Executive Summary

Hourly managers at small hourly businesses (restaurants, retail, care) waste hours on manual shift-building, swaps and payroll prep while paying recurring per-seat scheduling fees—this is a persistent time and cost pain for roughly 2M businesses. Those operators are price-sensitive and have high churn on expensive per-user SaaS, so a simpler, low-cost alternative addresses a real operational burden. Build a lightweight web app that offers genuinely free flat-rate scheduling for hourly teams with essentials: drag-and-drop shift building, mobile availability and shift-swapping, automated payroll exports to common payroll/POS APIs, and optional paid integrations or premium support. Position the product as free/basic with a single flat commercial tier for employers needing advanced compliance or integrations to avoid per-seat friction and lower acquisition resistance. The timing is strong: a $6.0B TAM (2M businesses × $3K ACV), a Market Score of 90/100, widespread SMB comfort with cloud SaaS, and standardized payroll/POS APIs all lower adoption barriers. Price sensitivity among SMBs makes a free or flat-rate offering highly competitive and increases the addressable market quickly. You can differentiate by committing to a true free/flat core product tailored to hourly workflows and by making integrations the primary lock-in—operational exports and POS links create real stickiness beyond per-seat billing. That said, competition is high, so winning will require rapid distribution (POS/payroll partnerships, employer/employee referral loops) and flawless UX/reliability rather than trying to out-feature incumbents.

Market Opportunity

Free flat-rate staff scheduling for hourly teams targets a $6.0B = 2M businesses × $3K ACV total addressable market with high saturation and a year-over-year growth rate of 8% YoY (Grand View Research / market reports for workforce management and scheduling software).

Key trends driving demand: Shift to cloud and SaaS — more small businesses are comfortable moving scheduling and payroll to cloud tools, creating an addressable market for lightweight web apps.; Price sensitivity among SMBs — rising per-seat SaaS costs push small operators to seek flat-rate or free alternatives.; Integration standardization — payroll and POS systems expose APIs making payroll export/automation easier and increasing product stickiness when integrated.; Product-led growth — SMB buying patterns favor free trials and easy self-service onboarding, which benefits simple, low-friction scheduling products..

Key competitors include Homebase, Deputy, When I Work, Sling.

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Free flat-rate staff scheduling for hourly teams

Executive Summary

Market Validation

Market Opportunity

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