A text messaging service that began five months ago with the aim of connecting Latinos in the community has collected more than 1,100 subscribers.

David Iberkleid, a 29-year-old UNC graduate and Chapel Hill resident, spent months researching and testing technological products and resources to engage Latinos before launching ReK2 (re-CAH-dos), Spanish for “messages,” in April.

Through ReK2, individuals receive text messages to about anything from job opportunities, upcoming events, recent news, promotions and emergency notifications. Users of the service are able to subscribe to several different categories, or channels, and receive related text messages. They can also respond to those messages and forward them to their friends.

Since its launch, the service has gained followers in North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia, with potential for expansion up and down the East Coast.

“The real value is that it’s a conversation starter, and that’s good for organizations as much as businesses,” said Iberkleid, who moved to the United States from La Paz, Bolivia, when he was 19.

He said the growth in the last few months has been driven by the participation of local businesses.

“That’s what’s going to make me sustainable—just giving technology to organizations and businesses,” he said.

Latino’s Express Plus, a tax-preparation service in Carrboro, was the first business to create its own channel. The channel is managed by owner Natalia Meyer and though only a few days old, already has 25 subscribers.

Through a special phone number, Meyer said the company sends promotional information, discounts and raffles.

Latino’s Express Plus has found advertisers to help cover the cost of having her own channel, and Iberkleid believes she could become a go-to for local message broadcasting.

“She could sell that service to people locally,” he says.

“If we have an event going on, anything like that, we send it out, and it reaches a lot of people,” says Viridiana Martinez, who heads the local chapter of the NC Dream Team.

Through ReK2, Martinez, of Durham, N.C., says she has been able to notify the Latino community of trainings that educate documented and undocumented immigrants about their rights.

Iberkleid has asked subscribers and friends to “like” the ReK2 page on Facebook, and only 10 percent of his subscribers responded to that message. He thinks his service can get information to an audience that isn’t necessarily using social media.

“The advantage to a business is that you’re reaching 90 percent of people, and even those 10 percent that are on Facebook are still using the service,” he said.

Javier Luna of Carrboro said he prefers ReK2 because it is easier to use and understand.

Luna, 36, uses ReK2 to get in touch with friends, to find out about jobs and to learn English.

“In whatever situation, I feel connected,” he said in Spanish.

Another opportunity for the expansion of ReK2 is among health organizations along the East Coast.

Susan Auger, president of Auger Communications in Durham, attended a migrant health conference in West Palm Beach where she demonstrated the ReK2 service to a group of about 50 health representatives.

“It was very representative of different organizations, communities, providers, policy people, administrative people, so there would have been lots of potential different ways that the service could be used,” Auger said.

Auger is working in collaboration with the UNC Center for Maternal and Infant Health to develop a program for teaching prenatal education in Latino communities. She said they have used ReK2 in their recruiting process and hope to continue using it in the future.

“Ideally, down the road, when all of the [research] process is finished, we could use it more as an actual business model,” Auger said.

Iberkleid is also hoping to expand to other nonprofit organizations like the Human Rights Center of Chapel Hill and Carrboro, which will soon begin their own channel through ReK2 to communicate with day laborers and residents of Abbey Court Condominiums.

While Iberkleid promotes the cost-effectiveness of the technology, he has found difficulty attracting interest from nonprofits.

“They don’t seem as quick to adopt technology as businesses,” he said. “It’s a great technology that beats sending out flyers.”

Iberkleid is pitching the idea to Plaza Fiesta, a large Latino-oriented shopping mall in Atlanta, in the hopes that the service could expand to yet another state.

“These five months have been evidence to me that this type of service works. People sign up, they like it, but I think that I need organizations and businesses to run their own channels,” Iberkleid said.

This article was reported for the 235 reporting course at UNC’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication.