The Donkey is a rare species at Nordic Growth Hackers—a startup with a physical product they put into the hands of costumers. Donkey Republic’s bikes are a hybrid between a free-floating and docked city bike system. “Hub centric,” that is.
After showing many really funny and smile provoking images of shared city bicycles in unlikely postures from all over the world, Ben Posetti turned to the challenge he and Donkey Republic faced when trying to serve a completely new segment 18 months ago—the commuters.
Until then, 90% of their customers were tourists. The commuters had quite different requirements and usage patterns. So, Donkey Republic tweaked their business model numerous times and ended up with a too complex business model reflected in a cluttered UX and a lot of potentially valuable features.
But, Ben adds, it was a completely necessary process because Donkey Republic learned which features were key and which business model suited the commuters. Based on this, they could finally build a great product with the right business model based on all the learnings from the past year.
