TLabs Showcase focus on startups featuring Stuttgart, Germany-based air ticket exchange system JumpFlight.
Who and what are you (including personnel and backgrounds)?
JumpFlight is an international online marketplace for second-hand flights. Persons unable to travel due to medical, professional, or personal reasons, can offer their flight tickets for sale without a commission on our platform. Travellers looking for cheap flight offers can scroll through the database and contact the sellers about flight exchange.
What financial support did you have to launch the business?
This project was launched without financial support.
What problem are you trying to solve?
We are trying to gain awareness that many flight tickets are transferable and can be sold to someone else. Every day, thousands of passengers have to cancel their flights, and the airlines fly with empty seats. It's a waste of money, there is no reason why other travellers shouldn't use these flight tickets.
Furthermore, we want the visitors of our site to know that a holiday cancellation does not have to be a complete financial lost. If you can't find a buyer for your flights, you can still reclaim taxes and service charges from the airline.
Describe the business, core products and services?
We offer travellers a simple and user-friendly platform for posting flight offers. JumpFlight is a free service, you just have to be a registered user to be able to add flights to our database.
For persons looking for flight offers, we've implemented a search field right on the welcome page. In addition, the sections “All flights” and “Latest entries” give you a good overview of the current flights posted on our site. If you want to be informed about new flights on JumpFlight, just follow us on Twitter.
You can contact flight offerers by using an internal JumpFlight mailing system. If you would like to buy a flight ticket but you are unsure about transferring money to a stranger, you can choose to use the commercial JumpFlight mediation service. The financial transaction will then be processed by us.
As we want to reach travellers worldwide, the site is available in English, German, French, and Spanish.
Who are your key customers and users at launch?
Firstly, travellers around the world wanting to sell their transferable flight tickets. Secondly, spontaneous globetrotters and bargain hunters looking for cheap flight offers.
Did you have customers validate your idea before investors?
Not really. But anyone who has faced the problem of having to cancel flights knows how difficult it is to get a compensation for the unwanted tickets. After a thorough market research, we were convinced that travellers need an online marketplace like JumpFlight. The fact that we are getting new flight offers on a daily basis is a pleasant validation of our idea.
What is the business AND revenue model, strategy for profitability?
We want to provide our users a free service without obligations. Thus, we concentrate on financing our site through advertisements.
For our commercial mediation service, we charge 10% of the ticket price.
SWOT analysis – strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats?
Strengths:
- JumpFlight is an international and dynamic platform, covering a market niche.
Weaknesses:
- Unfortunately, not all flight tickets are transferable.
Opportunities:
- Every day, thousands of passengers have to cancel their flights. So there are plenty of flights out there which can be re-sold.
Threats:
- Big market players might start to offer second-hand flights as well.
Who advised you your idea isn't going to be successful and why didn't you listen to them?The feedback we've received so far has been solely positive. Many of our users run in to our service by coincidence and are surprised to find a new to way save money on flights.
What is your success metric 12 months from now?
We want JumpFlight to become the online marketplace for second-hand flight tickets. Our site should not only be the number one address for travellers wanting to sell their flights, but also a site always worth a visit for anyone looking for cheap air fares.
NB: TLabs Showcase is part of the wider TLabs project from Tnooz.