Getting Unstuck: How a SaaS Founder Went from 3 Months per Feature to 3 Days

The Challenge

Jen launched TaskFlow, a project management tool for creative agencies, 8 months ago using Bolt.new. The AI generated a working MVP in days, and she quickly got her first 50 paying customers at $29/month.

But as customers requested features, Jen hit a painful reality: every new feature took forever to build. What should have been a 2-day update turned into 2-3 months of struggle. Simple changes broke unrelated features. The codebase was a tangled mess of AI-generated code that she was afraid to touch.

Her customers were getting frustrated. Competitors were moving faster. And Jen was stuck—she couldn't keep up with feature requests, couldn't fix bugs quickly, and couldn't hire a developer to help because the code was too messy for anyone else to understand.

She was spending 60 hours a week just keeping the app running, with no time to actually grow the business. Churn was creeping up. Revenue had plateaued at $1,450/month because she couldn't deliver the features customers wanted.

The Partnership

When Jen contacted us, she was contemplating starting over from scratch. She'd invested $8,000 and 8 months, but felt completely stuck. Could the app be saved, or did she need to rebuild everything?

We started with a deep codebase audit. What we found:

• 12,000 lines of AI-generated code with minimal structure
• The same logic duplicated in 15+ different places
• No automated tests (changing anything meant hours of manual testing)
• Security vulnerabilities in authentication
• Database queries that would fail as her user base grew

But the foundation was solid. The core features customers loved were there—they just needed to be organized and made maintainable.

We laid out two options for Jen:

Option A: Rebuild from scratch (4-6 months, $15k-20k) Option B: Systematic refactoring while keeping the app running (6 weeks, $6k)

Jen chose Option B. She needed to keep serving her current customers while we made the app maintainable. We promised we'd work in small, safe increments so nothing would break in production.

The Solution

Weeks 1-2: Critical Fixes and Foundation

We started with the scariest parts: security vulnerabilities and database performance issues. We fixed authentication holes, added rate limiting, and optimized the slowest queries. Jen's customers noticed the app felt faster.

We also set up automated tests for core features. This would let us make changes confidently without breaking things.

Weeks 3-4: Code Organization

This was where the magic happened. We took all that duplicated logic and organized it into reusable components. We added proper error handling so Jen would know immediately if something went wrong instead of customers reporting it days later.

We documented every major function so anyone (including future developers Jen might hire) could understand how it worked.

Weeks 5-6: Developer Experience

We set up a development environment where Jen could test changes safely before deploying. We created deployment scripts so pushing updates took one click instead of 20 manual steps. We added monitoring and alerts so Jen would know immediately if something went wrong.

By week 6, Jen could add new features herself again—and it no longer took months.

The Results

The transformation was dramatic. Two weeks after we finished, Jen shipped a feature customers had been requesting for 4 months. It took her 3 days instead of 3 months.

Development Speed:

• ✅ Feature development: 3 months → 3 days (10x faster)
• ✅ Bug fixes: Days → Hours
• ✅ Deployment: 45 minutes → 2 minutes
• ✅ Can ship updates confidently without breaking things

Business Impact:

• ✅ Shipped 5 major features in 2 months (vs 1 in previous 6 months)
• ✅ Revenue grew from $1,450/month to $3,800/month
• ✅ Churn dropped from 8% to 2%
• ✅ Customer satisfaction scores increased
• ✅ Hired a part-time developer (who could actually understand the codebase)

Peace of Mind:

• ✅ Works 35 hours/week instead of 60
• ✅ Not afraid to add features anymore
• ✅ Knows when things break (monitoring alerts)
• ✅ Can take vacations without the app falling apart

"I was ready to give up and start over. AppUnstuck showed me that my app wasn't beyond saving—it just needed structure. Now I can build features in days instead of months. I went from dreading opening my code editor to actually enjoying building again. My revenue has more than doubled since we finished."

— Jen Martinez, TaskFlow Founder

Six months later, Jen has 180 paying customers and just raised a small seed round. She's hired two developers who were able to get productive quickly because the codebase is now well-organized and documented. Features that would have been impossible before are now straightforward to build.

Key Takeaways

Warning signs you might be stuck with technical debt:

• New features take exponentially longer than they should
• You're afraid to change anything because it might break something else
• You can't hire developers because the code is too messy
• You're working long hours just keeping things running
• Simple bugs take days or weeks to fix
• You're seriously considering starting over from scratch

When refactoring makes sense:

If you have paying customers and core features that work, refactoring is almost always better than rebuilding. You can:

• Keep serving current customers
• Improve the code incrementally
• Ship new features while refactoring
• Spend less time and money than a full rebuild

When rebuilding makes sense:

• You have no paying customers yet
• The core features don't work
• Security issues are too deep to fix
• The tech stack is fundamentally wrong for your needs

Get Unstuck

Stuck with a messy codebase that's slowing you down? We can help you get back to shipping fast without starting over from scratch.

Start with a free codebase audit where we'll assess whether refactoring or rebuilding makes sense for your situation, and give you a clear plan and timeline.

Get Your Free Codebase Audit →

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This case study represents a common scenario we see with AI-generated SaaS products. Client details have been modified to protect privacy.