Health, Auto … and Alien Abduction - Company Business and Marketing

Industry Standard, The, Feb, 2001 by Jen Muehlbauer

Getting stalked by little green men? Relax. For less than $20, you can insure yourself against alien abduction at SirHuckleberry.com. The Amsterdam-based site also underwrites policies in case of apocalypse, bigamy or Prohibition.

Armageddon aside, most of SirHuckleberry's policies insure against ordinary catastrophes like air turbulence and short-lived marriages. Yet the site -- which insists its policies are "perfectly authentic" -- has paid out only a few claims. That may be because validating a claim takes some doing. You'll get up to $500 if your cell phone dies for 48 hours straight -- if you can prove it with a note from your telco. Collect up to $20,000 for bad lotto tickets, but only if you blow five out of six numbers for 52 weeks straight. And that meeting with martians? Better back it up with testimony from an internist, air traffic controllers and the local police. Of course, since most policies are purchased as gag gifts, the fine print isn't really the point.

Last year, SirHuckleberry sold fewer than 20,000 policies, mostly to Dutch and German customers, says founder Knut Eicke: But the entrepreneur, whose once-red hair and schoolboy high jinks inspired the site's name, has big plans He's targeting corporate clients who can afford to buy in bulk -- car dealers, for instance, who might want to reward their customers with gift policies that would pay out if gas prices hit a particular price. By 2004, Eicke aims to sell 1 million policies and this year he intends to take the company pubic Sounds risky -- good thing SirHuckleberry insures against stock market crashes, too.