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http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/blog ... ml?ana=twt

St. Louis startup leaves town, citing ‘lack of angel investors’

Dabble, a California-based startup brought to St. Louis last year after it won a $50,000 Arch Grant, has moved to Chicago and raised $1 million from a group of investors led by that town’s KGC Capital.

Other investors in the round include Chicago-based Hyde Park Angels and M25 Group and Vancouver-based Pallasite Ventures.
Dabble CEO Jay Swoboda


Dabble CEO Jay Swoboda

Dabble acts as a platform that provides subscribers an easy way to teach or take specialty classes on a wide-range of subjects.

Jay Swoboda said he’d tried for months to raise money in St. Louis, but ultimately moved to Chicago in September and found the right investors.
“Dabble is still active in St. Louis and exists because of the support of Arch Grants and Capital Innovators, but it was Chicago-based investors that kept us alive,” Swoboda said. “We’re taking off around the U.S., and at the end of the day, I’d love to credit the life-saving support of Arch Grants and Capital Innovators, but it was the lack of angel investors in St. Louis that pushed me to Chicago and toward the current progress and success.”

Once again just underscoring there is no money in St. Louis now that might change as the city tries to reinvent itself, but the team needs a grand venue on a national stage and it is no longer the Gateway City.

Does that mean Kroenke was wrong about the city's prospects? Did something change along the way or did he just get fed up with their politicians?

moklerman wrote:Does that mean Kroenke was wrong about the city's prospects? Did something change along the way or did he just get fed up with their politicians?

It's a great analogy: The Rams came for the same reason Dabble did: St. Louis gave them a bunch of money to leave L.A. (In Dabble's case a 50k Arch Grant.) But once the upfront money ran out, there really wasn't much reason to stay...