Stonepile is being built around a simple idea: young athletes should have better tools for understanding, organizing, and owning their development.
But Stonepile itself will not be built by one person. It will take players and parents willing to test early versions, coaches and basketball professionals willing to challenge our assumptions, friends willing to make introductions, experts willing to lend their experience, early supporters willing to contribute financially, and over time, investors and strategic partners willing to help Stonepile grow.
You do not need to be an investor to help build Stonepile.
The simplest way to help is to download the Stonepile app and share your feedback. Email jared@stonepile.com with your first and last name and whether you’re a player, parent, or coach, and we’ll set you up with access to the early test version. From there, all it takes is using Stonepile and telling us what you think. Thank you in advance for helping us build something better.
Founders Circle
Help Stonepile get started.
The Founders Circle is the simplest way to support Stonepile during its earliest stage. It is primarily for friends, family, community members, and others who believe in what Stonepile is trying to build and want to give the project a little more runway.
Contributions might help cover software, hosting, legal expenses, research, travel, testing, design, and other early startup costs.
These are support contributions, not investments. They do not provide ownership in STAK Athletics LLC, future equity, or a financial return.
Think of the Founders Circle less like investing in a company and more like helping a founder get an ambitious idea off the ground.
“I believe in this. I don't need anything in return. I'd just like to help Stonepile get started.”
Interested in supporting Stonepile at this early stage?
If the Founders Circle sounds like the right fit, reach out and tell us a little about how you'd like to support the work.
Contact UsStonepile Syndicate
Contribute something Stonepile needs.
Some of the most valuable early contributions to a startup have nothing to do with money. The Stonepile Syndicate is for people willing to actively contribute to the development of Stonepile.
That contribution could include:
- Testing early versions of the app
- Giving thoughtful product feedback
- Sharing demo notes on the Validation page
- Participating in research
- Introducing Stonepile to players, parents, coaches, programs, schools, or organizations
- Opening doors to potential partners or investors
- Contributing expertise in basketball, technology, design, legal, business, marketing, research, youth development, or another important area
- Helping Stonepile establish itself in a local basketball community
The idea is simple: if you have something meaningful to contribute to the building of Stonepile, there should be a place for you in the Stonepile ecosystem.
Participation in the Stonepile Syndicate does not automatically provide equity or compensation. Some contributions may simply be part of supporting the mission. In other cases, sustained or unusually valuable contributions could lead to a more formal advisory, contractor, partnership, or equity relationship.
Any such arrangement would be made individually and documented appropriately.
“I may not be writing a big check, but I know I can help build this.”
Have something meaningful to contribute?
If you can help test, advise, connect, research, or strengthen Stonepile in another practical way, we'd like to hear from you.
Contact UsFounding Partners & Advisors
Take responsibility for part of the journey.
A smaller number of people may become much more deeply involved in building Stonepile. These relationships go beyond occasional advice or introductions. They involve sustained contribution, responsibility, expertise, or leadership around something important to the company.
These titles are not rewards or membership levels. They reflect the actual role someone plays in building the company.
Formal relationships at this level may include compensation, advisory equity, founder equity, vesting arrangements, or other structures appropriate to the role.
“I don't just want to help Stonepile occasionally. I may want to help build a meaningful part of this company.”
Interested in taking on a deeper role?
If you believe you could contribute sustained expertise, leadership, or responsibility to building Stonepile, start a conversation with us.
Potential Founding Partners and Advisors may be interested in our Founder’s Brief.
Contact UsEarly Investors
Invest in STAK Athletics LLC.
At the appropriate stage, we may raise outside investment capital.
Unlike Founders Circle contributions, these are actual investments made with the expectation that an investor will participate financially in the future value of the company.
A public record of local customer discovery lives on our Validation page.
Early investment may be structured through instruments such as a SAFE (Simple Agreement for Future Equity) or through an equity financing in a Delaware C Corporation.
A SAFE generally allows someone to invest money today in exchange for the right to receive equity under defined circumstances in a future financing. Direct equity investment means purchasing an ownership interest in the company under the terms of a formal financing.
We will only accept investments through properly structured offerings and from investors who are legally eligible to participate under applicable securities laws.
Startup investing involves substantial risk, a long time horizon, and the possibility of losing the entire investment.
“I believe Stonepile could become a valuable company, and I am interested in investing financially in its growth.”
Interested in a future investment conversation?
If you are an eligible investor and want to learn more about our future financing plans, reach out to begin a conversation.
Potential Investors may be interested in our Founder’s Brief.
Contact UsWhere This Could Go
Stonepile is still at the beginning. If we successfully build something athletes use, demonstrate that it improves the youth basketball development experience, and establish a sustainable business around it, the capital needs of the company may eventually become much larger.
That leads into the more familiar startup financing stages.
Seed
Seed financing generally helps a young company move from promising early traction toward a repeatable business. For Stonepile, that could someday mean expanding beyond an initial market, strengthening the product and technology team, developing partnerships, increasing adoption, and proving that the business model can scale.
Series A
A Series A usually comes when a company has moved beyond proving that people want the product and is beginning to prove that the organization itself can scale. For Stonepile, that could mean significant geographic expansion, a growing team, mature technology infrastructure, larger commercial partnerships, and increasingly predictable economics.
Series B and Beyond
Later financing rounds generally provide capital to scale an already working company much more aggressively. That could eventually mean national expansion, substantial technology investment, major basketball and commercial partnerships, new markets, acquisitions, or other forms of growth.
Those stages are not where Stonepile is today. They are included because we are building with the possibility of getting there.
There Is More Than One Way to Build a Company
Startup stories often focus almost entirely on investors. We think the reality is much broader.
A parent who spends an hour testing Stonepile may identify something that changes the product. A coach may introduce us to an entire basketball community. A player may say something during an interview that reshapes how we think about development. An expert may help solve a problem we didn't know how to solve. A friend may contribute $100 when $100 genuinely matters. An advisor may eventually become a critical member of the company. And an investor may provide the capital that allows all of those ideas and relationships to scale.
Stonepile needs different people at different stages, contributing different things.
The question isn't simply, “Do you want to invest in Stonepile?”
How might you help build Stonepile?
If one of these paths sounds like you, email Jared directly and tell us where you think you might fit.
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