I rebuild messy service businesses, then I build the software that runs them.
I am Justin Smith, General Manager of Adventure Idaho, a multi-site outdoor recreation company in Idaho. Since 2022 the company has grown 3.6x in customers and holds a 5.0 rating across 644 Google reviews, and it runs on software I wrote. I did the product, the demand, the pricing and the operation in one company, then built the system underneath all four.
- 3.6x customer growth since 2022, 1,279 → 4,709+
- ~147,000 annual website visitors, up from ~17,000
- 5.0★ across 644 Google reviews, #1 in market
- 44 seasonal staff across two bases, 272 people on the water in one day
One company. Same management team. Demand, pricing, operations and the software rebuilt together.
Most service businesses run on what one person remembers. The schedule, the exceptions, who is allowed to do what, which promise was made to whom. That works until it does not, and then the owner is the only thing holding it together.
That was never because owners are behind. Software shaped like a small business cost more than it saved, and the expensive part was never the code. It was writing the business down. That cost has collapsed, and the layer every service business is missing is buildable for the first time. I spent four years building it inside one company, in order: product, people, demand, pricing, then the operating system underneath all of it. I am now doing the same for other businesses, and working with the software companies those businesses run on.
The order I work in, and I will argue with you about it
- The product. Make it the same every time, delivered by people who are not you.
- The people. Training, standards and debriefs, so quality holds while the volume grows.
- Demand. Get found, get trusted, get chosen.
- Pricing. Raise it once demand has proved the product is worth it.
- The operating system. The process and the software underneath it, so growth stops running through one person's memory.
Most of the damage I see comes from doing these out of order. A demand engine pointed at an inconsistent product just manufactures bad reviews.
What I built
- Half the revenue base gone in FebruaryA policy change took the largest account. Records by May.
- The operating platformThe system that replaced whiteboard dispatch. Crew, vehicles, trips, food and compliance in one place.
- The demand engineFrom invisible to highest rated in the market, on content rather than budget.
- The sensor layerBookings, forms, radios and crew messages, read and reconciled against the live operation.
- Building a training program from nothingThe standards and debrief culture that held quality steady while the company tripled.
What I have figured out
- You do not extract a business. You instrument it.I ran a test on my own company and failed it. Where the rules actually turned out to be.
- What's left when nobody logs inI almost never open the software that runs my company. What is left when the screen stops being where the work happens.
- Ten percent came backI tested whether my company's operating rules could be found by analysis instead of memory. Then I went looking for where the rest of them live.
- The expensive part was never the softwareWhy custom operating software never reached small businesses, and what changed.
- We stopped hiring for experience and started hiring for trajectorySeasonal crews in a town nobody commutes to. What we changed and what it cost to learn.
- Capacity is not a numberWhat you can actually run today, once gear, crew and permits all have to line up at once.
- What was the solution is now the bottleneckThree seasons, honestly. The software that saved us became the thing in the way.
- Selling the seat is standardized. Delivering it is not.The industry published a connectivity standard. Read what it left out.
Ways in
- Run one of these businesses?I take on a small number of installs for owner-operated service companies, fixed scope and fixed fee.
- Build the software they run on?I work with software companies on the operations layer their product stops short of.
- Know an owner who is the bottleneck?Send them my way. Two sentences is enough.
Right now
- The research. I tested whether the operating rules of a business can be found by analysis instead of by memory, against an operation where I already knew every answer. Ten percent came back, which is not a method. The interesting part was where the rest of them turned out to live. Ten percent came back.
- Installs. Running this for other owner-operated companies, and writing the process down as I go so it stops depending on my instincts. What an install looks like.
- Platforms. Working with software companies on what it takes for an outside system to act on an operation instead of only reading it. The spec is the argument, and here is how I work with platforms.
- Speaking. Talks are being lined up with industry associations.
