OUR STORY · ATLANTA, GA · 2024–
01 / FRUSTRATION
We were the operators staring at the spreadsheet at 11 pm in January.
Saturday morning at a record fair — a buyer handed over cash for a pressing. It sold the same afternoon on Discogs. The spreadsheet hadn't been updated. We shipped an apologetic refund email at 11pm and swore it would never happen again.
The standard advice was: "pick one channel" or "hire someone to manage your spreadsheet." Neither was acceptable. Both were admissions of defeat.
02 / THESIS
Operators don't need more features. They need fewer surprises.
Inventory management software existed. Most of it was built for warehouse managers with SKU scanners and quarterly audits. None of it was built for the person sourcing at a thrift store at 9am and shipping at 2pm.
So we built around that person. The interface opens on inventory, not a dashboard. The sync runs in real time, not overnight. The pricing captures what you paid, so you always know if you're making money — not just revenue.
03 / TEAM
We’re a small team. We sell on eBay. We have more records than we’ll ever grade properly. We use Instica every day and ship fixes every week. That’s the product development loop: if something breaks on a Saturday morning, it’s fixed by Monday.
“We’re not building toward an acquisition. We’re building toward a tool we want to use for the next decade.”
04 / WHAT'S NEXT
eBay and Shopify sync is live. Discogs is in beta. AI tagging and pricing suggestions are rolling out to Pro accounts now. The iOS app is the primary client. The web app is catching up fast.
We're not building toward an acquisition. We're building toward a tool we want to use for the next decade.
06 / WHERE THE REVENUE COMES FROM, IN ONE PARAGRAPH
Subscriptions from operators, paid monthly or annually. That is it. We don't take a cut of your sales. We don't sell anonymized data to a market-research firm — we considered it once, and decided it was the kind of decision you can't undo. We don't earn affiliate revenue from any marketplace we connect to. If we ever change any of this, you'll read it in a founder's note before you read it in the terms of service.
VALUES
WHO BUILT THIS
Alfred N
FOUNDER · ATLANTA, GA
Sold records on eBay and Shopify simultaneously. Oversold twice in one weekend. Built Instica to solve the problem instead of accepting it.
HOW WE GOT HERE
2024
A 1973 LP sold on eBay and Shopify simultaneously. One refund, one apology, one weekend building the first sync prototype.
Early 2025
Ten operators. Real data. Real double-sells caught before they became disputes. The core sync architecture proved out.
Mid 2025
iPhone and iPad first. Sourcing floor to ledger in one flow. The web app follows.
2026
Three-channel sync. Sub-3-second latency on Pro. The ledger is finally honest across every channel we support.
WHAT WE DON'T DO
Free for 25 items · No card · Cancel from your account page.
09 / THE ANTI-ROADMAP
An AI that writes your listings for you. The listings that sell are the ones written by the operator who held the item. We will not commodify that voice.
An auto-sourcing tool. The market doesn't need software that helps people buy more inventory faster. Death piles are not a sourcing problem.
A marketplace of our own. Instica is for the operator. The day we become a venue, the incentive bends. We won't.
