Why we built FounderKit
Every founder deserves a solid starting point. Here's why we built FounderKit and what makes it different from the alternatives.
Every time I started a new SaaS project, I spent the first two weeks doing the same things:
- Setting up Clerk
- Configuring Stripe webhooks
- Writing the same Drizzle schema
- Building a dashboard layout
- Writing transactional emails from scratch
It's not hard work. It's boring, repeated work. Work that has nothing to do with the actual product I'm trying to build.
The alternatives
I looked at ShipFast. It's $199. It's fine. But it's missing an admin panel, which I need on every project. The email templates are basic. There's no blog. And $199 felt steep for what you get.
So I built my own.
What FounderKit ships with
FounderKit is everything I want wired up from day one:
- Clerk for auth — email, Google, GitHub, magic links. All working.
- Stripe for subscriptions — checkout, billing portal, webhooks. Three tiers.
- Admin panel — user table, MRR, plan breakdown. Know your numbers from day one.
- React Email templates — welcome, upgrade, payment failed, cancellation.
- MDX blog — because content marketing works and you should write.
- OG images — auto-generated social cards via Next.js built-in image generation.
The stack
I chose tools that are production-grade but not overengineered:
- Next.js 16 — App Router, React 19, Tailwind v4
- Drizzle ORM — lightweight, type-safe, fast
- PostgreSQL via Supabase — generous free tier, easy to scale
- Resend — best email API available right now
Why $99
Because it should be accessible. ShipFast is $199. I priced FounderKit at $99 because the goal is to help founders ship, not to extract maximum margin from a captive audience.
One purchase. Full source code. Use it on every project you build.
Get it at founderkit.dev.