We first covered Earth Class Mail in September 2005 (then called Remote Control Mail), and then again when they launched in late 2006. Today they are announcing a $13.3 million round of financing ($7.4 million of the round was closed last September and $2.84 million was previously raised convertible debt). The round was led by Ignition Partners and included angels from Keiretsu Forum.
Users direct snail mail to the service, which opens and scans it. It can then be shredded and recycled or forwarded. It’s expensive, but it is definitely a useful service.
The founders are also creating a video show about their startup experience, called “Start-up Junkies.” It will show on MOJO beginning on January 24. Warning: it’s going to be super cheesy.
Start-Up Junkies takes you behind the scenes of a rapid-growth technology start-up company as it goes through the trials and tribulations of raising angel and venture-capital investment, attracting seasoned start-up “junkies” to the management team, launching new products and dealing with all the people issues that arise when employees wake up running at Mach 3, every day of the week.
Most places (Credit Cards, Banks, etc) let you switch to online statements only already, so this leaves your birthday and christmas cards, and having them scanned and viewed online sure gives new meaning to sending these cards in the first place …
Meh, I guess I’m still one of the few that enjoy looking forward to opening a tangible letter.
“Start-Up Junkies takes you behind the scenes of a rapid-growth technology start-up company as it goes through the trials and tribulations of raising angel and venture-capital investment, attracting seasoned start-up “junkies” to the management team, launching new products and dealing with all the people issues that arise when employees wake up running at Mach 3, every day of the week.”
Right, so basically the movie Startup.com with probably less production value and a slightly less boring government-service related product.
I think privacy (duh) is an issue here.
– I wouldn’t use this service, just me I guess :/
– would a potential buyer be the US Mail ?
What’s next? I propose a company which buys and delivers pet food! Oh wait…
These folks are down the street from me and I actually like this idea. It lets road warriors not have to worry about stopping and starting mail service and enables them to get soft copies of the mail they want to see and screen the stuff they don’t. The remote, virtual worker is just anther step… more virtual.
Even if we assume that there is a market for this startup – which is very doubtfull since you can get online statements from the banks and pay bills online, there is still a huge potential for privacy violation here. Unless they design the robots, the scanning will probably be done by some piply faced teenagers and you can imagine what will happen with that birthday card from grandma!:)
You can buy a shredder at Staples for 30 dollars and a scanner for 70 dollars.
So for a mere $100 you can do this yourself and you keep a level of privacy.
Their cheepest package is $10 / month and their “Security-Cleared Employees” are sorting and opening your mail.
Come on…
OK, so when grandma sends the $20, are they going to scan that bill also (cause that’s a federal offense)? Would I know that grandma send $20, if she doesn’t tell me, because she wants to surprise me?
Is that rebate check ever going to arrive, because sometimes they don’t get sent, and if they are, they don’t always arrive.
Are images going to be destroyed in a proper manner, or would they just hit the delete key.
I hope that their servers are secured, physically and virtually, knowing that they contain scanned checks, bank account statements, SSNs and various other identity information.
Do they do background checks on their employees? Especially the ones that handle the mail?
This reminds me of all the bill pay services that exist or existed at some point, where you have all of your bills sent to them and they list and handle the rest. I wouldn’t use this service, for the same reason I did not use the bill pay ones: too much personal information about my family and I handled NOT BY ME.
Who would give their grandma the correspondence address of a scanning service?
Uhm… some European postal services already offer this service as part of their service portfolio.
Why doesn’t Google buy them out and offer this service for free?
That way, they could place contextual advertising on each mail-image you view (after scanning the text to see which ads to serve you). They could call it…. GMail.
I’m only half-joking.
I’ve got to make a few obvious corrections her as a user of Earth Class Mail. First, they don’t open and scan your mail unless you tell them to. You see a scan of your envelope online like email and then you decide what to do with it from there. Second, when you do decide to have the mail opened and scanned, the mail is opened by one person in a secure room with a no recording equipment. That person opens, scans the content, and then seals the mail in a new envelope. Also, Earth Class Mail hires veterans and each person who opens mail is Department of Defence certified and background checked. Thats about as secure as you can get. Besides, just think about how many people at your bank or credit card company look at your information each day.
