LaunchPad Lab

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for a global fintech company whose interests are primarily retail and banking. I work on the innovation team where my job is largely helping bring new products to market, from ideation to roll out.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab? 

We’re rolling out a new software product and needed a development team to perform frontend work.

What was the scope of their involvement?

The product is a marketplace that brings three main stakeholders together; financial institutions use it as a way to connect their customers with the broader community around them. LaunchPad built out the frontend of the marketplace, created profiles, and worked on deal redemption and backend dashboard creation. They work in Ruby on Rails. 

What is the team composition?

We work with around 5–6 people. My day-to-day contact is their project manager. Two designers and two developers also work on our account. 

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab? 

We looked at a variety of firms around Chicago and narrowed our search by using Clutch. There was an existing code base for this project that the selected vendor would have to pick up and run with, so one of our priorities was to find a Ruby on Rails developer. 

Our other requirement was experience working in financial services and banking. LaunchPad had some internal staff familiar with those industries. Finally, we did a few demos of our existing products and picked their brain on how they would approach those products. They came back with a concise plan of how they would roll it out. Their nature and team structure mixed well with ours. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent over $100,000 so far. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since April 2021. 

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

Any project that I’m working on is measured against its budget and timeline. The nature of this project has changed a bit; we’ve modified the statement of work as we learn new information about the project. Ultimately, we’ve been satisfied with what we’ve received compared to the initial budget, scope, and timeline. They’ve hit the mark of releases and key milestones throughout the project. 

LaunchPad is very accommodating of internal conversations and schedules we have, ensuring we have the resources to hit our expectations. 

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

I’ve gotten to know their team closely from working with them every day. When I selected LanchPad as our vendor, I focused on their ability to communicate day to day, and they’ve followed through. I’ve always felt that I have the information necessary and the most recent updates. 

We work primarily in Asana; LaunchPad added me to their organization so I can monitor their activity as a guest editor. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’ve been upfront with LaunchPad that our goal on the innovation team is to build products quickly, test them, let them fail if necessary, and keep moving forward. Our top priority is to not invest money where we don’t need to. LaunchPad has been great at helping us think strategically about where we should be prioritizing our budget and what features will allow us to scale better. They’ve acted as a consultative partner as we decide when and how we should do things. They’re great at ensuring we’re being smart with our spending without cutting corners. They help us set ourselves up for success as we roll out our new products. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

At this stage, I can’t think of anything. I’ve been very satisfied with them and would continue to work with them. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I have full confidence that LaunchPad can complete almost any project that they’re assigned. First and foremost, they are a good group of people that I enjoy working with. They have the right process for software development — going through the journey with the client. 

Anyone that works with them should push them to give feedback, as they’re open and willing to help us think through our rollout and construction. We didn’t want a vendor that would take our recipe, go off for three months, and then deliver exactly what we asked for. We wanted a hands-on partner, and LaunchPad excelled. Anyone who’s going to work with them should leverage them in that way. They have plenty of resources that will ensure your project is a success. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the manager of museum technology at Eskenazi Museum of Art, a non-profit art organization at Indiana University. My main task centers around contacting and hiring agencies that could handle development work for us. I also manage each project that we launch to ensure a smooth transition and successful run.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We needed their team to develop an application that specifically featured one of our exhibits.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We tasked LaunchPad Lab with developing a progressive web application that we could present to our different stakeholders who were part of our exhibit. We specifically wanted LaunchPad Lab to integrate features that allowed users to virtually view any art piece they wanted before or after visiting our exhibit. The web app also had a virtual tour map that guided visitors throughout the museum, which they could access anytime using their devices.

LaunchPad Lab relied on the content and information provided by our team. They then implemented everything into the web app using different technologies and developed a CMS backend to help us customize and manage the platform.

What is the team composition?

We mainly worked with Amy (Product Manager) and John (Product & Client Strategist), who trained some of LaunchPad Lab’s developers to take part in our project.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

I was first in touch with John when he was still part of another company. He then contacted me when that collective was acquired by LaunchPad Lab, and we organized a call with our CEO to discuss this project. We both thought that this project was a good fit for LaunchPad Lab, so we kicked off the engagement.

