Andy is Depop’s senior web developer. Originally hailing from rural Shropshire before moving down to London, Andy is now a regular of the city’s salsa scene. He’s always had a keen eye for the design side of building products as well as the technical, and likes to keep his eye in that world whenever he can. Read more below.
Check out: Salsa Playlist!
So how did you first hear about Depop?
Hm, probably the first time I heard of it was, maybe three years ago? When I saw that this weird Portuguese guy called Andre had gotten a new job.
Who’s Andre?
He’s a former developer and a former colleague of mine. So that was when the website was a little more than a screenshot of the app. That was literally the first that I heard about it, but I didn’t hear about it again for a while until at my last place, Jed announced that he was leaving to join Depop.
So was that when you joined Depop as well?
No, he joined nearly a year before I did. There was actually another One Fine Stay employee, Juan, who also left for Depop. He reached out to me on a One Fine Stay engineering private group and was like, ‘Hey, do you know anyone looking for a job?’ So I emailed Kerry and said, ‘I would like a job.’
And when did you actually sign up to Depop and start using it?
Well, I’ve bought things, but I’m not a very good seller. I don’t tend to reach for selling my stuff. Clothing-wise, I would usually give it to a charity shop.
What’s the coolest or weirdest thing you’ve ever bought on Depop?
Well, it’s on my desk, it’s a plush Pikachu.
Oh that one! That’s so cute. I always forget that’s from Depop. How much did you get it for?
I think £8? I have no idea if that’s a good price, laughs
I’m not in the market for Pokemon plushes… so I wouldn’t know. So what do you like most about Depop? Whether it’s the platform or the team?
I think it’s a very eclectic group of people in the company that I’ve not ever experienced before. People have very outspoken personalities and the first time you kind of witness that, you’re kind of like, ‘wow’. People talk quite on the nose about everything. But it’s actually quite an impressive culture that’s managed to be sustained for, I guess, over 5 years now. So I guess we’re doing something right there. I think, engineering wise, we’ve got a very high standard when it comes to hiring. It’s kind of tricky because we need engineers, but you’ve gotta make sure that you hire good people. It’s good that we’re kind of quite strict in terms of where the bar is, and I think that definitely works in our favour.
Outside of Depop, what do you do in your spare time?
Nothing really, laughs, I do a bit of salsa dancing.
Where do you go and do salsa dancing?
Several places around London. There’s no one location. Mostly it’s pretty central. Holborn or around Oxford Circus.
Do you have someone that you go with? A dance partner?
Um, no, so salsa is very…well primarily on where you go, it’s primarily a social dance…so you don’t need to go with a dance partner. You go there and are expected to just ask people to dance. It’s unusual to dance with the same person for even two songs in a row. It’s kind of very much encouraged that you just grab whoever you want to dance with.
Is that an element you like about salsa?
Yes and no. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been doing it, you still get nervous about asking certain people to dance, just because you look at them and are like, ‘Yep. They’re really good.’ But if it’s actually the previous guy using her who made her look really good, and that has happened before, I’ve danced with someone who I thought looked really good, and then I realised, ‘Oh…that’s the guy who was really good.’
On the top of your head, if you could think of a moment when you were really happy, what were you doing in that moment?
I think I was on a sailing holiday in Croatia. In very still waters, just lounging on the deck. Something about water, that I think we, as a species, that we just like sitting next to water and watching water.
That’s true. It’s quite calming, isn’t it?
And when you’re on a boat, quite relatively far from land, you’ve got an excuse for doing nothing else. That complete isolation is quite nice.
Is that something you’d like to do more in terms of going on holidays?
I mean, personally, this was organised with 10 people on a boat who I’d never met and you just sail around some islands. I’ve done that three times now. The first time was the best, I think, because of the novelty, but I would like to try doing it with smaller groups of people. You’re having a relaxed time, but you do need someone to drive the boat, laughs.
Yeah… can’t just float away. Should we move on to some of the fun questions? Or let’s dig into background a little bit. Where did you grow up?
I grew up, well, since I was ten I was in Shropshire, which is where Jack — my colleague on web — is from. We didn’t go to the same school though, he was actually at the enemy school.
Were you the same year?
laughs. No. We have a ten year age difference. I went to the grammar school and Jack went to the comprehensive. Jack wasn’t even a thought in his dad’s head when I was in school. He probably hasn’t even seen Buffy.
