⚡ How this Start-Up is Building a Global Marketplace for Local Car-Hire Firms

Morning Innovators ⚡ In less than 5 minutes, we’ll cover…

🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the start-up world
📰 The biggest news stories in the start-up world
🚗 How this tech start-up is levelling the playing field for local car-hire companies
⚾ How a baseball shot helped this drinks company go viral
🪝 An AI tool to help your sales team nail cold-outreach

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this link to Hotbed’s investor speed dating event.

Happy hustling,
Rich & Gary

🎤 Events/Opportunities

🚀 Applications for the fully funded NatWest Accelerator programme are now open for their Mid September 2024 cohort.

🅰️ Arāya Ventures Academy for Angels (AVA Angels) are inviting one start-up to pitch live to 50 new angel investors on 27th June in London. They’re looking for Consumer or B2B start-ups, in Health, FinTech, Climate, Commerce or Work, who are raising a pre-seed or seed round and are UK-based. To apply tag yourself and your company in the comments of this Linkedin post and email your PitchDeck to [email protected].

🦅 Want to cold email investors but not sure how? Eva Dobrzanska and Daniel Sawko are doing a collab on how to do this on 21st June. They'll talk through the approach (you must personalise) and what tools are at your disposal. Sign up here.

📝 Resources

Creandum have put together a series of templates for what they deem the perfect

👩‍🏫 Pitch Deck - https://blog.creandum.com/creandum-series-a-deck-template-21a6df9c1ac4
📊 Financial Model Plan - https://blog.creandum.com/financial-plan-model-template-creandum-f28622951028
🚪 Data Room - https://blog.creandum.com/seed-data-room-template-by-creandum-389e82f3058c

💼 Job opportunities

☕ Business Development Manager, Sharesy
💻 Growth Marketer, Neon
✏️ UI/UX Designer, ScaleMath

🏦 German financial regulator BaFin is lifting the growth restriction it placed on neobank N26 over concerns around money laundering and financial crime — leaving it free to onboard an unlimited number of new customers from June onwards. Sifted

💳 Nubank’s 100m customer milestone set a new benchmark for fintech — its success highlights both the pains and pitfalls upcoming for Europe’s neobanks. Sifted

🧑‍💻 Mistral, the French AI start-up backed by Microsoft and valued at $6 billion, has released its first generative AI model for coding, dubbed Codestral. TechCrunch

📌 Pinterest announced today that it is evolving its Creator Inclusion Fund to now be called the Pinterest Inclusion Fund. This sees Pinterest slowly moving away from traditional creators and focusing more on creative entrepreneurs. TechCrunch

🚗 FinalRentals: Empowering Local Car Hire with Global Technology

FinalRentals has carved a niche in the $54 billion car rental market by providing robust technological solutions to local car hire companies. These companies, often recognised for their personalised service and local knowledge, lack the resources to invest in digital marketing and efficient operation systems that their global counterparts like Hertz possess. FinalRentals bridges this gap with three essential tools: an online booking platform connected to major global sites like Discover and Kayak, a cloud-based dashboard for efficient booking management, and an online system for additional services like insurance to enhance customer transactions.

Founding Insights and Initial Customer Acquisition

The genesis of FinalRentals was deeply rooted in the founder's extensive experience in the car rental industry, having spent 15 years with Budget. This industry insight provided a solid foundation and a network of contacts that were instrumental in acquiring the first customers primarily through word of mouth and personal relationships - helped by the belief that the founder, Ammar, would be bringing an innovative take on the market. Once Ammar’s personal network had reached a ceiling, other early marketing efforts included social media campaigns on Facebook and Instagram, and a high-cost billboard in Dubai, which retrospectively, did not yield the expected return on investment.

Overcoming Early Challenges and Scaling Internationally

The journey of scaling FinalRentals was not without its hurdles. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic shortly after gaining initial traction brought the business to a standstill from March to November 2020. This period, however, allowed for strategic planning and rethinking the approach to global scaling. Participation in acceleration programs like Tech Seed Poland and the Poland Prize programme catalysed FinalRentals' expansion on the global stage, demonstrating the importance of adaptability and strategic international partnerships in overcoming early-stage business disruptions.

Lessons Learned and Strategic Pivots

The biggest takeaway from the early days was the inefficacy of non-digital advertising in a digital age. The founder candidly reflects on the decision to invest in a billboard as a misstep, emphasising the importance of trackable, digital marketing strategies for Start-Ups. If given a chance to start over, avoiding unmeasurable advertising expenses would be a priority to maintain lean financial operations.

Bootstrapping and Funding Transitions

FinalRentals was bootstrapped through its initial three years, generating $500K in revenue, which laid a solid financial foundation for the business. The transition to a funded company began in October 2022, leading to expansion into 32 countries and a revenue boost to $3.1 million. The journey to external funding was paved through extensive networking within ecosystems like Fintech Wales and Angel Invest Wales, highlighting the critical role of community and strategic relationships in securing investment. When crafting their pitch deck, the founder had to focus on clearly articulating how FinalRentals were solving the problem that local car-hire companies faced and demonstrate that the team they had to do it, as the biggest hurdle they faced was people thinking the car-hire industry was fine.

Reflecting on Missteps and Moving Forward

Aside from the billboard purchase, one of the biggest challenges the company has faced, was hiring as the business transitioned its headquarters to the EU and UK. Poor judgement on new hires provided lessons in human resources and the importance of a thorough vetting processes.

Key Takeaways for Aspiring Founders

FinalRentals’ journey underscores several key strategies for startup success: leveraging personal industry experience, the significance of digital over traditional marketing, the importance of networking for funding, and the cautious management of financial resources during pivotal growth phases. For new founders, understanding these elements can pave the way for informed decisions and sustainable business growth, avoiding the pitfalls that can divert valuable resources and momentum.

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This marketing play from Coors is some of the best reactive marketing we’ve ever seen.

During a baseball game over in the USA, one player managed to send a shot right at the advertising boards in the arena. At the exact time the ball hit, Coors were advertising their ‘Coors Light’ beverage. However, as the ball hit the display board, it knocked out the LED light on which it landed. This left one of the panels displaying the drink to be completely black as the panel had been knocked out by the baseball.

This went massively viral as fans were both impressed and amused by the accuracy of the shot. The Coors team saw their chance to capitalise on this free exposure and quickly launched the campaign you see above, actually releasing a limited number of cans with the black square on them to mimic the knocked out LED display. This whole campaign was valued at $700 million of free publicity.

Coors obviously had a big sum of money to be advertising in the MLB, which most Start-Ups don’t have. However, if you make a mistake on your packaging, or something brand related, how can you turn it into a bit of a publicity stunt?

Each week we highlight our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

PaddleBoat is a sales readiness platform that uses AI to facilitate realistic roleplays, helping sales reps improve their cold-calling skills. The platform offers customisable roleplays to match buyer personas, automated call feedback with insights on objection handling, and tools to create training programs from sales playbooks. PaddleBoat aims to minimise ramp-up time for new reps, eliminate dial anxiety, and provide managers with actionable analytics to enhance team performance. It's designed to save time on feedback and ensure sales teams are well-prepared for real-world interactions.

Next week we’ll be highlighting another awesome start-up (if you want us to feature you, drop us a message), as well as sharing all the usuals including funding opportunities, Start-Up news, plus plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with us on LinkedIn…