The Platform Group expands its platform business and acquires a stake in the Wiesbaden-based company The Cube Club. The company has built a procurement platform for hairdressers, offering everything from patented hardware to software to help hairdressers organise their purchasing.
Such developments are actually unpredictable: When the owner of a well-known hairdressing company, Stelios Tassias, was thinking about how he could make better use of the expensive tubes for hair colouring, he came up with the idea for a pressing machine. He exchanged ideas with his long-standing client Prof. Dr. Richard Beetz, who is involved in digitisation projects.
And so the idea was born to combine a machine for squeezing tubes with a procurement platform and app. The device was developed and patented, 50 machines were ordered and the first ones installed at hairdressers. All hairdressers who have tried the small box – called the “Cube” because of its cube shape – are thrilled.
“Our Cube is very simple for the hairdresser: hold the product up to the scanner and it is reordered and conveniently delivered. And since we connect wholesalers and hairdressers in one community, we called ourselves The Cube Club” says Stelios Tassias, CEO of the company. The products can also be ordered without the device in the app and in the B2B shop of The Cube Club, so that hairdressers can shop for all major hairdressing brands from Wella to L’Oréal and all products from shampoo to hairdressing chairs at any time.
For Richard Beetz, who is responsible for the company’s digital strategy, the development of the industry is reflected here: “In the past, hairdresser:in ordered by fax or phone. Today, perhaps error-prone, by Whatsapp. With us, this is done automatically via scan and you can make perfect evaluations via our tool, up to purchase planning and inventory management. We are alone in the market with this and have the Cube, which can be installed free of charge at hairdressers nationwide in 2022. And sustainability is something we also cater for: by squeezing out the tube, we save tonnes of valuable material and thus chemical waste.”
For the investor and managing director of The Platform Group, Dr Dominik Benner, the platform idea is crucial for the startup The Cube Club: “We now operate over 15 platforms, it all started with Schuhe24. The Cube Club has defined a perfect niche that is worth billions and built the first platform for hairdressers. And there are 80,000 hairdressers here in the country. All important brands and products can thus be ordered directly with a click. However, in line with The Platform Group’s philosophy, the existing wholesalers will not be replaced, but will also be able to serve their hairdressing clients as partners with the innovative solution.”
The company’s own online platform www.cube.club will play a central role for this in future, so that new hairdressers can also register directly and secure the Cube. The app also allows customers to order and manage inventory directly via mobile phone, even without hardware.
About The Cube Club:
The Cube Club is a B2B start-up in Wiesbaden, Germany, founded in 2020. The company offers hairdressers an electric tube press with a built-in barcode scanner on the one hand, and a complete platform solution and app on the other. With the patented “Cube”, the hairdresser can directly reorder the products and receive them in the shortest possible time. The founders of the company are master hairdresser Stelios Tassias and Prof. Dr. Richard Beetz.
About The Platform Group:
The Platform Group (www.the-platform-group.com) is a group of companies based in Wiesbaden, Germany, that invests in platform technology companies and is active in 15 industries. Important portals include Gindumac, Moebelfirst, Bike-Angebot, Lott-Fahrzeugteile, Schuhe24 and Dein-Juwelier. In 2021, a volume of over 200 million euros will be realised with 300 employees.
