ISSUE 006 // 2019

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(( ))PROFILE GREENSTORM COMES TO UK

TAKING US BY STORMGreenstorm brings IBDs into Europe’s leading e-Bike online marketplace with great incentives.

As one of last year’s Eurobikedebuts, industry newcomerGreenstorm Mobility taught us

what vacant hotel rooms and e-Bikescan have in common.

For 2019, the Austrian business isback with larger financial backingand an expanded e-Mobility servicepackage. Providing e-Mobilityservices to close to 1,000 hotels incentral Europe has now beenexpanded to include corporateservices and the independent bicycledealer (IBD) e-Mobility services.These new service projects rununder the names “My Job - My Bike”and “Green4Rent”. On top of thisGreenstorm has now heralded thedawn of the largest e-Bike onlinemarket place. On August 28thGreenstorm’s Marketplace went live.Here’s the story.

A SHORT LOOK BACKGreenstorm Mobility’s hotel barterand rental business relies on a win-win deal: hotel operators provide theAustrian start-up with vacant rooms.Greenstorm offers them online viavouchers and attractive discounts to

consumers. In return Greenstormgives (aside some e-Cars and e-Charging stations) premium-branded e-Bikes free-of-charge tothese hotels. It’s up to the hoteloperators if they give them out totheir guests for free or charge themfor rent. In holiday regions somehotel operators offer guided tours onthese e-Bikes. Because Greenstormexchanges these used e-Bikes annu-ally the company already turned intoEurope’s largest second-handpremium e-bike seller. 

“Over the last year we expandedour business step-by-step”, statesshareholder and general managerRichard Hirschhuber, before listingthe novelties: “To fully concentrateon Greenstorm in November 2018 Isold our hotel family business inKufstein that I had managed for 18years. Shortly beforehand we movedfrom the Greenstorm headquartersin Söll to downtown Kufstein. Asidefrom offices and a shop over therewe rented a nearby building forwarehousing and workshop. Speak-ing of them: Since the end of 2018 alarge part will be handled by a new

workshop service in Slovenia. Whenthe e-Bikes come back to us fromthe hotels for sale after a season,they are thoroughly refurbished byour Slovenian team. This means wedon’t manage more than 2,000 and3,000 units here in Kufstein. With ourSlovenia subsidiary we have a cost-effective solution in terms ofpremises and staff.”

INVESTORS KICK GREENSTORMINTO HIGH GEAR“Last, but not least, in December2018 we received a double-digitmillion Euro financial injection fromEuropean private capital firm BregalMilestone. This investment is madefrom a 400 million Euro fund dedi-cated to invest in European growthcompanies. With their investment wehave been able to order a total of15,000 e-Bikes for the currentseason.”

While no detailed investmentfigures are communicated we notethat Bregal Milestone usually investsan amount between 20 and 60million Euro into each company theyare interested in. 

By Jo Beckendorff

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“IN AUGUST 2019WE HAD 1,800 PLUS IBD

PARTNERS MAINLY OUT OFTHE GERMAN-SPEAKING

MARKET ON BOARD.”

Starting in April 2020 the impressivecatalogue of e-Bikes will be sold afterrefurbishment. Here the IBD marketcomes into the game. Greenstormwants to sell this second-hand e-Bikefleet also with the help of IBDs; thisproject started last year.

Now Greenstorm is riding somefurther trails. According to Hirschhu-ber his company’s current e-Bikebusiness is based on three pillars:Aside the e-Bike exchange system tohotels with ‘My Job – My Bike’ wecreated a corporate e-Bike rentalbusiness. With countrymanSwarovski  - a manufacturer of cutcrystal glass with global distribution –Greenstorm already has a largecompany on board. Swarowksi cannow equip its employees with green e-Mobility at very attractive prices.Moreover with ‘Green4Rent’ Green-storm created a most attractive e-Bikerental business also for IBDs.

WANTED: GREEN4RENT PARTNERS The app supported “Green4Rent” dealworks as follows: Greenstorm gives acomplete new premium e-Bike fleet totheir partners. These partners canrent them out to their customers notonly for testing, but also for weekendsand/or holiday rides.

“While our partners can get morecustomers interested in e-Bike mobil-ity 30 percent of the rental price will go

into their pockets. The remaining 70percent is for us. If there are repairjobs over the period of the partner-ships we take over the labor costs”,promises Hirschhuber. He also saysthat these e-Bikes won’t remain in thesame place longer than two seasonswith partners,

“We have to take them back afterbeing used for no more than 1,500kilometers. Otherwise we can’t sellthem after refurbishment with themargin we need when selling themsecond-hand,” he adds.

GREENSTORM MARKETPLACE: USEDMEETS NEW E-BIKE SALESOn top of all these new offers withGreenstorm Marketplace the Austri-ans launched “Europe’s largest e-Bikeonline marketplace”.

“It is the first European onlinemarketplace for new and second-hande-Bikes. What we want to create withthe help and support of a total of 3,000IBDs is a leading e-Bike marketplace,”explains Hirschhuber.

A larger stake of Bregal Mile-stone’s investment is used for theAustrian’s e-Commerce businessexpansion. While Greenstorm itself isselling its second-hand refurbishede-Bikes through this marketplaceIBD partners can sell their new e-Bikes through it too. Hirschhubernames the advantages participating

IBDs receive: “First of all – and differ-ent to others - we take zero provisionon their new e-Bike sales and youcan use us as your free advertise-ment channel. Second, we offer themfree Facebook- and Google-supervi-sion. Third, we have an intelligentlogistics and an automated paymentsystem behind. Finally - and this is inour view the most important plus –IBDs can offer their products on anonline platform with a million plusvisitors per month.”

Hirschhuber confirms that with thehelp of participating IBDs sellingtheir new e-Bikes through Green-storm’s online marketplace he wantsto create an expanded portfolio ofnew e-Bike offers to his existing usede-Bike sales business. This meansalso having more bicycle brands onboard as well as reaching higher traf-fic to his website.

“In August 2019 we had 1,800 plusIBD partners mainly out of theGerman-speaking market on board.We hope to increase this number allover Europe within a short time to3,000. The UK is included in this,”concludes Hirschhuber.

While talking about all thesefuture plans Richard Hirschhuberstalls for a moment before saying:“In 2016 we started with four people.Today we have a total of 160 people.Isn’t it great?”.

Richard Hirschhuber,Greenstorm’s founder

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