What. A. Year.
As 2025 takes off, we can’t help but take a look back on the wild year that was 2024.
This year was nothing short of transformative for Totem. We launched our first product (the Totem Compass), built an incredible community, and tackled challenges that pushed us to grow in so many ways.
This blog post pays homage to the classic format that made our newsletter, Totem Tuesday, famous...
The Totem 3-2-1.
3 things we accomplished in 2024,
2 things we learned in 2024,
1 thing coming up in 2025
Ready for some honest self-reflection? Here we go. 😘
3 Things Totem Accomplished in 2024
1) A Global Movement was Born
When 2024 began, Totem was still in its infancy.
Literally.. we weren't even incorporated until January 19th!
There was no budget, no team, no office. Just two believers and a prototype.
Flash forward to February, when we posted the first viral Instagram reel—which racked up over 25M views in less than a week. Everything changed in the blink of an eye.
Since then, the movement has only grown.
Totem has generated an jaw-dropping 125 million views in 12 months (with no advertising budget) across social platforms.
19 different videos have eclipsed 1 million views 🤯
The movement spread from internet to real world—with public appearances at SXSW, Tomorrowland, EDC Orlando, and countless other festivals where we got to meet so many of you, face-to-face.
Together, we’ve built something rare: a worldwide community based on one core belief: no one—regardless of race, creed, gender, or economic status—deserves to feel lost and afraid 🫶
It can be tempting to look back and brush this off as a stroke of luck. After all—there is an element of chance to virality. Anyone can stumble into a single viral moment if they work hard and long enough.
But this was no fluke. In fact, 19 different videos have eclipsed 1 million views in the last 12 months 🤯
(that's 1 viral post every 19 days, on average)
It was the result of intention, years of work, and connecting with a universal human truth: everyone wants to stay connected to their loved ones, no matter who you are or where you come from.
2) From Development to Worldwide Delivery
Over the course of 10 months, the Totem Compass evolved from an ambitious prototype into a consumer-ready product, shipping to over 60 countries! 🎉
Here’s how we brought the festival compass you know and love to life:
Development and Design
We finalized the development of our first product, building it 100% in-house. It pays to have a CTO with over a decade of R&D experience!
To help guide the development process, we conducted rigorous QA testing for months at festival grounds around the world.
These testing trips were designed to push the Totem Compass to its limits and ensure it performed spectacularly, anywhere in the world. 🌍
The end result? An exceptional product unlike anything on the market today.
💠 centimeter-level precision in good conditions
💠 730 meter peer-to-peer range
💠 decentralized mesh network
💠 real-time location updates
💠 100% app-free and screen-free
The Totem Compass is so user-friendly that even a 5 year old can use it. Fun fact: Carter's 4-year old nephew successfully used it during a game of Thanksgiving Hide and Seek 🥹
Production & Shipping
Turning the Totem Compass into a global reality meant taking on one of our biggest challenges yet: scaling production and delivering Totems to customers around the world 📦
We signed contracts with multiple contract manufacturers, allowing us to shift from small-batch assembly to full-scale mass production!
Shipping officially began in October 2024, and production is only increasing in speed with every passing week. Seeing the first Totems arrive in the hands of customers worldwide has been one of the most rewarding milestones of 2024. 🫶
3) Scaled the Company
In February, Totem consisted of two people working out of a dining room 😱
We have now grown into a full-time team of seven with our own dedicated office space, and have begun laying the foundation for the future.
When the year began, we had $0 in investment. By the end of January, we secured $10K (thanks to Jay, our first investor!).
As of today, we've raised $1.05M in pre-seed funding (and there's still a little room left in the round—email Carter for more info).
This capital has allowed us to take bold steps toward scaling Totem into a global reality—quickly.
We went from plans to assemble and ship the Totems ourselves to signing contracts with two global manufacturers and multiple 3PL (third-party logistics) providers to aid with fulfillment.
