• Food prices have increased by 15% in one year, according to the latest data from INSEE, released Friday.
  • In Nice, Simeon Simeonov, an 18-year-old high school student, launches a smartphone app to "make the maximum savings despite price increases".
  • Tous Anti Inflation is based on "the Open Food facts food library, used in particular by the Yuka application, and the websites of supermarket drives that offer this service," explains the young adult.

When you are a high school student and you still live with your parents, a priori, you have a wallet protected from the effects of inflation. But nothing prevents you from feeling concerned. Simeon Simeonov, for his part, took it to heart because, "during family meals, [his] parents talked more and more about it, about the fact that shopping was always more expensive for them". So this 18-year-old from Nice, who arrived from his native Bulgaria at the age of 6, wanted to help them. Them, and all those who regularly push a shopping cart.

The student in Terminale "Digital and Computer Science" of the high school Sasserno, in the center of the capital of the Riviera, has thought about an app to "make the maximum savings despite the price increases", 15% in one year on food products, according to the latest data from INSEE, communicated Friday. Tous Anti Inflation (the nod to TousAntiCovid is more than obvious), a kind of mega comparator, came out "after three or four months of work outside the classroom", says the young man. First on Android, at the end of March, then for iOS three weeks ago.

Open source data

With "just a few small algorithms" and above all the right idea, Simeon Simeonov offers a solution a little austere for the moment but above all devilishly effective. The program of the young adult, who had until then "hacked" lines of code but above all created many websites for which he began to sell his talents, is based only on open access data. "I rely on the Open Food facts food library, used in particular by the Yuka application, and on the websites of the supermarkets that offer this service. Quite simply," he explains.

The operation is childish: just scan the barcode of an item (or type its name) and, in a few seconds, its price is displayed for each of the different brands. Tous Anti Inflation allows you to put your shopping list in a basket and compare. With two solutions. Go to the store that offers the cheapest total. Or, for the more adventurous, the possibility of visiting the different brands to buy each item at the best price.

"The most expensive casino, Leclerc offers the best rates"

Thanks to this system, the young man has in any case forged a fairly precise vision of the offer. "Casino is regularly the most expensive. Carrefour and Auchan are often well placed and Leclerc offers the best rates in 70 to 80% of cases," he told 20 Minutes. Even if it means offending one of the giants of mass distribution.

Our Inflation Dossier

If his app takes off, which would not be surprising given that 97% of French people now say they "systematically compare prices" according to a study by the E.Leclerc observatory of New Consumption with Ipsos, published Wednesday, the young man should quickly add new features. In particular, he would like to list "all the promotions of the flyers, such as one bought, one offered, or the second at 50%, and one day why not propose the transfer of the basket directly on the site of the seller concerned. "

With a monetization of its app to the key? "I hadn't even thought about it," Simeon Simeonov said. If it is proposed to me, that would be good. Without advertising for the moment, his app is mostly free and should remain so "otherwise, it would make no sense," according to him. But the high school student, who pays a subscription to servers to run Tous Anti Inflation, still offers the possibility of "making a donation". Just click on the little heart at the top right of the smartphone screen. "A way to encourage me to keep going," he says.

  • Economy
  • Inflation
  • Feeding
  • Nice
  • Alpes-Maritimes
  • Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
  • PACA
  • Mobile app
  • Tech
  • Mass distribution