Food deal app Hooked launches in Orem/Provo area

If there’s two things college students love, it’s food and good deals. Thanks to popular food and drink app in college towns, Hooked, students in Orem and Provo now have access to both.

Founded in 2011 by childhood friends Tim Rothwell and Brett Berman, Hooked is a free mobile app that collaborates with local restaurants to offer deals and discounts on their products to anyone who downloads the app.

“We launched our first location at the University of Texas in Austin, and we got about one third of the student body using Hooked by the end of the fall semester,” said Rothwell. “It provides students, young professionals and faculty an app that [helps them] decide what to eat. It makes choices easier and more convenient.”

Launching in Orem and Provo marks the app’s fortieth location in the country and the second one in Utah. Hooked went live at Utah State University in 2017, and visitors of the school clamored for the app to expand to Utah Valley.

The app opens on a page similar to Instagram, and lets you scroll down to see the current deals. Deals are organized by location, so the food spots closest to you will appear at the top. These offers are time sensitive and will usually appear for a few hours before the deal expires. Scrolling through quickly to see what is offered, there are national chains such as Little Caesars and Cold Stone next to local favorites like The Roll Up Crepe and Aubergine and Co.

The biggest draw for Hooked is that the app is completely free to use. Most other food apps charge a delivery or subscription fee, but all you have to do to get exclusive deals on food you love is download and sign up.

For restaurants, the app helps draw in customers and establishes a relationship with them, where apps like Doordash or UberEats keep customers at home. With Hooked, users can find new favorite spots and explore their city.

Bryson Naylor, a UVU graduate in entrepreneurship and a market manager for Hooked, thought that bringing Hooked to UVU was a no-brainer.

“At other campuses, bars and fraternities play a big part in the success of places around town. There isn’t really that culture here, but everyone still loves a deal,” Naylor said. According to him and Rothwell, business is booming already. “We’ve already [partnered] with close to 50  restaurants around town. Over the past 24  hours we’ve had nearly 750 UVU students sign up,” said Rothwell.

To celebrate this new location launch, Hooked is offering users two free food events a week for the next four weeks. They’ll be displayed at the top of the app and run as long as the everyday deals. Hooked is available on the Apple App Store and Google Play, so every student can take advantage of this money-saving app.