Our Story
bestphoneplans.net Started as a Senior Project
This website was designed, built, and created by two people, Stetson Doggett and Peter Mankiewich, and it all started as a senior project.
Stetson Doggett runs and manages a YouTube channel focusing on cell phone plans. From his research in the industry, he knew browsing online for plans was awful. Small carrier websites like Twigby, Pix Wireless, and Straight Talk can be confusing to navigate and understand. Which plans have what features? What network is each carrier using for coverage?
Even the large carrier websites like Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile make it challenging to compare plans and features. Their options are confusingly similar, their prepaid plans are separate and hard to find, and they often promote buying phones instead of signing up for a plan. It was also difficult to compare plans between carriers to see who had the better deal.
Stetson thought a website would be the perfect compliment to his YouTube channel. If he was having trouble comparing plans, he knew other people must be as well. While he was selecting courses for the spring semester of his senior year at Ithaca College, he noticed COMP 307 being offered by the Computer Science school. The course was an independent project where students could pitch an idea to faculty for a project related to website design or development and receive academic credit for it.
Stetson pitched his idea for designing and building a website for comparing phone plans, and his project was approved. Peter Mankiewich was brought on to the team because of his strong experience in website design and development, and because he was the president of YEO, the Young Entrepreneurs Organization. Peter could bring his skills and experience to the project to help turn a simple website idea into a viable business opportunity.
Together, Stetson and Peter worked on designing, building, and creating bestphoneplans.net throughout the spring semester of 2019. The website officially launched on May 1st, 2019, and it continues to be worked on today.