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This is a pretty vibrant space with many startups trying to solve the problem. It's been sparked by the raise of Airbnbs which rarely offer luggage storage. A
by Lucadg 7y ago
This is a pretty vibrant space with many startups trying to solve the problem.
It's been sparked by the raise of Airbnbs which rarely offer luggage storage.
A similar trend is in self checkin solutions.
It's interesting to note the herd effect on this kind of startups: it becomes easier and easier to raise capital to solve problems many others are trying to solve already.
- vbordo 7y agoAny examples of startups working on self check-in? I haven't seen any.
- Lucadg 7y agoKeynest: get the key from a shop. Keycafe:get the key from a self service box in a shop. Keesy: get the key from a machine. Vikey: keyless. Enter with a code. And many many more. At Host London exhibition there were at least ten new ones.
- riffraff 7y agoisn't this solved "well enough" with a code-lock holding a key? I've used it a few times and while it's low tech it seems pretty effective and costs about zero.
- Lucadg 7y agoThat's one of the best solutions when possible. Low tech, low cost, high usability. Unfortunately in many cities, particularly in Europe, you are not allowed to stick a lock on the wall of the building.
- pugworthy 7y ago> It's been sparked by the raise of Airbnbs which rarely offer luggage storage. Help me understand this. People go to an Airbnb, unpack their luggage, then take it (or have it picked up) for storage elsewhere? And when they are ready to go, they get it back and pack? I'm basically a minimalist packer, so if this is what people actually do, it's very foreign to me.
- mey 7y agoIf you arrive in town before your check-in time or have access to a property. Hotels handle this with a bag check. Same issue if you aren't headed out around the time your check out time.
- Lucadg 7y agoThis. It's an issue both before and after the stay.
- go_prodev 7y agoI think they meant that upon checkout you need to take luggage with you immediately. Many hotels will store your luggage after checkout, until you are ready to depart.
- cody3222 7y agoAnd if you can show traction that you're growing far faster than similar companies, it becomes much much easier to raise capital. When we were starting Bounce, we noticed players in their local markets. We weren't impressed with the product or execution at the time. It's been really interesting to see the development and some of these players have done quite well. It seems like most folks started with a slightly different idea but the market pulled everyone closer to the same thing. I started Bounce out of a burning vision. You can read more about it here: https://medium.com/@codycandee/the-story-behind-bounce-21aeaeb9fb8 https://medium.com/@codycandee/the-story-behind-bounce-21aea...
- Lucadg 7y agoI've never heard of you in the VR space but you seem to have a nice product. Do you go to conferences? Let me know if you need some tips, I'll be happy to share.
- cody3222 7y agoWould def love to connect. Let me know the best way to... I haven’t plugged into many conferences in the space. We’ve been a very small team grinding daily. Thanks for being such a power commenter on this thread btw!
- Lucadg 7y agowell, there's also the danger in getting in the conference trail and going to too many of them. So I'd stick to one or two and prepare them well. I absolutely love VRWS which this year is in France in October. It's the best for networking with the leaders in the VR space. You may want to check out Host London 2020 (from Terrapin) as they seem to give speaking slots to startups. Many of the luggage startups mentioned here were present last year. Drop me an email and I'll introduce you to the organizers. You may even get a free startup booth from them. Also, check-out Trips Community where you may become a partner if you commit to integrate when it's ready, getting some visibility.
- tluyben2 7y agoI wanted to start something like this many years ago (and I still cannot find anything like it in the cities I go to); I travel a lot for work and I want to leave a suitcase in every city I travel to every few months so I can just take my laptop on the plane. The places that exist only do 24-48 hours max or are very expensive (can rent an apartment for just a little more). So yeah, airbnb for luggage.
- cody3222 7y agoWhere have you needed this? Will add it to our expansion roadmap! Keep a look out for us next time. We're in 72 cities now and that number will at least double this year.
- tluyben2 7y agoHK, Shanghai, Melbourne, Orlando and Bangkok. I travel between those.
- tluyben2 7y agoI was thinking of adding some other services as well as all people (expats) were looking for those; buying stuff for you and putting it into suitcases for instance. I have a room full with crap; even at $1/day per case (which I would pay long term), I can put enough cases in there and easily get them out to pay triple the mortgage on the entire house every month... All my chinese and thai friends (where I store stuff now) would gladly long term store cases in their houses: 20-30 of them for sure. Short term they would not but 2 weeks or more; many people working abroad would jump at that.
- sammorrowdrums 7y agoSeen several mentioned below but not https://www.nannybag.com/ https://www.nannybag.com/ they seem to have a very similar offering. What differentiates Bounce?
