site-headersrc/components/site-header.tsx
Grove 2.2.1
Every part Grove ships, on one page: the tokens, every section once, and the primitives they are built from.
Every swatch below reads from src/theme.css, so a rebrand recolours this page too.
21 files, no cross-imports: take one section or take the folder.
herosrc/components/hero.tsx
Bookkeeping for small studios
Alder keeps the ledger for two-to-twenty person studios. It categorises as the money moves, tells you how many months of runway you have, and turns month-end into an afternoon instead of a weekend.
| Date | Description | Category | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mar 04 | Wren & Co — March retainer | Income | +4,200.00 |
| Mar 06 | Bramble Coworking | Workspace | −980.00 |
| Mar 09 | Hollis Studio — invoice #114 | Income | +6,750.00 |
| Mar 12 | Northbank Rail | Travel | −118.40 |
| Mar 14 | Adobe, Figma, Linear | Software | −214.00 |
| 5 of 47 lines · March 2026 | +9,637.60 net | ||
logo-cloudsrc/components/logo-cloud.tsx
Keeping the books for 1,400+ studios, including
feature-showcasesrc/components/feature-showcase.tsx
How it works
Alder earns your attention about four times a month, and stays quiet the rest of it.
Link your bank, card and Stripe account. Alder pulls twenty-four months of history so your first report has something to say.
Typically 4 minutes
Everything routine is categorised the moment it lands. What is left arrives as one short queue, grouped by the question behind them.
≈ 6 items a week
A checklist, not a spreadsheet archaeology dig. Tick through it, sign off, and your accountant gets the pack without another email.
One afternoon
This is the whole list. Alder does the three marked auto before you sit down, which is why March closed in under four hours.
Read the month-end guidefeature-splitsrc/components/feature-split.tsx
Runway
Alder reads your real burn — payroll, software, the quarterly VAT bill you keep forgetting — and answers a single question in plain language: how many months until this gets uncomfortable.
Solid bars are booked. Faded bars are projected from committed costs and signed work.
Hollis Studio
#114
Wren & Co
#115
Northbank
#116
Ardent Type
#117
Getting paid
Alder sends the reminder you would have written on day three, then again on day ten, in your own wording. You only hear about it when an invoice needs a human — which, for most studios, is roughly once a quarter.
feature-gridsrc/components/feature-grid.tsx
Everything else
Quarterly returns prepared from the ledger you already reviewed, submitted straight to HMRC under Making Tax Digital.
All plans
Send the email to receipts@ your studio address. Alder reads the total, matches it to the transaction, and stops asking.
All plans
Invoice in dollars, bank in pounds, and still get a P&L that reconciles. Rates are locked at the date of the transaction.
Studio and up
Free, permanent, read-and-adjust access. They see the same ledger you do, so nothing gets re-keyed in March.
All plans
Connect Deel, Gusto or a spreadsheet. Wages, employer tax and pension land in the right accounts every run.
Studio and up
CSV, a proper double-entry ledger export, and a documented API. Leaving should be as calm as arriving.
All plans
testimonialssrc/components/testimonials.tsx
Proof
“We used to lose the first week of every quarter to the books. Last quarter I did the whole close on a Thursday afternoon, and the only thing my accountant asked for was a coffee.”
Marguerite Osei
Founder, Fieldwork Studio
12 people · Bristol · with Alder since 2024
“The runway number is the only dashboard I look at. It has been right within a fortnight every time, including the quarter we hired two designers.”
“I run books for nine studios. Alder is the first tool where I have not had to teach the client anything before it works.”
pricing-tablesrc/components/pricing-table.tsxshowHeading
Pricing
Every plan files your VAT, gives your accountant a seat, and keeps your data exportable. The difference is how many people and how many ledgers.
Yearly pays for ten months. Switch either way, any month.
One person, one set of books.
£18/month
Billed monthly. Yearly pays for ten months.
What you get
Outgrow it the month you put someone on payroll.
Two to twenty people, one set of nerves.
£49/month
Billed monthly. Yearly pays for ten months.
