Story

The origins of Glass Web Projects came from a place where many small businesses start: earning money doing something you enjoy.

But with GWP, it’s always meant more than that. 

Derek unofficially started GWP when he was a returning student at IUPUI in 2011. While working towards earning a degree in IT, Derek immediately felt that small, local, community-minded organizations were not being represented like the “big guys”, mostly because they didn’t have the time, money or workforce to dedicate to technology. He wondered, “How are these little guys ever going to compete if they can’t keep up?” 

Derek volunteered his web skills with Nap Town Chickens, led by founder Andrew Brake, and watched as NTC’s new website provided huge utility and value as they grew. Derek was inspired to take his skills in the direction of these small companies, feeling immense satisfaction from encouraging and influencing an organization he really believed in. 

And so GWP was born.

Derek understands the profound power that business owners have: the ability to assist and influence whomever and whatever they want. And he sees this as his chance to do something great, something he’s proud to see succeed, and something he’s excited to tell his kids about.

And as he built GWP, he realized that there were more tech people like him that were hungry to do good with their skills. So we hired other local IT/design professionals with the same values to all work together to help our community. GWP never outsources our work to out-of-state or off-shore workers. We stay right here with people who live in Indy and care about Indy. The result is that GWP both employs and services an incredibly intelligent, thoughtful and all-around amazing group of humans.

GWP strives to use our tech and design skills for good and to positively impact communities. We look beyond just profit dollars and margins, and we:

• love learning how local organizations thrive and then sharing that knowledge with other growing organizations to raise us all up.
• work to remove the barriers of doubt and confusion caused by large businesses and get down to just solving problems, efficiently and effectively.
• teach our community that businesses aren’t built around concrete and walls, or profit and loss… but they’re built around the people that work there and the passionate ideas they want to spread.
• show the community, by leading through example, the power and simplicity of doing what’s right… and to remind humans that we all have a profound ability to make a positive impact on those around us.