they're paying us on average about a
hundred bucks a month a little bit over
that and so we're making half a million
in annual revenue hey everyone today I
have an interview for you guys with a
couple who built their startup while
traveling we talked about how they
started their company the strategies
they use to stay productive while
traveling and the tech stack that they
use to build their system among other
things I personally learned a lot from
this interview so hopefully you'll look
to startups come cannae and that's the
website scanning dot io and it's a user
feedback tool and so we help other
software companies keep track of feature
requests and bug reports from their
users that they can build a better
product Yeah right so actually I had
seen Kenny before oh really yeah
yeah so what I saw was it's like a list
of feature requests where people can
like upload and maybe down boy
- right no down vote no their cell phone
which iq+
and how long have we been running the
company
I think I left my full-time job about
three and a half years ago but I guess
we launched Kenny almost two and a half
years ago now yeah okay
so that was your job at Facebook yep
cause we're gonna react team at Facebook
nice stop engineer yep and you were
designer at Facebook I was a designer I
worked on a messenger messenger yeah so
you left three and a half years ago did
you leave about the same time no funny
enough I started and entered left pretty
much right exactly when I started as
your left oh yeah so I kind of stayed
there for my year and a half while
Andrew kind of worked on an earlier
version of candy I guess and then
eventually I left to join him yeah I
like to say I recruited sir did you did
you leave Facebook to work on this
startup yep this is different flavor of
this startup and so back then was called
product pains and it was a community
where people can post and vote on
feature requests for any product
publicly and so we had a couple
companies using it
eventually the companies wanted more and
more features and we kind of turn it
into a sass - Landry pretended as candy
and so yeah I was similar definitely
yeah I mean eventually we found that we
needed to make money a heart business
and the earlier product pains the
earlier version was very consumer
focused and so there was not really a
business model behind it and so we
basically flipped it into a SAS tool and
so we charged businesses to pay to use
the platform yeah and how were you like
how could you be so confident that you
know you left good job it's not too
comfortable it felt like um you know I
wanted to get into startups and it felt
like the things that I was learning at a
big company weren't really relevant to
startups like sales and marketing and
recruiting and all that and so yeah I
felt like I had to had to you know take
a risk and go do it you know I had an
idea that I was excited about and yeah
that's turned out great I mean I think
when you're going to startups there's
there's no guarantee and this is our
first venture together and so there was
definitely like this feeling of you
don't know what's gonna happen you don't
know if you're gonna be successful and
it definitely felt that way for a long
time with product pains we just didn't
really know where it was going for a
long time
I know we made our first dollar or first
$20 and then we were like okay there's
something going on here which brings us
down here today right how long did it
take you to you know make those firsts
ready no yeah it was like a year and a
half since I quit my job yeah but we
weren't really focused on you know we
were building a community like there
wasn't even way for people to pay us and
so we were just focused on growing this
community with users giving feedback to
companies and then companies started
asking for the features and we said hey
would you pay for those and then they
said yeah and kind of happened naturally
that we turn it into a money-making
business which is great because we're
bootstrapped
and so we wouldn't be able to really
contain
doing this the way we want it to without
being able to charge customers to make
money off our work yeah yeah that's
really cool
so it's been two and a half years since
since the launch since the launch yeah
and like after that like after all that
could you tell us about how the company
is doing you know in terms of maybe the
number of employees revenue numbers you
can do my cherish sure yeah so we have
450 customers and those are paying
customers and they're paying us on
average about a hundred bucks a month a
little bit over that and so we're making
half a million in annual revenue which
feels great for bootstrap company no no
outside funding half a million is enough
where we can support it like our
business and a team we've hired three
other people and they're all remote and
so our team is in UK Estonia and Seattle
and then we're here in Toronto and yeah
we're really excited about where we are
oh yeah so I went to the University of
Waterloo and I studied a software
engineering and I studied in a design
program it was a joint program between
York University and Sheridan College
yeah I was like a regular 4 year program
but very very much graphic design
