Tabblr: Activity Finder For The Here and Now

Who among us is not occasionally faced with the problem of how to spend the next few hours, the afternoon, the day? This being Chicago, something is happening pretty much at every moment, but until now there was no one to tell you what, only where.

Enter Tabblr, the brainchild of co-creators CEO George Tung and Designer Milos Golubovic, who earlier came on the scene with myliferank.com.  Tabblr offers something different — its streamlined and easy-to-use website focuses on the events and activities going on around you today, right now. With interfaces for both user and business profiles, not to mention the ability to sign in through existing Facebook and Twitter accounts, this is up-to-date hands on management for the events and happenings nearest you.

Walking down Michigan Ave and looking for something to do? Pull up Tabblr’s mobile app, with its GPS locating software, and voila! Sales, bargains, events and specials all happening around you — you choose from a radius of 1-15 miles away. Did you blow your budget shopping and you need some cheap eats? Sort the results by category, with options such as food and drink, nightlife, outdoor activities and services. Since the listings are based on GPS location, Tabblr is recommended more for mobile devices than your public library.

“We’re not trying to take on Yelp or Foursquare,” Tung tells Flyover Geeks “they’re good at what they do [but] they’re limited in the scope of what those locations are up to. Tabblr doesn’t show locations, it shows the activities and events around you offered by the businesses signed up with Tabblr.”

This takes the initial decision element out — you don’t have to decide where first, you simply decide what from the list and since its right there, you go do it. Done and done. And to keep your peeps connected, you just add the activity to your tab and it gets posted in Tabblr, Facebook or Twitter, whatever your network of choice.

You can also check out the business’s profile page, add them to your own profile to keep regular tabs on them or follow a link to their Yelp reviews. And while the offerings are up only for the day, they aren’t the kind of daily deals offered by sites like Groupon, either.  First of all — Tabblr is free to use, for both the user and the businesses so that’s a win for everyone. Second, no purchase is necessary to score the stuff you see — you head to the activity location and show them the deal on your mobile device and ta-daa, you have redeemed this selective opportunity.

On the business end of things, this is an opportunity to be at the top of prospective customer’s lists. Once your profile is created — and business verified — you can manage separate locations and different activities for each through the central business profile. Tabblr is an activity finder for things to do — you won’t be finding any ‘online-only’ deals here — any business signed up with Tabblr must have a physical and local store or office.

In an effort to encourage businesses to keep things “unique and fresh, not activities that never change” Tabblr limits events to no longer than a day, though there is no limit to how short an activity can be. Fire sale on Bears gear during halftime only? Post it on Tabblr and you’ve got total discretion as to the details. Events and activities can also be limited to only Tabblr users for extra-special stuff or just your Tabblr followers as a way to say thanks for following us. And in an effort to keep things simple, businesses can copy previous events for future use, or set up the whole calendar month’s schedule at a time.

So far Tabblr’s got some great local groups on board: Leona’s Restaurants, Fairmont Hotel—Millennium Park to name a couple; and they’re courting several more, among them local Akira fashions and national fashion retailer Buckle.

Tabblr is available now in the Android and iPhone app markets, with Windows 7 and Blackberry platforms soon to follow. And, you can always check it out at http://www.Tabblr.com.