Hi, I’m Gennifer. I’ve been with ByteStand pretty much from the beginning. Or really, before the beginning. I started working for Todd’s Amazon FBA business in 2014, entering products into Amazon and prepping shipments to go to Amazon’s warehouses. It was a pretty sweet job with flexible hours.

But then, one day, Todd came to me with this crazy idea to enter all 80 billion of his Amazon listings into Shopify. He wanted images, descriptions, variations, quantities, prices, ALL THE THINGS. Todd had clearly gone insane, but I got paid by the hour and I didn’t really mind the tedium of spending all day entering data, only to get roughly 3.5 products done at the end of the day.

Todd eventually regained his sanity and told me he was going to find a way to automate the process. I had no idea how he would do it, but I was happy to go back to listing things on Amazon.

Soon after, Todd hired a developer in Algeria to help him get all his listings into Shopify. He said they were creating an app using something called Ruby. I imagined them hovering over treasure chests filled with sparkling gems, occasionally picking a couple of them out and tapping them together in some indiscernible pattern.

After some Googling, I learned that they weren’t using gemstones to create an app. They were using a programming language. I read a little bit about it, got bored to tears and gave up on learning anything more about that side of the business.

Ultimately, that decision led to me parting ways from the company once Todd began to focus more on app development than his Amazon store. We parted amicably and I spent the next year and a half starting a dog walking/pet sitting/poop scooping service business and then shutting it down after breaking up multiple dog fights, seeing my husband get attacked by a Chihuahua and nearly getting attacked myself. They say do what you love, and I do love playing with animals, but I found out I do not love running an animal-related business.

So I closed the business and started looking for another job. Out of the blue, Todd got in touch with me and asked if I’d like to come back to work for him. His app business was taking off and he needed help with customer support and marketing. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect.

I’ve been back with the company for a few weeks now, and I’m loving it. I get to talk to customers about their unique products, create interesting marketing campaigns and help people grow their small businesses. And I get to do it from home, which means I get to hang out with my animals all day (who are too lazy to attack anyone) and answer challenging technical questions without ever changing out of my pajamas.

So if you ever reach out to chat with us, just know that you’re likely going to be talking to a crazy cat lady in her PJs.