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Tupalo.com

An ex-Paddy Power marketer wants this startup to become 'the Airbnb for business'

As part of our weekly Startup Spotlight series, we profile Popertee.

DUBLIN STARTUP POPERTEE plans to roll out its pop-up shop booking service in London later this year – and it hopes to entice department store behemoth John Lewis to put its vacant units on the platform.

The company, which currently only operates in Ireland, says it will soft-launch the booking platform in the UK capital this September.

Popertee was founded in 2016 by ex-Paddy Power marketer Lucinda Kelly, who tells Fora the idea for the company spawned from her interest in Airbnb’s model, which she thought could be replicated in the retail industry.

Although it has only been in operation for a year and a half, the young company’s business proposition is already undergoing a reboot as it pursues a “more scaleable” opportunity in the data analytics sector.

“It’s a little bit deceptive – when you go on our website you see what we are doing, versus what we are building,” she says.

At the moment, Popertee appears to be what Kelly calls a “simple platform” where companies and marketing agencies scout for pop-up retail venues around Ireland.

“We’re running almost a concierge service to validate the proposition,” she says. “We match brands directly with spaces”, adding that the company looks after the legal agreement and rental transaction in exchange for a total 10% commission.

LK 2 Popertee CEO Lucinda Kelly Fred Rood / Popertee Fred Rood / Popertee / Popertee

Artificial intelligence

However behind the scenes, the company is developing a technology that uses artificial intelligence to match venues with the specific demands of retailers and brands looking for short-term lets.

“Brands and agencies wanted to understand footfall demographic information and neighbourhood insights when pre-booking,” Kelly says. “We realised there was a much bigger, more scaleable business opportunity there.”

Popertee started buying data from social media companies and telcos to help it build a property search engine that spits out fine-tuned recommendations for pop-up spaces based on clients’ requests.

“For example, let’s say you have Amazon coming to Ireland – they’re looking to promote a new Kindle and they’re looking to target males aged 18 to 35 in shopping centres,” Kelly says.

The marketing agency would use Popertee to seek out venues that can cater for that specific demographic.

90401326_90401326 Stephen's Green Shopping Centre Sam Boal / Rollingnews.ie Sam Boal / Rollingnews.ie / Rollingnews.ie

The company closed a €500,000 seed round a couple of weeks ago to help build out that model. It has already been backed by Enterprise Ireland and NDRC.

The bulk of the half-a-million euro just raised will be earmarked for hiring new staff, Kelly says.

The startup has grown from a solo operation with help from friends to a five-person team with four interns in the last 18 months.

Several employees and advisors have followed Kelly from Paddy Power. Head of product and operations Joe Packenham is former head of operations at the bookmaker, while director Edgardo Savoy was previously at Paddy Power and has served as chief technology officer at Lastminute.com.

“There’s a really strong team that we’re building out,” Kelly says.

Well-known brands

Despite its short history, Popertee has already worked with an impressive line-up of well-known brands in Ireland.

It helped find a venue for Heinz Baked Beans’ pop-up café in Dublin and was also involved in Italian beermaker Peroni’s ‘House of Peroni’ campaign, as well as sourcing spaces for car brands Citroen and Volvo.

Kelly says the company is currently in talks with John Lewis in the UK in the hopes of putting vacant shop space it owns up for rent through Popertee.

She stresses that Ireland is very much a “test market” as the company looks to break into the much tougher British sector.

Kelly identifies Appear Here as a major competitor on the other side of the Irish Sea. The pop-up shop provider closed a $12 million series B round in May.

“They’re more like a hybrid estate agent,” Kelly says. “They’re doing really well.”

‘Experiential’ marketing

Popertee is riding on the so-called ‘experiential marketing’ wave, which it expects to continue growing over the coming years.

Kelly says marketing firms have begun to significantly increased their spending on the campaigns, a buzzword for Instagram-friendly PR stunts. She attributes that growth to changes in consumer appetites.

“When you look at online,” she says, “it’s about getting from A to B as quickly as possible and getting customers to take out their credit card and make a transaction. What’s lacking is an experience.”

A pop-up venue gives branding gurus the opportunity to give their clients a physical experience in high footfall areas, which Kelly says helps increase “loyalty with the brand”.

When asked about the company’s future plans, she says it is looking at revisiting its original Airbnb concept and extending its offering beyond traditional retail space.

“We believe in five years’ time that it’s not just about retail units or about warehouses,” she says.

“It’s almost going back to Airbnb but for business. But smart Airbnb where you rent out the side of a building or a spare room in town, or a window at the side of your shop. Brands and marketing agencies are looking for new types of spaces.”

For now, the startup is also looking to bulk up its advisory board.

“I think it’s important that we bring some really seasoned experts on board across retail, property, ad-tech,” she says. “We need to think about a chairman. They will help shape us in where we want to be.”

This article is part of a weekly series featuring Ireland’s most promising startups. If you would like to see your company featured email news@fora.ie.

Correction: An earlier version of this article said Daniel McCarthy was head of operations at Popertee. Joe Packenham is head of product and operations at the company.

Written by Conor McMahon and posted on Fora.ie

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    Mute Moorooka Mick
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    Feb 26th 2019, 6:32 AM

    They will not last long with the local ‘happy campers”. They’ll figure out a way of hobbling the sat-tracking and cash-in.

