Josh Fendley of Ample
How did you start your business?
Five of us left our jobs working at a local digital advertising agency in 2008 to start Ample. We wanted to focus on more digital product design and development, as well as the branding, advertising and marketing work that we had been doing for over a decade. We wanted to bring our experience working with huge clients to help small to medium-sized businesses.
How did you come up the idea for your business?
We were all excited to be entrepreneurs. We had several ideas for products of our own, but we kept getting requests to design and build web products for other people. There’s a strong demand for a group that can deliver in any platform from web to mobile.
What resources here did you take advantage of and how did they help?
There’s quite a bit of digital talent here. We’ve been lucky to have our pick of some of the best to come work with us. It’s helped to have a strong belief in Ruby on Rails as development platform. It’s really helped us attract talented developers that want to focus their careers in that direction.
What inspires you?
Wowing our clients. We strive to exceed expectations. We also want to solve seemingly impossible problems. Luckily, we’ve been able to do both on a regular basis.
What’s next for you and your company?
We’re actually in process of repositioning ourselves to focus even more on digital product development and marketing. We’ve been somewhat devoid of positioning until now, but we’re really excited about honing in on what we like to do most. We have a leg up in that we’ve been doing it now for four years and have developed a solid reputation as a shop that can deliver from start to finish (strategy through execution).
Interview by Robin Donovan