Sheets Resume
Sheets Resume is an AI resume builder, a website where a large language model, a program trained on large amounts of text that writes new text on request, turns a job seeker's old resume, LinkedIn profile or answers into a new resume. The model follows one plain format and a set of rules from two former recruiters: Colin McIntosh, whose free resume template has more than 4 million downloads, and his old colleague Nate, now a software engineer. A member pays US$99 once, or US$39 a month, for unlimited resumes, cover letters, mock interviews and job search, and pays only after finishing a resume.
McIntosh wrote a resume guide on Reddit in 2018 that in January 2025 was the first Google result for resume advice on Reddit, and he answered questions under it for years. In 2023 he and Nate sold one-to-one reviews for US$400. In 2024 they wrote their rules into an AI tool, gave it away for a week, then launched it in August: US$128 in sales on the first day, US$500 on the second. In a Starter Story video of 22 January 2025 he said it made more than US$20,000 a month at about 90% net margin, the share of revenue left after all costs. On 21 March 2025 a written Starter Story interview gave US$26,000 a month, and he wrote "$30,000+ per month". That is a run rate, monthly revenue times 12, of about US$312,000 to US$360,000 a year. Three partners own it, with no employees and no investors.
Every revenue number on this page is a founder statement, grade C, and the last one is from March 2025. No payment processor or buyer has confirmed them. The page also shows four earlier companies that tried to serve job seekers or recruiters and failed, and the risks this one faces from general chatbots, from the large resume builders and from employers who now receive many more AI-written applications.
The numbers, graded
Each row shows the evidence grade and the source numbers from the list at the end of this page. The grades are explained in How Aiolum verifies.
| Fact | Value | Grade | How we know | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue per month, March 2025 | US$26,000 in the profile; more than US$30,000 in the founder's text | C | Starter Story interview of 21 March 2025. The profile box gives US$26,000 a month; the founder writes that paid memberships "are now generating $30,000+ per month". The page title still says US$20,000. | [1] |
| Run rate from the March 2025 figures | about US$312,000 to US$360,000 a year | calc | Calculated: US$26,000 and US$30,000 times 12. The headline figure on this page is the midpoint, US$336,000. | [1] |
| Revenue per month, January 2025 | more than US$20,000 | C | Starter Story video of 22 January 2025, its title and description. A separate interview from the written one of March 2025. | [2, 3] |
| Yearly revenue, January 2025 | US$250,000 | C | A newsletter of 31 January 2025, nine days after the video and with the same points. It also says the app reached US$20,000 a month within two months of launch. | [4] |
| Growth from January to March 2025 | 30% to 50% | calc | Calculated: US$26,000 and US$30,000 against US$20,000. The figures come from two different Starter Story interviews about two months apart. | [1, 2] |
| First sales, August 2024 | US$128 on the first day, US$500 on the second | C | Founder, March 2025. The tool had been free for its first week. The newsletter gives US$1,000 a day within the first week. | [1, 4] |
| Margin | about 90% net | C | Founder in the January 2025 video: "close to 100% margin product", "around 90% net margins". The newsletter repeats 90%. | [3, 4] |
| Prices in early 2025 | US$99 lifetime or US$29 for one week | C | Founder in the video and the interview. He said he did not want monthly subscriptions because he finds them "predatory" for a job search. | [3, 1] |
| Prices in October 2026 | US$99 one-time or US$39 a month | C | Membership page. The one-week pass is no longer listed. | [7] |
| Price by country, July 2025 | a one-day membership for US$3 | C | Founder: shown to visitors from dozens of countries after a cost-of-living study, and tested on 20% of visitors first. Revenue per visitor from those countries "more than doubled". No amounts are given. | [5] |
| Downloads of the free resume template | more than 4 million | C | Founder, March 2025. The template carries a line that offers the AI builder. | [1] |
| Price of a one-to-one resume review before the AI tool | US$400 on the home page, US$500 on the about page | C | The pages do not say which price came first. The founder says one review took him three hours. | [6, 8, 3] |
| Team | 3 partners, no employees | C | Founder in the video: "I split this three ways with these two other guys", and he spends at most 5 to 10 hours a week. The site names Colin and Nate; in March 2025 Nate was also a software engineer at Eventbrite. Starter Story's profile box lists 1 founder and 0 employees. | [3, 1, 6] |
| Outside funding | none | C | "The business is totally bootstrapped." | [1] |
| Operating company | Colin McIntosh LLC, doing business as SheetsResume.com | C | Terms and conditions; Colorado law applies. Starter Story places the business in Denver. | [9, 1] |
| AI models | OpenAI and Google Gemini | C | Founder's tech stack in March 2025; the energy page bases its estimate on data from OpenAI and Gemini. No source names the model versions. | [1, 11] |
| Time from launch to the March 2025 figure | 7 months | calc | Calculated: August 2024 to March 2025. | [1] |
How to read this table: a grade C value is a statement by the founder or the company, in interviews or on its own pages, or by a third party that says where its data comes from. A "calc" value was computed on this page from the rows above it. No value is grade A or B.
