Perhaps its a sign that its getting harder to find ideas with huge growth potential?
With that said, it does look like Nebia is solving a real problem (their shower head uses 6 gallons of water for a shower vs the traditional 20 gallons).
Sure, but at $250, I can afford a lot of water before it becomes cost-effective. They look like they're aiming at making a premium shower experience.I'm skeptical that it would take the soap off my body, though.
Their copy on Kickstarter says it pays for itself in 2 years.
Think of it like Tesla for shower heads: Yeah, its expensive. Yeah, they're selling upmarket first. But it has a the potential to save a lot of water across the world if they ramp quickly and can drive the price down. (EDIT: Luckily, you don't need gigafactories for showerheads. It appears that their design can use traditional manufacturing methods, so it won't be terribly capital intensive.)
Places where water is a cost center (Hotels, AirBnB hosts, gyms, etc) would probably be the primary demand drivers to start.
The analogy to Tesla is a poor one; this product is easily reproducible, and the homeware space is rife with imitation products that are notoriously difficult to protect with IP. I feel this product is more suitable for an infomercial than VC investment.
Disagree. Tesla gave its patents away (short answer. long answer is they'll license them to you for no cost if you play nicely). You can still patent things in the US, as well as enforce your trademarks.
Technically, the hardware is easily reproducible (battery pack and electric motors). Its the software and firmware where the magic sauce lies, as well as the supercharger network and their unbeatable service.
I concede that anyone could copy a shower head and that you're relying on the rule of law to protect your invention. I don't see the problem with that, as that's how most manufacturing operates in the 21st century.
> Their copy on Kickstarter says it pays for itself in 2 years.
That is highly dependent on what they calculate for prices and what shower heads they compare to. Their main website shows savings examples of anywhere from $89.05/year (Miami) to $399.68 (San Francisco) for two nine-minute showers per day. This is presumably comparing against a 2.5 GPM head, since their head uses 0.75 GPM and they claim a 70% reduction in water usage. Comparing to one of the many 1.5 GPM or 1.75 GPM heads will obviously lead to significantly less savings.
> Think of it like Tesla for shower heads
Big difference between Tesla and Nebia: Tesla was going after a market where the current participants didn't really care about pushing the state of the art; Nebia isn't. Kohler and Moen in particular have been developing and pushing low-usage plumbing fixtures for a while.
Do the shower heads offered by Kohler and Moen offer flow rates as low as Nebia while still ensuring the person showering "feels" like they're provided enough water?
For at least some potential customers, saving water would feel virtuous, above and beyond any savings on their water bills. And/or the State of California may be negotiating with them to place an order for millions of units...
This is a lot more normal than investing in a startup that rents out inflatable mattresses. This saves a lot of water while still allowing people to continue their 30 minute washing rituals, making it somehow feel even more awesome, and it just so happens be around during the ever continuing trend of a horrible droughts.
A lot of startups profess 'to make the world a better place'... this one easily delivers.
A "shower head" start up? Atomized water? From YC?
Digging into the multiple reviews / press articles I think I figured out why investors love this and we should be compelled.
This is not a "shower head".
This is something new that has the same end-game of getting you clean like a shower head, but much more efficiently:
“It’s like walking into a humid environment that gets you super drenched,” Winter [Nebia's CEO] said, insisting that the mist is powerful enough to handle elaborate shampoo and conditioner rituals. (1)
and
“So I’m standing under it, and one of the things I realize is that it’s really hard to explain,” says Parisi-Amon [Nebia's CTO] “You tell people it’s fundamentally different and they’re like, ‘Whatever, it’s a shower.’” (2)
It's fascinating to see the press then try to get their head around it too:
NYT - "In my testing of a prototype, the multinozzle shower head produced a misty spray (the word nebbia in Italian means mist) that immersed me in water, unlike traditional shower heads that shoot pressurized streams of water. It made my hair feel flat and uncooperative, though my skin felt soft and relaxed." (3)
Buzzfeed - "Instead, at first, I felt nothing — as if there weren’t enough water to get wet, let alone shower. It felt like stepping under the nozzle that mists vegetables at the grocery store, and the mist kept recirculating — like a sauna with whatever makes saunas work on overdrive. While I didn’t think it would, the mist eventually got the job done. I still got wet. The soap still foamed, and it still came off. I felt clean. . . BuzzFeed News can confirm that this is definitely a shower."
