WAITE PARK, Minn. - [JUNE 30, 2026] - Impacks, the K–12 school-supply company on a mission to make back-to-school shopping easy, today announced the launch of a new direct-to-consumer product called the Impacks KitGenie that lets any parent build a complete, customized school supply kit in minutes. Parents simply upload their child’s supply list - or snap a photo of it with their phone - and Impacks’ proprietary AI image-analysis technology reads the exact items and quantities the teacher requested and automatically assembles a kit of name-brand supplies, shipped free to the door. The entire process takes under five minutes.
The new consumer experience is available now at thekitgenie.com, just ahead of the 2026 back-to-school season.
The launch marks Impacks’ expansion from a school-partnership model into a nationwide consumer offering. For the past six years, the company has built customized, grade-specific kits for school communities and bulk solutions for districts. Since 2020, Impacks has delivered more than 50,000 kits, grown from a single local district to 300+ schools across 30+ states, and generated more than $300,000 in donations for classrooms - roughly doubling in size each year and earning recognition as one of the fastest-growing companies in the school-supply sector. The new tool extends that capability to any parent in the country, whether or not their school partners with Impacks.
The innovation is powered by AI image-analysis technology Impacks developed in-house. Unlike big-box and online retailers, Impacks matches a kit to the exact list – including precise quantities, so a classroom that needs a single marker gets one marker, not a four-pack of extras. Parents can remove anything they already have at home before checkout, and every order ships free. Impacks kits are priced on par with or below big box retailers and typically well below online retailers; the average Impacks kit runs about $66, compared with the $140+
“Every August, I watched parents lose entire weekends to a scavenger hunt for one very specific folder,” said Clare Richards, CEO and co-founder of Impacks. “For six years we’ve taken that stress off school communities’ plates. Now we can do it for any parent in the country - just take a picture of the list, and we handle the rest. This is why we started Impacks: because every child deserves to thrive in the classroom, and no parent should have to lose precious time with their kids in order to find what teachers are asking for. We want back-to-school shopping to be easy.”
“The hardest part of back-to-school was never packing the box - it was decoding the list,” said Brandon Richards, CSO and co-founder of Impacks. “We built AI image-analysis technology that reads a teacher’s supply list from a single photo and matches it to the exact products and quantities requested, name brands included, in seconds. This technology lets us deliver big-box selection with a level of accuracy and convenience the retailers simply can’t.”
About Impacks
Founded in 2020 by Clare and Brandon Richards, Impacks brings a best-in-class e-commerce experience to K–12, making back-to-school shopping easy while supporting classrooms. The company offers tailored school supply kits for parents and bulk-order solutions for schools and districts, all rooted in a social-impact mission to positively affect teachers and families. Since 2020, Impacks has delivered more than 50,000 kits, generated $300,000+ in school donations, and expanded to 300+ schools across 30+ states. Impacks was named the Education Division Winner of the 2025 Minnesota Cup, a 2024 “Minnesota Startup to Watch” by the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal, and a 2024 Launch Minnesota Innovation Grant recipient. Learn more at myimpacks.com.