Brainstorming: The concept
This is the the first chapter about the story of a group of young entrepreneurs who had an idea of fulfilling a need among students who live temporarly in another city that is not their home: how to provide a product and a service that is convenient, time saver and avoids transportation contraints? The answer is simple: UniRental!
Our platform provides products such as furniture, kitchen appliances or sports equipmen, which has the advantage of allowing customers to rent for a period of time. After it, customers return the product(s), which can be done with a simple click, since we have an extra service of pick&delivery. Thus, you can have everything at your home without thinking "what am I going to do with this couch after leaving?" or "Will I be able to sell this surf board three months from now?".
There are five major ideas that we would enjoy to implement into our business, such as:
UniRental being a platform that allows students to rent different equipment/materials;
A rent fee that would be included in the service provided, which would be proportional to the duration of the contract plus an insurance fee;
There would be a premium service which delivers and collects equipment/materials from clients’ house;
Buying different products from everyone who has the desire to sell them in order to increase our inventory;
Do partnerships with all kinds of furniture & appliances stores in order to obtain old, damaged or unwanted inventory.
The concept was developed in our minds, thus then was time to think about different aspects relevant for the business:
Business Model Canvanizer of UniRental
2. Why are we starting this business?
To allow (international) students to rent house equipment or scholar material instead of buying it permanently, which is cheaper and suitable for them.
3. Who are our ideal customers?
Mostly exchange students who are planning to spend a limited time in Portugal;
Temporary workers who need to stay in Lisbon for an internship or a short-term contract;
Landlords who would furnish their apartments for a short-term contract rather than buying furniture.
4. What products or services will our business provide?
Furniture, kitchen & electronic & sport equipments;
UniRental will provide an extra service: deliver, assemble and pick up the products when the rental period is over.
5. Who is our competition?
Right now, we do not have direct competition: no other platforms provide our rental service.
Consumers can buy goods online in Ebay, Amazon and OLX;
They can also buy goods on physical stores such as Ikea, Zara Home, Casa and Area.
6. What differentiates us from other competitors in the market?
UniRental will offer a delivery and pick up service;
User-friendly, meet students’ needs.
Low price products;
Rental service;
Insurance;
Time saving.
7. What type of suppliers does the business requires?
Furniture providers, electronic and Sport equipment sellers;
Partnership with insurance company to guarantee the safety of the products for both UniRental and the customer;
Other partnerships: delivery service.
8. How will we advertise the business?
Contact with universities in Lisbon
Facebook and other social networks;
Through partners’ website as Uniplaces;
Airline companies websites.
Finally, the lessons we have earned so far were:
How to delevep the Model Canvanizer of UniRental, which was extremely important to better understand the business;
An heterogeneous team like ours is a driver for success and good ideas (based on Herrmann model);
The development of an idea/scratch into a company is possible if we define our key partners, activities, customers segments among others;
Simple ideas can be difficult to implement (due to distribution channels, as we will try to manage in the best way);
A good idea/model fulfill the needs of customers, which in the case of UniRental was felt in the first person.
