Turning everyone into a scrimpr and saver

About Me

I'm the person behind Scrimpr and a moderator of r/beermoneyuk, one of the UK's main personal finance communities.

Scrimpr started as my website to host tools I had built for communities on Reddit. It's evolved into an independent financial education platform with comparison tools, guides, and resources.

My Story

I have a background in engineering and data analysis, and I currently work in "big data". My day job involves building systems and working with complex datasets, and I've been doing this for over 10 years now. But I've been around the block a little. Before, during, and after going to University, I worked in McDonald's, Tesco, and even had a short working stint in the bank. Throughout a lot of that, I've also had a hobby building and fixing things - selling CDs at school, buying broken GameBoys off eBay, fixing them, and selling them on.

But I wasn't always so on it with money. During university, I got myself into overdraft and credit card debt. I spent a year paying it off using tips and tricks mostly from Martin Lewis's MoneySavingExpert site (before it was bought out). That experience taught me how much difference good information and efficient tools can make to financial decisions.

After getting back on track financially, I discovered the UK finance subreddits, r/UKPersonalFinance and r/beermoneyuk. I became interested in optimizing returns, finding better deals, and making the most of financial opportunities. After lurking and then contributing regularly to r/beermoneyuk, I eventually became a moderator.

I kept seeing the same questions over and over: "Which site gives the best cashback rate for Amazon?" or "What's the highest signup bonus available for this bank account?" People were manually checking multiple sites and apps every time they wanted to find a deal. As someone with a technical background, I realised I could solve these problems by building tools that automated these comparisons. Scrimpr and Reddit are my hobbies when I'm not at work. But it's all data, so I love it.

Building Tools for the Community

I started building tools to help answer the questions I kept seeing. The first tool I built was an Octopus energy price history tool - originally, I made it using Google Looker. I then built a supermarket cashback comparison tool, followed by the GPT search engine and bank rate comparisons. Rather than people having to manually check which site gives the best cashback rate for Amazon or what the current energy prices were, I could build systems that do these comparisons automatically and keep the data current.

Initially, these were just tools I shared with the Reddit communities. But I realized they could be more useful if they were hosted properly and made more accessible.

Creating Scrimpr

That's how Scrimpr was born - as a website to host the tools I'd built for Reddit communities. I knew nothing about building websites when I started and made plenty of mistakes along the way, like choosing not-so-good hosting providers. I'm still learning how to make things look nice - I focus on getting things working first, then try to make them look as good as I can. You'll frequently see the website change its appearance as I learn new tips and tricks.

What Makes Scrimpr Different

• Built from scratch: I built every tool myself rather than just repackaging existing data
• Function over form: I focus on getting the data right rather than making things look fancy
• Community-focused: Built by someone who actually uses these tools and understands what people need
• Independent: No corporate overlords telling me what to promote

What Scrimpr Has Become

Today, Scrimpr is an independent financial education platform with comparison tools, guides, and resources. It's grown well beyond just hosting my original Reddit tools.

How I Work Now

I update most tools daily using automated systems I've built. When you see rates or offers on Scrimpr, they're usually pulled fresh from the source sites within the last 24 hours.

I work to get affiliate relationships with as many of the sites I write about as I can - this keeps the site free while funding the development of better tools.

Get in Touch

Questions about the tools, suggestions for improvements, or want to report an issue?

Since this is a one-person operation, I actually read and respond to emails personally. If you spot something that looks wrong, let me know - I appreciate the feedback.

Thanks for taking the time to learn about what's behind Scrimpr. If the tools are useful, great. If they're not, let me know how to make them better.