How much have you invested with them?

Our fixed budget for this project amounted to $75,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project ran from October 2020–June 2021.

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

LaunchPad Lab was a dedicated team that promptly provided the deliverables we needed, even when they encountered some time constraints. They valued our feedback and created extra mockups or features that augmented the web app’s UX. In the end, we were rewarded with an impressive, user-friendly platform that mirrored both our organization’s style and the theme of our exhibition.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

LaunchPad Lab had an efficient project management approach — they kept things moving forward and provided us with constant updates and productive ideas. On top of that, we always looked forward to our meetings because LaunchPad Lab was fun and easy to work with.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They quickly understood our project requirements and their complexities. We were an art institution with different goals and preferences, and LaunchPad Lab’s team exerted a lot of effort to comprehend those deeply.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There were instances where we encountered delays and had to communicate with their team members to get them up to speed. However, those did not impact the outcome of our project, and we were still overwhelmed with its success.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure to appoint the right people to collaborate with LaunchPad Lab’s team. That way, there will be a productive exchange of ideas that can further refine your product.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the VP of Apex Leaders, a service provider to private equity firms around the US. We help to align those firms with industry expertise around the country.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We wanted to create a system that only our clients could see and use to be a part of our process. Before, our clients would send us an email and then we’d do an intake on the phone, put it into our Salesforce system, and then email our client with three leads.

After our client had given us their availability, we would then set up a video call and send a calendar invite. Although this process worked, it wasn’t scalable. A lot of the work wasn’t worth our team’s time. 

We wanted to automate everything that we could while making it an interactive process that reinforced our differentiation.

What was the scope of their involvement?

LaunchPad Lab created a two-sided platform that allows clients to select or reject individuals and then schedule time with them in our portal. The team used Heroku from scratch, which was a different approach to creating a portal.

What is the team composition?

Ryan (Partner) is one of our main points of contact. I’ve also worked with Diana (Software Developer). When we started the project, we had a UI/UX teammate and a project manager.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

We had two massive failures in the development of this portal with two other companies. We then went to Salesforce and told them that we wanted a partner who could work on Heroku, and LaunchPad Lab was one of the companies they pointed to. 

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve spent north of $150,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in April 2018, and our engagement is ongoing. The major part of the development took about 10 months. Once we released publicly, we spent about nine months doing a lot of tweaks. The team is now doing maintenance.

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

The portal removed a lot of our error-prone manual operations. Additionally, 90%–95% of our clients contact us through our portal. Before, they would go through a separate form. It’s easier for our clients as well as our advisors who can invoice us online.

Something else we measure internally is how many actions our internal teammates have to do to push things through the portal. Right now, 85% of all actions in the portal, are taken by our clients. This also tells us that only 15% of the time do our staff members have to do work on their behalf. 

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

Ryan was instrumental in the early days in terms of transcribing our business needs into technical elements. LaunchPad Lab is using Asana right now, and they’re incredibly timely. If they’re not going to be on time, they tell us.

Their ability to understand a problem and accurately measure how long they think it will take is great. LaunchPad Lab is also very responsive when it comes to maintenance. When we need to change anything or if something doesn’t work well, they respond quickly. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

LaunchPad Lab came up to speed on our business very quickly. Given that we don’t fit nicely into a box, the team did a great job of understanding the intricacies of our business and translating them. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I love working with them but there are definitely some things that they can improve on.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Because I’m non-technical, I had to put a lot of trust in them. I found that they were worthy of our trust and didn’t need to be as micro-managed as other development firms.

I would recommend potential customers to put a little trust in them because they’ve shown us that they deserve it. Also, be prepared to do a lot of QA.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a communications manager for a financial regulator — National Futures Association. We’re the regulator for the derivatives industry in the US.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We wanted to redesign a web application on our website. The app hadn’t been touched for the better part of 20 years with the exception of light facelifts over the years.

What was the scope of their involvement?

LaunchPad conducted research and ultimately redesigned the frontend of our web app. They collected and evaluated data on usage over several years and benchmarked the project. All of that information went into the wireframes, which we approved. Then, they conducted the design work based on the wireframes.

