5 ms·

Lollipuff's Y Combinator Experience

103 points by beambot 13y ago

beambot 13y ago
Lollipuff was in the Winter 2013 batch. We also released our YC application materials -- see the HN link. We recently helped with a VentureBeat article about "writing a winning YC application" [1]... I personally believe the most useful thing (besides "being really good already") is to look at other successful applications. Most of the applications found online are from already-successful companies (eg. DropBox and Reddit), so we figured a more-recent, rising company should share theirs too. This might be useful to folks who aren't doing "pure tech" startups -- as Lollipuff is a women's fashion company. [1] http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/20/how-to-write-a-winning-y-combinator-application/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/20/how-to-write-a-winning-y-c...
hnriot 13y ago
I'd fund the cat.
- bebefuzz 13y ago
  The cat says, "oh really? how much and at what cap?"
clicks 13y ago
I wonder how the YC guys feel about the abundance of "how to get accepted to YC" articles. Just as you can prepare for the SAT you can now prepare for the YC tests -- there are a lot of examples of accepted applications, videos, thoughts from founders, etc. just like this very submission. The point is, there is probably less differentiation in the new pool of applicants in terms of their submission applications which makes YC's job more difficult. My theory is that now they're going to place more importantance on filters like past work experience (I've noticed a considerable amount of acceptees having ex-Googlers in their teams) and academic pedigree (I've noticed a high amount of acceptees having big-name school people in their teams).
- beambot 13y ago
  I share your concerns -- I don't want YC to get inundated with masquerading applications. However, while you can prepare for the SAT, those scores alone are insufficient to guarantee you admission into top universities. You need something unique. In the case of YC, this will be either team, traction, or idea. It's pretty hard to fake a history of making (or pedigree), numbers, and wild ideas.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - clicks 13y ago
    (Just to be clear, I wasn't knocking on you guys for writing this article -- I enjoyed reading/watching your writing and submission video, thanks!)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- zeckalpha 13y ago
  I doubt any of these articles make or break an application. They're just good publicity, for both YC (for appearing difficult to get in) and the author(s).
- pg 13y ago
  Such articles can be good. It depends on their focus. It wouldn't be good if people wrote articles talking about how to trick us. But if they tell applicants how to avoid mistakes that will make it harder for us to appreciate them, that's great. I myself wrote an article about that: http://ycombinator.com/howtoapply.html http://ycombinator.com/howtoapply.html
- nazgulnarsil 13y ago
  If a metric is easy to game the people who rely on that metric should want to become aware of that.
- TimothyE 13y ago
saturdayplace 13y ago
Having no qualifications whatsoever about such things, I'd fund them. To me, this application (including video) make Lollipuff's success seem inevitable. Everything is stated just so matter-of-factly, but without bravado. They've found a market with customers, and have a product that appears to serve their needs, and to an outsider, it appears that the business will happen whether or not YC (or Silicon Valley at large) gets on board. I don't know if the YC reviewer(s) for Lollipuff's application is hanging around, but it'd be interesting to hear if their reaction matches mine.
- pnathan 13y ago
  Agreed. Success breeds success. This is an attempt to pivot from an existing ad-hoc business into an accelerated & more formalized business. There are customers, there is money coming in, the brand (CEO) is known in the field. IMO, the only question is if it can grow beyond the existing niche, and how far it can grow.
wf 13y ago
OT: Just a heads up to the lollipuff team if you're around, the meet the co-founders blog you link to in the OP shows up like this for me in FF 23 on Windows 7. http://i.imgur.com/db4Lr48.png http://i.imgur.com/db4Lr48.png Great insight, though! I really like lollipuffs concept, I would also have funded you guys; I love it when the perfect solution for a pain point takes off.
- beambot 13y ago
  Thank you so very, very much! I fixed it (I believe).
  - wf 13y ago
    Yes, looks great!
tptacek 13y ago
It's interesting to me how a simple-seeming bit of technical infrastructure (a blog -> auction site for a specific vertical) can become a vector for delivering and monetizing an expert service like fashion authentication. There are lots of "little" expert services like that which aren't well served with the professional services model, but are maybe hugely valuable when plugged into some kind of e-commerce or online fulfillment service. Also: is this the first demo day video that's ever been published by YC? Wow are those short. What does a "good" audience reaction look like? Can you get a read on the room while it happens?
- beambot 13y ago
  Searching for "ycombinator demo day presentation" on YouTube returns a couple other YC Demo Day pitches. I wasn't the one giving Lollipuff's pitch (it was our CEO, Fei, who has lots of experience from speech competitions). And yet standing just off stage, I was too nervous to judge audience reaction. Perhaps the YC partners standing in / around the audience would be better calibrated to make that determination?
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- randall 13y ago
