Visitors to New Orleans can discover the city through a local’s eyes by downloading a mobile app called FUHWE, which originated at the heart of an entrepreneurial competition in New Orleans. 

Co-founders Patricia Maher and Shawn Louis presented the winning idea at New Orleans Startup Weekend in 2015. Both from Grenada, they loved New Orleans’ assets and culture so much that they decided to stay and call their app FUHWE, which means “For Us” in Caribbean slang.

“We felt it explained the very essence of our company and built the authenticity of what we were creating,” Maher said. “We see a natural synergy between what New Orleans does and what the Caribbean does in terms of tourism.”

It’s easy to explore New Orleans like a local with FUWHE. Local hosts simply create a profile, get verified and certified, and post experiences they can offer to visitors, who pay for the excursions by credit card through the app. FUWHE currently offers 7 experience categories to search: art, culture, entertainment, food/beverage, history, music and sports.

Maher experienced the myriad of incentives New Orleans offers to startups, including co-working spaces, which she said were critical to FUWHE’s launch in 2016.

“New Orleans has a vibrant startup community with lots of support for newcomers to the city,” she said. “New Orleans is much more affordable for a startup company than, say, San Francisco or New York. We didn’t need to rent expensive real estate to start our business because we could start in a co-working space like Launch Pad, which made it very affordable. We are self-funded, so these costs are very important when you’re starting a business.”