The system features a series of pages that function as templates. Data populates the pages on the entity that a user searches.

Their team completed a series of pages that consisted of how the profiles would look for an entity in the system. They also created search landing and search results pages.

What is the team composition?

In the middle of the project, LaunchPad had turnover so there wasn’t a set number of people dedicated to us. Our main point of contact was Monique (Head of Design). She actually did the frontend design work for us. Ryan (Partner & CEO) oversaw the project.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

We researched firms in the Chicago area. When possible, we like to engage local consultants because they're able to participate in leadership meetings to get buy-in. I found and spoke with several firms but hit it off with LaunchPad. Based on the folks who started the company, they had an understanding of this project’s unique needs.

How much have you invested with them?

All in, we spent about $75,000 on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?                                                     

We first spoke in September 2017 and engaged them around January 2018. We launched the project around June 2019, but they completed their work around February 2019.

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

It was an absolute pleasure to work with LaunchPad. The product was better than we could’ve imagined.

They made a concerted effort to understand our business as it related to this project. Their drive to understand our users had a significant impact on their ability to design the system in a way that ultimately was received extremely well by the public as well as our organization’s leadership.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

They used Basecamp to manage the project. Their communication skills and turnaround times were exceptional.

There were several instances later in the project when I had to ask for them to rework features. Monique was responsive and completed the work in an exceptional manner. She helped to get the project done on time at a super high-quality.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their communication was exceptional and had a great impact on the project. What set them apart was their willingness to understand our business needs at a deep level, which ultimately benefited the tool’s UX.

Their greatest strength was their drive to understand why we asked for features and then translate that information into a product that met our needs. They met with subject matter experts to learn our needs across business units.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Honestly, it was a seamless project.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

The more information that you can give them the better. They wanted as much data and feedback as possible to access meaningful information that they used to complete their work.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of data and research at a small nonprofit organization based in Chicago. We work with Chicago public schools to ensure that students have access to arts as part of their education. We’re what is called a backbone organization; we’re not direct service providers, but instead support the universe of service providers that work in that area.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We have a software platform that we had previously built with another firm. We use the platform to support our work. 

The platform was built at a very basic level; a lot of it was hardcoded, and it wasn’t very flexible or adaptable. We wanted to rebuild the platform in a way that would allow us to grow and move forward. Eventually, we hoped to scale the platform to new communities beyond Chicago. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

LaunchPad Lab took our existing platform and rebuilt it from the ground up. They fully redesigned the database and converted it from an SQL to a PostgreSQL database. They also redesigned the platform and rebuilt the frontend. 

What is the team composition?

Our main point of contact on a project management basis is Stephen (Product Manager). Then, depending on what we’re working on, we interact with 5–6 people. 

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

We were beginning to think about how to rebuild the platform. We were also considering building a CRM system for our organization. We talked to a handful of different firms, including LaunchPad Lab, and did some discovery work. It took us a while to figure out what we wanted to do, so it took as long as a year for us to go with LaunchPad Lab.

How much have you invested with them?

My company has spent around $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our work together began in March 2017, and it’s ongoing.

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

We’re in a routine development cycle with them, so we’re not on a project-by-project basis. We do releases every two weeks. Given the fact that we’re on a release workflow with them, we evaluate the release and assess their work to make sure that we’re still on track with what we want to be doing. We’ve been very satisfied with the work we’ve done with them. We’ve been able to white-label the platform and launch it in different communities outside of Chicago.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

We interact with them a lot on Asana. Their project management is good; they meet deadlines, and we’re in regular communication. We know when there are challenges, and we work together to figure out how to adapt them. It works well.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We have become much more sophisticated consumers than we were when we went into this process. One thing they’ve done well is adapted their approach to our increasing level of involvement and opinionated perspectives about how to approach things. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing stands out as a real need for improvement. The only things that come to mind are just part of the routine of working with someone. There are moments when things are challenging, but then we always work through them well. I don’t view that as a need for improvement as much as it is a reflection of the fact that you have to figure stuff out when you work with people, and they do a good job of that.

Any advice for potential customers?

