BUSINESS IDEA | STARTUP

Groupon for Birthday Deals 🎂 

A piece of cake

Available Domain: Birthdaybonus.io

1. Problem/Opportunity❓

The Problem/Opportunity: Depending on your age a birthday is either a blessing or a curse. Although they’re clearly good for your health.

But in truth birthdays are a time for celebration, reflection but most importantly…receiving gifts. And it turns out tonnes of brands out there are keen to gift people vouchers or free samples on their birthdays to make them feel special buy more stuff from them in the future. So why not build an app which highlights all of these deals which someone is entitled to on their big day? Here’s what we’re thinking.

Market Size: The online daily deals market was valued at about $6.2 billion in 2022 in the USA alone

2. Solution ✅

The Idea: An app which aggregates birthday offers from brands and retailers for users to redeem

How it Works:

• A user signs up to the app and provides proof of their birthday as part of the sign up flow

• They can browse free deals that are available to them on or near their birthday. They can find deals both online and in stores/restaurants near them using their location data

• Users can then redeem these deals and even share deals with their friends on their birthdays

Go-to-market: You want to go directly to brands here and offer the rewards to customers directly in the app as an acquisition channel for customers

Business Model: Charge brands a fee to list their deals on the platform

Startup Costs: You could start this as a simple directory very cheaply, prove out the concept, then invest and build it into an app

3. How You’ll Get Rich 💰

Hold: This could be a cool little cash flow business for whoever builds it if you want to keep it small, but you could also try and swing for the fences here.

Exit Strategy: You could exit to a company like Groupon where this would fit in nicely with their existing business

Exit Multiple: This type of business likely wouldn’t get a huge multiple, maybe 4x - 8x revenue

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DRUNK BUSINESS IDEA

Metal Detecting Sandals

If you went to the beach as a kid you almost certainly had visions of using a metal detector to uncover some buried treasure that would put you in the history books.

Well now you can try that for real with these metal detecting sandals. Just walk around and wait ‘til you hear the beep alerting you to the potential treasure beneath your feet. And ignore anyone who gives you funny looks since they think you’re wearing an ankle monitor, they’re just jealous.

For extra style points pair this with a nice pair of socks. Happy hunting!

JUST THE TIP

Trend 📈: THC Gummies

It feels like the supplement market has been taken over by gummy products in the last few years, with THC gummies emerging as one of the fastest growing categories out there. These are edible candies that contain THC, the main psychoactive compound found in cannabis, and are legal only in certain jurisdictions. This is a vast, fast-growing market, presenting plenty of opportunity.

Business Ideas

• Marketing & Branding Agency for THC Products: An agency which caters to advertising THC products, given certain prohibitions on advertising these products on certain platforms in certain geographies

• THC Regulation Tracker: Create a platform which tracks regulation changes in the THC market for THC businesses

THE MONEYSHOT

How 3 Canadians Built a $35 Million Dollar Chocolate Business

Some industries out there seem almost impossible to crack. Take the chocolate industry which is dominated by a small number of huge players like Mars and Nestlé.

But against all odds these three founders came together to take on “Big Chocolate” and build a $35m chocolate business.

This is their story.

Lezlie Karls is a born and bred entrepreneur.

She spent years running her own fashion brand called Hektor, which boasted customers like Lady Gaga, but unfortunately for Lezlie the brand went under, so she started looking for her next opportunity. Lezlie and her husband Nick Saltarelli (right) both decided that the best thing to do would be to start a business together. So they spent months talking about different business ideas, anything they could think of. But all that time it turns out their big business idea was sitting right under their noses.

While Lezlie was hungry for a new business idea Nick was just…hungry. So Lezlie created a healthy chocolate bar for Nick to snack on, a “functional chocolate bar” with which was lower sugar, had extra fiber but tasted delicious. Which got them thinking…why don’t they just sell these bars? Well that’s exactly what they decided to do.

In fact the newlyweds were so excited to start the brand that they came home two days early from their honeymoon to get started. But they were still missing a piece of the puzzle. Both Lezlie and Nick are quite introverted so they needed someone more outgoing to lead the company’s marketing efforts. So they turned to Lezlie’s brother…Jake Karls.

Jake had a similar entrepreneurial background to his sister, having previously started various different businesses including a fitness boot camp and a clothing brand. Lezlie and Nick knew Jake would be perfect to lead their marketing efforts, but he was reluctant to join. But after months of trying, Lezlie and Nick managed to convince Jake to join just 3 weeks before launching.

The team had spent months perfecting the recipe for their first product, a brownie-batter-flavored square. And after extensive testing and feedback from family and friends (nice for some) the trio were ready to share their product with the world.

In 2018 they launched Mid-Day Squares.

Now that they had their product the next job was to find some customers. In 2019 they raised a small seed round to fund the business, but since they didn’t have huge ad budgets they needed to find creative ways to get customers.

So they decided to focus on telling their story. They took to social media with unfiltered videos showcasing the realities of building a business, covering everything from product development to fundraising efforts. In their own words they tried to become “a rockband that happens to sell chocolate.” And it worked. Pretty quickly their content started getting popular online. Think "Keeping Up with the Kardashians” but for entrepreneurship.

They coupled this with an innovative online sampling program that allowed potential customers to try their bars for a small, nominal fee, which helped to convert them into paying customers. And the customers started coming through.

In 2021 they did another raise, bringing the total funds raised by the business up to $7.5m. Which is when they got the call from one of the giants of the industry….Hershey’s. 

Hershey’s wanted to purchase the company in 2021, but the team decided the deal wasn’t right for them at the time. Coincidentally after turning down Hershey’s Mid-Day Squares received a cease-and-desist letter from Hershey’s about using the color orange for its packaging. Quite the coincidence right? But they won in the end, responding with a music video called “Chocolate Gone Crazy” and posting $8 million in revenue that year.

In April 2022 the company raised $10m at a c.$35m valuation, cementing their place as one of the leading challenger brands in the chocolate market.

The company now produces about 60,000 bars daily and has expanded its product line to include multiple flavors sold in over 8,000 stores across North America, including major retailers like Walmart and Target.

All of which goes to show that no matter how competitive an industry is, there’s always room for new entrants. All it takes is to approach a market with fresh eyes and a fresh perspective.

Because in every market, like Mid-Day Squares, there’s always room for the best.

INFLUENCER IDEAS

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