Trying again ā this time with a real problem and a better strategy
Hey Indie Hackers š
Iāve been a long-time lurker here and have tried (and failed) to get a few projects off the ground over the years.
My first product took me years to build and I didnāt do any sales or marketing. I just assumed once it was live, people would find it and use it. Rookie mistake, I know. Since then, Iāve reused the same SaaS template for different ideas, but kept hitting the same wall: no traction because I didnāt know how to get people interested.
This time, Iām doing things differently.
Iām building a project called FreshCycle - it solves a boring but real problem I kept running into:
Iād constantly forget to change my HVAC air filter.
Eventually, my AC would struggle, the energy bill would creep up, and the air in my house would just feelā¦ off.
So I made a tool that:
- Remembers your filter size
- Tracks when itās time to change it
- Automatically ships you a new one right on schedule
Itās kind of like āDollar Shave Clubā ā but for air filters and HVAC peace of mind.
This one hits close to home: my dad is a retired HVAC tech, so the idea feels personally meaningful. If I can turn this into something successful, I know heād get a kick out of it.
Iāve started validating it with some early Reddit research (aside from getting banned from r/frugal š ), and now Iām looking to get more feedback before I take the next big steps.
Would love your thoughts on:
- Is the problem clear and relatable?
- Does this sound like something you or someone you know would use?
- Any tips for early traction (besides ads)?
Hereās the site if you want to take a peek: š FreshCycle
Really appreciate any feedback, Iām here to learn and improve.
Thanks!
I really love this idea. I am one that always forgets to replace my air filters. Here's why:
One thing that would help sell someone like me. Numbers. (i.e. A dirty filter costs you more than this service does)
Yea that's a good suggestion, I need to emphasize with the numbers - why a fresh air filter replacement will save money versus running your system on a dirty filter and damaging other components.
Hey there!
I think there's also people that have rarely (if ever) changed their filter and don't know how different it can be to have a fresh filter. That's another target point is people that don't even realize the problem exists.
Great landing site and very clear strategy! :)
Question for you-what changed wit your sales and marketing strategy this time that makes you more confident? What was that process like?
Youāre absolutely right, a lot of people donāt even realize their system is running with a dirty filter, or how much it affects air quality and efficiency. Not to mention, a clogged filter can actually cause long-term damage to the HVAC unit itself. That āinvisible problemā is definitely something Iām leaning into more in the messaging.
As for whatās different this time, in the past, Iād dive straight into building and completely ignore sales and marketing. Honestly, I was nervous about putting things out there and just focused on improving my dev skills. I spent years building in the dark.
This time, I havenāt written a single line of code. Iām focused entirely on validating first, talking to people, running simple ads, and figuring out what actually resonates. Itās been a totally different (and better) experience so far.
Thanks again for the thoughtful feedback!
Solved the problems that bothered me in my daily use of the website.
Thanks! that means a lot to hear! Glad it helped make things smoother for you. If thereās anything else that could be improved, Iād love to hear it!
Hey Goomies,
Great post, thanks for writing it up. A few thought points as you asked a few questions, then I have a few questions of my own:
Thoughts:
Kinda. Makes sense as an elevator pitch, but tbh there can be some 'subscription fatigue' and for you to pitch that you will auto-bill me on something I'd have to go manually check if it's time for doesn't sound appealing. If your pitch was more along the lines of 'take a picture of your HVAC sticker, we pull your system details and maintenance info from sticker, and auto-build a lifecycle tracker for everything you need for that specific brand/model, then we email you when we think it's time for anything to be done. Filter? Email sent with one click buy. 5 year maintenance time? We'll remind you, and recommend someone. Just set it, and forget it."
I agree that anyone who owns a home with HVAC has to do this, but I'm not sure I want another subscription from another website with my billing that I have to cancel eventually. I think a lot of people don't have a problem picking one up at Ace or Home Depot, they just need a reminder and don't enjoy sorting through 400 different ones to find the right one. Right now if I click 'claim my air filter' on your site, it asks me what size and type of filter I use. Bro that's half the problem, you tell me (lol)! If you told me just take a photo and you'll figure it out then it's like ya okay you're time to value is short and I'm kinda down to let you take that off my plate. Identifying where the machine is in my house (or getting to it) is 1/3 the problem, identifying the correct size and type is like 1/3 the problem, then just ordering one from amazon or adding it to my list at Home Depot is 1/3.
