New App Rents Out Your Underused Household Items

App connects people who have things they use rarely with those who want to borrow or rent them - and goes by the strap line of "Own Less, Have More".

Credit: Elise Garcia | Linkedin

Do you need a blender, a paddle board or a raclette machine? Perhaps you have a camera, bread maker or a power-drill in the cupboard gathering dust? If the answer to either question is “oui”, French entrepreneur Lucie Basch has a solution for anyone (currently, only) in France.

Already the pioneer of a hugely successful anti-food waste app (Too Good to Go - which now has more than 100 million users in 19 countries), Basch has turned her attention to a different but similar problem: the simultaneous underuse and overconsumption of everyday household objects.

Basch has co-founded a new app, named Poppins, in reference to the world’s most famous nanny’s seemingly bottomless carpet bag full of impossibly large items. The app's mission is to connect people who have things they don’t need with people who might want to buy, borrow or rent them. It feels like an app that's been waiting to happen for years, particularly as Basch says research shows that the average French person owns about 2.5 tonnes of objects, around a third of which are never used.

“It doesn’t make sense ecologically or economically,” she told The Guardian. “The aim is to allow everyone to find what they need easily and nearby. Collective prosperity is the only way forward.” She added: “The raclette machine is a great example. You buy one, use it twice a year, and it takes up half your kitchen space. Yet it is easy to rent.”

Launched in April, the app attracted 40,000 users in France in its first few weeks. It displays objects available in an area, some of which can be borrowed, others rented. Poppins takes a commission.

Basch says: “The beauty of sharing is it combines ecological, economic and social incentives. If we make sharing normal, less is produced, which is ecological, we will spend less because it’s cheaper to rent or buy and we will be more social as we are talking to each other again."

Poppins will launch in Belgium next year and in the UK in late 2026 or 2027.