School for a young billionaire: useful tips. School for a young billionaire: useful tips A business built on junk

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Who needs unwanted clothes

Financial University graduate, semi-finalist of the Forbes startup competition Daria Alekseeva talks about the benefits her Charity Shop brings to successful employees of large corporations and people in difficult life situations

My path to the Charity Shop began in a rooming house in Honolulu (Hawaii, USA). Foolishly losing my passport and bank card, not remembering a single mobile phone number except my own, I went to the only place where they were ready to help me. After living for five days with other homeless people in a large hall that looks like a sports hall, receiving free normal food and clean clothes that you can choose for yourself, I learned a lot about what kind of help should be, which is not ashamed to accept.

Since then, I graduated from the Financial University, worked for charitable organizations for six years, volunteered in the Pskov village, Europe and Africa during the summer holidays - and understood how the non-profit sector functions.

The crisis of work in the fund is comparable to what occurs in corporations: you cannot speed up decision making, you must act within the vision of your leader, your ideas risk being buried under operational and urgent tasks. I began to feel like I could do more and was ready for my own big adventure. Thus, the idea was born to open a social business that would work like an ordinary company, but for the sake of something more than making a profit.

A business built on rubbish

In Europe and the USA, the “charity store” format is very popular, where everyone can donate unwanted clothes. The best will be sold so that the profits go to social projects, and things in substandard condition will be sent for recycling. I was inspired by the idea that we can raise money for charity without begging for it on the Internet, but simply by selling good quality clothes to people at prices of 10-20% of retail prices. In addition, we unloaded the cabinets of those who do not know where to put unnecessary things.

We rented a basement two minutes from the Tretyakovskaya metro station, I asked my friends, acquaintances and people on social networks to hand over their unwanted clothes, selected the best and opened a store. People were ready to bring their old clothes, I sorted them by hand, took the best to dry cleaning and sold at ridiculous prices - cheaper than even in ordinary second-hand shops. Things in an average condition, and there were more than half of them, went to the needy. Things in poor condition, we sent to the factory, where they make building materials and furniture filler.

In the first month, we barely had enough revenue to pay the rent, in the second, I was able to pay the salaries of the salesmen. Revenue increased by 20% every month and after three months we reached operating profit and began to transfer part of the money to charitable organizations. For example, in 2015 we donated more than 250,000 rubles to the Vverkh center and other charitable foundations, while our monthly turnover is approximately 800,000 rubles.

Service to help

Of course, everyone has a lot of unnecessary clothes and it’s not difficult for us to part with them - the problem arises at the moment when you need to take them somewhere.

We came up with and implemented a service for collecting clothes in the offices of large companies: we ordered containers for collecting things that are temporarily installed in the office and each employee can bring any clothes directly to work and throw them into a box.

We take care of the removal, sorting, storage and redistribution of things, saving people's time and raising the team spirit of the company's employees (it's nice to know that you and your colleagues helped 30 needy families in the Trans-Baikal Territory without interrupting work). In 2015, more than 45 companies took advantage of this opportunity.

Of course, not everything went smoothly from the very beginning: we had to order the first mobile containers (since there were no analogues) from a company that produces bee hives. As a result, the night before the first action (in a large bank), they brought us ugly, crooked coffins, similar to plywood trunks for transporting goods. I painted them all night, trying to somehow bring them to a decent look, but this did not help the case. Of course, since then the containers have been redesigned and more than 5,000 people have used them, but this story taught me one important thing: if you see that something in your product is not good enough, you should not think that the client and partner will not notice it.

Your old shoes will help you take your first steps.

It turned out that part of the work can be done by people with disabilities and those who find themselves in a difficult life situation, who find it difficult to find a job elsewhere. At first, we had one assistant - a young man with intellectual disabilities, who did the cleaning and helped the sales girls to carry heavy boxes. Now we have 22 employees, and nine of them are people from crisis groups. I am happy that as a small business we inspire large companies to talk about inclusion - I am often invited to talk about our experience and how we manage to integrate people with disabilities into work without losing cost effectiveness.

And it is also important for me that our employees with disabilities get the opportunity to work because someone else in this big city decided to take their unnecessary things not to the trash, but to the Charity shop.

