TaskRabbit Raises $17.8 Million, Brings in Eisner as Adviser
TaskRabbit, the Bay Area-based start-up that outsources human “rabbits” to perform odious chores for neighbors, has raised its second cash pile in eight months. — It's also bringing former Disney chief executive officer Michael Eisner on board as a strategic adviser.
Context & Ripple Effects
TaskRabbit's $17.8 million round is its second in eight months, per the confirmed terms — a fast follow-on for a startup that pays neighbors to run errands for each other. The more unusual move is the addition of former Disney chief executive Michael Eisner as a strategic adviser, putting a legacy-media operator's name behind a peer-to-peer labor marketplace.
The Eisner tie matters because of where he comes from: Disney spent late 2011 pushing deeper into web distribution, including its November video partnership with YouTube, and has long invested in operational monitoring such as the Walt Disney World command center that tracks ride lines in real time. An adviser with that brand-and-operations pedigree signals TaskRabbit intends to look like a mainstream consumer business, not a Craigslist side project.
First-order effects
- TaskRabbit gains fresh runway to expand its chore marketplace city by city, with the raise landing just eight months after its previous round.
- Eisner's advisory role gives TaskRabbit immediate access to a consumer-brand operator's judgment and network at the moment it is scaling supply of 'rabbits' and demand from users.
Second-order effects
- Rival errands and peer-to-peer services startups now compete against a twice-funded player carrying mainstream-brand credibility, raising the bar for their own fundraising and hiring.
- A named adviser of this stature becomes a recruiting asset in itself, helping TaskRabbit attract operators and partners that less-connected marketplaces cannot reach.
Third-order effects
- If legacy-media executives keep taking advisory seats at consumer internet startups, the paid-adviser role hardens into a standard bridge between old-media brands and the emerging collaborative-services economy.
- Household-labor marketplaces point toward consolidation around venture-backed platforms with recognizable names, rather than informal local arrangements — though whether TaskRabbit's model sustains demand is the open question the funding is meant to answer.
The trend: Venture capital is flowing into peer-to-peer services marketplaces, and legacy-media executives are lending them mainstream credibility through advisory roles.