focused and less like digital tech focus
yeah I eventually found my way to doing
kind of more product design and UI
design and stuff right so how did you
get into tech yeah tons of my friends
went to Waterloo honestly for for
engineering and eventually participated
in a bunch of hackathons which really
opened my eyes to tech and San Francisco
in general and I just really gravitated
towards that and less of what I was
studying at school which was a lot of
like editorial design packaging stuff
like that that's more traditional so I
really really enjoyed that the the web
aspect and so I just pretty much focused
on that and did a bunch of internships
and then eventually yeah I found my self
at Facebook did you learn to do web
stuff like digital stuff on your own
then yeah school the school curriculum
was behind
in those aspects so we did have to take
that onto ourselves just having a
website it's kind of a must so in third
year I think I just kind of said screw
it like I'm not really learning how to
build a website I'm just gonna go do
this on my own during some summer and so
I just got my own website and that's
kind of how I picked my front-end skills
yeah nice so after graduating from like
those programs you bullets decided to
work at Facebook I did this I tried to
do a start-up for six months and it
didn't go super well my co-founder felt
some pressure to go get a job and so
it's kind of just me working full-time
and I had like the Facebook offer
there's a backup option and I ended up
taking at one point yeah I think it was
a good move for both of us just to get
some like foundation and like early job
skills but there's nothing really that
like sets you up for entrepreneurship
other than doing it so yeah I'm glad we
both got that taste but now we're like
here doing our thing I think was super
worthwhile like there's the the
experience you get of you know being
able to put together a project on your
own which you might not get until you
have some professional experience and
then also financially like we probably
couldn't have worked on it without you
know funding if we didn't have a little
bit of a financial cushion from working
in a big company yeah that's really true
right so working at Facebook was like
very different from what you did not
right 100% different I mean I wouldn't
say I didn't like it like I really do
like I really thought I did go to work
there and I really enjoyed the people
that I worked with but it wasn't like I
knew from the beginning that I wanted to
do my own company someday and so I made
the jump eventually and yeah it's it's
really different same thing for you
yeah I mean I think at a big company
like you're focused on this tiny tiny
thing that's part of a huge huge picture
and like for me I didn't really even
know how my job correlated to growing
Facebook's business I just was tasked to
like make react native which was a part
of react a great project used by a lot
of companies and yeah whereas it can II
it's hard to do anything without
thinking about the ROI and like how is
this gonna grow our business and if it's
not worthwhile then we don't do it yeah
that's really your impact a lot more
directly yeah and the breath like you
know here we're doing sales were doing
marketing we're doing recruiting we're
doing all this stuff that you know was
totally abstracted away from your job as
an engineer at Facebook which is cool
it's fun to learn about a lot of new
things to learn them yeah definitely so
let's let's talk about you know how
you've been traveling yeah building the
company when did you decide to move out
of San Francisco and why did you decide
to move out of it yeah well since this
was a great place to live if you're
working at a big company or if you're
trying to raise money but after we were
after we left our big company and
weren't trying to raise money it didn't
feel like a great fit for us anymore
it was it's really expensive really
really expensive City and we had always
kind of wanted to travel and you know we
didn't have an office we didn't have
employees we're gonna have investors
there's no reason really keeping us
there and so we thought why not go beat
digital nomads for a little bit and we
booked a ticket to London was our first
destination just to kind of warm up with
traveling and yeah we we ended up
traveling for about two years after that
yeah we're actually just now kind of
slowing down a little bit and we decided
to stay in Toronto so that's pretty
exciting so were you like tired of
traveling I think the biggest thing is
loneliness is because we would stay in
the city for about a month and then move
around and you don't make a lot of
friends that way just because you know
even if you do meet people then you like
leave immediately after and it's hard to
find people who are gonna like travel
tips from city to city with you and yeah
I just missed like being around friends
and so that was the big motivator for me
was just being coming back and being
around friends and having that
camaraderie that you have you know
hanging out with people that you know
and like and yeah it's not for everyone
that's for sure I would continue doing
it but honestly and you Andrews made a
big compromise for the last two years so