“Also, Earth Class Mail hires veterans and each person who opens mail is Department of Defence certified and background checked. Thats about as secure as you can get.”
Ummm… that is not the truth at all. I’m sure there are vets in the mix, but not ALL of their employees are vets. Sorry bud.
Have been for a couple months. I like it. I just have no idea why they need another $13M to run this business.
Nothing new. This model has been around since before 2000.
My always on-the-road roommate used (and may still use) “Status Factory” now MyEzBills.com
Congrats on the raise!
I don’t think that’s match to Google, but I would like to try it new option services.
Terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible idea.
@I use Earth Class Mail
You said “when you do decide to have the mail opened and scanned, the mail is opened [...] That person opens, scans the content,”
What is the delay between the moment you decide to get an envelope opened and the moment you receive that scanned letter? Don’t you find it is time consuming? Why did’nt you buy the equipment and do it yourself?
Unless you move 10 times a year in different countries, I’m trying to understand.
When ever I hear the word “Security-Cleared Employees”, I think of the people working for the airports checking bags for bombs… would you want these people checking through your mail?
Jon
http://buzvia.com – Share Influence
It takes 24 hours from the time you assign a piece of mail to be opened and scanned to having a downloadable pdf document in my online acount. There are hundreds of reasons I wouldn’t buy the equipment and do it myself. Here is a list of reasons. Avoiding the clutter of mail, I travel every month for work so I can access my mail from anywhere in the world. I also have a small home business that I run and people would show up at my home all the time so having a mailing address separate from my home keeps me safe from these crazy people. The fact is that handling paper mail is the time consuming factor in my life. Doing the scanning myself would be pointelss. Also, having my important documents in pdf form means I can save them on my computer and have them for as long as I want. I could go on forever with reasons Earth Class Mail has helped free up my schedule. I believe the reason they need more funding is because they are trying to scale the business to grow and the business requires a lot of expensive automation, equipment, and real estate. They are opening more street locations throughout the United States to have more of a physical presence.
“Unless you move 10 times a year in different countries, I’m trying to understand.”
Seriously – it’s 2008, 9 out of 10 things you need to see *immediately* can be accessed online/via email and the other 1 thing I can’t think of (just giving the benefit of the doubt). This thing isn’t worth 13 mil.
Funny to hear about this service – more than 13 years ago when PCs and broadband internet access weren’t viable to my folks in India I used to send an email to a company in India which used to print the email, put it in an envelope and mail (via Indian snail mail) it to my folks for a fee. The advantage of the service was faster delivery.
This seems to be the reverse of this.
Also, the post title seems really weird “$13.3 Million For Startup That Wants To Kill Snail Mail”
I mean, without snail mail, this startup has no purpose, so I’m pretty sure they don’t want to “kill” it…
good idea, there is a need for it . price is right too. only thing is the online statements make it easy enough to get your important mail. I dont mind paying 10 bucks to get the junk mails destroyed and only the important ones forwarded to me. Finally, we are seeing something that is not ad supported social web 2.0 bs.
This service is actually something I want to use.
We’ll see if they can make it a business, but it’s a simple and brilliant product idea I say.
I am a user of Earth Class Mail (about 10 months now) and I find some of these postings amusing. These posted comments can be classified into a) the group that loves to quickly shoot holes in every innovative idea, b) the curious wishing to gather more info, c) users or promoters of the service because they are informed.
I fall into category “C”
The service is about convenience for mobile professionals or businesses wishing to streamline business processes dependent on mail. It is not about competing with online bill payments.
It may not be for everyone but it works great for me. If you enjoy getting the value pak coupons, the switch your mortgage rate cards, the local real estate agent available for your needs cards, the credit card applications, the unsolicited calatogs, the class schedules for the local community colleges, etc. through the postal mail and then transferring them directly to your recycle box, then this service is not for you.
What is unique about this service is that it gives you options of which state you want your address in, what to do with the envelope once they receive it, and ADDED security. These folks have done their homework on security and they surpass what the USPS uses for security measures so you should check into that.
I hate taking the time to shred or scan documents. I do not have time to do that and with this service, everything I want, I get PDFs up to refer back to. That alone is worth the $20 per month.
I am excited to see them get the $13m so they can add additional features, add some more addresses and enhance the interface. (The interface is a little outdated). When is check cashing being integrated?
good luck guys!
