You don't have to own everything to use it, say Victoria Fischer and Nick Huijs . Renting a car is widely known, but you can also rent strollers, e-scooters and many other products. With their company circuly, they offer companies software to expand their business model from selling to renting their products.
Sometimes you have to take detours to gain valuable insights. Nick Huijs developed a stroller rental business model in the Netherlands, inspired by the circular economy approach. The idea behind it: Each stroller is only needed for a limited time and is usually still in very good condition afterwards. So why should parents buy strollers when they can rent them, thought the business economist and computer scientist. “Use instead of owning” was Huijs' maxim, so that products and materials remain in circulation for as long as possible. However, he found that a product subscription model is extremely complex - from subscription management to recurring invoicing to tracking rented strollers and return processing. And he came to the conclusion that the existing web shops were not designed for subscription models.
Then he met Victoria Fischer at the Founders Foundation, an innovative start-up center in Bielefeld, who was dealing with similar issues and pursuing sharing economy approaches. “It was important to us to build something that offers sustainable added value for society and at the same time is so economically attractive that we can fundamentally revolutionize the way we consume,” explains Fischer. She founded circuly together with Huijs in 2020.
“This makes renting very easy and companies can bring more sustainability to their e-commerce.”
circuly is a software-as-a-service solution for managing, automating and scaling the operations of a subscription-based business model for physical products. Essentially all products with a limited useful life - usually around three months to two years -, high acquisition costs and/or high service requirements are eligible. The spectrum ranges from strollers to e-scooters and pieces of furniture to medical products. While Huijs and Fischer believe that conventional online shops are designed more for selling, circuly has developed software that focuses on renting and complements and integrates all business processes in such a way that companies can use this software to build a circular business model within a few months. This allows manufacturers to concentrate on their core business, while the software, which can be seamlessly integrated into existing shop systems, payment structures and ERP programs, creates a platform for all subscription processes.
From renting and exchanging products to tracking returns and billing payments to sending invoices. “This makes renting very easy,” emphasizes Huijs, “and in this way we bring sustainability into e-commerce.” Huijs believes that the easier it will be for companies and therefore also for customers to rent products instead of buying them and fishermen, the sooner consumer behavior will change and thus reduce the waste of valuable resources.
Huijs and Fischer developed their business model at the Founders Foundation in Bielefeld, which specializes in supporting founders and promising start-up ideas. circuly – which has now grown to 15 employees – continues to have its headquarters there. “The Bielefeld start-up ecosystem offers us a strong network here at the location,” praises Huijs. also works Bielefeld University He and Victoria Fischer also benefited from the NRW start-up grant in North Rhine- , and the entrepreneur was also able business angels and other investors in North Rhine-Westphalia, with whose financial support they are now on the path to growth.
This success story of an innovative transformation was published in November 2023. There will be no updates or checks of the information afterwards.
The publication series “Transformation through Innovation” is intended to illustrate how companies in North Rhine-Westphalia have been able to write successful innovation stories thanks to the framework conditions created by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia.
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