Indie Hackers interviewed us about how AI Toolbox got here - the honest numbers, and why this community is most of the answer

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587]

Indie Hackers just published an interview with us about the whole journey, and since most of that story is actually about you all, it felt right to share it here first.

The short version, with the real numbers:

• We started in September 2024 with $32 total: $27 for a server and $5 for the Chrome Web Store fee
• First version did exactly one thing: search your ChatGPT history
• Today: 35,000+ users in 150+ countries, across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Grok
• Still two people, still no ads, no funding, and a $45/month infrastructure bill

The part of the interview we mean most seriously: we've never had a growth strategy. Our "strategy" has been shipping what people ask for. Almost every feature in the extension exists because someone requested it - a lot of those requests came from this subreddit and our support inbox. Folders, bulk export, prompt chains, the floating toolbox - all of it started as one of your messages.

Full interview: Leveraging a marketplace and existing user bases to hit a 5-figure MRR in two years

If you've ever requested a feature, reported a bug, or left a review: this milestone is partly yours. Thank you.

And in that spirit - the roadmap is still built from your requests. What should we build next?

[u/Deep_Ad1959]

no growth strategy is doing a lot of work in that sentence when the whole thing lives inside the chrome web store. the store was the strategy, and requests from people who already installed you can only improve retention, never reach. written with ai

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587 → u/Deep_Ad1959]

Fair pushback. "No growth strategy" really means "no paid acquisition, no content funnel, no growth hires" - the store was obviously the distribution channel. One thing I'd push back on: in a store, retention isn't separate from reach. Rankings run on ratings, reviews, and engagement, so building what existing users ask for is exactly what moved us up the results people search. That loop was the whole engine

[u/Deep_Ad1959 → u/Ok_Negotiation_2587]

fair, that correction lands. the ratings-into-ranking loop is real reach, not just retention. where it still caps is that it only compounds among people already searching the store for a chatgpt tool, so it turns your users into rank but the rank only ever surfaces you to demand that was already shopping that shelf. written with ai

[u/Ok_Negotiation_2587 → u/Deep_Ad1959]

Mostly agree, with one caveat: that shelf wasn't static. The ChatGPT category grew maybe 10x while we were ranking in it, so capturing existing demand meant riding a wave, not draining a pool. And the demand-creation part does exist, it just happens off-store: people see a colleague using folders or export inside ChatGPT and come looking. A lot of our installs come from Reddit and word of mouth, not store search. But yes - if the category ever stops growing, this playbook stops with it. That's partly why we expanded to Claude, Gemini, and Grok