The Octopus Club: Parent marketplace, concept to investment
A Sharetribe marketplace for parents to trade baby and kids' items, built from MVP to investment-ready, with handmade seller features.
The idea
The Octopus Club: an online marketplace for parents and caregivers to buy, sell, and give baby and kids’ items, including handmade products by trusted makers. Ana Rachel Estrougo founded it for a community focused on reusing and recycling, reducing waste and saving money. We joined before the platform received any investment and played a critical role in its early development.
What we built
We worked on it from conception to launch. Working closely with founder Ana and a team of developers, we built the marketplace on a Sharetribe template in stages: the first users joined within weeks, and over about seven months we added multiple features and fresh designs for web and mobile:
- Product type transactions Modified the Flex template to support product-type transactions
- Third-party CMS integration Enhanced content management capabilities with third-party CMS integration
- Featured and recently sold items Showcasing popular items for discovery, helping buyers find trending products
- Similar product recommendations Suggesting products users might like based on their browsing and purchase activity
- Signup without bank details Letting sellers list items without entering bank details initially, simplifying onboarding
- Live chat and pop-up messages Third-party integrations for customer support and engagement
- Custom filter mapping Custom filter mapping, helping users find items based on specific criteria easily
The result
The Octopus Club launched as a marketplace supporting a sustainability-focused parent community. The unique features improved engagement and satisfaction. Our early contributions helped attract £150,000 in pre-revenue funding and further investment in early 2023, used to enhance the platform and expand offerings. The marketplace later closed.
There is never an issue that cannot be solved. They're always happy to discuss things and find the best way forward. We've been working together since the very beginning of The Octopus Club, from concept to investment.
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