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    Mute Dotty Dunleary
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    Feb 26th 2019, 6:58 AM

    @Moorooka Mick: Not unless the bicycles are made from pure steel :-)

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    Mute DJ François
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    Feb 26th 2019, 7:42 AM

    @Moorooka Mick: they said the same about Dublin bike scheme but it didn’t happen

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    Mute Moorooka Mick
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    Feb 26th 2019, 12:44 PM

    @DJ François:
    You have obviously not lived in Sligo.

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    Mute Donncha
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    Feb 26th 2019, 6:19 AM

    I would warm Sligo Council to give any of the Chinese bike companies that approach them a very wide berth. Just look up Chinese bike mountains on Google Images to see how the “free bike” companies have worked out in China.

    Also, one of them set up in Stockholm at the end of last summer. Unilaterally, I would add as they never asked, they just did it. I’ve yet to see anyone use the bikes (partly I imagine it’s because the app that activates them looks like it was made by a colour-blind 6th class student learning to code). Despite the fact they’re close to unused, they are absolutely riddled with rust only six months later. I reckon they’re death traps at this point if someone hopped on one without a helmet.

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    Mute J.P. Ness
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    Feb 26th 2019, 8:42 AM

    Sligo is too much of a kip to merit this scheme. It really is a bunghole of a place

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    Mute Garreth Byrne
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:45 AM

    @J.P. Ness: They’d regard you as an asset at the local tourist information office. Failte go Shligig.

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    Mute Brian Ó Dálaigh
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    Feb 26th 2019, 1:29 PM

    @J.P. Ness: I lived in Sligo for over 11 years. Despite not being a native, I very much consider Sligo to be home. Lots of friendly, welcoming, helpful people and, despite its small size, it has so much to offer in terms of music, arts, crafts, surfing, beaches, hiking, cycling trails, mountains, lakes, fishing, pubs, places to eat and festivals. A kip it most certainly is not. What it is, however, is lacking in funding proportional to other areas of the country, though, thankfully, some of that is being addressed finally.

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    Mute john doe
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    Feb 26th 2019, 2:52 PM

    ^^don’t feed the troll ^^

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    Mute Marcus Eugene
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    Feb 26th 2019, 8:19 PM

    @J.P. Ness: Don’t feed the troll

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    Mute Dave Barrett
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    Feb 26th 2019, 7:52 AM

    And while they are looking for free bikes let the old people with empty large houses get out and down size to free up houses for those looking for them. FG take take take.

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    Mute James Wallace
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    Feb 26th 2019, 7:59 AM

    @Dave Barrett: first of all, what has a housing proposal by the government got to do with a bike scheme proposed by a local council? second of all, if the housing downsize scheme ever happens, it will be entirely optional. Go back to bed.

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    Mute John
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    Feb 26th 2019, 8:29 AM

    @Dave Barrett: what’s wrong with older people in council houses downsizing.people are always screaming about the housing crisis but people in social housing don’t want to have to help in any way.they just want to scream BUILD HOUSES………a lot of older people(including my parents)in private housing downsized because of their needs,what’s wrong with people who have enjoyed very very cheap houses.

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    Mute MarkS
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    Feb 26th 2019, 11:14 AM

    @John: bit of a tangent there love.

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    Mute kehe
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    Feb 26th 2019, 7:55 AM

    Will they ever learn? Undocked bikes just end up vandalised and thrown in rivers, ditches, fields etc in any city or town that’s tried the scheme.

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    Mute James Wallace
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    Feb 26th 2019, 8:19 AM

    @kehe: it doesnt happen much in Dublin. Can you name the towns in ireland where it has?

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    Mute Karen Wellington
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:02 AM

    @James Wallace: does Dublin have an undocked bike scheme? I thought they were all docked.

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    Mute James Wallace
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:12 AM

    @Karen Wellington: no they have bleeperbike, an undocked scheme. I do agree a docked bike scheme would be preferable if they don’t already have one.

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    Mute Karen Wellington
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    Feb 26th 2019, 10:58 AM

    @James Wallace: didn’t know that, thanks for the info

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    Mute Garreth Byrne
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:42 AM

    In the mid-1960s student and other utopian radicals persuaded the Amsterdam authority to place ‘white bicycles’ strategically around the city centre. Anybody could use an available bike and leave it at a designated bike rack after use. The scheme lasted a short time. I hope the Sligonian authority has taken the Dutch example into consideration. Waar is mijn fiets?

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    Mute James Wallace
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    Feb 26th 2019, 10:19 AM

    @Garreth Byrne: that was before the days of mobile technology. The bikes these days, like the bleeper bikes in Dublin , require you to register a card and the bike is unlocked using smart technology and an app. No comparison to Amsterdam in the 60s. We should copy Amsterdam in the provision of safe segregated cycle tracks, though. That would work here.

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    Mute FlopFlipU
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:00 AM

    You will probably find the any bikes that go missing up in Dublin ,them lads using the bikes to escape ,only joking now I have ties there through marriage

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    Mute John
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    Feb 26th 2019, 9:14 AM

    @FlopFlipU: I wish some of the country people would escape from Dublin.might give us a bit more room.ha ha,only joking I have family down the country.

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    Mute Michael Drumm
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    Feb 26th 2019, 8:05 AM

    Shave a madra

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