thanks so when you're traveling
would you like book on Airbnb for a
month something like that yeah I booked
flights yeah I mean we wouldn't like
it's a trade-off if you if you booked it
farther in advance you get cheaper and
better places but you get less
flexibility if you booked it like last
minute you get worse places for more
money but you get a lot of flexibility
so we would some end up somewhere in the
middle where maybe we'd book it like a
month in advance or we'd book like a
couple of our next stops we'd never try
to be like crazy planners but we
wouldn't save it for the very last
second so that we could slip in a nice
place and yeah we would try to stay in
Airbnb for a month and you know usually
if you stay for a month there's a
discount it can be as much as like 30 40
percent off and so you can get some
great deals it makes it like very
livable
it was definitely way cheaper than
living in like San Francisco like I
think our average rent split between the
two of us so it's maybe like $700 a
month
for the two years Wow which is pretty
affordable compared to most cities yeah
yeah especially like Southeast Asia
right can you make it over there is just
like meals or a dollar like it's crazy
it's so cheap yeah yeah yeah we actually
travel the world and save money
yeah a lot of you asked how do you how
do you afford to travel so much like
we're saving yeah yeah yeah I think if
you have the flexibility like I would
recommend anybody should like try it and
honestly if you don't like it just come
back it's not a big deal yeah yeah and
what was he like to you know try to
build a company well chocolatine it was
challenging I mean we weren't just like
traveling right like we were working
full-time and so every day it's like
okay where's the cafe we gotta find a
cafe with Wi-Fi and bathrooms and food
and outlets and all that and that can be
a struggle you know you get to a new
place you get to like you know we're in
like Ho Chi Minh City and we're like
okay where's the cafe today and it's
just like they did have them they've got
like great tea shops and whatnot and
like that was the ongoing struggle was
like finding a good place to work but we
did and a lot of times we work from home
and um yeah I don't know I think I think
well well and what's it being like well
like what was he like to you know work
with people remotely yeah yeah we kind
of figured it out as we go as we went
and yeah I don't know like we we had to
think about like especially for
something like customer success or
marketing and something that we haven't
actually worked in a job like this
before and so we just think about like
what do we do on a daily basis you know
we're like this is how we talk to
customers this is how we do support and
then yeah we help them get on boarded to
what we're doing and I would say it's
been a learning process as still as a
learning process like the next time we
hire somebody we have to sit down and
think about it really hard about like
okay what is this person gonna be doing
and how are we gonna get and make them
successful but yeah overall you know
lots of communication early on and then
and so people are on boarded and then
yeah we have to weekly meetings we have
a meeting on Monday and Friday where
everybody attends and Monday is like
how's your weekend what are you working
on this week and then Friday's like what
did you work on this week
what are you doing this weekend um so
it's pretty casual you know we don't
like a lot of meetings but I think face
time is important just keeping in touch
with people while your remote is really
important and so yeah and as a remote
team like we don't see each other that
often so what we're planning on doing is
team off-site or retreat or however you
like to call it where we bring everyone
together in some city around the world
just for around a week so we've done two
at least so we did our first one Lisbon
and our second one in split in Croatia
and then our third one is in Denver in
September so just I think it's a great
way for your team to get some like real
personal like hangout time cuz you just
it's not the same when you work with
someone and you only see them via video
chat it's a totally different vibe and
we think it's really important for our
team to just connect like on a personal
level yeah they have been really fun
yeah yeah yeah do you think it would
have been easier if it wasn't a Remo
team like there's definitely something
nice to like be in the same offices your
co-workers work with your co-workers see
them every day but I just think it's
like I don't know it feels like remote
it's kind of the future it feels like
that's where things are headed and
especially for us when we were general
digital nomads it seemed like that was
the only company that we could build
like we're not gonna build like a
digital nomad troupe of people like
traveling together and so yeah I just
felt like the company that we had the
build the company that we wanted to
build and so that's what we did
yeah anything a lot of people today are
looking for a remote work and we just
have like way more access I think to
talent across the world which is letting
a big deal for us when you know my
competition for talent is so high but
