Very Good Ventures

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am Principal Engineer of a personal financial services company in NYC. We offer a web and mobile app to help people manage their money for everyday spending, general saving, and retirement saving. I oversee large technology projects.

For what projects/services did your company hire Very Good Ventures?

Our mobile apps have been under active development for 7+ years and have generally lagged behind our web app. We also struggled to build large enough android and ios development teams to keep up with the pace at which we wanted to deliver features. Over the years, our codebases became hard to maintain and it became ever slower to deliver new features to our customers. We decided it was time to explore cross-platform mobile development solutions.

We did enough research on our own to figure out that we wanted to do a pilot project with Flutter. We brought VGV in to help us figure out how to get started, to guide us in proving out the value of migrating our mobile apps to Flutter, and to train our team on how to use Flutter.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals for this project were to evaluate Flutter through a pilot project, figure out how we would migrate from our current native development approach to Flutter, train our team on how to use Dart/Flutter effectively, and in the end deliver a higher quality software product to our customers with more frequent feature releases.

How did you select Very Good Ventures?

We researched consulting companies with experience with Flutter. We reached out to our network to see if anyone had worked with a company on Flutter work. We found a small number of companies, but in the end, recommendations from our network and chatting with VGV gave us the answers we needed to pick them.

Given how young the Flutter consulting space is, it was important that the team we worked with have connections to Google and have the maximum experience possible with Flutter. Also, it was important that they had some experience with "add-to-app" which was a newer approach to adding Flutter to an existing app -- exactly what we needed to do. Given that VGV checked all those boxes, that sealed the deal.

Describe the project in detail.

The project consisted of 3 phases: pilot, training, fan-out / migration. The pilot was a tightly scoped rebuild of an existing feature. We folded VGV developers into our squad and worked how we normally would to build the feature out. We spent a good deal of time whiteboarding how concepts work in Flutter and generally exploring all sorts of architectural choices and approaches.

VGV was there to help surface options, guide us in making choices, and when the time came, help us crank through the project tasks. After the pilot was successful, we moved into a dual-track phase: planning a training program for our team and building out some more of the core capabilities we'd need to support more complex features within our app.

VGV developed a dart/flutter basic training with our input. VGV also provided 2 resources to us to help build out the core functionality we needed to have done for everyone post-training. Both the training development and the core functionality work were highly collaborative. We had many conversations throughout, divided up the work, pair programmed, etc. It was a lot of fun and very effective.

VGV also performed the training for our team. We had planned to do it all in-person, but when the pandemic struck, we had no choice but to shift it all remote. That required some speedy adjustments on VGV's part, but they figured it all out and in the end we had a great zoom-based 3-day training experience. After training, we moved into the final phase of the work: staggered onboarding for each squad to everyday Flutter development.

We took our 4 VGV resources and kicked off a project with our first squad. Each squad got 2-3 weeks of dedicated, full-time access to their 2 new VGV teammates. After the 2-3 weeks for one squad, we kicked off the next squad until all 3 squads were working on Flutter features concurrently. At that point, VGV resources were floating around between squads providing support, code review, pair programming, and anything else folks needed to build their features.

What was the team composition?

For the pilot project, it was 2 VGV developers and 3 of our developers. We worked as a single squad for 2 months to deliver the pilot project. After that, we did a training with VGV which included 4 or so of their people and our entire team of 15. After training, we shifted into full team Flutter execution.

For that we had 4 VGV developers working with us across our 15 developers broken into 3 squads. VGV navigated the whole process with us seamlessly.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

At this point, we're building all our new features with Flutter. So, after about 4 months, we've got our entire team and even a bunch of new team members building with Flutter full-time. That means that every feature we've built has been built only once for Flutter instead of twice, once on android and another time on ios.

The time savings in initial development, but also in maintenance is huge. Also, having resources that can confidently fix bugs in a feature and see it fixed on both platforms is huge. It's a fundamentally different place to be in than where we were this time last year. VGV provided us everything we needed, at each step of the way, to successfully evaluate Flutter, learn Flutter, and transform our team and our app to use Flutter.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The interactions between VGV and our team were smooth. We got the whole team into our Slack workspace and our GitHub organization. That allowed us to fold VGV developers into our normal workflows with ease.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I was really impressed by the depth and breadth of knowledge that VGV has of Flutter. There was really nothing that we ran into or could ask about that VGV didn't know or have a really clear understanding of how to find out. It was also great and impressive how much they knew of ios and android development.

That was critical for us in relating concepts to Flutter effectively, especially as we had to figure out a durable way to integrate Flutter features into our native codebases.

Are there any areas for improvement?