| Plan | Per month, billed yearly (US$) | Per month, billed monthly (US$) | Limit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lifetime access | 99 one-time | all tools, unlimited use | |
| Monthly | 39 | all tools, cancel anytime | |
| Free tools | 0 | 0 | basic builder, resume template, cover letter generator |
Lifetime access is a one-time payment; the monthly plan can be cancelled at any time. Both give all tools. The user pays only after finishing a resume, and refunds are same-day. In early 2025 the prices were US$99 for lifetime access and US$29 for one week, with no monthly plan. In July 2025 the founder described a one-day membership for US$3 shown to visitors from dozens of countries; it is not on the page. Connecting the builder to Claude or ChatGPT is free; exporting files needs a paid plan.
The timeline
From a Reddit post in 2018 to a resume app with a run rate of about US$336,000 a year, seven months after launch. Each entry carries its grade.
- 2018CColin McIntosh, a former recruiter, writes a long resume guide on Reddit on a Saturday morning. It becomes the top Google result for resume advice on Reddit, and over the years he answers tens of thousands of questions. [1, 3, 8]
- 2023CHe and Nate, his former recruiting colleague, sell one-to-one resume reviews on nights and weekends for US$400. They cannot serve everyone who asks. [1, 6]
- 2024CNate suggests automating the reviews. They spend about four months of nights and weekends writing their rules into an AI tool. [1]
- August 2024CAfter a free first week, launch. A line in the free template points to it. Sales: US$128 on the first day, US$500 on the second. [1]
- 22 January 2025CA Starter Story video says the app makes more than US$20,000 a month at about 90% net margin, with the founder working 5 to 10 hours a week. [2, 3]
- 31 January 2025CA newsletter puts revenue at US$250,000 a year and says the app reached US$20,000 a month within two months of launch. An affiliate agency has started to promote it. [4]
- 21 March 2025CStarter Story interview: US$26,000 a month in the profile box, "$30,000+ per month" in the text. A job board for employers has just launched. [1]
- 26 July 2025CThe founder writes that a one-day US$3 membership for visitors from dozens of countries raised revenue and profit, after an A/B test on 20% of visitors. [5]
- 2026CThe company's press page lists Forbes Advisor's 2026 ranking of the best resume builders, with Sheets Resume fourth of ten. [13]
- October 2026CRunning: US$99 once or US$39 a month, and a free connector that brings the builder into Claude and ChatGPT. [7, 10]
Why it worked
Four causes, in the order they mattered. Each one is a reusable lesson.
A Reddit post that ranks in Google
In 2018 the founder wrote a long resume guide on Reddit and kept answering questions under it. Google ranks Reddit high for advice searches, so the post still brings visitors, and his free template has more than 4 million downloads. When the AI tool launched, the template itself carried the offer. He describes this as using Reddit's search ranking instead of building his own.
Write the expert's rules into the AI
The two partners first did reviews by hand for US$400, about three hours each. The AI tool applies the same rules from their recruiting years, so in the founder's words he can now do "1,000 resume reviews a day". The model cost is small, and the founder puts net margin near 90%.
Charge once, after the result
The user builds a full resume first and pays only if satisfied: US$99 for lifetime access, and at first also US$29 for a week. A job search is a one-time event, so a one-time price matches it. Refunds are same-day, and anyone short of money can ask by email for a free temporary membership.
Price by country
A cost-of-living study showed that visitors outside the United States and Western Europe almost never paid. A one-day US$3 membership for visitors from dozens of countries was tested on 20% of traffic and then shown to all. The founder says revenue per visitor from those countries more than doubled.
How it was built
These details come from the founder's interviews and the company's own pages. They are grade C. [1, 3, 4, 10, 11]
- Models from OpenAI and Google Gemini, PHP with the Laravel framework, a REST API and Amazon Web Services. Stripe takes the payments.
