Back in April we reported on an innovative loyalty reward startup called FrontFlip. The Kansas startup, founded by Sean Beckner, takes a unique approach to rewards by offering virtual, mobile based “scratch cards”.
FrontFlip is currently available for both iOS and Android, and back in April they already had 725 merchants signed up.
While heavily entrenched in a national rollout for the Overland Park based FrontFlip, their director of national account Ken Miner got some terrible news on the home front. SiliconPraire reports that Ken’s wife Kris was diagnosed with Stage 4B Large Cell Lymphoma. It’s a very aggressive and intrusive form of cancer with a life expectancy of 1-3 years. Milner’s doctors advised a quick course of action including a bone marrow transplant.
Less than a month ago, on May 11th the Miner’s found out that out of 17 million people on the national bone marrow registry, not one of them was a match for Kris.
So while maintaining his full time position at FrontFlip, Ken decided to attack his wife’s Lymphoma the same way that an entrepreneur would attack and solve a problem by founding a startup.
Problem: Kris Miner needs a donor
Solution: Team Kris Miner
Almost immediately Ken dove into his contacts and first reached out to Joe Cox, the President of the Social Media Club of Kansas City.
Of the phone call, Ken told SiliconPraire:
“(Kris) wants to tell her story, to be able to help people. That’s ultimately what she wants. Now, I’m a little more selfish; I want to find a match to give her the best possible chance of living.”
Ken is hoping that he can get 1000 new registrants on to the registry. As of Thursday 103 people had already signed up for the registry. Ken set up a Facebook page and a custom landing page on the national registry site. Friends, family and colleagues have already taken to Twitter with the hash tag #TeamKrisMiner
SiliconPrairie has posted these ways to help:
To register for program, Team Kris Miner has set up a custom link that tracks their goal to 1,000 sign-ups: join.marrow.org/krisminer. They’re also aiming to raise $25,000 for the organization. Ken said the monetary support is meaningful, as well, as it costs the National Marrow Donor Program around $100 per test conducted.
To learn more about Kris’ disease, the ways in which you can help and her hopeful treatment, visit kris-miner.com. You can also reach Ken by email, kminer@ken-miner.com.
Also, this isn’t the first time the tech community has seen an individual expecting for a bone marrow transplant drum up awareness on Twitter. In October, a friend of the founder of Photojojo turned to social media to encourage people to sign up for the bone marrow donation program. In January, a match was found.