Defender Bike Light Shipping Update Below
We’re less than 1 year old and only have 2,000 customers, but we’re building a foundation that’s designed to last decades and support millions of customers. That means time, money, and headaches now in order to scale later. Here are some of the tough decisions we’ve made.
1. Slava’s Apartment versus Third Party Fulfillment
We could have shipped everything out of our apartment. We’re organized and have a cargo bike to deliver to the post office. And perhaps some customers would have received their Defenders a few days sooner. But instead we’re building a fine-oiled fulfillment machine: order comes from bikegotham.com, automatically is sent to the warehouse, and ships out within a day. Amazon will be jealous.
2. DIY Manufacturing versus Mass Production
We could have built 2,000 Defenders ourselves. We’re crafty and have access to the world’s best machine shops at MIT. But while enthusiasm and adrenaline can make 2,000 bike lights, it won’t make 200,000 bike lights. So we spent 200 hours vetting factories, $40,000 on tooling, and many sleepless nights stressing about production delays before receiving a single part. But, now, as we prepare to order 10,000 more Defenders, the manufacturing foundation is set and we’re ready to build.
3. Offshore Call Center versus Founder’s Customer Service
Yesterday I did a FaceTime chat with a customer in Saskatchewan, Canada with questions about the Defender set screw. On Saturday, I got a 4am photo-SMS from a Los Angeles cyclist, excited (and drunk). He wanted to show me his new Defender. Later we’ll hire customer support reps, but just like Kayak.com has their infamous red customer service phone http://www.inc.com/magazine/20100201/the-way-i-work-paul-english-of-kayak.html, we’ll always be crazy about customer service.
4. Create Content versus Paying Bloggers
Each email and blog post we write takes me 4-8 hours. For $5 per blog post, we can replace me. But I never will. Our customer’s time is too precious for crap content.
5. Distributors versus Internal Sales Team
We have been approached by bike distributors who want to sell our products with promises of hundreds of bike shops and hundreds of thousands of dollars. We said, “No thanks, we’ll sell directly to American bike shops.” That decision is costing us quick and easy money, but again it’s a long term investment. It will hurt our long-term financial health and put a middleman in between us and the customer.
What do you think about our strategy? Is there anything else we can do to scale the business without jeopardizing product and service quality?
Where is my bike light?
1800 Defenders have been built and delivered from our factory to our warehouse(!!!!)
~900 are on your handlebars
~100 are on their way to customers
~800 are in our warehouse in Connecticut. They’re shipping ~50/day
October 26, 2012 at 4:39 pm
Should i put this thing on a fixie, penny farthing or british three speed so Jim Sadtler will see it?
October 28, 2012 at 12:42 am
Have you thought about floating on the stock market and trading shares?
October 29, 2012 at 12:10 pm
Jim Sadtler stopped by my office today and asked if I received my light yet. The answer is no. Do you have my correct shipping address?
Ronald P. Cooper
623 East Vermont Street
Indianapolis Indiana 46202
317-636-6243 home telephone
October 30, 2012 at 12:10 am
Hi Ron, We didn’t get a survey response with your address. We just emailed you and we’ll get it straightened out right away!
November 6, 2012 at 8:20 pm
Hi. Can you tell me when my light might be arriving? Thanks,
November 6, 2012 at 8:28 pm
Hi Stan, please email us and we’ll tell you where you are in the queue!
November 9, 2012 at 1:05 am
Still waiting. Trying to stay patient.
November 9, 2012 at 1:06 am
Still waiting. Trying to be patient……….
December 29, 2012 at 4:03 am
Hi. Can you tell me when my light might arrive? Thanks, Stan Ross
April 28, 2013 at 12:43 pm
Much like Ron up there I live in indianapolis and have not got my light yet. Looking forward to it.
August 1, 2013 at 3:20 pm
Great idea, but I won’t be buying one quite yet. Why? I live in Bogotá, Colombia. Interesting city with a growing number of biker-focused routes, but some lunatic ideas like mixing pedestrians and bikes on the same pavement (a curious thing is that I have never heard a cyclist use a whistle to warn pedestrians, they just ride through any “obstruction”!). On the road it is suicide - car (and particularly taxi) drivers have no respect for anything softer then them. Given the recognised aggressive nature of local drivers it’s better to mix with the pedestrians. Then there is bike-jacking. My wife recently refused to go riding in a big public park as apparently many years ago she was attacked and almost bike-jacked there — too scary to repeat. So, no riding means no need for a light! Pity.
As to your strategies, we have a small business and had some of the same distribution thoughts as you. My suggestion is this — forget high faluting philosophical principles. As a business you are there to make yourself money. If you can guarantee the quality Iincluding service quality) and that your name will always be associated with the product (i.e. no 100% re-branding) why not let anyone who wants to sell your stuff?
By the way, when is the red rear light going to be made?
Andy
November 21, 2013 at 7:26 pm
I get the idea of selling direct in the US. But the world is a big place. Shipping costs to Europe are quite big for each small purchase an individual might make. I bet it is 40-50% of the cost of the product. A European distributor would also help make import costs predictable for the customer. In Sweden, that can be an additional 25%. So I doubt I would get a set of Aviator/Afterburners for under $175 after all is said and done. Luckily, with the European Union, you can solve the problem with a single EU distributor. The rest of the world has similar geographic zones that ease things.
My 0.02.