Plan to take over the city

Of course, by increasing the turnover of clothes, we had to increase revenue in order to afford the rent of a large warehouse, logistics and the work of people who are engaged in sorting. In September 2015, we opened another store, and now I am looking for a place for a third one. In addition, we have become active participants in city events: the Charity shop area can be found at Lambada Markets, Seasons, sales at Flacon, Artplay and other city venues.

Our biggest challenge in 2016 is to increase the number of locations where citizens can donate unwanted clothes. We contact shopping centers, cultural and leisure venues, government agencies and friendly institutions that will agree to accept our boxes for things. Very soon the first batch of containers will arrive from the plant, and we hope that Moscow will meet them friendly. For now, clothes can be brought to any of our stores during opening hours or to your office if our promotion is running there.

An all-Russian competition for novice businessmen "School of a young billionaire" has been announced. Deadline September 30, 2014.

Organizer: Forbes magazine.

Entrepreneurs who have registered their company no earlier than August 20, 2013 can submit an application for the competition. At the same time, the experience of managing one's own business should not exceed 5 years: the companies previously created by the applicant alone or with partners should be founded no earlier than August 20, 2009.

A business project must go through the stage of discussing and testing the idea: a prototype has already been created or the fact of the first sale has taken place. There are no restrictions on the field of activity. The project must be related to the Russian market.

Authors of 10 projects will receive the right to study. This year, the jury will select the semi-finalists separately in two groups: Internet startups and projects whose core business lies outside the network. Five projects of each type will be among the semi-finalists.

Each of the jury members will become a consultant for one of the projects for several months and will help him with advice, as well as hold one public master class with his ward. At such a meeting, each novice entrepreneur will be able to talk about the development of his project, problems and achievements.

Confirmed their participation in the project:

1. Kamil Kurmakaev (co-founder of Wikimart)
2. David Yakobashvili (founder of Wimm-Bill-Dann)
3. Raisa Demina (Member of the Board of Directors of Velcom)
4. Alexander Sukharevsky (Partner of McKinsey)
5. Evgeny Demin (founder of the Splat company)
6. Yuri Mitin (Head of the Skolkovo Startup Academy)
7. Albrecht Bokhov (Kirov Plant)
8. Andrey Romanenko (founder of Qiwi.ru, managing partner of Run Capital)
9. Matthias Eklof (President of Yell.ru)
10. Elena Masolova (founder of Groupon Russia)

Increased. If in January we had 20 mini-laundries, by the end of April their number was close to thirty. Laundries opened in Sterlitamak, Elektrostal, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

Having expanded the geography, we decided to set up a feedback service via SMS messages: we connected a mobile number to which anyone can write an anonymous SMS message with wishes or criticism. We see all incoming messages in our personal account and can respond to them. As practice has shown, customers use this service more often than a technical support phone number. Out-of-town clients who stay in hostels asked to connect free WhatsApp and Viber instant messengers so as not to spend money on long-distance calls.

Rescue Powder

Feedback via SMS and instant messengers gave us an idea of ​​how we can further expand the range of services. After analyzing the reviews and suggestions, we realized that in every third message, customers asked if they could buy washing powder from us. Then we decided to start selling the powder through administrators in hostels, but it turned out to be not very effective. Being distracted by the issuance and packaging of the powder, the administrators forgot to deposit money at the cash desk and make an entry about the sale in the ledger. Then we decided to automate this process - I found the developers who made a wall-mounted device for the sale of portioned powder for us. This allowed us to exclude the human factor from the sales cycle, and not only facilitated the accounting of the powder, but also solved the packaging problem. Now we centrally pack the detergent and put it into vending machines. This saves us at least 30% of the money spent.

A few months later, we realized that by solving one problem, we killed two birds with one stone. Often, customers refused to wash because the hostel ran out of powder, there was no one to ask, and it was too late or far to go to buy. Now, for 15-20 rubles, guests can buy a portion of the powder without leaving the washing machine and wash things.

When the sales of the powder began to make a profit, we thought about offering professional concentrated household chemicals. This helped not only to increase revenue from one mini-laundry, but also to increase the number of washings and their quality. We even think about creating a device through which it will be possible to buy not only washing powder, but also disposable slippers, toothpaste, hygiene items and other little things needed on the road.

