SKYPE A FOUNDER #4: Gunnar Froh, Country Business Manager Germany, Airbnb

This is a follow up to the interview TechBerlin did with all founders of Airbnb last week.

Gunnar Froh was one of the founders of Accoleo, an Airbnb clone that was acquired by Airbnb four weeks ago. Accoleo was Airbnb’s first acquisition and as a newly titled Country Business Manager, Gunnar just opened Airbnb’s first office outside the US.

They are rapidly growing the team and they sure need to. The Samwer cloning machinery behind the heavily funded Wimdu is in full swing and anyone in the tech scene knows what that means. Most people I have talked to in recent days seem to think that the Samwers will ultimately make the race, worldwide! As one commentator on Gründerszene put it (referring to the original Airbnb founders):

“These guys are design softies. The Samwers eat those for breakfast.”

This will be one of the most interesting competitive races in the internet industry, with two completely different approaches and company cultures facing each other: The incumbent, Airbnb, with its focus on community and product development vs. the challenger, Wimdu, with its focus on fierce sales and distribution. 

The Airbnb model is one that was born out of the collaborative consumption movement. It will be interesting to see whether Airbnb’s strong community values prevail in the end or whether battlesome land grabbing tactics will lead to a sustainable long-term success for the clone(s). 

If you ask me: I place my bet on Airbnb. Sure, it is not a winners-takes-all market and brand loyalty among hosts and barriers to entry for new players are low. However, in a competitive market like this, inventory is just one area of competition. Brand experience, product development and customer support (see Zappos!) are other important areas and I do not see any of the current clones competing on these fronts effectively.

Who knows, maybe Wimdu will sell to Airbnb in the end. Anything else would kind of be against the legality of the Samwer’s modus operandi. However, with $90M raised, Wimdu does not seem to be in it for the quick flip. Only time will tell.

During the interview Gunnar talks about the acquisition, his strategy to compete with the clones and explains why he decided to base the German office in Hamburg instead of Berlin. 

He also answers some of the practical questions that people have raised about Airbnb such as: Do I need to have professional photos taken to list my place?  Do I need to tax the income that I make off the site? And how does insurance work with Airbnb? 

(Sorry for the visuals of the video, there are a couple of “freezes”. #skype #fail :-)) 

by Nikolas Woischnik