In a bid to pedal previous eBay, Craigslist, Fb Market and others, two Seattle-area tech veterans have launched a brand new on-line market geared towards the sale of bicycles and elements.
Dan Marx and Rob Einaudi are the co-founders of BikeList, a peer-to-peer market which launched again in Might and is gaining traction with an assortment of bikes and frames — from mountain biking to touring — and elements of all types.
The 2 are skilled web site builders who beforehand labored collectively at CarDomain, the web automotive fanatic neighborhood co-founded by WhitePages founder Alex Algard. Launched in 1998, CarDomain was acquired in 2012.
“Rob’s the bike geek, however I’m simply the geek,” mentioned Marx, the BikeList CTO whose engineering expertise contains stints at Amazon, Expedia and Microsoft, amongst others. “I’m extra of your informal dad bike owner.”
For greater than a decade the 2 had been speaking about doing one thing collectively once more. They nearly pulled the set off just a few different instances, however it was Einaudi’s enthusiasm round bikes and imaginative and prescient for the brand new startup that lastly satisfied Marx.
“I spent all my cash as a child attempting to get higher and higher bikes,” mentioned Einaudi, the BikeList CEO who not too long ago moved to Bellingham, Wash., to be nearer to a extra sturdy mountain biking scene.
He talked his means into his first bike store job at age 15 and labored in bike retailers by means of faculty and grad college earlier than ultimately turning to internet-focused work. Einaudi was editor in chief at CarDomain and he beforehand co-founded Grassworks Digital, a startup that constructed CRM instruments for hashish retailers that was acquired in 2017.
Along with bikes and the basement filled with them he has at residence, Einaudi is a self-professed automotive and guitar nut. He’s satisfied there’s a greater possibility for promoting stuff past Craigslist, which is tailor-made towards native gross sales, and eBay, the place a generalized market and better charges are simply an excessive amount of.
“Carry a Trailer did a tremendous job of disrupting eBay after which Reverb disrupted them within the guitar house,” Einaudi mentioned. “And I used to be like, ‘Somebody’s obtained to do it in bikes. It’s apparent.’”
BikeList makes cash by taking 9.9% from gross sales, which incorporates bank card charges.
The positioning is optimized for cellular internet and proper now customers can merely purchase what they’re excited by. However Marx and Einaudi plan to launch a “make provide” perform and auctions could possibly be a factor of the longer term. Einaudi additionally needs to construct out the neighborhood side, the place things like featured gadgets or feedback on posts can generate added enthusiasm.
BikeList can also be in talks with Venture 529, the bicycle safety startup co-founded by Xbox co-founder J Allard. The hope is to fight theft and fraud by integrating the BikeList market with 529’s registry.
BikeList, which employs a Denver-based developer on contract, has raised an undisclosed quantity in pre-seed funding from Paul Jarrell, founder and president of Pennsylvania-based Roam Funding Group, a fund targeted on exposing extra individuals to outside actions. Angel buyers Mike Musto and Scott Wilson joined within the spherical.
The positioning has had some notable gross sales already, together with a $3,200 carbon fiber racing bike which bought within the first week.
Even with every thing of their tech backgrounds, the expertise of launching a brand new startup and seeing it begin to work is thrilling for Marx and Einaudi.
“We’re form of on this stage the place each time we promote one thing, doesn’t matter the time of day or day every week, Rob and I are texting one another,” Marx mentioned. “In order that’s form of cool.”