#13, #20 and #26 –
Come on, just post the comments as the company founder. We see so many comments, obvious shill stuff glows like it’s radio active. There is no reason not to simply post under your real name, representing the company.
When you post under a fake name, it suggests dishonesty, and this company needs to be all about trust.
I used StatusFactory for a while back in the 90s and it worked well… Until my SF address in “Henderson, NV” started showing up as a residence on my credit report. To this day I still see it as a former address on mortgage paperwork, credit reports, etc. I once received a junk mailing directed at “former Nevada residents.” When I started a new job the background check agency called the Nevada DMV and Henderson, NV police department to investigate me.
I’m not sure if there’s any downside to this, but I get a little uneasy when anything’s added to my credit record, let alone partially inaccurate data.
haha one thing about Mike is he pays as much attention to what others write as much to what he posts himself….. ! thats remarkable!
yeah, I’m refreshing just to see if the coward comes clean
I love the idea of this service. I’m just waiting for them to have a physical address in San Francisco before I sign up. My work is portable and I often find myself travelling for extended periods. I’ve signed up for as many e-bills/statements as possible, but it’s still nowhere near 100%.
Honestly I’d feel more secure with these guys having my mail than it sitting in my easily-accessible mailbox every day…
wacko idea, but might just be useful
Some people may actually find it useful especially those without privacy concerns but I think its not for me. I will still want to get my mail as it is when I need it and get online statements for the rest.
think of what the valuation must be for ignition et. al. to make its money back with this kind of investment
this is beyond reason in any sense
It is an interesting service for those who aren’t in the US, don’t receive highly confidential email, but want to access certain types of info by mail.
For those who don’t like to have their email read, it’s obviously not a service for them.
Thumbs up!
michael @ 27 — if they are self-promoting under false names, you have to worry about 1) their business practices in general and 2) their real potential if they have to stoop to this
I’ve known Ron (the CEO and founder) since the early 90’s in Portland. he’s a straight-up guy who really presses for results.. and gets them.
He’s also wicked-smart in his domain of choice.
Here’s the success story:
1) Founded PrintBid.com (a number of startups before that, including one of the largest pilot-centric accessory catalogs… hence the familiarity with printing and mail issues).
2) Sold PrintBid.com for $24 million (Ron, if you’re reading this, remind me if that was the final number).
3) Founded SnapNames.com. Snapnames is ongoing.
4) Started VentureMechanics as an incubator… Remote Control mail started there.
5) Built the team one-by-one, using his own cash and sweat equity from some great people.
6) Raised the last 3 rounds to get this baby on the rails.
Based on the recent conversations with the company, the US is somewhat behind when it comes to how snail mail is handled. Europe is evidently way ahead of us in that area.
I believe they’ve developed not just a system, but some nice IP that’s going to make this a good Exitpath for the team and investors in the coming years.
And I’m no shill. Just a guy who’s seen Ron and friends through more than one venture, and believe they’ve landed on something of significant scale.
Best of success in ‘08, guys!
Mark Alan Effinger
http://www.RichContent.tv
What about junk mail? they gonna charge extra to scan-n-shred it?
Weird idea but whatever. They got their 15 seconds of T(L)C now need to get back to TCB.
I’ve been using the service since November, 2007. I was planning to do some traveling and wanted a convenient way to manage my mail while in Europe. This service has delivered what I expected and their sales/customer service has been responsive. I like the efficiency and convenience.
Joe Jabaley
How about putting basic facts like how much their service costs in your article Michael?
for someone who spends over 6 months out of the year overseas (sometimes for 1 or 2 months straight), this is a beautiful product.
and agree with paul above – it took me 5 clicks to get from this post to how much the service costs.
It’s an innovative idea but it won’t last long due to the fact people will not be using snail mail for much longer
I agree with #42. The people that need this product will be transitioning to an all-digital system as soon as they can. The people that still receive snail mail will not be savvy enough to use this product; if they were, they’d also be transitioning to an all-email process. There may be niche groups that use this service, but for most technically inclined people, why not simply get rid of snail mail?
DO NOT TRUST THIS COMPANY.
Their mail handlers have DoD security clearances? I call bullshit.
