anson
Joined 19 years ago
Karma
429
Submissions
29
Member since
Feb 22
founder of cardpool.com
founder of anywhere.fm
View on Hacker NewsRecent submissions
Comment · 13 years ago
San Francisco, Full time. H1Bs welcome.
We are also offering the first 25 people who apply through Hacker News a free $100 Cardpool Gift Card (can be used to buy virtually any other gift card in the US).
Cardpool.com (YC W10) is looking for software engineers to join our talented team of 4 engineers (total team size ~15 + customer service and fulfillment). We are also looking for a Senior/Director-level Account Manager to help develop, launch, and manage new high-profile partnerships. This person will be responsible for implementation, training, reporting, problem solving, growing the business, presenting to executives, and much more.
Cardpool makes it ridiculously easy to buy and sell gift cards. In the last 3.5 years, the company has grown from 2 guys in a living room to a company that helps hundreds of thousands of customers buy and sell over $100,000 in gift cards each day. We have been featured on CNN, NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX, NPR, and The New York Times.
We pride ourselves on being an engineering-focused group (with experience @ Apple, Google, Amazon.com, Microsoft, MIT, CMU, UIUC, Harvard, and Brown) that moves quickly and builds great customer experiences. Some of the interesting technical and business challenges we're working on include real-time inventory management, dynamic pricing problems, high-performance transaction processing, security, data mining, API design, and ping-pong matchmaking algorithms :)
The ideal candidate would be excited by the prospect of working on a small group of highly technical engineers and enjoy having a ton of responsibility while learning something new almost daily. Experience working with Ruby, Python, or Ruby on Rails is a plus but not a requirement.
Cardpool has an incredible team, above-market compensation, and a generous profit-sharing program. We were acquired in 2011 and will appeal to candidates who are looking to work at a fun small startup-like environment but with the lifestyle (reasonable hours), benefits, and financial strength of a public company.
To learn more, head to http://www.cardpool.com/jobs or email us at [email protected] (this goes straight to the founders).
Hope to hear from you soon! Anson, Founder/CEO/GM
Comment · 15 years ago
You're right, Blackhawk manages many of the operations related to gift cards.
On the other point, however, I can guarantee that Cardpool is about get a whole lot BIGGER, and won't be shutting down or changing directions anytime soon ;).
Comment · 16 years ago
We applied last-minute for Cardpool (W2010) and Anywhere.FM (S2007). Applying last-minute is certainly better than not applying, as YC has been great for us both times :).
We were REALLY worried we'd be way behind everyone else, because we started later (or didn't even have an idea yet in the Anywhere.FM case), but turns out that the pressure of being behind helped us launch by month 2 both times.
Comment · 16 years ago
You're lucky :). Not everyone will have unused gift cards, but you still benefit from being able to buy them at a discount. E.g. you get 30% off at 1-800-Flowers.com, 12% off Gap, 10% off iTunes, etc, stackable with any other coupons or promotions you can find. If supply meets demand, we're happy!
Comment · 16 years ago
awesome news! like pg said, anyone who has met him knows how smart, determined, and genuinely nice he is. certainly a very valuable and welcome addition to the yc camp and he's already helped our group a ton.
Comment · 16 years ago
First and foremost, our customers are always protected by this since we take on 100% of the risk associated with any transaction and we guarantee its full value.
Second, to protect ourselves, we've developed several methods of detecting high-risk transactions and ways to mitigate them (such as working with merchants to reissue new gift cards). I'd go into more detail, but we don't want the wrong people to get ahold of this information ;).
In the end though, we'll be fine. The fact that we mail the check to a physical address, make out the check to the seller's name, and the seller has to cash the check at a real bank, is already a big deterrent to bad behavior. These bad people will have an easier time trading their fake gift cards to people on sites like craigslist.
Comment · 16 years ago
absolutely. we verify every gift card when we buy it and when we sell it, and will refund your purchase for any reason, even if its because the retailer goes bankrupt, leaves town, or you simply change your mind. we are creating this service to solve the problems with gift cards and the last thing we would want to do it contribute to it :).
Comment · 16 years ago
great question, the techcrunch article needs to be updated. but basically, we strive to have the simplest, most hassle-free solution, at the best prices.
all our gift cards have no fees and never expire and we offer a 100-day return policy, something no one else can claim. and since we are a small and lean startup, we can afford to focus purely on the consumer while offering the best prices. all of these features are unique to our startup and are the result of listening to what they want.
Comment · 16 years ago
we will be adding this feature very soon!