A Tool That Saves Small Businesses Time and Money and Simplifies the Way They Work
44 ǀ POSITIV 4/2025
LÍDR
A Tool That Saves Small
Businesses Time and Money
and Simplies the Way They Work
Caou was created out of the need to manage nances, projects, teams and customer relaonships
in one interconnected environment. It is a Czech all-in-one management system that runs online
with no installaon required. It makes work easier, especially for service companies or custom
manufacturers, and its aim is to become the heart of the business – a clear, central hub where
management and the team always have the essenals at hand. What led the founder, Ing. Petr
Macek, to this idea?
Caflou has now been running for ten
years. What led you to create it?
Before Caflou, I headed a small marketing
agency – a handful of people and a handful
of clients. As the workload grew, so did
the chaos: tasks became unclear, invoicing
was confusing, and you never really knew
who was working on what and for how
long. I felt the need to bring order into
it and find a proper system. But at the time,
no tool existed that could connect all of it
– invoicing, task management, projects
and finances. There were either invoicing
systems or project apps, but nothing
comprehensive.
Originally, we wanted to build an internal
system for our own use. But we gradually
realised that many other small businesses
were facing exactly the same problems.
So we decided to offer Caflou to the
public as well.
What slowed you down the most along
the way? Were there moments when you
said, “This isn’t the right direction”?
Definitely. There were several such
moments, but I’d highlight the key ones.
The first was uncertainty about our target
group. For a long time, we aimed at very
small businesses – one or two people.
But we ran into limits: these companies
often didn’t want, or simply couldn’t
afford, to pay more than a few hundred
crowns a month, and some expected such
a system to be completely free.
The second obstacle was how we presented
ourselves. At first, we described Caflou as an
“app for entrepreneurs”, which resonated
mainly with smallest entrepreneurs. Later,
we switched to a slogan about managing
a company’s economics and performance,
which attracted larger businesses –
but those expected us to replace their
accounting software.