The salary value of DoD security clearances is UPWARDS of $100k/year. Hell, some companies will hire clearance holders just to get access to the clearances.
So either they’re lying about their mail handlers, or those handlers have made some really bad career choices and are in desperate need of quick cash.
@#44
There are varying degrees of DoD security clearances. Not all of them are of the level you speak of in your post, and the employees making upwards of six figures are usually performing jobs that would have earned them 80-90k in the general market w/o the security clearance.
You think the guys at the local Postal Annex or Mail Boxes Etc. stuffing mail in your p.o. box for $16/hour are any better?
All the privacy grousing reminds me of the early days when all the brick and mortar stores threw all that FUD at Amazon. I can’t believe that meme is cropping up again. They’re going through pretty big lengths to be secure as is, and really it’s not too different from already existant bill-paying services.
My favorite part about Mail Boxes Etc? That they would ditch all the non-first class mail (i.e. junk mail) for me. That strikes me as the best part about this service, along with the road-warrior aspect. I clocked 100k miles a year for three out of the last five and would have KILLED to have had this service then. I wish them luck.
This is an equivalent to Pets.com of Bubble One. The service is very labor intensive but cannot be outsourced to India. Not to mention the privacy issues. The most annoying thing is the PO Box you get from the service. It has regular PO Box Number PLUS a five digit number, e.g. PO Box 4668 #22005, that leaves door wide open to a lot of errors. (my mail got lost very often due to addressing errors even my PO BOX number has only four digits). I wouldn’t say the VCs are dumb. In bubble one, you saw this kind of deals every month. I can only assume VCs only need one winner out of ten. So, this is simply one of the nine deals they have to close. Without the 13 millions money, the service could survive for a while. But with this kind of money, it will go to Mike’s deadpool very quickly.
Mike,
Thanks for the PR – always nice to have the traffic – but by leaving out some simple facts about our business it appears that in a vacuum all kinds of fantastic assumptions have been made by some of the commentators here, and I’d appreciate the opportunity to set them straight.
BTW, much has changed here since you and Cameron and I sat down at a Thai restaurant in Portland Oregon three years ago (before you hit on the phenomenal concept for TechCrunch) and you thought the idea of “Remote Control Mail” was so brilliant that you considered moving to Portland to help us launch the company, and as I recall you said you would have liked to be the first investor in the deal. [for the record, Arrington is NOT a shareholder in the company.] Fast forward… we’re 73 headcount and growing fast, customers in 130 countries, raised yet more capital from top-tier investors, have a strategic partnership with Microsoft, in discussions with 18 countries to potentially deploy this platform through their national posts, and we’ve been exclusively selected for an eight-episode TV documentary just about our company. We’re just trying to hold onto the nose cone. To all the naysayers out there, the proof is in the pudding… having real customers, even including a Fortune 50 company (watch the show).
Let’s first set the record straight on one thing… you accuse me of posting shill comments, which is simply not the case. In fact I was in solid meetings all day and by the time I heard about the TC posting, the shill comments and the anti-shill comments were already out there. With 73 folks I can’t be out there containing the misplaced enthusiasm of every employee, especially new ones. In full disclosure… we immediately inquired internally and found out that two of our sales reps had indeed posted shill comments (not me). They should have known better, and in fact they violated a published tenet that no public posting ever goes out without three executive sign-offs… trust me, they’ll never do it again. Of course we take full responsibility for their actions and we apologize for the transgression. I think it’s obvious which ones they posted, and which were posted by actual customers.
As for the show, I agree the marketing copy from the network which owns Startup Junkies (Comcast MOJO) is not of the same tenor that we would normally use in our own marketing communications. The show itself, however, is more of a documentary than a “reality” show, and is unprecedented in its frank depiction of what really happens at board meetings, investor pitches, etc. We don’t end each episode with a faked-up heated argument and an employee termination. The production company that produced the show is award-winning for its documentaries (Screaming Flea Productions), and blew us away with the rough cuts we got to see… it may not be The Apprentice on the budget they had to work with, but it is certainly better than the movie startup.com, and I think you would be very impressed by it.
