Reflections From Fairground Music

A fast-moving startup. A scene-native music platform. And a product experience shaped through real-world collaboration.

“Understanding an idea is one thing. Writing it down clearly? That’s where the questions begin.”

Therese Breslin · Junior Product Manager

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The Fit

Fairground Music was preparing to launch a scene-native digital platform for the independent music industry.

The startup was building toward go-to-market with a vision of creating an integrated ecosystem connecting artists, venues, promoters, labels, and fans — creating space for creativity, commerce, and connection.

At the same time, Kimolian was continuing its mission of creating career-changing opportunities for underrepresented women entering tech through hands-on experience.

For Therese Breslin, joining the Fairground Music environment as part of the Kimolian community became an opportunity to experience product-development work inside a real startup preparing for launch.

As Therese described it, the partnership felt like a natural fit.

Kimolian brings a community of hands-on product professionals eager to build real-world experience, while Fairground Music was building a grassroots platform for the independent music scene. The alignment also went beyond product work. Fairground’s focus on putting power back into the hands of artists also strongly aligned with the values that drew Therese to the experience.

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What We Did

Service: Product Collaboration · Startup Product Experience

Format: Embedded product collaboration · Hands-on learning · Startup product delivery

Over six months, Therese worked alongside the Fairground Music product team, contributing across different stages of product planning and delivery.

The experience involved practical exposure to how startup product teams operate day-to-day — balancing roadmap priorities, sprint cycles, feature planning, testing, and documentation.

Over the course of the collaboration, Therese gained hands-on experience across different parts of the product process — from drafting PRDs and shaping user stories to supporting QA, wireframing, roadmap planning, and sprint prioritisation.

The work also involved contributing to conversations around governance, onboarding flows, user testing, and platform considerations including GDPR, UGC, and IP Infringement.

Throughout the experience, the product roadmap remained the central reference point guiding the work, helping teams stay aligned while moving the platform toward launch readiness.

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What We Found

One of the strongest themes throughout the experience was how much product work happens in the thinking between the idea and the implementation.

As Therese reflected:

“Understanding an idea is one thing. Writing it down clearly? That’s where the

questions begin.”

Simple product decisions often opened up wider conversations around usability, development effort, and user experience.

For example, while defining a member perk pass, questions quickly surfaced around:

• Whether the QR code should be dynamic or static

• Whether access should be reusable or single-use

• Whether the experience should be time-based or event-based

Each decision affected both the user experience and the development process.

The experience also reinforced something important for people entering product roles:

You do not need to sound highly technical to contribute meaningful value.

Therese reflected that while technical acronyms initially felt overwhelming, the development team often preferred clear and simple communication over technical jargon.

Good product thinking mattered more than sounding technical.

Working closely with the lead PM, product designer, CTO, and developers also meant learning how to stay ahead of sprint cycles while balancing the realities of fractional product roles within a fast-moving startup environment.

During this period, the team contributed toward moving the product from concept toward launch readiness, including work connected to onboarding flows and roadmap priorities.

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Outcomes

Outcome	What happened
Hands-on startup product experience	Therese gained practical exposure to product planning, QA,roadmap support, documentation, and Agile workflows
Cross-functional collaboration	Work happened closely alongside the lead PM, product designer, CTO, and developers
Product thinking development	The experience reinforced the importance of asking clear questions and balancing founder vision with MVP definition
Launch-focused delivery support	The team continued moving the platform toward launch readiness across multiple roadmap priorities.

Why It Matters

This experience reflected something central to Kimolian’s approach.

Real growth in product work comes from contributing inside real environments.

Not just learning frameworks or terminology — but participating in the conversations, decisions, and challenges that shape products in practice.

For Therese, the experience created exposure to the realities of startup product work:

• Translating ideas into development-ready thinking

• Balancing roadmap priorities with an MVP mindset

• Working collaboratively across product, design, and development

• Learning that clarity matters more than sounding technical

The experience also highlighted the importance of startup culture.

From shared playlists during onboarding to quarterly meetups in Shoreditch, Fairground Music intentionally created opportunities for connection beyond delivery work alone.

As Therese reflected, those moments helped build genuine connection across the team.

Some experiences build skills.

Others build confidence in how to think, communicate, and contribute inside real product Environments.

That’s what this collaboration became.

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