After graduating college, many young people miss being a part of a large social community, with all the things that come along with it (opportunities to make new friends, dating scene, parties, intramural sports, events, sense of belonging). The workplace is not a replacement for this. Neither are bars.

\
The idea: a “country club” for young professionals living in urban metropolitan areas. For an annual membership fee, you can join the community, which offers:

* Frequent community events
* A fully-outfitted gym
* Sport courts (tennis, basketball, grass field)
* Individual workspaces and meeting rooms
* A restaurant and bar
* An app to coordinate everything (event signups, sports leagues, room reservations, a community directory)

\
I actually don’t think this is a bad idea — I would sign up tomorrow if it existed. There’s a good “Why now” as well: as we emerge from the pandemic, people are desperate to get back to IRL social experiences. The problem is it requires a lot of initial startup capital…

Country club for post-grads

Gyms suck — they’re crowded, often far from where you live, and force you to “wait your turn” to get the equipment you want. That’s why lots of people (especially during the pandemic) invested in a home gym setup. But unlike a traditional gym, home gyms go unused 95% of the time (i.e. when their owners aren’t working out). Why isn’t there a marketplace where I can rent time in someone else’s home gym when they’re not using it?

Airbnb for home gyms

Daily fantasy sports apps like FanDuel and DraftKings are considered legal (not gambling) as “games of skill.” Through the same justification, YC-funded [Players’ Lounge](https://playerslounge.co/) lets players stake money on console games like FIFA and Fortnite. Why are there no mobile games like this?

Mobile games with money on the line

Let’s say I’m moving from LA to NYC, and someone else is moving from NYC to LA. Instead of us both moving all of our furniture across the country at great expense, what if we could just “swap” our stuff?

Furniture swap marketplace

Amazon offers free delivery on grocery orders over $35. This is great, but I still have to manually plan out everything that I want to buy based on what I want to make. Instead, I should be able to just add links to the recipes I want to make and it should automatically fill my cart with the necessary ingredients. Then over time, let machine learning recommend other recipes I’d like. Once I’m confident the ML algorithm knows my taste, I can put it on “autopilot” if I’d like.

\
The economics of this are likely more expensive than a traditional meal kit service like Blue Apron, but still less than eating out. The problem is that this seems like a feature Amazon should build, not a standalone company.

Personalized Blue Apron

Like [Marco Polo](https://www.marcopolo.me/), but for interviewing candidates.

\
Benefits of interviewing via async video:

* More collaborative, more objective candidate evaluation
  * Anyone can go back and watch the interview—the interviewer isn’t the only evaluator
* Faster
  * No cost of synchronization (i.e. finding a mutually-agreeable time to interview)
  * Can easily end interviews “early” if it’s clear there’s not a fit — interviews don’t “block off” time

\
Note this is different from platforms like [HireVue](https://www.hirevue.com/) because it’s a two-way interaction. Anyone who’s done a HireVue knows how awkward it is. With a Marco Polo-like system, you’re having a real conversation with a real person.

Asynchronous video interviewing platform

Like Quora, but instead of typing written responses to questions, you record yourself speaking. It’s often a lot easier (and faster) to explain things by talking instead of writing. And contrary to popular opinion, plenty of people love the sound of their own voice — just look at Clubhouse.

\
An interesting use case could be Q&As. Instead of having a single interviewer ask Elon Musk questions, what if anyone on the internet could?

Voice-based Quora

Before starting Trove, my cofounder Kunal and I came up with a long list of startup ideas. Some we thought were good; others we realized were terrible. These are some of the worst / most entertaining.

Crazy startup ideas

Apr 7, 2021 • 7 blocks •

Country club for post-grads

4

Airbnb for home gyms

No comments yet.

Mobile games with money on the line

No comments yet.

Furniture swap marketplace

No comments yet.

Personalized Blue Apron

No comments yet.

Asynchronous video interviewing platform

No comments yet.

Voice-based Quora

No comments yet.