What Loek costs, and why

The first Loeks went out the door at an introductory price of €95. That was temporary. Since last week, the price we named at the start applies: €120. At the same time, we introduced a discount for families with a Stadspas or a municipal low-income scheme. This is the story behind those two numbers.

What you pay

€120 is one price for everything: the device and the Somtoday connection for the first school year. After that, the connection costs €4 a month, billed per school year. The device stays yours, even if you don't renew. Only the schedule stops refreshing.

We sell the device at cost

Of the €120, €21 goes straight to the tax office as VAT. So for us the sums start at €99. Of that, the device costs us €54. We buy it in from a supplier and make no margin on it. So there is no buffer in it either for one that breaks or comes back. We carry that risk ourselves, which is also why the discount can't go beyond the price of the device.

The connection is what it's about

The other €45 pays for the things you don't see. Loek gets its data through Somtoday's official connection. That is a paid partnership with Topicus, the company behind Somtoday: a fixed amount per year, whether one school is on it or a hundred. On top of that there are servers that fetch the schedule, and the accountant, the legal paperwork and the tools we build and run Loek with. Together, well over €6,000 a year in fixed costs.

Spread over the devices out there today, that is more than €100 per device per year. More than the connection brings in, in other words. That is the normal state of a company that has just started, not the intention: in time, Loek simply has to carry itself. Those fixed costs stay almost the same with ten times as many devices. With more devices, the same connection does cover the costs, and then the price can come down too.

The first LED bulbs

Anyone who bought an LED bulb around 2010 paid twenty to forty euros for it. A clunky thing with a heat sink on it, built from parts that were really meant for something else. Today they sit in the supermarket for two euros, and almost every incandescent bulb and fluorescent tube has been replaced by LED. Those first buyers helped finance the learning curve.

Loek is in that first phase. The current version runs on existing hardware that is also meant for other things. It contains parts we don't use but do pay for. At today's volumes, we can't have something made without those parts. At a few thousand, we can. So the parents buying now are paying for parts we would rather have left out, and at the same time helping build the volume that will make that possible. If it works, Loek gets cheaper in a year or two. We can't promise it.

Why the discount

We don't want Loek to end up only with families for whom €120 is an easy expense. Focus matters too much to us for that. So with a Stadspas or a municipal low-income scheme, you pay €65, the price of the device. Just get in touch with us at support@focusmetloek.nl. We may check that your pass is valid.

We know that €65 is still a lot of money for a family with a Stadspas. We can't go lower at the moment, for the reason above: the device costs us what you pay for it. Do you know that situation up close, and do you see a route we don't, through the school, the municipality or a fund? Then we'd love to hear it. That is probably exactly where the gap in our own picture is.

No automatic renewal

After the school year, we ask whether you want to renew. If not, the connection stops and you keep the device. We don't store payment details, so we couldn't quietly charge you even if we wanted to. That is deliberate. If Loek is no longer being used after a school year, we want to know that, rather than keep collecting.

What might still come

To be fair: with the LED bulb, the real volume only came with the ban on incandescent bulbs. For Loek, the smartphone-free school could be that. More and more schools are going smartphone-free, and more and more municipalities have an opinion about it. During the energy crisis, low-income families in Amsterdam got free LED bulbs installed at home, paid for by the city. So it is conceivable that a school or municipality will one day cover part of the cost of Loek too. That would fundamentally change the sums for parents. We are also thinking about renting instead of buying, so you don't have to put down €120 in one go. Neither has gone beyond conversations and ideas yet.

Think along with us

Two dads, forty-odd devices, one school, and more evenings than we have counted. That's where things stand. If you have an idea about how this could be smarter or fairer, we'd love to hear it at info@focusmetloek.nl. Chances are you'll see something we haven't yet.

Jelle and Jochem

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Loek is made by Focusmet B.V., founded by two parents who think focus matters more than ever, with everything that competes for attention today.