Holiday Essental Rentals with Fat Llama
I don’t travel as often as I would like, I mean who actually does….. unless you are a dedicated travel blogger. Those full-time travel bloggers make me really jealous, not only because they get to travel all the time to exciting destinations… but because they can really make good use of travel gear and tech like a drone. I’m am so envious of those soaring videos and epic Arial shots that you can get from a drone. Though not envious enough to go out and shell out £1000 for a DJI Mavic Air that I’ll use a couple times a year. Is it even possible to fly them in London?
What if you could rent a drone for a short period of time? Perhaps for that week away to Bali or a day out to the coast of Kent. Well, you can do just that with Fat Llama.
Harnessing the business model of peer to peer rentals like Airbnb, Fat Llama connects owners of “single-use” items or once in a while use items with renters that are keen to use for a special occasion.
Unlike the traditional rental method, you don’t need to leave an insane deposit, if you are a lender your kit is insured by Fat Llama for up to £30k in the event that there is a dispute with the renter. But as a renter, you are still responsible for any damage or loss, so bear that in mind when you lose connection with your hired drone over the Atlantic Ocean. (True Story)
The whole process is pretty simple. You search the website for what you want. The site shows where the kit is located. It’s very much like Airbnb where you select the dates that you want to hire, and the owner gets back to you.
Bear in mind that for your first rental you will need to go through some simple steps of verification. Involves sending in images of your id, proof of address and other small checks to enable their risk profiling.
Once Fat Llama verifies your identity, you then arrange to meet your lender to hand over the goods. My first experience was SOOO painless, the guy gave me the address, I showed up had a quick look at the kit and I was off.
I’d highly recommend this for hiring drones, camera equipment and other tech stuff that you may want for a special occasion, but don’t want to fork out for it in the long run.
If you use this link (fatlama.com/r/scot-27c5a) you can get a £25 credit in your account (And I get the same credit added to my account on your first rental). All in all, a super simple process, the only niggle was signing up I, did not get the credit added to my account. They said that signing up through Google or Facebook some time causes this issue.
Have a look at some of the footage from the DJI Mavic Air hired through Fat Lama and shot in Cornwall.