- Hi everyone,
Jason Hoch, Chief Content
Officer here at How Stuff Works.
I am here today with Vanessa Ferrer,
the CEO and Founder of Merch Cat.
So let's talk a little bit about,
what is Merch Cat exactly.
- Merch Cat is an app
for artists to sell and
manage merch at live shows,
so when a band or an artist
has a show at a venue
and they're standing at their
merch table ready to sell
their t shirts,
their buttons,
stickers, whatever they might have,
they would use this as
a point of sale system,
inventory management and for analytics
to tell them how much they've sold,
real time inventory tracking,
profit, it generates a settlement sheet,
lots of cool things.
- Yeah I'm fascinated by this.
When we come to South by Southwest,
it's the merger of music, film
and interact over technology right?
- [Vanessa] Yep.
- This seems to really put
tow pieces of those puzzles
together right?
So what is the problem that
you're trying to solve?
- I was managing a singer
songwriter for three years
and we had a big show
and I was looking for a tool that
I would have a couple of things
that would talk to eachother
so I would be able to tell how
the merch business was doing,
what the best sellers were,
what sizes were selling
and things like that.
And I went looking for it,
I couldn't find it
cause you know,
today's day and age
you would think that
there would've been an app
like that already
and we were using PayPal
and Excel and Word documents
and one, two, three, four, five
to keep track
and I decided to create it
when I couldn't find it.
- [Jason] You know
really the music industry
has gone from something
where you were selling albums
right to being on the road,
that's your life blood,
that's how you make your money
- [Vanessa] Absolutely.
- and this is an extension of that.
That sounds like it's really
an important problem you're solving.
- Yeah, I mean I think it is because
merch sales are really
one of the only ways
that artists can make money today.
You know a solid way,
that is directly attached to touring
which is the other way
that they make money today.
- So tell me a little
bit about the feedback
from some of the artists
that you've talked to
that have engaged with the app
and a little bit about what
fans think about it so far.
- I've gotten some great feedback.
One band that's using it
said it was exactly what
they were looking for.
At some conferences that I've been to,
some bands have said you know
this is every artists dream come true,
which I find that hard to believe.
So I've just been getting high fived
and like "Wow, you created this for us"
and you know bands are
really excited about it
and really excited to use it
and that's very encouraging for me.
- So where do you think this
goes in the next couple years
as you roll this out
what are some of the
things you'd like to see
as the experience grows
with lots of other bands?
- Well I'm already seeing a
need for foreign currency.
Some bands have approached me
and asked if you know it
works in other countries.
We're trying to figure that out.
- Fantastic, well that's
a quick look at Merch Cat,
thank you Vanessa for joining us today.
- Thank you for having me.
- Hope you're having a
great South by Southwest.
- I'm having an awesome time.
- We're actually right behind
some of the music right here
so I'm sure there's artists
that would grab onto this today.
- Well I'm hoping to find them
and sell it to them.
- Sounds good.
Thank you everyone for joining us
here in Austin, Texas
and remember come back everyday
at now.howstuffworks.com
