Local app developer creates app to order lunch from NewBo Market

CEDAR RAPIDS—When Jarod Smith first started building mobile apps in January 2013, the market was still fairly new to him. “I’ve been doing web development for 14 years now,” Smith told SPN. “But I’ve been doing coding of some kind for almost 20 years. Web development got me into mobile apps and I found I…

Lions Den Mobile logoCEDAR RAPIDS—When Jarod Smith first started building mobile apps in January 2013, the market was still fairly new to him.

“I’ve been doing web development for 14 years now,” Smith told SPN. “But I’ve been doing coding of some kind for almost 20 years.  Web development got me into mobile apps and I found I could use my web tech knowledge to build cross-platform mobile apps.”

In August, Smith rebranded his company as Lions Den Mobile, a name he says he felt more passionately about, and recently spoke at Iowa City’s 1 Million Cups about one of the projects he’s been working on: an iOS and Android app to order lunch to Geonetric’s newly opened building in Cedar Rapids’ NewBo neighborhood.

Earlier this summer, Smith says he saw a post from Geonetric CEO and Iowa Startup Accelerator organizer Eric Engelmann looking for someone to design an app to allow people working in the Cedar Rapids building to easily order and have food delivered from the nearby NewBo Market.

“I volunteered for it and started working with Eric and the people at NewBo Market people to figure out a way to pay for food from different vendors every day,” Smith said.

The free app, which is called NewBo2Go, uses Dwolla as the back-end payment system, which Smith says helps reduce the fees and hassle of the process. While NewBo2Go is only currently available for residents at Vault Coworking Space, members of the Accelerator and Geonetric employees, Smith says that down the road he’d like to see workers from around the area using the app to order lunch from the Market’s local vendors.

Smith also has built a mobile app for the Iowa Cultural Corridor Alliance to help manage upcoming events and is developing a side project of his own called CStore Deals, which helps gas stations reward their customers with convenience store deals.

This story is part of the AIM Archive

This story is part of the AIM Institute Archive on Silicon Prairie News. AIM gifted SPN to the Nebraska Journalism Trust in January 2023. Learn more about SPN’s origin »

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One response to “Local app developer creates app to order lunch from NewBo Market”

  1. […] Check out press mentions for new companies: Blue Cheese (twice), Ellison Eyewear, Lions Den Mobile and Spectator. […]