Culture Foundry

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am a director at Security Services Northwest, Inc.

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Security Services Northwest is a full service security company that provides security solutions for private entities, local, state, and federal government agencies.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Move outdated website from current CMS platform to Drupal
• Develop a website that could grow with the company
• redesign the website to fit with company brand
• streamline menu - redesign from the customer standpoint
• develop a more secure internal company portal

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

• Online Search
• Referral
• Clutch Site

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• High ratings
• Close to my geographic location
• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost

How many teammates from Culture Foundry were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Our website had been built on an old WYSIWYG platform. As the company grew, the website no longer fit the needs of our company. It was also not responsive, and the majority of our customers were finding our company on mobile. As our company expanded into other states, we wanted a website that could grow with us, and portrayed the professionalism of our company while adhering to company brands. We needed an entire redesign, strategy that examined our audiences and how they navigated the website, a site that worked for both mobile and desktop, and a more secure company portal for employees to access internal documents. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

They provided us a timeline/schedule of the work, with notes about the tasks that would be completed by Culture Foundry and the tasks that would be completed by our team. With regular virtual meetings and emails, we met those deadlines or adjusted as needed, so we knew that the project was moving forward.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Yes, they delivered items on time and were very responsive to our questions or requests to meet. When we were delayed on a few of our tasks, they quickly updated the project timeline so we would continue to stay on track for the rest of the project. When we later ran into issues with another vendor on this project, they stepped in and helped get things back on track.

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They are responsive, always giving updates and checking in, and excellent about meeting deadlines and staying on task. They also think beyond the project. They would bring up suggestions or find ways to improve the website that we had not considered, but they recommended based on their experience. This was especially impressive because it made us want to stay with them for continued hosting and future work beyond the initial project. They looked beyond the project specs we initially discussed and found ways to help our website continue to fit our needs.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

When we initially started our project, they did not do Drupal development, so my improvement area would have been to add that to their services. However, since the website launched they now provide Drupal web development services, which is why we now use them for our hosting and continued web development work.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.
I’m the executive of the LBJ Foundation, which supports the mission of the LBJ Presidential Library. We’re a federal presidential library that houses and digitizes the work and products of Lyndon B. Johnson’s presidency.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Culture Foundry?
We needed a company that could salvage a website development project that had been mishandled by a previous development firm. Our main website was developed by another firm, who essentially abandoned us due to a variety of reasons. They stopped working public sector gigs to focus on corporate ones, so the site itself was left barely functioning and in a largely unfinished state.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?
The previous firm built a very complex website, which had a Drupal backend and a JavaScript engine frontend that rendered every page in JavaScript as it was served. We initially wanted Culture Foundry to make the platform simpler, more stable, and more usable for a variety of users with 0% to 100% technical skills. This involved subtracting some technologies and fixing existing issues to make it more affordable to run and to make future development easier and more cost-effective.

Translating all the pages through JavaScript was terrible, complicated, and prone to failure, so we wanted Culture Foundry to implement features that hadn’t been implemented by the previous developer to simplify the site for its users, even the non-technical ones. We also wanted to make portions of the site editable and easy to create and upload content so users could create their own content without having to rely on a single choke point.

Culture Foundry also led something called a “Wayfinding Workshop” for us. Members of their team from all over the country came to our facility to help us figure out what we needed for the two projects we started with them. In addition to our main website, we’re simultaneously working with Culture Foundry on digitizing and migrating the contents of a heavily data-driven archival website into another one.

During the workshop, Culture Foundry worked our organization's stakeholders. These people are archivists — they’re very detail-oriented with very specific needs and wants that don’t generally align with the existing technology. Culture Foundry was able to handle a lot of these important details and went the extra mile to understand our people’s needs. The workshop really helped us focus on what we actually wanted and needed from the project.

What is the team composition?
We’ve worked with Laura (Technical Project Manager & DevOps Manager), Hans (CEO), Zach (Software Engineer), and one other technical person. Laura provided DevOps support, and Hans was also our project manager for the initial project.

How did you come to work with Culture Foundry?
We found them through a cold call. Culture Foundry was one of three or four development firms that we interviewed. We first did a nationwide search with four development houses that had some tie to Austin, Texas.

How much have you invested with them?
We’ve spent around $700,000.