Everything in Solo, plus
Most studios never leave this plan. That is the intention.
Accountants running books for many studios.
£129/month
Billed monthly. Ten client ledgers included.
Everything in Studio, plus
Fifty ledgers or more? Ask us about the flat rate.
Prices exclude VAT. Switching plan is immediate and prorated, and we refund the first month if Alder is not for you — no form to fill in.
pricing-comparisonsrc/components/pricing-comparison.tsx
No asterisks, no “contact us for details”. If a row says unlimited, it is unlimited.
| Feature | Solo | Studio | Practice |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ledger | |||
| Bank and card feeds | 2 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Automatic categorisationLearns your chart of accounts in about three weeks | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Receipt forwarding and matching | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Custom journal rules | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Multi-currency with locked rates | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Money in | |||
| Invoices and estimates | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Automatic payment reminders | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Recurring retainers | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Client payment portal | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | White-labelled |
| Reporting | |||
| P&L, balance sheet, cash flow | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Runway forecastBuilt from committed costs, not a trailing average | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Hiring scenarios | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Project and client profitability | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Tax and close | |||
| VAT return, filed to HMRC | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Month-end close checklist | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Accountant pack export | Included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| Payroll journals | Not included in Solo | Included in Studio | Included in Practice |
| People and support | |||
| Studio seats | 1 | 5, then £6 each | Unlimited |
| Accountant seat | Free | Free | Free |
| Client ledgers | 1 | 1 | 10, then £9 each |
| Support | Email, 1 day | Email, 4 hours | Named contact |
faqsrc/components/faq.tsxvariant="general"
Questions
If yours is not here, write to hello@alder.co and a person will answer within a day.
No. Alder keeps a proper double-entry ledger underneath, but everything you touch is phrased as a question about your business — who was this payment to, was this personal, is this invoice really unpaid. Your accountant gets the formal view.
Yes. Connect the account and Alder imports up to twenty-four months of transactions, contacts, invoices and your chart of accounts. Most studios are looking at a complete prior year within ten minutes.
They get a free seat with adjustment rights, a real trial balance, and a one-click accountant pack in the format they already ask for. Around a third of our new studios arrive because their accountant suggested it.
You export everything — transactions, attachments, invoices and a full journal — as CSV and JSON, at any time, without asking us. We keep your ledger readable for ninety days after cancellation and then delete it.
Because a bookkeeping app that pings you is a bookkeeping app you start ignoring. Receipts are handled by forwarding an email, and the web app is built to work properly on a phone when you need it.
ctasrc/components/cta.tsx
Thirty days, all of Studio, no card. Import last year while you are there — it takes about ten minutes and tells you more than this page can.
newslettersrc/components/newsletter.tsx
Written by the people building Alder. No product announcements dressed up as advice, and one click to leave for good.
page-headersrc/components/page-header.tsxeyebrow title lead meta variant
Legal
Everything we do with your data and everything you agree to, on one page, in the same plain English as the rest of the site.
Last updated 1 August 2026 · about four minutes
blog-indexsrc/components/blog-index.tsx
We timed forty-one studios through their March close. The ones who finished before lunch shared four habits, and not one of them was working faster — they had moved the work to the days it happened.
Elin Marsh
Co-founder, Alder
A dashboard is a pile of numbers arranged to make you feel informed. We shipped one sentence instead — you have 8.4 months — and this is the reasoning, plus the eleven charts we deleted to get there.
Devan Okonjo
Engineering, Alder
Nineteen days to payment versus forty-one is rarely a billing problem. It is a wording problem. Notes from reading six thousand payment reminders, and the three sentences that moved the needle.
Priya Nadkarni
Guest, Nadkarni & Co
We publish roughly twice a month, and never about ourselves twice in a row. Everything we have written stays up, and the letter below carries each new piece the morning it goes out.
auth-formsrc/components/auth-form.tsxvariant="signup"
Start free
Everything on the Studio plan, for a full month-end cycle. Import last year while you are in there — it takes about ten minutes and tells you more than the landing page can.