yeah I think just the flexibility of it
personally like I enjoy work from home
when I feel like it I enjoy going to a
cafe when I feel like it I don't I
enjoy not having to go into an office so
yeah I think it's like I think it's
great yeah it sounds like you you really
enjoy this yeah yeah I think everyone on
the team does to like people have
families and they like to spend time
with their families people like we
wouldn't be able to work together
because we're in totally different
places so this team is because we're
alone I think now before we go to the
next section about their productivity
and their tech stack I want to quickly
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using them alright now back to the video
how did you stay productive when you
didn't have an office yeah I mean we
never had we never had an office so we
always had to figure out what
productivity means to us and I think
that's really different for everyone
like even between me and Angie like we
have different work styles like for me I
really like to go to cafes I just feel
really really productive when I go to a
cafe I don't know you might feel a
little different
I feel similarly yet yeah or like some
days you're gonna work at home it just
depends on your day to day and that in
like again remote work just allows us to
decide when we wake up in the morning
what we feel like so yeah it's just like
what do you feel like today what do you
need to be productive do you need like
coffee do you need to like a list and
just make sure you have those and I
think you're in productive you're in a
productive zone yeah one thing that that
we learned from Facebook was like you
don't measure someone's productivity
based on hours worked it's not like you
know they need to show up at a certain
time and leave it a certain time and so
for us we don't really measure our own
productivity based on how many hours
we're working or based on you know like
nine-to-five kind of thing like what's
important to us is our output and that
our company is growing and doing well
and I think especially as founders we
feel like pressure like you were asking
like how do you stay productive right
like we feel pressure like you know at
first it was like if we don't you know
work then our company fails and now it's
like if we don't work not only does our
company fail but then our team
disappointed us and so there's just like
so much pressure just like keep going
moving forward that I couldn't imagine
like you know not being productive but
also yeah I think I think it's important
to separate like home mode versus work
mode especially you work from home you
know like you you can't just like roll
out of bed in your pajamas at work
because then you're feeling like super
lazy you know you have to like shower
and get dressed and like be in work mode
when you go to work if you're gonna even
if you work from home so yeah I really
think just having that mindset of like
going to work even if you're working
from home is important alright and are
there any like particular tools that you
recommend for staying productive
interesting what I mean I literally my
task list is like
code editor you know it's an atom and I
just have like a bunch of boxes and I
change them to check marks and I'm done
but um I mean there's one tool that I
use called cube serve and it it kind of
just tracks what you do in your computer
and so can help you know like this is
how much time you're spending on
productive things like you know your
code editor and this is how much time
you're spending on unproductive things
like Netflix and hacker news and
whatever and so for me I feel motivated
because there's a little percentage
counter like in the dock of my Mac that
says like you're like 81 percent
productive today you've worked like four
hours and 30 minutes of productive time
and I want to like drive that up like
every day I want to be like as
productive as possible yeah I like that
one it's kind of like a little bit of a
mental hack and yeah I don't know the
other side of things like I also feel
like it's important to not get kind of
too sucked into your screen and stare at
all the time so I have this app called
healthier that I've set to make me leave
the computer every hour for one to two
minutes it just helps me kind of make
sure I'm just not kind of deteriorating
in my seat so yeah that's I don't know
if it helps with productivity but I
think it's it's good for just health in
general okay going to a different topic
what's the tech slack that you use for
it Kenny
yeah it's all JavaScript and so we've
got a you know react on the front-end of
course cuz I used to work on that and
then note on the backend for our
database we use MongoDB and it's all
hosted on AWS how it is you decide to
use those um I mean really it's kind of
like how many start up I think should be
formed is my opinions like um it's what
you know what and what I knew you know I
was we're gonna react to my new
JavaScript really well and it kind of
makes sense for use JavaScript on the
front end you know JavaScript very well
like why not use it on the back end for
a database like MongoDB is pretty
controversial these days but it's like
