LSU Alumni Create Crawfish App
05/17/2017
BATON ROUGE - A husband and wife, both LSU alumni, have developed a cell phone app
to make it easier for you to eat crawfish.
鈥淭he idea came to us three years ago. At the time, we were having crawfish boils just about every weekend and it took a lot of time to call all the vendors, to figure out who had crawfish and how much they were,鈥� said Ryan King, co-founder of The Crawfish App.
Both Ryan and Laney King received bachelor鈥檚 degrees from LSU. Ryan studied engineering and Laney studied finance. Laney also received her MBA from the E. J. Ourso College of Business. Ryan is currently a third-year law student at the Paul M. Hebert Law Center.
鈥淚t鈥檚 really kind of the mix of both of our backgrounds,鈥� Ryan said. 鈥淭he technical aspects of the app, I鈥檝e taken care of. The business side and the sales side, she鈥檚 taken care of all of that.鈥�
The app is free for the user and the vendors.
鈥淓ventually we鈥檙e going to make money off advertising on the app. So, the more downloads we have the more appealing it is for advertisers,鈥� said Laney.
The Crawfish App allows users to search for live or boiled crawfish based on the price, reviews and their location. It鈥檚 not just southeastern vendors listed on the app. There are vendors from Illinois, Tennessee, even New York, Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
鈥淥ur goal is to have every single vendor on the app,鈥� Ryan said.
The Kings update the prices every week, calling the more than 900 vendors every Thursday.
鈥淏ecause that鈥檚 when we have been told they update their prices for the weekend. And we want users to have the most updated prices for the weekend,鈥� Lainey said.
They said the app is their way to celebrate Louisiana.
鈥淩eally, if you want to celebrate something every week in Louisiana, there鈥檚 something to celebrate. And we wanted to do something to give back to Louisiana. So, when we came up with The Crawfish App, we thought this is a great way to celebrate our culture. But what we didn鈥檛 see happening, is what it would do for the hardest working industry in Louisiana, which is the crawfish industry. This is their livelihood and they have one shot, six months out of the year to make the money to pay for everything and provide for their families. So many of them didn鈥檛 have a way to get the word out about their business,鈥� Lainey said.
The Crawfish App competed in LSU鈥檚 sixth annual Venture Challenge. The competition showcases student entrepreneurs and provides their businesses with capital and resources. The Crawfish App placed second in the competition and was awarded $6,000.
Additional Link: https://www.thecrawfishapp.com
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Contact Rachel Spangenthal
LSU Media Relations
225-578-3869
rachelsp@lsu.edu
More news and information can be found on LSU鈥檚 media center, www.lsu.edu/mediacenter.