Meet The Guys Who Created A Mobile Food App Before Their 19th Birthdays
Jeremy Markham and Kyler Juckins are a couple of small-town, college-aged kids. "We will just have to see where we end up," the duo muse when asked about their long-term career plans.
But unlike the vast majority of their generation, the two have already gotten a business venture off the ground, even securing investors at age 18. They are co-founders of DinnDinn, a mobile app that launched in August of this year and acts as a virtual fridge for food and drinks — users are able to follow friends, celebrities and food connoisseurs based on culinary likes and dislikes.
Say you've always wondered about the chicken enchiladas at your local Mexican joint. With DinnDinn, you're not only a couple of clicks away from user photos and opinions, but also from becoming "TasteBuds" with others based on personal preferences. We caught up with Markham to find out why a couple of young dudes spent their time developing a food app rather that playing video games or something.
How did the idea originate for creating the DinnDinn app?
Thankfully both of our fathers are successful businessmen, so we have had entrepreneurial influences since a very early age. Throughout our high school years, we came up with a few good ideas that we never thought would be feasible. One day we were in Kyler's kitchen reflecting on those ideas and it finally came to us – why not figure out a way for people to share food on social media and meet people while doing it? As boring as it sounds, we were just sitting around eating and were not doing anything overly exciting. There were no hackers and programmers with us.
What are your personal goals for the app?
First and foremost, we wanted to create a great product that we really loved, and this all started with our love for food. We have already achieved multiple personal goals such as finding investors and having the app go live – we managed to get investors on board just a few days before we turned 19.
What about business goals?
We would like to get to the point where our brand is recognizable to a wide range and number of people. Our "mascot" is a guy with a burger for a head, something people have really enjoyed thus far — and hopefully he will become somewhat of an icon. We would like to expand the numerous ways DinnDinn will go about becoming financially prosperous while being innovators in the multiple industries we are in. It is exciting having a company as well as a passion of ours being merged together into something we get to work on everyday.
Where do you currently live? What are your favorite restaurants?
We both grew up and currently reside in Naperville, IL. We happen to share the same favorite restaurant and it has a lot of history: Dell Rhea's Chicken Basket on Route 66 in Willowbrook, IL. Although we have to drive about 20 miles every time we want to go there, it is well worth it.
What is the first sip of alcohol that will ever (legally) hit your lips?
Being that I am Irish, the first sip of alcohol to hit my lips when I turn 21 will be a well-poured pint of Guinness. Kyler, being a proud Chicago native, will enjoy a 312 beer. Naturally the two of us will celebrate this day together, as we were both born on the same day in 1992! It is fun to hear some people's responses when we tell them we are quite literally the exact same age – we have been told the stars are aligned for us...among numerous other humorous things.
Has food always been a big part of your life?
Food has been a very important part of both of our lives. I am of Irish heritage, so I had a lot of different types of food from Ireland in my home growing up, along with the typical American staples. In his early teens, Kyler traveled around the northeastern U.S. and Canada for hockey and was able to experience all the great food that part of the country had to offer.
The DinnDinn app is available for Apple and Android, via the DinnDinn website.
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