I'd love to try one before committing to $400 (consumer price) and a plumbing project.
And I think they've covered that with the brilliant strategy of pulling in Equinox Gyms and the implication that Goog/Apple will have these installed on campus.
Thanks for the great review and drawing together all of those sources. Really great comment.
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This sounds like the worst showerhead ever - doesn't really get you wet unless you stand under it for a while. I can only guess how long it takes to rinse off with this after lathering your body. Showering already takes long enough.
This seems like it would be a more-effective sauna device.
It does lack the mechanical blasting action of regular showers, which is good for removing caked mud. But that doesn't come up often in my life. I found it more pleasant and just as fast for normal feel-good, smell-good showering purposes.
> "It does lack the mechanical blasting action of regular showers, which is good for removing caked mud"
Hmm, I need that, just due to playing with (and having) kids and doing yard work. I could imagine redoing a bathroom and having a shower large enough for a traditional shower head on one side, and this on the other.
We have added in a secondary mode which does exactly this, offers a more traditional, even forceful feel, yet still uses about 60% less water than a regular shower.
How different is it from a normal mist shower head? I found those infuriating, but they do perform better than a normal shower head if you have low water pressure.
I personally like the idea of recycling water better. Which potentially gives you even temperature, better pressure and water savings.
With some quick back-of-the-napkin math, I get just under 4 years of daily showers to break even (with their $400 retail price, assuming a generous $0.02/gal ($15/CCF), which is the highest residential marginal seasonal rate where I am).
If I wanted to reduce my water usage, I'd just take shorter showers and alternate days when I've not yet become smelly. These cost $0 and yield immediate savings.
If I wanted to reduce my water usage, I'd just take shorter showers and alternate days when I've not yet become smelly. These cost $0 and yield immediate savings.
Changing a person's behaviour, including your own, is pretty hard, its its less likely you'll actually follow through and take less showers.
Some people also live in households with multiple people, so that can affect your math as well.
Saving water doesn’t make sense at all in a great many places where (clean) water is abundant, population is stagnant and infrastructure already exists. In other words, in many places water supply is mostly all about fixed costs and trouble with the water supply are not in any way related to consumer use of it in showers. (Agricultural use that leaves the water harder to clean up completely and an ageing population that flushes more and more drugs down toilets are more likely to crop up as issues, both unrelated to the amount of water that is used to shower.)
In fact, disuse of water infrastructure can actually damage pipes and be very costly as opposed to just leaving the water running from time to time. (Just the logical consequence when the infrastructure – something that in the case of water can easily last half a century or more once built – is the main cost factor, not the water.)
Obviously this is not universal and there are also a great many places where water really is a scarce resource.
Why on earth would they focus on the payback period when the point is that it's a better shower? Is this because Kickstarter backers are supposedly more rational consumers than other people? I doubt that. If it's a more pleasant shower, then sell that.
Agreed, with a price tag of $400 this is a luxury product. Early adopters aren't going to care about a payback period in the slightest - they just want to experience the cool factor of a new shower + the feel good factor of saving water.
Maybe the company foresees on some kind of government subsidy to make these more affordable in the future?
Side note: Without having tried it, I find the idea of being misted like a vegetable in a grocery store somewhat unappealing as opposed to a nice hot shower after a long day of work. Perhaps the actual feeling is a lot nicer than I'm imagining with this level of VC/investor support.
For those surprised by the cost, I did a quick search on HomeDepot.com for the current line up of "shower head"s.
The largest category is the $50-100 group where HomeDepot lists 633 products. In the $200-250 category, where the Nebia is priced there are 95. Above $250, HomeDepot carries nearly 450 products including a $5500 shower head.
So if you think this is too much money to pay for a shower head, think again. It's the same discussion that appears every time Dyson launches a product (see LED light).
