A good product should not lose because nobody can see it.

I started Appel Studios for owners who make something worth buying and still lose to the louder business down the street.

I grew up in Calabasas, California, in a family that runs its own businesses. My parents run a company. My uncle runs a coffee shop.

Trading futures taught me where to put my attention. I can’t control the market. I can control my size, my stop and whether I follow my plan. Staring at the rest never made a trade better.

I run the studio the same way. I take on work I care about and spend my hours on the parts I can move. I can’t control the algorithm or what the shop next door spends on ads. I can control whether your site loads fast on a phone and says the true thing about what you sell.

Your customers already know why they come back. I find that reason, then build the website and cut the hype video around it. You work with one person from the first call to the live site, with no agency and no account manager in between.

Before I hand anything over, I test it on a phone and on a slow connection. I check it against a real number before I call it finished.

I run Appel Studios while I study management at the University of Florida.