OEN Member Spotlight – Balki Kodarapu of returnGuru, Inc.

returnGuru provides return expiration alerts for retail purchases; for premium subscribers, returnGuru also provides price change alerts. 

Q: What does your business do?
A: returnGuru's mission is to simplify that process for consumers with the help of smartphone Apps. returnGuru will do all the grunt work to process the receipts based on retailer return polices and sends smart alerts before it is too late to return something. returnGuru will offer price alerts on high-ticket and recurring purchases for its premium customers that pay an annual subscription of 30$-40$.  ReturnGuru’s strategy is to develop sophisticated and easy-to-use mobile applications for all the major platforms (Android, iOS, Windows Phone and Blackberry).  These apps will let the consumers take pictures of their receipts so returnGuru can process/capture the data for further analysis.  We eventually plan to incorporate features such as location awareness (alert when you get closer to a store where you need to return, or alert when you are near a store that is offering a deal on products that you buy often etc.), spending analysis and incentives from retailers.

Q: What problem does it solve?
A: We solve two problems in the retail market: (a) retail returns are a hassle and keeping track of the receipts and return policies is an uphill battle even for the most organized consumers (b) retail industry is very fragmented and hence the prices for many consumer goods are extremely dynamic.  There is no way for the average consumer to keep track of the (falling) prices on high-ticket items they already bought and products they buy regularly.

Q: How did you come up with this business idea?
A: My wife buys a bunch of stuff every single week.  With two young, growing boys and my wife’s changing tastes, we rarely get the sizes or colors right with the products we buy the first time around!  Magically however, I end up managing the returns in the household!  I am a very organized person but still can’t keep up with the various stores’ return policies and the corresponding receipts.  I took this problem to the Portland Startup Weekend in October 2011, validated the problem and business model against potential customers, judges and mentors, won the competition and launched returnGuru, Inc. shortly thereafter.

Q: Are you looking for funding?
A: Yes, we are preparing to raise an initial seed capital from the local angel/investor community.

Q: What would funding enable you to do?
A:  (1) Redesign the brand across all platforms (web, mobile Apps, tablets, emails etc.) to appeal to our initial target market segments
(2) Ramp up the marketing efforts via email campaigns, social media advertising (specifically Facebook)
(3) Ramp up publicity across traditional and online media channels
(4) Invest in design and development of the product: Expedite the development of mobile Apps, and add features requested by early adopters.

Q: Have you been an entrepreneur before?
A: I ran a document publishing small business right out of college and grew it several fold before deciding to enter the corporate world.  Throughout my career, I have been involved in startups of various sizes as an early employee but never ran a startup on my own before.

Q: What brought you to OEN? What do you hope to gain from membership?
A: We admire the support that OEN and the related organizations to new and growing companies.  We hope to get some heavy-duty mentoring and education from the various OEN events as we grow returnGuru over the next few years.

Q: What has been the biggest surprise in your entrepreneurial experience to date?
A: Even though everyone that went through the process mentally prepared us for the hardship called “building a startup”, it feels really tough when we get down to the trenches.  There are many more moving parts including legal, marketing, product, investor relations and customer acquisition than we expected going in.  At the end of the day, the experience is so much fun that we wouldn’t have traded this for anything else in the world!