13 Comments

1. Another Great post Rishi!
   So in short, these guys drive around, find a spot to park, and sell merchandise from their truck? Valencia seems a great place to set up shop if you ask me.

   • Hey Benji – thanks for the compliment man!

     I don’t think they do any selling, it is only a showroom. You have to buy it online or buy it in the truck and have it shipped to you…. I think!

2. This is a great idea, Rish. I actually think this approach could work for a variety of products, say mobile games or even up and coming online magazines. And the great thing is you get so much visibility for minimal investment.

   • I thought so too! I never even thought about games. I was one of those kids that stayed in Best Buy for hours and played games.

3. great post rishi. I was actually just checking out the warby parker bus the other day and thought their mobile showroom was really well done.

   You should check it out when it comes through SF in a few days: http://www.warbyparkerclasstrip.com/about-the-bus/

   • wow that is really cool, Nate!

     They pretty much took an old bus and converted it:
     

     Thanks for sharing that!

4. Thanks for showing us this, Rishi. A real Flying Cart!

   This actually is the future: On-demand experiential showrooms where customers select and purchase items to be delivered later.

   E-commerce companies like Trunk Club, CakeStyle and Warby Parker found out that prospective customers wanted to handle merchandise that costs more than $50. So they opened pop-up shops in their early-adopter markets. No brainer.

   My company, Leasabl, allows businesses to rent commercial space from 1 day to 1 year as easily as booking a room on Airbnb. The advantages for businesses and space owners alike are capital and market efficiency. A pop-up shop on wheels is very intriguing where customers respond enthusiastically.

   Please keep reports like this rolling our way!

   • Hey Jason – thanks for telling me about your company, Leasabl. Great idea for people that want to get their product in front of real customers.

     Do you have any spots available now?

5. Gorilly is one of the coolest marketing concepts I’ve ever seen. Super smart. I wonder if they get paid a flat fee or whether there’s a percentage of sales.

   Anyways, Offline –> Online is one of the best website traffic strategies that most people don’t think of. Offline traffic is typically some of the highest quality traffic. I was talking with one of the top direct mail consultants a few months back, and he was saying that in several industries, customers “acquired” offline are often worth as much as 2-5X what customers acquired online are worth.

   But I’m calling BS on this whole blog post. No way Ritual is your favorite coffee shop. It’s gotta be Philz or Rodgers. If it’s Ritual, we’re hitting it up next time. Coffee’s on me.

   • hahaha Pete, you totally caught me. Ritual is one of my favorites. Philz is my current favorite.

     I believe your stat. Offline has amazing conversions. Once you enter a physical store, there is a 80% chance that you are going to buy something. Most online websites have less than 20% conversions.

     I’m not sure how they get paid. I’m assuming a flat fee (for all the design work) + commission (to keep the Gorilly guys incentivized).

6. Hey Rishi,

   Love reading your posts.

   This is a pretty cool concept.

   Would hope they allow purchases direct from the truck, so as not to potentially lose a sale from the impulse buyer. Even if it was just the iPad option to take immediate orders on the spot for delivery later (if it was too hard for them to have stock onboard).

   Although personally I’d be a little disappointed seeing a cool product I wanted and not be able to go home with it.

   Sure there may be things to consider/work around to sell items directly from the truck, but there is always a way.

   It really is about sales at the end of the day, so anything to maximise this must surely be done, no?

   And in the case they really could not easily facilitate the stock onboard/realtime selling, then perhaps an on-the-spot discount/deal of some sort could work well to encourage immediate sales (and create a positive emotion linking the truck to good value AND cool new products).

   • Hey Luke,

     I totally agree. I would also be disappointed if I couldn’t go home with the product right away. It would be nice if they actually had in stock.

     Impulse buying is huge! Especially when it is low price point.

     Rishi

7. Hi Rishi, thanks for the write up. We enjoyed all the comments. To clarify, Gorilly serves as a showroom to give people an opportunity to see, feel, and experience products in person before buying online – a critical experience that is missing from e-commerce.

   We’re going to be showcasing a number of high-design, well-constructed products from e-commerce companies this summer throughout the Bay Area. To find out where we’ll be and what we’ll be showcasing go to our Twitter (@GorillyShowroom) or Facebook page (fb.com/GorillyShowrooms).

   Thanks again.

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