Latest News From CHRGR / August 2021
Thanks AGAIN to everyone who supported us thus far and please check out these CHRGR updates.
As previously mentioned COVID-19 has dramatically changed our business abilities to operate in a normal and consistent manner.
As you all know CHRGR is an advertising platform using power banks to market brands:
- Since April of 2020 brands are spending almost all marketing money on digital advertising specific to FB, IG, and Google, and not on platforms such as ours. That being said some brands (are) coming back, and we have now executed in FY21Q2 on several campaigns for our repeat clients like CNN (Turner) and RedBull.
As you all know CHRGR relies on venues and events for clients to distribute products:
- Since April 2020 there are no IRL events, and venues have been closed due to the national lockdown.
- That being said we have been contacted by one prominent Chicago based festival as an RFP, (waiting to hear back) and Live Nation c/o Bonnaroo has reconnected with us for 2021 activations - however due to an optional mask policy, no screening for Covid-19, and the rise of the Delta Variant - we had to make the difficult decision to pause on an (in-person) Bonnaroo event setup (to protect our staff) and (limit any legal exposure) - so instead we're (still) working w/ the festival planners on other hardware solutions that will not require physical staffing. Based on those communications we are optimistic that we will continue to support festivals - but just in a different capacity. (until it's safe)
CHRGR has continued to push a roster of other ways to earn and pivot, with a strong and fully mapped out (strategy) to attempt DTC via Shopify, and then via Amazon w/ limited success after 5+ months.
That new product previously mentioned for DTC was The UV-C Phone Sanitizer & Wireless Charger. (Using UV-C light to clean your phone from germs, while also providing a 100% wireless charge.
With that experience, we learned that the Amazon marketplace was very crowded (for this particular category) and that the marketing and advertising purchase rates became too high for a sustainable (practical) overhead. Therefore we have now paused on that DTC Amazon project (fully).
CHRGR further reduced workforce by 67% and reduced salaries by 47%
CHRGR also successfully applied for a PPP loan in 2021 and in the process of re-confirming loan "forgiveness" status.
CHRGR has further reduced office overhead by 65% c/o WeWork.
Again as mentioned - as difficult as this has been, we have continued to work hard on additional ongoing revenue efforts; and since April 2020 we have to leveraged our supply chain network and enterprise clients to broker buyer and seller demand of PPE and medical device products (globally). We continue to focus in this space as a means to generate income and essentially (keep the lights on). The sales pipeline is massive and the team’s hourly commitment to this endeavor remains in the 60hr-80hr range per week; although this (particular) industry remains a frenetic (commodities like) marketplace with a multitude of inconsistent business outcomes. The "juice is still worth the squeeze" and therefore we'll continue to pursue those opportunities until the ROI no longer makes sense.
Nonetheless we continue to leverage our network and partnerships for additional ways to generate income for the business.
One new item to mention for FY21Q2 is that (as the company entered into 2020 pre pandemic) we have been continually interested in developing our own media software - and taking CHRGR into a more predictive (AI and analytics direction) with our self service an in-venue customer charging systems.
Now that we're coming out of the pandemic and evolving our business model, the notion of a merger and/or acquisition by a media analytics company is being discussed and reviewed. Again this is just an early phase opportunity - but one that could provide our investors and partners w/ a new and exciting upside. More to come on that as we evolve that opportunity and continue to further define the future of CHRGR.
To that point another school of thought was to raise a secondary round for CHRGR, perhaps even with that media analytics company partner as a means to further fast-rack software development and inevitable company scale.
What do you (our investors) think about that? And would you support another CF raise? Curious to hear your thoughts as we continue to navigate these never before seen times.
Either way our current effort remains to keep our burn to a minimum, and to continue to get creative with how we generate revenue and growth opportunities for CHRGR to evolve (your) company.
Thank you again for the continued support and your consideration, as I sincerely appreciate it.
John M Mullin
CEO and Founder