  I attended every demo day session (and the practice sessions before demo day) for about 2 years* and the real difference between the audiences depended on time of day. I think a "good" presentation had a lot of people writing things down, vs BlackBerry / iPhone reading. Also, back when there were more sessions and they happened at YC HQ, the time of day played a big difference. The later sessions (I think they started at 4?) had people actually laughing at jokes, whereas the earlier sessions some of the exact same jokes, seemingly delivered the exact same way missed really badly. (I remember people actually cheering for Hipmunk's presentation. It felt like a home run.) I don't know what it meant for follow up, but two notable presentations at least generated some memorable notes that I spied over people's shoulders. Jason Shen from Ridejoy did a cartwheel on the way in (he's a former collegiate gymnast) and I saw a lot of people drawing stick figures cartwheeling. Also, during SiftScience's presentation, one of the founders punctuated his presentation by saying something to the effect of "We're going to stop people from fucking with our customers." A lot of people wrote down "fuck" next to their name :) I don't know what happened to most of the companies post demo day with their applicable raises. *: I did behind the scenes work with YC as the audio / video guy for a bit, before they went to the CH museum.
mbesto 13y ago
To the founders - feel free to get in touch (contact details in profile). I work with global luxury brands in the UK (Manolo Blahnik, Burberry, etc)
sfpirate 13y ago
Outside the Bay Area, few people know about YC. An article in 2006 by pg made me plan for 3 years to finally move to SF in 2009 (I had googled "how to start a company"). There are a lot of ambitious people out there that don't even realize people here compete for not having a job. Articles like this can change lives if they can raise that awareness through the right channels. Thanks for taking the time to publish it.
wellboy 13y ago
Not trying to be a downer, but how are you an interesting company to invest in when your entire opportunity, if you take 100% of the market, is $5M/year?
- beambot 13y ago
  Our MVP launched with just 3 of the hottest brands, which had that level of transactions on eBay alone. Across all women's fashion brands and all designer resale, there are roughly $100B in transactions per year (see the Demo Day video at the link). Start small and grow outward. ;)
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
  - wellboy 13y ago
    Ah ok, got it :)
  - 7Figures2Commas 13y ago
    Is there a reason you want/need to be the commerce platform on which these resale transactions take place? Two-sided markets are generally more difficult to crack, and displacing eBay in particular is going to be challenging. I'd expect your cost of customer acquisition to grow quite significantly once you've tapped out the low hanging fruit. If your core competency is your ability to detect counterfeits, however, maybe there's an opportunity to convince legitimate vendors to pay you to certify that their items are authentic, something that they then promote to prospective customers in all of their sales channels. You'd probably need to offer a buyer money-back guarantee for this model to be viable, but if you did this, you could try tying your pricing to the vendor's sales price (i.e. it costs more to certify a handbag being resold for $750 than a dress being resold for $250). If you're wedded to the idea of running your own commerce platform, you could provide vendors that certify their goods with you a free listing on your site, and reimburse the certification fee from the sales commission if their product sells through you. By getting listings this way, you can avoid some of the questions you're bound to be asked if your only proposition is that you're an eBay competitor (think "How many sales do you generate a month?"). And you avoid having to grow your buyer base to make money.
apu 13y ago
I'm surprised to notice (perhaps it's always been there) that the YC app asks for facebook and twitter ids. Are these just additional contact mechanisms, or used for anything more?
jcampbell1 13y ago
It is great to see a YC fashion/e-commerce company getting traction. High fashion authentication makes a ton of sense, and is definitely a valuable service. The sealed auction model is interesting. It is a good model, but misses on all the engagement that real bidding offers. I think it is a good fit for them. Standard auctions are full of tasteless bullshit such as sniping. Standard auctions offer the best available price. It would be interesting to see if they A/B test vickrey auctions where the price paid is the second highest bid. That prevents buyer's remorse, and could generate higher prices as people would bid higher without worrying about doing something "stupid".
pstack 13y ago
I'm really surprised by the "auction" foundation. That seems like a really dated internet fad, at this point. I built and ran a large (not eBay large, but 100k+ members and maybe $6m in transactions) niche auction site and community for about a dozen years and I recognized that interest in the whole "auction" thing was dying out about the same time eBay probably did. Only difference is eBay had the resources and interest in trying to pivot (something they're still trying to do) and I was ready to move on to something else entirely. If you can still find just the right niche, there's probably an avenue, but for the most part, I think there's an uphill challenge against the bias of most users against auctions (what with so many other cheap outlets that have usurped everything short of collectables). Will be really curious to see how this plays out, in and after 2013.