Yes. (1) Call 10 local HVAC companies and tell them you help their customer not f*ck their systems (which they would blame on the HVAC company that you're calling) by reminding them and delivering air filters and ask if you can rev-share or ask if you can do a call campaign for a small subset of their clients and you'll pay them $20 each one that signs up. (2) Go down to your local hardware store and tell them you handle reminders and delivery of air filters and that you will buy them all from their store if they pitch you to customers buying air filters. Give them pamphlets, QR code, whatever a customer might want to see when considering it.
Questions
Why focus exclusively on HVAC air filters? This problem exists in my car's cabin air filter, tap water filter, hot tub filter, etc. Also exists for toilet paper, toothpaste, milk, coffee, display flowers. Any 'consumable'. i.e. What makes HVAC filters unique from these other things where this business model should start with or start+end with HVAC filters?
What problem does this solve? It seems like if you sent me an email with a link to a one-click checkout page that would do it, which would prevent me from auto-getting a filter earlier than I needed because I didn't turn my central air on for a month. It seems like the underlying problem is the time it takes to check on the filter and then the live assessment of the 'health' of the filter, and not so much someone setting themselves a calendar reminder. Does summer have worse air quality, so I need a replacement filter more frequently in summer than winter? I'd imagine most people have heat and not A/C (geographically dependent) so they need 2/3 filters for winter and 0 for summer. It's tough when your interval is a unit of time (1 per 3 months, whatever it is) but the usage depends on time of year.
Did you speak with HVAC companies and ask them if/how they remind their customers? I'm curious what the existing workflow is among the manufacturers of the HVAC systems these filters are for, or among the installers/maintainers.
I hope this is helpful? lol. Good luck!
Hey SilconIndie! Seriously, this is one of the most thoughtful and helpful comments Iāve received thus far!
You brought up something I almost overlooked. Most people donāt actually know their filter size, and asking for it upfront can cause major drop-off. After reading your post, I started exploring a photo upload option where users could just snap a picture of their HVAC sticker or current filter, and weād identify the right size automatically.
I even ran it by my dad (a retired HVAC tech), and he confirmed something important: you canāt really determine the filter size from the HVAC sticker alone, since return air ducts vary so much. I also found that most filters have the size printed clearly on the side, so if people can access the filter, they can usually just read it directly.
I was really hoping the HVAC label route would work, but unfortunately, it seems like itās not reliable. If you have any further suggestsions on this topic, please let me know. Since I agree not knowing the filter size will cause a major drop-off.
I also really appreciate the subscription fatigue callout and I completely agree. Iām thinking of shifting toward a āsmart reminders with one-click reordersā model. Youāll get a ping when your filterās likely ready to be swapped (based on season or system runtime), and then you can buy with a tap, no subscription required unless you want it.
Also, those partnership ideas (local hardware stores, HVAC rev-share) are a great as well. I have already been thinking of doing that in some way, I just haven't had time to dive into that fully yet.
To answer your Qs:
Why HVAC first? Itās one of the most annoying and overlooked consumables, and the consequences of neglect (efficiency loss, allergens, etc.) are real. I want to keep the idea niche and narrow first. But Itās also a habit-forming gateway to broader home care tracking.
What problem does it solve? Iād say: decision fatigue, reminder fatigue, and filter lookup fatigue. People donāt replace filters not because they donāt care, they forget, donāt know the size, or donāt want to deal with it.
Have I talked to HVAC pros? My father yes but Iām going to go deeper soon hopefully. I want to learn their workflows and figure out how to support, not compete with, their customer relationships.
Thank you again, Iām seriously grateful for this kind of feedback. Itās shaping how I build the next versions of FreshCycle.
Thanks for the thoughtful reply. I'll reply as playing the role of pushing back because when I have an idea most people just want to support me and say go for it. Just random thoughts here.
"It's one of the most annoying and overlooked consumables". I don't think it's one of the most annoying, but I fully agree it is one of the most overlooked. Annoying can be defined in different ways - frequency of problem, intensity of problem, cost of solution, etc. I'm not sure of exact numbers but I'd imagine... half of the US populations rents instead of owns and they don't even know of this problem. For those that own, the problem happens ~4 times/year? Most prob can't tell the filter is dirty? $10 solution? This doesn't mean you shouldn't pursue it. This is maybe a reaction to hearing too much marketing copy (it's the MOST annoying) and not enough honest descriptions of problems. It's like an adverse reaction to marketers wanting me to act like some small problem is super urgent and important and the most annoying thing in my life. If you're tethered to reality then urgency, framing problems are both important and necessary. Personal anecdote, I'm not sure I've ever heard my parents be annoyed by anything with their air filter.
