7 Millennial Entrepreneurs You Should Know About

Rob Kalin, founder of Etsy

The majority of us think we can influence and change the world. With this mentality, it’s no surprise a number of us don’t see the good in sitting at a desk all day at a 9-5 job when we could actively influence culture or contribute to the greater good by starting our own businesses. We believe work should be challenging, fulfilling and rewarding, which explains Gen Y’s natural gravitation toward start-ups. But, before you start your own company, you can take some hints from those who have gone before.

Etsy, a handmade online marketplace, was co-founded by Rob Kalin when he was 25 years old. Kalin was an aspiring furniture designer living in Brooklyn who was getting by selling his items online. When he couldn’t find a place on the internet that did exactly that, Etsy was born. The most ironic, and perhaps inspiring, thing about Kalin is that he was a high–school dropout who attended half a dozen colleges before graduating from New York University as a classics major and becoming the founder of the indie-est place to shop online.

TOMS is a shoe company founded by Blake Mycoskie and driven by the One for One movement. For every pair of shoes sold, another pair is given to a child in need of shoes. Before establishing TOMS, Mycoskie started five successful businesses, including a laundry service for college students. He also competed on CBS’s The Amazing Race with his sister in 2002. In 2009 he was awarded the Secretary of State’s 2009 Award for Corporate Excellence (ACE).

Josh Greenberg and Sam Tarantino of Grooveshark

Grooveshark, a music sharing site, was founded in 2006 by Sam Tarantino and Josh Greenberg, two students at the University of Florida. Tarantino was an aspiring musician and UF Jazz band member, while Greenberg was a web developer and past entrepreneur. When the two got together, they decided to take a break from college and build Grooveshark, which is now in the same league as Pandora and Last.fm.

Mint, a financial management web site, was started by Aaron Patzer who was only 25-years-old. Aaron worked for Nascentric, IBM, and founded two web development and marketing companies before creating Mint. He graduated with a Masters in computer science and engineering from Princeton and Bachelors from Duke.

Quirky, a community-based product development company, was established in 2009 by accomplished 22-year-old entrepreneur Ben Kaufman. At the age of 18, Kaufman convinced his parents to re-mortgage their Long Island home for $180,000 so he could develop Song Sling, retractable headphones for the iPod shuffle. Kaufman dropped out of college to work on Song Sling and he also started an iPod accessories company called Mophie. Not too long after, he built the software that backs up Quirky (known as Kluster). Kaufman is a serial entrepreneur and focuses on product development.

Justin Cohen, Elliott Bisnow, and Jeff Rosenthal the Summit Series boys

Summit Series, a convention that brings young entrepreneurs together, was founded by three friends, Elliott Bisnow, Jeff Rosenthal and Justin Cohen.  Bisnow had previous entrepreneurial experience establishing an e-newsletter with his father, so when he thought of Summit Series, he brought along his friends. This conference is an invite-only conference where attendees bond over speakers and extreme sports to garner friendships rather than business acquaintances. The conference also raises money for non-profits and has participants like Bill Clinton, Russell Simmons, Ted Turner and John Legend.

Catchafire, a website that matches professionally skilled volunteers with non-profits and social enterprises, was started in 2009 by Rachael Chong, a former investment banker. Chong realized that she could volunteer more effectively if she could apply her skills to companies in need and soon left corporate finance to work in microfinance and non-profits, soon thereafter founding Catchafire and changing the way people think about volunteering.

Check out Fast Company’s Change Generation for more inspiring stories.