While shopping online offers an incredible amount of convenience, many still choose to visit brick and mortar retail outlets because there’s nothing like a little window shopping and banter with your favorite shopkeeper. Almost everyone has a favorite sales rep that makes their shopping experience that much better (for me it’s Chi Chi at Lottafrutta). But, when you travel out of your way and that special employee is not there, it can be a let down to say the least. Atlanta-based startup, PeaCube Communications, is producing a direct messaging app exclusively for your routine commercial transactions and the company is now seeking companies to partner with on its BETA launch this August.
Founded by Andrew Igharo, Timberley Jones (pictured above), and a senior developer at a large tech firm, “PeaCube is a direct messaging app that allows retail service and salespeople to communicate with customers of the store on a person to person basis,” explains Igharo. “The app could be used by a salesperson at a department store, a bartender or even a pet groomer at the pets’ store. PeaCube is dedicated exclusively to handling messaging around basic everyday commercial transactions.”
“At the simplest level, the problem that PeaCube solves is to remove the communication barrier between the ultimate product/service provider and the recipient of that product or service,” he continues. “On a higher level, the problem can be viewed as one of raising the level of trust in the shopping experience, both online and offline.”
To get a sense of the opportunity size, Igharo references one of the nation’s largest hardware retailers by saying, “consider that Lowe’s has about 61,000 employees on LinkedIn, but has 265,000 total employees. That means that less than 25% of the Lowe’s workforce carries the most relevant tool (based on adoption) for managing person to person relationships with the customers that they see on the shop floor, in some cases almost daily. We hope that the industry impact will be for PeaCube to help a company like that gain efficiencies in sales, cost and customer experience.”
The idea for PeaCube came to Andrew after he had concluded a routine dry cleaning drop off and needed to make an adjustment to his usual requirements, but had the hardest time reaching the particular assistant he sought. “After being put on hold for the third time I just thought, ‘Gee, I wish I had an easier way to reach the person at that business who I trust the most with my stuff,” he recalls.
Originally hailing from Harlem, New York City, Igharo is a former Investment Banking Vice President at Wells Fargo. There, he was part of the group that handled financing and mergers for publicly traded technology companies. He was also a part of the team at DealTime.com, which was sold to eBay. He and the PeaCube team are working out of a temporary office space at the back of a Mediterranean rug store in the Miami Circle corner of Buckhead. They are currently focused on attracting retail and hospitality industry partners for their Android-first BETA launch in August. The Android BETA, now in full development, is built on a Java backend with an HTML 5 at the front end. The iOS app, not yet in development, will be fully native and the company is currently interviewing iOS developers. If you’re interested in partnering, contact Andrew at andrew.igharo@gmail.com.