103 points by beambot 13y ago

Lollipuff was in the Winter 2013 batch. We also released our YC application materials -- see the HN link. We recently helped with a VentureBeat article about "writing a winning YC application" [1]... I personally believe the most useful thing (besides "being really good already") is to look at other successful applications. Most of the applications found online are from already-successful companies (eg. DropBox and Reddit), so we figured a more-recent, rising company should share theirs too. This might be useful to folks who aren't doing "pure tech" startups -- as Lollipuff is a women's fashion company. [1] http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/20/how-to-write-a-winning-y-combinator-application/ http://venturebeat.com/2013/09/20/how-to-write-a-winning-y-c...

hnriot 13y ago

I'd fund the cat.

bebefuzz 13y ago
The cat says, "oh really? how much and at what cap?"

clicks 13y ago

I wonder how the YC guys feel about the abundance of "how to get accepted to YC" articles. Just as you can prepare for the SAT you can now prepare for the YC tests -- there are a lot of examples of accepted applications, videos, thoughts from founders, etc. just like this very submission. The point is, there is probably less differentiation in the new pool of applicants in terms of their submission applications which makes YC's job more difficult. My theory is that now they're going to place more importantance on filters like past work experience (I've noticed a considerable amount of acceptees having ex-Googlers in their teams) and academic pedigree (I've noticed a high amount of acceptees having big-name school people in their teams).

beambot 13y ago
I share your concerns -- I don't want YC to get inundated with masquerading applications. However, while you can prepare for the SAT, those scores alone are insufficient to guarantee you admission into top universities. You need something unique. In the case of YC, this will be either team, traction, or idea. It's pretty hard to fake a history of making (or pedigree), numbers, and wild ideas.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- clicks 13y ago
  (Just to be clear, I wasn't knocking on you guys for writing this article -- I enjoyed reading/watching your writing and submission video, thanks!)
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
zeckalpha 13y ago
I doubt any of these articles make or break an application. They're just good publicity, for both YC (for appearing difficult to get in) and the author(s).
pg 13y ago
Such articles can be good. It depends on their focus. It wouldn't be good if people wrote articles talking about how to trick us. But if they tell applicants how to avoid mistakes that will make it harder for us to appreciate them, that's great. I myself wrote an article about that: http://ycombinator.com/howtoapply.html http://ycombinator.com/howtoapply.html
nazgulnarsil 13y ago
If a metric is easy to game the people who rely on that metric should want to become aware of that.
TimothyE 13y ago

saturdayplace 13y ago

Having no qualifications whatsoever about such things, I'd fund them. To me, this application (including video) make Lollipuff's success seem inevitable. Everything is stated just so matter-of-factly, but without bravado. They've found a market with customers, and have a product that appears to serve their needs, and to an outsider, it appears that the business will happen whether or not YC (or Silicon Valley at large) gets on board. I don't know if the YC reviewer(s) for Lollipuff's application is hanging around, but it'd be interesting to hear if their reaction matches mine.

pnathan 13y ago
Agreed. Success breeds success. This is an attempt to pivot from an existing ad-hoc business into an accelerated & more formalized business. There are customers, there is money coming in, the brand (CEO) is known in the field. IMO, the only question is if it can grow beyond the existing niche, and how far it can grow.

wf 13y ago

OT: Just a heads up to the lollipuff team if you're around, the meet the co-founders blog you link to in the OP shows up like this for me in FF 23 on Windows 7. http://i.imgur.com/db4Lr48.png http://i.imgur.com/db4Lr48.png Great insight, though! I really like lollipuffs concept, I would also have funded you guys; I love it when the perfect solution for a pain point takes off.

beambot 13y ago
Thank you so very, very much! I fixed it (I believe).
- wf 13y ago
  Yes, looks great!

tptacek 13y ago

It's interesting to me how a simple-seeming bit of technical infrastructure (a blog -> auction site for a specific vertical) can become a vector for delivering and monetizing an expert service like fashion authentication. There are lots of "little" expert services like that which aren't well served with the professional services model, but are maybe hugely valuable when plugged into some kind of e-commerce or online fulfillment service. Also: is this the first demo day video that's ever been published by YC? Wow are those short. What does a "good" audience reaction look like? Can you get a read on the room while it happens?

