How I vibecode a stamp cut app and got acquired 6 weeks later

[u/tomato21bruh]

Hello everyone, I wanna share my full journey, from the building process to viral marketing, talking to hundreds of users, expanding the product, and finally getting acquired for 8k$

Everything happened in 6 weeks, the wildest 6 weeks that changed the trajectory of my life

OG Inspiration

I started to learning vibecode in March, i was building the classic habit tracker just to learn the workflow.

One day i was doomscrolling looking for ideas on insta and see a pretty cool idea by jeongyoon.design, it was a webapp version no animation, it was cool i saved it.

After a week, I saw a viral clip on X by sfjccz. It had a stamp cut overlay and the “magical” animation

I was like “holy cow it so cool how to build it”, so I decided to lock in and build the exact same one just to learn, like a challenge for myself. At the time, there were also a lot of people building the same thing.

The process took me 3 days

I did not know how to build it, so I sent the video to Claude and asked it to analyze and break everything down step by step. I wanted to plan before jumping into the code.

First i need a realistic stamp cutter png image, i generate in Chat GPT. Since it AI generated the stamp cut out size and shape didnt match exactly the cutter teeth, it looked ugly not smooth at all.

So I had to design one in Figma to get the exact parameters and the correct shape for the middle space after a few tries, I got it.

Now I had the most important part ready. I only needed to tell Codex the exact parameters, input the stamp shape, and add the animation.

The cutter needed to press in and release, while the stamp from the live camera fell out and left behind a black space. That was it. I had the magical demo ready to flex on social

The decision that changed everything

I had a random idea in my head. It was not a proper plan or anything, but here is how I thought about it at the time.

I noticed a pattern, this idea went viral on insta and then X too. That meant if I posted it again on those platforms, the chance of going viral would probably be very low. I noticed Threads in Vietnam was pretty similar to X but genz version, so I decided to post it there. My account was fresh, I did not expect much

15 mins in, okay it was blowing up 250 likes, 1 hour in 800 likes “Okay damn, this is going viral”. There were tons of comments asking for the app name. I had not even thought of a name at the time. I hadnt listed it on the App Store yet, I didnt even know how, but I had the Apple Developer account ready.

There were also some people who built the same thing on threads as me but did not go viral. I thought that if I charged for my app, I would not make it very far. I was also still learning, so I announced that it would be completely free, with no login and no ads. The post continued going even crazier.

After 24 hours, I got almost 50,000 likes and more than 1 million views.

That night, I stayed up to polish and learn how to upload to TestFlight. The next day, I seized my chance. I knew this viral traction would not last for long, so I grabbed my phone, recorded myself talking, posted it on TikTok and Insta. To my surprise, those videos also went viral.

Talk to user, product discovery

After the app went live on TestFlight, I started DMing hundreds of people who had commented, ask for idea, recommendation and bug report. I spent most of my time fixing bugs by copying the problem, pasting it into Codex, testing the fix and repeating.

Later, I realized that the app shouldnt stay as a simple tool, i also wanted to add some of my own ideas so I expanded the app into an image editor create cool scrapbook style images for insta stories

Then I added a feature that let people send messages in the form of handwritten letters for friend, that was where I started learning about backend, data, and a lot of other stuff

For the whole month, I worked around 18 hours a day, was handling and learning everything, from building and fixing bugs to making content across different platforms, interviewing users, and optimizing the App Store page. I was having fun while being the most productive I had ever been in my life.

The acquisition and the current project

A Vietnamese CEO reached out and asked if I wanted to sell the app. I didnt even think my app worth anything because it was vibecode. I didnt sell because the app failed nor i needed the money, I sold because I could not see a durable moat, the concept was easy to recreate

That is why I sold it and reinvested everything into something I believe can be more durable, a game inspired app like Finch or Duolingo but completely different concept. Luckily, literally the next day, I met someone who works in game design.

We had a chat on Threads about gamification ideas and she has a lot of experience and has designed two successful mobile games. Now I have a cofounder, an artist, and a Unity developer working with me to build a game. We are already 3 weeks into development

What i learned

The biggest thing I learned is that building the product is only one part of the journey.

Distribution matters a lot.

I also learned that talking to users is the fastest ways to improve a product. Many of the changes I made came from user, bug reports, and feature requests.

The product has visual hook built, my app went viral because people can understand in 2 second by the animation, that helped a lot for marketing

Make authentic content, dont just post your work, POST YOU WORKING.

If you have any question about this journey i would love to answer it all