Drying machine

In addition to feedback via SMS and instant messengers, we decided to interview hostel administrators and the guests themselves. It turned out that people sometimes refuse to wash things if there is no time to dry. “Now, if it could be dried in a couple of hours, then yes,” the guests said. Then in one of the hostels we installed a dryer, put it directly on the washing machine, because the laundry room was located in a small room of a couple of square meters. We launched the service of drying things for free, while the cost of washing remained the same - 100 rubles. After 1.5 months, the revenue of this point increased by 38%. This indicator allows you to return the money spent on the purchase of equipment in a few months. We have already equipped four mini-laundries out of twenty, which are located in hostels, with drying machines. We are negotiating the installation with the remaining points in order to be in time for the summer tourist season in St. Petersburg. Additional options helped us increase revenue from one point by 40%.

About the benefits of alerts

Another innovation touched points in student dormitories. When I went to shoot the cash register, I noticed that the students, coming with their things, were languishing at the washing machines, waiting for the neighbors to take their already washed clothes from the machine. There was a hitch that could last more than an hour. It created inconvenience for customers, and we lost money due to equipment downtime. SMS notifications about the end of washing helped to solve this problem. Before starting the machine, a message about this service appears on the payment terminal and the customer can enter his phone number.

We invested a little more than 100,000 rubles in the development and purchase of additional equipment. But I am sure that these investments will pay off and bring not only additional revenue, but also benefit to customers. This solution will allow us to collect a database of our customers and analyze the activity of washings and frequency. It turns out that in the first place you really need to hear your customers, and not just listen.

Read more about the project

Forbes begins collecting applications for the "School of a Young Billionaire" contest. This project is a continuation of the startup competition that we held in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013. Ten semi-finalists will be able to tell the whole country about their business and get advice on its development from experienced entrepreneurs and top managers.

The terms of participation

Entrepreneurs who have registered their company no earlier than August 20, 2013 can submit an application for the competition. At the same time, the experience of managing one's own business should not exceed 5 years: the companies previously created by the applicant alone or with partners should be founded no earlier than August 20, 2009.
A business project must go through the stage of discussing and testing the idea: a prototype has already been created or the fact of the first sale has taken place. There are no restrictions on the field of activity. The project must be related to the Russian market.

How to apply

To apply, you must complete the following four steps:

1. Shoot and upload to YouTube a video about the team and the project - in any form, up to 3 minutes. In Russian.
2. Upload your project presentation to Slideshare - 7 slides. In the presentation, be sure to indicate who is the leader of your project, what problem the project solves, who is your customer, who are the competitors, and also what are the main problems facing the project that you would like to solve during the competition. In Russian.
3. Write an essay about how the project differs from competitors and why it can win the startup competition. Volume - no more than 2000 characters.
4. Send application to address [email protected] in the following form:

• Project name
• City
• Project start date
• The essence of the project in one sentence
• Project leader
• Previous experience as a project leader in business (project name, launch date)
• Link to video posted on YouTube
• Link to presentation hosted on Slideshare

Deadlines and regulations

Applications are accepted from the moment of publication of this announcement until 23:59 September 30, 2014. Authors of 10 projects will receive the right to study. This year, the jury will select the semi-finalists separately in two groups: Internet startups and projects whose core business lies outside the network. Five projects of each type will be among the semi-finalists.

Each of the jury members will become a consultant for one of the projects for several months and will help him with advice, as well as hold one public master class with his ward. At such a meeting, each novice entrepreneur will be able to talk about the development of his project, problems and achievements. Videos from the master classes will be published on the Forbes.ru website. The semi-finalists will also talk about the development of their projects on the startup competition blog.

Based on the results of the work, the curators will determine the best projects, taking into account the dynamics of their development during the training and achievements. The results will be summed up in June 2015.

Mentors

Confirmed their participation in the project:

• 1. Kamil Kurmakaev (co-founder of Wikimart)
• 2. David Yakobashvili (founder of Wimm-Bill-Dann)
• 3. Raisa Demina (Member of the Board of Directors of Velcom)
• 4. Alexander Sukharevsky (Partner of McKinsey)
• 5. Evgeny Demin (founder of the Splat company)
• 6. Yuri Mitin (Head of the Skolkovo Startup Academy)
• 7. Albrecht Bokhov (Kirov Plant)
• 8. Andrey Romanenko (Founder of Qiwi.ru, Managing Partner of Run Capital)
• 9. Matthias Eklof (President of Yell.ru)
• 10. Elena Masolova (founder of Groupon Russia)