{"id":17718,"date":"2020-03-21T16:42:45","date_gmt":"2020-03-21T16:42:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rbsitsoftwaresolution.com\/blog\/instagram-founder-launches-gift-card-site-for-quarantined-restaurants.html"},"modified":"2020-03-21T16:42:45","modified_gmt":"2020-03-21T16:42:45","slug":"instagram-founder-launches-gift-card-site-for-quarantined-restaurants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rbsitsoftwaresolution.in\/blog\/instagram-founder-launches-gift-card-site-for-quarantined-restaurants.html","title":{"rendered":"Instagram founder launches gift card site for quarantined restaurants"},"content":{"rendered":"

Coronavirus quarantines are hurting local businesses, but Instagram <\/a> co-founder Mike Krieger <\/a> wants to help them keep revenue rolling in. Krieger and his wife Kaitlyn this week launched SaveOurFaves<\/a>, a directory of Bay Area restaurants selling gift certificates to offset lost income amidst \u201cshelter in place\u201d orders across the region. Users can search for restaurants or browse by neighborhood, and then click through to buy gift certificates straight from the eateries with no added fee from SaveOurFaves.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re no longer going out because of COVID-19 (San Francisco is under a \u201cshelter in place\u201d ordinance), so we started buying gift cards to help support our favorite cafes and restaurants during this unpredictable time,\u201d write the Kriegers. \u201cSaveOurFaves is our simple way to make it easier for people to help local businesses.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

For now the plan is for SaveOurFaves<\/a> to focus on the San Francisco Bay Area that the Kriegers call home. It\u2019s currently listing 700 restaurants and coffee shops, and getting 50 submissions per day. Similar sites for other locations are quickly popping up, including Help Main Street<\/a> in New York, and Give Local<\/a> and Rally for Restaurants<\/a>, which provide directories for multiple cities.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been heart-wrenching\u201d<\/h2>\n

The Kriegers got the idea<\/a> for SaveOurFaves after a call with Zack Schwab, Mike\u2019s sister\u2019s partner and co-owner of SF restaurant The Snug. \u201cHow long could he keep the restaurant afloat with sales plunging?,\u201d Kaitlyn tells me. The couple says there are 12,000 small businesses that employ more than 350,000 people in SF alone. The problem was too big to fix with one-off donations.<\/p>\n

But then they saw an Instagram post about how NYC restaurant Atomix was asking their community to support them through gift cards, and set out to build SaveOurFaves with Kaitlyn doing design while Mike coded. They crawled the web for a list of local restaurants, and hired people through Fiverr to hunt down their gift card links. The Kriegers plan to expand the site to include other types of businesses, and today they open-sourced the code<\/a> so others can build versions for their own communities.<\/span><\/p>\n

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AUSTIN, TX \u2013 MARCH 11: Josh Constine, Mike Krieger and Kevin Systrom speak onstage at Interactive Keynote: Instagram Founders Kevin Systrom Mike Krieger with Josh Constine during the 2019 SXSW Conference and Festivals at Austin Convention Center on March 11, 2019 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Chris Saucedo\/Getty Images for SXSW)<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve lived in the Bay Area for over 15 years, and one of the reasons I fell in love with it was the vibrant community of shops, restaurants, caf\u00e9s and other businesses,\u201d Mike tells me. \u201cIt\u2019s been heart-wrenching to see the immediate effect that the shutdown has had on the people working at these places. While there\u2019s no one single thing that will solve the problem, I\u2019m hopeful SaveOurFaves is one of many initiatives to help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Krieger and his co-founder Kevin Systrom resigned from Instagram<\/a> and Facebook in November 2018 following tensions regarding Insta\u2019s dwindling autonomy. Systrom last night published a model for predicting the magnitude of the spread of COVID-19<\/a>. \u201cWatching [Instagram\u2019s] growth, I became interested in the science of how<\/em> things grow,\u201d so he built an equation for a SIR model where \u201cevery individual is in one of three states: s<\/strong>usceptible,\u00a0i<\/strong>nfected, or\u00a0r<\/strong>esistant.\u201d The model finds that there\u2019s a 95% chance of more than 15.4 million infections in the U.S. \u201cI\u2019m hopeful that these predictions push policymakers, local governments and individuals to take extraordinary precautions to reduce transmission rates,\u201d he writes.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Krieger and Systrom told me they plan to start something new together<\/a> during a talk at SXSW a year ago, but are still exploring opportunities. That\u2019s given Krieger the time to build out SaveOurFaves with his wife. Restaurants need all the help they can get. \u201cThis is like armageddon,\u201d SF restaurant China Live\u2019s chef and owner George Chen told Eater\u2019s Luke Tsai<\/a>, referring to the three-week shelter-in-place order issued across California.<\/p>\n

While restaurants can still offer delivery and take-out, higher-end spots with large dining rooms or that usually only offer dine-in are being hit hard. China Live cut its workforce from 200 to 20. Oakland\u2019s Brown Sugar Kitchen laid off its whole staff of 50 except for three full-timers. The SF Mission\u2019s Prubechu went from 20 to employees to just five managers who also took pay cuts, according to Eater<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Brown Sugar Kitchen and Prubechu are now two of the many restaurants listed on SaveOurFaves. If users discover one of their favorite haunts is missing, they can submit them via a form to have them added or to have SaveOurFaves reach out to recommend selling gift certificates. The site even recommends how restaurants can contact their point-of-sale provider like Square or Toast to start selling gift certificates, or make their own gift cards on GiftUp<\/a> or GiftFly<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More ways to help<\/h2>\n

SaveOurFaves is just one of many efforts spearheaded by local techies to address the health crisis and the subsequent financial fallout of social distancing. Crypto startup MobileCoin<\/a>\u2018s Joshua Goldbard helped create The Safety Net Fund<\/a>, which has raised $145,000 to provide living-expense grants to Bay Area artists who\u2019ve lost income due to event cancellations. Investor Ryan Sarver of Redpoint Ventures and friends are running an #SFHospitalMeals<\/a> program where people can donate $1,000 to buy meals from local restaurants for hospital staff<\/a> of SF\u2019s emergency rooms and intensive care units. You can click through those links to donate.<\/p>\n

The Kriegers hope the government will do more, too. That includes \u201cBig, immediate and lasting cash transfers<\/a> to Americans,\u201d as well as zero-interest loans for small businesses that need representation in the conversations about stimulus efforts. \u201cW<\/span>e are also advocating for a reduction in prison jail density, because those populations are exceptionally vulnerable to a pandemic like this,\u201d Kaitlyn tells me.<\/p>\n

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The Safety Net Fund<\/a><\/p>\n

In the private sector, they support the idea from Electronic Frontier Foundation\u2019s Peter Eckersley for Apple, Google and other mobile operating system vendors to create an opt-in, privacy-preserving feature for contact tracing<\/a>. That could notify people if they\u2019ve been near someone who tested positive for the virus. And when the crisis subsides, the couple note that we\u2019ll need ways to smoothly reconnect people with stable jobs.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s been a lot of talk about \u2018flattening the curve\u2019 of the coronavirus outbreak \u2014 slowing the spread to reduce the burden on our healthcare system,\u201d Mike concludes. \u201cWe hope SaveOurFaves<\/a> will help \u2018flatten the curve\u2019 of lost income for restaurants \u2014 giving them the resources to make ends meet and preserve the livelihood of wage earners during this difficult time.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

Article source: http:\/\/feedproxy.google.com\/~r\/techcrunch\/social\/~3\/oL3ErPQQ2hU\/<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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