Hi 👋
On Friday (Dec 1, 2023) the price of Ellie is going to change to $9.99/mo and I wanted to give some context on the price change.
First, this change does not impact existing subscribers. Existing subscribers are grandfathered into their current plan for life. To those users, thank you so much for your support 🙏
This also means that if you sign up before Dec 1, 2023 you will be grandfathered into the old pricing.
👀 So why the price change?
You might not know this, but I'm the solo developer of Ellie. I've been working on Ellie for almost 2 years and do all the software dev, marketing and customer support.
However, I want to start moving faster on a few key features (Outlook integration, notifications, iOS widgets) over the next year and hire a part time contractor to help accelerate the timelines.
The cost of a good software development contractor is ~$4K/mo minimum (again, not even full time).
Ellie makes around $1,400/mo which after necessary expenses is around $1,000.
This might shock a lot of you to hear but yes an app with ~350 paid users charging between $3-5/mo depending on the plan only makes ~$1400 😅
My hope is that raising the prices will increase revenue over the next few months and I can afford to bring on some help and deliver more value for you all in 2024.
Since the last price change ($1.99 -> $4.99) the feature set of Ellie has almost increased substantially (2-way Google cal integration, Apple cal integration, email forwarding, recurring tasks, lists, Zapier integration, due dates, analytics, etc…)
I think the value that Ellie now brings can live up to the new price point. And I have many features in the pipeline to exceed it.
To students, non-profits and people who look to Ellie as an affordable alternative
The student/non-profit discount will not be going away. You can get 50% off any plan (including the lifetime plan). Feel free to reach out to me (chris@aloa.co) or sign up with your student email for this discount.
And if you are in a position where you feel like Ellie could be beneficial to you (ADHD, job hunting, etc…) but are not in the financial position to pay the full amount: please reach out directly to me.
Hope this gives some context! Please reach out if you have any thoughts ✌️
Chris Raroque
