Many are finding that a period of stress and limited mobility has deeply affected their physical, mental, and social well-being. Enter wellyou, an app startup that combines the best gamified science-based wellness activities to provide users with the knowledge and tools to create a sustainably happier and healthier life. wellyou are launching their scavenger hunt, the world’s largest, in 1500 cities across the globe on June 19 to engage users in a fun adventure where all the players win as they improve their bodies and minds, and strengthen and enlarge their social bonds.
wellyou founders Adam Schuster and Amelia Strzepek were about to launch the wellyou app in March 2020 when COVID-19 shut down their plans. “We were so devastated by what was going on, but we hunkered down, like everyone else, to be safe and take the time to reevaluate,” notes Amelia. Adam adds, “then we realized we needed to do something bigger than just the app once people got vaccinated and could resume regular activities. Since we were already doing a gamified app, we thought, let’s do a global game, so our wellness scavenger hunt was born.”
Players will be able to access the scavenger hunt via the official website: www.wellyouworldwide.com. Starting on June 19, the web app will direct them to three scavenger hunt locations in their city daily, and instruct them to do a physical, mental, and social wellness challenge via video.
From climbing to the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles, to running along Lake Ontario in Toronto, to taking the stairs up the Empire State Building (even if they only do 10 flights before taking the elevator to the observation deck!) in New York City, to doing a quick workout at “Checkpoint Charlie” in Berlin, players will be able to enjoy experiences both internationally and locally known.
Once they complete a physical challenge, the app will also deliver mental and social challenges from completing a puzzle to contacting your nearest friend for a quick catchup and so much more. These activities will help users reintegrate into their cities and regularly scheduled lives.
Better physical, mental, and social health isn’t the only reward available in the wellyou’s scavenger hunt! Players are also eligible for prizes from numerous global and independent health, wellness, and sustainable brands including Freeletics, HUM Nutrition, Cognifit, and many more, with new brands coming into the game all the time.
You can learn more in this interview.
Why did you decide to create the wellyou app?
The idea of wellyou came about after Adam, my partner, had been working on a big project with a friend, which fell through, almost from one day to the next. Not only did he lose a friend and partner but the next planned-out years were suddenly empty. Before reflecting on his future, he decided to firstly focus on getting himself out of his slump by looking into the science of happiness and creating a program for himself where he would work on improving his physical, mental, and social wellbeing.
At some point, he thought, “wait, if this can work for me, it could surely work for others!” This is exactly when wellyou was born.
The one thing we all want in life to be happy but we never formally learned how. We have between 10-20 years of schooling where we were prepared for the working world. We learned to read, write, took courses in history and science, etc. but our schools never offered courses on how to live a full and balanced life.
And yet so much research has been conducted around the world that can be turned into small daily actions, helping people create good habits for the future, and therefore build sustainable levels of happiness and wellbeing. With wellyou, it’s all about putting this knowledge, that has been proven by experts to work, into practice for real, positive change. wellyou is a holistic and gamified program designed to increase peoples’ happiness & well-being on all levels (physical, mental, social) with science-based methods in an app.
wellyou is also a product of Adam’s life-long interest in helping people and finding solutions for their problems. After years of listening to people’s stories, he realized that the greater the gap between who someone is and who they want to be, the more unsatisfied the person is with their life. With wellyou, we enable people to close this gap themselves so that they can lead the lives they want to lead.
How can scavenger hunts be fun and beneficial?
Studies show that when you make small changes in your daily tasks or routine, it allows your brain to make different connections and, therefore, work more effectively. This is exactly what a scavenger hunt allows you to do! Exploring new spots, turning left where you would normally go right, and partaking in new activities can spark creativity and these connections as well, which makes a scavenger hunt a fun and great way to do good for your brain health.
Why did you start one?
After a long year and a half of not being able to go out and do all the things we love doing, we decided to launch something that everyone can do and enjoy even with covid-guidelines. The wellyou scavenger hunt is a fun game that encourages people to work on their wellbeing and health in a unique way.
Available as a web app, participants get to explore parts of their city that they may have never been to before by searching and walking to three different locations during the hunt. At each destination, the participants will be encouraged to complete a challenge on the spot, related to physical, mental and social wellbeing. Challenges can range from lunging to the next building to learning a new word in 5 different languages to complimenting a stranger, just to name a few. What’s more, for those who complete all 3 challenges on one day can enter the raffle to win a cool prize from one of our sponsors. We are proud to have partnered up with 24 amazing wellbeing companies.
How does gamification help people improve habits?
A gamification approach can help to increase participants’ motivation to keep working on their goals. By giving small rewards for tasks throughout the game, such as points, it will increase the appeal of repeating those tasks and working towards the next small goal, supporting intrinsic motivation. This gives participants a sense of achievement which reinforces positive behavior helping users to develop a habit. Gamification can help keep players accountable with the use of tools, like calendars, where one can place tasks to be completed for that day or week, followed by a reward. Most importantly, gamification is a great training method that makes learning processes more fun, creative, productive, and helps people to retain more knowledge and acquire new skills.
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