This told essay is based on a conversation with Johanna Abzug, a 38-year-old freelance product designer living in Madrid. Edited for length and clarity.
We moved for political reasons.
My partner and I had just had a baby and were living in Texas. I don’t know if it was a hasty postpartum decision, but we decided this was the best thing for our family. That was my main goal for over a year. It was something that touched us all.
There were some big things like this. If you want to see everything of value, you can donate, but you’ll need cash. This is what I want to sell. The list grew and grew until I ended up with over 200 items that I needed to sell.
I started out on Facebook Marketplace and OfferUp, but realized this wasn’t viable. You can’t do this. When I tried to sell bed frames and mattresses on Facebook Marketplace, I received dozens of messages from unenthusiastic people asking, “Can I get this?” or “Can I get $10 for this $1,200 thing?” I don’t want to get involved in that.
I tend to like to do things the hard way. I looked for something that met my needs but couldn’t find it. That’s why I created it.
I used Bubble. This requires no code and basically connects the logic behind things. Since I had a working prototype, I quickly created an inventory of what I had on hand and created a way to sell it.
It’s like an online garage sale where people can come and add multiple things and the idea was to sell as much as possible as quickly as possible because we want to complete this task.
Johanna Abzug Vibe has coded a platform where sellers can list their products and take questions. Screenshot via Johanna Abzug
I call this a personal pop-up sale. You can create a personal inventory of products and put them up for sale when you’re ready. A sale is a scheduled event that lasts for a set period of time. Also, the offer expires after 24 hours, which requires more commitment. Share it with your personal network.
What makes this deal different from Facebook Marketplace and OfferUp is that you don’t chat with the buyer until a price is agreed upon. It is offer-based, initially back and forth, and can be applied to multiple items. The idea is to separate the transactional part of selling products online from the direct message part.
The name was actually inspired by Enya. It’s a sale away.
In the end, I made the sale myself and posted it on Nextdoor and Craigslist. I stopped promoting the sale when fewer than 10 people visited my site.
This person bought a lot of things for me. The offer was over $1,000. I think someone moved out and I moved out. The deal went well.
Then I moved. I was always hesitant to put myself out there and thought, “I can just forget about it.” But it always really bothered me that I didn’t finish the project and let other people use it. That’s why I remade it.
I started the project using ChatGPT and switched to Claude. In the three years since we created our first prototype at Bubble, the technology has grown significantly. It was a great way to bring ideas to life in my head.
Johanna Abzug said Sale Away is “like an online garage sale.” Screenshot via Johanna Abzug
Making things has different problems than designing things. Becoming a designer is usually the penultimate stop before putting your product into production. The deadline approaches and everything goes downhill. I can feel the developer stress, but that’s not what I want.
It’s very satisfying to do this. I always had something personal going on. I’m also the mother of a 6-year-old, and I’m taking Spanish classes while working.
This is the first utility I’ve ever built, and I definitely wouldn’t have been able to do it without Vibe coding.