The private community for people building a software business with no cofounder and no CTO. A CTO who's done it in your corner every week, and a room full of builders who won't let you quit.
And when you're stuck on a call that matters, who are you supposed to ask?
You can ship a whole product in a weekend now. Whether anyone will pay for it, whether it holds up when real users show up, what to build next, how to price it: that's still hard. Those aren't coding problems. They're decisions.
The code is the easy part now. The decisions are the hard part, and they're a lot easier with people around.
Nobody tells you it's a bad call until it's cost you three weekends. By then you've built two more things on top of it.
People selling shortcuts and prompt packs who have never had a customer pay them. You don't need more hooks or more tools. You need straight answers from someone who's shipped.
Not a demo you show friends. A product strangers can sign up for, and it's live.
Your first customers, found on purpose. You know who they are, why they bought, and where the next ten come from.
You made the calls that matter at 100 users before you had 100 users. Nothing you built needs to be torn out.
A room that watched it grow, cheered the launch, and noticed the week you went quiet.
Most communities hand you a course library and a feed. This one runs on a rhythm, so you always know when you'll get help and what's expected of you.
Post what you'll ship this week. One line. Everyone can see it.
Me, live, hot-seat style. Bring the decision you're stuck on. Same evening every week, recorded with a transcript if you can't make it.
Post the call you're stuck on: the context, your options, your deadline. I answer the top three on video every week. The room answers the rest.
Post what you shipped. The room holds you to Monday.
I review one member's product live: the stack, the landing page, the pricing. Everyone learns from it.
When you launch, the room shows up. Once a month I feature a member's launch on my Instagram, @davecto.
A monthly pairing with someone at your stage, so there's always one person checking in on you.
Everything I've written, arranged into tracks: Validate, Build, Ship, Sell, Run. Plus members-only decision templates and Claude skills.
A starter path so week one isn't "now what?" Already launched? Skip to the part you need.
I've spent 20 years building software. I've been the engineer writing the code, the CTO making the calls, and the one who got the phone call when it broke. I took a company from $0 to $2M.
I also have a full-time job. So I build the way you do, around everything else, and I show up on a schedule I don't miss.
There are 20 free guides on davecto.com/resources. That's what I give away. The Lab is where I help you apply it to your product.
Locked for as long as you stay.
You're On The List ✓
I'll write once, the morning doors open. Nothing else.
Founding price is for the first 100 members. After that it's $79/month. One email when doors open, nothing else. Runs on Skool.Founding price is for the first 100 members or until Tuesday, Nov 17 at 11:59pm ET, whichever comes first. After that it's $79/month. Runs on Skool.
If it isn't worth it in your first 30 days, tell me and I'll refund you. No questions, no forms.
The room works because the people in it are building. A trial fills it with browsers. The refund takes the risk off you anyway.
One bad call caught early, like a rebuild, the wrong stack, or a month on a feature nobody asked for, pays for years of this.
Most of the room does, and so do I. That's why it runs on a schedule. Office hours are in the evening (ET) and recorded. The Decision Desk and Ship Log are async. An hour a week gets you real value. More gets you more.
No. It's built for people who can get something working with AI tools but don't have an engineer to check their calls. I translate the technical decisions into plain trade-offs: what it costs, what breaks, what you can put off. If you can describe what you're building, you belong here.
No. AI tools come up all the time, because they're how we build now. But you're here to build a business, not to get good at prompting. The Classroom is there when you need it. The room and the calls are the point.
One live office hour every week, video answers to the top Decision Desk posts every week, a live teardown every month, and me in the feed most weekdays. Not unlimited 1:1s, and not DMs. That's how I keep showing up every week without burning out.
It's the best time. Week one of the starter path is validation: finding out whether anyone wants it before you spend months building. Advice is cheapest before you've written the code.
No. Skip the starter path. The teardowns, the Decision Desk and Launch Pad are built for products that have users and need more of them.
Anytime, from your Skool settings. Your founding price stays locked only while you stay a member. And if it isn't worth it in your first 30 days, I'll refund you.
Almost every week, someone DMs me a version of the same question. They've built something with AI. It mostly works. And they have nobody to ask whether the next call they make is going to cost them six months.
I can't answer every DM. I can build a room where those questions get asked, get answered, and turn into products that make money. That's the Solo Founder Lab. I'd like you to build in it with me.
Dave