Ottawa entrepreneur diving into shareable marketplace with ‘rent anything’ app, Ruckify

A new business, launched in Ottawa, is looking to help people who might have a job or activity that they want to do, but who don't necessarily want to buy the item or piece of equipment necessary to do it.

Following a windstorm a couple years ago, Ruckify Founder Steve Cody approached his neighbour (and now Ruckify Co-Founder) Bruce Linton, who was cutting down a tree on his property. Linton said he could only cut the tree down so far because the blade on his chainsaw wasn't quite big enough. Cody thought, surely someone in the neighbourhood would have one which could cut farther down the stump, and that's where he said the idea for Ruckify was born.

If his business had existed at that time, Cody could have gone online to see if anyone nearby had a bigger chainsaw laying around for rent, and “ruckified it.”

The app works similar to Uber or AirBNB, in which users give each other ratings, in order to hold each other accountable. Plus, Ruckify insures all items being rented out for liability, damage and theft.

“We're the first marketplace where you can post an umbrella or post a yacht, if you own one — it can be fully insured, and we're the first ones in the world to do this,” Cody told The Rick Gibbons Show on 1310 NEWS.

Listen to the full conversation:

And anyone with a lot of stuff to put up for rent can create a 'pro store.'

“If you're a hobbiest or enthusiast, you're into something — think about Etsy or Shopify stores — you can have your own Ruckify 'pro store,'” added Cody. “So you can list all of your things, have your own logo, have your own name. We have people saying, we want to bring in containers from China, what do we buy so we can start a Ruckify business?”

The added bonus, according to Cody, is the positive environmental impact he believes the business can have, as less people will be buying things that might only get used a handful of times. Plus, Ruckify pledges to plant a tree for every transaction on its site. It's goal is to plant 10-million trees in the next three years.

The app launched in Ottawa on October 17 after a year and a half of development.

Cody said the response so far has been nothing but positive.

“We had somebody who was a student from Australia. She was here for three months and wanted to ruckify a guitar,” he explained. “She ruckified a guitar from another gentleman for three months and paid like $30 or something, but now they're going to be doing music together, jamming together — it's a community as well, right? It's not just a transaction, it's people meeting like-minded people.”

Cody originally wanted to call the app “Rent It,” but his daughter suggested something different, including the German word for rent — ruck. The end of the word is taken in admiration of successful businesses, Shopify and Spotify.

The app is free to use. Cody said his team makes money by taking 10% from every transaction on the site, and if you use Ruckify's insurance program, it goes up to 20%.

In the new year, Ruckify is looking to be launched in Calgary followed by Toronto, with other major Canadian markets not far behind. Cody said he wants to see his business eventually go international.