I'm Andy! I launched a terrible business idea to give kids in Detroit free electric scooters.

How will you turn a profit?

We won't! That's why it's a terrible startup. We're going to give everything away and get paid in high fives.

Ok. Just curious since you posed the project as a business.

So it's a charity.

Cool beans. Good luck and I hope you get lots of donors.

It was what turned out to be a bad joke it looks like.

Any plans to teach the parents of the kids using the Bird and Lime scooters how to scout out the high-value lost scooters for the commission?

It seems that may be a decent way for them to self source scooters and other items by way of earned commissions. Plus, it would give them some quality parent/kid time while searching for the scooters together.

I teach everyone I come across how to sign up for charging, how to harvest scooters and how to maximize value. The major challenge is that you can't get paid for charging unless you are over 18, have a drivers license and a bank account. That leaves out most of the people who actually really need the income!

How many scooters do you have?

We have 3 in the garage and about 12 on the way from Amazon. We just launched this project this morning. We also have about $1,500 to spend so far but I imagine that'll grow quite a bit as people check out the newspaper.

EDIT: We have a live ticker at playfreebird.com near the bottom. And by live I mean I do it by editing the page.

Digging your sense of humour. I am just visiting the states and have noticed these scooters everywhere in LA. I've tripped over at least three so far

There are almost as many here, which is weird to see a startup hit our rust belt city so hard. It's the cruel irony of the thing - that people who need 'em most can't access them.

A day in the life of a Detroit hipster.

My blood is cold brew and my meals are beard wax.

How much of your own money are you spending on this "project"?

It's hard to put a dollar figure on it because I don't track it. It's mostly sweat equity at this point: driving around, talking to people, building the website, managing the data and donors, telling the story. We're using our HQ to receive the scooters and have a place to assemble them.

We'll be buying a few scooters to add to the giveaway fleet too.

What’s your day job?

He runs the Detroit Bus Company, a seemingly successful (non-profit?) company that's been around Detroit since 2011, helping to address in some part the city's disappointing lack of public transportation.

Thanks for this. It's medium successful

What is the quality of scooters like - are there some that are not worth the money?

All the ones we have on our Amazon Wish List are good scooters that will last. The ones getting donated range from brand new to needing a little love -- we'll work with volunteers to refresh and paint the ones that need fixing.

You must not have much experience with low income people? One thing I can tell you for certain is that low income people don’t value their possessions, especially possessions they didn’t have to pay for. I expect the kids to break the scooters just like they break everything else. Alternatively they will leave the scooter outside and it will be picked up by another kid who will ride until the battery dies and then it will be abandoned until a scrapper picks it up and sells it for scrap metal.

I have a large amount of experience with lower income folks having grown up in and around Detroit. My opinion is that your view is incorrect, so we'll just have to disagree.

Y'all need to stop shitting on this guy so hard.

It's not easy to donate your own time or hard earned money, let alone create and launch an idea, all with the intention of helping.

The guy has simple goals, just try to make the place a bit better and give joy to some kids. He's not trying to fix the economic crises or solve world hunger.

So he created a fun-to-him idea that he could follow through with, and he did. If you think it can be done better, then go do it better. I can't imagine how many ideas fail because of the constant struggle of trying to do the best thing. Let some kids enjoy the scootering!

Question- what was the hardest part of getting your idea to reality?

I appreciate you!

Hardest part: managing the digital end (messages, posts, emails, media) while also still charging and deploying scooters all night so I keep learning about the environment they're in. I am averaging about 5 hours a night of sleep.

This is great! I do a lot of fundraising and such and this sounds exactly like my kind of project! No earnings? Paid in high fives? Helping out people in need?

Awesome! No question just saying-keep up he good work!

Thanks a ton for the feedback and love!

Could see about getting sponsors and letting them put advertisements onthe scooters?

Sponsors yes. Ads no.

Have you considered partnering with the local library or public school system and figuring out a system that rewards good grades or summer reading with ride credits?

This is a great idea that actually has come up a lot in recent conversation. Our initial goal started as a pretty simple and short-term one, but we are now looking at ways to sustain variations of the project long-term that would involve partnerships with groups and organizations in the city who are far better equipped than we are to help us figure out the how & who. Thank you for this feedback, it's very valuable!