Trinity Student Creates App to Buy and Sell Textbooks

MICAH ONDITI ’18

CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Micah Onditi ’18, a current Trinity student, created an app called Mivy. Mivy is an e-commerce app designed exclusively for college students with the slogan “Sell Last Semester. Buy The Next.” The app provides college students with a viable alternative to continuously buying expensive course materials. By providing a direct connection to their peers, Mivy will offer students a network to obtain course supplies from each other and save a pretty penny. Mivy is for college students ranging from pre-orientation freshman to seniors about to finish their last semester. The app is available on the iOS App store.

During my first year at Trinity College, CT, there were many times when I was required to buy textbooks which I ended up barely using. At the end of that semester, those books sat on my dresser collecting dust.

Stories like this are all too common in the lives of millions of college students. At the end of the semester, students are left with three options with respect to purchased books:

1.Sell the book back to the bookstore for a fraction of what was originally paid.

2.Keep the book in one’s room to clutter the shelves.

3. Throw away the book.

In response to their needs, over 17 million students buy course supplies every semester. I spent the summer after my freshman year creating Mivy. The app is meant for students with no use for a textbook from last semester. Mivy is a platform for them to reach out to their peers and easily sell their book. For the student looking to buy materials for their next semester, Mivy allows buyers to negotiate the seller’s initial price of a book to fit their own bank account. Mivy currently has hundreds of users at many universities along the east coast and has the potential to quickly become a national dorm room name.

I have recently been accepted into ReSET’s Impact Accelerator for the creation of Mivy. With the help of mentors, such as Anthony Price of Loot Scout and Richard Brown of Metro Hartford Alliance, I plan to propel Mivy to the place it deserves to be – the top.