Home services platform Thumbtack is now available at a physical retail location.
Thumbtack — which offers homeowners access to local service providers through its platform and app — has placed branded displays in 300 H-E-B grocery stores in Texas, Thumbtack said in a Friday (March 10) press release.
At these displays, H-E-B shoppers can scan a QR code to find and hire providers of dog walking, grooming, pet sitting, training and other pet services, according to the release.
“Thumbtack’s job is to make caring for everything in and around the home a seamless experience for the homeowner,” Thumbtack Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships David Steckel said in the release. “Expanding into physical retail brings us one step closer to that by allowing us to be a partner for consumers whether they’re shopping in-store for their pets or getting their backyards ready for hosting.”
Together with the pet services, some H-E-B stores will also display the Thumbtack On-Demand feature that allows consumers to access handyman, lawn care and cleaning services, according to the release.
The Thumbtack platform is used by hundreds of thousands of local service providers and offers online access to the $600 billion home services industry, the release said.
“This is Thumbtack’s first move into physical retail, with the goal of meeting consumers where they are,” Thumbtack said in the release. “As the only platform people need to care for everything in and around their homes, Thumbtack is excited to expand its physical footprint in the year ahead, kicking off with beloved Texas retailer H-E-B.”
This announcement comes about 11 months after another home services platform and app, Jobox, raised $42 million in a Series B funding round and said it planned to expand.
Jobox offers home service professionals a mobile-based operating system that lets them manage their businesses from their homes and includes a marketplace infrastructure that lets them search for jobs that match their schedule, skills and location.
“Consumers are looking for these home service professionals where they are not: on the internet,” Jobox founder and CEO Shay Bloch said in April 2022. “Most skilled trade pros still work with pen and paper, but consumers turn to Google and online websites to find them. And sometimes, these websites don’t know how to connect the right pro to their customers.”
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