I think it is important to remember that the $250 is only the Kickstarter reward price. The actual retail price is $399 ($150 higher than what you discussed).
HD has nearly 200 between $300-$500. $400 isn't a shower head only available to the 1%'ers of the world. It's not your $40 basic shower head, but that's not the market they are going after. Look at this $1000 unit that Restoration Hardware has, and they are doing alright (https://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product....)
Well technically the current price is $250. Hardware startups some times have a hard time getting out of kickstarter and into the retail space. We'll see if it ever gets launched in retail at $400. Could be more, could be less (unlikely) or could be not at all.
Remember, too, that Home Depot has the advantage of not having to stock everything everywhere. If they have 450 shower heads that cost over $250, it's a good bet that most of their stores carry one or two of them at most -- and that they can all be ordered, if that's what you want.
I wouldn't be too surprised if HD actually has no warehouse where you can find a $5500 shower head -- but the manufacturer will happily ship you one when HD orders it. Or perhaps they will make one when you order it. I don't see the $5500 shower head as being in high demand or time-sensitive.
You are correct, the HD page lists 124 shower heads as "in store". And even then I'm sure it varies store to store.
My comment was more to say, $250 isn't a crazy expensive shower head. I wouldn't consider it to be in the elite category only accessible to the world's 1%. Even at $400 (the eventual retail price) it's not bad. HD has nearly 200 shower heads between $300-$500. Restoration Hardware has a similar shower head to the Nedia (minus the small droplet water) for $1000 and Restoration Hardware exists in many malls around NA (https://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product....).
I couldn't agree more. You would think with the funding they receive they wouldn't need to raise a 100k. I like the idea and would be definitely interested in trying it out, but there are other ways to advertise your product.
dan and snake, thanks for your comments. We decided to launch on Kickstarter because we wanted to gauge what the interest level among consumers would be. Furthermore, KS is the best place to gather significant quantities of feedback on product features and finishing touches before going to mass production. Our decision to raise funds on KS is more about learning from our backers and gauging initial interest than anything else.
I hope that's true, but I have reasons to doubt it. While the consumer bit might be accuratr (albeit it's more early adopters oriented), I don't think KS is "the best place to gather feedback" since your partnerships with the various institutes and companies should have given you just that without the pressure and obligations that come with KS campaigns.
I'm curious to know how the droplet size effects the water temperature required to take, "a nice hot shower." Wouldn't the smaller droplets increase surface area and convection/radiative heat loss? There is a certain sublime feeling of having hot droplets rain down on you.
Buckminster Fuller had the same idea in the early 1930's with the fog gun shower[1]. I sometimes wonder how many of his ideas will be recycled and gain traction in the years to come.
Interesting but too expensive for just a shower head, if it did something else, for example remove fluoride from the water, then I might be more inclined to buy it.
Power saving/ water saving FWIW is a social fashion, which the consumer need to show up. You need to show up your priuses and teslas. Your shower head might not make that ecological concern statement that people might be looking for.
I am not sure how much water to energy to dollars it would save against a conventional shower-head for to be positioned for budget customers, like say a energy consuming light bulbs.
May be it gives a different shower feeling and people will like it simply based on that.
Whatever the concern may be the product is worth building, if nothing else to expand our horizons, be it in our success or be it in our failures.
Every time I see such startup attempt with an invention I think of this: They have made an invention, then they've patented it to prevent others from making the same product and selling it, then they'll start selling this thing and if they are somehow happen to be very successful (microsoft, apple, google, etc.) we'll accuse them of becoming trusts, as if they've not shown the intent thereof with the very action of patenting the invention, and as if when a startup comes out with the slogan "our invention will revolutionise the world," they are not willing to be the one company that sells every single instance of the product, which is, well, the very definition of a trust. So at the end of the day it is legitimate to feed the aspiring trusts until the day they become actual trusts bashing others with their patents, when we'll call them patent trolls that are killing the startup arena, market, world or whatever. Enter out two-faced deceitful and hypocritical western culture.
Then, a "shower-head startup" sounds more like a name for a comic strip than an actual business. I'm sorry, and I know that here is news dot ycombinator dot com, but yet, this startup thing is really becoming a big joke.
