Ask HE: Why Berlin?
Hey,
I have to convince one of my co-founders to move to berlin.
Besides that its the only city, where the whole team could stay and work together (because one of our co-founders already lives there and can't leave for at least a year), he doesn't see the advantages of the city.
We are a startup that will change the way we buy fashion online, so our clients are online retailers in europe.
To the berlin guys - what's the scene like and how does it positively influence your business and productivity.
Thanks!
TL;DR: What are advantages for fashion/it startup to move to berlin.
Edit: Thanks guys for the many answers.
One more thing: How do you see the uplink to the US? Are many big VCs screening the startup scene?
Berlin is 1000 times nicer than London. Despite the -15 or so this week, its much more well equipped to handle the cold than the UK.
the cost of living here is tiny. both in rents and in daily lebensmittel things. food etc.
there is a big startup scene here and with it a lot of hype, but there is definitely a tangiable feeling of optimism
there are a lot of tech guys (hackers) around looking for work, a lot of them want to be at the cool companies though so do your best to make your company cool + attractive
berlin is a party city like no other. as hyped as that is, it is true. you can go clubbing here most nights and its genuinely 247
having lived in London, Sydney, Dusseldorf + Berlin, I can say this place is the safest. ive never felt threatened once. If you're worried about random street violnece youve got more to fear in London / Sydney.
public transport here is cheap and functional. cabs are cheap. life is cheap.
the downside:
finding apartments is a nightmare. often they come with Provision which is this bullshit german real estate agent scam where they can charge a ridiculous finders fee just for letting you rent the apartment
German beauracracy is a joke in some areas. Germans love paperwork. some things are retardedly more complicated than elsewhere
The German language is also in mein humble opinion, retarded, compared to english (flame war?) to generalise, English is Simpler. The flipside of this point though is that, if you learn some German, Germans really appreciate it and are generally extremely helpfull and happy that you've taken the time to do so.. If you can program a computer, you can learn a language..
tell your friend to read this - http://needleberlin.com/2011/12/09/moving-to-berlin-the-needle-guide-2012-edition/ good guide
Note that this guide is mainly filtered against criteria what pleases the alternative scene. He focuses mostly on the few places that are "in" because they are "different" or fit the Berlin cliche and consequently are in high demand.
Not everyone favors surroundings where you have to be cool and anti-establishment all the time and where your Mercedes gets burned because only capitalist pigs own one. Coming to Berlin just because there are cheap places doesn't sound like a good idea. The downside of getting to the cheap places is that you mostly have cheap people around. And most of the hackers I know don't prefer the places he lists. Just saying...
Two things made me laugh: He advises to drink on Admiralbrücke (the neighbours totally hate it when the pleasure mob of drunken and urinating youngsters and backpackers yell and sing at 3 a.m. every night) while he whines about how tourists bring down all the nice places. Then he calls Sonnenallee "funky little Lebanon with good falafel", in fact they better should rename this place to Jihad Avenue. :)
interesting. where do hackers/programmers/startup people tend to live in Berlin?
I couldn't find hot spots (as I said: with those I know). They're distributed over the inner and wider city, but they don't flock all around the places the author mentioned. Some live there, others don't, but they're not concentrated there and they don't aim to.
There's a map with rent prices (yellow=low, red=high). Within the bold black area are living most of them (i.e., there are even some who live outside):
http://i.imgur.com/Z6y0R.gif
Map comes from there if you're interested:
http://www.stadtentwicklung.berlin.de/wohnen/mietspiegel/de/wohnlagenkarte.shtml
There is an issue with the quoting system
There are 2 advantages:
It's cheapest city of Western Europe. I live in Heidelberg Germany, and here is everything minimum 2 times more expensive than in Berlin.
There are too many professionals. It's one of biggest cities in Western Europe.
Disadvantages:
If you are not from Berlin, you probably would visit your city. It's too north in Europe, your expenses will be high.
It's too cold there. It's -20 C now. I can't live there. 3-4 Month snowing in Winter.
There are Nazis. If you are not Blond you can be killed by a Neonazi on the street.
It's true there are right wing nut cases, but there is crime and ignorance everywhere. The fastest way it will change in Berlin is
The good news is that by coming you can say not only that you are doing a start up, but that you are fighting the nazis, and it will be true. What could be more noble?
