Bizooki.com – Site Has Serious Upside Potential

Remember the parent-to-parent joke about how only their kids knew how to program the VCR?

Well, Andy Tabar was one of those kids. On steroids.

Tabar is winner of the “Huge Upside Potential” group in StartupNation’s 2008 Dorm-Based 20 ranking.

Visit the 2008 Dorm-Based 20 Winnners

The 21-year-old Tabar started building Web sites at age 11. By the time he was 14, he turned a profit. Now, the incoming senior at Belmont University in Nashville, makes just shy of six figures and has people working for him as far away as India.

Maybe “potential” is a bit of an understatement.

Tabar’s latest venture is called Bizooki.com, a business-networking site that aims to connect people around the world together on potential projects. For example, if you are a business owner that needs assistance on anything from Web design to writing music for a commercial, Tabar wants you to log on to his site to find talent.

One of the reasons the Cleveland native, who is majoring in entrepreneurship, thinks there will be a demand for the service is because of trends in the corporate world. Headcount is being reduced, which puts more talent on the street looking for their own business opportunities. And then there’s the growing allure of the work-for-yourself lifestyle.

“We’re seeing the shift from big corporate America to people starting their own businesses,” he says.

Tabar says that he has put tens of thousands of dollars into the venture. And though he has years of Web-building experience Tabar has hired employees virtually, from across the United States and as far away as India and Ireland, to build Bizooki. He’s building the site in a way that’s consistent with how he envisions his ultimate site customers will use it.

“I realized the importance of talent not only locally but globally and how the economy is shifting that way,” he says.

Bizooki will launch this fall, and Tabar sees his viral marketing campaign hitting full stride by the end of the year. So far, he says, investors have shown interest, but he wants to wait until he graduates next year before entertaining any offers. Between work and school, he’s kind of got his hands full right now.

But it seems as though Tabar’s had his hands full for a long time now.

He got his start building Web sites as a child because “it just felt right,” he says. It evolved into doing them for local small businesses, his church and musicians. Tabar has also constructed online entertainment guides in Cleveland and Nashville, and is doing work for a “large beverage company” that he can’t reveal.

“I’ve always just naturally wanted to create, and I’ve always been a worker,” Tabar says, referring to what drives him.

He also calls himself a “dreamer” pointing out that his influences are not limited to the tech world and include music and professional basketball’s Cleveland Cavaliers who have their own underage overachiever in star LeBron James.

“There are a lot of positive roll models out there,” Tabar says.

What comes after Bizooki for him? Tabar says he would like to get involved in tech work that can help developing and third-world countries, becoming involved in social entrepreneurship. As a partial preparation, Tabar is taking a class this semester on the economies of China and India.

“I’ve had a vision,” he says. “I’ve pursued it, it’s coming to fruition, and it will continue to grow. My message is: You can do what you want to do in terms of starting your own business. The opportunity is out there for every student today.”