Afloat, a present supply app that allows you to store from native shops and have presents delivered to a liked one on the identical day, is now accessible throughout the U.S. The startup introduced on Monday that it’s rolling out its service nationwide after beforehand solely being accessible in choose cities, together with Atlanta, Dallas, Charleston, Fort Price, Kansas Metropolis, Nashville and Wichita, amongst others.
The startup was based by Sarah-Allen Preston after she skilled the stress of her new child present process open coronary heart surgical procedure. After receiving considerate presents from family members, Preston wished to make rapid gift-giving potential for everybody, together with those that stay in one other state, to assist their family members in a time of want.
“When I looked back on that experience, though, I weirdly didn’t remember the stress and the heartache. All I remembered was how people showed up for me and how cared and supported I felt… So, I took that feeling and went on to amplify this in the world through technology,” she instructed TechCrunch.
Afloat goals to supply the comfort of on-line procuring and prompt supply whereas additionally supporting native companies with out leaving your private home. Afloat takes care of the complete gift-giving course of, together with reward wrapping and including a handwritten word for an additional private contact. (Preston talked about that that is extra considerate than receiving a typed Amazon receipt.) As for the supply half, DoorDash drivers deal with that.
After the pandemic, many purchasers realized how a lot they appreciated their native retailers. Practically 40% of small companies needed to shut down through the COVID-19 lockdown in 2021. That want to buy at small companies continues to remain sturdy. In accordance with a current survey by Intuit, 62% of contributors stated they wish to purchase from small companies of their group. E-commerce giants are additionally capitalizing on this mindset, as demonstrated by Etsy’s new gifting initiative, which options curated reward guides that spotlight impartial store homeowners.
The app at the moment works with 100 retailer companions, starting from bakeries and child shops to bookstores, florists, conventional reward shops, jewellery shops and so forth. In accordance with the corporate, it has helped its retailer companions broaden their gifting income by 30-50%.
The corporate has additionally now shifted to a SaaS (software-as-a-service) mannequin to permit extra shops to hitch the platform, together with different kinds of companies, like spas and related companies. Afloat will provide subscription plans at $99/month (Gold) and $299/month (Platinum), which features a newly launched dashboard that gives shops with advertising and merchandising assist, in addition to gross sales knowledge, and different helpful options.
“We don’t have to hard-launch markets anymore, which is really exciting… We are going to be able to be SaaS anywhere, everywhere,” Preston stated.
Moreover, the corporate is within the strategy of constructing a subscription tier for shoppers, which is able to permit them to entry premium options like scheduling deliveries and being notified as quickly as a brand new reward providing drops.
Afloat at the moment has over 30,000 customers. It’s backed by Goodwater Capital and Techstars, with over $5 million in complete funding.