4 ms·

Ticketstumbler (YC summer 08) "growing 50 percent a month"

42 points by ksvs 18y ago

nuclear_eclipse 18y ago
I have to say, Congratulations to Tom and Dan. Turning a profit from the get-go is very rare, and they managed it quite well. It's great to see that snowball rolling downhill... Cheers!
- deleted 18y ago
  [deleted]
- fallentimes 18y ago
  Thanks. Things are/were pretty close though. If we would have moved to SF, bye bye profitability. That's one of the main reasons we're in Boston.
hooande 18y ago
I think Ticketstumbler's unofficial motto is "Love us with money". Buy tickets y'all
- fallentimes 18y ago
  Now with concert ticket goodness. Hopefully theater tickets, more providers and roughly $2 billion worth of total tickets in early 2009.
  - palish 18y ago
    Hmm... It's probably prudent to reach $2 million before talking about $2 billion. Wait, are you saying you'll actually sell $2 billion worth of tickets, or just offer them for sale?
    - fallentimes 18y ago
      lol...offer them for sale. That's how much inventory we hope to have. Currently there are $1 billion worth of tickets offered for sale on TicketStumbler (we don't own the tickets, just like Expedia doesn't own the air planes). Shit man, if we had $2 million in sales already I'd be on an island somewhere. It'd be 99% profit.
      - palish 18y ago
        Right, yeah. It just doesn't seem like Ticketstumbler will necessarily become more valuable just by increasing inventory. (So why use that fact as a bullet point when describing why Ticketstumbler will become valuable?) Increasing inventory is necessary but not sufficient. Your best bet is probably to focus on ways to differentiate Ticketstumbler. For example, what reasons are there for me to buy a ticket through Ticketstumbler than from any other source? Etc.
        fallentimes 18y ago
        It's valuable because the more ticket providers we have, the cheaper prices will be and the better seats we'll have. This certainly has a limit, but I don't think we're there yet, especially since we don't even have theater tickets. The real value in Kayak wasn't that it included the big airlines, it was that it includes Southwest (not included anywhere else), Frontier, Airtran and many long tail airlines and forces the big airlines to compete. I traveled 250k miles in the past two years and often found myself on no-name airline flights that I would have never heard of if it wasn't for Kayak. And it has a super clean UI, isn't spammy and doesn't charge fees. Our value is/will be: clean UI, no TicketStumbler fees (we're free!), no Ads on the main site, simple to use, natural language search and user dashboards & interactive maps (both coming soon).
        deleted 18y ago
        [deleted]
        palish 18y ago
        It's valuable because the more ticket providers we have, the cheaper prices will be and the better seats we'll have. Yeah, that's true. What I'm saying is, that by itself isn't enough to be successful. Because of your next point, actually: I traveled 250k miles in the past two years and often found myself on no-name airline flights that I would have never heard of if it wasn't for Kayak. That example is a very different from a preppy highschooler buying a ticket to a concert. For one, you had to travel. If all of a sudden there weren't any airplanes, it would still be necessary for you to travel. But it's not necessary for people to go to concerts. Also, consider the number one reason why people go to concerts: because their friends are going. So one way to differentiate yourself from the competition might be to offer group discounts, for example. You could even sell them at a loss for awhile, just so you can use that as a way to market Ticketstumbler. Like "Going out tonight? Stumble into your next concert with Ticketstumbler. The more friends you bring, the more cash you'll save." What I'm saying is, try not to hyperfocus on making Ticketstumbler like Kayak. It isn't, and can't be. So those types of comparisons are a good way to communicate to someone about what Tickestumbler does, but are a bad design way to design the company.
fallentimes 18y ago
I actually didn't want this article submitted so I flagged it. Kidding, kidding. There are, however, some out of context quotes and a ridiculous looking picture (the photographer was nice, but quirky). Oh well, I <3 press. To clarify: -We've never said that we'll never take money. In an ideal situation, startups would not have to take money and if we can get away with it great, if not that's okay. We're well aware that the odds are against us on this one. -We've been very open with this with our potential investors. The sharp money is still investing in this economy and luckily some of them are still interested in us. You think a VC will argue with you when you say you want more months of operational information so you can make a better informed, data-driven decision? Nada. I've talked to four potential investors this week alone. -Due to the economy, sales have stayed relatively flat as average sales have gone down while volume has gone up. However, we're still working out bugs and have over $1 billion worth of tickets on the site. Most people don't even know we have concert tickets yet, which is by design. We'll be chasing more PR soon, which will hopefully lead to real salaries for myself and Tom. -We don't have a model, a deck, a pitch book or executive summary. We'll make them on demand if they are ever needed. If you want to do it right, it's a very time consuming process. In the short term we thought it was a better use of our time to talk to our users (I respond to literally every non-form letter email), create content, develop and sell. -Obviously models can reflect growth rates. My point was: when you are growing quickly in the early stages, by the time you get to the final boardroom meeting, everything can very easily be out of date. This is especially true when you haven't spent any money on advertising. -Month over month traffic is up 67% as of today. This is largely due to Obama Tickets, more pages being indexed, SEO and good ol Google. -I haven't had a haircut since I quit my job. \m/ Edit: Of course as I write this our contact page is down. We're on it. Edit 2: It's back up.
- thedob 18y ago
  Quality picture on top of the article Dan...if your hands were feet they'd probably be size 26.
  - fallentimes 18y ago
    Yeah I'm 6'3'', 220, but I don't have Shaq hands. They should have had Garry Tan take the picture. Here's what I actually look like: http://danhau.posterous.com/ http://danhau.posterous.com/ Here's what PG actually looks like: http://danhau.posterous.com/our-fearless-investor-paul-gra http://danhau.posterous.com/our-fearless-investor-paul-gra Here's an older picture of Livingston, but she still looks the same...adorable: http://danhau.posterous.com/when-ticketstumbler-met-living http://danhau.posterous.com/when-ticketstumbler-met-living
galenmoore 18y ago
Can't comment on the photo, but I think "out of context" is a little harsh. Here's why: http://tinyurl.com/5bvwzz http://tinyurl.com/5bvwzz -Galen (the MHT reporter)
- fallentimes 18y ago
  Yeah I just wanted to make sure everyone had the whole story. I certainly understand why it happens (I wasn't mad or anything) and how articles get trimmed down often outside the writer's control. I just didn't want people to think we'd never ever take money. For angel funding you often don't need a model and sometimes don't need a deck. Rest of the article was great (even if the picture was a bit embarassing :-D). The other clarification points were for the Hacker News headline (I didn't want people to think revenue or profits were growing 50% per month), the picture (ha) and to expand on points made within the article. Nothing tops this picture, however: http://is.gd/7yx4 http://is.gd/7yx4 (This one was at Tom's expense instead of mine)

