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Umbrella-sharing Startup Loses Nearly All of Its 300,000 Umbrellas In a Matter of Weeks (shanghaiist.com)

Posted by msmash on from the saw-it-coming dept.

With bike-sharing companies like Mobike becoming incredibly successful in Chinese cities, a few startups have decided to mimic the concept with shareable umbrellas. The only problem: most of the umbrellas have gone missing, reports local media. From a report: Only a few weeks after starting up operations in 11 cities across China, Sharing E Umbrella announced that it had lost almost all of its 300,000 umbrellas. The Shenzhen-based company was launched with a 10 million yuan ($1.5 million) investment. The concept was similar to those that bike-sharing startups have used to (mostly) great success. Customers use an app on their smartphone to pay a 19 yuan deposit fee for an umbrella, which costs just 50 jiao for every half hour of use.

5 of 159 comments (clear)

  1. Well, collect on the deposits... by bobbied · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You don't lose anything if you keep the deposit... Just buy new ones.. Right?

    Seems like a great way to sell umbrellas to me... Here borrow this, but if you don't bring it back I'm going to charge you...

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
    1. Re:Well, collect on the deposits... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      My father once worked at a convenience store (Circle K), where people would run out of gas and ask if they could borrow a 4 gallon gas can. At the time, this made sense - they didn't have a gas can, just walked a mile or two, and needed to get gas back to their car. ...
      Later, driving in a car with a) gas and b) a gas can, they would neglect to return it. ...
      In the days before debit/credit cards, my father's store had a "deposit" required (in cash) of $10 for the gas can. ZERO gas cans were ever returned. They also sold gas cans for $10.

    2. Re:Well, collect on the deposits... by Zocalo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Actually, it sounds more like they need to figure out how to bill their customers for the *on-going rental* of their non-returned umbrellas. At 50 jiao (5 yuan) per half hour, they're going to be making a pretty good RoI given each umbrella only costs around 60 yuan - including the 19 yuan deposit you're in the black after about 8 hours of rental. They've got an app that makes the initial payment, so surely that includes such on-going billing, right?

      Oh, wait, "startup". Maybe not...

      --
      UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
    3. Re:Well, collect on the deposits... by Wycliffe · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The problem is that umbrellas are too cheap. If they make the deposit any higher people won't use the service out of fear of losing it, but at the same time it's not enough to motivate them to return the item.

      This hasn't stopped Redbox in the USA. Redbox doesn't even charge a deposit but they will continue to charge you for 30 days if you don't return it. After that, it's yours.

    4. Re:Well, collect on the deposits... by wvmarle · · Score: 3, Interesting

      More likely this is not an issue of people not returning an umbrella they rented, but people taking an umbrella without renting it.