❓ Problem

Disasters used to be rare enough to ignore. Not anymore. The US logged 23 billion-dollar disasters in 2025, costing $115 billion, and the gap between them has shrunk from 82 days in the 1980s to one every 10 days last year. Around 14.6 million properties sit at substantial risk of flooding, nearly 70% more than FEMA's own maps admit.

When it hits, the problem is rarely a lack of supplies in the country. It's the last mile. After Hurricane Helene, western North Carolina had 400+ roads closed and officials told everyone to consider every road shut. The water trucks existed. They just couldn't get up the mountain.

And households are not ready to wait it out. Only 51% of adults think they're prepared for a disaster, and the Census Bureau found roughly 3.1 million adults were displaced by one in a single year. Of those, 37% ran short of food and 29% lacked drinkable water. The emergency kit you meant to buy is still in your Amazon basket. The backup plan is "hope the road reopens."

✅ Solution

Manna Aid: a disaster relief subscription that pre-positions essentials and coordinates deliveries when roads are cut off, where conditions allow.

• Supplies are pre-positioned before anything happens. Members' food, water purification, hygiene kits, batteries and basic meds are stored in local micro-depots on high ground, sized to the households covered. No scramble to source stock while the world is panicking.
• Delivery partners carry the last mile. Manna doesn't build drones. It contracts operators like the ones already flying for Walmart, plus boats, off-road vehicles and local crews, and triggers them the moment a member's area is cut off. Drones handle the light, urgent stuff where conditions allow.
• Members get a plan, not just a promise. Each household logs its needs (people, pets, prescriptions, a baby on formula) so the right drop goes to the right door, and the app becomes the check-in point when phone networks wobble.
• Donors fund coverage for people who can't pay. A "sponsor a household" tier funds deliveries through relief partners in disaster zones at home and abroad, with proof-of-delivery photos and GPS logs so donors see exactly what their money did.

The insight that shapes the product: a gallon of water weighs about 8.3 pounds, and Zipline's home-delivery drone carries 6-8 pounds. One drone drop is roughly one gallon. So drones won't haul a family's water. They'll fly in the filter, the insulin, the inhaler and the phone battery, while the depot and ground partners do the heavy lifting.

📊 Key Numbers

Market size

• Americans spent $11 billion on emergency preparedness in a year, with 29% of adults buying something. Demand clearly exists; it's just spent on one-off gear that sits in a cupboard.
• The natural disaster survival kit market alone is around $1.6 billion globally, with North America the biggest slice.
• Foundations directed $1.7 billion to disasters in the latest Center for Disaster Philanthropy count, before you add individual giving. That's the donation side's addressable pool.
• SAM (our estimate): the 14.6 million flood-exposed properties, plus hurricane and wildfire belts. If 10% subscribe at ~$20/mo, that's a ~$350M annual market in the US alone.

ARR potential