42 points by ksvs 18y ago

I have to say, Congratulations to Tom and Dan. Turning a profit from the get-go is very rare, and they managed it quite well. It's great to see that snowball rolling downhill... Cheers!

deleted 18y ago
[deleted]
fallentimes 18y ago
Thanks. Things are/were pretty close though. If we would have moved to SF, bye bye profitability. That's one of the main reasons we're in Boston.

hooande 18y ago

I think Ticketstumbler's unofficial motto is "Love us with money". Buy tickets y'all

fallentimes 18y ago
Now with concert ticket goodness. Hopefully theater tickets, more providers and roughly $2 billion worth of total tickets in early 2009.
- palish 18y ago
  Hmm... It's probably prudent to reach $2 million before talking about $2 billion. Wait, are you saying you'll actually sell $2 billion worth of tickets, or just offer them for sale?
  - fallentimes 18y ago
    lol...offer them for sale. That's how much inventory we hope to have. Currently there are $1 billion worth of tickets offered for sale on TicketStumbler (we don't own the tickets, just like Expedia doesn't own the air planes). Shit man, if we had $2 million in sales already I'd be on an island somewhere. It'd be 99% profit.
    - palish 18y ago
      Right, yeah. It just doesn't seem like Ticketstumbler will necessarily become more valuable just by increasing inventory. (So why use that fact as a bullet point when describing why Ticketstumbler will become valuable?) Increasing inventory is necessary but not sufficient. Your best bet is probably to focus on ways to differentiate Ticketstumbler. For example, what reasons are there for me to buy a ticket through Ticketstumbler than from any other source? Etc.
      - fallentimes 18y ago
        It's valuable because the more ticket providers we have, the cheaper prices will be and the better seats we'll have. This certainly has a limit, but I don't think we're there yet, especially since we don't even have theater tickets. The real value in Kayak wasn't that it included the big airlines, it was that it includes Southwest (not included anywhere else), Frontier, Airtran and many long tail airlines and forces the big airlines to compete. I traveled 250k miles in the past two years and often found myself on no-name airline flights that I would have never heard of if it wasn't for Kayak. And it has a super clean UI, isn't spammy and doesn't charge fees. Our value is/will be: clean UI, no TicketStumbler fees (we're free!), no Ads on the main site, simple to use, natural language search and user dashboards & interactive maps (both coming soon).
        deleted 18y ago
        [deleted]
        palish 18y ago
        It's valuable because the more ticket providers we have, the cheaper prices will be and the better seats we'll have. Yeah, that's true. What I'm saying is, that by itself isn't enough to be successful. Because of your next point, actually: I traveled 250k miles in the past two years and often found myself on no-name airline flights that I would have never heard of if it wasn't for Kayak. That example is a very different from a preppy highschooler buying a ticket to a concert. For one, you had to travel. If all of a sudden there weren't any airplanes, it would still be necessary for you to travel. But it's not necessary for people to go to concerts. Also, consider the number one reason why people go to concerts: because their friends are going. So one way to differentiate yourself from the competition might be to offer group discounts, for example. You could even sell them at a loss for awhile, just so you can use that as a way to market Ticketstumbler. Like "Going out tonight? Stumble into your next concert with Ticketstumbler. The more friends you bring, the more cash you'll save." What I'm saying is, try not to hyperfocus on making Ticketstumbler like Kayak. It isn't, and can't be. So those types of comparisons are a good way to communicate to someone about what Tickestumbler does, but are a bad design way to design the company.

