The Origins of Startbox

Being the new kid on the block, I guess I have a lot of explaining to do. Below should be answers to all the questions you’re probably asking yourself about Startbox. If I missed anything, please sound off in the comments!

What is Startbox?

Startbox is a revolutionary new framework for WordPress. It is a powerful tool designed for one explicit purpose: to help you build and launch better websites in less time and with less effort. By favoring convention and simplicity, Startbox does all the heavy lifting so you can do more in less time.

What Can You Do with Startbox?

I’ll be the first to admit that, on its surface, Startbox doesn’t look that amazing. But the minute you need to make a beautiful, functional website it will impress you. Spend a minute looking through a couple of the sites in the Showcase and you’ll soon find yourself asking a better question, what can’t you do with Startbox?

How Startbox Came Into Existence

Startbox was birthed out of the Sandbox project for WordPress in early 2008. I wanted a sensible starting point for all of my web development, one that packed in a lot of features and allowed for rapid development. I started with Sandbox because of its practical markup and dynamic CSS class system. In short time I found myself repeating the same modifications each time I started a new project and decided it was best if I just committed them to the core package. Enter Startbox.

The Growth of Startbox

For two years I started every new project by simply duplicating my Startbox theme folder and renaming it. It allowed for consistency and familiarity across all my work. As new functionally developed I made sure to merge it back in with Startbox. In time I found myself wanting to bring these new features and functionality to older projects, but retrofitting them was pretty laborious. Knowing there had to be a better way, I set out to make Startbox into the best WordPress theme framework.

Building a Better WordPress Theme Framework

Having spent the last two years building sites exclusively with WordPress, I was well aware of the solutions that were out there. Though I wasn’t actively contrbuting to the developer community I definitely had my finger on its pulse. Each of the available themes at the time did different things exceptionally well, but none of them did everything I needed in a way that I wanted.

Starting in December of 2009 I began making swathes of improvements to the core of Startbox. With each revision fat was trimmed, functions were improved, and capabilities were expanded. In version 2.4 I added the robust and easy-to-use Options API, better featured image support, modular script and CSS support, and a whole bunch of other things that have dramatically enhanced my web development experience.

In the Spring of 2010 I realized that my incredible tool could help so many other designers and developers and that it was wrong for me to keep it all to myself. I couldn’t just release it as-is, though. After all, the reason it was so useful to me was because I had spent the last 2.5 years of my life working with it. If anyone else was going to use it, I needed to create equally good supporting materials.

Support and Understanding are Job Number One.

Even if your product is capable of extreme functionality, making it easy to use on a fundamental level is job number one. To that end, I’ve spent the entire summer commenting my code, writing detailed documentation, producing how-to videos and tutorials, and carving space for future extendability. The first time someone lays hands on Startbox they are also gaining access to my numerous years of experience as a web designer and developer.

Why You’ll Love It – Guaranteed!

Startbox has dozens of incredible features that I’m sure will excite you, but that’s not why you’ll love it. You’ll love Startbox because, beyond being the best WordPress theme framework available, you have access to a wealth of resources and experience that no framework alone can offer.

My entire reputation is based on service and support. It would absolutely kill me to ever leave a client dissatisfied. This has driven me to excel in customer service, making sure you’ll get the most from what I’m giving you. And if you don’t completely love it, I want to give you your money back and refer you to somebody else. Really.

In Conclusion

So, there you have it. A brief history of my brain-child that has been nearly 3 years in the making. If you haven’t already, make sure you have a look at the Showcase and check out just a few of the many sites that are already running Startbox. If you’d like to see more, just contact us and ask for some samples!

Don’t forget to follow me on twitter: @rzen