social-networking — or should we say, a sports-networking — startup from Halifax of the great colorful north.  No, Bloxo’s app doesn’t post compromising pictures of AWOL team members to the Internet.  It starts from a different premise: that every pick-up game can be a winner, if the players plunk down the cash to ensure they’ll show up.  With an adult amateur sports market of over $1 billion, how could a startup in that market-space possibly go wrong?

Well you know where this one goes… COVID-19. Yup. But any business resilient enough to survive the Canadian winters, can certainly tough out the perils of a humidity-loving pathogen.  And, Bloxo is no exception. 

Join the team from Failure - the Podcast in a scintillating discussion with Jennifer McHattie of Bloxo.  You probably won’t get the urge to do your own pick-up sports startup, but you might learn a thing or two about weathering a pandemic.

P.S.,

Time for a shameless plug: did we mention that Bloxo was one of the winners of the MIT Enterprise Forum Startup Spotlight for 2020?