Last updated on July 16th, 2022
Welcome back to another episode of Into The Airbnb, where we talk with Airbnb hosts about their short-term rental experience.
Our guest for today is Sage Nathan, part of the Minoan Experience. Minoan Experience is a company founded under the new/old concept of Native Retail and it’s on its way to encourage hosts to embrace it by helping them create and capitalise on these magic moments guests experience in their rentals. But not only that though, Minoan helps hosts to save a ton of money and time on furnishing, it turns the property into lovely and naturally created shoppable experience for the guests, allowing you, the host, to make some income out of it.
Join us in this interview to get more info about Minoan and how to take part of this new and exciting opportunity for Airbnb hosts.
This episode is sponsored by Airbtics, short-term rental analytics for high return investments, comprehensive data for insights, ideas and inspiration. Go to app.airbtics.com to find precise Airbnb data such as occupancy rate, revenue, average daily rate, and so on. So, without further ado, let’s get into it!
Into The Airbnb Podcast S2 EP 45: Save on furnishing & offer a unique Native Retail experience with Minoan
You can also listen to this Into The Airbnb Podcast Episode on Otter.
Delia:
So can you do a little bit of introduction about yourself? And also tell us what is Minoan?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, of course. So my name is Sage, I lead partnerships at Minoa and I’ve been here for about a year and a half. We’ve been around for just about two years, so a relatively young company. But Minoan is a platform to help hosts simplify the ordering process and help them save money when they’re furnishing their rentals. So we believe that hosts should never be paying for retail for anything that they bring into their space. And so we’ve negotiated, you know, discounts on 200 different brand partners and built in all in one ordering platform where hosts can manage everything end to end, related to ordering in one place and it’s completely free to use.
Delia:
This is not only beneficial for hosts, right? It’s also for the guests they have in their short-term rental Airbnb.
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, exactly. So there are two components of our business. The first that I mentioned is more upstream when a host, let’s say they just close on a property or maybe they need to refresh, they want a new sofa, they want some new amenities, they can use our purchasing platform to get all of these great discounts on all of these orders. And then the second component of our business is we then can create what we call a shoppable experience for the guest, which basically takes all of the items that the host bought for their property through Minoan, whether it’s an article sofa, public goods amenities, a sasper mattress and we pipe those into a custom retail experience, basically a custom website that we build for the property. So anytime a guest comes to stay in a property and let’s say they love the mattress, they love the soap and shampoo, so much so that they want to buy it, we create a really easy well merchandise website where the guests can come in, learn more about the brands in the space and about the products, easily add the items to their cart and check out with the items they love most. And of course, the host earns a commission on anything that sells. So what we do is we serve the host and we also serve the guests.
Delia:
That is amazing! And can you tell us a little bit of how does the retail experience works for the guests?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, of course. So there are a couple of ways in which we show the guest and prime them of the experience. Our mantra at Minoan is to be present, but not overwhelming. So we definitely don’t want to sacrifice the sanctity of the guests day. If guests are paying, you know, $500 or $1,000 a night, whatever they are to stay at your property, we want to make sure that they’re not being bombarded with “shop this by now” and so we’re really careful in the way that we merchandise the experience. So there are a few ways guests can, you know, be made aware of the experience. There’s something like this, I don’t know if video is included in this, so apologies if it’s not.
Delia:
Yes, it is.
Sage Nathan:
Okay, awesome, we can create a co-branded touchpoint like this. So you know the property’s logo, the property’s name could go here, it’s super soft messaging, found something you like, again, there’s not price tags hanging from everything. And that QR code would take the guests to this fully immersive retail experience where they can see every product. So the QR code will take them to, you know, so they have 50 shoppable products in the property, a website with all of those products in one place so that they could buy them all, check them out without having to go to different tabs on their browser, that’s one way. We also work with the host to connect with them digitally. So if the host has an Instagram page or direct booking site, they can add the shoppable link into their linktree on their Instagram or perhaps on their direct booking site, there can be an exploring shop button. And also a combination of that with pre and post emails that, you know, the host is already communicating to their guests, again, we don’t want it to be overly commercializing in their face, but something simple like can’t wait to get here, click here and check out what’s waiting for you at, you know, the name of the property.
