Under the Hood: The Sun City Marketing Core Stack
I get asked what tools I use to build the sites and automations for SCM clients. The short answer is: fewer than you'd think, each chosen for a specific reason. Here's the full stack as it stands in 2026, with the reasoning behind each piece.
Intelligence Layer
Claude Code (Sonnet)
This is the primary development engine. Claude Code runs in the terminal, operates directly on the file system, and functions as a pair programmer across an entire session — not just a prompt box. The key difference from other AI coding tools is that it maintains full context across a build, can read and edit files directly, and doesn't require switching between browser tabs. Operating at the command-line level bypasses graphical interfaces that inject unnecessary markup. Every SCM client site is built through Claude Code.
Google Gemini 2.0 Flash
Gemini powers "Bit," the AI receptionist we've built for qualifying inbound leads in real time. The model was selected for inference speed — it delivers highly accurate conversational responses in milliseconds. For a contractor who may have a form on their site at 11 PM, Bit handles the initial qualification and data capture while the owner sleeps, then fires an alert when a job-ready lead comes through.
Infrastructure
Cloudflare Workers
Serverless execution at the geographic edge eliminates the latency problem that kills response times for most hosted apps. Code executes in the data center closest to the user — no cold start delays, no server spin-up time. For API-connected workflows that need to respond in under 200ms, Cloudflare Workers is the correct tool.
Visual Studio Code
The development environment. Local file management, Python script execution, direct integration with Claude Code via the terminal. The key is absolute authority over production data — nothing is managed through a browser-based interface where access can be revoked or sessions can expire mid-build.
Frontend
Vanilla HTML5, CSS Grid/Flexbox, and minimal JavaScript. No frameworks, no dependencies, no build step. Files load in browsers as-is, achieving 90+ PageSpeed scores consistently. Plus Jakarta Sans for typography — only the required weights imported to eliminate render-blocking requests.
Optimization + Delivery
Python with Pillow for image processing — every image is stripped of EXIF metadata, resized to exact viewport dimensions, and converted to compressed WebP before it touches a client server. Hostinger for hosting — SSD servers, fast DNS, and a clean control panel without the overhead of a reseller environment.
"The stack's value isn't in any individual tool — it's in the combination. Each piece removes a specific category of friction from the build process." — internal documentation, Q1 2026
That's the full stack. Nothing exotic. Everything chosen because it makes the output faster, cleaner, or more reliable than the alternative.
Dan builds custom websites and marketing systems for contractors across Southern California. He writes about local SEO, HTML performance, and the practical side of scaling a trades business with automation.