We had a few hiccups early on when it came to scheduling and how to best use VGV's time on the pilot. We wanted to write most of the code, but we also wanted to move faster. We had a few conversations about the issues and we easily resolved it.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I was the CTO of a same-day delivery pharmacy. We had brick and mortar pharmacies serving NYC and the surrounding tri-state area and were rapidly growing in existing and new markets.

For what projects/services did your company hire Very Good Ventures, and what were your goals?

I inherited an unscalable operational process, with an over reliance on aging manual processes and suboptimal visibility due to lack of data and siloing of data. We engaged VGV to come into the business with us, understand the processes, and implement a solution to give us a quick win as well as a foundation upon which we could build.

I was building out our own engineering teams and it was very important that the deliverables would become something we owned through shared responsibility and handoff.

How did you select Very Good Ventures and what were the deciding factors?

We had a startup mentality. And we needed a partner who understood what that meant. Launch quickly, learn from live code, observe, iterate, and repeat. VGVs background, team, and history with us uniquely positioned them. They had proven themselves before and it was clear they could take on this new challenge.

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

VGV designed a Slack-based operations workflow management tool. They worked with key stakeholders in many of our departments to develop the concepts, then quickly launch and iterate a live product in production. The backend was serverless with a modern architecture that would allow us to readily scale and enhance the tools.

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

We worked directly with the CEO, David, from beginning to end. He understood our business deeply and co-developed many of the concepts with us. He brought in a number of engineers from his team as well as recommended a top tier designer - who we ended hiring to be our Head of Design.

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

Our team was able to take ownership of the tool without any trouble. We have enhanced the tool directly and through the micro services architecture. It continues to power fundamental parts of operations.

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

The project management style was fast, open, and iterative. We utilized high bandwidth in-person meetings, especially at the onset, and maintained visibility primarily through email, Zoom, Slack, and phone (text and voice).

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

One of the key factors in choosing VGV is what I find most impressive - they take the time to really understand your business and your challenges, then tailor a solution with you. They do not show up with pre-planned options and treat you like an undifferentiated client. This is particularly important in software development, a technical and creative endeavor.

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

I honestly had no issues working with VGV! Personally, I prefer more updates, even if that update is just a quick "status quo - we good." They could have done a bit more of that. But I never communicated that desire to them, and do not fault them. Their communication was great.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder and CEO of AccuZIP, and we are a tech company making data-quality software that helps with transaction processing and information exchanges across a range of industries. We track over a trillion pieces of mail and other pieces of information every day through the

What challenge were you trying to address with Very Good Ventures?

We needed to make a consumer app, which was our first B2C venture, and that was how we started our relationship with their team.

What was the scope of their involvement?

The app itself is developed on both iOS and Android using Flutter and Dart and provides information sharing and tracking capabilities to individual consumers.

What is the team composition?

We have two point people who we interface with directly, and they have a whole team of developers working on the project behind the scenes.

How did you come to work with Very Good Ventures?

We knew we wanted to go with the newest technologies in the industry, particularly Flutter and Dart. We were digging around online and found them and their portfolio and were very impressed with the quality of work that they did. They worked with the right technologies, so after talking to some references we decided they were the right fit and moved forward from there.

How much have you invested with them?

In total, the cost has been well over $250,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started around January 2020, and we are continuing to work together.

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

The quality of their code has all been very good and extremely well-formatted. They have a lead developer who reviews all of the final code to make sure it sticks to a pretty strict set of style guidelines. Because of that commitment to consistency, we know that the app will be very easy to update in the future, for anything from little things like fonts or colors to major feature roll-outs.

We also licensed a technology called User Test, which allowed us to run tests with millions of people to see how the interface is working, and if any issues and where those are. Based on that feedback, we’ve been able to go back to Very Good Ventures with tweaks and modifications that we wanted to make, and they were able to take the whole app to the next level through that kind of iterative process.

How did Very Good Ventures perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management skills are outstanding. Whenever we give them a feature set we want them to complete, they go through it extremely thoroughly, ask any questions they have, and then go through a detailed process of breaking down the task, assigning difficulty ratings to each, and then assigning hours for each element.

From there, everything gets tracked in an app that we have access to, and as a result, they’ve come through ahead of schedule and under budget almost every time. They tend to overcompensate on hours so that there’s never something that they can’t deliver in the timeline they told us. But then on top of that, if they finish earlier than expected, they will take on new projects and get started with the remaining hours rather than just waiting for us to pay for new hours.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re very easy to work with because all of the work they do is planned in extreme detail so that you always know what’s going on. For maintenance purposes, they want you to be able to make any changes that you want without having to totally rely on them for it. So, they gave us trainings and notes and videos so that we would be able to take charge rather than needing them to control everything for us. That attitude of collaboration was something I really appreciated.

