WhatsApp, nein app
Germans give ‘message’ to FB, exit service
CALL it schadenfreude, but a small Swiss messaging app has seen its users in Germany double in the days after Mark Zuckerberg announced that Facebook was buying its competitor WhatsApp for $19 billion.
The app by Threema is now at the top of the paidapp chart in Germany, TechCrunch reported.
While Zuckerberg said he would not change the model of WhatsApp — a $1peryear fee with no advertising — the Germans seem to be voting with their feet.
Threema’s website says its app is true endtoend encryption and goes on to state, “Unlike other popular messaging apps (including those claiming to use encryption), even we as the server operator have absolutely no way to read your messages.”
Perhaps the Germans are a little untrusting of US companies after Chancellor Angela Merkel learned the National Security Agency was listening in on her conversations. In any event, 200,000 new Threema users have signed up to pay $1.99, with 80 percent of those new signups living in Germany. Michael Gray
Dress like Kim, kids!
The Kardashian sisters just unveiled their latest fashion product — Kardashian Kids — in a bid to grab a share of the lucrative $30 billionplus children’s apparel industry in the US, and announced plans to grow it offshore.
The collection of 30 designs for girls up to 24 months old will be sold at Babies ‘R’ Us in 190 stores in the US, and online, beginning next month.
Bruno Schiavi, chairman and founder of Jupi Corp., the Los Angelesbased firm that launched the Kardashian Kollection in 2011, said sneak peeks of the line last week sparked “phenomenal interest.”
Schiavi is also planning to introduce the line via Babies ‘R’ Us retail partners abroad. The Kardashian Kollection fashion by Kourtney, Kim ( pictured) and Khloe is now in 17 countries and will launch in Mexico in April.
Schiavi said the lower price point (from $14.99 to $29.99) would appeal to “moms [who] appreciate fashion at an amazing price.”
He believes Kids will appeal to moms who have watched the Kardashians hians grow up, as well as to young women who would buy the kids linee as gifts.
The next Kids collection ion will launch in May/June, and the sisters are currently working on the third and d fourth collections, he said. aid.
Kim explains they got the idea for a children’s clothing line when Kourtney was pregnant with her second nd child, Penelope.
Julie Earle Levine
Loo story
Need a cleanbathroom m break or shower and you don’t have Manhattan digs? A Fairfield, Conn., entrepreneur is launching what he says is the city’s first “luxury bathroom and private day storage” in New York.
The first Posh Stow and Go will be located in Midtown, near Grand Central and Pen stations, and on street level so visitors and commuters can stow their belongings for the day.
The 3,000 squarefoot space will also offer clean, individual bathrooms with showers that are open from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m., 3363 days a year.
Wayne Parks, 48, a firefighter and businessman with a background in construction, will launch as early as June. He’s putting $300,000 into it, and expects to open a downtown location later tthis year.
The selfconfessed germaphobe conceived of the idea because he didn’t want to uuse dirty bathrooms when he came into the city with his wife and kids.
He will charge a $15 membership fee and offer packages for three, six or 10 days, priced at $8, $7 and $6 per day, respectively, in any combination of packages. Julie Earle Levine
Sleeper sell
Valerie Bennis knew in 2000 wwhen she launched her natural aromatherapy company, Essence of Vali, she was on to something.
Today Bennis’ “Sleep” centrate is her bestselling product.
Sales last year grew 20 percent from 2012, and half of her sales are to hotels and spas. The Gem Hotels in Chelsea, Soho and Midtown buy the Sleep minisize to leave on their guests’ pillows, as does the Intercontinental Hotel in She sells her line through her website and specialty stores. Coeli Carr