AD Roberts
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If it’s been a while since you’ve hiked, strolled through your local park, or smelled the proverbial roses in your own backyard, you’re not alone.
We live in what’s been called the “inner generation,” but a new Atlanta-based app seeks to change that trend and connect more people to nature.
Roots provides “accessible ways to connect with nature” for those seeking to explore nature-based mindfulness.
Roots is the brainchild of entrepreneur Clint Jarvis, a veteran in the B2C startup space. Its goal is to “open up the natural world in a unique way,” even if users don’t have time for a day-long hike or an hour-long meditation.
The app includes guided meditations, audio-guided outdoor experiences, and selected soundscapes from around the world. The soundscapes, captured by Emmy-winning acoustic ecologist Gordon Hempton (aka The Sound Tracker®), can take you from Belize to Sri Lanka to dozens of natural spaces in between.
The meditations and experiments aim to help users connect with the natural world and are voiced by Meryl Arnett, an Atlanta-based mindfulness teacher behind The Mindful Minute Podcast.
The goal is to make both the natural world and mindfulness more accessible. The latest version of the app was launched last month and almost half of the first users are people trying a meditation app for the first time. This, Jarvis says, suggests there’s a gap between what big meditation apps offer and what users are looking for.
Meet the team
Jarvis previously founded gottaGolf, a B2C social golf app, which was acquired by Connecticut-based golf technology and media company SwingU in 2017.
He has since helped open Intown Golf Club, a private social club in the heart of Buckhead that has become a go-to retreat for golfers and non-golfers alike.
Jarvis started the app by partnering with two of his gottaGolf co-founders, Jesse Wallace and Trong Bui Tuan.
Jesse is an Atlanta-based designer who is the lead UX designer at Dragon Army. Trong is an iOS developer who lives in South Australia with his wife and young son, who goes by the name of Clint.
Mindfulness doesn’t always mesh perfectly with the “starter track,” Jarvis admits, but he started his own mindfulness journey while developing gottaGolf. He told Hypepotamus that being in nature brought more balance and creativity to his day, but he soon realized that the top mindfulness app players missed weren’t connecting with nature. and the outside world.
Building a mindfulness-focused app comes with a whole new set of challenges than others in the startup space are experiencing. For Jarvis, it’s about creating “conscious KPIs” and not necessarily about optimizing the user’s screen time.
Her advice for people who are just starting to explore mindfulness: just start. The app offers 5 and 7 sessions for those who want to try nature-based mindfulness between meetings or after a stressful day at work.
