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BUSINESS
Building GatherloopFrom a personal vision to a thriving community café and event space.In 2022, I turned an idea into a real business — Gatherloop, a community café and event space. I built and ran it end-to-end: operations, finance, marketing, leadership. Everything I learned there lives in every product I build today.
WHAT I LEARNED
What I Learned Running a Business
OperationsManaging daily café operations taught me how to build reliable systems and keep processes running smoothly under real constraints.
FinanceTracking real revenue, expenses, and margins made me ruthless about ROI. Every feature I build now has a measurable business case.
MarketingGrowing Gatherloop's brand from zero gave me deep empathy for users who aren't engineers. Clear communication matters as much as code.
LeadershipHiring, managing, and motivating a small team taught me more about leadership than any management book ever could.
CommunityBuilding a community of 1,000+ members showed me that software is nothing without the people who use it every day.
“Running a business changed the way I build software. Every feature I ship now has a reason — a real user, a real problem, a real outcome.”M. Nindra Zaka — Founder, Gatherloop
THE JOURNEY
How Gatherloop Grew
2022
The BeginningOpened Gatherloop as a small café and event space. Built every process from scratch — supply chains, staffing, daily operations — learning entirely by doing.
2023
Community & GrowthOrganized 50+ events, grew to 1,000+ members, and ran our first profitable quarter. Marketing, community building, and operations all scaled together.
2024
Building for OurselvesRealized off-the-shelf tools weren't cutting it. Built a custom POS system tailored to Gatherloop's exact needs and deployed it to production.