Why RGBloom exists
A quick hello, and the two reasons this company exists.
This is the first thing we've written here, so a quick hello, and the two reasons RGBloom exists at all.
The first is a question. I teach computer science, and this February a student with an offer to study it asked me whether, with AI now writing so much of the code, it was still worth it. I couldn't honestly answer her, and I didn't like that. So I set out to find out the only way I could: by building something real, with AI doing the coding, and paying close attention to what still needed a person. That something turned into this company. I've told the whole story in a piece of its own: Should I still study computer science?
The second reason is simpler. I found making a photo book with existing companies genuinely frustrating, and I suspected I wasn't the only one. The price you couldn't pin down until it was too late, with delivery and extras appearing at the till. The account you had to create just to see how the system worked. The "50% off, today only" that was somehow on every day of the year. The photos quietly uploaded to servers the moment you added them. The slowness, when you knew it could be quick. The wall of choices that turned a nice afternoon into a chore. Each of those annoyances became a decision to do the opposite, and together they became the product. Take the first: an RGBloom book is £10, UK delivery included, and nothing is added at the checkout.
Over the coming weeks we'll write a short piece on each: why we'll never run a sale, where your photos actually go, why there's no sign-up, why one book instead of fifteen, and why it's quick. This blog is where the thinking behind RGBloom lives.