The Jellyfish Entrepreneur • Hacker News Board

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#31

Post by brandnewlow » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 3:29 AM UTC

yosho wrote: post #26

I have the Jellyfish tank and it's pretty cool, however, all the Jellyfish died after about a month. They were too hard to find, get caught up in the rocks a lot, and feeding was a pain. However, we still have the tank and use it to hold tropical fish now. I would suggest that they go into the tank business and focus on unique designs, that's a scalable business with a big market. I wouldn't buy the Jellyfish again,…

I heard once that Airbnb thought the "breakfast" in Airbed and Breakfast was a crucial element of the experience for the first year or so. It took them awhile to realize no one cared about the breakfast.

Perhaps the Jellyfish aren't the crucial piece of the experience for Jellyfish Art? With your anecdote plus the story about the restaurant keeping the tank and using it for fish, perhaps there's something there.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#32

Post by 6ren » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 3:47 AM UTC

One great strength here is the smallness of market. Easy to dominate. Unattractive to large competitors.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#33

Post by beneth » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 4:04 AM UTC

Cool product!

1 quick suggestion: on your sales page food is listed in ounces. I think it would be more helpful and may increase conversions with impulse buyers to list that as "X months of food".

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#34

Post by moultano » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 4:56 AM UTC

Is it at all plausible to set up a tank with jellies that breed and sustain their numbers? I'm remembering a friend's fish tank that was perennially full of snails, because the snails laid eggs on the walls of the tank much faster than they died out.

Could the jellies be captured and shipped in polyp form to cut down on the cost?

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#35

Post by caseyf7 » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 5:20 AM UTC

Did you write a blog post about living in a van in SF? I see people doing this and I've always been curious about it. I would love to hear what that was like.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#36

Post by sheri » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 6:21 AM UTC

>The supply chain worked this way for a year. Then one day, the tropical supplier went to his jellyfish catching spot and couldn’t catch a single one. All of them were gone. Every week he checked out the same spot, but every week he went home empty-handed.

This is simply unacceptable. His achievement at the expense of local fauna is not to be applauded, but condemned. Regardless of whether jellyfish feel pain, exploiting nature is such destructive ways is simply ridiculous in this day and age.

Sad that so many comments here completely overlooked this, and focused solely on success at any cost.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#37

Post by elliotanderson » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 6:41 AM UTC

I've had a tank on my wish list since I first saw it on Kickstarter.

Sadly, we only have one distributor in Australia and they mark the price up 110% for just a basic tank setup. There's an untapped market over here, only problem is in the distribution channel.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#38

Post by msellout » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 12:06 PM UTC

sheri wrote: post #36

>The supply chain worked this way for a year. Then one day, the tropical supplier went to his jellyfish catching spot and couldn’t catch a single one. All of them were gone. Every week he checked out the same spot, but every week he went home empty-handed. This is simply unacceptable. His achievement at the expense of local fauna is not to be applauded, but condemned. Regardless of whether jellyfish feel pain, exploi…

Yes, it's interesting that so many people on HN are climate change environmentalists, but that this example of over-fishing didn't raise much concern.

Still, it does sound like Jellyfish Art is moving towards farming their own.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#39

Post by DoubleCluster » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 1:20 PM UTC

sheri wrote: post #36

>The supply chain worked this way for a year. Then one day, the tropical supplier went to his jellyfish catching spot and couldn’t catch a single one. All of them were gone. Every week he checked out the same spot, but every week he went home empty-handed. This is simply unacceptable. His achievement at the expense of local fauna is not to be applauded, but condemned. Regardless of whether jellyfish feel pain, exploi…

Do you have any idea in what amounts jellyfish usually appear? Probably the weather changed and they moved off, or died due to changing seasons etc.

Re: The Jellyfish Entrepreneur

#40

Post by up_and_up » Thu, Apr 04, 2013, 1:56 PM UTC

> Alex made the sale, but now he had a problem: he had to deliver on the tank he promised. Alex had a general understanding of jellyfish tank construction based on googling around and talking to experts, but he didn’t have enough expertise to deliver the product.

Daring and a bit crazy.