I am no animal guy. I spent 2002 in New Zealand and got so many dog bites I just have no desire to repair my relationship with the animal kingdom. A newish startup in San Francisco called Jellyfish Art is making me reconsider. Founded by Alex Anton and Cameron Urban, it is the first company in the world to attempt to bring live jellyfish into your home or office.
“In a normal fish tank a jellyfish will get sucked into the filtration system in a matter of minutes,” Alex told me last week at their San Francisco warehouse which was recently filled with thousands of tanks ready to ship out. The idea was born after Alex visited the Monterey Aquarium and was mesmerized by the jellyfish exhibit. A biology major in college, he determined to figure out a way to design a tank that would support the jellyfish, and bring them to consumers.
Started in 2008, Anton used to go to the San Francisco Bay and catch jellyfish in a boat and selling them anywhere between $30 and $200 each for customers from LA to Seattle. He also built custom tanks for people to bring the animals home. The soothing nature of watching a jellyfish swim is something people can’t get enough of. What’s more amazing is that jellyfish are generally considered pests thus are cheap to breed, and easy to find.
In need of funding, they took to Kickstarter to make it happen. Hoping to raise $3,000 by September 12, 2011, they managed to raise $162,917 from 515 people! Now 6-months later they have received a massive shipment of custom tanks from China to fulfill the orders and get the company off the ground. “We want to be the Amazon of exotic animals. Find ways to bring animals you’ve never been able to have into your home.”
While not a traditional tech startup, they have done well to leverage technology to create a market that hasn’t existed. This week features a deal with Fab.com and while I was in their warehouse last Friday they were taking emails and phone calls trying to answer questions and fill hundreds of orders. They also recently redesigned their website trying to facilitate more online orders and reflect their long-term goals of leveraging the web to build their business. Their deal was also all over Pinterest driving traffic and sales.
*Video: Meet the founders and check out their San Francisco operation.
Video: Cameron and Alex talk about breeding the Jellyfish in the warehouse for the first time.
Video: Walking through and looking at the thousands of boxed tanks. Most of these were pre-ordered up to 6-months ago in anticipation of the new tanks arriving in the US.