Why a creative agency builds its own products
Shed, Diner, Glee, Found, Haulage and 74 Tribe aren't side projects. They're how we stay honest about what it takes to launch something real.
Most agencies talk about building products. We decided to actually run some.
Today Shedfactory designs, engineers and operates six platforms of its own: Shed for local sellers and shoppers, Diner for restaurants and venues, Glee for beauty bookings, Found for property, Haulage for moving goods across Nigeria, and 74 Tribe Studios for shows and studio hire.
Here's why we think that makes us a better partner for anyone with an idea.
Launch day teaches things a brief never will
When a client hands you a specification, the hard questions have usually been answered — or quietly skipped. When the product is yours, nobody answers them for you. Who are the first hundred users? What happens when a payment fails at 11pm? Why did half the people who signed up never come back?
Running our own platforms means we've faced those questions ourselves. That experience shows up in every project we take on, often as the question nobody thought to ask yet.
Two-sided platforms are hard. We've built six.
Every one of our products serves two groups at once: shoppers and sellers, diners and venues, clients and stylists, buyers and realtors, shippers and operators, viewers and creators. Each side only joins if the other is already there.
That chicken-and-egg problem shapes everything — onboarding, pricing, what launches first and what waits. If your idea is a marketplace, a booking platform or a directory, it's a problem we know well.
We feel the cost of our own decisions
Hosting bills, slow pages, confusing forms, a feature nobody uses — on our own products, we pay for those mistakes directly. That makes us careful, practical builders. We'd rather launch a focused first version that works than an ambitious one that doesn't.
What this means if you're working with us
- You get advice from operators, not just designers. We'll tell you what to build first, and what can wait.
- You get production-ready engineering. The same standards that keep our platforms running go into yours.
- You get a partner after launch. Hosting, maintenance and growth are part of what we do every day.
Got an idea you've been sitting on? Tell us about it. A few lines is enough to start the conversation.
