Going through a family album always brings back so many vivid memories. There is something so magical about reliving the past through these precious photographs. We all have such great stories to tell and treasure and what better way to do it then print those perfectly captured moments. However, in a world, were smartphones with cameras have replaced the camera with reels; it can get logistically difficult to get photos printed.
Well then let timeshel help you! It is this new amazing app in town that strongly advocates the fact that everyone’s’ stories deserve to be printed. With this app, getting prints has never been so simple. All you have to do each month is add moments to your timeshel story. It’s as easy as 4 taps from the home screen.
Voila! At the end of each month, they print your story and send it to you either in a kickass looking shell or a nifty envelope.
About The Co-founders!
Ideated and co-founded by Philip Anema and Sean Pfitzemaier, timeshel is here to breathe life into your precious iPhone photos. Philip has a background in professional photography while Sean has an entrepreneurial background in web and mobile product development. Together, the duo has given the world a simple yet an exceptional way to get their stories printed.
How It All Began!
It all started a little over a year ago. Phil was photographing a daylong conference and took a quick breather in the corner of the room. He noticed a mother with a young child talking to a friend. She handed her friend her iPhone and they took a picture together. As Phil watched this unfold he found himself saying that they will never print that photo. In today’s time and age, we take more photos than ever but for some reason we don’t naturally think to turn those photos into physical prints.
Phil wanted to change this mannerism. To him there is something really special about holding a printed photograph in your hands and a well documented life is an incredibly beautiful thing. Digital photos are convenient and awesome for lots of reasons but they lack a sense of permanence and timelessness. Thus he started looking around and noticed a handful of people and companies working to bring this experience back to mobile photography and he naturally wanted to be a part of it. There was the impetus to create timeshel.
“I teamed up with Sean Pfitzenmaier, my co-founder, and we started thinking about how timeshel could work. We wanted to do something a little different and hopefully a little bit more meaningful than ‘just printing iphone photos’. That seemed super boring. We both agreed that photos are more meaningful when they tell a story and that story is the best when it’s about someone’s life. timeshel, we decided, would be about the ongoing experience of documenting and preserving our life stories with printed photographs. We would create a monthly rhythm for printing photos and over time participating in this rhythm would create a photo journal of the lives we live. We got really excited about the idea”, says Phil.
The X-Factor!
timeshel is a super simple way to document and preserve your story with high quality printed photographs. It helps your photos come to life as beautiful prints. This tool helps deliver your photos in an amazing and functional packaging that protects and organizes your photos.
Let’s face it; printing mobile photos is generally a cumbersome experience. Most solutions out there have adopted a traditional web-to-print workflow and crammed it into the mobile device resulting in a heavyweight user experience. Additionally, most of the print from mobile products in the marketplace have inferior quality and is not worthy of being called a keepsake.
Well timeshel is here to solve this very problem. This tool is super simple and the prints are super high quality. Selecting a photo for print is as easy as 4 taps from the home screen and allows for ‘on the fly curation’ of the photos you want to print. At the end of the month these are automatically printed and shipped to you. This means your digital photos don’t pile up overtime and printing them doesn’t become a massive ‘to-do’ that you never get around to doing.
That’s not all; the ongoing nature of timeshel creates a narrative experience that reveals that your photos aren’t just individual moments in time and that they are a part of a story. As this story comes to life in print a whole new dimension of value emerges which is really fun and exciting.
On Challenges Faced & Contenders!
The biggest hurdle faced by the team was procuring funding. Trying to find investors in order to fund raise was challenging and frustrating. It was really hard to tap into these communities, get their attention, and share the idea with them. The team feels that this may have something to do with not being a super sexy start-up that seeks to disrupt everything and turn the world upside down.
In terms of competition, Groovebook, ArtifactUprising, Shutterfly and Social Print Studio do pose as potential competitors as they all have a print from mobile presence.
On Expansion Plans, Intended Users & More!
“Now that we’re cruising with monthly delivery of prints we want to start thinking of simple, fun, beautiful ways to display the prints in peoples’ lives and homes”, says the duo.
At the moment, timeshel mainly targeted at pleasing mobile photographers who are enthusiastic about documenting and preserving stories with their photos. Further, when it comes down to monetizing the app, the team is sticky to a monthly subscription service.
In short, timeshel is here to bring back the good old tradition of printing and treasuring photos. So what are you waiting for? Seek their services now to preserve those precious memories that make life worth living!
Psst…. Special Offer For All You Startup Dopers!
The team was kind enough to leave our readers with some exciting offer. The coupon TRYTIMESHEL is redeemable in the billing menu of the iOS app for 10% off on your first month of timeshel.
To know more details on the app, do visit: www.timeshel.co
