Connor Simpson is a self-proclaimed sweater addict. About two years ago, unsurprisingly, his collection was getting a bit excessive and he tried to find a place to swap some of his sweaters in for something else.
But he couldn’t find a place to do it. So, with the help of a few others co-founders, the 21-year-old Simpson created one.
After his idea won Startup Weekend Spokane, Simpson hired a developer off Craigslist and recruited a high school classmate to design. Now, after 18 months of hard work, Barters Closet has raised $150,000 and just launched an Indiegogo campaign for its mobile app.
“We intend to make Barters Closet the world’s leader in online bartering, beginning with apparel,” Simpson said.
Clothes, though, is just the beginning. The company plans on offering additional categories such as household items, office supplies, consumer electronics, toys, tools and more.
We caught up with Simpson, son of Northwest Venture Associates founder Tom Simpson, for the latest edition of Startup Spotlight.
Explain what you do so our parents can understand it: Barters Closet is a social network for people to barter, buy, sell and donate their clothes.
Inspiration hit us when … I am somewhat of a sweaterphile. You’d be hard pressed to find me in anything but a sweater during the fall and winter seasons. About two years ago, I realized I had compiled about 50 sweaters in my collection and was no longer able to keep them all in one closet. I looked online to see if there was a place I could trade some of my sweaters for other ones. To my disappointment, I could not find such a place; so I decided to create one.
VC, Angel or Bootstrap: I believe you always have to maintain the bootstrap mentality no matter how much funding you’re getting or where it’s coming from. We’ve been fortunate to be funded by local angel investors, but are not opposed to securing venture capital. It’s not about who you have received financing from, but how you use it. A bootstrap mentality keeps you agile while raising too much money can stunt growth by leading to a complacent mindset.
Our ‘secret sauce’ is: Our secret sauce is our visual bartering interface. We allow people to select what they would like to exchange from their “Closet” and what they would like to receive from someone else. After an offer is sent, the recipient has the option to approve, deny or counter the offer. Our goals are not only to save people money on their wardrobe and to conserve resources, but also to make bartering fun, and game-like.
The smartest move we’ve made so far: While developing the site, we decided to make a weekly video called Barters Office that is a satire of The Office. We created the web-series to establish a following despite not having a product ready. It worked! People really enjoyed our candid comical moments of being involved in a startup. Though many of the hijinks were dramatized, many of them were inspired by things that were actually happening to us.
The biggest mistake we’ve made so far: Releasing the product before it was ready has been our biggest mistake. We were so eager to get Barters Closet live that we overlooked some technical problems with the site. We had to retract our initial version one a month after its release and send it back to development. We are now much more cautious before we launch any new features and we frequently remind people we are still in a beta.
Would you rather have Gates, Jobs, Zuckerberg or Bezos in your corner: It’s a tie between Gates and Zuckerberg. Both are top contenders due to their philanthropic outlook and desire to give back, something everyone at Barters Closet aspires to do, too. Being a company of youthful entrepreneurs, we can relate more with Zuckerberg, and we appreciate how he grew his business locally, then expanded. I couldn’t make a solid decision without meeting them.
Our world domination strategy starts when: We expand our categories and allow people to barter anything. We will become the leader in online bartering; clothing is just the beginning. We choose to start with apparel because it’s something that everyone has and are constantly changing. Clothes are light and easy to ship. Fashion is a source of social interaction and is a subject are people like to share because it’s a form of self-expression.
Rivals should fear us because: We operate with an exceptionally low overhead and will be able to outrun our competition. Our team is scrappy and we aren’t afraid of going to work in the basement. We are firm believers in the adage “slow and steady wins the race”. Lastly, we are passionate about what we do and are tenaciously confident that we are creating a valuable and useful product.
We are truly unique because: We focus less on revenues and more on how we can create value for our customers which will in turn come full circle. *Karma
The biggest hurdle we’ve overcome is: Prioritizing what features should be implemented. There is no lack of ideas or creativity at Barters Closet, we’re always working to prioritize (and re-prioritize) what functionality we should implement next.
What’s the one piece of advice you’d give to other entrepreneurs just starting out: Fight to achieve your goals and don’t stop until you can’t move anymore, and realize that when you reach your goals it’s not over, you’ll need to set new goals. “Never, never, never give up.” — Winston Churchill.
