Will Edwards sits in his Washington Ave. office describing a situation we all know far too well - watching someone coming at you that you’re really supposed to know, but for the life of you their name has vanished from your mind. It’s an sinking feeling, and a situation best avoided; luckily, Edwards has a solution.

“MetKnow is a patented flashcard and quizzing application that helps members and organizations learn each other’s names – so you can review flashcards, quiz yourself on them and get to know their names,” said Edwards - with earnestness radiating from his friendly face.

It’s a solution compelling enough to earn him a coveted Arch Grant in 2017.

He was inspired to start MetKnow through his experience in college trying to keep the names of his 200 fraternity brothers straight.

“We would call each other man, bro, guy – anything other than their names because we didn’t want to mess up,” he told HEC Media.

So, he created a mobile flashcard set and some related quizzes for his fraternity brothers and him to study. The early version of the app spread like wildfire throughout the frat, and Edwards knew he was on to something. He filed for a patent, and pretty soon he was dropping out of law school to pursue the company full time.

Edwards described the moment as exciting but scary “because I had no real plan … we needed to [re-build and] refine it - but I had a lot of support from my parents, my family, and some of my very best friends.”

It took a few years but Edwards and his team continued to refine their product and released their flagship option MetKnow Business in January of 2017.

“Companies want their new employees, who they spend a lot of money on, to feel comfortable, to know each other,” said Edwards. “We have it in multiple companies, with others in the woodworks – a good amount of users - and people have been willing to pay for it.”

They sell their business to business through human resource departments and customize it for each company, but also launched a  new product for individuals in 2018. Anyone can download the individual app for free, create a group and make their own deck. Each group you create can be any size you need, and will link to LinkedIn as well as Google Images.

The app will be free to download, however, it won’t be completely free to use. If you share a group you’ve created with others they’ll need to pay 99 cents to accept that shared group.

Edwards and his colleagues came to St. Louis for the first time in early 2017 to participate in the Midwestern Digital Marketing Conference and were “just blown away by St. Louis,” he said. It was then that they learned about Arch Grants.

They knew they needed that ticket to St. Louis for MetKnow.

“Right then and there we went home, applied for the Arch Grant and waited for the good news. Being able to say you are an Arch Grant recipient is incredible,” said Edwards.

He and his team continue to grow MetKnow here in St. Louis and in Santa Monica, CA and contribute to the St. Louis startup scene.

Copyright © Amanda Honigfort, 2019