Jack: I have seen Buffy. Don’t be ridiculous.
Buffy is the best.
How long ago did you move to London and why?
I think six months after graduating? So 9.5 years ago, I think? For a job. I was looking for work in Birmingham. I actually got an offer for a job in Birmingham a week before I got an offer for a job in London. The salary difference was more than 10K, so I moved to London, laughs.
Have you always been an engineer?
It’s a charitable description of what I do, but yes. My degree was in Computer Science, and after graduating, I was like, ‘Do I really want to do this?’ Because I’ve always been on the fence between creative and technical, and once you start down the technical route, it’s a route to increasing specialisation. When you try to be a generalist, that’s quite hard to maintain, so I’ve always tried to dabble and keep up to date in design stuff as much as possible, which helps because if I’m not doing that, I feel that I’m only using half my skill set.
Design as in web design?
So, primarily, yeah. I’ve always wanted to get into more arty things anyway, but who has the time these days? Too many social networks to keep up with.
What do you mean by ‘arty things’?
laughs. Well, I don’t want to be very poncey about it.
Be poncey!
Ok, well, actually drawing something purely for aesthetic rather than functional reasons. Like, ‘I did this because I like how it looks’, not because it serves a purpose.
Do you want to talk about side projects?
Sure?
What are you doing on the side at the moment?
I am building a website and or app for dance events. Primarily in London, to start with, but essentially the idea is that when people start out doing salsa or swing or whatever, they don’t really know where to go to practice or even find more classes, and there are plenty of very very bad websites and apps out there that attempt to solve this problem, but I feel like this is a very typical and engineer way to solve the problem, but I’m just going to design it myself. But also the promoters of the events just do a really bad job of separating themselves from every event. They’re always like, ‘we’ve got the best dance spots in London’, but apparently every spot in London is the best one. So I want to, kind of, make it easier for everyone and also make promoters be more honest, if I can.
Are you using this project as an outlet to flex the design side of things?
Probably more the programming side, because I probably spend more time designing than coding to be honest. Which is why this still isn’t finished after years. But, I think the main thing I struggle with is when I’m doing coding outside of work, it feels like work, and it’s hard to motivate myself when I’m doing designing, because I’m not designing during the day at work, it’s actually more rewarding because it’s not work.
What was the last picture you took with your phone?
Oooh! I don’t think it was anything naughty… laughs. It was the pumpkin that my girlfriend carved.
That’s sweet and such a topical photo to have at the top of your camera roll. What’s your greatest strength and weakness?
The greatest strength is that I’m very modest. laughs. I think that I learn how things work very quickly, my weakness is probably that I get distracted too easily.
Distracted in what sense?
Yeah, just like, ‘Oh. Internet!’ It’s why I always have, like, 100 tabs open. I’m like, ‘That looks interesting! That looks interesting!’
It’s a good problem.
But you have to actually find a balance and make sure it doesn’t become too distracting. ‘Stop! Get work done!’
Ugly and live forever or attractive and die in a year?
Are we talking physically ugly?
All of you is ugly
I’m sure if my personality is that ugly, the world will solve the problem for me.
Let’s say, same personality but the face of Elephant Man.
Well, in the words of Spike, ‘I want to see how this ends.’ So yeah, ugly and see how this ends.
You discover that your wonderful one-year-old child is a result of a mix-up at the hospital, and not yours. Would you exchange the child to correct the mistake?
Is the other child pretty? I mean, if I’ve got an ugly child, am I exchanging it for an uglier child?
We didn’t say the child was ugly!
That’s a very tricky question. Hm…See, I want to say I would correct the mistake, but I don’t know if I’d have the heart to do it.
Yeah, you might love this child that isn’t yours.
Yeah, it might be an utter dick though.
If it grows up to be a dick, then you can be like, ‘You’re not mine!’
Yeah, you can always have that in the bag ready to bring out.
What do you think of Elon Musk?
I think he’s one of the few major wealthy figures solving the really big problems. It’s kind of weird that the stuff that Bill Gates is doing is actually a smaller problem, because it can be solved more quickly. Wiping out certain diseases is very hard, but we know that we can do it. The stuff Elon Musk is trying to do is ensuring the survival of the species, so I think that’s very important that someone is very serious about trying to do it. I think the naysayers against him is almost inevitable and healthy, because I think everyone needs to realise how hard it is to do what he’s doing, but someone has to do it.
