We didn't set out to build rental management software. We set out to fix the software we already had.
Like most AV rental companies, we'd tried a few different systems over the years. Rentman. Current RMS. Both solid products, both used by thousands of companies. Neither quite fit how we actually worked.
So we did what any tech-minded rental company would do: we tried to extend them. Build on top. Connect the gaps.
That's where the problems started.
The API nightmare
APIs are supposed to let different systems talk to each other. In theory, you can pull data from your rental system, push it somewhere else, build custom reports, automate workflows - whatever you need.
In practice? The APIs we were working with were a mess.
We'd spend weeks building an integration. Get it working perfectly. Then an update would roll out and half of it would break. Endpoints would change. Data structures would shift. Documentation was either outdated or missing entirely.
And the logic behind some of these APIs? Confusing doesn't cover it. You'd need to make three separate calls to get information that should have been in one. Field names that made sense to someone, somewhere, but not to anyone actually using them.
We weren't trying to do anything complicated. We just wanted decent reporting. We wanted our PAT testing records in the same place as our equipment. We wanted systems that actually talked to each other without constant babysitting.
Too many disconnected pieces
Here's what our setup looked like at one point:
Rental management in one system. PAT testing records in a spreadsheet (because the RMS didn't handle it). Crew scheduling in Google Calendar. Time tracking in yet another app. Financial reporting cobbled together from exports that never quite matched up.
Every time something changed in one place, we'd have to update three others. Every report required pulling data from multiple sources and hoping the formats lined up.
We kept thinking: there has to be a better way. Surely someone's built a system where all this lives in one place?
Turns out, not really. Or at least, not one that worked the way we needed it to.
So we built it ourselves
NexusRMS started as a side project. A way to get the reporting we actually wanted. An attempt to stop juggling five different systems and finally have everything in one place.
It grew from there.
Once we had the foundation, we kept finding things to add. Proper crew scheduling with availability tracking. Transport logistics that actually made sense. A client portal that clients would genuinely use.
We're not claiming we've solved everything. We're still building. Still finding gaps. Still learning what matters most.
But we're building it while running a rental company. Every feature gets tested on real jobs, with real clients, under real pressure. If something doesn't work in practice, we feel it before anyone else does.
Why we're opening the beta
We could keep building in private. Polish everything until it's "ready" - whatever that means.
But we've learned that what works for us might not work for everyone. AV companies have different priorities than film kit houses. Event staging has different workflows than production rental.
So we're opening NexusRMS to other rental companies. Not to sell you something - we're in beta, it's free to try. But to learn. To find out what features actually matter. To build something that works for more than just our operation.
If you've had similar frustrations - with confusing APIs, with disconnected systems, with software that almost works but not quite - we'd like to hear from you.
Sign up at nexusrms.io/register. Tell us what's broken. Help us build something better.
We're Mike and Jack. We run an AV rental company. We got tired of fighting with software that was supposed to help us. So we built our own.