Additionally, we’ve begun setting up a robust network of distributors and official resellers in far-off regions around the globe, including:
💠 Germany
💠 UK
💠 South Africa
💠 Brazil
💠 Australia
💠 India
As a result, international customers will experience vastly reduced shipping costs and delivery times in 2025.
2 things we learned in 2024
1) Viral Growth is both a Gift and a Challenge
Let’s take a moment to reflect on one of the wildest parts of 2024: experiencing viral growth as an early-stage, pre-product company.
The Gifts
The tidal wave of enthusiasm and overwhelming demand that has poured in throughout 2024 has been jaw-dropping.
This traction helped us secure invaluable resources, partnerships with major global brands, and investment capital that allowed us to grow and scale to meet demand.
But the best part? Sharing so many moments of genuine connection with thousands of different yet beautiful people, in-person 💗
Getting to meet the Totem Tribe at festivals like SXSW and EDC, listening to your stories, and sharing our passion for bringing people together.
YOU are the reason we are here today.
The Challenges
With massive growth and visibility came a rather unique challenge: being the “talk of the town”.
As thrilling as it was to see Totem at the center of conversations around the world, it was also a reminder of how quickly excitement can turn into scrutiny (and sometimes, borderline doxxing).
Staying grounded and focused on the bigger picture is a real challenge with opinions and conjecture from thousands of directions circling 24/7.
Scaling to meet the demand brought its own set of hurdles.
- Navigating strained global supply chains
- Immediately producing a product at massive scale
- Overcoming fulfillment challenges for customers around the world
Perhaps one of the most painful—and important—lessons we learned is that external timelines are often beyond our control.
Here at Totem, we are wildly ambitious with our internal expectations and timelines—and generally, we meet them. But the rest of the world doesn't move at "high-growth startup" speed.
Whether it was hardware adjustments, regulatory red tape, technical issues, or the complexities of shipping a radio device to dozens of countries, there were moments when progress took much longer than we expected.
From the beginning, we have committed to building this company in public. But communicating fluid expectations to 23,000 people across 60+ countries is a huge challenge, especially when production and shipping timelines are subject to constant change.
Every update we've shared had to strike a delicate balance: transparency without overpromising, honesty without causing unnecessary frustration.
At times, it felt like no amount of communication could truly address the complexities and uncertainties inherent in building something this ambitious. But we never backed down from our commitment to extreme ongoing transparency.
It was a hard-learned lesson, but one that will only make us better and stronger. We will carry it with us into the future.💗
2) More than Music Festivals
The Totem Compass was originally designed with one community in mind: music festival-goers.
The festival community has been—and always will be—the heart of Totem. They’re the reason we gained the momentum to grow into what we are today.
That said, what began as a solution for festivals quickly expanded far beyond the space. Totem has found its way into countless other spaces:
💠 Parents use it to keep track of their kids during busy holidays (in fact, our very first product review came from a parent!)
💠 Pet owners rely on it at parks.
💠 Skiers and hikers take it on their adventures.
We’ve even heard from search-and-rescue teams, emergency medical personnel, and professional paintball teams who see the Totem Compass as an invaluable tool.
It's a reminder that getting lost is something we’ve all experienced at some point in our lives. The feeling of being lost, then reuniting with your loved ones is a universal human truth that goes way beyond our target market.
1 thing to look forward to in 2025
As we step into 2025, there’s so much to look forward to:
The final stages Rollout, new products to come, an entire line of accessories, major brand partnerships that we can’t wait to announce...the list goes on and on.
But above all, there’s one thing that really stands out...
2025 will be the first entire festival season where thousands of Totems will light up music festivals, connecting people in ways never before possible.
By the end of the year, Totem will launch a new era for festivals and live events around the world.
An era where festivals are safer, more immersive, and more beautiful than ever before.
An era where people can actually detach from their phones—without sacrificing their connection to loved ones.
An era where people can experience true freedom for the very first time. Go where you want, when you want, with who you want—and always find your way back.
So cheers to 2025—the year festivals become a little more fun, a little more magical, and a lot more human.
🫶
Happy New Year!
✌️+💗,
The Totem Team
