Ask HN: Just finished coding my new startup; need ideas for getting traction

1. Perhaps something similar could be done with people travelling on airports? (Ok, it's very dangerous to just carry random stuff, but perhaps would work for books or things like that)

Thank you very much... very sound idea.

I suppose the payment is done after the package arrives...

I would not have written all that code without testing out your hypothesis first or at least in parallel with your products iterative construction.

Use your friends and family or your "extended network" first and see how / if people use it, if they like it, what is missing, etc. Sorry if this comes off as negative, it's not meant to - I can't tell you how many times I've written a web-service that does X, only to find out it needs to be implemented differently to do Y or realize the bigger challenge is in reaching my target audience or even finding who that audience is.

Customer discover and development is just, if not more, important than product development imho.

Also, take a long, hard, and honest look at your proposed business model and make sure it makes sense (using your friends, family, and extended network can help provide some data around this).

Not to rain on your parade, but I'm having a hard to understanding how you'll undercut shipping companies. Their prices are so low because they rely on economies of scale (large trucks and a very sophisticated supply chain) and complex algorithms that determine the optimal route for delivery.

First, there's the problem of paying the couriers. I can't speak for others, but I would never carry a package in my car for $5 -- it's not worth the hassle. I might carry 10 at once for $50, but even that payout is very low for my time... not to mention that the likelihood that my route intersects with 10 different packages being shipped on the same day is extremely low. Drivers working for shipping companies make a relatively low wage, and they ship lots of packages. You'd have to pay couriers per-package, and at a much higher marginal rate than shipping companies pay. That means additional overhead, which means your prices will go up.

Then you'll have extremely high overhead with respect to fraud, insurance, etc. UPS/FedEx packages are handled by professional drivers, and I'm certain that their insurance costs are still astronomical. This means more overhead, which again means higher prices still. In fact, I'm willing to bet that even if you could find an insurance agency willing to underwrite your operation, the cost to insure each package would be higher than the overall cost UPS/FedEx charges their customers to ship.

Finally, you're going to have a hard time convincing customers that your service is reliable and safe. That means even for the customers you will get, your cost per acquisition will be much higher than UPS/FedEx. That won't hurt you too much right now, but it will be a major barrier to scaling -- and scaling is the only way you're going to compete with the shipping companies.

Maybe you can compete on some other way than price?