Draft:Punchd

Punchd was a digital loyalty punch card app that was founded in 2009 by Reed Morse and Grantland Chew. It was released in 2010 for IOS and Android. In 2011, Google acquired Punchd. In December 2012, Google Announced that Punchd would be discontinued in July 2013. Users could still use their loyalty Cards until it was removed from the Play store and App store. Their website is still up with a closed business sign. At that time Punchd was shut down, It was 3 years old.

History prior to Google Purchasing

Early founding

In 2009, 2 students from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo named Reed Morse and Grantland Chew, wanted to make an app to help connect businesses with its customers. Keep in mind, Google had donated a ton of Android phones to Cal Poly University so Grant and Reed had the technology to create any app they wanted. They decided to create an app that rewarded customers with a loyalty punch card app. basically, the idea of the app was to buy multiple times from a business, the next time you buy from there, it would be free. They tried their prototype but it hadn't been released to the public.

Extra developers and Android and IOS release

Reed and Grantland decided that they needed more developers if they wanted to release Punchd so they got help from Niket Desai, Xander Pollock, Matt Joanou, Kareem Nassar and Nat Welch. Together, they made something bigger and better. In 2010, Punchd released for the Android and IOS operating systems.

500 startups

Following the release of Punchd, It was a part of 500 Startups. During its time with 500 Startups, It made $50k

Features

Punchd was a digital loyalty Punch card app that paired up with different businesses, usually small and local businesses. Punchd Users could use it to save multiple punch cards and to track their reward points on it. In order to stop users from cheating, Punchd used GPS technology to verify if users are in the store. Punchd also used QR codes in order to register that the certain item in the punch card was purchased.

Google Acquisition

on July 8th, 2011, Google had acquired Punchd for $10 Million. The reason Google bought Punchd so that they could strengthen its relationships with small businesses. It was also speculated that it was to help its Google Wallet mobile payment service.

Reception

Punchd was praised by Techcrunch as a part of the "7 most interesting startups at 500 startups".

Shutdown

In December of 2012, Google announced that Punchd would be discontinued in July 2013 in which it would be replaced by Google Offers. The reason according to Punchd is to "dedicate our team's time and energy into the integrations with other products." but some speculate that not enough businesses were interested in Punchd.