3 ms·

Completely off the main topic, but - $25k/m is great, but growing beyond that is not difficult per se (when compared to growing any business). I personally know

Completely off the main topic, but - $25k/m is great, but growing beyond that is not difficult per se (when compared to growing any business). I personally know at least 5 different companies that have bootstrapped to over $1m/yr, three of those over $5/m year without a dime of investment. (We're in the $1m+ group.) For us, that's 5 full time people. That's it. One $5m company has grown to 20+ people. My point is, I wish people would stop with the narrative that getting funded is the only way to be successful. The idea that growing beyond $25k/m is too difficult without funding is absurd, because if you can get the money to scale quickly, you'll find that getting from $1-10m is really difficult. Then $10m-25m. And so on. And before you know it, your valuation is 40x revenue and you're kicked out of your own company without a dime to show for it. $300k/yr is awesome. It's not hard, trust me, to organically grow that to $1m. You'll pull a nice paycheck, and those dividends end up in your pocket, not someone else's. Edit: if you really have 60% month-over-month growth, you'll break $83,333.34/m ($1m/yr) in less than 3 months! I'll assume you're not actually holding steady at 60% m/m... But you can see you're not that far away.

eeho 11y ago
I'm not sure that you can look at their revenue the same way you'd look at the monthly recurring revenue of say, a SAAS company. I've never used any dating services personally, but I imagine the goal is to find someone you like as quickly as you can and then stop paying for it. It might be expensive to constantly acquire new customers, especially early on in the company's life. I do agree with your general point though. The vast majority of businesses don't take/need any VC funding.
cushychicken 11y ago
Just a guess, but since the company in question (Dating Ring) relies on matchmakers to help make dating matches for people, I can't help but wonder if they didn't try to grow their employee count a little early. Looking at their homepage, they have four matchmakers on staff, and from listening to Startup, I know they have another two people (a COO and a CTO) on board. Guessing they probably have a few other folks on staff too, and since they're based in NYC, it seems to me that they likely have payroll expenses well beyond what they're pulling down monthly. As I say - just a guess. But $25k/month serves 5 employees reasonably enough in NYC, but I wouldn't say more than that. I really hope they pull through. I anticipate nothing like I anticipate the latest episode of Startup now that Season 2 is going.

eeho 11y ago

I'm not sure that you can look at their revenue the same way you'd look at the monthly recurring revenue of say, a SAAS company. I've never used any dating services personally, but I imagine the goal is to find someone you like as quickly as you can and then stop paying for it. It might be expensive to constantly acquire new customers, especially early on in the company's life. I do agree with your general point though. The vast majority of businesses don't take/need any VC funding.

cushychicken 11y ago

Just a guess, but since the company in question (Dating Ring) relies on matchmakers to help make dating matches for people, I can't help but wonder if they didn't try to grow their employee count a little early. Looking at their homepage, they have four matchmakers on staff, and from listening to Startup, I know they have another two people (a COO and a CTO) on board. Guessing they probably have a few other folks on staff too, and since they're based in NYC, it seems to me that they likely have payroll expenses well beyond what they're pulling down monthly. As I say - just a guess. But $25k/month serves 5 employees reasonably enough in NYC, but I wouldn't say more than that. I really hope they pull through. I anticipate nothing like I anticipate the latest episode of Startup now that Season 2 is going.