I don't even know what you are rambling on and on about esoterically in the first paragraph, but as for your argument in the second paragraph, there are actual existing "businesses" that do sell showerheads. You bought it. I bought it. Everyone who lives in a house with a bathroom bought it. Otherwise we wouldn't have showerheads. It's not a comic strip.
The drawback to smaller droplets is that the larger surface area means they lose heat quicker, and so can consume more energy. The same problem occurs with those heads that put air into the center of each droplet.
I recommend trying out h2okinetic shower heads (now owned by delta in the US). They have channels that cause something similar to cavitation which then results in large droplets widely spread. It is like being in a rain storm. The result is feeling like more water is flowing than actually is, so flow rates can be reduced.
59 comments
[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 56.7 ms ] threadWith that said, it does look like Nebia is solving a real problem (their shower head uses 6 gallons of water for a shower vs the traditional 20 gallons).
It appears they have a Kickstarter as well: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1499369835/nebia-shower...
Think of it like Tesla for shower heads: Yeah, its expensive. Yeah, they're selling upmarket first. But it has a the potential to save a lot of water across the world if they ramp quickly and can drive the price down. (EDIT: Luckily, you don't need gigafactories for showerheads. It appears that their design can use traditional manufacturing methods, so it won't be terribly capital intensive.)
Places where water is a cost center (Hotels, AirBnB hosts, gyms, etc) would probably be the primary demand drivers to start.
I concede that anyone could copy a shower head and that you're relying on the rule of law to protect your invention. I don't see the problem with that, as that's how most manufacturing operates in the 21st century.
That is highly dependent on what they calculate for prices and what shower heads they compare to. Their main website shows savings examples of anywhere from $89.05/year (Miami) to $399.68 (San Francisco) for two nine-minute showers per day. This is presumably comparing against a 2.5 GPM head, since their head uses 0.75 GPM and they claim a 70% reduction in water usage. Comparing to one of the many 1.5 GPM or 1.75 GPM heads will obviously lead to significantly less savings.
> Think of it like Tesla for shower heads
Big difference between Tesla and Nebia: Tesla was going after a market where the current participants didn't really care about pushing the state of the art; Nebia isn't. Kohler and Moen in particular have been developing and pushing low-usage plumbing fixtures for a while.
10 years ago: "New VC firm funds unsual startups in an unsual program, at an unsual equity."
I do not think there are two people who thought Dropbox, Reddit or Airbnb would be what they are today.
If you thought DB, ABNB and RDD would all be worth what they are worth today, then I must say you need to be investing for me and everyone else.
A lot of startups profess 'to make the world a better place'... this one easily delivers.
Not sure if it's been resolved.
Digging into the multiple reviews / press articles I think I figured out why investors love this and we should be compelled.
This is not a "shower head".
This is something new that has the same end-game of getting you clean like a shower head, but much more efficiently:
“It’s like walking into a humid environment that gets you super drenched,” Winter [Nebia's CEO] said, insisting that the mist is powerful enough to handle elaborate shampoo and conditioner rituals. (1)
and
“So I’m standing under it, and one of the things I realize is that it’s really hard to explain,” says Parisi-Amon [Nebia's CTO] “You tell people it’s fundamentally different and they’re like, ‘Whatever, it’s a shower.’” (2)
It's fascinating to see the press then try to get their head around it too:
NYT - "In my testing of a prototype, the multinozzle shower head produced a misty spray (the word nebbia in Italian means mist) that immersed me in water, unlike traditional shower heads that shoot pressurized streams of water. It made my hair feel flat and uncooperative, though my skin felt soft and relaxed." (3)
Buzzfeed - "Instead, at first, I felt nothing — as if there weren’t enough water to get wet, let alone shower. It felt like stepping under the nozzle that mists vegetables at the grocery store, and the mist kept recirculating — like a sauna with whatever makes saunas work on overdrive. While I didn’t think it would, the mist eventually got the job done. I still got wet. The soap still foamed, and it still came off. I felt clean. . . BuzzFeed News can confirm that this is definitely a shower."
I'd love to try one before committing to $400 (consumer price) and a plumbing project.