Delia:
Right. In this website, you’re telling me that you set up for the hosts, is not only for the products, but it also will be like custom to the hosts’ rentals, right?
Sage Nathan:
Yep. So we take the images that they already have, you know, likely something that they’ve used on their listing page and we create a wireframe, so guests can shop by space. So we can have an image of the kitchen, they will click into the kitchen space and see the coffeemaker and see the, you know, the salt, pepper, everything that they have in the kitchen. And then if they hop over to the living room, there’ll be a picture of the living room, actually the living room that they’re staying in, then they can see the sofa, they can see the TV, they can see everything that’s available in the living room. So we use images of the host property to create this custom experience. So it’s different per property, you’re not going to see the same experience if you go to property A vs property B, it’s a combination of the unique items that they have curated for the space in addition to their images.
Delia:
That’s right. And there are obviously some, like very obvious benefits of using Minoan, but can you tell us a little bit more about the really deep benefits you have with using Minoan?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, of course, I’d say the first thing is it’s completely free. So it doesn’t matter if you’re a host who’s just getting started and you just closed on your first property. If you have 15-100 properties that you own and manage, it’s completely free doesn’t matter, you know, where you are along the journey of being a host. We have discounts on as I mentioned, at this point, over 200 different brands. Brands that these hosts are probably already buying from, brands like article, brands like West Elm, Casper, Parachute Wayfair, I mean, the list goes on, I won’t bore you or anyone who’s listening with that long list, you should definitely come and check it out. But there’s no risk and so if you come in, if you check it out, if you just need a sofa or if you need a full house, you can find everything you need in Minoan, from furniture to snacks to soaps and shampoos, just about every category you need. One of the biggest benefits that I’ve seen and heard from hosts firsthand is that we take care of all of the messy admin work related to customer service, related to tracking. Host don’t have to check their email inbox for “where’s the tracking link for the article sofa? Is it even coming on time? Did I order it?” and they don’t have to manage this in a Google spreadsheet. Everything that is related to their order, our team managers, our team has extensive background in retail and E-commerce. So we are very familiar with routing orders, customer service, all of the messy and candidly unsexy things that come along with ordering online. And it’s just giving hosts a one-stop shop, basically, one source of truth where they can come in and manage their order across all of these brands in one place. So it’s really about giving them visibility into empowering them to make the decisions that are right for their business, showing them you know, information on lead times, pricing after discounts to make sure that they’re trying to go live, you know, by the end of June and the product isn’t going to ship until August, they have that information upfront. So they don’t end up purchasing something that ultimately wouldn’t work for their property. So a lot of benefits, quick summary, free to use discounts on 200+ different brands and we manage all of the customer service routing and admin sides of retail post purchase in the platform.
