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----Round 1---- $13m raised 20k units shipped ~$650 per unit ----Round 2---- $15m needed 36k units remaining ~$420 per unit Obviously I'm not factoring in ini

by polartx 11y ago

----Round 1---- $13m raised 20k units shipped ~$650 per unit ----Round 2---- $15m needed 36k units remaining ~$420 per unit Obviously I'm not factoring in initial manufacturing costs. Having 13 million to invest in manufacturing at scale, brought costs per unit sold down 35%, which is good. But I don't know many people that would buy a cooler for $500.

zaroth 11y ago
Grepper, speaking during a live-streamed web conference, also said the company is seeking an additional $15 million, a third of which would be used to fill 36,000 outstanding orders from backers. I did have to laugh though at that cute info-graphic of where all the money went, tucked in the bottom right corner has a little asterisk -- "* not to scale".
jdmichal 11y ago
I know plenty of fishermen that have spent more than $500 on coolers which do absolutely nothing more than keep cold things cold. People are willing to pay money for the tools that meet their needs.
- jandrese 11y ago
  It's not clear to me that this cooler is actually good at keeping things cold. Their kickstarter page doesn't seem to want to talk about it. I'd thought maybe this thing had its own tiny built-in compressor and that's why it was so exciting, but it appears to be a boring old regular cooler with a bunch of cheap junk bolted on.
  - ionwake 11y ago
    It is. I have always been perplexed by the start. For the need, the cost and ultimately the trust required that it would even deliver. Let alone the quality!
  - ghaff 11y ago
    Give me a $500 per unit budget and I can pretty much guarantee you that I could put together a nice kit of higher quality components with plenty of money left over for profit.
    - djcapelis 11y ago
      Have you considered starting a Kickstarter?
      - ghaff 11y ago
        Not really. If I did, it would be to market and gauge interest in something that I largely knew how to do already and didn't involve a big capital outlay. ADD: In this case, my point is that with an hour of research and shopping I could source existing retail products that (for me) would be a better bundle. Of course, this wouldn't be cool.
jandrese 11y ago
The Kickstarter charged $165 or $185 per cooler. What I don't understand is why this was so exciting in the first place. It looks like a normal cooler with a few cheap accessories (ice crusher, blender, light, usb charger, bluetooth speaker) and it's not even very big. Why were people so damn excited about it that they were willing to put up $165 for this Sharper Image wannabe. Their website doesn't even talk about how good it is at being a cooler. How long does ice stay frozen in the hot sun? Can you keep your meat from going back over a long weekend at the campsite? Not that there is enough room in this thing for a camping trip. It's apparently focused on the beers on the beach crowd. How the hell did this shatter Kickstarter funding records?
- jdmichal 11y ago
  > It's apparently focused on the beers on the beach crowd. How the hell did this shatter Kickstarter funding records? I guess you're underestimating the size of the "beers on the beach" crowd.
  - giarc 11y ago
    I think there is also a big "Want to be part of the hype" crowd. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but I think many Kickstarter backers are impulse shoppers.
- ghaff 11y ago
  Yeah, I'm apparently not the audience. Yeti seems to be doing well selling what are, to me, somewhat ridiculously expensive coolers but at least those are optimized for actually keeping stuff cold. The accessories on this thing are either gimmicks that I can see using once or twice because they're coo1--Make a frozen margarita at the beach!--or they're easily replicated with an inexpensive standalone speaker or whatever. (Indeed, there are also hand-cranked and battery-powered blenders for camping.) ADDED: >Sharper Image wannabe I had to laugh. This is EXACTLY the sort of thing that one would expect to see in a Sharper Image catalog.
  - ansible 11y ago
monkmartinez 11y ago
Engel, Yeti and others make expensive coolers. Some can reach $500... but most people try to buy them on sale. Also, the market isn't massive as they are used mostly for recreational activities which are expensive endeavours to begin with.

by polartx 11y ago

zaroth 11y ago

Grepper, speaking during a live-streamed web conference, also said the company is seeking an additional $15 million, a third of which would be used to fill 36,000 outstanding orders from backers. I did have to laugh though at that cute info-graphic of where all the money went, tucked in the bottom right corner has a little asterisk -- "* not to scale".

jdmichal 11y ago

I know plenty of fishermen that have spent more than $500 on coolers which do absolutely nothing more than keep cold things cold. People are willing to pay money for the tools that meet their needs.

jandrese 11y ago
It's not clear to me that this cooler is actually good at keeping things cold. Their kickstarter page doesn't seem to want to talk about it. I'd thought maybe this thing had its own tiny built-in compressor and that's why it was so exciting, but it appears to be a boring old regular cooler with a bunch of cheap junk bolted on.
- ionwake 11y ago
  It is. I have always been perplexed by the start. For the need, the cost and ultimately the trust required that it would even deliver. Let alone the quality!
- ghaff 11y ago
  Give me a $500 per unit budget and I can pretty much guarantee you that I could put together a nice kit of higher quality components with plenty of money left over for profit.
  - djcapelis 11y ago
    Have you considered starting a Kickstarter?
    - ghaff 11y ago
      Not really. If I did, it would be to market and gauge interest in something that I largely knew how to do already and didn't involve a big capital outlay. ADD: In this case, my point is that with an hour of research and shopping I could source existing retail products that (for me) would be a better bundle. Of course, this wouldn't be cool.

jandrese 11y ago

The Kickstarter charged $165 or $185 per cooler. What I don't understand is why this was so exciting in the first place. It looks like a normal cooler with a few cheap accessories (ice crusher, blender, light, usb charger, bluetooth speaker) and it's not even very big. Why were people so damn excited about it that they were willing to put up $165 for this Sharper Image wannabe. Their website doesn't even talk about how good it is at being a cooler. How long does ice stay frozen in the hot sun? Can you keep your meat from going back over a long weekend at the campsite? Not that there is enough room in this thing for a camping trip. It's apparently focused on the beers on the beach crowd. How the hell did this shatter Kickstarter funding records?

jdmichal 11y ago
> It's apparently focused on the beers on the beach crowd. How the hell did this shatter Kickstarter funding records? I guess you're underestimating the size of the "beers on the beach" crowd.
- giarc 11y ago
  I think there is also a big "Want to be part of the hype" crowd. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but I think many Kickstarter backers are impulse shoppers.
ghaff 11y ago
Yeah, I'm apparently not the audience. Yeti seems to be doing well selling what are, to me, somewhat ridiculously expensive coolers but at least those are optimized for actually keeping stuff cold. The accessories on this thing are either gimmicks that I can see using once or twice because they're coo1--Make a frozen margarita at the beach!--or they're easily replicated with an inexpensive standalone speaker or whatever. (Indeed, there are also hand-cranked and battery-powered blenders for camping.) ADDED: >Sharper Image wannabe I had to laugh. This is EXACTLY the sort of thing that one would expect to see in a Sharper Image catalog.
- ansible 11y ago

monkmartinez 11y ago

Engel, Yeti and others make expensive coolers. Some can reach $500... but most people try to buy them on sale. Also, the market isn't massive as they are used mostly for recreational activities which are expensive endeavours to begin with.