

Show HN: Please Return Me - Recover your Lost Stuff - BadiPod

Please review my startup Please Return Me.<p>http://pleasereturn.me<p>Please Return Me is a service which helps recover your lost stuff.<p>We provide attractive labels (in 6 colors) which you place on your valuables like cell phones, wallets, keys, etc...<p>Gallery: http://pleasereturn.me/gallery<p>If you ever lose your stuff, we charge $30 for recovery and a minimum $20 reward for the finder.<p>--------------<p>We are giving labels away for free locally to try and collect data on returns and registrations. Our labels are available online for just $4.99 per sheet. Each sheet has it's own unique serial number registered to you.<p>If you have any marketing ideas, we'd love to hear those too. Please review!<p>Thank you HN!
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caw
I don't know what I would put the labels right now but if I think of something
I would definitely use the service.

2 things: 1) Do returners have any knowledge of the reward value before they
send it off? I can see it going two ways - someone not sending something in
because of the value of the item vs reward or users trying to get away with
the minimum payment of $50 because the other person doesn't know how much the
reward will be.

Still, if someone had a sticker on something like this I'd probably return it
regardless of the reward.

2) Typo on order page. "the'll hold up. "

I love the design of the stickers.

I could see an expansion being tamper proof stickers for an extra fee. Yours
are laminated, but I might want something (for corporate assets or something)
that can't be removed.

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BadiPod
Thank you for your feedback.

1\. About the reward; the returner does not know what the reward will be,
however we do mention that there is a minimum $20 reward.

The business is built around the idea that the general public is good. They
generally want to return someone's lost stuff. What we've found so far is that
the label just makes the process possible, and painless.

That's why we have the "Good Karma" badge :)

2\. Thanks, I have fixed the typo.

3\. About the expansion with tamper proof stickers, that's certainly a
possibility. We haven't done much corporate business yet, so we're not sure
the demand for that sort of thing. Our early customers have mostly been
individuals.

Thanks again for the feedback.

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dgunn
This is awesome. I love the idea. It's very likely I'll be signing up soon.
What do the different colors of the stickers mean? If nothing, you should let
people know that the colors mean nothing. Also, on the order screen (that's
right, I already tried to order) the boxes are filled with php error messages.
Gotta love php.

[edit] I just told my cofounder about this. He bought labels immediately. He
also had the php errors.

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BadiPod
Thanks for the feedback, I fixed the PHP error.

The colors don't mean anything, just personal preference- not unlike iPod
nanos.

We shipped out the labels your cofounder bought earlier today.

What is your business out of curiosity?

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dgunn
I let Matt know to be expecting his labels shortly. We're a marketplace for
dinner parties. Think the Airbnb model applied to dining instead of lodging.

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BadiPod
Very nice, when you can show me a prototype I'll be happy to give you some
feedback.

I think AirBnB was spamming craigslist when they first started, and now their
customers are doing it for them. Craigslist is free advertising. (Just a
thought)

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dgunn
He got the sheets. He liked the personal touch of hand-writing a thank you on
the receipt. Nice touch. Things like that mean a lot early on. Keep it up.

I think Airbnb is an idea to which craigslist can easily add value. Basically
people were on CL looking for a place to stay or listing their place for rent
so it was easy for abnb to step in and show their use case. Unfortunately
people aren't typically on CL advertising their dinner party or looking for
one to attend. That's not to say that CL can’t be used to our advantage in
some way, it just looks a little different.

We’re rapidly developing the product now and will be rolling it out to our
signed up chefs first so they can get their accounts created before official
launch. We’ll probably make a temporary back-door entrance for a "Show HN"
post to get some feedback. If you want, email me and I’ll keep you in the loop
as we roll it out.

[edit] email is "dave" at my startup's domain.

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meric
Changes are -> Chances are, in the paragraph below on your website.

We have a proven 75% recovery rate for valuables which is pretty darn good.
Changes are, you're going to lose something valuable eventually.

No one is perfect. (Not even you! :)

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soho33
very cool idea. the logistics around setting up the shipment from founder to
owner must be a big pain on your end! but overall i love the idea and will
check it out. do you guys offer your services in canada as well?

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BadiPod
Yeah, anywhere in the World.

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BadiPod
<http://PleaseReturn.Me>

