Why We Built Slipify
The Conversation that Started It All
As with many great ideas, Slipify didn’t come from a business plan or a strategy session; it started over a drink at a family gathering. Mike and I have always been each other’s sounding board and this time was no different.
We were chatting about work. I was deep into developing advanced AI software for a client, and while it was fascinating, I couldn’t help but notice how often we stumbled because of missing basic functionality. Mike, who’s been operating marinas for nearly two decades, pointed out that this was a common issue even in the software he uses at work. Sometimes the simple stuff is the hardest.
The Problem in Action
Mike had just come off a busy weekend, coordinating an influx of transient boats for a special event. With slips full and a scramble to make everything fit, he’d resorted to cutting out scraps of paper to represent boats on a map, shuffling them around to make everything work. It may have resembled arts-and-crafts more than marina management, but nothing in his software offered a better solution.
The Spark
I couldn’t shake the image of Mike, an experienced marina operator, bending over a table with tiny paper cutouts to solve a logistical problem that software should have handled. Over the following weeks, I kept coming back to the idea, spending late nights toying with ways to bring those “scraps of paper” to life on a computer screen.
The Interactive Marina Map Takes Shape
When Mike got his hands on the first version of the Interactive Marina Map, everything changed. Suddenly, he could make quick adjustments with the drag of a mouse, managing complex layouts with ease. Seeing how intuitive and powerful this tool became in Mike’s hands was the moment I knew we had something real.
The Birth of Slipify
After that, Mike’s complaints came flooding in—not in frustration this time, but with ideas. Every new problem he brought to the table became an opportunity for Slipify to improve. We realized that by focusing on getting the basics right, we could create a tool that made life genuinely easier for marina managers like Mike.
Where We’re Headed
We’re still working to make Slipify the best it can be, but our goal is simple: to give marina operators software that works the way they do. We’re here to make managing a marina easier and to support the people who make those places thrive.