Showing posts with label ByBox. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ByBox. Show all posts

Expert advice on the ByBox

However, I can well see work niche though consumer - ByBoxes delivery stations. It will be useful for small items easily transported on a route of train home. But even which does not give much of a benefit have the item delivered to the client from the Home Office.

ByBox should consumer research to try to understand the needs of the customer delivery and only these customer needs are willing to pay, even if retailers subsidize costs livraison.Je think ByBox will find that they should just focus on making their big B2B business as useful as possible.

Peter, CEO, peninsula

When a company tries to discover what the consumer wants and the processes they should consider in deciding to use a product or service over another, should define its client strategy. Only by understanding the consumer can business owners to advance their marketing strategy.

Most of the marketing strategies that begin with an idea, then gradually move into a series of stages of development.Stuart must first identify that consumers would use its service on another. Test environment in the boxes are will be a factor influen?ant.Cela him help boost sales and to determine, for example what is the age range within a geographical area and who is most likely to use the service.

Any company must have in place effective marketing strategy to obtain the product or service in the hands of the consommateurs.Stuart should seek proven marketing techniques may be from an established supplier.By marketing through the right distribution channels, advertising and promotions will hit the target market.

Cost of product development must be taken into account, giving a realistic idea of charging the consumer and the location where to put the margins.The objectives of the company must also contain an analysis of the lifecycle of their products, the introduction, development and growth prévue.Nouveaux competing delivery inevitably come on the market, ByBox can constantly consult its position and extending the life cycle can mean taking account of new products and services.

Stuart Miller should reflect on what it is and how it currently silver it seems to be qualified distribution and to present, estimable, £ 1 society.5 m, a profit of the year mainly earned by providing a service to the rear of its distribution network.

Matthew Riley, Chief Executive, Daisy Group Plc

I understand need for Miller to exorcise the daemon of the consumer, but believe that he himself is setting for a fall if this is the main engine.With a growth of 30 million pounds at 50 m £ potential left in the B2B supply chain I fear that taking his eye off the coast of this ball and conclude tried, tested and historically has no water may not be the right decision at this stage and could dilute current ByBox brand success.

Daisy business model is based on business-to-business marketplace and was born of a niche I spotted in the sector of small and medium-sized enterprises.

My original vision of the business has naturally molded and changed the route when the needs of two customers and new technology industry demanded, but the base remains the same.

I would suggest that Miller focused on maximizing success ByBox and during this time, expert staff and knowledge of the consumer market.

Once the right people, systems and processes are square, Miller can listen to their advice and make an informed decision if the consumer market is worth revisiting.

John Timpson, CEO, Timpson

Stuart doesn't really know how he will earn money for a consumer based service and then I ni.Il hope someone else will pay for its data, but the world is full of information banks which more to increase the volume of spam.

I respect the ambition of Stuart, he would great satisfaction to realize his dream original.Mais why the prosperous business, he created so carefully over the past 10 years the risk?

There probably not be satisfied until he had a go to the commercialization of public deposit boxes, but it must be prudent.Il should only invest a sum of money that it does mind lost in advance and should take on debt which could the future of its base.Si first signs are disappointing should lift not good money after bad investment.

Incidentally, there is an opportunity which actually a route to market our shoe repair or cleaning dry beginning me.Je believes that there must be a means of better and safer for Stuart Miller develop its ByBox undertaking.


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ByBox believes that outside of the box to settle an old score

 ByBox founder Stuart Miller: "With the risk of failure and all the stuff that happens to you afterwards, why would you start a business?" "You? d have to be stupid."

Stuart Miller's business might have a 70pc market share, but it is still not doing what its founder intended it for ByBox, which provides a nationwide bank of boxes to keep field service engineers supplied with shares, is expecting to grow its revenues, which were just £ 6 m in 2005, from £ 37 m this year to £ 49 m in 2011. The 10-year-old business also controls much of the associated supply chain by offering repairs, supplying engineers and owning the distribution network, and clients include Coca-Cola, Fujitsu and Konica Minolta. Miller estimates there's between £ 30 m and £ 50 m of growth left in the business before it starts "competing with its own customers".It's a far cry from the eCommerce play he originally envisaged, however - the business model that has brought success emerged from a stroke of "pure good fortune" after his initial vision had ended in a chastening failure.


"I've started to love the whole field services thing," says the 43-year-old.


