Jack Dustin, founder of Roof Space, talks to Tom Raynel about his dilemma that started the business, and the opportunities to expand his courier-esque business.
What is Roof Space?
Roof Space is a safe network of people who help each other out by transporting large sports items around the country. We’re like Uber but for long-distance travelling to relocate sports items. The whole idea is for the safety of our items and, obviously, affordability. It’s really cost-effective compared to the high prices that freight companies charge.
What inspired you to start the business?
It all originated from my need to send a longboard from Christchurch to Tauranga, and I called up a freight company and it was going to cost $450. I’ve always been from a sporting background from kayaking and surfing and I know how they handle items. I just knew there had to be a better way. I know people are always on missions and travelling for work or sports a lot.
There wasn’t a hub where people could post items they needed relocating. I made a Facebook group a few days later and then found someone to transport my longboard to Tauranga. I think I gave him $100 and he was already heading that way for work and had empty van space.
That Facebook group grew quite quickly, with people in the group posting a lot of items needing transportation or relocation and then people posting their trips. From there I organised a website and it progressed quite quickly after that.
Are the drivers trustworthy enough to take items?
We have two solid forms of verification as the profile and then once I verify them they can go away and send offers. There’s pretty good trust there with strangers signing up. People start to build their own status profiles. It is sort of like Uber in that sense where obviously the better work they do, the more likely they’re gonna be higher rated.
If there have been three offers by people wanting to transport a surfboard from A to B, the person who has already transported items is probably going to get picked first. But it also varies on where people can make the trip, because these verified drivers are already travelling that way whether for work or sporting events or adventures.
Are there opportunities to expand into other items?
Yeah, totally, I think it’s important. I want to expand into Australia next year so I think the space will stay niche and own the sporting network. But you look at the likes of Uber and those sorts of companies when they reached the peak of the mountain, they looked horizontally and started doing Uber Eats and that sort of thing.
So there’s definitely an opportunity there for us to do the same once we reach our peak of sports items in our markets, then look horizontally and open it up to furniture, artwork or pets even and a whole bunch of categories, which is pretty exciting too.
What has been the biggest highlight of starting the business?
I thrive off seeing items delivered. It’s really crazy but for me when items are delivered, that’s my excitement and why I do this. Connecting two people together is also big, and it excites me to see them help each other out to solve their own problems.
A highlight for me is a guy called Nick. He’s been doing a trip once a month for us for the last couple of years, and he tows a trailer now from Christchurch to Auckland. He travels for work but he made a customised trailer so he can transport, say, 20 items along the way there and back.
He makes roughly $2000 a trip and he puts that money towards his family’s holiday fund. That’s pretty cool running the service that allows him to do cool things with his family.
What would be your advice to other budding entrepreneurs?
I think it’s learning how you get your product or service out there without spending a lot of upfront capital just to see if people want it.
If you think that way, that makes it less daunting to get started because people might think there’s all this upfront capital to build your idea. But if you skin it right back and you just get something out there as lean as you can and fast as you can to the people, it’ll gauge whether there’s an appetite for what you think is an idea or product or service that everyone should have.
Tom Raynel is a multimedia business journalist for the Herald, covering small business and retail.