[itake]

It really doesn’t though. You could scale down to a 1-3 person team. Stop building new features. Keep a full stack dev on for 1year to fix bugs and the remaining team does customer support.

Hiring a contracting company for 3 mo per year to perform updates.

My guess is the decision maker doesn’t think it’s worth their time to run a business like this. Instead of rapidly shifting focus into a higher growth area, they would continue to be attached to a shrinking product

[tptacek]

A 1-3 person team in the US is a half million per annum proposition, and, again, even if you could make the payroll, you have to retain qualified engineers for a role that has zero growth potential.

[itake]

1-3 people to do customer support do not cost $500k.

you don't have to retain qualified engineers b/c you hire a contracting company that manages employee growth within their own organization.

[tptacek]

Serious contract engineers cost more, not less. This isn't a Fiverr job.

[itake]

cool, so you hire one for 2x the the price of a full time one for 1 week per month. 12 weeks * 2x price < 52 weeks * 1x the price.

I've done this job for a 3-4 startups before. they can't afford a full time engineer, so they hire someone to work part-time to keep the lights on. its not a hard job and many engineers appreciate the consistent work and extra cash.

[oidar]

What about in India? the Philippines?

[tptacek]

Anyways: that's generally why it's not going to happen.