Consulting

Advice from someone who ships

Most technology advice comes from people who stopped building years ago. We run production software every day -- scheduling, payments, patient records, AI inference -- and we will tell you plainly what to automate, what to buy, and what to leave alone.

Book a 30-minute scoping call See the $2,500 audit

Where this fits

There is a gap between "hire a developer" and "hire a consulting firm." Below the gap you get someone who will build exactly what you asked for, including the parts that were a mistake. Above it you get a slide deck, a junior team, and an invoice.

This is the middle. One senior engineer who has built and now operates multiple production systems in your industry, working directly with the owner. No account manager, no handoff to someone cheaper after the sale, no ticket queue.

We work most often with owner-operated practices -- childcare, salon and spa, massage therapy, chiropractic, fitness and dance studios -- because we have already built and deployed software for all five. We know what a no-show actually costs you, how a treatment note has to be stored, and where a booking system quietly loses money.

Three ways to work together

Start with the audit. It is the cheapest way to find out whether the rest is worth doing.

Start here

Technical Audit

A week-long assessment of what you run today, what it is costing you, and what to do about it.

$2,500 fixed

One week, start to delivered

  • Full review of your current systems and where they leak time or money
  • A written assessment you keep, whatever you decide afterwards
  • 90-minute walkthrough of the findings
  • A sequenced roadmap with honest cost ranges
  • Credited against implementation if you go ahead within 60 days
What the audit covers

Implementation

We build what the audit recommended. Fixed price, agreed before any work starts.

$8,000 and up

Typically 4 to 8 weeks

  • Fixed fee per work line, quoted in writing from the audit findings
  • 50% at kickoff, 50% at launch -- nothing billed by surprise
  • Weekly working demos, never a single reveal at the end
  • You own the code and the accounts it runs in
  • Out-of-scope work is quoted separately, not billed silently
Discuss a build

Retainer

Ongoing technical leadership for businesses that need judgment more often than they need code.

$2,000 /month

Month to month, 30 days notice

  • A senior engineer on call for decisions before you commit to them
  • Vendor and platform evaluation, so you stop overpaying for tools
  • Direct access by phone and email -- no ticket system
  • Unused hours do not roll over; you are buying availability
  • Larger tier available at roughly one day per week
See retainer rates

Every engagement starts with a 30-minute scoping call at no charge. That call is to decide whether we are a fit -- it is not a free audit, and we will say so if the honest answer is that you do not need us.

Selling products online? Look at Shopify instead.

If what you need is a storefront rather than a decision, an audit is the wrong purchase and we will tell you so on the call. Shopify storefront design and build is its own service, at its own fixed prices -- no audit required first.

  • Essential $3,200 -- free theme customized to your brand, up to 8 pages, 1 to 2 weeks
  • Signature $6,500 -- custom sections and editorial layouts, 2 to 3 weeks
  • Bespoke $9,850 -- custom mechanisms, migrations, integrations, 4 weeks and up

See Shopify storefronts

Rates

Published, because you should not have to sit through a call to find out what something costs.

Consulting rate card for advisory, fractional CTO, and hourly work
Engagement Price What it includes Effective rate
Technical Audit $2,500 fixed One week. Assessment, walkthrough, written roadmap. --
Implementation From $8,000 Fixed fee per work line, quoted from the audit. --
Advisory retainer $2,000/month Up to 8 hours, async access, two scheduled calls. $250/hr
Fractional CTO retainer $5,400/month Up to 32 hours, roughly one day per week. $169/hr
Hourly, outside a retainer $185/hour Two-hour minimum. Billed in 30-minute increments after that. $185/hr

Retainers are billed in advance on the first of the month and can be cancelled with 30 days notice. Fixed-fee work is 50% at kickoff and 50% at launch. Travel outside Montana is quoted separately. A signed services agreement precedes all work.

What we actually run

Not a capability list. These are systems in production, built and operated by the person you would be hiring.

Five booking platforms

Scheduling, records, and billing systems for childcare, salon and spa, massage therapy, chiropractic, and dance studios. Timezone-correct availability, race-safe booking, no double-bookings.

Payments that reconcile

Stripe integrations handling real money: whole-cent arithmetic, signature-verified webhooks that survive retries, and audit rows for every transition. Money bugs are the expensive kind.

Sensitive records

Encrypted health and treatment records with rotating keys, role-scoped access, and the boring discipline that keeps a small practice out of trouble.

AI you own

A self-hosted inference platform running on our own hardware, plus hosted-model integrations. We can tell you when a local model is enough and when you are better off paying per token.

Our own infrastructure

Self-hosted mail, backups, monitoring, DNS, and deployment. We are not reselling someone else's platform and guessing at how it behaves when it breaks.

Depth when it matters

A programming language and compiler, real-time audio pipelines, and GPU scheduling systems. Most small business work never needs this. It means we are not guessing when yours does.

How an engagement runs

  1. Scoping call 30 minutes, no charge

    We find out whether this is worth either of our time

    • What you are trying to fix, in your words
    • What you already run and what it costs you
    • Whether an audit is the right next step, or whether you should just buy something
    • A straight answer if we are not the right people

  2. Audit 1 week, $2,500

    The paid work starts here, and so does the value

    • We review your systems, workflow, and numbers in depth
    • You get a written assessment and a sequenced roadmap
    • 90-minute walkthrough so you can push back on the findings
    • You keep the document whether or not you hire us again

  3. Build or advise Fixed fee or retainer

    Two honest paths, and the audit tells us which

    • Build: fixed price agreed up front, weekly working demos, 50/50 payment
    • Advise: a monthly retainer when the need is judgment rather than code
    • Everything runs in your own private client portal
    • Scope changes are quoted, never billed by surprise

  4. Handover Built in, not extra

    You should be able to fire us and keep everything

    • Code and accounts in your name, transferred on final payment
    • Written documentation, not a verbal handoff
    • Training for whoever has to run it day to day
    • Ongoing support if you want it, never as a condition of leaving

Being honest about fit

This works well when

  • You own the business and can make a decision without a committee
  • Something concrete is broken, slow, or costing you money every month
  • You want to understand the reasoning, not just receive a deliverable
  • You are in one of the industries we have already built for
  • You would rather pay once for the right answer than repeatedly for the wrong one

Look elsewhere if

  • You need the cheapest available developer -- that is a real strategy, just not ours
  • You want hours filled with no defined outcome
  • You need a team of five starting Monday
  • The decision is already made and you want it endorsed
  • The work requires being on-site outside Montana most weeks

Start with 30 minutes

Tell us what is not working. If an audit is the right next step we will say so, and if it is not, we will tell you that instead. Either way you get a straight answer from the person who would do the work.

Book a scoping call