BY MELISSA MOORE, STAFF WRITER
Have you ever gone out to a party, had a little too much to drink and made a phone call that you wish you didn’t? The application Drunk Mode, which recently surpassed 1.3 million downloads, is here to help.
“Drunk Mode is the drinking app that your drunken self has always dreamed of,” according to the description on Apple’s app store.
Just switch your phone to Drunk Mode and your phone will have your back, according to the store’s website.
Drunk Mode is free for iPhones and Androids and doubles as a safety and party app. It has several features, including Find My Drunk (to track your friends while you’re out), Stop Drunk Dialing (which hides select contacts to prevent calls that you may not remember) and Breadcrumbs (which shows you where exactly your outing took you, from start to finish).
Additional Drunk Mode features include Find a Ride, which allows students to easily find an Uber or receive walking directions to their friends’ locations, and Hotspots, to help you find the best parties in your area while showing how busy they are, in addition to girl-to-guy ratios. Finally, SafeMode allows you to add trusted contacts to watch over you on your way home, call for assistance with a BlueLight button or easily call 911.
Sophomore Rahul Bajaj serves as the app’s business development lead. He met Drunk Mode Founder and CEO Joshua Anton at a Business Club meeting at Northern Virginia Community College and decided to join the 23-person team.
“I joined the team to help promote it because I really believe in the product,” Bajaj said. “When [Anton] presented the idea it was really interesting [to me] how this app can help people.”
The college startup was created in April of 2013 and has thousands of followers across its Twitter, Instagram and Facebook accounts. Bajaj said that the idea for Drunk Mode came to Anton after he attended his first party at the University of Virginia. The CEO answered a phone call that he regretted the next day. Thus Drunk Mode was conceived.
Bajaj said that Drunk Mode is a necessary app for students who want to go out and have a fun but safe time.
“It is important for college students to have Drunk Mode because it prevents them from drunk dialing and drunk texting,” Bajaj added.
Bajaj said that while he doesn’t drink, he believes the app will help keep his friends who do to stay off the roads when intoxicated and remain safe while they’re out.
Bajaj said the app can be useful for students who are non-alcohol consumers or partiers, too. He added he often uses the Breadcrumbs feature to keep track of everywhere he goes.
Drunk Mode has been featured on several different news outlets including the Today Show, Wall Street Journal, E! Online, MTV News, USA Today and the Huffington Post, among others. Bajaj said the app continues to grow and they hope to reach up to 3 million users.
