EDMONTON – Two local sisters are on a mission to create an app that will make grocery shopping a little easier – and less pricey – for people with gluten intolerance.
After her 13 year-old son was diagnosed with diabetes and then Celiac disease, Jodie Costello’s first shopping experience wasn’t exactly a positive one.
“His mom was in tears after realizing how hard it was going to be,” her sister Melanie Nathan recalls.
“So we figured, you know, there’s something we can do.”
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The women are now in the process of fundraising to build an app that will work by letting shoppers use their smart phones to scan the ingredients of products in order to find out if they contain gluten. The team, which includes Edmonton app developer Sean Healy, hopes the technology will give people more choice when it comes to buying gluten-free food.
“There are aisles in the grocery story that are, you know, gluten-free,” Nathan says. “But the food is just so expensive. You’re paying for a gluten-free loaf of bread $8, or a gluten-free box of cereal that’ll cost you $9.”
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“People need to realize that they don’t need to just shop from that gluten-free aisle where everything is three times as much as it is in the other aisles,” she continues. “They can use the app to walk around the grocery store and find other solutions to what they can eat.”
The sisters would like to release the app in May, which is Celiac Awareness Month.
For more information, you can visit their GlutenGuru App Indiegogo page.
You can also find out more about Celiac disease and gluten intolerance here.
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