Delia:
That is so great and also it sounds so relaxing that you don’t have to be checking all those websites, you know, tracking the order, so it’s really great! And can you tell me what is the purchasing process like, please?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, sure. So after the host has been approved, they will get email access to get their account set up and logged in. And they would see, you know, all of the different brand partners that we work with. We’ve built a Google Chrome extension, which is really exciting and basically what that does is once you have that installed, it will follow the host across any Minoan brand that we work with. So if you go to articles website, if you go to Westown, Crate and Barrel, so on and so forth, they will see a little green “M”, a Minoan “M” will pop up in the right hand corner and basically the extension allows hosts to pull in items from all of the different brands that we work with into one cart so that they don’t have to check out with Crate and Barrel and then checkout with article and then checkout with Casper. They pay us once for, you know, items from 4/5/10/15 different brands, so that eliminates a lot of time on their end. So the way that It would work as they would browse the brand’s website. Let’s say they go to article.com and they’re looking for, you know, a dining table, they would find the table that they like, pop open the Minoan extension and then there are a few pieces of information that we asked for, just to make sure we ship out and quote out the right product. So product name, any options that the product has, if it’s a table, do you want one that seats four, that seats six? If it’s a mattress, do you want a king or queen? and then how many do they want, so if they want two, they would click that, add it to their Minoan cart, it’s definitely important that the host never checks out on the brand’s website directly, otherwise, they would pay for retail. So to get the discounts, everything comes back into Minoan. Once the host has added all of those items from the different brands that they like into their Minoan cart, there’s an option to request a quote. We go through a quoting process just to make sure that we can consolidate all of the information across these different brands for the host in one place before they pay. So they would request a quote and within 4-6 hours, our operations team would turn back a quote to them, they will get an email update and it would take them to a page with all of the item details, pictures of all of the products, estimated delivery dates, definitely the most important column that I like to call out, especially when hosts are working against a tight timeline. We show them savings, we show them shipping costs, broken out by brands, so they understand you know, who is charging what, what is Casper shipping? What does it cost to ship my article sofa? All in one place. If all looks good, the host can approve and pay for the quote right there either via credit card or an ACH payment and then from there, it’s really hands off, that’s when we come in and we do all of the work, we send the order to the brands, the host just gets to sit back and as we start to get tracking information from these brands, as items have shipped, we populate it back into their order. So again, it’s one source of truth, they don’t have to check a spreadsheet, they don’t have to check their inbox, they could just check in with Minoan. And we’re at one point of contact, so if they order from five different brands, instead of them having to contact Crate and Barrel, then contact Article and then contact Casper, if something’s wrong or they just have a question with their order, they can contact Minoan. We’re at one point of contact and then we handle all the conversations with the brands. Hosts are busy, so it’s really important for us to help them save time and so that’s what, you know, we’re building and doing at Minoan. That’s kind of how the end to end process on the purchasing for the property works.
Delia:
That is amazing, actually! And I would like to make you some, like a question that is not really regular, but what happens if, for example, the host reaches the quoting process, right? But they see articles they really don’t like to purchase, they can delete it there? How does it work like?
Sage Nathan:
Good question. There’s a garbage can button in the quoting process. So once the quote is returned to them, if the discount, you know, if you’re like, “Actually, I could find something elsewhere, I don’t want that style anymore or this delivery time isn’t going to work for me”, there’s a garbage can next to every single item and they can just remove it then in there. Additionally, on the flip side, if there’s an item that they forgot to add, they’re like, “Sure, I wanted to add this article”, they can also add new products to an existing quote. So there are a lot of ways in which we allow modifications because things change and we need to be flexible to allow them to make whatever changes and modifications as long as it’s before they pay for the order. So that’s not a problem, if something’s wrong or if they don’t want an item any longer, they can remove it from the quote, good question.
Delia:
And what about canceling some orders, maybe a single item or the whole order?
Sage Nathan:
Yep. Once the order has been placed there, we just need to send a message to our orders team. So there are two ways to get in touch with us, they can either respond back to the email that they’ve received about their quote and order or we have a really nice that we just launched probably, you know, two months ago, at this point, I’m a chatbot in the platform to where they can come in, type a message and it goes to our entire team. So whoever you know, is online at the time can respond and help them address that issue or concern. So if they need to cancel an item, if they need to cancel an order, as long as, you know, typically it hasn’t shipped yet or we can get in touch with the brand before it’s shipped, we can handle all of that for them. So again, it’s just saving them time, if there’s a problem, they want to cancel something life happens and so we’re flexible, as long as we can figure it out with a brand which most often than not, we’re able to, you know, take care of that for them. And it just again, they don’t have to mess with that. They just let us know and then we take care of that with the respective brand.
Delia:
Oh, that’s amazing really! And what about the purchasing process for the guest?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah. It’s pretty similar. It’s funny because we actually started Minoan primarily with the shoppable experiences for guests and then we realized that, you know, hosts were coming to us and it was so easy for guests to buy through this experience that we were creating that they’re like “Can we buy from you guys?”, so that’s when we ended up creating this procurement or furnishing platform where hosts can buy for their property. But the guests purchasing process is pretty similar, they would go into this custom experience that we built for the property and they will have an option to explore all of the products, explore by room, they can pick on a product they like, add it to their cart and then they check out just as you would on any normal E-commerce or retail website, our team gets the order and we send the order directly to the guests, wherever they, you know, put in their shipping location. So it should be frictionless exactly as if you were going to any brands website directly and ordering something, you know, directly to your home.
