Bartyr

To build lasting local communities by connecting people with reason to trust each other through accountable, secure, and flexible methods of exchange, starting with students.

College is full of exciting firsts: first time living away from home, first roommates, first apartments, but it can also be the cause of a lot of anxiety. College students face a lot of financial responsibility, and the rising cost of living, which impacts rent, groceries, and school supplies, can make firsts - like decorating your first off-campus apartment - incredibly stressful. Traditionally, many students and first-time renters turn to thrift stores and second-hand marketplaces like Goodwill, Craigslist, OfferUp, and Facebook Marketplace to find cheap furniture for their first homes and other supplies. While convenient in price, the current second-hand marketplaces that are available hold various challenges for their users. For example, online platforms like Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, and OfferUp provide users with lower prices; however, sellers have extremely low response rates, and the sites offer little in terms of security, leaving buyers unprotected from scams and fake accounts. Thrift stores like Goodwill offer variety and price; however, there is a large unpredictability factor with their inventory. Buyers are left to make the lengthy journey for the mere chance of running into exactly what they need. Bartyr takes all of the benefits of previous second-hand marketplaces and combines them with new features that solve customers' main problems with second-hand shopping. Through an innovative swipematch feature, similar to Tinder, sellers can swipe through offers without feeling overwhelmed by message-based systems in previous online marketplaces. Bartyr will only allow the display of a few offers at a time, permitting sellers to continue to other offers after denying previous ones, forcing accountability and quick responses. By denying or accepting more offers, sellers can receive a "quick response" badge. Finally, all accounts on Bartyr will be open to reviews, allowing previous buyers or sellers to share their experiences with each other and creating more trust within the community. Bartyr will not only be a site for cash exchange, but also for bartering, a feature absent from most e-commerce platforms. For students who can't afford to spend a lot of money, trade can be a new pathway to affordability. Listings will be separated by "sell" and "barter" categories, allowing for a seamless shopping experience. Most importantly, Bartyr will create a safe and secure community of exchange through a .edu verification process, allowing for exchanges between students on college campuses, a target market that already has a foundation of trust and enthusiasm for second-hand shopping. By solving the specific problems that students currently have buying second-hand: ghosting, safety, pricing, and cash constraints, while designing features around their behavior like the swipematch mechanism and barter focus, Bartyr creates a defensible position in a crowded space and aims to revolutionize online second-hand shopping in local communities.