Open in a browser · File → Print → Save as PDF. In the print dialog, keep Background graphics on so the green cover matches the online brief.
A SaaS product that turns a small or medium church’s essential public information into a polished mobile experience—fast enough for a weekend launch, serious enough for the App Store when the church is ready.
Most churches already have a website, a Facebook page, or a bulletin. Visitors still struggle with three basic questions. Church Vault collects those answers once, then produces an app the congregation can keep on a phone home screen—without forcing every church into a six-month custom build.
Service times, address, directions, parking, accessibility, and what a first-time visitor can expect.
Upcoming services, small groups, classes, and community events—with dates and signup details.
Phone, email, office hours, social links, and a short form for a call, visit, or ministry interest.
Why this matters commercially: churches buy outcomes (“people can find us and feel welcome”), not frameworks. The product is positioned around those outcomes, with optional add-ons for sermons, giving links, notices, membership, prayer, and richer accessibility notes.
Congregations that want a modern mobile presence without hiring an agency for a bespoke native app—or maintaining a cluttered mega-church platform they will never fully use.
People who can answer service times and events, pay an annual invoice, and update the calendar occasionally. Technical depth is optional; clarity is not.
One predictable yearly charge for the base app, plus plugins and extra languages. Stripe handles cards; renewal is automatic.
Not a generic “build any business app” tool. Core pages, prayer privacy language, visitor expectations, and multilingual congregations are first-class.
Church Vault is both the marketing site and the operating system for creating each church’s app.
Church admin creates an account and names the church.
Guided wizard: story, services, events, contact, languages, plugins, app type.
Stripe Checkout charges the annual total immediately and renews yearly.
System generates a hosted PWA or a MAUI project for store apps.
Admins update events and profile anytime; phones sync on open.
This distinction is easy to blur in marketing copy. Treat them as two honest offers with different cost, speed, and prestige—not as “web vs app” in the casual sense.
A website that behaves like an app: it can be installed to a phone home screen, works offline with cached content, and opens full-screen without the browser chrome looking like a temporary bookmark.
Real installable applications for iOS, Android, and Windows—built from one project, ready for Google Play, Apple’s App Store (via Transporter), and desktop install.
A Progressive Web App is a website with a few extra capabilities: an install prompt / “Add to Home Screen,” an app icon, a splash-like standalone window, and a service worker that can keep recent content available when signal is weak. Visitors open a Church Vault address such as /c/grace-fellowship, then keep it like any other app icon.
Why churches like it: no Apple Developer account required to get started, no Google Play review queue for the first version, updates publish the moment the church edits content on the server, and cost stays lower. For many congregations, “it’s on my phone and it answers my questions” is the whole job.
What it is not: it is not automatically listed in the App Store or Play Store. Discovery still happens through the church’s website, QR codes, bulletins, and word of mouth—unless the church later upgrades to store apps.
.NET MAUI is Microsoft’s framework for building one mobile codebase that produces native apps for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Windows. Church Vault copies a prepared template, stamps the church’s name, colors, package id, and API address, then supplies scripts and a publishing checklist for the stores.
Why churches choose it: store presence, the psychological trust of “search our name in the App Store,” deeper native feel, a local SQLite cache that syncs whenever the app opens, and a Windows desktop option for office staff. It is the premium path when a church wants to look established beside larger ministries.
What partners should know: store apps still need the church’s (or a partner’s) Apple and Google developer accounts, signing certificates, and store listings. Church Vault streamlines generation and packaging; it does not replace those accounts. That is a feature of honesty in the sales story, not a gap in the product story.
| Topic | PWA | MAUI (iOS / Android / Windows) |
|---|---|---|
| Time to first useful app | Minutes after payment—hosted immediately | Project generated immediately; store approval adds days to weeks |
| Install experience | Add to Home Screen from the browser | Download from Play Store / App Store / desktop package |
| Updates to content | Instant via the shared API | Content updates via sync; binary updates when the church republishes |
| Offline / weak signal | Browser cache of the last snapshot | On-device SQLite database refreshed on each use |
| Store discovery | No store listing by default | Searchable listing once published |
| Best marketing angle | “Live this week. No app-store waiting room.” | “A real church app on every major platform.” |
| Best fit | First mobile presence, trial, budget-conscious | Established brand, multi-campus pride, long-term home-screen presence |
Agency tip: sell the PWA as the on-ramp and MAUI as the upgrade path. Same content, same admin portal, same three questions—higher packaging and distribution for churches that outgrow “install from the website.”
Welcome, next service, address, and clear buttons for Plan a Visit, Events, and Contact.
Times, location, directions, parking or accessibility, and first-visit expectations.
Services, groups, classes, and community gatherings with dates and signup notes.
