Waterloo students, researchers and alumni are at the forefront of unconventional innovation, shaping industries and increasing productivity.
When Henrietta van Niekerk, a fourth-year student in Global Business and Digital Arts at Waterloo found herself without a co-op job, she saw this setback as an opportunity to innovate by participating in Enterprise Co-op (E Co-op) a signature program at the Conrad School of Entrepreneurship and Business that allows students to pursue an entrepreneurial co-op venture for credit
Drawing on her entrepreneurial instincts and a personal understanding of the everyday challenges people face in making smart decisions in the grocery store, she launched Skrimp.AI a meal planning app that helps users save money by planning meals around grocery flyer deals.
Her parents were always thrifty, and she and her brother picked up that trait from an early age. After being inspired by a statement from Aaron Epstein at Y Combinator that challenged designers to use AI to launch their own products and build their own companies, van Niekerk saw an opportunity to turn this vision into reality.
Van Niekerk shares that Skrimp.AI was shaped by her own experience, coursework in design and business, an interest in artificial intelligence (AI), and Waterloo's entrepreneurship ecosystem.
From co-op credit to startup credibility
E Co-op is a uniquely Waterloo offering that provides ongoing mentorship and feedback on business development, practical workshops and access to funding opportunities. It was through this program that van Niekerk developed Skrimp.AI, with support from the late Dr. Wayne Chang, a Waterloo professor who helped shape E Co-op and was renowned for helping students turn bold ideas into thriving businesses.
During Velocity's Cornerstone a two-week sprint for students to share their business idea with stakeholders who live and work outside the University, van Niekerk interviewed parents with children to validate her idea with real people and better understand the problem.
Skrimp.AI leveraged the full range of entrepreneurship resources Waterloo offers to support founders, including hiring other Waterloo students, through the Bridging Entrepreneurs to Students program, established to support junior co-op students and seed early-stage startup companies.
"Very quickly, I had two engineers who were very well versed in software, so coming back from Velocity Cornerstone, I had a team to help me bring Skrimp.AI to life," she shares.
Harnessing the designer mindset
To build a user-friendly product, van Niekerk used listening sessions as part of her design process a mindset she learned in Global Business and Digital Arts.
These sessions allow the user to step back into their memory and tell her how they felt when they were comparing prices or what mindset they were walking into the grocery store with. The process gave van Niekerk deeper insights into her users than a survey would. "That's because a lot of users struggle to articulate the exact things that they want, but they know the things that are making them struggle," she says.
"If I can understand the user's pain points, then I can build something that will address some of those," she adds.
"I thought I was going to be the big tech designer, but getting to actually build something for people, or see actionable improvements in people's lives, even if it's just a little bit, has been so rewarding."
The free app is currently used by residents across Waterloo region, saving users between $50 and $100 each week. Looking ahead, van Niekerk plans to expand Skrimp.AI to the Greater Toronto area and eventually across Canada.
