New New York City-based startup Hoseanna is entering the online retail market with a unique mission to help keep women’s bathrooms and beauty cabinets consistently supplied. The startup hopes to offer women a small, curated shopping experience for ‘nuisance’ items like hosiery, feminine products, shaving supplies, and other beauty and health products. In an effort to avoid the annoying realization that you’ll have to make an unexpected trip to the store because you just ran out of deodorant, Hoseanna offers users the option to auto-ship necessary items every two or three months. As a user, this means that you can select your favorite and most-used products to buy, and they will automatically arrive at your doorstep before you run out.
Started by two time-starved friends who also happen to be former corporate executives, Hoseanna was their solution to a quicker and more convenient way to help keep women happy and stocked up on important supplies. In an era of women doing it all, a service like this means one less errand to run and one less thing to think about. “Convenience solutions on-line have been targeted to men, but women are time-starved multi-taskers with a never-ending to-do list. We wanted to build a platform that went beyond just shopping on-line, and actually added value by giving them back time, which these days, is a real blessing,” says co-founder Katrina Caroll-Foster. To sweeten the pot even more, the site will offer a rewards program that gives consistent users discounts and points towards buying products.
The co-founders also mention that while Websites offering exclusive luxury products and beauty deals have become commonplace, no one has yet filled the niche for everyday basics. “A lot of attention has been placed on branding in the luxury and beauty space, but no one has been really trying to ‘solve’ for the commodities space. With Hoseanna, we want to transform the way women experience and shop for these ‘must-have’ products. Just because you’re buying every day items, it doesn’t mean that it should be a boring, generic experience,” notes co-founder Tracey Solomon.
While the selection on Hoseanna is somewhat limited at this early stage, we like the idea that the site makes an effort to ‘curate’ its selection and only offer the best products and brands in each category, instead of overwhelming you with too many choices. The look of the site is personal but clean and sophisticated, and includes a blog that makes the experience seem even more like shopping from a fun, members-only Website instead of your typical big box store. We’d like to see a slightly larger selection in some of the categories (intimacy, lip care, and skin care for example) and possibly additional things like shampoo and hair care, but when we went to make an order, most of our daily-use nuisance products were right there waiting. The checkout process is simple and allows users to select an auto-ship option or to make a single online order like any other Website.
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a service like this for everything on your shopping list? We definitely get the appeal of all your necessities arriving on your doorstep before you’ve realized that you need more, and Hoseanna seems like a smart solution for busy women who want to simplify their shopping and make fewer trips to the store.
As a gift to Digital Trends readers, Hoseanna is offering a 25% discount with the code DGTRENDS. The offer will last through October 10 on your first order.
