Adam Mulsow was hiking in Lubbock’s Canyon Lakes and thought it would be nice to have a kayak he could easily carry over his shoulder to move from land to water.
So he made a seven-pound kayak and created a company called Pontos. On Thursday, Pontos got a boost when Mulsow captured top honors at the second-annual Capra Tank competition during the Chamber of Commerce Business Expo at the Civic Center.
His lightweight, easy-to-pack and easy-to-carry kayak costs $675 and, Mulsow claims, offers great performance. During his presentation, he said other portable kayaks range from 15 to 45 pounds.
“It was just kind of a daydream that I had,” Mulsow said.
He started figuring out how to do it.
“I started out just going to the hardware store and getting flexible little pieces of wood and stuff that I could find there and kind of building a skin-on-frame kayak. At the time, I’ll be honest, I thought I was inventing the idea of a skin-on-frame. Come to find out, that concept is thousands of years old,” Mulsow said.
Just before COVID, he started learning how to make parts on a 3-D printer. The idea went from there.
He won $10,000 split up between $1,000 cash, a free commercial bank account with Capra Bank for one-year, free ads on KAMC, Fox 34, Lamar Advertising (billboards), and Town Square Media (radio).
What led to Mulsow’s ‘daydream’
Mulsow is a husband and father of two small children. His full-time job with the South Plains Food Bank is director of agricultural operations – he oversees an 11-acre orchard and five-acre farm.
“We grow produce. We grow apples at that orchard and all of that goes straight to the food bank,” Mulsow said.
It’s also a place to teach kids about growing food.
“I was born in southern Louisiana, and I grew up in North Georgia, north of Atlanta, right by this big lake called Lake Lanier,” Mulsow said.
His mom was a Texas Tech professor who moved the family to Lubbock when Mulsow was 11 years old.
“There’s just a pull to Lubbock and a great community here. And so, I keep sticking around,” Mulsow said.
He loved kayaking as a child. But the kayaks can be big, heavy and inconvenient for traveling.
“It didn’t make as much sense to haul that whole thing out, just go paddle on the little lakes we have,” Mulsow said.
Mulsow’s superlight kayak is meant for flat calm water – not whitewater kayaking.
“I want people to get the boat that’s going to be right for them. I want people to get out and enjoy the outdoors. … The average casual kayaker who just wants to go out to a bay or a lake – calm water – that’s where a Pontos kayak makes a lot more sense,” Mulsow said.
Capra Shark explained
Capra Bank has been in Lubbock for nearly three years. The bank approached the Chamber of Commerce with an idea for a contest modeled after the TV show “Shark Tank.” Local business startups could pitch their ideas for a chance to win a prize.
Kathy McDowell, director of marketing for Capra, said, “We are really interested in making sure that the business community is thriving.”
“Last year was our first year. We’ve had a little time to get the word out. And so, we had a better response this year – more applications than last year. And we hope to see that continue over the next year,” McDowell said.
Last year’s winner was Armani Williams, CEO of Locshark.
The device Williams developed keeps your smartphone locked. You can track its location and control the lock/unlock mechanism remotely over the internet.
Winning last year’s event helped spark consumer interest and get the device closer to market, he said.
SELT and Cocoamoo
Mulsow’s company Pontos was up against local competitors SELT and Cocoamoo.
Ohinoyi Moiza and Peace Enesi were Texas Tech students when they came up with the idea for SELT, a verified student marketplace online with special security features built in.
Enesi told the judges during the competition, “In August 2023, Ohinoyi and I tried to buy a couch on the Facebook marketplace and we got scammed.”
Someone created a generic account just to scam others, she said.
“I don’t have time to deal with the scammers on Facebook,” Enesi said.
And she thinks other students felt the same way.
“They’re scared … and they don’t have time,” Enesi said.
So she and Moiza thought, “What’s the one thing every student has that already solved the verification issue?”
Every student has something called a “single sign on.”
An example of single sign on is Google. When you log into gmail, you’re automatically logged in with your other Google services tied to the account. Texas Tech has it too.
The Texas Tech version, RaiderSELT, went live on April 15 – picking up 54 listings in two weeks with 500 active students.
The service sells ads for revenue and students can pay to “boost” an item. But the basic service is free.
Cocoamoo, founded by James Woodley with his business partner Keelyn McInroe, made a pitch for a line of good-for-you chocolate milk products.
Woodley, with a huge smile and animated body language, introduced the company, saying, “We are Cocoamoo! We make the world’s healthiest and best-tasting chocolate milk mixes! You see, I really love working out and eating healthy, doing healthy things and putting good things in my body.”
But his trip to local stores disappointed him. He wanted good chocolate milk but no “junky” ingredients.
“I thought, ‘This is ridiculous. I shouldn’t have to go through life being scared of what’s in my chocolate milk. So, I’m gonna solve this problem myself.’ That’s what I said about two years ago,” Woodley said.
Right now, buying a Cocoamoo mix on Amazon will cost $19.99. But Woodley said if the company can grow, it can get better economies of scale and bring the price down.
The price is lower in person (no shipping cost) and Woodley said Cocoamoo was able to sell $10,000 worth chocolate milk during weekends (the last six months of 2025) at the Wolfforth Farmer’s Market.
