Mailbox
The mobile email app that promised inbox zero with a few swipes
- Founded
- 2011
- Closed
- 2016
- Lifespan
- 5 years
- Total funding
- $5.3 million
- Country
- United States
- City
- Palo Alto
- Sector
- Consumer apps
- Founders
- Gentry Underwood
- Investors
- Charles River Ventures, SV Angel, Kapor Capital, CrunchFund
- At its peak
- 1.3 million reservations and 60 million messages a day (March 2013)
- Cause of closure
- Acquired and shut down
What did it do?
Mailbox was a free email app developed by Orchestra, a company based in Palo Alto. With swipe gestures, users could archive emails, file them into folders or snooze them to be reminded later, and the app nudged them towards emptying their inbox. It started on iOS and then moved to Android and macOS.
Why did it shut down?
Just five weeks after launch, in March 2013, Mailbox was sold to Dropbox together with its whole team, closing off its path to growth as an independent product. Although Dropbox brought the app to Android and the desktop, the product remained far from its new owner's core business. In December 2015 Dropbox said it had not been able to fundamentally fix email with Mailbox and would focus instead on simplifying the workflows that generate email. The app was shut down on 26 February 2016.
The story
When Mailbox arrived on the App Store on 7 February 2013, very few people could use it straight away. A pre-registration period opened weeks before launch had collected more than 380,000 reservations, and users were waiting their turn in a virtual queue. Even so, that day it became the second most downloaded free app on the App Store; Cult of Mac called it the best email app they had ever used. As well as being a marketing tool, the waiting list was needed so that the servers could cope with the load.
Mailbox was developed by Orchestra, a Palo Alto-based company run by Gentry Underwood. In November 2011 the company had raised a USD 5.3 million Series A round led by Charles River Ventures, with SV Angel, Kapor Capital and CrunchFund taking part. The idea behind the app was simple: archive emails, file them into folders or snooze them to be reminded later, all with swipe gestures, and so get the inbox down to zero.
Five weeks after launch, on 15 March 2013, Dropbox bought Orchestra for an undisclosed sum, and the entire 13-person team joined Dropbox. According to TechCrunch, Mailbox had by then reached 1.3 million reservations, was delivering 60 million messages a day and was struggling to keep up with demand. Dropbox CEO Drew Houston said his company could bring Mailbox to a very different audience much faster; the app would remain a separate product, and its technology would also be used to improve Dropbox's features around email attachments. The waiting list was removed in April 2013, an Android version came out in April 2014, iCloud and Yahoo Mail support arrived in June 2014, and a public beta for macOS opened in August 2014.
In December 2015 Dropbox announced that it would shut Mailbox down. According to the announcement, the team had realised it could not fundamentally fix email, and from then on it would focus on simplifying the workflows that generate too much email. Mailbox was shut down on 26 February 2016.
Mailbox shows that even a much-loved product may not survive inside a big company when it does not fit that company's core strategy. The sale was a good outcome for the team and the investors; for users, it meant the app they loved was gone within three years.
Lessons for founders
- A promise in an acquisition deal that the product will live on separately can lose its force when the buyer's strategy changes; consider securing the product's future in the contract.
- Scarcity mechanisms such as a waiting list create demand, but if your infrastructure is not ready they only buy you time.
- If a free consumer app has no revenue model, its most likely end is a sale to a big company and dependence on that company's priorities.
Sources
- Mailbox (application) (Wikipedia)
- Dropbox Buys Mailbox, All 13 Employees Joining And App Will Remain Separate (TechCrunch, 2013-03-15)
- Mailbox CEO says insane 380K person wait list kept app from crashing today (VentureBeat, 2013-02-07)
This section is compiled from public sources (Wikidata, news archives and company announcements). Figures are given as they appear in those sources; unknown fields are left blank. If you spot a mistake in an entry, you can send us a correction.
Is something in this entry wrong? Request a correction → Method