Name of your website?The Baby Hire Centre - Solutions For The Young Traveller
Your name?
John Corcoran
Your Location (city, etc)
Almeria Province in the heart of South-East Spain.
Please give us a short summary of your website?
This is South-East Spain's foremost baby equipment hire providers website. We pride ourselves on our, experienced, 'family friendly' approach, delivering professional customer service and quality infant and toddler equipment, at value for money prices on everything from Travel Cots, Buggies/Pushchairs and Car Seats, to High Chairs, Baby Baths and Playthings.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
Being frequent visitors to Almeria and Murcia in Spain. We knew that the solution was already out there in the form of baby equipment hire providers, but that it was limited to the more 'popular' costa's.
There was a lack of availability of quality items ready for hire at our chosen destinations, and our friends, neighbours and the community at large were crying out for 'The Baby Hire Centre' to be created...
We are now the foremost baby equipment hire provider in the area. But, we have never forgotten that we are here because of our customers, and are very proud to be able to say that much of our business comes from repeat custom, or as a result of customer referrals and recommendations.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
Back in 2001 We launched a similar venture in the UK, it was very ambitious and involved the hire and rent of numerous types of different products not limited to just baby equipment. It was ultimately purchased from us and re-branded under a larger company due to its huge success.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
Even the very smallest of our clients is of the utmost importance to us as a family, and as a business. And so we thought that if we were concentrating on the young traveller, we should incorporate this into the name...
We also wanted people to recognize immediately what it is that we do - 'Hence The Baby Hire Centre'.
We Feel that it does "exactly what it says on the tin".
What makes your website different from other, similar offerings?
It has an incredible amount of functionality. We wanted it to be very easy to use, and it is. We find competitor websites very hard to navigate by comparison.
It has also been formulated specifically with the retired ex-pat community in mind also. Grandparents who are being visited by little ones, who may not have extensive computing skills and/or knowledge. So the entire website has been designed from the ground up to be very simple and intuitive to use. We also have an exclusive discount package system which means that ANY combination of items can earn the hirer a discount on their entire rental cost, without them having to rent specific items which they may not require.
We are also very proud of our claim that you will experience NO hidden costs with our service. Whilst others may charge 20, 30, 50 Euro's or more to deliver and collect their items, ALL deliveries and collections made by The Beb y Hire Centre Representitives are completely FREE.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
We are already destined to be the No.1 baby equipment provider for Almeria and Murcia. But we always think big! - The entire Iberian peninsular could one day benefit from our approach to this service, and as such we are already looking into future plans to employ representatives on every 'costa', and a whole host of exciting ventures which will accelerate our future growth.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
What you put in relates directly to what you get out of any business, and this is no exception! Blood sweat and tears have already been shed and much more will be in the coming months and years in order for us to fulfill our potential! But we are looking forward to this challenge and are confident that no corners should be cut with what we do. For example we make a point of always delivering nothing short of what we always wanted for our nippers when we travelled abroud with them as babies and small children.... I think that is why what we have is a winning formula.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
We would invest in large scale advertising campaigns in order to increase awareness, as so many people do not even realize that the service we offer even exists. Marketing and communication is the key thing with this and it is very costly. A blank cheque would see 'The Baby Hire Centre' ads in your breakfast newspapers, on billboards along your daily commute, and on your prime time evening television ad breaks!
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Oh yes, and in fact we are already geared up for that very thing, because we are confident that good news travels fast, and that the service we provide will lead directly to a 'snowball' effect of future enquiries as awareness and popularity of the raft of benefits of using us continues to increase.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Lots! But what successful business venture has not! Bug fixing and development of the website took a long time, but that is because a very good website has an awful lot of very complicated scripting and coding going on 'beneath the surface' which the end user (should) be unaware of...the downside to this is that there is a lot more to go wrong whilst in development and this takes lots of time and money to remedy.
What has been your biggest challenge?
Getting from initial concept development - to 'live' launch. As I said before...Blood sweat and tears!
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
No one method has been outstanding for us. A combination of a full gamete of On-line and off-line marketing techniques has been employed. But more than anything I have a feeling (judging from the comments of satisfied clients) that it is so nice for the users of our services when they realise that nearly everyone involved in what we do is family....it means that we all care so much more than 'employees' might.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
It is much more hard work, and more time consuming than we imagined, but as a result has been so much more rewarding of course.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
This website is now OUR baby from it's birth!...and will be for life!
How do people place order with you in order to rent or hire baby equipment?
It is very easy... They can simply visit any of the product pages on the website and select the items that they wish to hire by adding them to the intuitive 'shopping cart'. Once all of the selections have been made they can pay securely on-line by any method of payment is most convenient for them by going to our 'checkout' facillity. Finally, they will be directed to a simple form on which they can notify us of their specific requirements,, destination, dates of travel etc...
Alternatively they may contact us directly to discuss their exact requirements & details in person on 649 332 134 or from the UK 0208 133 1644.
What is your website address?
The Baby Hire Centre - Solutions For The Young Traveller