Delia:
Okay, that sounds great! And do they also get some discount by any chance?
Sage Nathan:
Currently, we price everything at full retail, meaning it’s at parity with what the brands are offering. So if the article sofa on our website is $1,000, it’s also going to be $1,000 on Articles website, we want to make sure that we’re at parity. We’re really capitalizing on the moment of inspiration when a guest comes in and you know, they wake up from the best night’s sleep ever on the mattress that they love, the taste of the local coffee that they had in the property. But we should never be more expensive than what a guest could go and get on their own. But we’re also testing you know, different promotional ways of merchandising the site especially during, you know, maybe Labor Day sales or summer savings to where we can allied with some of the promotions that brands are running on their own websites.
Delia:
Okay, that sounds good. And can you tell me a little bit about the brands that are involved in this whole Minoan thing? Also what kind of items can they get? For example, furniture kitchenware, items in the bathroom.
Sage Nathan:
Good question, I will do my best to make this concise because I could probably speak 40 minutes just on the brands that we work with. But again, we work with, you know, over 200 brands at this point and really, almost everything you would need to furnish a property. So we work with furniture brands like Article and Crate and Barrel and Walker Ediso. You know, some of these brands are in the higher end category and some of these brands are more in the value category because you know, we want to make sure that we can serve as hosts, no matter what type of property that they’re working with. So that’s furniture in terms of mattresses, we work with Purple, we work with Casper, we work with Semmens, linens, I mean Casper techs, Parachute, Brooklyn and the list goes on and on. And then we have consumables, we have snack partners, we have, you know, brands like public goods who do gallon refillable for their soaps and shampoos and also all you would need to outfit your kitchen. We work with brands who have appliances like microwaves and coffee makers and dishwashers. And the discounts, of course, vary depending on the brand, but most of our brands are what we call trade + pricing, meaning if you’re a designer or someone, you know, who can get these credited memberships yourself, our discounts are typically, you know, 5 to 10 points below what that standard discount is because of the value that we’re providing, you know, for these brands as well. For brands, it’s kind of a no brainer, I mean, I won’t bore you with these details, but you know, the digital space is really crowded with how much brands are spending on digital advertising to get people to click on ads. But these short-term rental properties are creating really meaningful moments between people and products in the real world and so it’s something that, you know, we position, that’s how we position ourselves to brand. So ton of different brand partners, I’ll just name a few more Westown I think I mentioned already, we work with Crosley, they do really cool record players, you know, everything that you would need to furnish a rental, Polywood does incredible outdoor furniture, you know, the list goes on and on.
Delia:
Wow, that’s amazing, actually! And can you tell us a little bit about, is it easy to get the brands to work with you in this? How do you pitch them? Do you think they actually are pretty accessible when you explain to them how does this work?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, you know, for brands that we’ve talked to thus far and onboarded has always come from a host telling us “Hey, we work with Westown” “Hey, our mattresses are from Casper” and that’s when the conversations kicked off. And basically the way that we have these conversations with the brands is we tell them that Hey guys, digital advertising is expensive. You guys are spending a tremendous amount of money on, you know, the digital side and we’re not saying that digital is wrong. I mean, digital is definitely an important component of a brand’s, you know, marketing proposition. But the reality is the best way to experience a product is to use it. The best experiences don’t happen on screens and they don’t happen on shelves, they happen when you’re actually able to use a product for what it was designed to be used for. And the reality is that’s exactly what these properties are creating these moments every single day, someone is sleeping on a mattress for three to four nights, someone is using the soap and shampoo on their hair when they are in the shower. And so we say “You know, these are the moments where you guys want to be present” and the reality is they’re already in these spaces, right? Casper mattresses are all over the place, public goods has their soap and shampoo and all of these properties. But it hasn’t been properly illuminated yet. And what I mean by that is people aren’t necessarily being made aware, “Hey, you love that mattress? It’s a Casper mattress and here’s why it was so comfortable” or “You loved the way that the Public Good shampoo fell on your hair? Here’s why” and so we’re really connecting the two to make sure that when someone wakes up from the best night’s sleep or they love the coffee, that it’s not just “Okay, great” and then life goes on, that we’re capitalizing on that moment and making the connection between guests in the property and the products that they’re using. So it’s been a fun time, you know, getting all of these brands on boarded and we’ve found them to be extremely receptive and excited honestly, about what we’re doing and this new retail channel is what we’re calling Native Retail.
