In a culinary city like Chicago, a casual walk around any neighborhood could inspire a list of must-try restaurants and cafes.
But what's an on-the-go foodie to do? There's Yelp, but that requires you to log in and write a review to save spots. There are note-taking apps, but you can't share those recommendations with others. Food-oriented city explorers have turned to everything from pen-and-paper notes to excel spreadsheets to keep track of their culinary to do list, and offer recommendations to anyone looking for a specific spot.
That's the pain point that Ryan Mattison, a University of Chicago Booth alum, is aiming to address with Nomwell, an app that launches today on iOS and Android, and accompanying website Chicago Tastemakers.
Nomwell acts as the ultimate foodie to do list. Users can search, save, and share restaurants, cafes, and bars in curated lists with accompanying maps that can be sent via email to someone looking for recommendations. Users can also write notes, tag, and rate each eatery, and follow friends' lists. Plus, the app is debuting a function that can import text-based documents into the app, so you can onboard an ongoing restaurant list from an Excel spreadsheet, Notes app, or Word document right into the app.
Users can also save and view restaurant lists for any city across the US--helpful for travelers hoping to find new restaurants ahead of a trip.
The shareable and social aspect of the app is key, said Mattison, because people tend to take recommendations from those they know.
"Anyone who cares about eating out is looking for really good restaurant recommendations, reliable recommendations, and what we have online is secondhand and third degree," he said. "We end up trusting the recommendations from people we know or look up to most. If we could have some useful tool for keeping track of a restaurant list…and then be able to share recommendations within that platform, it would be the best of both worlds."
In addition to the app, Nomwell is also debuting a special website in the city called "Chicago Tastemakers," which will feature curated restaurant lists from local Michelin-starred chefs, bloggers, and tastemakers. Over the next few weeks, the site will showcase recommendations from Graham Elliot (G.E.B), Chris Anderson (of Moto), Amy Cavanaugh (of Plate Magazine), Erica Eckman (of Chicago food blog Everything Erica), and Curtis Duffy (of Grace) among others. Nomwell users can follow and save these lists to their own account as well.
Nomwell is certainly not the only restaurant discovery and list app out there, but they hope to be the one that brings foodies' favorite restaurant list features to one place: a one-stop-shop where foodies can take notes, rate, curate lists, plus find and share recommendations on one platform.
"We're trying to be as helpful to the individual as possible," he said. "We want to curate a platform where you're only engaging with the most helpful recommendations."
The idea came to Mattison, who previously worked in finance, when he sought date night restaurant recommendations from Booth friends. He was overwhelmed with suggestions, so he decided to compile all the restaurant recommendations in a Google spreadsheet and pin them all on a Google Map. The resource was a hit among his colleagues.
Previously Nomwell went through the New Venture Challenge and Booth's Polsky Summer Accelerator. Currently their focus is to create a solid product, and plan on exploring revenue options in the future. One idea is to offer a premium version with extra features.
Through word of mouth, the app already has over 1,500 users, which has signified to Mattison that there is a hunger for their tech. "People are already keeping restaurant lists, so it's a need that people are filing on their own," he said. "We're just offering a free, really awesome way to do it better."