In fact, I’d like to invite you, Michael, and any other Bay Area member of the media, venture capital community or startup management team to join us next Tuesday, January 15th, for an exclusive pre-screening of Episode One of the show. It will be held at Microsoft’s Mountain View campus in the Galileo auditorium. There is also a Seattle pre-screening the following night, January 16th, to be held at Microsoft’s Redmond campus in the Kodiak Auditorium. There’ll be refreshments, networking, etc. We only have 300 tickets to give out for the Bay Area and 400 for Seattle, so if any of your readers want to join they can email jessica.grimes@earthclassmail.com for an invitation and to RSVP attendance. First come, first served… they’re going fast.
To the question of our security and confidentiality assurance methods, I’d invite TC’s readers to check out http://www.eart...il.com/security. We are doing work for major enterprise accounts, law firms and medical practices who have consistently told us that our security measures –in terms of personnel screening, operational methods, and security technologies – far exceed their best practices. This is something we’ve worked extremely hard to accomplish and are very proud of, and it has led to numerous government agencies including DHS to evaluate our service for the most sensitive mail imaginable. Consumers and small businesses get the benefit from all this infrastructure we’ve developed for the most demanding enterprise customers. And we’re certainly safer than leaving your credit card offers and other juicy items sitting in your mailbox or recycling bin for thieves to abscond with – as they do every day, everywhere in this country.
You again make the claim as you did when you covered Earth Class Mail previously, that we’re “expensive” – but compared to what, exactly?? When VCs were in due diligence and calling our customers for feedback they were apparently told quite often that our customers couldn’t believe how much less expensive our service is than the alternative methods they’d been using in the past to get a remote address and have all their incoming documents digitized. http://www.eart...alternative.php has some comparison info on true costs of our service versus the alternatives available (executive suites, hiring admins, etc.). We’ve continued to offer lower and lower prices as we’ve made greater investments in high-speed automation and as our volumes increase… our lowest cost plans now start at only $9.95/mo, all-in. That’s cheaper than an efax account.
Several people asked why we needed to raise so much money. The answer is simple. To grow our business we have to add production capacity in more geographic markets. Just a single mail sorter costs several hundred thousand dollars. We’re rolling out 18 cities right now, starting with NYC, SFO, LAX, and DCA… about one location per month. Expect we’ll raise a B round to open up Europe once we get North America’s major cities up and running. Like a FedEx or UPS we are building a worldwide network because our business opportunity is global. People who’ve comment about “how dumb an idea this is” are apparently not aware of the fact that postal mail is a $1 trillion dollar industry (with a “t”) employing 9 million people worldwide and processing a half-trillion transactions a year… and that post offices are typically the largest employers in their countries. We’re the only company in the world to have created a system so scalable that a national post office could deploy it. That’s why our Beaverton processing facility is literally the size of a football stadium and can hold 50 million pieces of mail at a time… there is real hardware automation in this deal, not just a web service… a lot more meat on the bones and real IP than this week’s flavor of a social networking company. Mike, I’d like to invite you to tour the plant yourself anytime – or, if you’re too busy, watch the TV show for a glimpse of our inner workings.
Thanks for the air time. I’ve admired your continued success with TechCrunch, as you know, and thank you again for the coverage on Earth Class Mail.
Cheers,
Ron
If this were the only postal service available in the world, I’d stop using postal mail.
I see some very major problems with this model:
1) Privacy – Department of Defence certified? My gosh, privacy issues are primarily about a citizen’s privacy from the government, not some random guy in another city.
2) Confidential mail – cant be opened. Refers back to standard snail mail.
3) The service is adding more cost than it is adding value to an already lean postal mail formula. I can use my standard postal carriers carrier’s premium services for anything extra. If there’s something to kill snail mail, it’s e-mail, although it’s got it own problems.
This business might have an opportunity in delivering mail in poor countries where there might be sufficient internet infrastructure but postal mail doesnt work due to bad address, PO boxes, etc. I can think of a few countries like that. But they’d probably never get around government control of postal mail in and out of those countries.
Blah…. doesn’t look good.
#42 – is this earth class mail not the transition you are referring to? lol. THEY ARE going from snail mail to digital here.
IMO, snail mail will still exist for a very long time. saying snail mail will disappear is like saying we wont be using paper anymore because we have computers.
>The service is very labor intensive but cannot be outsourced to India.
Actually, why not outsource it to rural China? If people don’t speak English, that is as secure as it can get.
Just if I would scan Chinese letters