Millions of students all over the world every
year leave their homes and head for college for at least the next four years of
their lives. For most of them, they go from being under the roof of their
family and having most of the main responsibilities taken care of to being
completely on their own away from their homes in a whole new environment. High
school didn't help much in prepping them for college outside of classes, so
students find themselves completely lost on how to take care of themselves
regarding responsibilities such as proper scheduling, budgeting/financing,
cleaning, cooking, etc. This can become a much bigger problem than people think
as it can lead to students blowing through all their money, eating unhealthy
diets, living in unsanitary areas, and not having enough time to focus on their
academics. This market is all over the country in all college towns such as
Gainesville, Orlando, and Tallahassee for examples in Florida. The market
mainly consists of 18-22-year-old college students but more specifically those 18-19-year-old
freshman who are on their own for the first time. Right now, these students are
struggling to find answers for this solution. They can find help for these
problems individually through internet sources or just going back to their
parents assistance but those are not efficient and consistent ways of solving
their problems and many students hate having to bother their parents all the
time for more money or food or doing their laundry for them. This opportunity
is huge as there were over 20 million students enrolled in college in 2017
according to the US college enrollment statistics. As of now, the window for
this opportunity is not closing anytime in the near future because more and
more students have been attending college over the years, however, because of
factors like the ones I described above, there are many kids who are struggling
to much in college to be able to finish school which hinders the numbers a lot
in the long run.
To solve this problem, I have created an idea for an app that
covers all the bases in one hit. This application is like a college survival
guide to help college students be able to take care of themselves and get tips
on how to make the transition from home to college much easier. You would
initially purchase this app for $1.99, in return you get the basic run down
which actually has all the essentials. This app will help you budget yourself
by breaking down how much you should be spending and saving daily, weekly,
monthly based on how much you have and also give you tips like how to fill out
a check, how to apply for a credit card, how to use a credit card, etc. Also,
as far as shopping for groceries, supplies or anything really, the app will
search for coupons available at nearby stores and send them to you to use at
your convenience. For scheduling you put in your work and class schedule as
well as all the daily things you need to do throughout the week and it will
generate a weekly schedule for you with everything you have to do spaced out in
time slots that can evenly allow you to do everything you need to do without
cramming. Many students also aren't very well prepared on how to cook by
themselves when they get to school so for cooking, the app has pre-loaded
hundreds of recipes for easy to make meals that provide proper nutrients as
well for students since their diets aren't always top on the list of
priorities. All of these things also come with tips, reminders, alerts and
instructions on how to do them as well so students can eventually learn to do
it if they do not have the app accessible to them or near them or even if they
just do not have the app anymore. I am selling the rock that will be holding
down everything going on in the student’s life while they are focusing on
getting an education. This app also has long term benefits as it does not just
teach students these things now but also teaches them how to take care of
themselves post degree while they are starting their new lives in the real
world which is much more stressful.
As stated in the Innovation section, the app will solve the
need by showing and teaching the students how to take care of themselves as
well as assisting in their day to day responsibilities. Customers will switch
to this new product because it puts everything in one instead of solving things
individually. It will be so easy to switch too because you are just simply
downloading an app and putting in your info. There are not too many specific
competitors out there since this is one of the first ones of this product.
There are some individual like coupon apps and cooking apps but none of them
can combine everything. Packaging, location, and distribution don't play the
biggest role since this is available on the app store and you just need a
smartphone. Behind the scenes, we would have a marketing team, a software and
IT team, a customer support team, a finances team, and an executive team to
oversee it all and make the larger company decisions.
My most important resource would be my
ability to be one of the first of this product to enter the market because it
stops mass competition and is new to everyone, so they are curious to try it.
The next opportunity I may want to try is the same type of app but for newly
formed families like for couples having their first child and how to get
through it. In the next 5 years we would want to be downloaded in about 20-30%
of the some of the top colleges in at least 30 states.
Hey Christian,
ReplyDeleteI love your idea for this app of helping students navigate college life and essentially being their guide. Most college students come directly from high school and living at home with their parents so it is a major transition to go from that to then being independent and taking care of yourself while also being on top of your academics and even job if necessary. This application will help ease that burden and in turn reduce the increased stress and depression that comes along with such a transition.