Do your best going into the work to figure out what you want the engagement to look like, and try to be as clear as you can about that. Then, you’ll be able to set up a good working relationship in terms of what you need to get out of them and what you’re able to put into the process.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Zcruit, a platform that college football programs use to find recruits and access high quality recruiting data and insights.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We hired them for design work. We had an MVP product that was working with 13 Division I football programs at the time. We initially hired LaunchPad Lab to design our player profiles.

However, they ended up convincing us to take it a step further, which was the right decision. We wanted a professional design to be put together to allow us to build on the product we had. We wanted to expand it and clean it up.

What was the scope of their involvement?

In the first two months, we had a great iterative process where the team created design screens and honed in on what we were looking for. Afterward, they helped us with the overall look and feel of the product, and then they focused on the profile page experience.

From there, the team worked on the list and filtered views that help users search and find players. Additionally, they built a settings page. I often put the product in front of our users and then communicated the feedback to LaunchPad Lab. From there, we would iterate to get the product we wanted.

What is the team composition?

Our primary points of contact were Monique (Head of Design) and Paul (Director of Product).

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

My company was acquired by a larger company at the end of 2017 and one of the product managers told me to reach out to 3–4 Chicago-based design companies that he had worked with. We reached out to them and we got proposals from them. 

We felt comfortable and confident in LaunchPad Lab’s understanding of our scope of work in a high-quality way. Additionally, their price and timeline were very reasonable, and the product manager at our sister company had had a positive experience with them too.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $60,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement began in February 2018, and it’s ongoing. We haven’t done any work with them in the past 16 months but, starting next week, we’ll be engaging in another design project with them that will be more longterm.

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

Since working with LaunchPad Lab, the Zcruit product has grown from working with 13 Division I programs and having $50,000 in revenue to working with 60 Division I programs and having a projected revenue of $500,000 this year. 

A lot of that growth is attributed to the design experience that we worked on with them. Additionally, our product usage rates are astronomically higher than they were. Before working with LaunchPad Lab, we would’ve been lucky to even have 20–30 users.

Now, we’re getting north of 400 unique weekly users, which is good for a closed system website like ours. We’ve also tripled the price we charge, which has been exciting and encouraging. Across the boards, it was a great investment with a great ROI. We got everything we wanted out of it.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

We didn’t collaborate over project management tools, but the team was great from a project management standpoint. Along with our two direct contacts, we also had check-ins with one of the co-founders.

In the first two weeks, there was something that we weren’t comfortable with from a communication standpoint, and that was something we were able to remedy very quickly. They pushed out work at an incredibly fast pace and the time that was required of me was very minimal.

When working with our internal design team, it often takes up a lot of my time. However, with LaunchPad Lab, all I had to do was provide them with feedback, and then a week later I’d see drastically improved screens with all of my thoughts, comments, and feedback incorporated. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ve been really impressed with the caliber of the people who work there, so I have nothing but good things to say. They’re a high-quality team. 

Even though we haven’t worked with them in 16 months, I still grab lunch and catch up with Paul every so often. It’s been a good continuous relationship.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of anything. Our collaboration was great.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be very upfront and thoughtful right off the bat in terms of communicating exactly what you’re looking for and understanding the process. LaunchPad Lab does a great job of telling you which processes work and which ones don’t.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of a test prep organization. We teach ACT and SAT test prep online. We work with students across different socioeconomic backgrounds, non-profits, and public schools, to make sure that our students have access to an engaging education.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

I was about to launch the company and needed to develop a website to host our video content.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They built the front- and backend of our site. It’s primarily Ruby on Rails, but has a few components in Java. We also needed a way to allow students to have individual learning profiles, and for schools to be able to track data analytics through the backend. We worked on the wireframes and mockups together.

They understood our needs and were able to put together an MVP in 8–10 weeks. That led to our product that could be sold and begin generating revenue.

What is the team composition?

There were 2–3 people who worked on the project.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

I took an application development class in college, so I reached out to my professor for suggestions. He provided a list of domestic and international web dev workshops.I vetted all of them with the help of my CTO, and we selected LaunchPad Labs because of their ability to meet our deadlines and their quote.

