For many people who live abroad, last-mile logistics problems quickly become thousand-mile logistics ones.
It is particularly difficult for those who live in Central and South America. Big box stores like Target, Costco, and Walmart aren’t in the region, and most things on Amazon can’t be delivered. So it is common for travelers between US and Latin American countries to bring extra suitcases filled with items requested by friends and family.
But customs requirements and cross-border regulations make travel logistics hard to navigate.
Entrepreneur Karla Valdivieso knew that pain point first hand as a business owner in her native Ecuador. But she knew there had to be a tech solution, so she started to dive into the problem with her startup Shappi.
TECH MEETS TRAVEL LOGISTICS
Valdivieso said Shappi leans into the “DNA of travelers” who are looking for a more streamlined way to move things across borders.
When a business or individual outside the US signs up on Shappi, they are given a pricing quote and a “virtual box” with an address that can be used for ordering items. When items arrive at the box in the US, Shappi conducts important quality control checks with AI, something that is particularly important for international buyers who will have a tough time making returns.
Once an item passes quality control, it’s time to connect items with verified travelers within Shappi’s database. Travelers are notified about items that are ready to travel and what any country-based travel restrictions there are. To Ecuador, for example, you can’t carry more than two iPhones or surpass more than $10,0000 worth of new products.
Travelers are verified via biometrics and background checks. Valdivieso said the typical traveler brings 100 to 200 items per trip, but the platform ensures that none of those will cause problems with customs regulations when they arrive.
“We send everything ready for them to be able to pack and follow TSA rules,” she added. Upon arrival, Shappi takes care of bringing those items to their warehouses for another round of quality control before ultimately getting everything to the final destination for their clients.
“It’s super simple for travelers, extremely simple for customers and business,” she said. “But there’s all this web underneath it with smart technology and AI.”
The typical traveler using Shappi are those that are going back and forth between Latin America and the United States twice a month, whether for business or for visiting family.
Clients can buy things ranging from batteries to toothbrushes to shoes to the latest gadgets. While phones or laptops are popular, Karla said that requests for refurbished products are gaining steam as well. Items from Shein are particularly popular right now, she added.
MEET THE TEAM
Valdivieso grew up in Ecuador and spent a lot of time traveling between the US and South America, something that made it very clear that items available in the US are not easy to get outside the US.
She previously founded KOMLEP, a digital studio that helped other startups through the product creation process.
Valdivieso was living in Ecuador at the time, and in 2018 she traveled to the US to get some new computers for her business. She posted about her upcoming travels on Facebook, and said she “unsurprisingly” got multiple people requesting to bring things back from the US for them. That got her thinking about how tech could help streamline the process.
She started building Shappi alongside COO CJ Valdivieso in San Diego, California. But the fundraising process ultimately brought her to Chattanooga.
That move might not seem like the most obvious move, but she said Chattanooga’s logistics industry was a big draw.
Brickyard was another.
The “insulator” Brickyard and its $17 million investment fund has attracted founders from across the globe to Chattanooga, Tennessee.
The move has allowed Valdivieso to not only focus on building up Shappi, but also to connect more deeply with Chattanooga’s innovation scene.
“We wanted to have partners that understand logistics really, really well to be able to guide us through this moment to possibly an exit. So it just makes so much sense. So we moved our business to this hub where we built our first warehouse,” Valdivieso added.
The team right now is 20 people strong, four of whom live in the US.
While the startup is currently only serving people in Ecuador, Valdivieso said they are eyeing expansion into other countries in 2024.
“This is a global problem. And it’s affecting every single country,” she added.
