Stan Announces Launchpad, a 14-Day Competition for 100 Founders With a $100,000 Prize

Founders will live and build together at a private camp in the Poconos, with mentors and speakers including Gary Vaynerchuk, Sophia Amoruso, Zach Yadegari and Brandon Bryant. The program will be filmed as a documentary series and closes with a Demo Day in front of investors.

NEW YORK, Sept. 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Stan, the company on a mission to help anyone live life on their own terms, today announced Launchpad, a 14-day program bringing 100 founders together to start and scale their companies by sharing their journey publicly. Participants will turn their ideas into companies, growing awareness around what they're creating and learning how to build distribution from day one.

The program will run October 4–19th, 2026 at a private camp in the Poconos, about two hours from New York City, and will include masterclasses and mentorship from leading operators and investors, protected focus time, immunity and elimination rounds, and a closing Demo Day in front of actively investing firms.

Throughout the 14-day program, founders will live and learn alongside other early-stage entrepreneurs, receive ongoing mentorship from Stan co-founders Vitalii Dodonov and John Hu, and compete for a $100,000 prize. The full experience will be filmed and produced as a documentary competition series, giving audiences a front-row seat to the founder journey.

"Building is easy. Distribution is hard. You can build the best product in your category and still lose to someone who started building an audience a year earlier," said Vitalii Dodonov, Co-Founder of Stan. "Building in public is how founders build distribution before they need it, and it's what we will be teaching at Launchpad."

Throughout the program, founders will use Stanley, a Personal Head of Content built by Stan, to document their journeys, develop content and share what they're building with a broader audience, putting Stan's belief that distribution is a core founder skill into practice.

Launchpad is open to early-stage software and AI founders, with roughly 30 teams made up of 100 founders expected to be selected. Programming will include sessions from Gary Vaynerchuk, serial entrepreneur, chairman of VaynerX and CEO of VaynerMedia; Zach Yadegari, co-founder of Cal AI and founder of Flow; Sophia Amoruso, founder and managing partner of Trust Fund and founder of Nasty Gal; and Brandon Bryant, co-founder and partner at Harlem Capital.

"A handful of people bet on me before there was anything to bet on. That is the only reason Stan exists," said John Hu, Co-Founder of Stan. "Launchpad is our turn to make that bet on a hundred other founders."

Applications are open now at launchpad.stan.com and will remain open until September 25th 2026.

About Stan
Stan is the ecosystem helping anyone live life on their own terms. Stan brings together Stanley, a personal Head of Content, and Stan Store, an all-in-one hub for selling digital products, coaching, and community programs. Since 2021, Stan has helped more than 90,000 people to build their visibility, their business and their confidence, earning more than $600M through Stan Store. We believe anyone, anywhere can make it if they work hard.

SOURCE Stan