What is the status of this engagement?
We started working together in March 2022, and the engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
We now have a fully functioning main website that is technologically easy to manage and upgrade. The code is upgradable and future-proofed, which means we can reskin the bones that they have built if necessary. Everything is documented and executed correctly. There are many ways to write code, but the right way is to make everything easily understandable, upgradable, and well-documented. That’s what we’ve gotten from Culture Foundry.

We’ve had other successes, too. We had a problem integrating Salesforce and Blackbaud forms into the website because we couldn’t embed the JavaScript code we got from Salesforce. Culture Foundry has found a way to work around all that and make it work. They’ve also made changes so that we can easily manage artifacts on the backend. Everything that we've asked them to do, they've completed.

How did Culture Foundry perform from a project management standpoint?
The Culture Foundry team are all A+ people who quickly provide solutions and answers for all our problems. They’re incredibly professional and affable. They know what they’re doing, are highly engaged, and empathetic towards what we’re going through.

Everything is also documented well and done correctly, and they work collaboratively to help us determine our needs. Every time we have a new task, they provide a full description of the scope and the cost.

We primarily communicate through email.

What did you find most impressive about them?
Everything that we've asked Culture Foundry to do, they've completed. Nothing's been left hanging, and they never over-promise. In the past, we had been sold things that couldn’t be done. We had kept throwing money at a project and ended up with nothing. With Culture Foundry, it has been the opposite. When we work on something with them, they tell us exactly what we’re going to get and always nearly exactly what it’s going to cost.

The previous developer we worked with just kept taking money and promising us the sky for multiple years, but they didn’t even deliver a working site. They overcomplicated everything in order to get us to more service contracts with them. However, Culture Foundry worked with us to determine our concrete needs and undid what the previous developers did.

Aside from that, one of the things I specifically like about them is that from the initial call that I made to them and through every engagement I’ve had with them, they always bring on their entire development team. They don’t just make me talk to one salesperson to try to upsell me. I’ve talked to the actual coders and specialists who are in the project.

Whenever I ask a technical question, they always get back to me immediately, even before we had decided to do business together. This spoke of their professionalism, influenced my decision to choose them, and helped build a collaborative working relationship.

Are there any areas they could improve?
I can't think of anything they could do better.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?
Their Wayfinding Workshop is a valuable tool. It’s important to know what you want and need. It helps you focus on what you want.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am a Director of NYRA Bets

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

NYRA Bets is an online horse betting site with betting on over 300 tracks and available in 39 states.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Modernizing the look/layout of our marketing pages on desktop and mobile.
• Implementing a new CMS to give us more flexibility and creativity in creating marketing pages.
• Creating areas to display content effectively on desktop and mobile (and making it mobile-friendly).

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

Culture Foundry won an RFP bid over 8 years ago, and my company has been working with them since.

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• Company values aligned
• They had experience within our industry and we've had great success with them on past projects.

How many teammates from Culture Foundry were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

The NYRA Bets website and app was built with an iframe within an iframe (there were two different site not talking ot each other) and was also not mobile-friendly. Culture Foundry scraped our old CMS, and brought in a new one. With this change we accomplished:

• A mobile-friendly site for our growing mobile/app business
• A more modern asthetic based of our brand guide
• A much more fuild customer journey from traveling from marketing pages to our bet pad (which is developed and maintained by a seperate company)
• Custom modules in our CMS to fit our unique content needs (posting expert horse racing picks)
• A better performing calander/promos area not only for the customer, but for the NYRA Bets team to work more effectively
• A much improved site look an unique and stylish ways to include graphics within a page to break up text and provide seemless looking call to actions

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Horse racing is a business that is very resistant to change. I was worried that even though the new site was better, our customers would be resistant just because it was new. And it was the total opposite effect! We had no major customer complaints about the site.

In fact, a whitelabel partner of ours saw the new site and instantly wanted it for their sister site. We've been able to publish so much content that can now be easily viewed on mobile. With the update to our landing pages, we saw an uptick of 28% in new registrations during our KY Derby campaign, which garners the most registrations of the year.

The time the team has saved from the ease of the new CMS would also be considered a great success. 

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The project management was great. They were always receptive to our feedback and ideas, and quick to respond to emails. We had a very strict deadline as to not interfear with Kentucky Derby season and those goals were met. 

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

The team is very creative and about more than delivering a cookie cutter option. NYRA Bets has unique challenges, and Culture Foundry always comes up with an idea of how to suit our needs. Every concern is met and we're never told "we can't do that." 

