Daniel Dubois is the founder of ShareShed, a local startup that's giving outdoor equipment a new lease on life and making adventure accessible to everybody. When it comes to adventure, Daniel can speak from experience. He just flew back from Istanbul (where he was attending the G20 Young Entrepreneur Alliance) in time to hit the stage at Vancouver's first ever Startup City. We caught up with this entrepreneurial star-on-the-rise to talk about Vancouver’s sharing economy and why he can't think of a more awesome city to grow a business AND get outside.
What is ShareShed?
ShareShed is creating a world of unlimited access to adventure with a web and mobile app for renting outdoor recreation equipment off of locals. We're described as the Airbnb for outdoor adventure gear whether it's kayaks, stand up paddle boards, tents and more. What we do is make it easy for people to have fun outside. Our community of gear sharers deserves all the credit though. They provide the gear to get you outside and living vibrantly.
How did you come up with the idea?
When I graduated high school my friend and I backpacked Australia for six months and couch-surfed for most of our trip. Early into our travels we connected with an incredible family who hosted us for a couple months. We would wake up in the morning and go surfing with the dad or on bike trips with our neighbours. After this trip of a lifetime I saw the TED Talk, A Case For Collaborative Consumption by Rachel Botsman. Rachel’s presentation made me completely redefine wealth from thinking about it as what you own, to what you have access to. I thought back to Australia and how we truly were wealthy in the sense that we didn’t own a surfboard but we were still going surfing. In fact we didn’t own anything, but had access to anything we could ever want. More than just items, we had a sense of belonging and were part of a tight knit community. It made me want to create the same world I felt in Australia not only for other travelers, but here at home.
Why did you decide to build your business in Vancouver?
Starting in Vancouver was obvious. We live in an outdoor playground with one of the most gorgeous backyards out of any city in the world. Many Vancouverites never truly experience the amazing outdoors that we have at our disposal and there’s a massive opportunity for us to help with that. We want to use ShareShed as a tool to empower people to expand their horizons and make it easy to experience the great outdoors. There are other ways Shareshed is having a social impact too: on the environment by helping to shift our culture from hyper consumption to access above ownership and on economically by allowing people to have a secondary revenue stream through renting what they own. We're also cultivating human connections and building a vibrant online and offline community.
Your startup encourages people to share, but do you think Vancouverites are really embracing the sharing economy?
I believe sharing is a pillar of Canadian culture. Sharing is also innate to most Vancouverites and we’re quite receptive to the idea of wealth being access over ownership. Mountains and ocean surround Vancouver so we are limited in space and possible urban sprawl. On top of limited geographic space, we are seeing a global shift of moving from smaller towns to the city. Limited space means we are naturally forced to share and come up with creative ways to do more with the space we have. The average car sits idle for 23 hours a day and most outdoor equipment sits for most of the year completely unused. Imagine what we can do with our space and time if we have unlimited access to everything that we could ever want without having the financial burden of buying it.
The sharing economy is still in its infancy here and expected to double in the next 12 months alone. This will affect everyone and every industry, making our day-to-day living more efficient and enjoyable.
What makes Vancouver an awesome city to launch and grow a startup?
There's a lot of reasons....
1. Quality of life and location: we consistently rank in the top three cities to live in worldwide. We’re a two-hour flight from the valley and a 2.5-hour drive from Seattle.
2. Supportive programs and culture for startups: We have Canada’s top young entrepreneur fellowship, The Next Big Thing based out of Hootsuite HQ2 in Vancouver. Launch Academy is another pillar of the Vancouver startup community and has everything you need to go from ideation to launch, scale and exit.
3: Success stories such as Hootsuite, Vision Critical, Plenty of Fish and Shoes.com: these have seeded the Vancouver ecosystem, making it easier for every startup to go from ideation to exit.
4. Government subsidies such as IRAP, SH&ED credits, and Mitacs: they provide huge support to stretch every dollar.
5. Five year working visa for Canadian based Startups: it makes it easy for non-North American entrepreneurs to acquire a visa to Canada. This makes Vancouver and Canada a more realistic and attractive option than even the valley and other cities in U.S.
You help make adventure accessible to others - what are YOUR favourite Vancouver-based adventures?
Our last meetup event we went Stand Up Paddle Boarding from Spanish Banks along the Pacific Spirit forest towards Wreck Beach. We were out on the water watching the sun set into the Coastal Mountains with the city of glass lit up behind us. It felt like we completely escaped the city while we were only minutes away from downtown.
Any advice for aspiring local entrepreneurs?
Get started. Ryan Holmes, CEO of Hootsuite wrote a great example of how to take your first step towards creating a lean startup. You can read more here.
You’re growing fast, any new hires that you’re looking to make?
It’s exhilarating to see the team that is coming together to build ShareShed into the movement I know it can and will be. The culture we’re creating is energetic, adventurous with gratefulness at our core. I jump out of bed in the morning with excitement to meet with our team and build something bigger than us together.
Two big roles we’re looking to fill:
Technical Lead
Community Manager
Any interested candidates can email info@shareshed.ca directly for a job description.If you’re interested in connecting with ShareShed’s community you can join the ShareShed Outdoor Adventure Meetup group, here.
You can hear Daniel (@danielmdubois) speak on The Big Story…and The Next Big Stories tech panel followed by a fireside chat with the CEO of Shopify on Sept 24th at The Imperial. V.I.A. is a proud sponsor of Vancouver’s first ever Startup City. To see the full list of Startup City programs visit: http://www.vancouvereconomic.com/vancouverstartupcity
