Best Startup
British start-up Lupe Technology – makers of the UK’s most recyclable vacuum cleaner – discusses the UK’s built-to-break culture.
It is a known fact that hardware start-ups rarely succeed. Investors will not have forgotten the infamous story of Pebble, a smartwatch which raised over $10 million on crowdfunding site Kickstarter, eventuating in a total of $59 million following venture capitalists investments due to the hype Pebble had created. Despite all of this public and private backing, the smartwatch shut down 4 years later, selling all of its assets to Fitbit.
Hardware is difficult because it costs a lot a money to create physical objects and garner enough public demand to make it profitable. This is in part a big reason why apps have considerably grown in popularity, with an average of 611 new apps released on the App Store every day. However, although scarce, there are some success stories. Lupe Technology, a start-up vacuum cleaner designed by a former Dyson engineer, is one such example.
At the end of the last quarter of last year, Lupe Technology hit over 250k profits and achieved month-to-month profitability, despite only beginning trading in July. Due to the size of the market, Lupe only sold 1/30th of what its main competitors would have sold in a month, showing the latent potential for exponential growth, thus proving how challenger brands are now more than ever a force to be reckoned with. In addition to this, 50% of Lupe Technology’s exports are now to the US, having grown exponentially since launch last year.
Ending the epidemic of appliances that are built-to-break
In response to the sheer quantity of domestic appliances across the world being discarded into landfill, British start-up Lupe Technology is challenging the status quo of popular consumer goods by creating a premium product developed to be a vacuum-cleaner for life. Lupe’s Pure Cordless vacuum is crafted from recyclable plastic and delivers high performance whilst far outliving the expected shelf-life for typical household appliances. In the event a part does break, each individual small part of Lupe’s product is fully replaceable.
Lupe Technology is also very aware of the carbon footprint mass consumer household appliances have so in order to try and counteract this they are offsetting carbon for the lifecycle of each model sold, with the aim of becoming carbon negative during 2023.
Pablo Montero, Co-Founder of Lupe Technology, comments on the epidemic of domestic appliances that are built to break:
“The public conscience of climate change, pollution and excess household wastage has undoubtedly increased in recent years, and has motivated consumers worldwide to seek more sustainable and ethical products. Yet despite all our good intentions, we are hamstrung by a trend of built-to-break gadgets and household appliances, which is contributing to an appalling amount of plastic pollution and electrical wastage in Britain.
The Pure Cordless is the domestic appliance designed not just to shake-up the vacuum market but the entire home technology arena. We have strived to make a product as reliable and long-lasting as possible and hope consumers understand our mission to make technology stand the test of time.
When designing the Pure Cordless, we had two core values; class-leading performance and longevity. The launch has represented the realisation of this and six years of hard work to make the best possible cordless vacuum available today while thinking about our environmental footprint. This is a product that has been designed to change our attitudes towards consumable electronics and home appliances.”
About Lupe Technology
Devised by a former-Dyson research and development engineer, Pablo Montero, the Lupe Pure Cordless is the first vacuum designed from the ground up to be long-lasting, fully serviceable and kinder to the planet whilst delivering best in class performance. By using clever design, more durable materials and over half a decade of research and development, the Lupe Pure Cordless aims to buck the built-to-break trend in Britain and help consumers to build a greener home.
