Chirply (YC S10) is Threadless for Paper Goods(techcrunch.com)
techcrunch.com
Chirply (YC S10) is Threadless for Paper Goods
http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/09/y-combinator-backed-chirply-is-threadless-for-paper-goods/
15 comments
forgive me for my lack of knowledge of HN lore, but what was the advice? (a link/keywords for searching would be good :)
There's this user, patio11, I think he's in the top 5 karma here, and his schtick might be summed up as:
1) A/B Test 2) Middle aged women are tremendously underserved in the software market, and not because they don't buy software.
1) A/B Test 2) Middle aged women are tremendously underserved in the software market, and not because they don't buy software.
Give the Business of Software guys a few months and there will be a video which answers one of these questions in an amusing fashion.
In the meantime, to build upon euroclydon's summary, do you have any recommended articles about catering to, um, middle aged women? (software! I mean software-wise!)
On your blog I found only something about abusive customers :)
On your blog I found only something about abusive customers :)
I have quite a few HN comments about it. Most of them boil down to "You should try selling software to women. Women pay money for software, unlike 20-something white and Asian males. You are more likely to sell software which solves a pressing problem for her than to sell software which solves a pressing problem for him like 'How do I steal music more efficiently?' Also, since the industry spends a disproportionate amount of time and effort on the needs of techies, the software currently available to her largely sucks, and fairly few competitors are in any given niche relative to the market opportunity. This is profitably exploitable: make something that she wants, charge money, she will happily pay you money."
This is a slight tangent, but my dream service - and sadly I'm only half joking - would be:
* Enter in a list of all those family members I'm obliged to send birthday and Christmas cards to, including some basic demographic info
* Upload an image of my handwriting
* I'm reminded at the appropriate times to pick from a filtered selection of cards and enter a personalised message
* Printed & sent (bonus points: handwriting looks real)
Someone build this please!
* Enter in a list of all those family members I'm obliged to send birthday and Christmas cards to, including some basic demographic info
* Upload an image of my handwriting
* I'm reminded at the appropriate times to pick from a filtered selection of cards and enter a personalised message
* Printed & sent (bonus points: handwriting looks real)
Someone build this please!
Printed & sent
That's the big thing I see missing here. "Having it sent" is the goal of the game. Otherwise I might as well snap a personal photo and send it with Postino (which is how I am doing things now - and unscientific sampling shows that is much more likely to stay on somebody's fridge long after the event is past).
Still, wrapping paper has some potential, especially if they offer good quality paper, which Hallmark/Walmart/whatever don't seem to carry much.
That's the big thing I see missing here. "Having it sent" is the goal of the game. Otherwise I might as well snap a personal photo and send it with Postino (which is how I am doing things now - and unscientific sampling shows that is much more likely to stay on somebody's fridge long after the event is past).
Still, wrapping paper has some potential, especially if they offer good quality paper, which Hallmark/Walmart/whatever don't seem to carry much.
haha, everything you just said is already in development! great minds think alike :)
Possible variant: Accept a picture/image of a handwritten message, and apply it (cleanly) to the card / piece to be mailed.
EDIT: I'm thinking of e.g. an image from a cell phone, if you can get sufficient quality. Not something that becomes significant effort for the user. Bonus points if, or necessary that it looks (fairly well) handwritten.
EDIT: I'm thinking of e.g. an image from a cell phone, if you can get sufficient quality. Not something that becomes significant effort for the user. Bonus points if, or necessary that it looks (fairly well) handwritten.
The logo, sketch-y theme and use of birds and clouds is strikingly similar to the Chirp conference website.
http://www.chirply.com/ http://chirp.twitter.com/
http://www.chirply.com/ http://chirp.twitter.com/
I dare you to make a logo for any org with the name chirp at the root of its name with anything other than a bird.
The link, in case people try .ly first: http://www.chirply.com/
A few things I noticed:
Related: Someone should collate "Threadless for x" and FML clone sites so people can see what openings are still available in the market.
A few things I noticed:
- front page looks very different from the voting index, as though they're very different sites
- front page lacks focus
- index mentions tacky greeting cards but only shows blank white line-art empty cards rather than actual examples/previews (even if they're not real yet). I'd cut back (or shrink) the front page text and put some designs to vote on there too.
Related: Someone should collate "Threadless for x" and FML clone sites so people can see what openings are still available in the market.
i actually owned the domain chirp.ly back in the day. got an inquiry of purchase sometime that would fall in line with the conception of this company. though lost contact with the inquirer.
possible it wasn't the yc company, but i only bring it up because i've seen this happen several times on hn and hey, small world.
possible it wasn't the yc company, but i only bring it up because i've seen this happen several times on hn and hey, small world.
So, that's like http://moonpig.com then? What do they do differently?
Edit: Nevermind, answered it myself. Chirply does all paper goods, whereas moonpig only does cards, flowers, gifts, and bottles.
Edit: Nevermind, answered it myself. Chirply does all paper goods, whereas moonpig only does cards, flowers, gifts, and bottles.
and it's crowd-sourced design, so the designs are better. Whereas moonpig is mostly about customized text.
Probably the more appropriate question is - how it's different than http://minted.com? I know TinyPrints is not crowd-sourced, but Minted is.
Please note, I'm not trying to demean your service or existence by any means, but just trying to learn how you're distinguishing and plan to compete with this super growing startups?
Please note, I'm not trying to demean your service or existence by any means, but just trying to learn how you're distinguishing and plan to compete with this super growing startups?
sometimes focus (on one vertical - as opposed to four) can mean all the difference.
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This is really neat! I just heard about this on Twitter and can't wait to get these cards out to the family next holiday season.
The site looks great guys, can't wait until I can order my cards and wrapping paper from chirply.
Greeting cards have needed fixing for a long time, but the traditional card brands have tended to pay for fitting/fixtures etc. to have a monopoly in stores (at least here in Aus). Always good to see more competition in this space.
On my Mac, Safari & Firefox, the "Shop" links on the front page do nothing. Also not sure why the links there aren't seasonal -- the Christmas Cards link is useless, but a Valentine's Day link would be useful.
sorry about that! The shop isn't active so those links are empty links. Right now it's all voting and submissions :)
It may be a good idea to let the user know that if they click the links.
Wow, I'm bachelor dude and I don't care for stuff like this and even I want to order from them. If this is how I feel, I can't even imagine what... this is going to be HUGE.
Awesome designs + Easy UI = Totally looking forward to ordering cards to send my mom :)
Congrats Gagan and Neel!
Congrats Gagan and Neel!
So... how do I actually BUY these cards? I WANT TO GIVE YOU MONEY.
The cards go on sale after the first contest is over, at the beginning of March. :)
Their home page is the equivalent of going to mcdonalds.com and seeing a help wanted ad instead of a juicy Chipotle BBQ Bacon Angus Burger.
Congrats Gagan, Neel, and the rest of the Chirply team!
1) Targets women, so leverages 50% of patio11's awesome advice.
2) Unlike the similar product I'm working on, solves the huge problem of content creation.