And I think they've covered that with the brilliant strategy of pulling in Equinox Gyms and the implication that Goog/Apple will have these installed on campus.
Cool!
- - - -
(1) http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/S-F-startup-clai...
(2) http://www.wired.com/2015/08/nebia/
(3) http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/11/nebia-a-shower-head...
(4) http://www.buzzfeed.com/brendanklinkenberg/i-tried-silicon-v...
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This sounds like the worst showerhead ever - doesn't really get you wet unless you stand under it for a while. I can only guess how long it takes to rinse off with this after lathering your body. Showering already takes long enough.
This seems like it would be a more-effective sauna device.
It does lack the mechanical blasting action of regular showers, which is good for removing caked mud. But that doesn't come up often in my life. I found it more pleasant and just as fast for normal feel-good, smell-good showering purposes.
Hmm, I need that, just due to playing with (and having) kids and doing yard work. I could imagine redoing a bathroom and having a shower large enough for a traditional shower head on one side, and this on the other.
I personally like the idea of recycling water better. Which potentially gives you even temperature, better pressure and water savings.
http://www.amazon.com/Watersaving-Experience-7-setting-Hands...
If I wanted to reduce my water usage, I'd just take shorter showers and alternate days when I've not yet become smelly. These cost $0 and yield immediate savings.
Changing a person's behaviour, including your own, is pretty hard, its its less likely you'll actually follow through and take less showers.
Some people also live in households with multiple people, so that can affect your math as well.
In fact, disuse of water infrastructure can actually damage pipes and be very costly as opposed to just leaving the water running from time to time. (Just the logical consequence when the infrastructure – something that in the case of water can easily last half a century or more once built – is the main cost factor, not the water.)
Obviously this is not universal and there are also a great many places where water really is a scarce resource.
Maybe the company foresees on some kind of government subsidy to make these more affordable in the future?
Side note: Without having tried it, I find the idea of being misted like a vegetable in a grocery store somewhat unappealing as opposed to a nice hot shower after a long day of work. Perhaps the actual feeling is a lot nicer than I'm imagining with this level of VC/investor support.
The largest category is the $50-100 group where HomeDepot lists 633 products. In the $200-250 category, where the Nebia is priced there are 95. Above $250, HomeDepot carries nearly 450 products including a $5500 shower head.
So if you think this is too much money to pay for a shower head, think again. It's the same discussion that appears every time Dyson launches a product (see LED light).
I wouldn't be too surprised if HD actually has no warehouse where you can find a $5500 shower head -- but the manufacturer will happily ship you one when HD orders it. Or perhaps they will make one when you order it. I don't see the $5500 shower head as being in high demand or time-sensitive.
My comment was more to say, $250 isn't a crazy expensive shower head. I wouldn't consider it to be in the elite category only accessible to the world's 1%. Even at $400 (the eventual retail price) it's not bad. HD has nearly 200 shower heads between $300-$500. Restoration Hardware has a similar shower head to the Nedia (minus the small droplet water) for $1000 and Restoration Hardware exists in many malls around NA (https://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product....).
Nevertheless, the product looks really awesome and I would love to try it.
[1]: http://www.bfi.org/about-fuller/big-ideas/dymaxion-world/dym...
I am not sure how much water to energy to dollars it would save against a conventional shower-head for to be positioned for budget customers, like say a energy consuming light bulbs.
May be it gives a different shower feeling and people will like it simply based on that.
Whatever the concern may be the product is worth building, if nothing else to expand our horizons, be it in our success or be it in our failures.
Then, a "shower-head startup" sounds more like a name for a comic strip than an actual business. I'm sorry, and I know that here is news dot ycombinator dot com, but yet, this startup thing is really becoming a big joke.
I recommend trying out h2okinetic shower heads (now owned by delta in the US). They have channels that cause something similar to cavitation which then results in large droplets widely spread. It is like being in a rain storm. The result is feeling like more water is flowing than actually is, so flow rates can be reduced.
Their 90 second fluff piece video explains it, with the actual working (not moving) part shown at 30 seconds in: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxWeyd-pnK8