I generally have very long relationships with third-party vendors that I work with, and I told them that. I explained that as long as they were honest, we would have a great and long relationship, and they have completely upheld their end of that so far. On top of that, the relationship is very personal, so they always make you feel like they’re just normal people and that you’re their only customer.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Honestly, we’re totally happy with everything they’ve done as a part of the collaboration. Even the payment process is made extremely easy for the customer, and if we ever do ask them to change something, they accommodate it right away. We really have no cause for criticism.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

As long as you’re reasonable and can work with other people, you’ll be fine. They’re extremely easy to work with.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the director of client services with Marathon Digital. Our company runs social media for Broadway and other live entertainment clients.

What challenge were you trying to address with Very Good Ventures?

One of our clients is Hamilton, the musical, and we were trying to create an app that engaged fans in a new way and hosted a lottery for people to enter to win $10-dollar tickets to the show.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We are a social media marketing company, so we have very little knowledge about app development or any of the specific requirements of this project. Because of that, we worked with their team to provide the broad requirements that we had and some specific design requests, but beyond that, they handled the entirety of the development.

What is the team composition?

We worked with David (Owner), an account manager, and then a few developers on their end as well.

How did you come to work with Very Good Ventures?

We took interviews with a lot of different companies but liked that they were a small team located in New York and seemed to share our excitement about the work. They introduced us to the idea of using Flutter to manage the app on both iOS and Android, and that was one of the main reasons why we decided to work with them.

How much have you invested with them?

Over the years, the total cost has been somewhere in the ballpark of $400,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in January 2017, launched the app in August, and have continued to work with them on updates and new features since then.

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

The biggest success metric for us was being able to pull this off in the amount of time that we gave them to do it on a platform that really hasn’t ever been used at the scale that we did with it. We’re up to three million users now and are incredibly satisfied with the performance of the app under that kind of incredible volume. They implemented an excellent analytics system which is also super helpful in managing all of the operations running through the app as smoothly as possible.

How did Very Good Ventures perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team is super collaborative, always coming to us with new ideas and listening to us when we have ideas for them, and perfect about meeting deadlines. The project manager that we started with was great and went through a transition period where David stepped in a bit more directly and then handed us over to a new account manager, but even that was as seamless as it could have been.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They are extremely flexible to our ideas and requests and are always open to finding a way to make things work. Even if the result isn’t exactly how the idea was first presented, they always find a way to make it happen for us, which has made the collaboration incredibly easy to manage.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I really have been totally satisfied with all of the work they’ve done for us.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It’s important to know what you want but to be flexible and understand what might be doable and what might have to be changed or approached in another way. If you defer to their expertise on the specifics, they won’t let you down.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a Software Product Manager at BerkOne, INC., a business automation company based out of Bethlehem PA.

Our company has roughly 150 employees, mostly based in Bethlehem, however, we have satellite locations throughout the country. We service clients through all of the United States.

I manage new application development for our clients using our in house .NET development team and IT resources.

For what projects/services did your company hire Very Good Ventures?

We manage a web app for one of our biggest clients, which has asked us to build a mobile app to support it. While we have a team of talented developers, our focus is web and back end databases and services.

We were not ready to dive into learning the intricacies of mobile app development and management, especially across both platforms (Android and Apple). We then turned to VGV to help us build the mobile app.

They helped round out the gap we had in our own development team.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goal was to provide an opportunity to simplify the user experience by allowing customers to use a mobile app in a more streamlined workflow, vs using the antiquated web application.

Additionally, we wanted the mobile app to work in such a way that user accounts within the mobile app were in sync with the same exact data that was available to those users via their web based accounts. VGV worked with us to implement this functionality.

How did you select Very Good Ventures?

We used VGV at recommendation from our client, and have been quite pleased with their experience and their eagerness to help us learn any part of the app development that we wanted.

Describe the project in detail.

The main functionality was to allow users to use the mobile app to submit their local tax returns in one of 2 ways - either by completing app based form data entry, or snapping a photo of the app to submit for processing.

In both methods the app data must sync with our existing legacy systems on the back end. In order to achieve this we met with our client to scope out the business requirements, and then worked side by side with VGV to turn those requirements into usable functions within a web app.

The biggest goal was ease of use/simplicity. Our web app is very cluttered, and quite frankly no one likes filing their local taxes. We wanted to do everything we could to make that a painless experience.

VGV offered their expert advice with mock ups,story boards and wireframes, providing us with options on how the user experience would actually work. We met with VGV each week to review the status of the design, which then changed into the status of development.