- The founder is not a programmer. Nate and a third partner build it; he writes the feature notes and the product plan, in 5 to 10 hours a week.
- About four months of nights and weekends in 2024 from the first rules to a working interface.
- Free for the first week to test demand, then paid. The charge comes only after a finished resume.
- A connector built on the Model Context Protocol (MCP), an open standard for connecting AI assistants to outside services, lets Claude and ChatGPT users edit their Sheets Resume resumes inside the assistant. The AI writing then runs on the user's own assistant plan, and only exporting files needs a paid membership.
- 0.5% of each membership fee goes to carbon removal through Stripe Climate.
Tools named in the sources
Each one opens its page in the Tools tab, with every story that uses it.
The dead that came before
Four companies in the Loot Drop database promised job seekers a better resume or a better job search, or sold AI that reads resumes. The values below are from that database and are not independently verified.
Jobspice
The promiseGood-looking resumes for job seekers who cannot design.
Why it diedOne narrow product. LinkedIn and free tools did the same job for nothing.
Jobr
The promiseSwipe through jobs on a phone, like a dating app.
Why it diedLinkedIn and Indeed had more jobs and more job seekers. The swiping did not keep users.
Ansaro
The promiseAI for recruiters, from reading resumes to scheduling interviews, without bias.
Why it diedEmployers saw it as optional and trusted human judgment more than an algorithm.
Monster Worldwide
The promiseThe first large online job board.
Why it diedLinkedIn's network and Indeed's search traffic took the job seekers.
What changed
Each of the four sold to people looking for a job or for a candidate. Three lost to larger platforms that already had the job seekers: LinkedIn, Indeed and free tools. Ansaro sold AI on the employer side and found that recruiters did not want it enough to pay.
Sheets Resume differs in cost, not in promise. It paid nothing to reach job seekers, because a 2018 Reddit post and a free template already reached millions. The AI applies two recruiters' rules at a model cost so low that the founder reports about 90% margin, so three part-time partners can run it without employees or investors. It sells to the job seeker once, at the moment of need. The old risk remains: LinkedIn, Indeed, the large builders and the general chatbots can write a resume too.
Can one person copy it now?
The structure, yes. The audience, not quickly.
The method can be copied: sell an expert service by hand, write its rules into an AI tool, and charge once after the customer sees the result. The audience cannot be copied quickly. It took six years of free answers on Reddit and a template with millions of downloads before the AI tool launched to a ready market.
Where it is still open: Other one-time events where a professional's checklist decides the result: rental applications, visa document packs, grant applications for small nonprofits, and insurance claim letters.
- 1Do the expert work by hand for money first, to learn the rules and the demand. They charged US$400 a review.
- 2Write those rules into the prompts and checks of the AI tool, so its output follows one tested format.
- 3Give it away for a week, then charge once, after the user sees a finished result.
- 4Put the offer inside free material that already ranks in search.
- 5Test prices by country on part of the traffic before showing them to everyone.
What to watch
The risks are the mirror image of the causes above.
Founder figures, one publisher, nothing after March 2025
Every revenue figure is a founder statement: two Starter Story interviews, a video and a written one, and a newsletter that repeats the video's points nine days later. The podcast summary quotes the video. The March 2025 page shows US$20,000 in its title, US$26,000 in its profile box and "$30,000+" in its text. The newsletter dates the launch to August 2023, but the founder's own account says August 2024. No source gives a figure after March 2025.
General chatbots write resumes too
Greenhouse, a hiring software platform, reports that 65% of candidates use AI at some point in the application process, including for resumes and cover letters (reported by Black Enterprise on 4 September 2026). A user of ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini can get a resume without a resume site. Sheets Resume's answer is to work inside those assistants: its connector for Claude and ChatGPT is free, and only exporting files needs a paid plan.
The large builders have AI as well
Kickresume's page, read on 16 October 2026, says its AI Resume Writer uses a fine-tuned GPT-4.1 model, and it counts more than 12 million resumes created. Aiolum's aiCarousels story covers a solo founder whose other product, ResumeMaker.Online, sells in the same field. The company's press page reports fourth place in Forbes Advisor's 2026 list of ten resume builders; that list was not opened for this page.
