The week that broke Bimble’s heart but not its resolve
This is the eleventh morning of the war in Ukraine.For those of you that do not know this, Bimble has two offices, one in Oxford, UK and one in Kyiv, Ukraine. As you can well imagine, we have been so tied up with it that we haven’t had time to reach out to you all and let you know what is going on behind the scenes at Bimble.
We chose to build a team in Kyiv because we were so impressed with the skill, energy, entrepreneurial spirit and resilience of the people we met there. They are exactly the kind of people we wanted with us at Bimble. We were introduced into the Ukrainian tech world by our friend and advisor, Andy Baynes, who, with his wealth of experience at Apple and Google, said he had found the same energy there as in Silicon Valley in the early days. It had become a hub for tech companies, with teams working for Google, Microsoft, Snap , Revolut and Uber, amongst many others.
Little did we know that this city, full of life and laughter and home to some of our favourite restaurants, bars and florists, would one day be at war. And these same human qualities would serve our team and the Ukrainian people in a whole new way.
We have been speaking to each one of our team members, Vova, Vlad, Vlad, Diana, Taras, Andrii, Yurii, Ilya, Anton and Daryna multiple times a day. Supporting them and their families in their efforts to stay safe. Not only do they still joke and smile. Not only are they optimistic and strong. They are sending us photos of their pets and their children and of their brave acts of resistance.
Extraordinarily, many of them are even asking to be given work to do, to keep them focused and occupied and to ensure the future of a business they love being part of.
We are incredibly lucky at Bimble that all our team is so bonded. Together, we will make it through this crisis.
As you all know, Bimble is about finding, celebrating and exploring unique places to go around the world. We focus on the little places, the out of the way and hard to find places that make neighbourhoods special. And we will continue to share Bimbles full of places to go out.
But it is only in a free world that people can be light hearted and have fun. We must support Ukraine in their fight to stop Putin and his army.
Bimble is a tool for the community to list and share the places that matter to them. Right now Ukrainians need essentials and Bimble can be used in a humanitarian crisis. We are creating Bimble placelists that are useful for displaced Ukrainians within the country and for those that make it through the border. These are collections of pharmacies, supermarkets and petrol stations in Western Ukraine and border towns in Eastern Poland, Hungary and Slovakia. We are listing border crossings and places where people can take refuge. If any of you can help with recommendations, or places to stay, please create your placelists and share them on social, tagging #standwithukraine
We are also collecting locations of places in the west where donations can be dropped off — sleeping bags, warm clothes, etc. Click here to see what we have and if you know of others, please let us know.
Francesca Howland & Julia Mallaby — Bimble co-founders
