January 30, 2017

Meet Shaun Savage of GoShare

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Shaun Savage.

So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I was born on April 19, 1983. I grew up near the Jersey shore in the suburban town of Howell. I started my entrepreneurial journey an early age by mowing lawns, shoveling snow and washing cars in the neighborhood to make extra cash. I always knew that I wanted to own my own business.

By the time I got to high school I was not a good student. I was more interested in the social aspects of school and was bored in most of my classes. I did just enough to get into college and it was only then that I started to refocus on learning. While studying history and criminal justice at the University of Delaware, I ran a house painting business before graduating in 2006.

After graduating I moved to Philadelphia and worked for Philly.com then on to New York City to work for a tech startup named Conductor. When I moved to California in 2011 I knew that it was time to start my company. I worked on a few different ideas while improving my marketing and sales skills. I became passionate about developing mobile applications especially pertaining to the sharing economy and transportation. I knew that my professional experiences in sales, business development, and marketing would help me build GoShare.

In 2014 the idea for GoShare came about after several bad truck rental experiences. I was a fan of the sharing economy and wanted to see if we could use a similar business model to make it easier for people and businesses to get a truck when they needed one. We started getting some traction and once I realized it was a viable business I sold my condo and asked an old colleague named Assaf Karmon to help me build GoShare. My mom gave us $25k in addition to my investment and we were on our way. We launched in April 2015 and have been growing every since. Our goals for the company are to improve the moving and delivery experience for ur customers, create a reliable income stream for truck/van owners, and increase shareholder value. Our team is smart, hardworking and fun loving. We have focused on creating a cool company culture to make sure our employees are happy with their work.

In my limited free time, I enjoy: playing hockey, bike riding, spending time with family & friends, driving fast cars, and closing deals. I volunteer for Big Brothers and Big Sisters.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
No, it has not been a smooth road. It’s more like a roller-coaster where you go up and down. Some of the struggles include: building trust with customers, building a great product, creating real value for our both customers and drivers, finding great investors/partners/employees.

Before you know it you have thousands of customers and hundreds of people depending on you to make a living. It can be stressful and rewarding at the same time.

GoShare – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
GoShare connects drivers with trucks and vans to businesses and people who need to deliver, move or haul large items on demand. We are known for being fast, efficient, and low cost. Some people call us the Uber for Trucks or the Lyft for Moving. I’m proud of how far we have come in the last 2 years. We have a great team, we have a lot of happy customers and a big opportunity ahead of us.

Developing technology is what we specialize in. Our software engineers have built a proprietary system that combines the latest mobile and web technologies to make the experience seamless for our users. Our focus on user experience sets us apart. We expect each customer and driver to have a great experience every time they use GoShare. Not every experience has been perfect but anytime a customer or driver has a bad experience we have been able to quickly learn from it and make them feel better and make the product better.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Closing the deal with our lead investor was a proud moment. It was the largest deal that I have ever closed in terms of the amount of money. It required six months of careful negotiation with some very smart and successful investors. Having a group of investors thoroughly evaluate our business and then write us a big check was a validation of our early accomplishments and felt rewarding. At that moment I knew that we are going to be successful.

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