Staff Backend Engineer

Who is Recruiting from Scratch:

Recruiting from Scratch is a premier talent firm that focuses on placing the best product managers, software, and hardware talent at innovative companies. Our team is 100% remote and we work with teams across the United States to help them hire.

Staff Backend Engineer

Location - San Francisco, CA (Hybrid – 3 Days per Week)

Compensation - $200,000 – $240,000 Base + Competitive Equity + 10–12% Annual Bonus

Visa - Visa Sponsorship Available

(H-1B Transfers Preferred with 2+ Years Remaining)

Company Stage - Late-Stage Startup (~$1.5B Valuation, Profitable)

Industry - Consumer Marketplace, eCommerce, Collectibles, FinTech, Enterprise Software

About the Company

The company is building one of the world's leading digital marketplaces for high-end collectibles, enabling collectors to buy, sell, authenticate, and trade premium assets through a modern technology platform.

Its platform combines marketplace infrastructure, authentication technology, payments, logistics, and large-scale backend systems to support millions of consumer transactions while expanding into entirely new collectible categories. Already backed by industry leaders and prominent investors, the company has achieved profitability while continuing to rapidly scale its consumer platform and engineering organization.

Backed by world-class venture firms and industry leaders, the company is entering its next stage of growth by modernizing its backend architecture, launching new product categories, and evolving toward highly scalable microservices infrastructure.

As a Staff Backend Engineer, you'll own large-scale backend architecture, greenfield product launches, and platform modernization while working closely with product, infrastructure, and DevOps teams to build one of the largest consumer marketplaces in the collectibles industry.

This is a rare opportunity to join a profitable, pre-IPO technology company where you'll directly influence backend architecture, engineering standards, and the future of a rapidly growing consumer platform.

What You'll Do

Architect and build scalable backend systems supporting a rapidly growing consumer marketplace

Design and implement containerized backend infrastructure using Kubernetes and AWS

Lead migration initiatives from monolithic architecture to modern microservices

Build backend services powering new marketplace categories and product launches

Design scalable APIs supporting high-volume consumer transactions

Improve platform reliability through observability, monitoring, and production engineering

Build distributed backend systems handling billions of monthly transactions

Partner closely with DevOps teams to improve scalability, deployment, and operational excellence

Leverage AI-powered engineering workflows using internal development tools, Cursor, and Claude Code

Collaborate with Product, Engineering, and Business teams to define scalable technical solutions

Mentor engineers through technical leadership, architecture reviews, and engineering best practices

Own backend initiatives from architecture through production deployment

Ideal Candidate Background

Experience Requirements

8–15 years of backend software engineering experience

Strong experience building production backend systems using Node.js and TypeScript

Experience building and scaling high-volume consumer-facing marketplaces or eCommerce platforms

Experience owning large technical initiatives from design through production deployment

Experience working in startup or mid-sized technology companies with significant ownership

Experience designing distributed systems supporting large-scale production workloads

Experience leading architecture modernization or microservices migrations

Demonstrated ownership of high-impact backend engineering initiatives

Technical Requirements

Strong Node.js and TypeScript engineering skills

Strong PostgreSQL and relational database experience

Experience building scalable backend APIs and distributed systems

Experience with AWS infrastructure and Kubernetes (EKS)

Experience with Docker, Terraform, Redis, and modern cloud infrastructure

Experience migrating monoliths to microservices

Strong understanding of observability using tools such as Datadog and Sentry

Daily user of AI coding tools such as Cursor, Claude Code, or similar developer assistants

Strong debugging, performance optimization, and backend engineering fundamentals

Strong system design and backend architecture expertise

Education

Bachelor's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related technical field required

Strong academic background from a respected engineering program preferred

Soft Skills

Strong communication skills

High ownership mentality

Excellent collaboration across Engineering, Product, and Infrastructure teams

Comfortable operating in ambiguity

Self-directed and proactive

Bias toward execution

Startup mentality

Strong architectural thinking

Customer-first engineering mindset

Preferred Backgrounds

GOAT

StockX

Fanatics

DraftKings

Uber

Airbnb

DoorDash

Instacart

Stripe

Etsy

Whatnot

Discord

Early-stage consumer startups

Marketplace companies

High-growth B2C technology companies

Product engineering organizations

Compensation & Benefits

Base Salary: $200,000 – $240,000

Competitive Equity Package

Annual Performance Bonus (10–12%)

Direct collaboration with engineering leadership

Significant ownership over backend architecture and platform modernization

Opportunity to build foundational marketplace infrastructure

High-impact engineering role

Exposure to modern AI-powered software development workflows

Rapid career growth opportunities

Hybrid collaboration with a high-performing engineering team

Visa Sponsorship Available

Why Join

This is an opportunity to build the backend infrastructure powering one of the fastest-growing consumer marketplace platforms.

You'll architect scalable backend systems, modernize platform infrastructure, and launch entirely new marketplace categories while collaborating closely with engineering, product, and infrastructure teams solving challenging large-scale distributed systems problems.

As a Staff Backend Engineer, you'll have outsized ownership over backend architecture while helping define the technical foundation supporting the company's next phase of growth.