Rent Like a Champion

Rent Like a Champion began as a niche idea inside a real estate business. The company spun out of a brick-and-mortar real estate firm in South Bend, Indiana, home of Notre Dame, and became its own company in 2012 with a plan to expand nationwide. The founder, Mike Doyle, saw that in college towns, a single football weekend can overwhelm the local hotel supply, leaving fans with few places to stay and homeowners with an opportunity to earn income from their properties.

The model was a marketplace with a deliberately narrow scope. Homeowners living near stadiums listed entire homes, and fans booked them for the weekend. The company only rented whole homes because it targeted families and larger groups. Its take rate was roughly 22%, structured as a 15% fee on the homeowner's list price and a 9% markup charged to the renter. In 2012, the company booked about $630,000 in total volume and kept about $140,000 of it. By 2015, volume reached just under $3.3 million, with about $720,000 kept as revenue. Instant booking let homeowners set availability and prices for upcoming events, with the company offering pricing ranges based on historical data.

The company then went on Shark Tank. Doyle said the team priced the deal below its own valuation estimate of $3 to $5 million so the sharks would want in. They accepted $200,000 for 10% of the company, with Mark Cuban and Chris Sacca each investing $100,000 for 5%.

Growth came from concentrated demand in a small set of markets. The company operated in more than 100 towns, but about 25 were core markets with enough homes to justify marketing spend. Its demand strategy relied on reaching super fans where they already spent time online, including college football podcasts, blogs, and Facebook pages. Doyle said the company was building peer-to-peer rental supply in towns that big rental platforms ignored, such as Tuscaloosa, Oxford, and South Bend.

Repeat business was strong. Doyle reported a reorder rate of about 50%, largely because the customers, often alumni, season-ticket holders, and parents, returned yearly. Seasonality was the main constraint. Most bookings came from college football, and the company was expanding into PGA tournaments and NASCAR teams to smooth demand. Utilization varied: rivalry games sold close to 90% of listed homes, while an average game was closer to 50%.

By 2016, the company reported over 3,000 homes, about 60,000 hosted fans, and cumulative transaction volume above $12 million. It had a target of $4.5 million in 2016 volume and a lean team of five full-time and five part-time staff, based in Chicago. Doyle said the company was not raising capital at that time.