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About

Over twenty years of building the software businesses run on.

I'm Christopher McGrath. Load Bearing Code is my practice: I design, build and support custom software for businesses, and I'm the one you talk to from the first call to long after launch.

Christopher McGrath
Fig. 1 · Principal engineer

01 / Why Load Bearing Code exists

Small businesses were getting the worst of this industry. I started Load Bearing Code to do it differently.

For more than twenty years I built software inside big companies and agencies, and kept watching the same thing happen to smaller businesses. They'd get handed to a junior while the senior name stayed on the invoice. A developer would vanish halfway through a project. A simple quote would turn into a surprise bill. And everything got explained in jargon that seemed designed to keep them from asking questions. Good businesses were paying real money for software that buckled the first week they got busy.

Load Bearing Code is the opposite. You work directly with me, the person who designs it, writes it and lives with it afterward. The price is agreed up front, and nobody runs a meter while you ask a question. No account managers and no hand-offs, because there's nobody to hand off to.

The name is the promise. Load-bearing code is the part of a structure everything else rests on. It has to hold. That's what I build: software your business can stand on, and keep standing on as it grows.

02 / Working with me

What you can count on.

The same four things on every project, whatever size it is.

01

One point of contact

I plan it with you, build it, show you progress every week, and answer the phone after launch. Nothing falls through a handoff, because there isn't one.

02

Big-company engineering

I've built platforms for national companies and dealer networks. You get that same engineering, sized to your business and your budget.

03

Built to last

Clean, organized, tested code that holds up as you get busier instead of buckling under the load. And it's yours, so any competent developer could pick it up.

04

Plain English

You'll always know what I'm building, what it costs, and why. No jargon, from the first call to launch day.

03 / Tools

The right tools, chosen well.

More than twenty years in means I reach for the right tool, not the trendy one. I build things that are easy to maintain and don't fall over the week you get busy.

  • Laravel
  • PHP
  • Livewire
  • Filament
  • Symfony
  • Node.js
  • JavaScript
  • TypeScript
  • Vue
  • React
  • Alpine.js
  • HTML & CSS
  • Tailwind CSS
  • MySQL
  • PostgreSQL
  • MSSQL
  • Redis
  • REST APIs
  • Stripe
  • WordPress
  • Linux
  • Nginx
  • Docker
  • AWS
  • Git
  • GitHub Actions
  • Pest
  • ASP.net
  • C#

Let's build something that holds.

Tell me what you're trying to build, or what's slowing the business down. A 30-minute call, no charge and no obligation.

Schedule a Discovery Call