VGV focused on the app interface, and the user experience, while working with us to set up necessary data lookup API's, account validation, and data submission into our legacy systems.

The app was developed cross platform (Android and iOS), and while it is a completely separate build from our own web application, the data behind the scenes is synced to our legacy system.

They helped with all aspects of the app development, including any art used for the app.

What was the team composition?

From VGV's side there was the main point of contact - the project manager, as well as a team of developers. Offhand I do not recall exactly how many - perhaps 2 or 3 dedicated to our project at the start.

From my team's side we had myself managing the project as a whole, as well as 2 back end developers working on the integration, and necessary API's.

After initial development, and release (in time for 2019 tax season), our needs for new app development slowed down, so VGV reduced their development team to just the project manager and one developer - which was fair as we did not need more than that any more.

We still use VGV in an ongoing basis as we constantly enhance and add new functionality into the app, including a new build we are planning to release in the next few days.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

We initially released the app back in March of 2019, just in time for the 2019 local tax April deadline. We were pleasantly surprised that we had over 3000 local tax returns filed through the app that year.

Since then we have been adding more user functionality (at our clients request) and are in a constant state of enhancements for the app. This year we easily doubled the number of returns filed, as well as submissions through completely new workflows we implemented at the end of 2019.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

I feel like VGV was almost an extension of my own development team. They were easy to communicate with, both through weekly skype(and eventually now teams) meetings, as well as were very responsive to email communications as needed.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I was extremely pleased with their ability to consider the user experience, and not just merely the functionality of the app. That is something that we lack in house, as we never really had to focus too much on that.

Additionally they helped us learn new technologies we were not familiar with (PUB/SUB to be precise), as well as aided us in external oAuth setup and API implementations.

Our development team has benefited greatly from this experience with new skills learned just form this project - something that we can use for countless clients in the future.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I do not think there is anything I would change. VGV completed exactly what we needed for our client, in a very tight deadline (for the initial implementation). VGV offers development training services for mobile app development as well.

In a perfect world, I would have my own development team take them up on that offer, but instead we have made a business decision to continue to keep our focus on business automation and back end services, but to utilize VGV for any app development needs we have in the future.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for a regional coffee chain company based in Montana. I’m the director of technology. 

What challenge were you trying to address with Very Good Ventures?

We wanted to build a mobile app.

What was the scope of their involvement?

The app interfaces with our loyalty program and allows for mobile orders and mobile payments. They used Flutter for the architecture of the app. We also have a Google cloud platform backend with Firebase. The design for the app was done by another company, but Very Good Ventures supported the implementation of the design and helped clarify any outstanding issues. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with about five people, but my primary point of contact was David (Founder & President). 

How did you come to work with Very Good Ventures?

I’d heard of their work before because of their expertise in Flutter. They’ve worked on multiple prominent projects including developing and maintaining the Hamilton mobile app, so I felt confident in hiring them. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $25,000 so far. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in July 2020, and the engagement is ongoing. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

The app interfaces with our loyalty program and allows for mobile orders and mobile payments. They used Flutter for the architecture of the app. We also have a Google cloud platform backend with Firebase. The design for the app was done by another company, but Very Good Ventures supported the implementation of the design and helped clarify any outstanding issues. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with about five people, but my primary point of contact was David (Founder & President). 

How did you come to work with Very Good Ventures?

I’d heard of their work before because of their expertise in Flutter. They’ve worked on multiple prominent projects including developing and maintaining the Hamilton mobile app, so I felt confident in hiring them. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $25,000 so far. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in July 2020, and the engagement is ongoing. 

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

I’m a full-time developer, and we have another in-house developer. We brought them in for their expertise in Flutter. However, we wanted to make sure that our in-house team would be able to maintain the app. I feel really comfortable with the solution because of the time they’ve taken to educate us about the platform. 

How did Very Good Ventures perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve been great. It’s been a little difficult because I went on paternity leave in August 2020. The project is also more time consuming because they have to take the time to teach us about how to build and maintain the platform. However, they’ve taken the initiative, and they’re willing to pick up the slack if I’m unable to get to something. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have some of the best Flutter engineers in the world. They have great talent. I also like that they’re focused on Flutter and have honed in on that as their niche. 

Are there any areas they could improve? 

It’s hard for me to single anything out because we haven’t run into any issues as a result of them. The team is opinionated, but that’s because they’re experts in Flutter and so they know how to do things the best ways. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers? 

Know exactly what you want from them and have conversations to make sure expectations are clear, especially if you’re interested in employing the embedded expert model.