Butler Smart Point solves the last mile challenge of e-commerce

More than 200 services in one place, saving time with daily shopping and reducing CO_two, as its major contribution to rationalizing transport emissions. Three of the benefits with which Smart Point Butler wants to solve the last problem of the massive digitization of purchasing: how to cover the so-called last logistics mile efficiently and in an environmentally friendly way.

That beginning Barcelona promotes a network of smart lockers to accept both online purchases and – and here comes its great novelty – to solve usual services for each consumer. Errands like sending a suit to the dry cleaner, getting contact lenses, or leaving the keys for the car check at the shop can be handled by Butler Smart Point “in one place and with one management,” he explains. Thomas JungleCEO and co-founder of the company along with his partner Edward Hamilton.

These entrepreneurs have developed a service with no barriers to entry, allowing it to be used by the major US logistics companies ecommerce, like Amazon or Correos are already doing, and at the pharmacy around the corner or at the veterinarian via a commission.

At the moment it already has the approval of 340 companies and 50 residences in Barcelona, ​​​​​​Madrid, Santander, A Coruña, Palma de Mallorca and Lisbon, where it operates to date. But the company is hungry for growth, currently preparing the jump to Copenhagen and already considering proposals in cities in Italy, Austria and Germany.

Endesa and Bayer: two extraordinary guinea pigs

In 2017, these entrepreneurs convinced two companies as emblematic as Endesa and Bayer to test the proposal in their offices, who knows if they were emboldened to find a solution to organize the transmission allowing the delivery of online purchases in generated by many companies.

“In the six months of testing, we learned a lot of things,” Selva recalls, “including that users aren’t interested in using a different app to access a new service, as we originally suggested. In fact, we saw the big change when we channeled management via SMS and online email.”

A new sign of how important it is for this company to break down all barriers to entry to their service. Currently, the most used method by the users is the web app technology, which offers a browsing experience similar to that of the classic web app through the computer. smart phone.

But this point would never have been reached without the previous two years of intensive work. Time to perfect the idea of ​​Selva, a mechanical engineer in London specializing in robotics and business administration, and Englishman Hamilton, experienced in corporate digitization and advisor to more than 50 startups. In 2016, Hamilton worked with so-called dumb lockers or 1.0 for a dry cleaner, which are simply activated with an app without offering any more service. With this initial experience, “we decided to develop together a technology that did not exist on the market that would make it possible to manage hundreds of providers through centralized intelligence, with a system that could choose which provider at any given time for a certain time could deliver users.” The result of these reflections lasted two years.

A system that integrates everyone

This is how the locker generation 2.0 came about and later the current 3.0, which “enables the delivery of every online shop and every deliverer without technological and economic barriers”.

In this way, the user communicates with the company through the Internet, mobile application or screen, through which each device must select the desired service. For example, the system, equipped with a layer of artificial intelligence, selects a number of suppliers based on their preferences, with a clear selection orientation based on price or quality. Once consent has been given and payment has been made, the customer can withdraw from their purchase within the specified period.

The Mayordomo Smart Point deal is based on a 20% discount on the price for which suppliers must be part of the network. Of this percentage, 15% is passed on as an additional benefit for the customer in order to maintain the commercial competitiveness of the network, and the remaining 5% as payment for the service provided.

Small business opportunity

Networks such as Midas workshops, Nespresso or Aldi supermarkets, but also many small companies have joined their proposal. For florists, opticians, grocery stores or dry cleaners, it’s a way to digitize the business by offering a service to its neighbors.

Some deliveries expected to be largely on foot as one of the strongest arguments for growth is carbon savings_two on the last logistical mile. “Just as we have achieved economies of scale that reduce the cost of a product, standardizing delivery points can reduce emissions. If 20 people order 20 different products from 20 different manufacturers, we make sure they all arrive in a single delivery at a single point with 20 compartments, notifying each consumer of the pick-up time.”

In addition, the system avoids the 30% failed and undelivered shipments that the sector is now facing, as the lockers are always ready to accept the shipment. In the same way, it allows the return of purchases, the implementation of shipments and, as already said, the request for the delivery of a medicine or the purchase of flowers: “We bring hundreds of local suppliers closer to the delivery points, avoiding the displacement of individuals. Reducing emissions and improving the competitiveness of small producers.

After completing the offer, Mayordomo Smart Point is preparing for the international leap. For this journey, it offers investors a stake in the target market’s business, as well as a small percentage of the global business. For now, Selva assures that the only alternative is to be part of a company that has chosen self-funding and global growth.

THE COMPANY IN FACTS: Billing: 1 million euros. employees: 45 people. offices in Barcelona and Madrid. target marketss: Italy, Austria, Germany and the United States.