Gourmet Pixel

Main point: I learned to get things done in the early App Store days, running a small studio where design, business and shipping were all my job.

How it started

I started designing iOS apps the day Steve Jobs announced native apps and the App Store. With a childhood friend as CTO and me as Head of Design, we built a Formula One app after work, just to see what we could make. When it launched, Apple called from Cupertino and asked to promote it globally.

Gourmet Pixel

We left our jobs and founded Gourmet Pixel. The plan was to build our own apps, but we were soon working for clients like Rolls-Royce, Virgin, Wolfgang Puck and Audi, plus a secret project with Electronic Arts. I led product design, and also marketing, branding, sales, finance, hiring and firing.

Our own products did well too. Our game Roll passed one million downloads in a single week, and a Christmas app was a hit every December for years.

What it taught me

• Distribution is part of product design. You design the conditions for a product to be found and trusted.
• Constraints are normal. Simplify, focus, cut, ship.
• Quality is a system, not heroics: patterns, checks, reviews and a clear definition of done.
• Business fluency changes how you design. You learn the real cost of delay and over-scoping.
• Collaboration is the work. Working beside a CTO co-founder, alignment was a daily practice, not a meeting.

Why it matters now

The goal was never "great design". It is to deliver great outcomes, repeatedly.