For growth's sake
We love working with our clients, because they love what they do.
Who we are
Café is a small studio that designs and builds apps, and runs a couple of its own.
Café started in Hamilton as a creative studio for craftspeople, founders and local businesses: brands, online stores, and the occasional piece of custom software. The software was always the part we enjoyed most.
So that is what we do now. We work with a small number of clients at a time, from the first sketch to the app in the store, and we stick around afterwards to keep it running and make it better.
Running our own products keeps us honest. When we tell you how long something takes to build, or what users will put up with, it comes from shipping Bandleader and Communed ourselves.
Build the right thing first
We test the idea before we polish it. A small first version in real hands teaches more than a long spec ever will.
Made to last
Everything we ship should work as well in five years, and at ten times the users, as it does on launch day.
Launch is the first step
We measure what people actually do, then keep improving. The best apps are never really finished.
“Building the right product requires systematically and relentlessly testing that vision to discover which elements of it are brilliant, and which are crazy.”
How a project runs
Whether it is a new app or a rebuild, the same six steps get us to the right answer.
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Discovery
We learn everything we can about you, your customers and what you want the app to do. Clear goals make every later decision easier.
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Strategy
We look at your market and your users, then decide what the first version must do and what can wait.
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Design
Our favourite part. The strategy becomes screens and prototypes you can tap through, revised until they feel right.
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Build
We build in short cycles you can see and test, on foundations that will hold up as you grow.
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Launch
Everything goes live: the stores, the servers, the announcement. It is the start, not the finish.
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Measure and grow
We watch how people use it, learn what works, and keep improving the app month by month.
Let's start a conversation
Have an app idea, or one that needs rescuing? Tell us a little about it. Or just suggest a coffee and we'll talk it through.