Delia:
Native retail. So that’s a really interesting concept, right? I think it’s a really old concept to be honest because people that go to at a house and you look at the shoe rug, you look at the curtains, you look at something and you ask, “Hey, where did you buy this?”, right? “How much did it cost?” It’s really, really an old concept and you were the first one to capitalize on it. So it’s really great.
Sage Nathan:
It’s everywhere, right? It’s not just, we’re just starting in hospitality, but if you think about it, you know, it’s everywhere. It’s in your own home, it’s in if you’re going on, you know, a fishing charters, like what rod? What reels do you have? It’s everywhere, this native retail concept in gyms, if you like the treadmill or if you like, you know, the dumbbells, whatever it may be, we’re just starting in hospitality. So, you know, the opportunity for this native retail concept is just about everywhere, you can imagine. But it’s been really fun. And to your point, exactly, it’s not that we’re reinventing the wheel here, we’re just taking these moments and bringing them to life and starting in hospitality. So it’s been really fun.
Delia:
Yeah, that’s amazing! And now that you talked about brands previously, what about, for example, new startup brands? Do you think someone can reach you out, for example, if they have beauty products, if they have art or decor and try to work with you?
Sage Nathan:
Definitely! Yeah, we’re open to exploring new partnerships always, you know, as long as it’s a good fit. As long as we can secure a good discount, you know, that’s really important to us, hosts come to us, they trust that they’re gonna get a lot of value out of the brands and discounts that we offer. And so typically, it’s one of the first, you know, we want to understand the brand, what’s the value offering? What type of category a niche maybe are they filling in terms of assortment? You know, are they providing eco-friendly toilet paper? Are they providing really affordable mattresses and then we work out the logistics and making sure that it’s easy to route and have them fulfill orders. But yeah, we’re always open to learning about new brands I mean, the big brands like West Elm article, Crate and Barrel, most people are familiar with them, but it’s really fun for us when we get to work with some of these smaller, maybe not as well-known brands because this is the perfect avenue to help get them, you know, distribution in the real world and in these moments and times of use for people are going to be using their products.
Delia:
Okay, that sounds amazing! And how about like, can the hosts make money with Minoan?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah, they can save money and make money. So they’ll save money up front, of course, with all of the purchases that they can make through Minoan to, you know, for items for their property. And if they decide to make their property shoppable, anytime a guest comes in, buys something, there is a 50/50 profit share on any things that sold. So they save money up front and then they have the opportunity to make, you know, recurring revenue anytime a guest buys something from their property. And these products at this point are already a sunk cost, right? They’ve already bought the mattress, they’ve already bought the sofa, now let’s just let’s bring your property to life. And I’m sure a lot of these hosts from what we’ve heard, they’re always getting questions, “Where did you get the mattress? Where did you get the sofa”. But the reality is, these hosts don’t have time to be, you know, to manage a full retail operation, they’re already managing a lot, being a full-time host and so for us, it’s really easy to just take that work off of their plate and allow them to still capitalize on those moments and earn some additional, you know, incremental revenue. It’s just gravy on top of, you know, the money that they’re getting in bookings, but, you know, that’s how they can make money is by making their property shoppable and having those commission’s flowing anytime guests order something from their property.
