Why I Built OroScout

Somewhere between the beautiful Aegean waters, the creamy Feta, and the views from the top of Mount Olympus, a person still needs things for everyday life.

And here’s the thing that actually set me in motion. I was after a product but Amazon Germany didn’t carry it even though it had other products from the same brand but Amazon Italy did. This took some serious searching and comparing going back and forth between tabs and sites to figure this out and find the actual product I wanted, randomly trying different countries and different companies until I stumbled upon it. Other times I can’t find what I’m looking for at all and just give up. Often, I’ve ended up putting it on my list to bring back from the US next time I’m there. All of this amounts to a lot of shopping frustration and work.

I looked for sites that solved these problems but nothing quite did it. There are tools that compare one Amazon store against another, but putting genuinely different stores side by side is harder to find. The few sites that do came with their own baggage including sponsored placements deciding what you see first, and a stubborn habit of assuming things for you like assuming your language is whatever country you happen to be standing in. I don’t suddenly speak Spanish because I’m on holiday in Mexico yet there I’d be, shown prices in pesos while trying to book a hotel in Greece.

I split my life between two countries. I’m American, but these days home is as much Greece as anywhere. I go back and forth, and I travel for work on top of it. Sometimes I’m landing in a country I barely know, for just a few days, suddenly needing to find something specific in a hurry. If you’ve ever tried to do that, you know it’s harder than it sounds.

So I started building the thing I wished existed.

In the middle of building I was thinking about a bookstore that breaks an unwritten rule: it puts the used copy of a book right on the shelf next to the brand-new one. Same title, two options, side by side and you pick. It sounds like it shouldn’t work, but it works beautifully and has for decades. So I decided to do the same with OroScout. See the choices side by side and decide for yourself.

OroScout was never really about comparing prices; that’s just what happens once you can see your options side by side. Plenty of stores don’t even allow price comparison, and I want to bring them in too. The point is access and choice, finding the thing wherever it happens to be, and actually being able to get it where you live.

This is how I chose the name OroScout. Oro means gold in a handful of languages as in treasure, but it also echoes óros meaning “mountain” in Greek, the very word in Mount Olympus. Scout is the searching, the seeking out. And the compass in our logo is there to help you find your way. All together that’s the whole intention. OroScout is here to help you find your way to your own personal treasures, whatever those turn out to be.

As I write this, I’m on a KTEL bus heading back to my village after a week of language school in Athens, hoping others will find OroScout helpful. Thank you so much for reading this. I hope it saves you the headaches it was built to solve.

— An American in Greece