Kitomba blog

The 22nd of April 2022 marked 20 years of Kitomba Salon and Spa Software. We are so proud to be part of such an incredible industry and to have helped it be more successful for over two decades.

The company, which started as a small startup in New Zealand, has grown over the last two decades to become one of the largest salon and spa software solutions in the New Zealand and Australian market, helping hair and beauty businesses to streamline their day-to-day processes, increase their revenue and achieve success.

So much has changed over the last 20 years, so we want to take you on a trip down memory lane to show you how Kitomba and our software has evolved during this time.

A look back at the journey of Kitomba Salon and Spa Software

2002

Tom Murphy, a budding entrepreneur and engineer started a company called Magic Pulse in his bedroom. The system was originally a text message reminder service. He was joined by a friend, and they were living off their savings as well as using them to fund the business.

Back then no-one wanted to know about the startup and then his original business partner made an exit after the financial strain became too difficult. 

 

However, Tom kept going and was determined to make Magic Pulse a success.

2003

The bedroom didn’t last long, and Tom soon moved to a small office in the Wellington Botanic Gardens. At the same time, Al Quinn, an adventure sports fanatic, ex-cycle courier and talented software maestro, joined Tom at Magic Pulse. 

Tom and Al noticed a lot of their customers were in the hair and beauty space, and after getting to know them, realised they needed a more comprehensive solution for managing their businesses. So, they started developing a solution for them; one that eventually became Kitomba – a full business management system created specifically for the hair and beauty industry.

 

2004

Kitomba’s first employee joined the company and decided to secretly build a game into Kitomba – this game is still hidden in the software, and you can still play it today if you know the secret access code!

2005

The company and the team grew, as did our reputation in the industry. Our little office was bursting at the seams and we were out of space for desks, so decided the broom cupboard was the only option! Putting an employee in a cupboard didn’t feel right, so the doors were taken off and it was called an alcove.

2006

There were many fun times in the botanic gardens office and still we grew, this time into a bigger space at the same location. 2006 was also the year Kitomba began to turn a profit and Tom clearly remembers going to the White House (a well-known restaurant in Wellington) and drinking expensive red wine to celebrate.

2007

A major milestone for the company; Deloitte named Kitomba as the 24th fastest growing company in New Zealand, with a revenue growth of 294%!

2008

By now we serviced many of New Zealand’s salons and spas so we decided it was time to expand internationally. It was an exciting moment when our first UK customer came onboard.

2009

Another big year for us! We continued to grow so moved to a bigger space with a wicked view over Wellington harbour. We also expanded into Australia and were recognised again by Deloitte for our impressive growth.

2010

A milestone year for Kitomba: we hit 1,000 customers across New Zealand, Australia and the UK.

We also did something else pretty cool – although Kitomba, HITO and Hair and Barber NZ (formally known as NZARH) had been recognising hair, beauty and barbering excellence in other forms, 2010 was the first year that the separate awards came together to form The Industry Awards. 

10 years on The Industry Awards is New Zealand’s largest celebration of the best in business, training and creative across the hair, beauty and barbering industries. Follow them on Instagram to learn more about this incredible event!

2011

In 2011 our growth continued as our support team expanded to fifteen, we drank our forty-thousandth cup of coffee and launched Kitomba 1 – a cloud-based solution that allowed their customers to access key features from anywhere on any device.

2013

In May we upgraded from a 20sqm room to an open-plan 600sqm office in central Wellington, complete with table tennis, an old-school arcade machine, a ‘proper’ kitchen, floor to ceiling windows and great coffee to keep the creative juices flowing.

In fact we even got a bell which rang every so often and became an integral part of our culture.

2014

Our customers, people, products and growth caught the attention of Jonas Software and in September we decided to join their group. This was great news for everyone as it meant we’d benefit from their experience as we continued to innovate and support our customers under our much loved Kitomba brand.

2017

Kitomba turned 15 and we took the time to reflect on our journey and successes! 

In June, Al Quinn was appointed as Kitomba’s new Chief Executive Officer. Al succeeded the founding CEO Tom Murphy. Having previously worked in every area of the Kitomba business, Al started his CEO role with a thorough understanding of our company and a strong appreciation of our customers. 

2019

We felt it was about time we documented our values, so we worked together to determine what they were and how we could have those represented throughout our office.

We came up with teamwork, think like a customer, make things happen and our personal favourite – the mullet. You can read more about them here.

2021

Mike Henton was appointed as Kitomba’s new Chief Executive Officer in January 2021. Mike has over 15 years of experience in the software industry, most recently working within the health and leisure sector. Kitomba co-founder Al Quinn left after 17 years at Kitomba, including his last three years as CEO.

2022

Kitomba continued to grow and develop over the years, and realised we needed a general manager to help oversee and drive Kitomba to success. We were excited to bring Alyssa Dowsett, who had been at Kitomba for over seven years, into the role.

This is the year we’re celebrating two decades of Kitomba! We’re a pretty amazing bunch of people who are talented and passionate about what we do, what we’re achieving, the incredible industry we’re part of and the fantastic customers we’re lucky enough to work with. You can learn more about life at Kitomba here.

We’re now looking forward to entering the next decade of Kitomba and we’re excited about what it’s going to bring!

Kitomba’s logo over the years

Previous logos

Current logo

Kitomba’s software and development evolution

When it came to the evolution of our software, one key component was changing with technology.

Text messaging technology

Kitomba all started because text messaging was trendy and a solution our founders believed many businesses would need to remind their clients of an appointment. 

Increasing prevalence of the internet

Benchmark, a much loved feature of Kitomba due to its ability to let you see where you stand compared to your competitors, was a lot of effort over many years. That’s because it was our first online feature which our developers used initially as a training ground as they investigated data warehousing and data transformation, but ultimately led to the creation of a valuable feature. 

The increasing prevalence of the internet then drove our decision to develop Online Booking so that clients could quickly and easily book their own appointments online. And the development of Kitomba 1, our cloud solution, was in response to the increasing use of the internet and mobile devices. This has seen us continuously add high demanded, industry specific features to Kitomba 1 like Digital Forms, Time Clock, Repeat Appointments and many more.

The evolution of our software has also been influenced a lot by our development and testing processes.

Development methodology

After about 10 years in the business, we started dabbling with consultants, scrum (an agile development methodology used in the development of software based on iterative and incremental processes) and business analysts. It was an incredibly different way of working and something that didn’t stick immediately. However once it did, and we really began refining our agile processes, we saw the true benefits it can offer and it is now a key factor to our success. 

Software testing

The testing phase of our development process is a critical part of what we do, so for many years now we’ve had a dedicated team of highly skilled testers to ensure we reduce any issues (what we call bugs) being released to customers. However, rewind back to the first years of Kitomba and there were no testers, unit tests or a defined testing methodology. Instead we relied on close contact with customers, a highly skilled, dynamic support team, and close working relationships to work through any issues.