Carolin Kunert is the CEO and founder of Knister Grill, a transportable and sustainable barbecue produced in Germany. Carolin had the idea for Knister Grill during her studies at Munich University of Applied Sciences and launched her product in 2017 after a successful Kickstarter campaign. Having no one in her immediate circle of friends or family who has started their own company, Carolin had to figure out how to found a business by herself. With the support from mentors she met during networking events and through the Strascheg Center for Entrepreneurship, Carolin managed to navigate her company through various challenges she encountered. She is therefore of the opinion that resilience is key, as a lot of strength is required to tackle the problems that will arise when founding a company. Additionally, Carolin urges students to start as early as possible, even during their studies, since their fixed costs are usually still quite low at that time and entrepreneurship centres such as the SCE offer great support. In Carolin’s words: “If you generate some work experience, you still have no experience in founding a company. So simply start as early as possible. You really cannot lose anything.”

Links:

Knister Grill https://knister-grill.com/

Connect with Carolin Kunert: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carolin-kunert-290180134/

Connect with Franziska Mattner: https://www.linkedin.com/in/franziska-mattner-5b592b208/

Follow our podcast: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/five-podcast

SCE, Strascheg Center for Entrepreneurship | Munich https://www.sce.de/en/home.html

Hochschule München https://www.hm.edu/index.de.html