what I knew and what was really easy to
get started and sort great for us so far
it'll be the same thing it's like it's
what I knew all this stuff is just like
what I knew and so that's what we
started with right it's worked out I
think it's a pretty common
dr. Hoffler yeah it's not too crazy yeah
yeah did you have any like difficulties
any any point like building you know
this product on your own like I was
opposed to working on Facebook yeah I
mean I had never built a product like I
had built side projects but nothing like
to this scale and so it's definitely
been a learning process you know and now
that we have like customers there's like
security and stuff involved and you know
we've been learning a lot about you know
scaling our app up but I remember like
there are some significant difficulties
when we went from like client-side
rendering to server-side rendering or
like when we went from one server to
having multiple servers and just like
these kind of like 0 to 1 steps we're
difficult but you know we're so much
more well put together now that we've
got all that stuff but there's a lot
ahead of us right so that was that was
like a lot of learning involved to you
yeah yeah especially like we did service
I've been doing before next jest existed
and so we kind of had to just like plug
a bunch of stuff together cuz that's how
people used to do it and now that we've
got a bunch of stuff plugged together it
doesn't really make sense to like tear
all apart to move to next chance and so
that's an interesting place where that
we're in right yeah and are there any
like particular resources for learning
JavaScript react no and like those tools
yeah that's kind of a tough one because
I learned it kind of a long time ago but
uh yeah I mean so like I learned react
from joining the react team and learning
it from literally the people that like
invented it and popularized it and so
you know that's one way go join the
reaction of Facebook but yeah I think
like one cool website that I'm really
excited about these days is repli'd
where you can just spin up like a coding
environment for any programming language
JavaScript node no PHP anything and just
start coding and then you get like the
output right there and they support
react and you can build like websites
there and so I think that's really cool
and you're just like hacking around you
don't have to worry about like setting
up here
environment I don't know if you can
really like learn JavaScript but you can
definitely play around there but
otherwise it's just like try to build
something see what walls you run into
and yeah Google it you know try to solve
your own problems because I think a lot
of how I learned I totally agree like
that's the best way is just like dive in
and you know pick a project and try to
do it and when you get stuck just like
Stack Overflow like that's the best
resource for me honestly when I was
learning in front and stuff it was it
was great and yeah whenever somebody
asked like about for a book or something
I have no idea
sorry that's okay Oh how does your learn
front end stuff yeah I mean literally
like I was like I'm gonna build my
portfolio website the first one was like
just vanilla HTML CSS but the second one
I for some reason did decide to use
WordPress which a lot of people were
using at that point but I just thought I
would extra challenge myself and so I
don't know yeah I was literally just
when I got stuck I literally googled a
problem that I had and it was usually
like the first like overflow link and I
just click it and I implement it and it
works and then from then on I remember
how to do it right so where I can school
it again yeah yeah it's it's really as
simple as that I think I guess that
works yeah I mean I'm special for
front-end where's like you don't yeah
you don't need to have all that like
mathematical background and all this
logic stuff like yeah I think it's
pretty straightforward all right so it's
just one last question
yeah is there anything you want to add
to this conversation ooh I would say
build side projects I would say like
even if you know you're you're at a
full-time job now start hacking on
things like like especially if you can
find someone that you work really well
with I think that's like one of the big
things for us was having someone else to
bounce ideas off of or like just go
check on certain things just go and
build stuff honestly like there's you
have free time like do it
you get a good taste of what it's like
to yeah just get started in the startup
world yeah I think a big one for us was
we made our first dollar before we
launched and so then by the time we
launched we knew that we could make
money and so I would encourage people
who want to start a software business to
try to make their first dollar as fast
as possible and then like they can do
that by solving a problem you can only
make money when you're solving a problem
for somebody and so yeah solve a problem
for somebody charge them for it and then
launch and it'll be a pretty good start
not saying that's the formula for like a
billion dollar company but you kind of
get like a small software business off
the ground I think that's absolutely do
it yeah oh great thank you so much thank
you