About us
Online product recommendations are broken. We're fixing that.
What we do
PerfectRec is a personalized product recommendation site. We ask you simple questions and use a combination of human experts and machine learning to recommend the perfect products for your unique needs.
Why we do it
It's harder than ever to find the right product online. Spammy search results, fake reviews and paid affiliate sites make it nearly impossible to get an honest and smart recommendation. We're solving that problem by combining actual human subject-area experts with machine learning to help everyone — regardless of their expertise — find their perfect product, quickly.
Online shopping doesn't have to be a daunting time-suck, hours spent combing through impenetrable specs and questionable reviews. Getting good recommendations at the right price point is possible. At PerfectRec, we help people to find the right stuff, faster — and make their lives better, easier and a little more perfect.
How we provide perfect recs
Our goal is to provide the perfect recommendation for you — not just another list of the "49 Options You Might Consider." In order to do that, we guide users through a series of questions about what they're looking for. After each answer, we share updated recommendations with you; the more questions you answer, the better our recs get.
When Google or Amazon recommends a product for you, they're using data gathered from your browsing history to guide you toward what other people like you tend to buy. But we're not interested in people like you — we're interested in you, specifically. And ultimately, we get more information about what you need by going straight to the source: you. With a few quick multiple-choice questions, we can make better recommendations, tailored to your individual needs.
Electronics and beyond
We are starting with consumer electronics, like phones, TVs, laptops and earbuds. After that, we'll evaluate other product categories such as cars, home appliances, e-bikes and credit cards. When the time comes to monetize, we will do it with targeted auction-based shopping ads, not affiliate links.
The leadership team
We're a group of experienced entrepreneurs, many of whom have worked together on a previous successful startup.
Joe is an economist and experienced startup founder. Previously he was a software engineer at Microsoft and an economist at Google and Upwork. A lifelong tech enthusiast, he has a well-honed radar for detecting false claims and marketing nonsense. As the resident skeptic and “gadget guy” in his family, Joe has spent untold hours coaching family members on how to evaluate big purchases and think about major decisions. Now he's building PerfectRec to help everyone cut through the fake reviews and marketing jargon that have made online shopping so hard.
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Lindsey has a JD from the University of Michigan Law School. She has worked as legal counsel for a number of Indian tribes and as general counsel for Collage.com, where she focused on supplier contracts, employment law and employee benefits.
Josh is a professor in the department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at UC Berkeley, where he also earned his Ph.D. His primary research and teaching interests are in introductory computer science, generative art, the social implications of computing, data science, and machine learning.
Nick is a Recommender Systems expert with over a decade of experience and an international background. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Warwick and was the Chief Data Scientist for Dressipi, a UK-based personalization provider.
Co-founder, Marketing & Product Wally was an early employee at Collage.com, where he led the company's marketing efforts. Prior to that, he managed digital and direct mail for US House and Senate campaigns. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan.
Craig is an engineering leader with experience in startups and large organizations. He was an early employee at Collage.com, and worked at Thomson Reuters and Strata Decision Technology. He has a BSE in Computer Engineering from the University of Michigan.
Our values
What sets us apart
Every company has seemingly the same set of generic corporate values. These are a few we believe set us apart.
True Honesty
Honesty isn't just the absence of lying; it's saying what you actually think. If an idea is bad, we say so. If we aren't certain about something, we don't pretend we are.
Open Debate
Solving hard problems requires raising issues, sharing evidence and thoroughly debating potential solutions. We believe respectful and constructive argument is part of the job.
Curiosity and Skepticism
We're curious about the world and skeptical of incumbents, gatekeepers and other defenders of the status quo.
Fun Working Together
We believe a fun workplace is one where people have fun working on hard problems together — not a place with semi-mandatory happy hours.
Problem-First Thinking
We're obsessive about learning everything we can and gathering as much relevant evidence as possible about the problems we're solving. We want to know what's wrong with everything, because that's the only way to solve everything.
No Powerpoint
Powerpoint and other presentation tools discourage actual thinking. We don't use them. Instead, we explain our assumptions and reasoning in writing, using shared documents to allow collaboration and asynchronous feedback.
We Are Maximizers, Not Satisficers
We aim to build the best possible product recommendation service possible, period. We will never stop improving and our mission will never be complete.