fallentimes 18y ago

I actually didn't want this article submitted so I flagged it. Kidding, kidding. There are, however, some out of context quotes and a ridiculous looking picture (the photographer was nice, but quirky). Oh well, I <3 press. To clarify: -We've never said that we'll never take money. In an ideal situation, startups would not have to take money and if we can get away with it great, if not that's okay. We're well aware that the odds are against us on this one. -We've been very open with this with our potential investors. The sharp money is still investing in this economy and luckily some of them are still interested in us. You think a VC will argue with you when you say you want more months of operational information so you can make a better informed, data-driven decision? Nada. I've talked to four potential investors this week alone. -Due to the economy, sales have stayed relatively flat as average sales have gone down while volume has gone up. However, we're still working out bugs and have over $1 billion worth of tickets on the site. Most people don't even know we have concert tickets yet, which is by design. We'll be chasing more PR soon, which will hopefully lead to real salaries for myself and Tom. -We don't have a model, a deck, a pitch book or executive summary. We'll make them on demand if they are ever needed. If you want to do it right, it's a very time consuming process. In the short term we thought it was a better use of our time to talk to our users (I respond to literally every non-form letter email), create content, develop and sell. -Obviously models can reflect growth rates. My point was: when you are growing quickly in the early stages, by the time you get to the final boardroom meeting, everything can very easily be out of date. This is especially true when you haven't spent any money on advertising. -Month over month traffic is up 67% as of today. This is largely due to Obama Tickets, more pages being indexed, SEO and good ol Google. -I haven't had a haircut since I quit my job. \m/ Edit: Of course as I write this our contact page is down. We're on it. Edit 2: It's back up.

thedob 18y ago
Quality picture on top of the article Dan...if your hands were feet they'd probably be size 26.
- fallentimes 18y ago
  Yeah I'm 6'3'', 220, but I don't have Shaq hands. They should have had Garry Tan take the picture. Here's what I actually look like: http://danhau.posterous.com/ http://danhau.posterous.com/ Here's what PG actually looks like: http://danhau.posterous.com/our-fearless-investor-paul-gra http://danhau.posterous.com/our-fearless-investor-paul-gra Here's an older picture of Livingston, but she still looks the same...adorable: http://danhau.posterous.com/when-ticketstumbler-met-living http://danhau.posterous.com/when-ticketstumbler-met-living

galenmoore 18y ago

Can't comment on the photo, but I think "out of context" is a little harsh. Here's why: http://tinyurl.com/5bvwzz http://tinyurl.com/5bvwzz -Galen (the MHT reporter)

fallentimes 18y ago
Yeah I just wanted to make sure everyone had the whole story. I certainly understand why it happens (I wasn't mad or anything) and how articles get trimmed down often outside the writer's control. I just didn't want people to think we'd never ever take money. For angel funding you often don't need a model and sometimes don't need a deck. Rest of the article was great (even if the picture was a bit embarassing :-D). The other clarification points were for the Hacker News headline (I didn't want people to think revenue or profits were growing 50% per month), the picture (ha) and to expand on points made within the article. Nothing tops this picture, however: http://is.gd/7yx4 http://is.gd/7yx4 (This one was at Tom's expense instead of mine)