Meet Drew Koszulinski of Rayka in Boulder

Today we’d like to introduce you to Drew Koszulinski.

Drew, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Rayka started with our CEO, Landon. He had been traveling full time for a while when he started to get the idea that there was something missing in the market that would help people like him figure out what to do when they arrived in a new city. The idea was born from the cumbersome process of sourcing recommendations from friends or other personal contacts. He found that two things seemed to be consistently happening whenever he asked someone for recs. That person would either forget every restaurant or experience they’d ever been to in that moment, or they would dig deep into their phones for a small paragraph inside a notes document with their favorite experience from their trip to the city in question. This is the problem that Landon set out to solve, and since then, the product has seen a pretty vast evolution based on more market and user research. The first version, launched to a controlled group of student beta testers, informed the second major update of the product which was designed by myself in conjunction with the team based on what they learned from the first version. Since then we’ve been tweaking this version and testing marketing strategies in 3 cities throughout the US – Denver, San Diego, and Charleston, SC.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
No startup is exempt from unexpected speed bumps. Much of Rayka’s struggles align with what you’d expect from a company whose intention is to grow fast: hiring is challenging and time consuming.
Seeking a path to revenue is inherently nerve-racking. A sick day or simply some PTO for one team member on a small team can easily create roadblocks for others – the list goes on. All that said, during my time at Rayka, our team has proven to be highly resilient, flexible, and understanding of one another, and I believe this is why none of the speed bumps I’ve seen during my time here have been all that notable.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
Rayka’s biggest differentiator is a fundamental shift from the way people decide where they’d like to eat, drink, or explore. Part of our mission is to disrupt the 1-5 star review system that plagues consumers with piles of distractions and red herrings when they decide where to go – what people really want to use to help them decide is: a recommendation from a trusted individual or community. We’re simply providing the infrastructure for folks to source these recommendations and hopefully, share their own with their friends and family.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.rayka-app.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rayka_app/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RaykaApp/?ref=br_rs
• Other: https://apple.co/2Mr3uJG

Image Credit:
Rayka

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