Venture Idea Name:
Shoe-Stream TV
Group Members:
Emily Nitschke, Kiley Van Alstyne, Emily Miley, Tommy Soudachanh, Alexis Tavarez
Description:
Want a projector but don’t want to spend the money on one? Here’s a DIY solution that Chapters can use and sell on campus! You just need a magnifying glass (without the handle), a mobile phone stand (legos, a rubber band and a card, etc…), a rectangular box (shoe boxes work well because they are long enough to adjust the focus), tape, and some scissors or a knife. Here, here, and here are examples of how to do this! The cost is so small that you could sell these projectors for just $10 and still make up to $8 in profit. Note: the quality of the image is…fuzzy to say the least. Make sure your customers know, that a $10-$15 projector won’t wow them with its image quality, but hey, it’s cheap. You’ll have to fool around with the distance between the phone and the magnifying glass for the best focus.
Marketing Ideas:
Target Market:
College or high school students that have a smartphone.
Setting up a table and a screen with a working example could be an effective marketing tool, hosting a movie or tv show watching event using the projector could also work (assuming the quality isn’t that bad.)
Revenue and Expenses:
Probable Expenses:
Magnifying glasses, materials for a stand (research the ways people have made these to come up with the best type of stand for you,) tape.
You should be able to get boxes donated, ask members, roommates, friends, etc..
Sources of Revenue (price, bundles, diverse markets, etc…):
The image quality is poor so I would recommend charging a low price. You could instead host events like a March Madness watch party and charge for popcorn or a seat close to the front, or you could use this to show project videos when tabling. It might be difficult to sell a lot of these considering the quality of the image, but they are exceptionally cheap to make so if you can find the market, you could make anywhere from $5-$15 on each one.
Profits and Other benefits of Venture (Marketing for an upcoming event, advance ticket sales, social value created, etc.):
This novel idea could be used as an eye-catching marketing tool. You could take a big piece of white paper and an easel to your next tabling event and show project videos on it!
Challenges:
Image quality. If there’s a cheap way to significantly improve the image quality, this could make a boat load of money.
Sound. The person using the projector will need a way to connect their phone to sound if they are going to watch something.
Tips:
Do a lot of research into the different ways people make this. It might be better used as a marketing tool than as a Venture.
Would you recommend to other chapters?
Still an untested idea. Maybe for a Chapter who knows people interested in purchasing something like this. The image quality is a serious concern so the novelty of being able to project your phone screen is what they pay for.
Learn about building a business model for your Venture here!
Contact info:
Emily Miley (UO) – emiley3@uoregon.edu
Alexis Tavarez (UF) – actavarez12@yahoo.com