Phone, email, address, office hours, social links—phone and address are tappable.
Short intake: name, preferred contact method, interest, message. Only what staff need.
Church story, beliefs, leadership, and community. Can import wording from an existing webpage.
Annual billing, charged up front, auto-renewing. Plugins and extra languages expand average revenue per church without complicating the core promise.
It does not process donations. The giving plugin is a trusted link to the church’s existing giving service.
Notices are useful in-app updates (schedule changes, reminders)—not a full push-notification network requiring every church’s Apple/Google push certificates on day one.
Prayer requests stay private to staff (and optionally a prayer team), with clear wording about who will see them.
American English is always included. The base plan includes three languages; more are an upcharge.
Every church app reads the same Church Vault API and SQL Server database. Content edited in the portal shows up in the hosted app and, after sync, on phones.
Each MAUI install keeps a local SQLite copy and refreshes when opened—so a basement fellowship hall with weak signal still shows last-known times and events.
Admins can paste an About or Beliefs URL. Church Vault reads public pages and drafts those sections for human review—reducing blank-page friction.
Optional: sample a church’s current site for theme colors so the new app feels related without cloning a messy layout.
Platform admin sets prices and status. Church admins only manage their own congregation—events, story, inbox, billing portal.
UI chrome is translated across a starter set of languages. Congregations can offer a language switch inside the app—vital for many U.S. churches.
An app that answers the questions people actually ask—when you meet, what’s happening, and how to connect.
Live preview during setup. Annual pricing. Plugins for growth. PWA this week or store apps when ready. Built for churches, not generic small business kits.
“We already have a website.” Perfect—Church Vault can import story text and sample colors. The phone experience is the gap.
“We can’t wait for the App Store.” Start on the PWA; upgrade to MAUI when listings matter.
“We don’t want another megaplatform.” Core is intentionally small. Sermons, giving, and membership are optional plugins.
“Who controls our data?” Church admins edit their record; prayer and membership stay off the public feed.
Sharpen the category story: church visitor clarity vs. generic app builders vs. heavy church management suites.
Campaign ideas, landing experiments, and language that stays faithful to the three questions without burying PWA/MAUI nuance.
Channel plan, launch sequence, and metrics for paid acquisition, partnerships, and content—aimed at first paying churches and expandable ARR.
Demo ready today: the working MVC product can walk a prospect from marketing page → wizard → hosted sample/preview → admin portal. Sample church: Grace Fellowship. Development billing bypass exists for demos before Stripe keys are live in production.
Church Vault is a focused business: help churches greet the next visitor well on the device they already hold. The technology is deliberately split into a fast hosted path and a premium store path so marketing can sell progress, not perfectionism.
The product collects the truth of a congregation—times, place, events, connection—then keeps that truth available when someone is deciding whether to walk through the door.
Optional add-ons that expand what the church offers without bloating the core visitor app. Linked from the revenue table above.
Lists sermons and a livestream the church already publishes elsewhere—YouTube, Vimeo, a podcast host, or similar. Church Vault does not host or encode video; it organizes the links inside the app so visitors can find recent teaching and join a live stream from one place.
Useful talking point: churches keep their existing media workflow and gain a mobile shelf for it.
↑ Back to pricingA clear giving button that opens the church’s existing giving service (Tithely, Pushpay, Planning Center Giving, a bank form, and so on). Donation card data never touches Church Vault; the plugin is a trusted handoff, not a payments product.
Useful talking point: no PCI burden for the church or for Church Vault—just a reliable path to give.
↑ Back to pricingIn-app notes for schedule changes, weather cancellations, potluck reminders, and short announcements. Staff post them in the portal; they appear in the visitor app. This is a notice list inside the experience—not Apple/Google push notifications that require every church’s push certificates on day one.
Useful talking point: practical communication without promising a full push-notification network.
↑ Back to pricingA private roster for church staff—not shown on the public site, not in the visitor snapshot, and not synced into the open app feed. It supports internal continuity without turning Church Vault into a full church-management suite.
Useful talking point: member data stays off the guest-facing app by design.
↑ Back to pricingA short form where someone can submit a request. The wording tells the sender the note is saved for church staff and, if the church allows it, may be shared with a prayer team. Requests never post publicly; staff see them in the inbox and mark them handled after follow-up.
Useful talking point: pastoral care channel with clear privacy expectations.
↑ Back to pricingExtends the Visit page with a longer accessibility note and language-access detail (interpretation, large-print materials, hearing assistance, and similar). Parking and a short accessibility line already ship in the core Visit experience; this plugin is for congregations that need more room to say how they welcome people with different needs.
Useful talking point: hospitality depth without stuffing the free base plan.
↑ Back to pricing