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

The NYRA Bets project was on a tight deadline, so I wish we had jumped on to the Slack channel earlier and perhaps involved our bet pad company on it as well. It's difficult coordinating three companies (one that is not in the US) to jump on calls.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the VP of Strategic Planning & Marketing of Virginia Equine Alliance

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

The Virginia Equine Alliance is a 501 C 3 that represents and promotes the horse industry in Virginia , with a primary focus on racing and breeding. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Update and give a fresh look to our website
• Make our website user friendly and easy to navigate, and easy to load content
• Give our website the capability to handle large vide content

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

• Online Search
• Referral

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• High ratings
• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me
• Company values aligned
• understanding of our business

How many teammates from Culture Foundry were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

The project was to re-design and update the exisiting website and consolodate the other related sites to easy to navigate links off of the main site. This included a complete new pages design for the virginia horse racing pages, including a new logo, color scheme, updated navigationn, increased video and conten hosting and displaying capabilities, staff training and complete site launching. All deliverables were met on time and successfully.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

A modern and fresh page design and logo with an easy navigation and hosting of all content and forms.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Culutre Foundry's project management was exemplary and complete. Their team was responsive, helpful in suggesting design implementations to work well for our various needs, their creativity of design was outstanding and in line with our vision . They immediately assisted with any questions we had and did a phenomenal job of educating our team in the entire process, making it easy for us to be able to manage our site.

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Culture Foundry has an outstanding creative design talent that understands a company's vision and brings it to light with a strong passion for doing so. The professionalism of every member of their team from design to technical implementation to account management is second to no other company I have worked with on any type of project .

They are a very high level company who have worked on major projects , but I always felt as though I was their number one client and that they understood my expecations for this project and helped me visualize that.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

I can find no areas where Culture Foundry needs improvement, they were perfect in every detail of our project from start to finish....it exceeded all expecations.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Chief of Staff of ImageSource, Inc.

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Enterprise process automation software and services

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Ongoing website enhancements
• Design, build, and host new corporate website
• Host and manage product training and documentation sites

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

Referral

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• Close to my geographic location
• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Referred to me

How many teammates from Culture Foundry were assigned to this project?

6-10 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

We hired Culture Foundry to design and build our new corporate website, www.imagesourceinc.com. We needed the new site to go live in a few months and had just rebranded the company. The work included content strategy, site map, functional specifications, design concepts, web design and development, and working through review and revisions until launch. As part of the project, hosting and ongoing maintenance of our site was moved over to Culture Foundry from our in-house team. 

Since launching the new corporate website, we have launched serveral enhancements in the proceeding two years. In addition, we have turned over the hosting of two other sites we maintain, an online learning site (ILINX University) and product documentation site (ILINX Help Center).

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

I came from 25 years as the head of creative at a digital agency, so I knew the standard we wanted for our new ImageSource website. Culture Foundry's design concepts and website execution needed to meet high standards. 

Our Marketing team measured success by the accolades from leadership when the  site launched, praise from customers, the ease of updating the site via the WordPress CMS, and the ongoing partnership Culture Foundry has shown to evolve the site and improve communication across our teams.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Culture Foundry has been attentive to details and outstanding in their ability to meet agreed-upon deadlines and deliverables.

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

• In-Person Meeting
• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I was impressed with the continual improvement in design aesthetics and technical expertise from Culture Foundry. This is a digital agency on the rise and it feels that way from the client side. They are not resting on their laurels or coasting, they are driven to get better and it shows.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

There are always challenges with any project, including changing priorities, personnel transitions, and dealing with time/resource realities. Close communication is key to working through all of these things, Culture Foundry has accepted this challenge and gotten better and better in this area through the course of our partnership.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Deputy Director, Public Programs Office of American Library Association

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

The mission of the American Library Association is to provide leadership for the development, promotion, and improvement of library and information services and the profession of librarianship in order to enhance learning and ensure access to information for all.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Redesign ALA's website, ProgrammingLibrarian.org

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

Referral

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Referred to me
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from Culture Foundry were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

The American Library Association (ALA) embarked on an upgrade of the programminglibrarian.org website from Drupal 7 to Drupal 9. Along with this upgrade, we took the opportunity to collect stakeholder input, increase engagement, evolve the website's content structure, and modernize its design. Culture Foundry's deliverables included a creative brief, a set of wireframes, visual designs, and a design kit.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The most notable measurable outcome from this project is the creation of our beautiful new website design! We launched the much-improved Programming Librarian in early 2024, to widespread praise from our readers and stakeholders.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Culture Foundry absolutely delivered items on time, and their work was of the highest quality. ALA staff required the project to be delayed (due to an unplanned family leave by the client's project director) but Culture Foundry was ready to pick up again as soon as we were. They were organized, clear in their delivery of materials, and excellent communicators.

