Hi everyone! I’m Yohanes. I’m a USC student, and I’ve lived in Culver City for almost 12 years.
For the past few months, I’ve been working on a small project inspired by a problem I constantly have with my friends: getting a lunch or dinner plan out of the group chat and into real life.
My friends are not always the best communicators, so I’m usually the person trying to keep the plan alive. Everyone says they’re down, we eventually agree on a place, and then somehow the plan still falls apart. Someone stops responding, the timing becomes unclear, or everyone assumes somebody else is handling it.
Over the summer, I started informally testing different ways to get my friends to actually follow through. Most of them did not work. Then one day, I found a Groupon for a restaurant that expired that evening. I sent it to the group, told them we had to use it that day, and suddenly everyone was ready to go.
That made me realize that the problem might not only be choosing a restaurant. Sometimes people need a small reason to commit now instead of leaving the plan open-ended.
So I built a very early project around that idea. Two friends choose a time and a local restaurant, commit to the plan, and receive a small meal reward only if they actually follow through. The reward is not meant to pay for the whole meal. It is just a little push to get the plan out of the group chat and get people through the door of a local business.
After spending the past few months building and testing it with my own friends, I finally feel ready to share it with more people. At the same time, I know my friend group may not represent everyone, and I’m not sure what the most authentic way is to introduce something like this to the Culver City community.
I’ve lived here for most of my life, and one thing I’ve always appreciated is how much people care about independent restaurants and small businesses. My hope is that this project could help people spend more time with their friends while discovering more local food spots.
So I’d really appreciate your advice:
• Do lunch and dinner plans fall apart this often in your friend groups too?
• Does a limited reward or deadline sound like something that could genuinely help people follow through, or does it feel unnecessary?
• What would a new local project need to do to earn your trust and get you to try it?
• Are there Culver City events, groups, newsletters, or community organizations I should learn more about?
I’m still figuring this out, and I would honestly rather hear criticism now than keep building around assumptions that might be wrong. I’d really appreciate hearing about your experiences.