One unrelated point - any city that votes the pirate party into power and has C3 has to appeal to your inner geek.
Berlin is cheap? When I went in 2004 it was expensive.
being born and raised in berlin I'd like to intervene:
for some reason the startup scene in berlin is exploding right now. i can't say whether this is a recent trend or i just didn't notice before. there are a number of startup platforms building up (organizing weekly/monthly entrepreneur meetings etc.), maybe you can get some impressions here:
i have worked as a freelancer for a couple of startups and i always loved the atmosphere, a bunch of very likable people who do business at day and party at night.
edit: oh, and fashion fits to berlin. just walk around mitte (center district) when it's getting warmer again and you'll see what i mean. plus there are tons of local designer studios here.
I can second that. I have an office in Heidelberg and just establish one in Leipzig (with two clients in Berlin). It is really cheap. Even if I am not the biggest fan of Berlin it has its advantages (all mentioned already)
But I have to disagree with the Nazi problem. Beside the fact that you will see some of those in every big city the opposite fraction got a far greater number. And being killed on the street just because of that (read: just because you do not look German or not being German) is IMHO extremely exaggerated.
How valid is the third disadvantage? Is it really that bad?
And one more thing to say: If you're not German citizen, you can't simply start a startup in Germany. For not-Eu-country citizens there are 3 conditions. One of them is investing minimum 250.000 euros and hiring 5 German citizens. Also the founder must speak German in level of B2. All three conditions: http://dejure.org/gesetze/AufenthG/21.html
in English: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdejure.org%2Fgesetze%2FAufenthG%2F21.html
It's cheap and there's lots of creative talent. But maybe you want to wait to get him to Berlin until the temperature has gone up.
I am from London, but I have lived/worked in Berlin for a year and can attest that it's definitely worth it. It's an extremely fun place to be, very cheap, lots of interesting arty types (due to it being so cheap) and there are lots of talented hackers around too — especially hanging out in places like c-base.
I'm also a Londoner but thinking of moving to Berlin when I graduate. I can't speak German (yet). Will I struggle to find work or set-up my own start-up only speaking English? Thanks.
You will be able to get by fine in English. You will get much more out of it if you speak German. The good news is German and English are not nearly as different as you may think. The bad news is it will be hard to speak German because everyone speaks English. My advice - go do an intensive few week course somewhere in the countryside. It is not very expensive.
Echoing what freyfogle said, it's really easy to get around in Berlin without any knowledge of German. Pretty much everyone in the tech scene loves to get a chance to improve their English...
tell your friend to read this - http://needleberlin.com/2011/12/09/moving-to-berlin-the-needle-guide-2012-edition/ good guide
Are you like "fits.me"? Anyway, we're in the same industry and you should contact me please under jklauck@uos.de , I'm very interested in joining forces.
Now the advantages of Berlin:
You have lots of creative people from all around the world in Berlin, there's much willingness to try new things. We've four major universities (including Potsdam) and several smaller ones, so the amount of skilled people is good. There are several tech meetups and user groups and the startup ecosystem is growing.
W.r.t. fashion, we have tradeshows (e.g., Berlin Fashion Show, Bread and Butter), more designers/brands are moving to Berlin, the fashion scene has many young faces. There are enough possibilities for direct industry contacts.
Berlin usually is a tolerant city. And it's a green city with many trees in the streets and parks and plenty of woods and water. You'll find lots of bars and restaurants, events of all kind, art from classical to alternative. Very relaxed most the time. Actually we have two inner cities (West=established and East=new) and the boroughs are mixed from cheap to expensive and alternative to "old money" so there's room available for many lifestyles. In fact most boroughs are like little towns themselves.
It's a poor city with massive debts, but it usually only shows in bad streets. Sometimes the public transport has issues (in the sense of first-world problems), but if you can tolerate some little chaos it's bearable. The plus side is that they don't have enough people to give you much trouble (except for parking fines). In recent years the administration became more friendly and service-oriented to its "customers" and they even might assist you with relocating, office space and co-funding (provided your move brings jobs, but talk to me first).
Do you (or your co-founder) have specific questions?
working on fashion and the web?
interested in dropping me a line?
massimo
http://www.linkedin.com/in/moruzzi
You could see how many startups are in Berlin, maybe it helps you to take a better decision. We're trying to do so with http://hascore.com