99. Story Locker

Just Started Award Shortlisted

For the company which, despite being in business for only one year, has already demonstrated impressive growth, success, or disruption in its field.

Startups 100: Just Started Award

Founder: Dhilon Solanki
Founded: 2023
Website: storylocker.co.uk 

Story Locker is the lovechild of two trends that few of us would have thought to combine: genealogy and podcasts. As more people look to learn about their ancestry, the startup is capitalising on the podcast boom to invite everyday people to curate their own digital legacy.

Founded earlier this year by seasoned entrepreneur Dhilon Solanki, Story Locker offers a unique and intimate way for individuals to capture their life stories in the form of a podcast recording, ensuring their memories can be cherished for generations to come.

“Sadly, my Mum passed away at just the age of 50,” explains Solanki. “My son never got to meet his Grandma and started to ask lots of questions. Other than a few old photos and VHS tapes, I just had my own memories to share with him.”

Thinking on his feet, Solanki asked his Dad to record a podcast all about his Mum’s life story for his son to listen to. “I’ll never forget the look on his face when he listened to it,” he says. “That’s when I knew I had to start my business. That’s when Story Locker was born.”

Unlike the public landscape of social media, or the impermanence of scrapbooks, Story Locker stands out by ensuring the experience is intimate and reverent. Its podcasts allow individuals to capture their loved ones’ stories in their own words, including the nuances of their voices, their laughter, and their emotions.

The result is then stored in a secure, digital ‘Family Locker’, creating a lasting record that is engaging and deeply personal for future generations to enjoy.

Just one year into operation, Story Locker has broken new ground in the podcast space, creating a new revenue stream: selling podcasts as a service. It has also identified and targeted a niche audience, thanks to strong partnerships with wedding and funeral services. Its growth journey is such that it has also been nominated for our Just Started award.

And, with more than 20 million podcast listeners in the UK already, Story Locker is on a mission to become the go-to platform for anyone seeking to create something more powerful and intimate than a photo album.

Solanki hopes to develop into a SaaS platform where user-generated content can be created. In the future, parents will be able to create voice notes about things that happen in a child’s first year, which Story Locker will edit together into a longer-form piece of content. 

With its commitment to personalisation, quality, and innovation, Story Locker is set to make a lasting impact on the way we preserve and share stories. Its legacy will surely be one to remember.