At some point I’ll have enough time to write about how we accidentally launched Box of Awesome the weekend I got married. And how twenty thousand kids jumped on the concept in about three days. But in the meantime I thought it might be useful just to talk about what it actually is.
We started BOA to solve a problem which kids brands (both big and small) are suffering: discovery. Specifically, too much content noise (desktop, mobile, basically everywhere) and (increasingly) too little physical retail. Although in the long-term I think that Marc Andreessen is wrong about retail, it definitely is changing-I suspect Jason Calcanis is on the money with his “experetail” concept. Here’s how I describe this emerging space:
THE NEW PLACE
The BOA concept is a free box of curated items from brands (established and new) that we think 8-14 kids will find, well…awesome. The physical box element cuts through the noise (how many kids get sent something through the mail?), the free aspect delights kids and parents alike and our partners get directly into the hands of their target audience. I still think Steve O’ Hear from TechCrunch summed it up better than anyone.
Our first boxes started shipping yesterday. And if you’re curious about how engaged our audience is then you should have a look at our FB community…