Delia:
So if I’m thinking right, if you sell for example, five times your mattress, that mattress will be paying for itself, right?
Sage Nathan:
Exactly. Yeah, that’s the whole idea of it. If you can, you know, and again, we’re a relatively young company, but we’re a technology company and so we’re building all of these platforms to be able to capture information exactly like what you were referring to on, hey, if you spend an additional, you know, $200 on this mattress, here’s the commission that you will earn, if you to your point sell five of these, it’s already paid for itself and now it’s just a net profitable asset that you’re earning incremental revenue time and time again. There’s a lot of interesting data and things that we’re working to collect and thinking around such as, you know, if you buy, we don’t work with Dyson just yet, but if you were to put a Dyson hairdryer in your property, could you charge $10 more a night? If so, not only, you know, someone necessarily just didn’t have to buy it, if they do, of course, that’s additional money on top, but if you can charge $10 more a night, that will pay for itself in three weeks or whatever it is. And so there’s a lot of interesting analytics that go behind purchasing decisions and all of this is to be able to come back and share this with the hosts to empower them, to make the decisions that are going to be most beneficial to them and also create the best guest experience. So yeah, what you’re saying is exactly right, it’s an opportunity, basically, to pay off the upfront costs that they’re having to put into furnishing the property.
Delia:
That sounds amazing! And like you said before, you are working on a tool to allow them to calculate how much can they put the average daily rate at with the amenities and items they sell there, right?
Sage Nathan:
Not yet. We’re working on figuring out how to best display data like that and offer suggestions, so that’s probably a ways out, but it’s certainly something that thinking about. We want to make sure that we get the product or the platform right first. So later this summer, we’re going to be releasing Minoan 2.0, which we’re really excited about. A lot of changes and enhancements that we’ve made based on the incredible feedback that we’ve heard from hosts in our network. So we’re making the changes, were listening to what they want to see, what would be helpful for them and our team is, you know, over 70% engineers and so it allows us to move really quickly to make these changes and updates that are going to be really helpful to the hosts.
Delia:
Okay, that sounds really exciting! So can you tell me a little bit of how can a host apply and get accepted into Minoan?
Sage Nathan:
Definitely. So we have a really quick, probably takes 2-3 minutes application process on our website, so a host would go to www.minoanexperience.com, which is our website and there will be a “Join Us” button on the top right. We just asked for a few pieces of information. So how many properties do they have? How many guests do they see a month? It’s a really quick, again, probably 2-3 minute application process. Once they submit that it gets passed to our partnerships team to do a really quick review. I mean, we’re typically reviewing these applications as soon as they come in and then we will approve their account and then they will get an automated email from our system with information on how to get their account set up and they can start shopping. So as soon as they put their information, it’s a very quick timeline to get their account are approved. And right now we are only working with hosts in the US and so if a host is, you know, we’ve had some hosts come in from Spain and Mexico, which is incredible, all places I would love for us to be and I’m sure eventually one day we will. But right now, again, only available to host in the US but quick application process, no cost to sign up, no cost to working with us and as soon as we review it, they get approved and get their account information via email.
Delia:
And is this open to any kind of host? Or are you looking for a specific niche group of like hosts or a specific type of rentals to work with you?
Sage Nathan:
Yep, so we’re open to, you know, any host who believes in creating beautiful spaces and really cares, you know, it’s not just about heads and beds, they want to create an experience for their property and for their guests, so a lot of that we’re able to see through the application process. But no, we don’t really have, you know, we just want to work with hosts who, again, like realize the potential of their properties and take this, it’s an investment, right? To be a host and to have a short-term rental, it’s a big financial investment. So we want to help them, you know, make it a bit easier to do all of those, a lot of the operational things that come along with being a host. But, you know, we have a lot of pockets in New York and Florida and California in the mountain areas, but we don’t have a specific geography that we’re looking for. We’re excited to work and learn from hosts all over with all sorts of different backgrounds.
Delia:
Great, this sounds amazing! Can you tell us a little bit about the reviews and the feedback that you have got from either the hosts or what they got from the guest? What kind of value do you bring to their property, right?
