Meet Ben: Owner & Lead Designer at LEAF9
LEAF9 really has it’s roots in the library of a small private school where I first discovered the delight of building my first web page. Back in high school I used to blow off homework to learn HTML and web programming, and somehow I convinced my art teacher to allow me to take on “special assignments” designing graphics in Photoshop while the rest of the class was sketching gourds and trying not to fall asleep. To most people, acronyms like HTML, CSS, PHP, and MySQL are either gibberish or elicit a feeling of being smothered – to me they are magical.
The first website I built for a paying client was in 2002 – Hockessin Indoor Tennis club. They first hired me to take phone calls, schedule tennis matches, and wash the towels. Since doing laundry was never really my thing, I decided that my time sitting by the phone was better spent building a killer website for them. They loved the website, bought it, and I left my job as laundry boy to pursue website design for other small businesses.
In 2003 I graduated from Wilmington Christian School, and my plans shifted toward a degree in Electrical Engineering at Cedarville University in Ohio. I didn’t get very far into my 4 year degree before I remembered how much I enjoyed the internet world and design. I liked the project aspect of engineering, and I will always be a DIY guy – building things and dreaming up inventions and electronic circuitry – but my true love in work took me back to my roots where design, business logic, and technology fuse into the creation a website.
I graduated from Cedarville University in 2007 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Interactive Media, and a minor in Biblical Studies. After a brief jaunt with another web services company in Delaware, I decided to pursue the independent life of self-employment. LEAF9 was born out of a leap of faith, and with the support of my wife, and my family, I jumped off of the cliff and started the business. It was one of the best decisions of my life.
Several years later now, I have watched LEAF9 grow steadily with the continued patronage of my loyal customers. I love working with local clients, developing friendships with many of them, and always trying to make each project my absolute best work. I enjoy waking up each morning and going to work in my home office, producing work that delights my clients, and building a meaningful, profitable and successful business. I know that not everyone can say that they love their work, but I am thankful that I truly do.
If you are a client of LEAF9, thank you so much. If you are considering working with me, I am looking forward to meeting with you and crafting a custom solution together. Let’s talk.
– Ben Kouba
