Member Article

Digital startup led by 18-year old entrepreneur launches crowdfunding campaign

Founded by CEO and developer, Callum Short, BeamBox is an automated marketing solution targeting the hospitality industry.

The 18-year old worked alongside co-founder and CMO Finn Pegler to develop the tool, which allows bars and restaurants to gather customer data via their WiFi.

For Callum, using WiFi as a medium to collect consumer data seemed like a no-brainer, he told me: “I was sitting at a Café in London, hundreds of people would pass through it daily and their free WiFi was well advertised.

“I’m familiar with the WiFi marketing techniques of large international brands and I considered how it could be brought to smaller businesses and be made easier for the consumer.

“From there the concept has just snowballed into the initial vision of marketing automation and customer tracking.”

As a trained developer, Callum has brought BeamBox to market with minimal funds. Now the pair are turning to crowdfunding platform Seedrs for a financial boost. He explained: “Crowdfunding opens you up to a much wider audience than just a small network of angel investors.

“A successful crowdfunding campaign comes with the support of many minds, all with different ideas, opinions and criticism. There is also a high success rate for companies looking for funding through Seedrs.”

BeamBox has adapted the highly-innovative technique of 3D printing to help create the physical product, Callum added: “From a technology standpoint there were no major challenges, none of the programming or development required was new. Surprisingly, the main problem I had was getting the product casing to look appealing and match the branding properly.

“Working on low volumes with low startup capital meant that a cost effective solution was hard to find. In the end, we went for 3D printing.”

Callum saw a gap in the WiFi marketing industry targeting small businesses, partnered with his development expertise, BeamBox holds a unique position in the market.

Callum said: “While there are competitors in WiFi marketing, their functionality and vision is much more corporate and of no concern to the Beambox platform. Additionally, our lack of dependency on third party wireless frameworks will allow us to reduce hard costs substantially.

Looking forward, the duo are hoping to market the product globally in an effort to create as many partnerships as possible. He concluded: “It’s all about sales at this point. Our potential customer base is huge and we know that we can’t scale fast enough internally.

“We need to build a solid affiliate system and create sustainable marketing campaigns. Funding is needed to initiate this. We have set the target of 500 customers in 10 countries.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ellen Forster .