A few weeks ago, a flyer in my mailbox: join the new platform nebenan.de
I was curious- a platform called „nebenan.de“ from a Berlin startup you can get in touch with your neighbors for help, sport activities or events? Interesting, so I started the easy going registration process.
The online portal sueddeutsche.de described the business idea nebenan.de as the new „Facebook for your neighborhood“, in my opinion, it is more a social platform to connect people in the same area, because you can just register in your hood, and also more a platform for private interest or need for help.
How is the registration on nebenan.de going?
You can get an online invitation from a friend or you can just register on the startup website. To make sure you are not a fake profile, they send you a postcard with an activation code (the addresses will not be sold).
After activation of your account at nebenan.de, you can use the platform for free. On your profile you can put a photo and your interests, you can select the neighbors from your street or send private messages to other neighbors.
Content on the neighbor platform:
Contributions: where you can write whatever you want to tell the community, I posted an event near our hood.
Marketplace: where you can put everything from selling clothes to „I need help to fix my lamps“ (good for single woman 😉
You can also create your own event or create a group.
The group idea has been for me just amazing: In my hood „Helmholtzkiez“ for example, you find groups for cat-lovers, for yoga in the park, for cooking (ok, that’s definitely not my group 😉 and I also found one group for running.
My experience with the nebenan.de neighbor running group
So sure – I joined the running group – it was easy, just a request. Toni, the organizer of the group, answered me within a few minutes. Appointment next Wednesday in the middle of the hood.
So we met 7 p.m. Toni, Edda and me, all between 25 and 40. All not daily professional runners, but this was not important. It was a fun run, 6k in the „Friedrich-Ludwig-Jahn-Sportpark“, a station in our hood. The run was just great, we talked a lot and we met again one week later. Denis from the Pappelallee joined us that time and this time we have gone to the Volkspark Friedrichshain a 7.8k run.
What I really enjoyed was the fact, that we are all from the same area. So to find a meeting point is just easy. That is a big advantage in big cities, because you don’t have to travel a long time to join the running group. Another positive fact is, that you meet similar people. What does it mean? The people living in your hood are not all the same, for sure. But they like the same vibe like you, because they are living in your hood. For me this was also an interesting experience.
What about the future with me and nebenan.de?
The group isplanning to meet now regularly, I am curious who this running group will go on.
I think I will regularly check the website and I am hoping, that more people put some posts and are active on the platform. My hood has 440 members now and in my opinion there, would me great if there will be more going on. It is important, to keep the platform alive with posts and activities, because if there is nothing interesting and regularly going on, maybe people will forget. That is why it is very good they send you a regular newsletter about new members and that content.
At the moment it is also not possible to connect to other areas, which would be good. Then more people could join our group.
What is my opinion of the startup idea?
For me this startup idea is visionary for the generation 20 to 40, because people often just moved to the city like Berlin. They often have no family to meet or ask for help. My idea is, also, that this generation wants to have a quality time with people who have similar vibes and spend with them time – for example on free time activities – together.
