Pinestraw Enterprises LLC

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of technology for Tools of the Mind, and we are focused on supporting teachers and children. In particular, we do a lot of professional development for early childhood educators and we also provide an early childhood curriculum for preschools and kindergartens.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Pinestraw Enterprises LLC?

We offer a number of technologies as part of our work with school districts, teachers, and children. We needed to develop a mobile app but we didn’t have the internal capacity for it, so we reached out to Pinestraw.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I first spoke with Alfred (Founder & CEO) and we went back and forth to develop the scope of work. We laid out what needed to be in the application and determined that it should be a native app in order to work on both iOS and Android. We produced all of the designs in-house and the Pinestraw team went on to implement that using React Native. They went on to develop a couple more apps for us after that. 

One of the applications is a mobile version of our existing products and facilitates messaging between teachers and parents. Another app goes hand-in-hand with our video coaching program. It can record and upload short videos to our servers as well as play these back for teachers. The app also houses a dashboard and a graphical representation of an educator’s progress in their learning of our curriculum. 

What is the team composition?

I primarily worked with Alfred, a project manager, and 1–2 other people from their team. At one point, when we encountered an unexpected challenge, they brought in a number of other people to support the app development. 

How did you come to work with Pinestraw Enterprises LLC?

We had worked with them on a different project in the past. Because of our good experience with their team, we decided to call them back for this one. 

What is the status of this engagement?

This particular project started in July 2021. The development took around 2–3 months, after which they provided support in the form of bug fixes.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The video coaching app that Pinestraw developed for us has been used by hundreds of teachers that we work with all over the country, so that’s been a big success. The other application is in the process of being rolled out due to strategic decisions on our end. 

We did experience a few crashes early on when we were developing our first mobile app together, but this is typical in mobile app development and not really a significant issue. They took in our feedback, fixed the problems, and supported us through to the app’s launch. 

How did Pinestraw Enterprises LLC perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicated via Slack and collaborated on GitHub to track bugs and manage the development. I do know that they use another project management tool internally, but they went with a workflow that felt most comfortable for us. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were really responsive. When we hit an unexpected challenge related to the video uploading function, Alfred was frequently in touch to make sure that the problems were addressed. They worked late into the night and even over the weekend, and I appreciate that dedication. The work has been high-quality. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I never had communication issues with Alfred, but I did encounter some challenges when working directly with one of their developers. Alfred quickly stepped in to sort out the misunderstandings, though, so no, there wasn’t anything significant that stood out to me.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you’re looking for high-quality development, I highly recommend that you work with Pinestraw. They’re hardworking, responsive, and motivated to meet even some of the most ambitious deadlines.