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Probably their communication. Jory was an absolutely delight to work with -- clear, straightforward, always giving great advice. And of course Trevor's web designs were excellent.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

None that I can think of. Culture Foundry was a joy to work with, and I'd highly recommend them to others.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the VP - Data Management of Wine Business Monthly, Winejobs, Wine Business Analytics

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Wine Business is the leading producer of information and events for the wine industry.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Culture Foundry to accomplish?

• Visual corporate identity to unify our multiple lines of business
• Website redesign (Wine Business)
• Design and create subscriber-only, high-end monthly digital Analytics Report

SOLUTION

How did you find Culture Foundry?

Referral

Why did you select Culture Foundry over others?

• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Other

What was the size of Culture Foundry’s team?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

We have worked with Culture Foundry across 4 projects over past few years. Most recently, we asked them to develop a visual identity to unify our lines of business. CF delivered beautiful results, gave us many options and really listened to our goals for the new look. CF also redesigned winebusiness.com, achieved all of our goals there. Prior to that, CF built our Wine Analytics Report, the functionality and design.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Senior management thrilled with new design. Beautiful and easy to navigate website. Highly functional digital publication platform with dynamic charting, very easy for our editors to publish with.

What was your primary form of communication with Culture Foundry?

Virtual Meeting

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Very timely, very responsive. Always very clear in communications, setting expectations and timely follow through.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Direct and personal communications with each contributor on our projects.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Culture Foundry could have done differently?

No changes needed. Everything from initial discussions to delivery was spot-on and professional. We have returned for 3 more projects since initial engagement.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the President and CTO at a national non-profit dedicated to increasing the meaningful and influential participation of women and girls across all intersecting identities in computing fields and careers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Culture Foundry , and what were your goals?

Our Aspirations in Computing award portal was built on Drupal 7, which was going end of life, and needed to be entirely rebuilt and relaunched.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

Culture Foundry had worked with us on a prior project with outstanding results. We did an initial engagement with them to scope the new portal, and were impressed by the selected architecture and plan.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

This was a large scale custom web application development project that included scoping, many rounds of requirement gathering, wireframe and information architecture reviews, and functional approvals. This included a transition to a single sign on provider and a completely redesigned headless CMS system.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We worked with a project manager, and relationship manager, the CTO, and several engineers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

Our portal was launched on-time, and our thousands of applicants were able to successfully submit award applicants. The system operated smoothly and with limited errors.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

We had weekly meetings with the team to discuss progress. We also had a shared document to track user stories, testing status, priorities etc.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Culture Foundry's commitment to their customers is unique. I have worked with many technology vendors through the years, and they demonstrated a commitment to completing the project on time that I have not seen with any other tech vendor I have used.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

The project went well!

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

The New York Racing Association operates three Thoroughbred horse racing tracks in NY state - Saratoga, Belmont Park and Aqueduct - as well as a national ADW platform called NYRA Bets. I oversee digital strategy for the company, which includes website, social media, email marketing, streaming and app strategy.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Culture Foundry , and what were your goals?

Our website network was completely outdated and went offline frequently. We hired Culture Foundry to completely revamp our site structure, design, and backend setup.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

Culture Foundry was selected through a detailed RFP bid process. They demonstrated strong knowledge in technical elements, were very willing to educate us along the way, and made us feel that they truly understood our unique business.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

We had a kick off meeting to discuss objectives and our business goals, which was followed by wireframes and edits until we launched. We now do regular audits so that we can keep improving the customer experience on the front end of the sites and protect secure information on the backend of the sites.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We always work directly with a project manager, have regular contact with web developers and the CEO is also available and involved in everything.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

Culture Foundry’s work has helped us take our business from NY based to National in terms of reach and customer acquisition. We went from having zero control over our Google rankings and SEO to having all our top-performing pages pull up on the first page of common searches.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

Their PM style is great, I always know what is being worked on and am able to easily report updates to my leadership group. We have biweekly calls (more frequently if we’re in the final stages of a launch) and regularly communicate over slack and email. They also use Jira.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I really feel that Culture Foundry's team members are committed to working together to help achieve our business goals. That’s very rare to find in a vendor relationship.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

Nope, I really enjoy working with them on every level!