What to do in the case of capacity surpluses and capacity bottlenecks? Exactly, bring both sides together. This is precisely where the online platform STAFFCHUM We wanted to know more and asked co-founder Dr. Karsten Gessner exactly 7 questions.
1. Who are you and what do you do? Please introduce yourselves briefly!
We are Sascha Gerber (engineer, 37 years old), Dr. Karsten Gessner (engineer, 45 years old), and Peter Hohenadl (business economist, 55 years old), the founders of allchum GmbH. The three of us come from management consulting backgrounds and can look back on at least ten years of consulting experience in the fields of strategy, supply chain, logistics, purchasing, development, business processes, and IT. We have also founded startups.
In 2016, we had the idea of developing an application for the sharing economy in the business-to-business sector. Our first product is STAFFCHUM, the innovative, web-based service for solving capacity problems in companies. Our "Personnel Sharing Platform" connects experts and assignments from company to company through temporary employment and contract work, and is ideal for small businesses, medium-sized enterprises, and skilled trades.
On STAFFCHUM, providers create their employees' CVs and offer them for hire or outsource projects to third parties. Buyers find staff and can submit bids for tenders. With our innovative negotiation module, the parties quickly achieve fair negotiation results. STAFFCHUM creates customized contracts based on the negotiated and accepted terms.
“Share economy for business-to-business is new”
2. But that's been around for a long time!
No! There are already major providers for the business-to-consumer sharing economy, such as Airbnb and Uber. However, the business-to-business sharing economy is new, especially in Germany. STAFFCHUM is actually the first platform on the market to help companies solve their capacity problems.
3. What has been your biggest challenge so far?
Since allchum GmbH is not our first startup, we did not have any major problems with founding and building the company itself.
A key challenge was finding suitable legal support with equal expertise in labor law, temporary employment, and commercial law. After all, temporary employment is a complex topic, and our company's success depends significantly on finding a simple, fair, secure, and legally sound process for our clients. Our service is mediation. With STAFFCHUM, the parties also receive a customized draft contract (temporary employment and work contract) for their negotiated project. Of course, this was not written by us, but by our lawyers. In K&L Gates, we have found a fantastic partner who supports and complements us with the content. They also demonstrated a great understanding of the challenges of a startup and were willing to take entrepreneurial risks with us.
“The market seems to be waiting for us”
4. Let’s get down to business: How is business going?
We originally planned to launch STAFFCHUM in October 2017. However, during our initial discussions with potential customers and during presentations of our business idea, we were practically pressured to launch sooner. With tremendous effort, we managed it and are very proud to have launched STAFFCHUM since July 11, 2017. How's business going? Well, the market seems to be waiting for us. It's going to be exciting...
5. What does Munich mean to you?
First and foremost, Munich is home for Karsten and Peter. Sascha is from Bad Hersfeld. However, it was clear from the start that allchum GmbH (the operator of STAFFCHUM) is a Munich-based company.
Munich has a very active and broad startup scene. Connecting with like-minded people is always exciting and extremely helpful. For first-time entrepreneurs, there are countless seminars, events, and information resources, all concentrated locally. Particularly important for us: all the major associations serving our customer market are represented in Munich (Chamber of Crafts, Chamber of Commerce, business associations, etc.).
However, Munich is an expensive place, and the success of the startup scene brings its own problems. For us, having a second base in Bad Hersfeld is definitely an advantage. It's easier to find urgently needed programmers in Waldhessen and at more realistic prices than in Munich.
“Failing is not an option”
6. How will your startup become the next unicorn? Or will we see you soon at Epic Fail Night?
What a question?! All the feedback we've received so far has been positive without exception. The sharing economy for business-to-business is new, and we are the innovator in this segment in Germany. Failing is not an option!
7. Isar or English Garden?
Definitely the English Garden. The English Garden brings people together. And that's what STAFFCHUM does, too. And with the new tunnel, the English Garden will be "barrier-free." That's also our goal: simple, fair, and safe!
