COOPER DELIVERED DIGITAL / RURAL WESTERN AUSTRALIA
I GOT TIRED OF SAYING,
“SOMEONE SHOULD BUILD THAT.”
Hi, I’m Cailin Cooper. I build interactive WordPress websites, WooCommerce plugins, apps and digital tools, usually because somewhere along the way, I needed them myself.
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> OPEN DIRECTORY /ORIGINS
01 / WHERE IT STARTED
Two businesses.
A lot of ideas.
I’m the co-founder of two very different Australian businesses.
Cooper Delivered
Cooper Delivered is an Australian eco haircare business. I’m a hairdresser by trade, and it began with a simple question: how could I stay connected to an industry I love while doing things differently when it comes to waste?
Shampoo bars were part of that answer.
Nana’s Quest
Nana’s Quest is an online marketplace for handcrafted goods. It started because I wanted somewhere my Nana could sell the things she made.
I wanted it to feel a little like wandering through a Sunday market. But why shouldn’t we try to make it feel closer?
Both businesses have plans much bigger than where they stand today. Somewhere amongst those steps, I started building technology.
NEW DIRECTORY DETECTED /TECHNOLOGY
> locate_builder();
BUILT SOMEWHERE
YOU MIGHT NOT EXPECT.
We live off-grid on five acres in rural Australia.
We didn’t exactly begin as country bumpkins. We’re certainly enjoying becoming them, though.
CRAFT
TECHNOLOGY
COLLISION DETECTED.
> OPEN PROJECT /EARTH
I NEEDED A BETTER
WAY TO GARDEN.
I love gardening. I tried gardening apps. I didn’t particularly like them. And, to be completely truthful, I didn’t particularly want to keep paying subscriptions for them either.
Why don’t I build my own?
That became Cooper Delivered Earth. I built the gardening app around the way I actually wanted to use one.
Eventually I showed it to someone. They loved it. So I thought:
Bugger it. Let’s put it on Google Play.
> marketing.status();
SYSTEM OVERLOAD
I WANTED SOMETHING
THAT WORKED MORE
LIKE MY BRAIN.
So I built The Board, a marketing app where campaigns become cases, competitors become suspects and research becomes evidence.
COMPETITOR – SUSPECT
RESEARCH – EVIDENCE
> woocommerce.scan();
ORDER STATUS …….. PROCESSING / ACTUAL PROGRESS UNKNOWN
STOCK VALUE ……… UNKNOWN
PRODUCT PROFIT …… UNKNOWN
CUSTOMER ISSUE …… DON’T FORGET
SMALL PROBLEMS.
SMALL TOOLS.
Running WooCommerce businesses presented another collection of annoyances. So we started building little WooCommerce plugins. Not enormous systems trying to reinvent WooCommerce.
AI DETECTED.
YES.
I USE AI.
And I’m not going to hide that.
I use AI to help project-manage ideas, research, challenge my thinking, troubleshoot and get from “could we?” to “let’s try it” faster.
AI IS A TOOL.
THE IDEA STILL NEEDS A HUMAN.
> load_template();
WE DON’T BUILD
BORING WEBSITES.
There are thousands of perfectly functional website templates. If that’s all somebody needs, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with using one. But that’s not what excites me.
I want things to move. I want the website to respond. I want somebody to discover something. I want a digital shop to feel like somewhere you entered.
Why should your website look like everybody else’s?
IF WE CAN DREAM IT,
WE CAN BUILD IT.
Maybe it’ll work. Maybe it won’t. Maybe we’ll build version one and realise there’s a much better way. That’s part of it.
I never wanted to spend my life saying, “I thought of that years ago.” I’d rather give the idea a go.
PLUGINS
WEBSITES
BOOKS
TOOLS
PHYSICAL PRODUCTS
EXPERIMENTS
Some probably won’t work at all. But we’ll know because we tried to build them.
> trace_origins();
CONNECTION
ESTABLISHED.
Eco haircare – Earth – books – sustainable packaging – technology
Craft – marketplace – immersive commerce – technology
COOPER DELIVERED DIGITAL
Build what you need. Share what works. Keep asking what could be better.
Built off-grid on five acres in rural Australia. Not a bad place to build the future from.
CDD://ABOUT/NEXT_BUILD_SIGNAL
> what_should_we_build_next?