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Sunnyside - Mindful Drinking — SMS-based alcohol tracking to improve your health & wellness
Sunnyside helps anyone who regularly drinks alcohol to build mindfulness and intentionality around when and how much they drink. Plan and track your drinks via 2-way text message, and see how small changes to drinking habits can have a big health impact.
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Dan Pierson
I've been using Cutback Coach for a few months now and it's helped me noticeably cut back on my drinking. The SMS notifications cut through the noise, and are a quick, easy way for me to log how much alcohol I've had the previous day, without having to open up an app. Once I got into the routine, it became easy to take just a few seconds and a natural part of my morning.
Look forward to seeing analytics sometime down the road - will be interesting to see how much I've had over the course of the summer and to see that line continue to trend down. Maybe at some point, you could also connect to smart scales, Apple watch, etc. to combine drinking data with other health tracking.
For anyone looking to manage their alcohol intake, I highly recommend giving this a shot (no pun intended).
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@danpierson Thanks so much for being an early tester, Dan! Longer term analytics are being worked on as we speak. We hope to have a week in review live by Monday to show you how you're doing relative to your starting point, and the goals you specific upfront in the onboarding process. I think it's going to be a pretty cool step forward, so looking forward to hearing what you think 🙂
haha as a 34 year old, @Nick Allen and @johnmcbride24, booze's impact on sleep and energy only gets more pronounced from here on out
@nick @johnmcbride24 @danpierson Hahaha I hear you! Great reason to start being proactive now so we can live forever 🙂
Top Hunter
Love this kind of light touch intervention for changing one's relationship with alcohol. I like that it's positioned to help you "cut back" rather than "stop" altogether. By amplifying your motivation for cutting back with regular reminders, I think you're more likely to succeed!
@chrismessina that's the idea, I appreciate the feedback! From my own personal experience I've never felt that my drinking was out of control or that I needed to quit entirely, but definitely did have times here and there where I'd overdo it. I tried a bunch of apps to moderate but none felt quite right for the use case of optimization and awareness building, and all subtly seemed to guilt trip towards quitting entirely. My goal is to make this a lot more fun and less somber, so that the conversation around alcohol health can break into the mainstream.
@ashwinl you're in the right place! We're really focused on helping anyone who drinks at all, even if not a lot, to optimize when and how much they drink in order to achieve other health benefits like sleeping better, losing weight, and increasing energy levels and productivity. There are specific strategies around how to consume to avoid negative next-day effects and maximize enjoyment without the downsides that I think can be helpful for any drinker. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts as you get into the product!
Have enjoyed the simplicity of SMS-based goal setting. Think MyFitnessPal for alcohol intake. I can definitely see this kind of engagement/interface working well for other types of "habit changing" behavior.
@cfrolich love that analogy Colin! We've learned to track everything from calories and steps to mindfulness, mood and even anxiety levels. For some reason alcohol has been largely left out of the conversation, but I think now is a great time for that to change.
This product totally surprised me (in a good way)! I'm a health conscious person but never thought too carefully about alcohol consumption, despite tracking my steps, sleep and different areas of women's health. I love the feeling of having deeper levels of understanding (and thus, control) over this. I find myself looking forward to checking in on how I'm doing over the week, and making small changes for optimization, which really seem to make all the difference on a weekly basis. The friendly, non-judgmental nature of the app is perfect in quarantine times when you might find yourself having a few more glasses on a weeknight. :)
@kiramccroden So glad it's having a positive impact for you. And I think you'll really like the new feature we've got in development to give more visibility into longer term trends and insights. Stay tuned!
I've been using Cutback Coach for a few weeks now and have noticed a significant increase in awareness to my drinking habits, which has absolutely led to a decrease in consumption. Getting started was quick and easy, and although I was skeptical about the app-free experience (almost the entire UX happens over text message), I found it to be surprisingly intuitive and useful. Getting started was pretty simple: Fill out a form telling Cutback Coach how many drinks you have on average each day of the week, set a goal for the upcoming week, and then let start tracking your drinks, which is as simple as sending a 🍺 every time you crack open a cold one. The science/psychology behind changing a habit by bringing awareness to it is sound (see Noom as an example), and Cutback Coach definitely makes bringing that awareness to your drinking a cinch. I highly recommend checking it out, even if it's out of morbid curiosity about how much you drink in a typical week.
@thepaulthompson thanks for the review! I too was surprised that the simple act of tracking could make such a profound impact, but the change has been really dramatic for me as well. I'm now 5 months into tracking my own consumption, and have lost about 10 pounds, am sleeping better, and exercising a lot more regularly. It gets better the longer you stick with it!
Love your mission, positioning, and sheer focus on SMS as an engagement channel. Excited to continue following your journey!
@johnny_chen Thanks so much! We've still got a long way to go to bring the conversation around alcohol health out from behind the taboo, but hopefully this can be a step in the right direction!
I started using this a week ago and it has become an absolutely essential part of my health tracking. The SMS flow is extremely well done - maybe the best I’ve ever seen - and the onboarding is very good as well. Highly highly recommend this. I think it will be a breakout.
