With the final of the Green Capital Digital Challenge Hackathon in less than 2 weeks’ time and in with the chance of winning £50,000, things are hotting up for shortlisted team Snapcycle!
In the hope of helping us all to tackle our ever growing mountains of ‘stuff’ and at a time where it’s becoming more and more important that we reduce our impact on the planet – Snapcycle have created a website and app that makes it easy to sell, reuse or recycle unwanted goods.
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We’re talking anything from sofas, computers and garden sheds, to glass bottles, gardening pots and dead batteries – not only does Snapcycle offer a platform to advertise your goods to the local community with just a quick photo but, if you can’t sell or give it away, it will also tell you how and where you can recycle it!
The Green Team
We got chatting to the team, who are all developers at web and app specialists Nudge Digital, to find out more about Snapcycle, their experience of the digital challenge hackathon and what they hope to achieve should they win at the final.
Speaking to team-member Ed Welsby about how the team got involved, it was clear that the event was very popular at Nudge Digital, making it tough to pick team mates for the challenge.
“Most of the company at Nudge Digital wanted to take part in the Green Capital Digital Challenge hackathon”
Ed tells us: “Ben (our Technical Director) found out about the hackathon and pasted a link in our team chat.”
“Most of the company wanted to take part after reading about it so we had to disappoint a few people to fill our allocated 5-person team.”
Sell, Reuse, Recycle
Once the team had been decided upon, what to do next seemed to come quite naturally. With the team consisting solely of web developers, Ed describes how building a website and app seemed sensible, as this was an area which played well to everyone’s strengths. But, he says: “We also felt it was the best way of providing a long term benefit.”
“We did some initial research on the various categories and were shocked by the statistics around waste and recycling, so felt this was the area where web technology could hopefully make the largest positive impact.”
The digital challenge judges agreed and it’s easy to see why with such a polished looking site and app (check out the sneaky-peek screen shot of the app on the left), created in just 48 hours!
“Seeing the judges and other guests logging into the site and uploading items – it came alive”
Ed describes their sense of achievement during the presentation at the first round of the challenge: “Seeing the judges and other guests logging into the site and uploading items – it came alive!”
Still challenges to come
Turning their ideas into a fully functioning reality won’t be without its challenges though. Ed tells us: “Our biggest challenge will be making the website self-sustainable without too much of a moderation overhead.”
It turns out a team consisting of solely web developers also mean the team are having to learn quite a few new skills along the way, to get the balance right between something that’s technically brilliant but also looks the part and functions well.
Ed explains: “We don’t have a dedicated UI designer on the team so we’re going to have to be careful not to have too much ‘developer art’ and create something that is both intuitive and accessible.”
“We hope to make a self-sustainable website that assists and educates people to recycle more of their unwanted items”
However, the team still have big ambitions for the future of the Snapcycle website and app, should they win the ultimate £50,000 prize at the final. Ed says: “We hope to make a self-sustainable website that assists and educates people to recycle more of their unwanted items.”
“We’d also like to keep as many items as we can out of landfill, by either finding them a new home or by assisting the user in recycling them as effortlessly as possible.”
Thanks to Ed and the team for answering our questions. You can get the latest updates by following them on Twitter: @Snapcycle. Keep an eye out for the last of the six profiles on the shortlisted teams next week as well as more information about the final at the Bristol 2015 International Youth Summit, which will be held at the Colston Hall on the 20 April.
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Bristol 2015 are also helping bring Venturefest to the South West to show off the amazing products and services being created in the Bristol and Bath region to potential investors. See Venturefest Bristol & Bath for more or keep up with the latest Venturefest news by following them on Twitter here: @venturefestbb
