Posted on Monday, 11th August 2008 by Launching Today
Name
What do they do?
AirBed & Breakfast gives you an alternative to booking an expensive hotel room. Users can post spare rooms/beds for rent and other users can book them.
What are they like?
There are a few virtually non-existent players in this space which I am not going to mention, but as a whole this niche has no clear market leader. There is of course the enormous Couch Surfing, which isn’t quite the same, as it is a community where you let people stay at your place for free and in turn you can stay somewhere for free - it’s not about the money more about the community.
What else should they do?
There are surprisingly a decent amount of users on the website already, and each offering is categorized well based on space, expected bed time (so the service isn’t matching party ‘6am and stumbling through the door drunk’ with a 70 year old host) and prices are clearly defined. I like it a lot, and I was able to find what I was after very easily. Some of the pages open in a new window which is annoying, and please, ditch that logo - it’s horrible and looks like one of those web 2.0 logo generators created it. Full props to the website name though - I love it.
How they can fail
Obviously this is an extremely niche market (which I would never be a part of) but there is certainly a demand for it. It is important that they are focusing on events where hotel prices tend to skyrocket or book out completely (like they are with the Democratic National Convention), and AirBed & Breakfast certainly has plenty room to prosper. They need to continue doing this to stay successful, because, when you are the last resort, suddenly there are people in your niche that weren’t in there before.
Final word
Nice product, works very well and has a good potential to create some steam. As for it being successful, I am not so sure. Low maintenance costs can keep this site alive for a small amount of capital, so they can sure try for a long time.
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