St. Cloud Startup Impacks Makes Minnesota Cup Finalists List

ST. CLOUD (WJON News) -- A St. Cloud-based start-up is a division finalist for the 2025 Minnesota Cup.

The competition that celebrates new entrepreneurs recently announced the 27 companies that are moving forward to the finalist round, with three finalists in nine different divisions.

In the Education and Training division is Impacks created by Clare and Brandon Richards of St. Cloud.

Clare and Brandon have done a great job of building the business.  They wrote a great plan.  I'm excited to see how they compete against the other strong finalists in their division.  They have a great story, they've had wonderful growth, they are doing a great job.

Impacks works with schools to put together classroom-specific boxes of school supplies for the students.

Read More: Impacks: Revolutionizing School Supplies For Families Nationwide |

The winner of each division will receive a $25,000 prize, and will go on to compete for the overall grand prize of $50,000, which will be announced on October 6th.

Minnesota Cup co-founder Scott Litman says, beyond the cash prizes, the connections to resources and mentors are a big benefit.

If we talk about the roughly 90 semifinalists, the businesses that advanced out of the first round, they all got assigned mentors.

Since 2005, Minnesota Cup has awarded over $5.8 million in seed capital. Their alumni companies have gone to raise over $1.1 billion.

Past winners include Sezzle, the logo sponsor for the Minnesota Timberwolves, and Jonny Pops.