Gadzet.in, a company started in mid 2015 by 3 MBA graduates Ashwin, Sriram and Parteek. The startup provides the facility of ease in buying and selling of used smartphones.
The company started up with an aim to organize the sector of used smartphones, which no other C2C company (example - olx, quickr etc) were offering. They started up with a small amount of savings contributed by the three of them.
The 3 guys spent their hard earned money to buy used smartphones with good condition, with hope of selling it to the needful people and getting a cut in between for maintaining the working capital. As they explored, they got to know more possibilities and opportunities in sector.
After designing the layout of website and spouting down the plans for business, they got down to the market for purchasing the cell phones.
Nexus 8, the first phone which the company ever bought, from a fellow seller.
The fellow was very convincing and very good in talking and he lured the guys to buy the phone with a good condition and a low usage period. At first they asked for all the other accessories, the box, the bill, the IMEI number, but the guy resisted for the bill. he told them that the bill was misplaced as of now, and he would get it to them in a while. The guys went out with a new-like Google Nexus 8 with the bill, box and accessories.
The guys were happy that they got such kind of phone in such a low price, but Ashwin was still suspicious about the phone, so he googled down the VAT tin number just to check the validity of bill. The VAT tin number showed an address of an old liquor shop, his suspicion got stronger.
They got down to the address of the bill. A mobile phone store was there, but with a different name. they shown the bill to the shop owner, to which he counter-showed a similar kind of bill, admitting that another fellow was conned just like that with a stolen phone.
The guys were so furious about this, they thought of filing a case, but they did not wanted to get down in all the fuss at such an early stage. They learnt an important lesson from their first experience. They started to be more alert and more clever the next time they dealt with something like this. they even thought that somebody else could have been fooled while buying a used smart phone, so they came up with a strategy to protect the interest of buyers as well sellers and the company started to flourish.