Our group narrowed down to 2 ideas and so this writeup contains our work and interviews for both ideas. We are planning to narrow to 1 after class after talking to TAs on feedback/suggestions.
Idea #1: Pooling Trips and Hitching Rides
Summary: At places like Stanford, and other areas that are spread out and have limited public transportation, it can be quite hard to get around without a car. Running errands like grocery shopping or even going on trips to places like San Francisco can be very time-consuming and expensive. Let’s say person A is going to Costco and owns a car. What if person A was willing to take additional people (ex. Person B, C who also want to grab things from Costco) along? In theory, person B, C will pay person A (and the app) a small fee for hitching a ride and for gas fees. This alternative may be much better than Ubering places (due to costs) or taking public transport (ex. Inconvenient if you have a lot of things with you or time-consuming) for the rider. Furthermore, the driver will be compensated a bit for a trip that they were planning on making in the first place! Also a win for energy and environmentalism purposes! [Can be extended to hobbies or general trips/activities too]
TAM/SAM/SOM:
| Customer Profile | Number of customers | Estimated Pricing* | Market size | |
| SOM | Stanford Students | 17,000 | $5 a trip each week | $4.42M |
| SAM | US Campuses | 19,000,000 | $4.9B | |
| TOM | Urban residents | 4,460,000,000 | $1.16T |
Notes on pricing:
- In order to be attractive we need to be an order of magnitude cheaper/more convenient that existing alternatives (since it’s a saturated market)
- Uber ride to Target is ~$30 for round trip (for User)
- Gas will cost the driver around $2
- $6 per gallon
- 25mpg for you average car
- 8 miles to Target and back
Interview Takeways:
Person 1:
- “I usually go to get groceries at trader joes once a week and then sometimes to the shopping mall to get a change in scene and usually to get food or do more grocery shopping on the weekends. I usually do my costco or target or 99 ranch or really any Asian grocery store during the weekends since I have more time and it is a bit farther out.”
- Takeaway: one big use case might be grocery stores or trips that are farther away. I.e. situations where it is not as convenient with bikes, public transportation
- “ On the weekends I usually rent a zipcar for everything. But if there’s no zipcars available and I need something urgently then I’ll just Uber but that’s expensive so I try to avoid that”
- Takeaway: Zipcar demand and supply can be an issue on campus for those who want to go out
- “ Zipcar really increased the hourly prices over my time at Stanford. I remember being able to rent a car for an hour for only like 5 bucks but now it’s a lot more expensive, like up to 15/17 dollars an hour, and makes me question whether it’s worth it.”
- “Alternatively if the marguerite were a bit more convenient and went to other places that would be great, but also I suppose there is a limit and not too much flexibility in that since I can’t do much about it.”
- Takeaway: Stanford marguerite locations and times can be a bit limiting.
- “If there’s an easy way to find other people who need rides and are willing to chip in, that would really help reduce the costs, especially since I’m a grad student so I am a bit tight on money. But I think I’d ask my friends if they wanna go together first.” –
- Takeway: Gas prices are expensive, students are tight on money
- “If I want to have exercise I’ll take the bike otherwise the scooter. The scooter can hold a bit more groceries more safely but it’s still not a lot I can carry or feel safe scootering/biking with.”
- Takeaway: Convenient and cheap options like bike and scooter are good for shorter trips and when not much needs to be carried. Safety can be an issue with these options.
Person 2:
- “I drive since I own a car. If it’s really close then I bike but also biking can be quite tiring especially if it’s anything past Uni[versity] Ave or town and country or the stanford mall.”
- Takeaway: Distance is a big factor in transportation type and price people are willing to pay.
- “I wouldn’t be comfortable lending my car to people I don’t know but I might be okay driving them places. Might be a good way to make a bit of money since I’m going somewhere anyways.”
- Takeaway: Not much of a cost to people who are planning to go somewhere versus going out of their way to take people places.
- “… But I remember freshmen year, before I had my car, it was SO hard going off campus. I think that’s partially why the Stanford bubble exists. Zipcars run out really quickly and I didn’t have a [driver’s] license at that point so I would have to either Uber which would end up costing more than a meal if I went to a restaurant…or DoorDash which is also so expensive. Sometimes I’d just give up or bike to town and country or university ave.”
- Takeaway: For people who can’t drive or who don’t have friends to drive, getting off campus can be expensive and a big hassle. Zipcar demand and supply might also be a bottleneck.
- “If it’s too much effort [to set up hitching people a ride] and not worth the money I get like if I’m getting only a dollar, then I’d just go on my own.”
- Takeaway: People care about how seamless the process is. People are lazy and price sensitive.
