#50startups: Droplr Banks on a Freemium Model

Droplr and its co-founders Josh Bryant and Levi Nunnink moved from California to Bend two years ago in search of a better lifestyle for their growing families and a place where they could grow their file-sharing startup. The pair tapped into many of Oregon’s startup resources, taking advantage of Portland accelerator programs and local angel and VC funding, eventually raising more than $850,000.

A favorite of creative workers who want a simple way to share unwieldy documents, videos and images, Droplr is now looking to grow its client base inside bigger companies and tip into profitability. BendTECH caught up with Bryant recently to get the update.

Startup: Droplr
Co-founders: Josh Bryant and Levi Nunnink
Started: 2009
Employees: 5
Headquarters: Bend

How do describe Droplr? It’s sharing made simple. You can turn anything into a link. We started it because we were tired of wasting time trying to share and collaborate on large files with our colleagues. My co-founder Levi and I were using all sorts of tools and still having a hard time sending stuff back and forth easily. So we made something ourselves.

You’ve had a busy two years since moving to Bend. What have you been up to? We left our full-time jobs as developers in 2013 and did the Bend Venture Conference that fall. We went through the Portland Seed Fund program and we were part of the Portland Incubator Experiment in 2014 and still have desks there. The latter was especially valuable. Rick Turoczy (PIE’s co-founder) had contacted us to see if we were interested. He had been a Droplr user and then discovered we were in Oregon.

You’ve garnered a loyal following of agency creatives. Is that your target market? Yes, they’re part of it. That’s where our organic growth really happened — our first couple hundred thousand users came from that space. Now we have a split that’s about one-third individuals, one-third agencies and one-third smaller teams inside larger companies.

You recently launched a freemium model. Why? In May, we began letting people download the product and share files for free. However, the links you share self destruct after a week. The Droplr Pro plan ($8.33/mo) lets you create permanent links and gives you access to additional features such as private drops and password-protected files. Our hope is that people will try the free service, realize the efficiency and ease it brings to their work and not only sign up for an individual account, but also introduce their teams and companies to Droplr.

What’s up next for Droplr? We’ve done the fundraising and the startup programs. Right now we’re focused on growth and settling on a repeatable model for sales and marketing. And we’re moving toward $1 million in ARR, which will be a nice milestone.

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Kelly Kearsley

Kelly Kearsley, the co-founder of StartupBend.com, is passionate about startups, entrepreneurship and Bend. In addition to writing this blog, she creates content and manages content projects for global financial companies, tech firms and startups. She began her career as a newspaper journalist and later worked as a freelance writer. Her work has appeared in WSJ.com, Money Magazine, CNNMoney, MSNBC and Runner's World. See her work at kellykearsley.contently.com or kellykearsley.com.

You can reach Kelly by email at [email protected].

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