One area to look at are apartment/condo buildings where one central air system might be pushing air for 20 units, which might mean there is a 20x frequency of dirty air filters (that math works, right? 20x more air = 20x bad things filtered out = 20x more frequent filter changes?) and they're a group of people that have legal liability if they don't maintain the system. So, could be interesting to look at B2B instead of B2C because they have a more frequent problem, a larger liability, and also spend more.
B2C will have a good amount of people also using stand-alone filters like Dyson. Tbh, most of my friends do it this way. Just run the dyson filter that sits on floor in living room. No central air filter involved. I'm aware they might do this without realizing the central air filter is the reason they have to, I'm just saying B2C might feel like they have a solution already. Yours is cheaper, but more labor required of removing old and putting in new.
Riffing on that: Another angle here is a lot of people monitor their air quality via some sensor - like their dyson. You could approach this from the perspective of "get people to monitor their air, then sell them the solution". So you're basically saying "buy my sensor or connect my app to your dyson data, and find out if you need a filter. If/when you do, here they are." So kinda fearmongering (politely?) that people don't know what's in the air they're breathing, they should at least spend $15 to monitor it, and if it's not good then they can get the solution from the same place they got the sensor. This angle is kinda the 'Plaid for air quality' where your app can ingest data from any source (dyson, nest, etc) and you can be the system of notification. So youre the pipeline that ingests in-home sensor data, then translates that into some kind of insight or action (like ordering a filter).
To me it seems like the long-term winner in this space will be the one that unifies data points (owning the underlying air quality data) and then building insights and actions on top. Owning the data could be integrations with physical sensor companies (still platform risk), or going further upstream and selling your own sensor.
If you had a data set of (1) public air quality data for my specific part of town, then layered on (2) my own data from the sensors in my home, potentially added in (3) my specific address so you can tell me sources of pollution that I'm near (freeway within 1 mile = tire soot, exhaust, etc) then you would be able to provide a unique value proposition that I currently get from 3 different disparate sources and my own research. That unified value proposition combined with a marketplace of solutions could be a cool angle for people super into this stuff to go deeper than they have been able to go, additionally, for people not into this stuff it just makes it easy and actionable.
To end with a focus on just on the physical filter model: Right way might be embedding into the HVAC companies' installation process - every installation they do they will know at the moment what filters the customer will need and if they write it down and send it to you for $10/pop and a customer could stay with you for 4 filters/year/5 years which means if they're $10/filter then your CAC is $10/referral (once set up w HVAC co) and your LTV is $200 which if you don't markeup filters then your costs are $210 for lifetime of customer and your revenue is $200? And if you convert 25% then you average $240 cost per $200 revenue? You could ask the HVAC for installations older than 6 months for less expensive like $4/pop and they might be better customers because they're already needing a filter rn where the newly installed systems won't technically need you for 3+ months. You could literally just buy old customer lists from HVAC co's and call the customer saying "hey I work with your HVAC guy, Joe from Joe's HVAC over on main street, and we offer their customers the specific filters they need at correct intervals and at cost. I have all your HVAC details, you need 3 filters at sizes x, y, z replaced every 4 months. Are you open to your filters being delivered at cost instead of having to go to your hardware store?"
Tbh this still reeks of "I didnt turn my air on from May to September but you still sent me filters". Imagine if you had the data of how much air has passed through the filter to then know when to replace. Or imagine you had a live video feed of each filter and your AI monitors them and will only ship a filter when needed. Or your app ingested their sensor data and you know when the air quality dropped. To me whether you are the one that will supply someone's filters come down to "How do you know for sure I need a filter right now?" Because as soon as you send me filters when I don't need them, I'm cancelling.
/rant
Anyway, just some thoughts. Meant to be purely constructive. I hope it's going well!
Hey Goomies, I really dig this concept. You nailed a super specific problem thatās familiar but rarely addressed. Iāve had that same āugh, forgot the damn filter againā moment more than once.
One thing that might help: see if you can tighten your landing page to hit the pain point faster. Right now, the valueās there, it just takes a little scrolling. Maybe something like:
"Your AC's silently choking on a dirty filter. FreshCycle fixes that."
Then drop a quick graphic of how it works in 3 steps. Youāve got a clean brand vibe already, a little conversion tuning might go a long way.
