Every week we feature a new startup at Fundsup that forces a radical breakthrough. This time we chat with Jeroen Janssen, founder of Crazy about Eggs.
Read the Dutch version on Emerce.
Jeroen, what exactly are you doing?
We’re re-inventing the eggsperience and everything you thought you knew about eggs, egg products, farmers and chickens. We do it by selling eggs and egg-products through the supermarket chains and direct to consumers.
Crazy About Eggs’ business model is based on total transparency. All business activities are in the chicken blockchain. You can see where your chicken has been, how the packaging was made, even what the margin of the store and my salary is. You can follow the chickens live via cameras and sensors (the chick ‘n trace). You can see that they have a lot of space (max two chickens per square meter), they have no cut beaks, roosters and hens are mixed up and every chicken rests, sleeps and gets good food. You can know everything and see everything.
We believe that chickens deserve a normal chicken life on the farm. A life with plenty of space, uncut beaks and the best food in the bowl. There are such farms in the Netherlands, but you can never find their eggs in supermarkets. We are now making these delicious, sustainable eggs available to everyone as Crazy About Eggs.
Where do you see its main application?
Our main application is customer & community engagement and it’s facilitated by several current and future digital ‘headless’ touchpoints. We start with our own digital ‘eggsperience’ where the journey begins. To enhance the offline store-experience you can scan the QR code on the packaging and the ‘chick ‘n trace’ starts to show you all validated touchpoints in the (block)chain. This includes a live stream on Twitch straight from the chicken coop.
Later this year we’re launching our Crazy about App that will include thousands of recipes, chicken-Tamagotchi, games and more. End of May we’re launching our online store where customers can get their egg-subscription for bi-weekly delivery of our delicious products.
What is the impact of your business?
The Dutch consumer taps an egg about 180 times a year for baking, for tossing in a salad or making a cake. At the same time, more and more attention is being paid to the impact of our food. Just think of meat substitutes and the discussion about plastic. Many people yearn for more sustainable alternatives to popular products. And we are the ideal alternative to regular eggs.
People see an egg as a commodity and that’s a problem. Everyone thinks in three categories: 1, 2 or 3 stars. There is no brand, the market has no face and no voice and the quality mark does not work. The result is that the number of bio-farmers has been shrinking for years and the industry has not progressed but is even declining. With Crazy About Eggs we want to show how great sustainable farmers are. We want to supply you with the best and the tastiest eggs, and bring them to your home in your favorite way.
Our sustainability impact is super important across all the touchpoints. For example, our packaging is environment-friendly during its entire lifecycle. Nature itself breaks down the material in a matter of weeks – pollution-free and with no harmful leftovers.
“The number of true organic farmers has been shrinking for years. We are going to change that.”
Where do you stand right now?
It took us twelve months to develop the unique packaging experience, and a few days ago our new ‘eggsperience’ went live. Mid-June we’re launching our eggs across a few hundred supermarkets in the Netherlands. We want to expand to supermarkets and cities in Germany in the second half of this year. We are now in the final phase of negotiations with some of the best organic and regular supermarkets in the country.
When are you planning to go to the market?
We’re 50 days away from the official launch in the Dutch supermarkets, with two different egg-lines. Our online D2C store will launch at the end of May for Amsterdam, people are able to pre-register already. Our Instagram account – including our little too free-spirited chickens – is already available.
Who has invested in you and what kind of investors are you looking for?
The initial development phase is funded by ourselves. We’re fortunate to have met our pre-seed-investor coming from a real egg-family from one of the biggest egg-companies in the nineties. He really brings the egg-experience together with our key-egg-supplier and packaging partner. We’re looking for investors to expand our operations to multiple markets across Europe. Our ‘blitz-scale’ approach includes a clear growth strategy, that requires heavier investments and more specific partnerships.
What would be the ideal investor match?
Our ideal investor match brings finance and growth experience, together with a consumer/ retailer focus. An investor who values customer lifetime over short term profit. We don’t expect daily engagement but do appreciate monthly support for the long term. For this stage, we prefer a smaller group of professionals over a large fund.
Best of luck with everything!
Thanks, check out our pitch deck in the Funds Up app: https://api.fundsup.co/go/eN9Rdyzpau