How we work
Every tool needs a handle.
A helve is the handle of a tool. The part you hold. The part that turns a blade into something you can actually use. Capability has never been cheaper. What is scarce is the handle. That is what we build.
Ideas are cheap. Building is the advantage.
Most businesses do not have a technology problem. They have a process problem with technology sold at it.
The quote that takes three days. The information typed into three systems. The job that stops when one person is on holiday. None of that is fixed by buying more software. It is fixed by building the one thing that fits how the work actually moves.
That used to be out of reach. Bespoke software cost £250,000 and took nine months, so a business your size made do with spreadsheets and six subscriptions.
The cost of building has collapsed. A small senior team now builds in weeks what used to take quarters. We use AI heavily to get there, which is why we are fast and why the price works. It is how we build. It is not what we sell.
How an engagement actually runs
Talk. Free.
Fifteen minutes. You tell us what is slow, expensive or broken. We tell you what we would look at first, and whether we think it is worth doing. If the answer is that you should buy something off the shelf, we will say so, and we will tell you what to buy.
The Pilot. Two weeks. £7,500.
We spend two half-days with the people who do the work. Then we build you a map of your own operation:
- How the work actually moves today, with the leak points marked
- What the friction is costing you, in hours and in your money
- A prioritised list of what to build, ordered by value against effort
- A costed recommendation for the first build, with a fixed price and a date
- A working, clickable prototype of the most valuable screen
You own all of it, whether or not you build with us. The £7,500 comes off the build in full if you start within 60 days.
The Build. Six to twelve weeks.
Fixed scope. Fixed price. A launch date in the contract. Product definition, interface design, the built tool, the integrations into what you already run, your data moved across, your team trained, and 30 days of support after launch.
Adoption is in the scope. It is never an upsell. A tool nobody uses is a cost with a nice interface.
Run. Monthly.
It stays alive, patched, monitored and supported. And it keeps improving, because every live tool generates a list of things that would make it better within a fortnight of launch.
If the problem is that nobody can find you
Not every business needs a build. Some need a site that loads fast, says the right thing and turns up in search.
We do that too, as a fixed ten-day product.
We are not for everyone
Written down so we can be quick about it.
- Pre-revenue startups wanting an MVP to raise on. Not our lane. We will point you somewhere better.
- Brand-led marketing sites. There are agencies who want that work more and do it better.
- Staff augmentation. Two developers for six months is a body shop, not a studio.
- Enterprise procurement. Six-month sales cycles and a 200-page RFP are somebody else's business model.
- Businesses that will not change their process. A tool cannot fix a process nobody will alter.
The honest comparison
| Option | The pitch | The catch |
|---|---|---|
| Hire a developer | We will own it, cheaper long term | About £107,000 in year one fully loaded. Ships nothing for two months. One person, no design or product thinking beside them. And you have to know what to build before you hire. |
| Buy software | £40 a user a month, works on Monday | If it fits, buy it. We will tell you so for free. It stops fitting the moment your advantage is the thing you do differently, because that is exactly what a generic product flattens. |
| Do nothing | It works well enough | It works because three people absorb the cost in overtime. Price that, then price the tool. |
The last one is the real competition. It always is.