Written by Tobiasz Dankiewicz (BASc ’13) & Michal Martyniak (BASc ’11)
Canadians
love
their
flyers.
They
are
an
essential
part
of
how
we
shop,
the
focal
point
of
retail
marketing
budgets,
and
a
$3
billion
a
year
Canadian
enterprise.
The
creation
of
reebee
was
inspired
by
our
first
jobs
distributing
flyers
around
our
neighbourhoods.
At
the
time
we
learned
how
important
they
were
to
our
neighbours’
daily
shopping
routines.
By
the
time
we
arrived
at
the
University
of
Waterloo,
we
were
already
wondering
“Why
aren't
flyers
available
on
our
phones?”
It
was
strange
to
think
that
such
a
massive
industry
did
not
innovate
on
its
own!
We
knew
as
consumers
we
wanted
an
easier
way
to
engage
with
flyers
on
the
go.
It
wasn’t
available,
so
we
set
out
to
build
it.
We had the idea. What we didn't have was the business expertise. We reached out to friends who had taken their own projects to market. Before we simply dropped down cash to rent office space they advised us to look into Velocity, UWaterloo's booming entrepreneurial program. Through it, we learned about a pitch competition that could earn us $25,000 and free office space for a year.
More importantly we were immediately connected with the co-founders of Kitchener-based software company Vidyard. They taught us how to pitch our business, and as a result we were awarded $25,000 from the Velocity Fund program in January, 2012.
Velocity was already pulling strings on our behalf, helping us network and draw insight from entrepreneurs who were a few steps ahead of us. The Velocity environment was instrumental in enabling us to focus on our core business, and providing great mentors to help us through the roadblocks startups traditionally face. In the summer of 2013 we went to the highly regarded startup incubator Y Combinator in California, and picked up more invaluable lessons.
Eventually, we came back to Kitchener-Waterloo and began establishing reebee as the next great Canadian startup.
Why KW? Talent. We loved the co-op program, and we continue to hire co-ops from UWaterloo and other surrounding schools.
What began as a simple idea, brought on by childhood experience, was given life by UWaterloo's entrepreneurship programs. For that we are grateful and encourage all incoming and current students to take full advantage of the same opportunities we did!
Photo credit: Crestina Martins