Employers receive more AI-written applications
Greenhouse counts an average of 244 applications per job opening in 2025, against 116 in 2022, across more than 640 million applications at more than 6,000 companies. In a study of 25 recruiters in the United States, 92% said their applicant tracking system, the software that collects and ranks applications, did not reject resumes automatically for content, formatting or design. In a 2025 survey of 1,013 HR professionals by Jobseeker, itself a resume builder, 81.6% had seen AI-written cover letters and only 11.6% treat AI-assisted applications the same as others. A polished resume is now common, and unedited AI text is judged more strictly.
Model prices can rise
The founder said in January 2025 that OpenAI credits are "dirt cheap" now and "I don't think it'll be like that forever". The product runs on OpenAI and Gemini models, so the 90% margin depends on their prices and terms, which Sheets Resume does not control.
One post and two platforms bring the traffic
The main channel is a 2018 Reddit post that ranks in Google. A change in Reddit's rules or in Google's ranking would cut it. The about page says the site exists partly "in case Reddit ever shuts down or my post goes kaput".
Pricing has changed
In January 2025 the founder said he did not want monthly subscriptions because he finds them "predatory" for a one-time job search. In October 2026 the pricing page offers US$39 a month, cancel anytime, beside the US$99 lifetime price, and the one-week pass is gone.
Sources
The grade next to each source is the best grade that the source can support. "Read in full" means that the text of the page was downloaded and the numbers were checked in it.
- C Starter Story, 21 March 2025: We Built A $20K/Month AI Resume AppRead in full. Founder-written interview, not a page marked "Estimated from public sources". Source for the March 2025 revenue, the launch account, the tech stack, the team and the funding.
- C Starter Story on YouTube, 22 January 2025: How I Built It: $20K/Month AI App as a Non-Technical FounderRead the video page: title, publication date, length of 15 minutes and description, which says "over $20,000/month". The video itself was not watched; its quotations on this page come from source 3.
- C Better Launch playbook of the same episode: How I Built It: $20K/Month AI App as a Non-Technical FounderRead in full. Quotes the founder from the video on prices, margin, the three-way split, hours per week, Reddit and Google, and OpenAI costs.
- C Money Making Story newsletter, 31 January 2025: AI Side Hustle to $250KRead in full. Published nine days after the video, with the same points. Source for US$250,000 a year, US$20,000 a month within two months, 90% margin and the affiliate agency. It dates the launch to August 2023 and writes the domain as SheetsRes.com; both look like errors.
- C TechBullion, 26 July 2025: Surprising Decisions That Fueled Revenue Growth: 21 Leaders Reveal AllRead the section by Colin McIntosh. A founder statement on the one-day US$3 membership and its A/B test.
- C Sheets Resume home page, read 16 October 2026Read in full. Names Nate and Colin, the US$400 review and the rule that payment comes after a finished resume.
- C Sheets Resume membership page, read 16 October 2026Read in full. Source for the current prices.
- C Sheets Resume about page: The Sheets Resume StoryRead in full. The founders' history, the US$500 review price and the reason for the site.
- C Sheets Resume terms and conditionsRead the sections on the operator, data rights and governing law.
- C Sheets Resume: Use Sheets Resume in Claude and ChatGPTRead in full. Source for the MCP connector and what it costs.
- C Sheets Resume: Energy Consumption and OffsetRead in full. Names OpenAI and Gemini as the basis of its estimate, and the 0.5% Stripe Climate pledge.
- C Sheets Resume tools pageRead in full. Lists the resume analyzer, anonymizer, LinkedIn updater and job search.
- C Sheets Resume press pageRead in full. The company's own list of its coverage, including the Forbes Advisor ranking; the rankings themselves were not opened.
- C Black Enterprise, 4 September 2026: Your AI-Generated Resume Could Be Hurting Your Job SearchRead in full. A summary of an Inc.com report; inc.com was not opened because its robots rules exclude ClaudeBot. Source for the Greenhouse application data and the study of 25 recruiters.
- C Jobseeker, last updated 20 October 2025: 2026 Hiring Trends: What 1000+ HR Professionals Really Want in a CandidateRead the sections on AI-written letters and the research background. A 2025 survey of 1,013 HR professionals in 59 countries by a company that sells a resume builder.
- C Kickresume: AI Resume Writer, read 16 October 2026Read in full. A competitor's own page, source for its GPT-4.1 claim and its resume count.
- C Loot Drop database export, failed startupsLocal export. AI-written summaries, not independently verified. Source for the failed predecessors.