I've been using this product for the past few weeks and have loved it! The power of tracking my habit not only made me more informed of my alcohol intake, but also helped me cut down on it (even though I didn't think I needed to).
Great job Nick!!
@anthony_emberley I really appreciate it Anthony, and glad you're liking the experience so far. More to come in the form of longer term trends and insights, plus a deeper understanding of how alcohol impacts other areas of your health and wellness. So excited to have you on board!
Nick, this is a great idea and incredibly helpful to raise awareness. If there's a book recommendation that I've found helpful is Dr. Gabor Maté "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction". The case studies might be helpful.
@david_fox2 Thanks David! We have an exciting new feature we're shooting to launch either next week or the following. I think you'll like it!
@nathaniel_robinson exactly. We want to make alcohol tracking a part of your overall quantified health picture, and connect the dots between alcohol and overall wellness. You'll be amazed to see how small changes to when and how you drink can have a major impact on your mental and physical wellbeing 🙂
@sahar_hash thanks so much, I really appreciate it. And even if you aren’t fighting with your drinking, being proactive about building awareness about how alcohol impacts your wellness is a good idea!
I've really been enjoying this product for the past month or so.
+ Suuuuper simple and lightweight.
+ The reminders are timely, and feel like they're coming from a trusted friend.
+ Quantifying and tracking my habits has upended a previously "guilty pleasure" experience to one where I can enjoy myself and still feel healthy.
+ I've been able to cut my drinks by 30%!
* Looking forward to more social features :)
Great job @nick_allen8 !
@steven_chien I really appreciate the feedback, and so excited to hear about the 30% reduction, that's huge! Social features are on the radar, as are longer term stats and game mechanics to keep the experience fresh and interesting over time. Looking forward to hearing what you think!
Hey everyone! Nick here, founder of Cutback Coach. A bit about me: I grew up in a household with 2 recovering alcoholics (now 30+ years sober!), so when I started drinking in high school, I had a lot of help in recognizing my own proclivities and tendencies around alcohol.
I’ve spent the last 15 years building awareness around my habits, through many ups and downs. In exploring apps and services in the alcohol health space, I found a large concentration of products focused on helping problem drinkers get sober, but very few options for those who enjoy drinking and have no desire to quit, but who could nonetheless benefit from increased awareness about the role alcohol plays in their overall health and wellness.
Cutback Coach is my attempt to fill this gap.
My mission is to help **anyone who regularly drinks** — whether just a little or kind of a lot — to optimize their drinking to achieve quality of life benefits like sleeping better, losing weight, waking up with more energy, and saving money. I want to make tracking drinks as common and socially accepted as tracking calories and steps. And just like you don't need to be extremely out of shape to benefit from tracking diet and exercise, I believe you don't need to be a "problem drinker" to benefit from increased awareness about your alcohol consumption.
Cutback Coach is a simple, behavioral psychology-backed system for planning and tracking your drinking. Instead of another app, we've started with **SMS as our core delivery mechanism**, so we meet you where you are in the text inbox. I believe text is the perfect channel for habit forming products that require frequent engagement, given the reduced friction to participation the channel enables.
I invite you to check out the product and let me know what you think. You'll be surprised how small changes to your drinking can have a big impact on your overall health and wellness.
**And the best part? Product Hunters can get started with a free 15 day trial!**
I'd love to hear what you think. Check it out and drop a comment below!
I love that this approach takes the bite (negativity) out of feeling guilty w/ drinking -- instead focuses on a thoughtful, practical approach. I wonder if other adjacent industries might take a cue from this...
@b_nicks11 thanks Brian! Yeah I think a big reason the vast majority of drinkers don't actively manage the habit like they do other parts of their health is that up until now it's been really taboo and unapproachable. By creating an experience that's 100% supportive and guilt free I hope more people will feel comfortable joining in, and see the benefits increased mindfulness can bring!
I am an early Cutback Coach user and I love the simplicity of the product and utility. Love it @nick_allen8 !
Exciting! Great work on this product Nick. So far the SMS tracking and interface is the killer feature for me. Makes it really easy and low-pressure to log and track throughout the week. I'm also appreciating the overall tone... it feels like a service that's meant to assist with health and awareness rather than cut out alcohol completely. I definitely need to get better at making my weekly commitment though :)
@ian_andersen I really appreciate the feedback and your early engagement with the product! Still a lot more to do to make the process of planning and tracking even easier, but glad to see it's been useful for you so far!
Behavior change is difficult and takes time so it helps when the process is fun. I found that Cutback Coach helped me to be cognizant of my drinks and the emoji input / output functionality made it fun to check-in daily. I'm excited to see what's next - leveraging engagement tactics like streaks etc to help drive continued impact. I can imagine added functionality with mood logging and added visualizations to understand personalized trends within the journey as well. Highly recommend and excited to see what's next!
@luke_langon thanks for the feedback, and definitely on the same page in terms of what comes next! We're aiming to release a new feature to provide longer term trend visualization and streaks on Monday, then from there can start to introduce simple game mechanics to provide reward for longer term engagement in the form of quantifying the impact small changes make over time. Looking forward to hearing what you think!