NEWADDRESS.IE, Unit 8, Maple
Avenue, Stillorgan Industrial Estate,
OUTSTANDING SMALL BUSINESS
Co Dublin. Tel: 01 2959278.
www.myaddress.ie
Make a
move
Fromacentralisedplatform,
NewAddress.iehasfoundan
ingeniouswaytotakethehassle
outof changingaddressforboth
individualsandcompanies
‘From a global point of view,
there are other services
that do similar things,
but none of them are as
technically advanced’
Also shortlisted in the
Innovator category
Derek Quinn
I
T’S often said that moving house is one of the most to include more services. talks with four post offices — one in India, one in Japan
stressful events in a person’s life, but for Derek “The property market changed and that was our core and two in Europe — about licensing its software to them.
Quinn, managing director of NewAddress.ie, it business, so we had to look at other ways to increase rev- Hoffman had approached embassies around the world,
sparked an idea that has led to a company with the enue. Our intention with the new services such as seeking advice, names and contact details for the various
potential to license unique software to 161 post offices bereavement and change of name notification is to central post offices.
around the globe. place us in the minds of consumers as being the company “We’re working through the cultural problems. Once
“Seven years ago, I moved from one apartment to to use when changing any data with organisations going you have a post office behind you, this automatically gives
another and thought to myself: ‘there must be an easier forward,” says Quinn. you credibility in a market,” says Quinn.
way of informing companies of my change of address than Corporates and utilities pay an initial licence fee, The plan is to mainly focus on the global side of the
having to call each one up’,” he recalls. then a yearly renewal and a fee per transaction. New- business for the next few years, he adds. “There is huge
A couple of years later, this thought was turned into Address.ie now has links with more than 80 organisa- potential, as only a handful of the world’s central post
action as Kevin Gill, who set up www.movieextras.ie tions. Individuals using the site follow a simple offices have a system anything like ours. As we spent two
with Quinn in 2002, and Bob Hoffman, who had worked step-by-step process once they register: they provide and a half years developing the software, we learned a
in sales for O2, came on board and started developing contact details, click on the companies they wish to not- lot about the change of address process and as such we
the concept. ify and provide extra information such as account num- can offer all of that experience with the service.
Eight months into its development — after a lot of bers, where necessary. MyAddress.ie then submits the “Last year, our turnover was ¤200,000 and this year
negotiation — the venture was greatly boosted by a ¤1m information to the companies and will update users with we’re aiming for ¤350,000 and to licence the software to
investment from the property and homes portal the response from the companies, where relevant. at least one post office. We’ll be talking to others, for exam-
MyHome.ie. “The directors saw a lot of potential in the “The whole premise is extremely innovative in the Irish ple, in Japan. We have gotten close to the Universal
business and that it was a good fit. The investment context as there is nothing similar available. From a glo- Postal Union [UPU — the global body for post offices] and
allowed us to expand the core product,” says Quinn. bal point of view, there are other services that do simi- have spoken at a number of conferences since November
Since MyHome.ie was taken over by The Irish Times in lar things, but none of them are as technically advanced about our service — it’s seen as one of the sexier topics
2006, it has become a marketing partner, rather than a — for example, there’s a simple email service in the UK in the industry.
shareholder. which sends update information to organisations such “After post office services are liberalised [by 2012],
NewAddress.ie officially launched in 2005 and, by as BT. The difference with ours is that we capture cus- the UPU’s focus is to ensure a change of address service
2008, 1,000 people a month were using the service. tomers’ information and allow the organisations to exists in each country and what we’re pushing is the fact
Having started out being mainly about updating the likes interact with those customers,” Quinn explains. that we can supply the technology to make this happen,”
of Eircom about a person’s new address, the site evolved For the past four months, NewAddress.ie has been in he adds.
24 SFA NATIONAL SMALL BUSINESS AWARDS WWW.SFA.IE/AWARDS
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