8/17/2023 0 Comments Bird buddy feeder camera![]() Not everyone can sit by their window all day and watch the birds come and go (though I do). (If jays don’t fit, the feeder ain’t it, as I say.) It also looks big enough to accommodate medium-sized birds, something roofed designs don’t always allow. The feeder itself seems nicely designed - they scored Kyle Buzzard, who designed the Chromecast and various other consumer tech items, whose friendly, rounded approach shows through here as well. A cute app with badges, notifications, points, social sharing and other modern conveniences may not be how people envisioned the birdwatching community growing, but that may be just what’s needed. Birds are “the perfect collectible,” Zidar said, an observation which manages to be both a crucial insight and face-palmingly peak tech.īut being precious about how people engage with one’s hobby is the very kind of gatekeeping behavior that deters those people from even trying. ![]() Obviously birdwatching existed before the popular monster collection game, but they tap into the same “collect them all” instinct that some people have. The secret is in the life-imitates-art-imitates-life fact that birds are very Pokémon-like. Suddenly, although the Bird Buddy doesn’t look fundamentally different (though better designed, to be sure) from what’s out there already, and costs about the same ($200 to pre-order), it looks like a way into the hobby rather than something only a serious hobbyist would buy. It speaks to people who are bird-curious but didn’t get into it because it seemed passive - so we made something that turned passivity into activity.” We needed the beautiful hardware piece that people will have in the yard, but a big part of it was that story of reconnecting. “But what we realized is it’s not just about building a smart bird feeder, but a brand and a company about reconnecting people with nature. “They saw these original ones as something for people super into birdwatching,” he explained. Zidar thinks they’re coming at the whole thing from the wrong direction. Still, one wonders, if everyone loves birds so much, why other camera-equipped bird feeders haven’t become commonplace. “We spent the first half of 2020 doing a lot of validation, and it’s something people are really passionate and active about. No doubt this trend accelerated during the pandemic, when for many people birds provided a pleasant reminder that there is indeed a world outside their windows. “Birdwatching is the second biggest outdoor hobby in the U.S., and huge internationally,” he said. But co-founder and CEO Franci Zidar explained how this market is something of a sleeping giant. ![]() It’s an ambitious statement of purpose from a company working on something as apparently trivial as a bird feeder. Its first product will ship in a few months, but it’s just the start of what the company hopes will be a new approach to using tech to better enjoy nature. After the resounding success of several crowdfunding campaigns for its gamified smart bird feeder, Bird Buddy has raised an $8.5 million seed round.
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