GoWorkaBit started at Garage48 Women Special hackathon in Pärnu in October 2013. Kei had been working in HR industry and saw the need to connect companies that need urgently workforce for short periods and people who want to work a bit. She pitched the idea at Garage48 event and met Gerli and Ethel for the first time there. Kristjan who is today CEO of GoWorkaBit attended the event as mentor. So it was totally the „preparation meets luck“ kinda event for all of us.
The Story
behind GoWorkaBit is that everyone sould have freedom to choose when and where
they work. To get experiences and to combine their ohter activities with working
as flexibly as possible and as needed. There are certain groups of people
today, who can´t participate in work market, because there are no options for
such flexibility. Students, who want to choose the time and place for working
on weekly or even daily bases. People who already work somewhere and want to do
some extra to earn more.
Young parents who don’t want to return for a full-time work yet. And of course
we all know that more and more people don´t want to commit for working 9-7, 40
hours per week anymore.
The biggest achievement for us all is that we have been able to create revenue from the start and stay alive through difficult times. But most importantly that we have fun doing every day what we do- changing the world so that everyone can choose when and where they work. We have been lucky to have paying customers from the beginning.
Our revenue on 2014 was 430K and we intent to make it to 1M this year. But we are even more happy about 55 000 users in Estonia and large clients like Prisma, Statoil, Omniva, retail chains and restaurants. Because that shows the need for our service for both sides.
For us, next big and important step is to launch in UK and make everything in our power to grow, so that everyone can have the freedom to work a bit.
Doing the
startup has been a road of lessons for us all and that makes it so exciting.
We have learned that in the startup world - the team is the most important
thing. Great team is what makes things happen and who support each other in
crazy times. And if you ask what makes one team great, then it is willingness
to learn constantly and desire to reach goals and make the visions of the
start-up happen.
- Kei Karlson
Co-Founder @GoWorkaBit