steffoz

Love it!

A bit! By having a non strict published_at ordering, but grouping by author, I definitely feel like a know more about the people behind their blogs!

I like the idea very much! No code available yet? :)

There's some real gems in this comment.

> we have paid off the mortgage on our premises and are decidedly boring

We too like to call us boring :) This kind of boring is so good.

> We incorporated in 2000. 25 years later, we are still trading, which is nice. We will never fiddle with unicorns or set the world on fire, we just want to get along comfortably and be able to sleep at night.

On one hand 25 years in business is a mind-blowing achievement. But at the same time, just "nice" is the right way to see it. Being comfortable and sleep well at night is exactly what we all want. You don't need to set the world on fire to be proud of what you do!

For us it was a performance issue. We load tested DBs and servers with our real app and found out Heroku (notoriously known for being stuck in 2010) performed better then some more recent competitor.

I don’t give employees (and stable freelancers/contractors) the minimum I can get away with; I give them a fair share of the profits on top of their regular salary.

I’m not sure how common this model is in Europe, but it has certainly helped me keep my best employee with me throughout the entire journey and feel much less alone in my decisions—especially at the beginning, when things are harder.

Plus, it's just more fun to share when you can.

Awesome to hear, thanks for sharing man! Enjoy! :)

Kudos to you! What’s your current venture, if I may ask?

> I think you're leaving a lot of money on the table

100% agree. Also, I'm completely fine with it. Money is not the end goal to me.

> you’re adding existential risk to the business with your current strategy.

There's risk in any strategy. The VC playbook of "grow quickly" carries its own dangers: product enshittification, cultural rot, jeopardizing the very thing that made the business work in the first place...

> I’ve noticed over the years that as a general rule some European founders proudly care less about growth than American ones

I don't know if it's a Europe/America cultural difference. Probably, to some extent. We do care a lot about how we spend our lives outside of business. There’s a whole world beyond work that’s worth protecting :)

> If any mid-size company with functional distribution and tech wanted to take your business away, they could.

But why would they? For a "mere" €6.5M/year? We can optimize for the niche that the big players aren't even interested in. Being small and "ignorable" is its own form of defense.

> "in software it's grow or die."

I’m fine with this framing too, honestly. If this business ever runs its course, we have enough runway, experience, and optionality to start something new. There’s no inherent value to me in making a piece of software last for centuries.

What does matter is having a clear and fair exit plan for customers when that moment eventually comes.

> I hope you are writing the 20 year retrospective happily in 10 years from now

We'll see! :) Thanks for a genuinely thoughtful reply — I can tell where you're coming from. These are doubts I've wrestled with for years, and still do. I just keep landing in the same place (for now!).