Machestra

Hey IH. I'm Charles, solo founder of Machestra.

I've been building a scheduling tool for small manufacturers. Shops with 3-30 machines (CNC, fabrication, woodworking, molding, printing) that schedule production on whiteboards, spreadsheets, or just memory.

The existing tools in this space start at $97/mo (Prodio) or charge per user at $49-180/mo (MRPeasy, Katana). A 10-person shop ends up paying $500-1,800/mo just to know who's doing what.

Machestra does four things: machines, people, materials, schedules. That's it. Per-machine pricing, not per-user. $19/mo for 10 machines. Free plan for up to 3 machines.

The site is live at machestra.com. No paying customers yet. Looking for honest feedback on the product and the positioning.

A few things I'm thinking about:

• Is per-machine pricing clear or confusing?

• Am I too niche or not niche enough?

• What would make a shop owner actually switch from their spreadsheet?

Happy to share everything openly as things progress.