KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 5 — It is 1pm. You have had a tough first five hours in the office with unmet deadlines, screaming bosses and unpleasant clients. All that would slip away into a distant reality if you could only dig into that plate of char koay teow from your favourite eatery right about now.
But leaving the office would mean losing that perfect parking spot, fighting your way to the centre of the capital’s more congested areas and queuing up under the sweltering heat in your work clothes.
Just the thought is enough of a deterrent to put you in a sour mood for the rest of the day, something that even the plate of mouth-watering perfectly charred fried noodles can’t make up.
Seeing an opportunity, former management consultant turned entrepreneur Francesca Chia found a way to outsource that need — or craving — for an affordable fee via a web application aptly called GoGet.my.
Quite simply, it is for people to help each other run errands.
GoGet, described as a marketplace for errands launched the middle of last year by Chia and her three friends, offers people the chance to save a few extra hours by relegating little tasks — without having to break the bank in hiring a personal assistant.
All one has to do is to post one’s requests on the online marketplace and state how much you are willing to pay per job. This is then carried out by a community of GoGetters around Petaling Jaya, Bangsar and Damansara, and occasionally areas in Greater Kuala Lumpur.
The idea is similar to TaskRabbit, a US-based errand-running business started by IBM former software engineer Leah Busque, when she ran out of dog food just as she was about to leave her home with her husband to meet friends for dinner in 2008.
In Malaysia, apart from indirect competitors like Foodpanda and Tesco Deliveries, Supahands runs services much the same as GoGet but it assists people by outsourcing research, business planning and data entry.
Unlike its competition, GoGet is currently free as it is in its trial phase where users pay by tipping GoGetters for running their errands.
The founders of GoGet began toying with the idea to set up a platform similar to Yelp, a database of crowdsourced reviews about local businesses in the United States, last year as a means to help Malaysians find the best eateries in town.
But soon enough, it dawned upon them that being avid food lovers, Malaysians, already know where to get their staple fixes.
“Actually Malaysia didn’t have an issue with where to find the good food but they did have pains getting to their favourite food places,” said Chia.
“So all you have to do is to post up a job and state the tip you are willing to offer for a packet of nasi lemak. The tip comes down to the same as paying parking and petrol and time —probably even more.
“And we thought, why not crowdsource it. Tell someone that you need a drop off and see if someone is willing to pick it up.
“That’s when we realised that it is even beyond food, it could be groceries, it could be an errand... it could be just about anything,” related Chia.
The reception has been overwhelming since they rolled out. GoGetters completed 30 jobs posted by 100 users within a week.
“We didn’t have advertising. We started with the Bangsar community and worked with local businesses to push up their business,” said Chia, with RM5 to RM10 for the most basic jobs.
GoGet is now beyond groceries or helping to satiate one’s char koay teow cravings.
Errand-runners have taken cats for vet visits; delivered hundreds of bottles of energy boosters for a bootcamp coach; delivered tiffins for home-based kitchens like Dish by Ili and Chopstick Diner; and even scoured the Internet in search for the bhut jolokia — which is unique to the perilous region of north-eastern India and ranks among the world’s hottest chilli peppers — upon a poster’s request and was paid RM150 for the job.
The business’ main-revenue is, however, derived from tie-ups with merchants who need help with bulk orders.
With an accumulated database of over 1,000 posters and 50 verified GoGetters who range from college students, freelancers and stay-at-home mothers, GoGet has grown by leaps and bounds despite still operating over a beta-phase.
Chia said they are working on expanding the number of GoGetters to 250 when they start monetising GoGet.
“We realised that we were empowering people by putting money back into their pockets instantly and giving them the opportunity to earn in their own time,” said Chia, which has even piqued the interest of full-timers.
“There are GoGetters who make RM60 after a full day of work... they now earn that in two to three hours.
“GoGetters also feel good when a job is done well and when they see how people are so surprisingly grateful when you do those jobs for them.”
Like any other start-up, GoGet has had their share challenges—in changing behaviours.
“If you need something, don’t get into the car... it comes to just about the same as tipping someone to do it for you,” added Chia.
“This is for people who don’t have the time. There’s a cost that you incur, you just don’t see it. The economics makes a lot of sense even to the middle-class.”
Understanding security concerns, Chia and her team vet their GoGetters through a series of assessments, which include a video testimony and a series of multiple choice assessments, which is then followed by a trial run.
“Background checks are also done... we have zero tolerance if there is a criminal record and for first-time GoGetters we encourage posters to meet them to drop off their parcels at the lobby or in a public space.
“If people don’t pay up we will ban the user, and vice versa for our runners... and we are going to get goods-in-transit insurance in future,” she said.
As the response has been overwhelming with the changing landscape of lifestyle in the city, and confident that Malaysians are willing to pay for the service, Chia said they will be integrating a paywall next year.
“Eventually, we will be charging GoGetters a flat subscription fee.
“We had a long time to think of a revenue model... regardless of which side you charge — the poster or the GoGetter — you will cut into a GoGetter’s tip.
“The challenge was to find a revenue chain the GoGetters are willing to accept. We got their feedback if they prefer a commission type model, where we take 10 per cent per job or they pay flat subscription fee of RM20 and then they can claim as many jobs. Obviously, they said subscription,” said Chia.
With the subscription fee, runners are able to claim as many jobs as they want to set off the subscription payment.
