

Ask HN: Alternatives to Kickstarter? - neltnerb

I've been working on several LED lighting projects for the last five years, and the latest is quite close to coming to fruition. It's a pretty awesome little gadget, fully open-hardware and open-source light with a 10W RGB+white LED and an arduino core that I'm targeting trying to sell for $70 each.<p>Unfortunately, the time it's taken me to design this has meant that I haven't had a full-time job in over a year. So, I don't really have the $40k or so it'd take to build 1000 first-run units.<p>As such, my first thought turns to kickstarter. But they charge 5% fees on the project, plus the 3.5% credit card fees, plus I may have to pay Philips patent royalties (probably not since these are prizes, not sales), plus I may have to do FCC certification tests (probably not since these are prizes, not sales), the list of "incidental" expenses goes on and on.<p>I think I might be able to do better if I could do something equivalent to kickstarter pre-orders on my own website, but how does one go about managing an eskrow of this kind? Is it possible, or is the only reason it works because kickstarter is there to manage it and make sure that the eskrow works properly? It may not sound like much, but that 5% overhead fee is a noticeable chunk of my revenue; enough that I have to remove components from the light to accommodate it.<p>If anyone is curious also, here is a link to the schematic:
http://db.tt/ResLCCbY<p>It started with a lot more stuff, then got pared down to almost nothing, then had a lot more stuff added again, and then got pared down again... I think that everything that's left is going to be legitimately useful and cool to have available.
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neltnerb
Oh, if anyone is curious, the older projects are at:

<http://led-artwork.com/>

and

<http://saikoled.com>

Neither website is very good, just some html I threw together to get something
online. Naturally I would significantly improve those sites when I'm shifting
from "show and tell" to "trying to sell stuff for realz".

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mittermayr
Also, this: <http://selfstarter.us>

built by the guys behind Lockitron (<https://lockitron.com/>) because there
were issues with kickstarter.

but don't forget: having a donation/payment setup all wired up does not ring
the cash register just yet. it's 90% promotion, 10% collecting payments.

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alberthartman
Awesome stuff! Ditto the comments that the biggest challenge will be getting
your name out there. Depending on your focus and bandwidth, the DIY approach
of Lockitron may work, or you may wish to just go Indiegogo/KS and focus on
the promotion side yourself and let someone else handle the payment plumbing.
You'll have to promote either way.

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dear
Just charge 5% more. Think of all the work to build, maintain and market your
own selfstarter site. It's not worth it.

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neltnerb
I'm open to the idea, but I feel like $70/system is about the sweet spot for
this, if not on the high side already. I'd rather be at a $50 price point; I
think that at that price point they'd find all sorts of new applications.

If I raise that to $80, I know that I personally start going from "that sounds
reasonable" to "that's almost $100". And since I've been trying to get a
product off the ground for five years, I feel like I have a reasonable sense
of what "too expensive" looks like for what will largely be considered a toy.

I am curious as to thoughts of whether the 5% kickstarter tax is worth the
possible additional exposure from going through the big crowdfunding site.
I've seen Rock the Post, and now indiegogo, but since I had never heard of
either before a few weeks ago I feel like they can't possibly be as popular.

~~~
dear
Don't forget it's 5%, not 50%. That means $50 will become $52.5. Not a big
deal.

Indiegogo is also hugely popular. They charge 4%.

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neltnerb
Thanks for the suggestion about Indiegogo. I guess I'm just not very in the
loop. Too old or something ;-)

I realize 5% isn't that much, and I have seen enough projects fail due to
penny pinching that I want to allocate value as value deserves. But for my
margins, 5% of $70 is $3.50 -- the same cost as my entire case... I'm just
nervous about it being quite tight while feeling like I'm already at the
ceiling of what I can ask for in price.

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mittermayr
I'm working on a similar project: <http://www.indiegogo.com/aircubus/>

been using indiegogo after kickstarter seems to be very cocky about identify
validation (bunch of great e-mails).

~~~
neltnerb
Looks very nice! Do you have a microphone on there? It seems to be responding
to music quite quickly for having to go through a computer and web server.
Either way, very impressive.

Feel free to copy anything you like from my schematic if it'd be helpful!

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NonEUCitizen
Why not charge more to account for that 5% overhead, FCC certification, etc. ?