- cody3222 7y agoBounce has a much higher bar for quality - for example, you may find a sketchy liquor store on other platforms but Bounce is much more focused on quality. Additionally, these other companies have been around for years. Come back to this thread in a year and we will see how things play out.
- bostik 7y ago> Come back to this thread in a year and we will see how things play out. Just wanted to say: thank you for demonstrating a mature, no-nonsense approach. With the world drowning in hype, it's refreshing to see someone (anyone!) take the no-fluff route.
- cody3222 7y agoAppreciate that! Action > words !
- sammorrowdrums 7y agoThanks for the reply. Do you feel that you'll be able offer competitive coverage with that quality bar? I do like the idea that this is a solved problem, but if I'm in some tiny town, I still might need a service like this, and my go to service would have it covered. I get that launching city by city makes sense at first, but just curious how this rolls out coverage wise! Also, do you insure the luggage?
- cody3222 7y agoYes, we can maintain quality at deep scale. The market we can reach is insanely massive. Think of how big DoorDash, UberEats, etc is - they can tap into every restaurant. With Bounce, we can tap into every restaurant, hotel, coffee shop...any decent retail location. It scales really nicely with coverage. We get daily requests from stores all around the world who want to sign up. We will catch up to the coverage of other companies this year or next year. We offer $5000 insurance...absolute peace of mind!
- moduspol 7y ago> it becomes easier and easier to raise capital to solve problems many others are trying to solve already. Generally, if you don't have competitors, then you don't have a market.
- dlhavema 7y agoTrue. There are the rare cases where you are the first to hit the ground and essentially create the market.
- cody3222 7y agoThis seems absolutely correct. Google, Facebook...not the first but now ARE the market.
- Lucadg 7y agoIn that case you are the first trying to solve a problem, thus creating a new market. What I meant is that I notice a herd mentality in VCs. Particularly in Vacation Rentals there's many problems waiting to be solved and yet it seems everyone is trying to solve the same ones.
- moduspol 7y ago> In that case you are the first trying to solve a problem, thus creating a new market. Critically: No, in business, it more often means that the market doesn't exist. If it did, you'd likely have competitors. My point was just to note that this isn't unique to startups or VCs--it's common to all markets. It is generally a worrisome indicator if you have no competitors, and it is easier to justify chasing things other people are chasing.
- cody3222 7y agoI find this super interesting to watch being on the inside. There is some phenomenon where several people around the world come up with the same idea at the same time. There's even a term for this in scientific literature: Multiple Discovery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_discovery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_discovery The theory of evolution, calculus, etc were "discovered" by multiple people with zero contact at the same time. An event or change in the world (like airbnb here for example) trigger people to come to the same conclusion. Now imagine you have a team of people working on it who are "just ok" - maybe they lack the product or engineering skills but still bring something to market. When the next team comes along that is truly stellar, they will out-execute. With VC, it is really interesting. They may decide to invest in the team that is farthest along because they look like the leader in what is a new market. Or the stellar team may raise money and then the B team that started earlier and has more scale may go to investors and say "Look, this company raised money and we're way bigger - give us money too!" and they have a pretty good case for it at the surface level. That is my take on how these things may happen and evolve.
- ghaff 7y agoI don't know if the interest is driven by AirBnB. But, for me, luggage storage (and corresponding access to a front desk all day) is a major feature of conventional hotels when I travel. Many times a year I either arrive in a city early or aren't leaving until the afternoon/evening and need somewhere to drop my bag. And, in a lot of places, there aren't really luggage storage options available other than your hotel, especially at convenient locations. Japanese train stations are great for this. But it's very uncommon in many/most places.
- wenc 7y ago> Japanese train stations are great for this. I was trying to store my luggage at lockers in Tokyo Station, and I tried different locker clusters but they were all full. I wonder if there's a way to check for empty lockers, or to reserve the lockers? (I don't read Japanese so I genuinely have no idea)
- cody3222 7y agoTokyo is a massive inspiration for Bounce. We hope to have that ubiquity someday and with an even better experience including your suggestion to know which areas have empty lockers. And support for multiple languages! When I went to japan, the occupancy of these lockers were often 100% -- people would be standing in line waiting for a locker to open up!
- bsder 7y ago> It's been sparked by the raise of Airbnbs which rarely offer luggage storage. Gee, after you add on all the "extra" web services you need when you use AirBnB, it's almost as good as a hotel.
- Lucadg 7y agoThey are different products. Here's another way to put it: as the vacation rentals industry solve these problems it becomes even more attractive.