Sep 08, 2016

Q&A: Student-Led Zippity Brings Car-Care to You

An interview with Ema Reid T'17 on her First-Year Project. Discover Ema's Pathway. 

 

So what is Zippity exactly and how did it begin?

Zippity Cars is an entrepreneurial First Year Project (FYP) that provides a subscription car-care service at one’s place of work.

Zippity came to be when co-founders Russell Walker T’17 and Ed Warren T’17 realized they had the exact same idea: a subscription care-care service. Ultimately the two were put in touch, realized they were working on very similar projects, and decided to combine forces.

Russ and Ed spent a lot of time working on [Zippity] during the winter prior to the FYP. They ended up winning a $2,000 founders grant, so their idea obviously had a lot of legs.

What was the main goal of the FYP?

Our main goal was to determine if there’s a consumer need for this type of service and what this business could be.

Our first null hypothesis was whether car maintenance is an issue that people are frustrated by. We found that the answer was overwhelmingly, yes! Car maintenance is one of the biggest issues people have when owning a car.

Our second null hypothesis was to determine what their exact pain points were: convenience, trust, the cost? After those pain points were identified, it helped us determine what kind of car service to offer.

What was your main takeaway from working on this FYP?

I purposefully chose an entrepreneurial FYP. My internship is in internal strategy at New Balance within a new division; I knew this would be an entrepreneurial venture within a larger company, so it was important for me to test what I learned—to make sure I was comfortable before setting out on this new project. Because of this FYP experience, I started my internship with more confidence and excitement about the skills that I’ve been nurturing at Tuck all along.  

Visit the Zippity Cars website to learn more. 

(Photo at right: members of the Zippity team celebrate Ema's birthday!)