Miller spent his late 20s fruitlessly pouring his efforts into Octopus, a telephone-based concierge business. "We spent six years lurching from one financial mess to another, desperately trying to convince ourselves it wasn't a small niche when it was clear to everyone it was." "We never properly got it going". In 2000, having sold half of Octopus for £ 200,000, Miller was determined to use the proceeds to get ahead of what he saw as an inevitable eCommerce boom.The idea was a nationwide network of drop-boxes where delivery firms could leave customers' products that had been ordered online, so consumers could avoid having to stay at home or miss a delivery slot. "The distribution solutions Katherine ain't working - delivering at home when you Katherine can't there seemed stupid." "Having spent so long torturing ourselves in a niche of a niche, there was also an immediate appeal to something that was mass market."


Miller secured a joint venture with Logibag, French manufacturer of left luggage lockers, and decamped to Silicon Valley where he assumed the adoption of eCommerce would be swiftest. "It didn't work at all. We didn't have enough money, then the NASDAQ crashed in March," he admits.Not that he's apportioning much of the blame to the dotcom crash. "We didn't understand the market - or even who our customer was." Was it the carrier, the retailer or the consumer? "All of it was daft."


His business partners "sensibly" abandoned the idea, he says, but he returned home determined to press on."85pc of start-ups fail after five years." With the risk of failure and all the stuff that happens to you afterwards, why would you do it? "You'd have to be stupid." Despite the Silicon Valley experience, Miller still thought consumer delivery was where the action would be. "We still hadn haven't learnt."


Two strokes of good fortune changed the company's direction. First, he joined forces with Dan Turner whose Dynamid business was aiming to provide drop-boxes outside people's homes. Next, at a trade show, he bumped into recruitment giant Hays plc.Hays had built up a network of 11,000 mechanical boxes across the UK into which it delivered spare parts to mobile engineers. In 2003, Miller secured a five-year deal to supply the company with banks of "intelligent" electronic boxes.


"It was perfect," says Miller.Then, just 10 weeks later, Hays announced it was breaking up the group. "Just when we thought we d sorted it, it seemed to be falling apart again." However, Miller and Turner managed to raise £ 330,000 from friends and family and bought the division, giving them a company with a customer base producing £ 6 m of revenues.


Realising "the box was not enough", they quickly built a transportation network to go with it and set about improving the service. "All the customers that came from the Hays division were totally cheesed off." It was a blessing. "You have to bend over every now and then to quickly achieved what it is they need."


Miller, who has a background in software development, Duino that the mantra "move the data, not the hand" was the answer. "You could understand how you could use the data from the boxes to control the flow of parts." ByBox has turned its business into a "virtual warehouse" that cuts out the central hub for shares already in the system; "ones that need repair are sent straight to the repairer and the rest directly to where they're needed".


The company, which had a pre - tax profit of £ 1. 5 m last year, now has 18,000 boxes across 1,350 rentals and a share of total UK outsourced parts study 70pc. In 2008, the company was the fastest growing tech business in the UK. It also operates smaller networks in five countries. But the initial consumer failure still seems to be troubling Miller - and now he's got a national infrastructure, he wants another crack.


"We still haven't scratched B2C properly." We've got the infrastructure. "But we re still not making that breakthrough." He has finally identified who the customer is, however - the end consumer.ByBox has established a consumer website - mybybox.com - that allows online shoppers to register, find their nearest bank of boxes, and receive a new delivery address - ByBox's Coventry hub - to use for all of their online shopping. They receive a text message when an item is ready for collection. Miller readily admits some cultural and pricing obstacles remain - not least, who country for a service that he estimates costs ByBox £ 1 per delivery. "I don't think people will pay £ 10 for the privilege." People expect it to be cheaper because it's not delivered to their home and we're thinking it should be a premium product. That's a massive disconnect. "But if we can go to a place where delivery is free and make money on other things, that's a really interesting place to be."


The company has a deal with Network Rail to put up to 1,500 boxes in mainline stations by 2014, with the first set already installed at London Victoria. A "free, next day, don't wait in" trial run through lingerie site Figleaves produced encouraging results. "The only thing I wanted was to send an email saying, ' if you liked this experience, you can use this for all your online retailing - go to mybybox and register'." "We've been staggered by the response."


Miller surfers "countless business plans have been thrown on the fire on the basis of a purely advertising funded model", but he believes the value of the data ByBox would own should reduce the cost to the end - user."I know where they live and their gender."If we stay with delivery is free, maybe I can ask how old they are.I'd also know where else they shop.When they come and collect, we can stream 10 seconds of appropriate advertising to them before the door opens."What's that worth?"He said that the company could add other services such as dry cleaning and shoe repair and take a cut."How will the competition react if I give away what they have to charge for?"We've had a little breakthrough - how do we marketed it?Last year, there were 1. 3bn study half would fit in our box.In May it's up 26pc year on year."The high street is changing forever."


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