Read-only open banking, about four minutes. Or skip it and poke around the demo books first.
Long enough that your first runway number means something. It is usually done before the kettle boils.
Most studios try March before they decide. That is the point at which people either stay or do not.
Already keeping books here? Sign in.
walkthroughsrc/components/walkthrough.tsx
The walkthrough
March 2026 at Fieldwork Studio — twelve people, three bank accounts, one person who would rather be designing. Nothing here is a mock-up; it is the same four screens every studio sees.
00:00 · 1 March
Read-only open banking for the current account, Stripe for payouts, and the card that nobody can find the statements for. Four minutes of clicking, then Alder reads two years backwards while you make a coffee.
Monzo Business
Current account
Stripe
Payouts and fees
Barclaycard
24 months of history
01:10 · 9 March
Everything routine is already filed. What reaches you is the handful of lines a rule cannot settle, each one phrased as the question behind it. Six of them this week.
To review6 left · ≈ 4 min
Northbank Rail — £118.40
Client travel, or getting to the studio?
Travel — billableTravel — overhead
Ardent Type — £96.00
One licence, or the studio’s?
SoftwareFreelance costs
02:20 · 22 March
Fieldwork asked what a fourth designer does to the line. Alder reads the real burn — payroll, software, the VAT bill in April — and answers before the conversation cools off.
Solid bars are booked. Faded bars carry the new salary from May.
03:40 · 31 March
The close is a checklist with four lines already ticked. Fieldwork did the rest in an afternoon, and their accountant had the pack before she asked for it.
March closed31 Mar, 16:12 · 3h 40m
3h 40m
One month, start to signed off, at a twelve-person studio with three bank accounts. The median across 1,400 studios is the same figure.
Thirty minutes with the person who built the close checklist, on your books rather than Fieldwork’s. No slides, no second call.
guidesrc/components/guide.tsx
A close is slow because the evidence has gone cold, not because the arithmetic is hard. Three weeks after the payment, nobody remembers whether £118.40 to Northbank Rail was a client visit or the commute, and finding out costs a phone call.
We timed forty-one studios through their March close. The ones who finished before lunch were not working faster. They had moved the work to the days it happened, so by the last of the month there was nothing left to discover.
The write-up, with the four habits ranked: read it in the journal
Everything routine is filed the moment it arrives. What reaches you is the handful of lines a rule cannot settle, each one phrased as the question behind it: client travel, or getting to the studio?
For a studio of twelve that is about six items a week, and four minutes on a Monday. Do the four minutes and the close has nothing left to find. Skip them for a month and you are reading bank statements in April.
Four things account for most of the mess at month-end, and every one of them can be settled in the week it happens.
By the last day the checklist has three of its five lines already ticked, and the fourth was cleared on a Monday. What is left is reading the numbers and agreeing with them.
Fieldwork Studio signed March off at 16:12 on a Tuesday, and the accountant pack went out in the same click. Three hours and forty minutes for the whole month, which is also the median across 1,400 studios.
March at Fieldwork Studio, with every sitting timed.
| Day | What you do | Time | Elapsed |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 Mar | Connect the feeds and leave them alone | 4 min | 00:04 |
| 2–8 Mar | Forward receipts as they arrive | 16 min | 00:20 |
| 9 Mar | Clear the first review queue | 50 min | 01:10 |
| 16 Mar | Invoice the work you finished | 30 min | 01:40 |
| 22 Mar | Read the runway line | 40 min | 02:20 |
| 31 Mar | Tick the checklist and sign off | 1h 20m | 03:40 |
| March, start to signed off | 3h 40m | 03:40 | |
The order works in any ledger, on paper if you like. Alder takes the sorting and the arithmetic off every line above, and leaves you the judgement.
contact-desksrc/components/contact-desk.tsx
Reaching us
Email is fastest, the phone is answered by a person, and post still works.
Post
Unit 4, Portwall Yard
Redcliffe, Bristol BS1 6NB. Knock if you are passing.
Elin Marsh
Co-founder. Anything about the product or a migration.
