Artel Workshop

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work as a CTO for an equity joint venture partnership. We build out certain functionality for the company I’m responsible for.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Artel Workshop?

We were building a custom booking engine for hotel rooms.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Artel Workshop has taken our UI/UX designs and built the functionality from scratch. Initially, we presented our requirements and reviewed the necessary integrations and tech stack. Then, they started working on development.

They’ve used PHP and Vue.js. The solution allows users to find hotels nearby, search by neighborhood and amenities, and book.

What is the team composition?

We work with three teammates.

How did you come to work with Artel Workshop?

I worked with them before on Upwork. I reached out again to follow up because I had another project to do.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $60,000–$70,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in May 2022, and our relationship is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

People are booking without any issues, which speaks for itself. Moreover, we’ve generated $1 million in revenue in bookings.

There are always bugs in development, but Artel Workshop fixes them immediately, which is all we can ask for.

How did Artel Workshop perform from a project management standpoint?

They meet deadlines and stay on budget. We use GitLab to track issues and Slack to communicate.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re responsive. The team is always here if we need them, which is a big deal for us.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there isn’t anything negative. Sometimes things slip up, bugs happen, or there are careless mistakes, but it’s easy to find a solution.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Just be clear about your goals and what you’re looking to build.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work as a project manager for various startups.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Artel Workshop?

I had an end client that needed custom software development. I was working with some talent that wasn’t working out, so I hired Artel Workshop to come in. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I was building a dashboard with Laravel when Artel Workshop came in. They started taking up work from other developers, so I decided to bring them on full-time. I expanded the engagement further from there. Artel Workshop primarily worked on the backend, but did a bit of frontend and design work as well. 

We built a database system from scratch with built-in APIs; Artel Workshop also helped set up the AWS infrastructure of the product. The system has a simple sign-on using social media or an email and password, and users can access several reports and displays that show charts and graphs of data and money transfers using promo codes. The dashboard has several filters to organize the data, and users can generate new promo codes and distribute them. 

The money from those specific promo codes sends money into a user's account, and there is also a place to set up a payment method using Stripe. Administrators can get all of the statistics from money transfers and withdrawals. 

We also set up an online store with some promotional material so that social media promoters can accumulate points based on the money transfers under their promo code. Those points can be used to go into the store and purchase merchandise. 

What is the team composition?

I primarily worked with Roman (Business Manager), and there were two other people on the team. 

How did you come to work with Artel Workshop?

I found them on Upwork. 

How much have you invested with them?

I invested around $20,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together between November 2020–June 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

The work's success would be the adoption of the product, and we believe two companies are using the product at this point. Artel Workshop is one of the resources that I rely on when new clients come to me with specific needs that line up with theirs. 

How did Artel Workshop perform from a project management standpoint?

We dealt with a lot of bugs, but we tracked them in Jira and used kanban to address our backlog. We raised the most important bugs to the top of our priorities, and the team from Artel Workshop took care of them from there. For the most part, they stayed in budget and within deadlines. We built the product in time, and it was shipped out.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I worked with a lot of developers on that project, and the developers from Artel Workshop were quick to learn and got involved with very complex ideas. They were smart, flexible, and quickly adapted to the new tech stack. What set them apart, though, was their work ethic and dedication. They have been one of the few companies I’ve worked with that were actually difficult to keep up with because they continued to produce so much and worked so hard. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

There is a little bit of a language barrier, and the time zone difference was a bit of an issue. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Prepare a good backlog and have your product definitions ready before you meet with them. They will build everything fast for you, but this might not be the right company for you if you don’t know what you’re looking for.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the startup founder

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Artel Workshop, and what were your goals?

We hired Artel Workshop to take care of the front-end development side of our website.

SOLUTION

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

After an online search, we found Artel Workshop to be the company best suited for our needs

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

As mentioned above, we hired Artel Workshop to take care of several front-end development tasks for our nutrition website. Tasks went from signup forms, to booking systems, calendars and other sections of the website. The main framework used was Vue.js

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

2 people in totale, both front-end developers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

All tasks were delivered.

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

All work is managed on project management tools like Asana.

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

All tasks were delivered on time and with good quality.

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

Some misunderstandings at first, but we managed to smooth them down later on