Sage Nathan:
Of course, yeah, I’ll start with the host who use us for purchasing items for their property, just having visibility into everything in one place, so they can order from as many Minoan brands as they want, but they don’t have to, again, look at their inbox, look at these Google Spreadsheets, everything is available to them within Minoan and they’ve loved that. They’ve loved not having to worry about where is their item, what if I do if it comes damaged? Because they know they can rely on us. So having the visibility end to end about their order with tracking, with estimated delivery dates, has been incredibly helpful. Of course, the discounts, that’s incredibly useful as well like a host, I’ve been shocked at how many hosts I’ve talked to have paid full retail, for sofas, for linens, for whatever. The moments that these hosts are creating in their spaces, they should never, ever be paying for retail. So being able to save 1000s of dollars when furnishing their home. Of course, any money that you can save, but if you’re able to even upgrade the items that you were maybe going to buy, let’s say maybe you’re going to buy an Ikea table, with the discounts were able to, we’ve negotiated, now they can get a Westown table for not too much more than they were planning on getting before. So it helps them elevate their spaces. In turn, they can charge a higher ADR, have, you know, different clientele of guests coming in. And then for guests, it’s been awesome for them because they can now connect with the products that they’ve used during their stay. It’s no longer “Oh, I love that coffeemaker, what is it'” and then life happens and you know, the moment passes, we’ve created a really easy way for them to discover new products and to easily buy the ones they love most. So it helps enhance the guest experience for the host, the host is able to save money, the host is able to make money and it’s just this really nice ecosystem between the host, the guests and Minoan that works in all different ways. So we’ve had a ton of great feedback on the discounts, on the ease of use, on the ability to have the same ordering process no matter which brand you’re going to, you just use the extension and it makes it super easy. So you know, we’ve tripled our host network in the past month or so, which has been fantastic. And we love the feedback that we get from hosts, you know, a lot of the feedback that we’ve had, even if constructive, we welcome it because it helps make our product better and a lot of those changes are coming later, you know, this summer in Minoan 2.0.
Delia:
That’s great. So basically, if a host works with you, they can expect to save their time, save a lot of money, also maybe making profit out of their items to get and also get much more happy experience for the guests, right?
Sage Nathan:
Yeah. It’s just a value add. It’s a unique experience, right? It’s not something that every property offers and it’s one of those things that can differentiate you from the person or from the property next door or down the road. So it’s just a value add and again, there’s no cost, so you can try it out, see how it works for you and you can go from there. So there’s no commitment required or anything like that.
Delia:
Okay, that’s amazing! So the last question that I would like to make is, why do you think Minoan needs to exist?
Sage Nathan:
Minoan needs to exist because hosts are incredibly time strapped and it is expensive and time consuming to own and manage a property. So Minoan needs to exist to help simplify that. So hosts can spend more time, you know, dealing with guests, getting connecting with housekeeping, getting new properties, let us handle all of the messy stuff and you can focus on, you know, the components that are most important to running your business, not spending time on the phone with customer service, not having a look where item is and when it’s going to be delivered. So that’s why Minoan needs to exist. And again, we’re young and we’re growing, but if we can help host save time and save money on ordering, we’ve heard it’s one of the biggest pain points when getting a rental is furnishing the property. It’s overwhelming, you have like a blank slate to look at. So us being able to save on the time and the money and time is money especially for these hosts who likely have a 9 to 5 five job outside of being a host. So you know, if we’re able to win on those two pieces, we’ve had a lot of incredible feedback from hosts on, you know, just making their lives a lot easier.
Delia:
Brilliant. Okay, so that’s all the time we have for today. Thank you a lot for being with us today. It has been amazing hearing about this new opportunity for hosts, right? And I cannot wait to see your success and also being in every short-term rental out there. That will be amazing!
Sage Nathan:
Thank you! We’re excited too. Thanks for having me and appreciate the time. It’s always fun, you know, sharing a bit about our story. So thank you again for having me on!
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