beambot 13y ago
Searching for "ycombinator demo day presentation" on YouTube returns a couple other YC Demo Day pitches. I wasn't the one giving Lollipuff's pitch (it was our CEO, Fei, who has lots of experience from speech competitions). And yet standing just off stage, I was too nervous to judge audience reaction. Perhaps the YC partners standing in / around the audience would be better calibrated to make that determination?
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
randall 13y ago
I attended every demo day session (and the practice sessions before demo day) for about 2 years* and the real difference between the audiences depended on time of day. I think a "good" presentation had a lot of people writing things down, vs BlackBerry / iPhone reading. Also, back when there were more sessions and they happened at YC HQ, the time of day played a big difference. The later sessions (I think they started at 4?) had people actually laughing at jokes, whereas the earlier sessions some of the exact same jokes, seemingly delivered the exact same way missed really badly. (I remember people actually cheering for Hipmunk's presentation. It felt like a home run.) I don't know what it meant for follow up, but two notable presentations at least generated some memorable notes that I spied over people's shoulders. Jason Shen from Ridejoy did a cartwheel on the way in (he's a former collegiate gymnast) and I saw a lot of people drawing stick figures cartwheeling. Also, during SiftScience's presentation, one of the founders punctuated his presentation by saying something to the effect of "We're going to stop people from fucking with our customers." A lot of people wrote down "fuck" next to their name :) I don't know what happened to most of the companies post demo day with their applicable raises. *: I did behind the scenes work with YC as the audio / video guy for a bit, before they went to the CH museum.

mbesto 13y ago

To the founders - feel free to get in touch (contact details in profile). I work with global luxury brands in the UK (Manolo Blahnik, Burberry, etc)

sfpirate 13y ago

Outside the Bay Area, few people know about YC. An article in 2006 by pg made me plan for 3 years to finally move to SF in 2009 (I had googled "how to start a company"). There are a lot of ambitious people out there that don't even realize people here compete for not having a job. Articles like this can change lives if they can raise that awareness through the right channels. Thanks for taking the time to publish it.

wellboy 13y ago

Not trying to be a downer, but how are you an interesting company to invest in when your entire opportunity, if you take 100% of the market, is $5M/year?

beambot 13y ago
Our MVP launched with just 3 of the hottest brands, which had that level of transactions on eBay alone. Across all women's fashion brands and all designer resale, there are roughly $100B in transactions per year (see the Demo Day video at the link). Start small and grow outward. ;)
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- wellboy 13y ago
  Ah ok, got it :)
- 7Figures2Commas 13y ago
  Is there a reason you want/need to be the commerce platform on which these resale transactions take place? Two-sided markets are generally more difficult to crack, and displacing eBay in particular is going to be challenging. I'd expect your cost of customer acquisition to grow quite significantly once you've tapped out the low hanging fruit. If your core competency is your ability to detect counterfeits, however, maybe there's an opportunity to convince legitimate vendors to pay you to certify that their items are authentic, something that they then promote to prospective customers in all of their sales channels. You'd probably need to offer a buyer money-back guarantee for this model to be viable, but if you did this, you could try tying your pricing to the vendor's sales price (i.e. it costs more to certify a handbag being resold for $750 than a dress being resold for $250). If you're wedded to the idea of running your own commerce platform, you could provide vendors that certify their goods with you a free listing on your site, and reimburse the certification fee from the sales commission if their product sells through you. By getting listings this way, you can avoid some of the questions you're bound to be asked if your only proposition is that you're an eBay competitor (think "How many sales do you generate a month?"). And you avoid having to grow your buyer base to make money.

apu 13y ago

I'm surprised to notice (perhaps it's always been there) that the YC app asks for facebook and twitter ids. Are these just additional contact mechanisms, or used for anything more?

jcampbell1 13y ago

It is great to see a YC fashion/e-commerce company getting traction. High fashion authentication makes a ton of sense, and is definitely a valuable service. The sealed auction model is interesting. It is a good model, but misses on all the engagement that real bidding offers. I think it is a good fit for them. Standard auctions are full of tasteless bullshit such as sniping. Standard auctions offer the best available price. It would be interesting to see if they A/B test vickrey auctions where the price paid is the second highest bid. That prevents buyer's remorse, and could generate higher prices as people would bid higher without worrying about doing something "stupid".

pstack 13y ago

I'm really surprised by the "auction" foundation. That seems like a really dated internet fad, at this point. I built and ran a large (not eBay large, but 100k+ members and maybe $6m in transactions) niche auction site and community for about a dozen years and I recognized that interest in the whole "auction" thing was dying out about the same time eBay probably did. Only difference is eBay had the resources and interest in trying to pivot (something they're still trying to do) and I was ready to move on to something else entirely. If you can still find just the right niche, there's probably an avenue, but for the most part, I think there's an uphill challenge against the bias of most users against auctions (what with so many other cheap outlets that have usurped everything short of collectables). Will be really curious to see how this plays out, in and after 2013.