When a startup that sells modified flip phones posted internship roles, it expected a flood of applicants eager to unplug. Instead, it got a flood of AI-written cover letters that had nothing to do with its offline-first mission. According to businessinsider.com, Dumb.co responded with a quirky but revealing fix: it asked candidates to submit handwritten cover letters.
The experiment offers a clear window into how both sides of the hiring table are struggling to find something real in a process increasingly shaped by automated text. It also raises useful questions for anyone running interviews, reviewing résumés, or applying for project, agile, or operations roles.
Why Dumb.co Made the Switch
Dumb.co, a company whose brand centers on "dumb phones" and reduced screen time, opened four internship positions spanning growth marketing, day-to-day operations, customer support, and engineering work. The listings went live on the job platform Handshake. Almost immediately, the customer success manager, Marlee Pelton-Fuentes, noticed that many of the cover letters sounded generic and detached from the company's purpose.
She raised the issue with CEO Danny Hogenkamp and other coworkers. A few days later, the team added an unusual requirement: applicants had to answer a short set of prompts by hand. The prompts asked what drew them to a less-connected lifestyle, what attracted them to Dumb.co specifically, and whether they actually used a stripped-down phone.
The Numbers Behind the Experiment
The response was large. The company said nearly 900 people applied across the four openings. Roughly 70 percent of those applicants uploaded handwritten letters, and another 200 to 300 physically mailed their full applications, including handwritten notes, according to Afreka Ebanks, Dumb.co's director of brand and communications.
After reading through the submissions and interviewing 60 candidates, the company hired 10 interns. Pelton-Fuentes said the handwritten letters felt like personal reflections rather than formulaic essays, which made it easier to spot candidates with the right attitude.
What the Interns Experienced
One of the hires, Ian-Karlo Krockel, joined as a marketing intern in July after graduating from Boston University. He had been struggling to get responses from other employers and described the Dumb.co listing as "a needle in a haystack." A week before applying, he had publicly posted on social media about moving away from his smartphone, so the assignment felt natural.
He spent about an hour writing and scanning his letter, in which he described owning multiple flip phones and a recent internship in London where he enjoyed the city's green spaces without a smartphone. During his second-round interview, CEO Hogenkamp held the letter and referenced it directly. Krockel said that moment made him feel like a real future teammate rather than a filtered-out keyword match.
What It Means for You
For hiring managers and team leads, the Dumb.co story points to a few practical lessons:
- Signals of effort matter. A short, specific prompt that requires real thought can quickly filter out candidates who are mass-applying with AI tools.
- Personal review changes the interview. Pelton-Fuentes said she remembered what each shortlisted applicant wrote, which made later conversations warmer and more focused. That kind of context is valuable in agile and project management roles, where collaboration and communication are core skills.
- The format can be the filter. Asking for a scan of handwriting, a short video response, or a one-page reflection can raise the quality of the applicant pool without adding endless criteria.
For job seekers, especially those chasing agile or leadership-adjacent internships, the takeaway is sharper. A tailored, human-written story about why you care about a specific team will travel further than another polished paragraph. Hiring managers, like Judd Kessler of Wharton noted in the report, may increasingly lean on recommendations, phone calls, and other signals that depend on real relationships to cut through what he called "AI selecting AI."
Key takeaways
- A simple handwritten requirement helped Dumb.co sort 900 applicants down to 10 interns who genuinely fit its offline-first mission.
- Personalized application steps can save review time later by raising the signal quality of the entire pool.
- Candidates who invest in authentic, specific stories about their interest in a role stand out more than those relying on polished, generic AI drafts.
Frequently asked questions
Why did Dumb.co require handwritten cover letters for internships?
The team noticed that many incoming cover letters appeared to be written or heavily assisted by AI and did not connect with the company's mission. A handwritten requirement forced applicants to engage personally with the prompts.
How many people applied, and how many were hired?
According to Dumb.co, nearly 900 people applied to the four internship roles. After reviewing handwritten submissions and interviewing 60 candidates, the company hired 10 interns.
What did the handwritten prompts ask applicants to write about?
Applicants answered what drew them to a less-connected lifestyle, what attracted them to Dumb.co specifically, and whether they used a stripped-down phone.
Did the handwritten requirement slow down the hiring process?
Pelton-Fuentes said reading handwritten letters took more time than skimming typed ones, but it made sorting easier because the applicants were more aligned with the mission and easier to remember during interviews.
Could a similar approach work for project management or leadership hiring?
The core idea, using a small, specific prompt that reveals motivation and thought, can work in many fields. For agile or leadership roles, brief written reflections on a real problem or past collaboration can surface candidates who think clearly and communicate well.
Source: businessinsider.com