How BeforeTheApp works, without the fine print.
Pay once, be part of every app in the club. What you get on day one, what each grid guarantees, what is never included, and what happens if things run late.
The short version
You pay once
A one-time payment for a fixed slot on a 16×16 founder grid. It covers every app in the club — past, current and future.
You join production
Roadmap, production log, idea & feature requests, votes and priority beta invites — working from day one.
One app guaranteed per grid
Often more: surprise second and third apps, sometimes all three candidates. The team decides how many.
Every app's benefit
Permanent access, a member discount or an offer code — set per app, and yours for every app. No equity, no revenue share.
Founder vs Access
Every epoch opens with a Founder Grid: 256 physical squares arranged into 197 slots — 184 singles (1×1), 9 blocks of 2×2 and 4 blocks of 3×3. The layout is fixed and identical for every grid; big blocks are never split.
Only when every founder slot has sold and at least one concrete app benefit has been announced can an Access Grid open: 256 single seats priced at F(g) + $5. Access holders get the member benefit of every app in the club, but no votes, no requests, no profile and no square. If no concrete benefit exists yet, Access takes no payment and collects a waitlist instead.
- ✓ Roadmap, production log, decision reasoning
- ✓ Idea & feature requests
- ✓ One vote in every open poll
- ✓ Priority beta invites when a build exists
- ✓ Profile and square on the grid
- ✓ Every app's member benefit, past and future
- ✓ Every app in the club, not just this grid's
- ✓ Every app's member benefit
- ✓ Public roadmap summary
- ✗ Votes and requests
- ✗ Profile and grid square
- ✗ Guaranteed beta invites
- ✗ Never called a founder
Every app's benefit
Members get the benefit of every app in their club — including apps that ship long after they joined. The type is set per app, versioned and published on its card; at checkout we store the catalog and benefit versions you bought under.
Permanent access
The app's defined premium features, for as long as the product is offered. No extra app fee.
Member discount
Buy the app at the announced discount. You still pay the discounted price.
Offer code
A free or discounted App Store offer code within the app, country and Apple's current rules.
To be announced
The app exists or is coming, but its benefit type isn't set yet. We say so openly until it is.
Real Apple offer codes can only exist after an app is Ready for Distribution and its in-app purchase is approved. We never sell a future App Store code as if it were already delivered, and nobody pays twice for the same access.
The AI credit boundary
AI model calls, image or video generation, tokens, third-party API usage and extra storage are never included in membership or in any app's permanent access. They are sold as separate credits, usage packs or subscriptions — via Apple in-app purchase when consumed inside an iOS app. Each app card separates features covered by permanent access from screens that need credits.
Grid epochs
A grid epoch is one sales event. Every grid guarantees one app; we can decide to ship a surprise second or third — sometimes all three voted candidates. Extra apps don't open a new grid or raise the price, and every member of the club, from any grid, is part of all of them. iOS and Mac count their grids independently. The table below is an example milestone plan, not a production commitment — twenty apps do not require twenty grids.
| Grid | Catalog on entry (example) | Planned this epoch (example) | Founder 1×1 | Access |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0 or 1 app | The first app gets selected; it may be in production or already out | $9 | $14 |
| 2 | App 1 | App 2 | $19 | $24 |
| 3 | Apps 1–2 | Apps 3 and 4 | $29 | $34 |
| 9 | First 8 apps | App 9, not yet selected; 10 and 11 may follow | $89 | $94 |
| 10 | First 11 apps | App 12 | $99 | $104 |
| 11 | First 12 apps | Apps 13 and 14 | $109 | $114 |
| 12 | First 14 apps | App 15 | $119 | $124 |
| 13 | First 15 apps | Apps 16 and 17 | $129 | $134 |
| 14 | First 17 apps | App 18 | $139 | $144 |
| 15 | First 18 apps | Apps 19 and 20 | $149 | $154 |
Epoch statuses: idea pool → selected → in production → in review → released. Surprise apps are included for every club member at no extra cost. When a new grid opens, unsold slots from the previous one are withdrawn; sold rights are kept.
Pricing
For grid number g, a founder single costs F(g) = 10g − 1 USD. A 2×2 is 4 × F(g) × M₂(s) and a 3×3 is 9 × F(g) × M(s), where s is the number of squares already paid for when your quote is created. Both multipliers start at 2.0 and drop 0.1 for every 10% sold; the 2×2 never goes below ×1.5, the 3×3 never below ×1.2.
The exact steps fall at 26, 52, 77, 103, 128, 154, 180 and 205 paid squares. The 2×2 reaches its ×1.5 floor at 128 (50%), the 3×3 reaches ×1.2 at 205 (80%). Every price is computed on the server, stored in cents and locked into your order.
Grid 1
1×1 $9
2×2 $72
3×3 $162
3×3 floor $97.20
Grid 9
1×1 $89
2×2 $712
3×3 $1,602
3×3 floor $961.20
Grid 15
1×1 $149
2×2 $1,192
3×3 $2,682
3×3 floor $1,609.20
If you wait for a cheaper 3×3, the last blocks may sell first. We never guarantee a future price and never re-price what you already paid. A refund that lowers the sold count doesn't re-price anyone either.
Voting rules
- One vote per person per poll. A 3×3 does not give nine votes, and owning slots in several grids still means one vote.
- iOS votes stay in iOS; Mac votes stay in Mac.
- Every poll states up front whether it sets binding priority or is advisory feedback, plus its open/close times and tie rule.
- Next-app polls offer three feasible candidates with a responsible partner, scope and rough cost.
- The winner is confirmed by the partners on technical, financial and capacity grounds. If it can't be built, we publish why and the new plan.
- Results are final once a poll closes. Corrections are new, reasoned decisions; individual votes are never published.
Reservation & payment
30-minute checkout
Stripe Checkout sessions last at least 30 minutes. Your price is locked for that window.
40-minute hold
The slot is held for 40 minutes, so a checkout still open can never collide with a new buyer.
Webhook, not redirect
Your membership opens only when the payment is verified server-side, never from the success page.
When a hold expires we check Stripe before releasing anything. If a payment succeeded but the slot can't be delivered, it goes straight to an operations review — never a silent failure.
Refunds & the wait limit
Before a grid opens for sale, its terms define a last selection date, the update cadence, a maximum waiting limit and the refund or exit option if that limit is passed. If no date is given, the uncertainty and the refund right are shown plainly.
The current draft offers a full refund if no closed beta opens within nine months of the selection vote. A refund or chargeback deactivates the related membership rights; what happens to the slot is defined in advance.
What “0 released apps” means
The first grid can open before a single app has shipped — even before the first idea is picked. It still guarantees one app, chosen by founders. When that's the case we show “0 released apps” big and honest on every sales screen. Unbuilt apps are marked “not available yet”, with their uncertainty, target window and what happens if they are delayed or cancelled. What works on day one is the founder space itself.
FAQ
Seen enough?
Pick a square, or wait on the list — we never charge the waitlist.