In the beginning, we were drawn to their client-first focus. We considered a few other companies, but beyond the initial scope meeting, they were able to meet our deadlines, they were more affordable than their competitors, and they could give us feedback on our ideas. It felt like we were collaborating with their team.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $120,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began in February 2019 and it’s ongoing.

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

Overall, the quality is very high and we’ve only experienced a handful of bugs that were immediately resolved. They were able to make those adjustments in a thoughtful and efficient way.

In client calls and demos, I’ve received feedback that the site looks very clean, that it addresses all their major pain points. We’ve also received positive reviews from internal reviews from students in entertainment, education. Users have provided testimonials and have commented that the site is easy to use. In the end, we were pleased with their work. They were receptive to feedback. Initially, we weren’t thrilled with the design elements, but we got exactly what we wanted in the end. They continued to deliver on time and present strong work that exceeded our expectations.

We have been able to continue to scale through our collaboration with them. They continue to offer advice about what different updates we would need to make to grow the platform sustainably.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

Also, their product team was extremely communicative. They responded within moments of asking a question. They were focused on making sure that were felt empowered to ask questions and understood what was being delivered. So, communication was very clear.

We use Asana to communicate, and I’m able to rely on their speedy response. It has been a pretty seamless process. Our project manager who is a reliable communicator. We recently were unclear about whether or not we needed to add on hours, but that was a wrinkle that was ironed out very quickly. I can now trust that we’re on the same page when it comes to billing and hours worked.

What did you find most impressive about them?

When building a company, it’s super important that we trust the party we’re working with. We needed them to be available, transparent, and at the top of their game, and LaunchPad Lab always delivers. Other companies might be cheaper on an hourly basis, but the value we’ve received from this partnership has been one of a kind.

They continue to prove that they’re a mainstay in our company’s growth. Beyond the high-quality product they developed, their communication and ever-ready presence is a sign of security and assurance through what could otherwise become a tumultuous journey of entrepreneurship.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Initially,  I would have said their design work, but they’ve done a stellar job at improving that. We’re on the same page about how we can work together moving forward.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Trust that they have your best interest at heart. Also, communicate about wrinkles that come up because they’re particularly receptive to receiving feedback.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium. I’m the Senior VP of finance and administration and CFO.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

We were looking to improve the CX on our web store, primarily in regards to ticketing and membership purchases.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They worked with the API in order to post unique ticket-numbered sales as well as unique purchases or renewals into our PoS system accurately. Our PoS is SQL.

They also designed the UI and screen-flow of the web store in order to make it as efficient and intuitive as they could. They even added a pop up at the end of the screen set that allowed for solicitation for contributions. Recently, they developed a new page for donations.

What is the team composition?

Ryan(Partner & CEO) and Diana (Software Developer) were my main points of contact. There were normally four people on our review calls though.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

They had done some work through our PoS provider. We received an RFP response from them and another company we worked with. We selected LaunchPad lab based on their experience with our product and their presentation.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $85,000 to date.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working together in December 2017 and we continue to make adjustments or develop new pages.

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

In 2019, the first full year our system was in place, we saw a 7% increase in both online membership sales and general admission tickets.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

Their communication was great. They always met deadlines. They were very good at laying out the schedule and setting expectations.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their effort on this project was definitely noticed. They also addressed peripheral issues as they came up. For example, when our PoS API caused a problem, they were willing and able to help troubleshoot those issues. They’ve always been extremely helpful and knowledgeable.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, we were completely satisfied on our end.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure that you’re prepared from the beginning. Commit to the schedule because they’re dedicated to meeting that timeline, but that requires effort on the customer’s part too.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

My organization's name is Empower Illinois, and we're a scholarship granting organization that provides scholarships to low- and middle-income students and their families to attend private schools. I’m the senior director of operation.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

There was no integrated platform that met the needs of scholarship organizations like ours. We needed a platform that would bring in donations, awards students, and provide school portal and parent portal information. After conducting extensive research into various options, we decided to work with LaunchPad Lab to create our own proprietary platform.  

What was the scope of their involvement?

