
Swapbox Lands $800K To Take On Google’s BufferBox And Amazon’s Lockers - drakaal
http://techcrunch.com/2013/12/05/swapbox-automated-delivery-seed-funding/
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erikb
Are you kidding me? We have this for over 5 years in Germany... Normal service
of Deutsche Post.

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neel_murthy
You're right, but it's not common in America, that's where we come in, with a
few other tricks and tech up our sleeves...

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erikb
I agree that there is a lot to improve upon the existing designs. Don't worry,
my surprise was not meant as criticism on your project.

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msandford
So how are you guys solving the Commercial Mail Receiving Agency (CMRA)
problem?

Congress passed a law in 2001 regarding CMRAs and directed the USPS to
establish regulations regarding them. What it boils down to is that in order
to receive USPS mail on someone's behalf as a commercial entity, you've got to
register with your local post office AND have all your customers do so as
well.

[http://www.rscentral.org/Programs/USPS-Retail-
Programs/USPS-...](http://www.rscentral.org/Programs/USPS-Retail-
Programs/USPS-CMRA-Program.aspx)

If you only accept UPS, FedEx, DHL, etc but no USPS you're in a legally grey
area. Most reasonably adults would suggest that FedEx isn't "mail" the same
way that what the USPS delivers IS mail. But I haven't seen any case law
either way on this but I'm not a lawyer so it could be out there.

The reason this is a problem is that the purchaser (the SwapBox customer)
doesn't always have control over how the items he/she purchases will be
shipped. Think Amazon Marketplace or eBay; they often go "whatever's cheapest"
and you don't get a choice since it's a $10 item with free shipping. When that
happens the USPS can't legally deliver the items to the SwapBox and will
return them to the shipper.

If SwapBox does go the route of registering with the local post office(s) as a
CMRA it gets worse. According to the regs you have to register as a customer
at a particular address. So if you want to get mail at SwapBox A you have to
fill out paperwork and get it delivered to the post office for SwapBox A. Now
if you want to get deliveries at SwapBox B, which is at a different physical
address than A? You got it, another set of paperwork for the post office that
delivers to SwapBox B.

This is not a trivial problem to solve. I know, I used to work at a mid-sized
CMRA and there's no way around it, legally, without lobbying Congress to
change the law. At least that I could come up with.

EDIT: Transcript from Congressional Hearing is here
[http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-106hhrg61646/pdf/CHRG-106h...](http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-106hhrg61646/pdf/CHRG-106hhrg61646.pdf)

EDIT2: I don't want to discourage you guys, there may be a way around this. I
suppose that might be some kind of competitive advantage so you might not
disclose it publicly. If you didn't know about this already and you want I'd
be happy to explain this whole thing in detail and/or give you some things I
already looked into as ways to ease the pain. I'm not sure what the proper
"get in touch in real life protocol" is here on HN.

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bstewr
Typically with these services they have a central location that they have you
ship things to and then the service will go deliver it to the right box. This
is how Bufferbox does it and I assume how these guys are as well.

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msandford
That makes sense. It doesn't scale terribly well because as you get more than
maybe an hour from the central location by car/truck you can't expand further.

It also doesn't solve the problem of needing to have the customer fill out the
form which scares tons of them away. It's either got to be signed in front of
one of the company's employees, or notarized. Neither of which makes it easy
for a company to grow.

It also means that you're still fairly tied down. Yeah a metro area is much
larger than a single zip code, but it's definitely not a nationwide rollout in
any kind of reasonable timeframe.

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bstewr
It definitely seems pretty capital intensive as well with all the delivery
vehicles and the actual boxes. As for signing - I don't think the delivery
guys are as concerned just as long as someone accepts it. For instance in San
Francisco roommates usually accept for each other without really needing to
sign. I've also heard issues with amazon lockers being full most of the time
so people will need to find a different spot and I'm curious if it will be the
same for this. Overall I think there are still a good number of problems these
guys will need to straighten out to be able to scale. I'd also be curious how
much they are paying the stores with the actual boxes.

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msandford
You're right that the delivery guys aren't too concerned so long as it's non-
commercial. So a roommate or neighbor or the apartment front office or
whatever is no problem. That's how you can get USPS packages at your work even
if it's a huge building; the mail department at your work isn't a separate
business that charges you for the accepting your mail. Once it's clear that
it's a mail accepting for hire kind of business though the USPS guys will be
sticklers about it.

Ultimately I expect that these businesses will get bought up by UPS or FedEx
for the software, the already designed physical boxes and the small but
existent network of facilities. Once that happens they will become a
nationwide thing but only in areas where the drivers have to do lots of re-
delivery. They will look at it as a cost reduction more than anything else. At
least that's my take.

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drakaal
I love the idea of having packages delivered to a locked location near my
home.

Being able to have expensive things delivered to some where safe that has 24
hour access is awesome. (No Mailboxes ETC isn't a bad idea but it costs money
and gets junk mail)

I also like that I can have people send stuff without giving my address.
(there are some creepy people on Etsy and Ebay)

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neel_murthy
Glad we could provide you with a way to do this drakaal. Feel free to ping us
at support@swapbox.com with any ?s, concerns, feedback, etc!

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toomuchtodo
Where do I signup :)

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bmoggach
bufferbox.com :D

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toomuchtodo
No Chicago! :(

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FreeKill
I'm a big fan of BufferBox, so I hope SwapBox brings even more to the table. I
find it especially useful when ordering anything that ships via UPS/Fedex
since they mostly try to deliver during the day and if you're not home to
receive, it can be a big PITA. With BufferBox, they sign for it, then place it
in the locker for you.

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neel_murthy
Try us out if you're in SF, for free, and let me know what you think :)

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protomyth
How do these services differ from the UPS store where I get mail delivered to
and packages signed for?

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georgemcbay
One thing that is different is that (with the exception of Amazon Lockers)
they basically don't exist if you don't live in San Francisco.

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paulgb
BufferBox is in Toronto as well.

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dustcoin
I could see this service being very useful to Silkroad buyers as it avoids
giving a home address to drug dealers. If paid for anonymously, it would also
make the buyer more difficult for law enforcement to track than someone who
sends packages directly their residence.

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voltagex_
Come to Australia - Australia Post Parcel Lockers need some competition!

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neel_murthy
We're on it!

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voltagex_
Really? I'd love to have a chat to you - contact details are in my profile.

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jrockway
So they've taken $800K from someone who works at Amazon in order to take on
Amazon? I think not.

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neel_murthy
I wouldn't say we're "taking on" Amazon...

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jrockway
The title says that. But I guess that's TechCrunch editorializing, and not
something you actually said. My apologies.

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neel_murthy
No worries jrockway. It's in the headline. I'm just clarifying how we see
ourselves.

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dsugarman
you can't move the burden of logistics costs to the e-commerce retailers, they
put the burden right back on the consumer.

