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jzig | on: Ask HN: What are you working on? (November 2026)
I was laid off a few weeks ago. Then I learned my dad’s carpet cleaning company has been struggling, so I started learning about Google Local Service Ads to help him out. THEN I learned his old Windows desktop CRM was discontinued and one OS update away from no longer working. I wanted a way to track every dollar spent to determine return on ad spend, but the Google LSA dashboard left a lot to be desired. And existing SaaS CRMs didn’t have great integrations to Google Ads API. So I built Crewbird, a Field Service Management and CRM for service based businesses with Google LSA integration where my dad is quickly approaching 3x ROAS!

I’m still looking for work in the mean time but I’m proud of what I’ve achieved so far.

https://getcrewbird.com/

tropicalhunter | parent | next
Man, I would love to know more about this. The space between a full blown ERP and a tracker on an Excel Spreadsheet is absolutely abysmal. Then when you start introducing things like fleet and field crew management on top of the procurement, account management and AR/AP while acting as a full blown salesman that a lot of middle managers are being expected to do right now, it gets absolutely soul crushing to swap between 12 different trackers per hour just to find a snippet of the information you are looking for.

I have something vibed together as an internal tool that does well enough, but definitely not something I would ever refer to as a CRM by any stretch of the imagination and the bridge between basic on-the-shelf inventory and tracking rental assets are two completely different beasts. Maybe more of a prettier version of the spreadsheets we already use with more automated functionality would be more apt.

jzig | root | parent | next
Thanks for one of the only positive comments here. There are still areas for improvement but it has proven useful so far. Happy to talk any time.
xeonax | root | parent | next
My slop attempt at this https://worx.aeonax.com/. I felt there was a gap, an absence of high bureaucracy software. So made above. People I know did check it out. so theres that.
skrig | root | parent | next
Building this right now! I've helped several companies implement CRMs and worked on heavily customizing my ERP at work. They all suck, bad. 90% of companies only need something simple. I'll let you know when I'm finished, would be awesome to get some feedback if you're willing.
tropicalhunter | root | parent | next
All horrible. Some of those modular CRM's seemed promising, but still felt like we would end up with oversaturated feature sets and would just be trading one suite for another and the same problems.

Definitely share when you do. If you have a repo or anything that I can follow while it is still in development, that would be great.

calvinmorrison | root | parent
or better to say different people need different things. a accountant is more interested in properly calculating the COGs than the guy inputting his labor and goods on a ticket.
minierpthrowawa | parent | next
I actually did this for my father’s industry in 2016. Took a break from my sales job, and built him a project management tool about 25% of the way to an ERP tool. I’ve sold a few monthly recurring accounts to other companies and overall the people that like it enough to finish onboarding seem to like it. Watch out though.. don’t work too hard too long for too little just for dad. Him being your #1 user that loves you can make you keep going longer than you would if you had to face reality.

My real advice… start working for him and using the software yourself 100%. Even for $5 an hour so you both have skin in the game. Him to have some help, you to learn, but the money adds a bit of reality so neither of you do things only because it’s free or because it’s family.

My saas has improved leaps and bounds this year when I started to work in the industry for a company actually using my product. I learned things I never saw by just giving demos.

jzig | root | parent
Sage advice here, thank you. That makes a lot of sense in terms of learning the domain. Would you be comfortable having a brief conversation? Would love to learn more of your story.
golddust-gecko | parent | next
This is great. And I think if "software engineer" as a large-scale job category (i.e. not just highly specialized big co. technical staff) persists in the AI future, it looks like this: "the jack of all trades computer person working in a non-software company".
no-trbl-2-u | parent | next
This is so sick, great job dude! I actually just started a startup with a few friends of mine and we just started using Google ads and we literally just complained about the dashboard and what we can and can not see. I'm not 100% sure Crewbird aligns since we really only have the 2 services, but I'll definitely check it out further and bring it up with them. Funnily enough, though, the platform we're building is a job hunting platform (hunt.tech) I hope it helps and I can't wait to really dig into this.

Out of curiosity, where did you get the name Crewbird?

jzig | root | parent
Thanks! How are you using Google Ads with your job search product? The name came from brainstorming dozens of examples with Claude, refining what made some sense for the product/industry, and cross-referencing with what TLDs were available.
xyzzy_plugh | parent | next
Please create a newsletter sign up or something. I have several clients who could be interested in this as it matures.
jzig | root | parent
Interesting thought! What would you want to read about? Would a blog suffice?
xyzzy_plugh | root | parent
Just send an email when you post a new blog post.
mikert89 | parent | next
use checkhq to add payroll, and charge 10k per year ACV from businesses :) then add voice intake agents and you will be essentially replicating venture businesses that have raised 20M+
thunky | parent | next
> I was laid off a few weeks ago. Then I learned my dad’s carpet cleaning company has been struggling

Nice story but also kindof sad you didn't have time for this while you were working. Good example of what can happen if we don't work so much.

monooso | root | parent
You don't know the first thing about OP, other than that he's trying to help out his dad.

Maybe his father didn't want to worry his family, and had been keeping it to himself. I have no idea, and neither do you; you just chose to assume the worst about someone you don't know.

thunky | root | parent | next
> you just chose to assume the worst

I did no such thing. My assumption was that OP, like most of us, dedicates most of his life to work. That's not a character judgment and it's not "the worst". It's normal.

In the absence of work he was able to help his dad, presumeably because he had more time. The "sad" part isn't OP, it's the fact that work demands so much.

jzig | root | parent
Thank you; roughly accurate.
iLoveOncall | parent | next
What happens when you find a job and don't have time to keep working on the CRM that your father uses for his company, and he inevitably runs into issues or limitations that require new development?

This feels like a very risky move.

Benjamin_Dobell | root | parent | next
Yeah, impressive project, but I had the same thought.

My LGS recently got me in to have a look at building some custom systems for them. I looked at what they needed and was like:

> Hold up. You can pay me thousands of dollars to build something custom, and it will inevitably have on-going maintenance costs and high associated monthly costs for hosting + third-party API access (not amortized across multiple stores/clients), OR I could set you up on Shopify and a bunch of well maintained plug-ins.

SoftTalker | root | parent
Maybe the CRM will become a viable replacement for a job. There are tons of one-person or very small service businesses who could probably use that.