Parties and other gift-giving occasions have always mattered to Bhavna Sehgal. When she throws parties for her children, she spends a lot of time creating the perfect invitation. For the other people in her life, Sehgal devotes just as much care in picking the perfect greeting cards and gifts.

How can you capture these special moments and well wishes? Sehgal has come up with an app called Wish Me (wishme.io) that aims to do just that.

With it, people can send and receive personal video and photo invitations, and greetings. Users can also collect, save and share photos and videos from their celebration.

“What I’m trying to create is a virtual shoebox of memories,” says Sehgal.

That’s just a start. Sehgal already has plans to broaden the applications, helping users to manage different aspects of festivities.

She sees Wish Me becoming a party planning app, where people can not only create invitations but also find vendors and set up gift registries. She’s focussing on children’s parties for now, to help busy parents.

Another possibility is using the app as a platform to send and receive selected gift cards.

Sehgal didn’t set out to be an entrepreneur. She has an MBA, and has done consulting work in finance and strategy. The idea for Wish Me came from her experiences as a mom and gift-giver, realizing that life is made up of special milestones and moments. So why not find ways to seize, amplify and preserve them?

Though she had been mulling over the Wish Me concept since 2015, she only started working on it in earnest in late 2017.

To help Wish Me take shape and get off the ground, Sehgal received early backing from the Northumberland Community Futures Development Corporation. She also linked up with a mentor through the Forum for Women Entrepreneurs, sponsored by KPMG.

Another boost came from Haltech, which is Halton Region’s effort to help tech companies accelerate innovation. “That helped me to get more clarity on my business,” she says.

Her next step is to raise investments. While Wish Me may end up having multiple uses, the philosophy behind the app is clear. Show and share the depth of your feelings, and create lasting memories.

“It’s about meaningful interactions,” says Sehgal.

This article was originally published on the StartUP HERE TORONTO site.

Author:  Stuart Foxman
Photo Credit:  Zlatko Cetinic