Foap.com turns your iPhone photos into dollars

Snap or upload a photo with your iPhone, and sell it for commercial/ editorial use. Foap is launching today in AppStore along with their website, in hope of creating the worlds largest marketplace for smartphone photos. The idea is simple: You snap/ upload photos through the phone, and if you are lucky and your photos get approved, they will be published for sale at Foap.com.

Each photo is licenced for $40, and you earn $20 every time a company downloads/ buys it. An in app PayPal integration allows you to easily cash out the money. It looks likes an awesome service for the users, but how about the photo buyers?

“We have learned from the market that there is a huge need for more variation in photos. If you make a search, like for instance on smile, or students, at some of the largest online stock photo companies, you will see that there are always the same type of photos, everywhere! And they may be of great quality, but totally unnatural, with many of them missing out the local feeling that many photo buyers are looking for. So with a focus on smartphones, we definitely think that we can fill this gap, and create something valuable for both users and photo buyers”, says David Los, Co-Founder of Foap.

While the basic idea is simple, it's still a challenge to launch a consumer product, a marketplace and an admin tool, all at once.

“We have been working very hard with all the products, and have gained tons of positive feedback from our test users, however, the real work starts these days, when we will need to review thousands of thousands of uploaded photos. We have prepared for that and have a team ready to review all the photos. We will be very strict with what kind of photos that we approve. In the end, it’s about selling them, and it should be a great experience to browse around photos at Foap Market, so you need to be a great iPhoneographer in order to get your photos published”, says David Los.

The company has raised around around $230k up to this date, and are looking to raise a second round within the next two or three months.

“This is the first iteration of Foap, there are already many improvements in the pipeline for the service and a strategy for us to become the number one stock photo company within years. The lovely Instagram acquisition that Facebook did, has of course led to some extra attention from the investors, but the upcoming numbers of user growth and sales will speak for them self I hope ”, says David

Even though Foap is a Swedish start up, it will launch in Australia primarily before it opens up for the rest of the world

“Australia is a large market, with much variation in climate, nature and people, and we would love to succeed here”, says David.