The season for car rallies is well underway, Gold Rush 3 and Gumball just ended and Bull Run is just about to start but somewhere in Canada the OverRun Rally just took place. As you may have heard from some of our previous posts, Klutch22 is the official app of many rallies and our friend Julien Noel, one of the founders of Klutch22, which only a few months ago was working hard to launch the app, is now enjoying driving a 2007 Bentley Gt through his own rally The Klutch22 Overrun Rally. Today we bring you coverage of the overrun rally and get a chance to speak with Julien about how much Klutch22 has grown.
What is the OverRun rally?
The OverRun is simply a mixture of a rally and a car show…. with Klutch22, we didn’t want to organize a traditional car show because most car enthusiast are tired of those kind of events. A private rally is great, but is too small to give us a maximum exposure to our iPhone app. So we decided to organize a single run from Montreal to Québec city with some pit stops along the way. Our goals were to invite all the car clubs around and invade the highways… Our plan was to start with 100-150 cars at the starting location and have cars joining the pack on the highways as we drive to our final destination. Our goal was to finish the run with 500+ cars and we achieved it. Reuniting 500+ cars of all kinds just to celebrate their love for cars and cruising with other enthusiast. This is the true essence of Klutch22.
How many users are on Klutch22 now?
Our number of users has more then tripled in the last 2 months reaching 6,500 members in more than 80 countries. We are growing at a rate of 75-100 new users per day… and this is just with the iPhone app. We will be launching our Android version in just a few days and we expect to double our users rate within the first few months. The demand for an Android version is HUGE. We were suppose to wait until next year to build it…. but we kept having emails from people wanting the Android version over and over… so we decided that we needed to build it quicker.
How has this grown through the past year?
The last 2 months have been crazy but we are really expecting massive download of the app once the Android version will come out. We hope to create a domino effect and never look back. We want to break 100k users for 2012.
What big achievements can you celebrate with Klutch22?
We recently signed the agreement to build the Bull Run Rally apps for this summer which is major exposure for us. Bull Run is the only rally that is televised and this alone will give us exposure on more than 60 countries. They just signed a new deal with MTV for next year. It’s too early to confirm it but we are working on a major sponsorship with Scion Canada for the next 12 months… We’ll keep our fingers crossed :)
We have a great partnership with the Gold Rush Rally team for which we made an app as well. We just lived our first rally experience with them recently. Lots of good feedback from the participants which in turn came lots of new ideas for the app from this first experience.
What has changed in your life now that Klutch22 has gained some traction in the US? What are the next big moves for you and Klutch?
We are seriously thinking about moving our operations down in California. We did a great job in eastern Canada with our BETA version of the iPhone app to realize it is ready for a bigger market. Won’t be an easy decision, but if we want to reach a global market, we think California will be our bread and butter.
Anyone you want to thank for their help through this journey to success?
So many people to thank and we have not even had a full year of operation complete…
One big thanks to Jared Guynes founder of RiceKiller.com, a car enthusiast community from Dallas, Texas that was the very first person to believe in Klutch22’s technology for his car community. At this moment, the RiceKiller krew is the most important on our network and we believe it will keep growing massively once the Android version is out. Jared is doing a great job managing his car club and promoting the use of our technology. He is a key player for us.
Special thanks to Derrick from D2forged Wheels for hooking me up with my absolutely amazing set of wheels… They are the hottest wheels in the game right now!!
And finally a big thanks to Secret Entourage, for all the support and help you gave my partner and I. We haven’t meet yet… but you’re next on our list and the drinks are on us :)
Your life has also changed now that you have enjoyed some great success, we heard you picked up a sick new car. Tell us about your past cars and of course your newest one?
My past three cars were all in the BMW family. The 7 series, 6 Series and M5 all made it in my garage but the latest and greatest of course is my new Bentley GT. I modified the car slightly by dropping it on a set of MB series D2 forged Wheels and slightly tinting the tails and windows.
We want to extend our congratulations to Julien Noel and the whole team at Klutch22 for their success so far and send our best wishes for the road that’s ahead of them.
If you haven’t already done so, please visit www.Klutch22.com and get this awesome app for your iPhone or iPad, and it will be coming soon for the Droid as we know you will ask.