Devan Okonjo
Engineering. Feeds, imports and anything that looks wrong.
contact-mapsrc/components/contact-map.tsx
Six minutes from Temple Meads, behind the green gate, with the kettle usually on.
The office
Alder Books LtdUnit 4, Portwall YardRedcliffeBristol BS1 6NB
Sketch, not to scale. Drawn for this page, so it works offline and sets no cookies.
legal-docsrc/components/legal-doc.tsx
This page covers what Alder does with your data, what cookies we set, and the terms you agree to by using it. It is written to be read once, in full, in about four minutes.
Three things. Your ledger — transactions, invoices, contacts and attachments, either imported by you or pulled from a bank feed you connected. Your account is a name, a work email and a hashed password. And a service log of sign-ins and errors, kept thirty days, which is how we find out something broke before you tell us.
Bank feeds are read-only. Alder cannot move money, and no credential you type at your bank is ever seen by us.
We keep your ledger readable for ninety days after you cancel, in case you come back or your accountant needs one last export. Then it is deleted, backups included, within a further thirty days.
Five companies, listed below in full. Each one is under a data processing agreement, each one is inside the EU or the UK, and none of them may use your data for anything except the job named. We add to this list by updating this page, never quietly.
| Company | What it does | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Hetzner | Hosting and backups | Falkenstein, DE |
| Stripe Payments Europe | Card payments and invoicing | Dublin, IE |
| TrueLayer | Read-only open banking feeds | London, UK |
| Postmark | Transactional email | Frankfurt, DE |
| Plausible | Page counts, no cookies | Tallinn, EE |
Under UK and EU data protection law you can ask for a copy of everything we hold, ask us to correct it, ask us to delete it, or object to us holding it at all. Most of that you can do yourself without asking: export lives in your account settings and produces CSV and JSON, at any time.
For anything else, write to hello@alder.co and we answer inside one working day, and act inside thirty. If we get it wrong you can complain to the ICO in the UK, or to your own supervisory authority in the EU.
One cookie, and it is the session that keeps you signed in. There is no advertising cookie, no third-party pixel and no consent banner, because there is nothing to consent to. Page counts come from Plausible, which measures without storing anything on your machine.
Alder is a subscription. The trial runs thirty days and asks for no card; if you do nothing at the end of it, the account goes quiet rather than charging you. Paid plans are monthly or yearly, prices exclude VAT, and yearly pays for ten months.
Cancel any month and it ends at the next renewal, with no notice period and no exit fee. We refund the first month for any reason if you ask. Upgrades are prorated to the day; downgrades take effect at renewal so nothing disappears mid-month.
Your books are yours. We do not claim a licence over them, we do not train anything on them, and we will not sell the company’s customer data as an asset. Alder Books Ltd is registered in England, number 14882031, VAT GB 412 7788 03, at Unit 4, Portwall Yard, Redcliffe, Bristol BS1 6NB.
If this page changes in a way that matters, we email every account at least thirty days before it takes effect and say plainly what moved.
10 shared files that every section above is built from. Two are pure constants (the type ladder and the row pitch), so they have no specimen of their own.
ui/buttonsrc/components/ui/button.tsx
ui/badgesrc/components/ui/badge.tsx
Bookkeeping for small studios
ui/fieldsrc/components/ui/field.tsxfieldClasses(invalid)
Rest and error. The error state is ochre rather than red — Grove’s status axis already reads ochre as waiting on someone — and it never arrives as colour alone.
That address is missing its @ or the part after it.
ui/mode-togglesrc/components/ui/mode-toggle.tsx
ui/iconssrc/components/ui/icons.tsx
ui/containersrc/components/ui/container.tsx
ui/article-cardsrc/components/ui/article-card.tsxpost
Shown without a cover and without an author portrait, which is what the card does when a CMS record has neither.
Nineteen days to payment versus forty-one is rarely a billing problem. It is a wording problem. Notes from reading six thousand payment reminders, and the three sentences that moved the needle.
Priya Nadkarni
Guest, Nadkarni & Co
site-footersrc/components/site-footer.tsx
