The past few weeks have been high times for the Chicago based food sharing app, DinnDinn. After a successful launch of their first update, the team lead by Co-Founders Jeremy Markham and Kyler Juckins has overcome the struggles of not having in house developers to continuously update and refine their product after their initial launch.
“It’s hard to stay current and keep up with the ever changing landscape that today’s mobile app industry presents,” said Juckins when discussing the challenges of waiting so long to update. “You get to a point where you almost lose motivation completely because it’s hard to hear the great feedback that users send you without having the ability to make changes,” he added.
Markham and Juckins launched DinnDinn, their first ‘real’ entrepreneurial venture two years ago. After contracting Clique Studios on Michigan Ave. to build the first version of the app, the two young entrepreneurs made great strides but didn’t anticipate the need for the changes and updates that would soon need to take place. Markham said of this oversight, “It’s a little embarrassing to admit that we made such a big mistake in terms of planning, or lack thereof, but it’s one of those lessons that we learned at the age of twenty and will remember for the rest of our entrepreneurial lives – you’ll almost never be perfect the first time around! There are probably a lot of people out there laughing at us and how we made this mistake, but that doesn’t discourage us because we’re taking the chance, trying to build something from scratch.”
It’s the optimism and desire to learn and grow that has kept DinnDinn alive. Over the summer the Co-Founders were able to connect with their now lead developer, Nate Shane. With his extensive development experience, entrepreneurial know-how, and love for everything mobile, Shane was exactly what DinnDinn needed to fulfill their technical needs. “Nate has been a huge addition to our team, just look at his resume,” Juckins quipped.
DinnDinn wont’ be going anywhere any time soon, unless of course, you’re talking about up. Chicago is the best place for the team to be thanks to the start-up scene as well as the fact that the city is more or less in a golden age for food. Markham and Juckins both agree that they need to overcome the barrier of helping people remember that they should post most of what they eat or drink at restaurants on DinnDinn. Not only is it good for users in terms of keeping track of what they eat for health reasons, but also because they can go back there time and time again and know what they ‘loved’ or ‘hated.’ From a community standpoint, people using DinnDinn will only help to improve the quality of food available regardless of location, but especially in Chicago. On top of it all, users who post dishes will be helping other people who use, or might want to use, the app because now they will be able to see what everything on a menu actually looks like before ordering it. There are sure to be some great recipes from kitchens all across America filling the DinnDinn live feeds, too.
Get on DinnDinn and start posting! Keep building, Chicago!
Contact Jeremy Markham: [email protected]
Contact Kyler Juckins: [email protected]
Contact Nate Shane: www.linkedin.com/in/nateshane
Download DinnDinn for FREE: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dinndinn-friends-sharing-food/id553855391?mt=8
[ibimage==41622==Original==https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dinndinn-friends-sharing-food/id553855391?mt=8==self==null]