- “As a Sustainability co-term, it makes me happy to think how this might have environmental benefits”
- Takeaway: Potential marketing point
Idea #2: Tailored, dynamic, and centralized heat-map for opportunities, activities, and events on campus
Summary: There’s always a lot going on around campus – clubs, career fairs, classes, socials, parties, study sessions, trips, mixers, and much more. To keep track of all this, you’re subscribed to numerous mailing lists, overwhelmed with slack channels, tracking word of mouth, inundated with flyers, and frantically texting your group chats. That is, out of the dozens of things going on every day, you’re left on your own to figure out what really matters to you and how to most productively spend your time.
TLDR;
- Heatmap to see people with similar interests
- Can build relationships with companies on campus with your demonstrated interest
- Meet like-minded people with similar interests/identities, easily plan a meal/coffee
- Connect with students that are in the same classes to form study groups
Instead of going back and forth to find what’s worth your time and curiosity, imagine if all this information was centralized on a heatmap. Think Snapchat heatmap (pictured below) –
– but tailored for your interests and availability. You can see what’s going on at any given time (or what is scheduled to happen in the future) on campus. The red shows a physical congregation of people with similar interests or a predefined activity (class, party, etc.). Incidentally, non-Stanford members – like companies on campus – can securely access student engagement/activity data for a fee (much like companies pay Stanford to be present at a career fair) and target specific opportunities based on students’ previously demonstrated interest in similarly-aligned activities on campus. Based on student participation at certain events, they receive karma points for being an active member of the community, and can redeem them for certain opportunities, events, etc. Apart from general interests, another adjacent feature is connecting with students that share certain classes that you’re taking this quarter.
Note: it might seem like there’s a lot going on here, we can prioritize.
TAM/SAM/SOM & Market Size:
| Customer profile | Number of customers | Estimated Pricing* | Market size | |
| SOM | Sizeable tech companies in the bay | 4,000 | $10,000 per year | $4M |
| SAM | Large companies in the US | 125,000 | $1.25B | |
| TOM | All large companies globally | 350,000 | $3.5B |
Notes on pricing:
- Since this is not as saturated a market as ride sharing, we can probably price close to what our competitors are pricing
- Some references
- Handshake premium costs $10,000 annually
- On average the recruiter spends $4,000 on 1 recruitment
- On average a large company will undergo 100 recruitment processes
Interview Takeways:
Person 1:
- “[I discover events] mainly through email lists like my residence in EVGR has one or through word of mouth of friends inviting me to places.”
- “Who do I know is going? How much energy or time do I have? I usually go to at least one social event but I suppose it’s mostly just with my small group of friends or friends of friends’ social mixer.”
- Takeaway: How useful may be dependent on social factors and energy/capacity
- “But I’m happy I have narrowed down what I want to spend my time on since it can be quite hectic as a grad student. I’m also quite content just hanging out with my friends since many are also coterms still on campus!”
- Takeaway: how useful the idea/product is may be dependent on undergrad vs grad or how happy they are with their social life.
- “I’m not sure which events are public public events versus semi private (and where I might feel not the most “welcome” and thus a bit awkward and out of place). Actually, if there’s a way to separate grad and undergrad events that could be useful haha… [Undergrads] can be a bit too energetic or in a slightly different stage of life”
- Takeaway: Grads and undergrads are in different stages of life and have different energy levels, so it may be useful to think about different population groups and how they interact
- “I currently just use find my friends on iphone to see what my closest friends are up to based on their location. I find that pretty fun sometimes I’ll head to the gym if I see my friends are there.”
Person 2:
- “I don’t really go to many events. Sometimes I’m just lazy or just want to hangout with friends. I did go to the football game for a bit though, to pick up a free shirt and also since it was the first big football event of the year.”
- Takeaway: People with strong friend groups or who prefer just hanging out with them may not benefit as much from seeing what activities are going on around them
- “I’m pretty happy with it [how I find events and my social life]. But probably as a freshman I would have liked something like this, especially freshman fall or winter when i might not have people I’m already close with or just want to explore and experience all that campus has to offer.”
- Takeaway: Who benefits most from such a product? How long will they find it useful?
- “But I think maps and visual things can be overwhelming if there’s too much stuff.”
- Takeaway: Design of map in a way that is intuitive and not cluttered will be crucial
- “I guess if the map has some temporal component like seeing activities during a certain time frame that would be good. Not sure if the idea is to see what’s going on live. It would be cool if I can discover events for later in the day that I may be unaware of and interested in.”
- Takeaway: Temporal aspect of events might be useful to consider.