I originally hired them to develop our website, but our engagement grew and they became our complete technology vendor.

Our main platform is Ruby on Rails. They created a platform with a lot of different tabs on it. It involves school information, which schools and students received the award, the amount, and so forth. There’s a family info section that provides pertinent information and provides a portal for applicants.

There’s a processing component. There’s a donation tab that shows what the donations are from each donor and if it’s available in the system. Then there’s an administrative component that they created for reports, expiration rules, reservation imports, and so on.

What is the team composition?

We have a project manager and two developers. There’s a core group of four people, but they’ve brought in 4–5 other people on a rotational basis depending on what we need. In total, we’ve probably worked with nine people.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

During a major event that’s important for us to distribute these scholarships, the technology our provider used crashed. It was a catastrophe and we needed to fix everything quickly. A tech person at a local incubator recommended LaunchPad Lab to me. They understood this process better than everyone else, so I thought they could deliver what we needed.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in October 2017 and the work is ongoing.

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

After they created this solution, all of our reservations and have gone off without a hitch. To put it in context, we have thousands of people come to our site, and it’s first- come, first-served, so that’s very important. Anecdotally, one of our primary contacts in a big school system told us that she had no calls or concerns this year. Before we had this solution, there was a lot of anxiety, panic, and a lot of people didn’t understand how it worked.

We now have an established process that is easy to follow. They did a great job conceptualizing the project and executing it. The process has been very iterative, and whenever we tell them we need something, they discuss amongst themselves and create a solution.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

They primarily use Asana, so we use that to make comments or point out any changes. I think they’ve missed some deadlines, but nobody is perfect, and that was really early on in the project. Now they understand what we need. They have also added another developer, so there’s a little less pressure and they can follow the timeline. They’ve been responsive. I’m a tough grader on this, but in the gran scheme of things, nothing has affected the performance of what we needed.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They listen, and understand what we want to do. They always come up with creative solutions. They’re very diligent, and it’s clear they’ve bought into our mission.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Not at this point.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m one of the co-founders of Guild Row, a social club for the artisanally curious. It’s a space for people to come together and build relationships by making things.

What challenge were you trying to address with LaunchPad Lab?

One of the biggest challenges we had was to establish an operating taxonomy for all the different activities we wanted to do. We didn’t want it to be a free-for-all because customers need a high-quality structure to be able to experience and learn. 

We wanted a digital interface that would allow us to source ideas from members as well as handle all of the logistics around producing a real-life, high-quality experience.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We went through an extensive discovery phase and provided the team with photoshop mockups of what we wanted. A lot of firms wanted to build something from scratch at great expense that wouldn’t have been very flexible and adaptable. 

However, LaunchPad Lab found a baseline, off-the-shelf club solution that we could customize to our liking. They created an effective web app that has simple, clear, robust functionalities.

What is the team composition?

Our main point of contact was Brendan (Co-Founder & CTO). Over the course of the project, we’ve worked with 4–5 different teammates depending on the stage.

How did you come to work with LaunchPad Lab?

I previously worked for a tour boat company in Chicago whose website and booking interface LaunchPad Lab had redone. I was really impressed with the work they had done.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $50,000 on their services.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in the spring of 2018 and our engagement is ongoing.

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

The product has been incredibly valuable for us. The solution they found kept delivery time and costs down. This showed that, from the beginning, they were thinking of our needs and not their bottom line. 

It’s hard to speak to specific metrics because their work is so central to what we do. We have more than 150 members at this point, and it’s a vital component of their everyday experience. Overall, we’ve been successful and this is at the heart of what we do. It’s a very broad metric, but it’s an important one.

How did LaunchPad Lab perform from a project management standpoint?

They perform exceptionally well. LaunchPad Lab has been tinkering with different project management tools, including Basecamp and, now, Asana.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re great listeners. You tell them something once, and they know it. The team doesn’t give you what they think you want; they actually give you what you truly want and need.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I have no suggestions. We haven’t encountered any pain points, so we’re very happy.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Don’t be too eager to translate everything into technological language. LaunchPad Lab is able to have a plain-spoken conversation at the outset and then translate it into technological terms when needed.