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My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

mtlynch.io

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Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#41

Post by mtlynch »

leros wrote: post #36

Looking back, how do you feel about your slate of past projects? I'm curious as TinyPilot is your most successful project and it looks like the most business-oriented thing you built: as in, its a product aimed at serious businesses. Whereas Zestful is a niche micro-saas and Is It Keto is a niche website. Perhaps I'm characterizing things wrong, but that's my rough perception.

Thanks for reading!

>Looking back, how do you feel about your slate of past projects?

I feel like I learned something valuable from all of them.

The ones I'm most proud of are TinyPilot, my book, and my blogging course (in that order). Those are, uncoincidentally, the ones where I found product-market fit, whereas the rest never really achieved that.

TinyPilot was business-oriented by mistake. When I initially made it, I thought the market was entirely hobbyists who would rather make a DIY KVM than buy a $600 enterprise-y device. As I continued working on it, I found that my customers were much more interested in paying a higher price for a pre-made device than saving money with a DIY solution.

But yeah, I think the fact that it appealed to businesses made it more viable than my other business attempts that were consumer-focused.

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#44

Post by throwaway260210 »

mtlynch wrote: post #2

Author here. Happy to answer any questions or take feedback about this post.

I’ve been reading your blogs for the past 8-years.

Question: do you not have income concerns / pressures?

Please take this question from a positive place but it seems like you’ve been able to sustain years of relatively low pay (especially since you’re a father now) without concern.

I’m not sure most people can endure as long as you have and it makes me wonder if you have supplemental income not accounted for.

Not asking you to share anything you don’t feel comfortable with … and your transparency over the years has hugely influenced my thinking on should I start my own business.

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#45

Post by xyst »

I do give this author praise for actually being transparent.

> In total, I had $8.2k in profit on $16.3k in revenue. That was my total income for the year, which is obviously not enough to support a family, but my wife also works, and we have savings/investments.

Self bootstrapping is not for the weak. At the height of the "indie grind set", you would get all of these "indie developers" raiding your social media feeds with click bait shit like "I bootstrapped my project and earned 100M pre-revenue11!1!!!1"

In reality, a very small minority even make a living self bootstrapping. It’s quite literally the lottery.

Author in this case clearly has fallback (rich/working partners, savings, and ofc probably still has $ from TinyPilot sale).

Unfortunately, for the lot of us. You end up working for shitty Fortune 500 company, work on useless/mindless shit, grind for 8 hrs, collect paycheck, eat, sleep, and repeat.

No unions to have our backs when incompetent management wants to cater to shareholders. No stability. Maybe get laid off for vague reason. Find another shitty job and hope for less shitty management.

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#46

Post by Lalabadie »

apparent wrote: post #28

Maybe it's just me, but it seems kind of weird to say you earned $8,200 in "profit" when there was no salary. Profit is typically the excess a business earns above its costs. For a solo founder, it can be a little tricky because the more you pay yourself in salary, the less you have in profit (and vice versa). But here, there was no salary. Maybe "earnings" or "income" would be a better term to use? Otherwise someone…

For a solo company (which I assume is the situation here), it seems rather expected. Income minus expenses is the profit. No salary as expenses this year.

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#47

Post by hdra »

mtlynch wrote: post #34
LightBug1 wrote: post #23

I like these kind of stories. Insight into these situation is inspiring. When I hang up the gloves in my current role I'll probably do something similar. But, come on ... isn't it just a touch disingenuous to call this a bootstrap situation? I assume an ex-Google developer jettisoned with a decent safety net. Perhaps I'm wrong. But I have a very different idea of what bootstrapping is. Anyway, kudos to you ... making…

Thanks for reading! > But, come on ... isn't it just a touch disingenuous to call this a bootstrap situation? > I assume an ex-Google developer jettisoned with a decent safety net. Perhaps I'm wrong. But I have a very different idea of what bootstrapping is. Yeah, I agree and wish I had a better term. I've heard people talking about "bootstrapping" a business with $200k+, and I roll my eyes. I used to call these upda…

out of curiosity, which one is the bigger part of your "financial cushion" nowadays? is it still mostly the ex-Google income/savings or has the TinyPilot exit taken that place?

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#48

Post by mtlynch »

throwaway260210 wrote: post #44
mtlynch wrote: post #2

Author here. Happy to answer any questions or take feedback about this post.

I’ve been reading your blogs for the past 8-years. Question: do you not have income concerns / pressures? Please take this question from a positive place but it seems like you’ve been able to sustain years of relatively low pay (especially since you’re a father now) without concern. I’m not sure most people can endure as long as you have and it makes me wonder if you have supplemental income not accounted for. Not as…

Thanks for reading for so long!

> Question: do you not have income concerns / pressures?

Yes, definitely. I am a bit worried about not being able to get back to $100k+/yr in income, and I'm less confident that the safety net of "just go back to FAANG" is still available.

> I’m not sure most people can endure as long as you have and it makes me wonder if you have supplemental income not accounted for.

I do. We have investments that provide additional income. We also live in Western Massachusetts, in an area where living costs are fairly low, so we fortunately don't need to draw down much from our investments to get by.

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#49

Post by [deleted] »

hdra wrote: post #47
mtlynch wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for reading! > But, come on ... isn't it just a touch disingenuous to call this a bootstrap situation? > I assume an ex-Google developer jettisoned with a decent safety net. Perhaps I'm wrong. But I have a very different idea of what bootstrapping is. Yeah, I agree and wish I had a better term. I've heard people talking about "bootstrapping" a business with $200k+, and I roll my eyes. I used to call these upda…

out of curiosity, which one is the bigger part of your "financial cushion" nowadays? is it still mostly the ex-Google income/savings or has the TinyPilot exit taken that place?

[deleted]

Re: My eighth year as a bootstrapped founder

#50

Post by jwpapi »

switz wrote: post #12

Thanks for being so transparent. As a fellow solo bootstrapper, I think the thing people most often misunderstand is the relative inconsistency (income, "wins", the camaraderie, etc.) so it's nice for you to bare all. That being said, you do get the consistency of independence and autonomy. As I watch my peers deal with crappy work environments, losing their jobs, and other bullshit, I just keep chugging along: self-…

I get exactly what you are saying, but honestly man freedom is the best. I’m so happy every day as long as I have my computer an can work on taking over the world. Every day feels like school holidays to me
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