Rooting for you on this one , especially with the HVAC dad legacy! If you ever want a quick set of eyes on copy tweaks or funnel flow, happy to jump in.
Thanks so much this is super encouraging and helpful. That headline suggestion is awesome and really aligns with the vibe Iām aiming for. I decided to use it with just a slight tweak. Totally agree with you the landing could use some tightening to hit the pain point quicker. I updated it further so feel free to take a look https://www.getfreshcycle.com. Not sure if I got exactly what you mean by the how it works section, but I tried to make it more clear. And haha yes, the HVAC dad legacy is strong in this one. Grateful for your support!
Ads are genuinely your best bet to quickly validate something like this, especially since the concept feels relatively weak in terms of defensibility or moat. If you have zero budget for ads, manual outreach is the play: cold emails, direct sales pitches, industry conferences, and building a network with HVAC-related businesses.
There's a growing community of private equity firms actively buying HVAC businesses. Reaching out to them or HVAC operators directly could give valuable insights and potentially strategic partners.
Beyond ads, I'd strongly suggest surveys or direct user interviews to dig into price sensitivity, subscription willingness, and general perceived value. This will help you avoid guessing what people will pay and get a realistic sense of your market.
If you're looking for a quick and cheap way to validate concepts with actual ad traffic, Product market fix (my tool) can automate landing pages and ad validation.
You're already doing the right thing by validating early and openly asking for feedback. Just don't underestimate the sheer amount of manual hustle required if you're bootstrapping without ad spend.
The subtle advertising of your product is nice. Good luck!
2a. This is kinda what I built my product to automate so I will plug it again lol (https://www.pmfix.app). Once a user signs up for your waitlist, you can have a quick followup survey display, catching users in their high-intent moments will lead to best results in my experience. Followup emails are ok as well, especially if you make them look authentic. Before I had built automation around it, I was manually setting up surveys in mailchimp / carrd to popup after someone signed up for a waitlist.
2b. RE getting users to sign in: you don't, feedback is a gift and shouldn't require a login, anonymous surveys are fine. For the first few days of PMFix I did offer some incentives for feedback but once you launch an MVP that people are paying for, you'll get more feedback than you'll know how to deal with.
Thanks, really appreciate you taking the time to write all this out. Totally fair point on defensibility. Iām not aiming to build something massive here, just a lean, recurring service that solves a real (even if small) problem. Iām still super early, so trying to stay scrappy and focus on actually finding a niche that cares. I'm thinking pet owners with allergies and home owning DIYers are the two Iām leaning into for now.
Iāve been testing a few Facebook ads with a small budget to get signal, but I know that only goes so far. Iām planning to back that up with direct interviews and maybe a quick survey to get real answers on what people would actually pay and whether a subscription even makes sense to them.
I has also thought about reaching out to HVAC businesses but haven't gotten that far yet on that angle. Appreciate the recommendation for Product Market Fix too, I can have a look to see if it can help.
Thanks again for the thoughtful feedback. Definitely grinding through it and trying not to overthink before getting real validation.
Iāve been on a similar journeyātrying to focus on solving a real problem and being more thoughtful this time around.
Iām working on a product called MeasureMate ā a handheld tool that projects real-world dimensions (like 1Ć1āÆmeter or 2Ć3āÆfeet) onto your wall or floor, so people can actually visualize space before cutting, mounting, or installing furniture, decor, etc. Itās not a digital mockup ā it uses real-life projection, almost like a smart laser tool for everyday use.
Iāve done some early market surveys and got decent feedback, but itās mixed ā some love it, others donāt see the need. Iām really trying to figure out: is this a slow-grower that needs patience, or am I pushing a product thatās too niche?
If you were me, how would you keep testing and validating? What signs would tell you to move forward or pivot?
feedback welcome š
To give you my opinion, its a good sign your getting some decent feedback. But I would say the best form of validation is with sales, if you can get one sale, you should be able to repeate the same steps to get more. So I would suggest spending sometime trying to market/sell your product, timebox it and if you can get a couple sales keep going.
One thing I'm really trying to figure out right now is how to differentiate my offer. Since buying a fresh air filter on a reoccuring subscription basis has already been done by several other companies. So how could I make my offer unique in some way - so that a customer will choose my business versus another more established business. I thought of some how adding AI but idk how or in what way that could work. Any suggestions from anyone on how I can differentiate my offer and create a quality USP would be helpful.