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My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

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Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#171

Post by RachelF »

prawn wrote: post #162
nikkidurkin wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are only 23 million people in Australia, and its a small population spread over a huge area. That means shipping is expensive, which isn't great for trading low value second hand fast fashion items. An item that can get shipped for $2.80 in the US would cost $7 at least in Australia. Also, Australia Post doesn't have any APIs to automate shipping. Girls had to physically go to the post office to ship items, and…

+1. Postage in Australia is a very rough deal for many businesses. On top of internal pricing, companies overseas can often ship to here more cheaply than we can even ship internally. It's crippling and will remain so without either drastic overhaul or something like autonomous couriers years down the track. Wine is big business in Australia, but where wineries in California seem to have (I'm an Australian with one p…

+1 It is cheaper to ship from China to Australia than domestically in Australia. This really hurts doing business locally.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#172

Post by 7Figures2Commas »

nostromo wrote: post #137

Sometimes I wonder how non-technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. It elevates cofounder risk to a single point of failure for the entire company. Seeing through "developer bullshitting" is a dark art that is hard to master without spending a bit of time as a developer.

Sometimes I wonder how technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. After all, the number of technical founders who can effectively sell is small, so most of them have a single point of failure too, just on the other side of the business.

The harsh truth is that lot of non-technical founders set themselves up for failure precisely because they're limited to the pool of developers who will consider a co-founder relationship. If you're a solid developer with a proven track record of shipping, there's very little incentive to join a venture run by somebody you don't know very well for less than market pay, and in some cases little to no pay.

You typically get what you pay for, which is why more entrepreneurs should skip the technical co-founder nonsense and hire an experienced contractor or shop with a solid portfolio and references. If you don't have the money to do this, it's worth rethinking whether you're in a position to start a business in the first place.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#173

Post by aagha »

vijayboyapati wrote: post #138

I was in the same YC batch as Nikki. The thing I remember most about her was her enthusiasm. I also remember that her presentation on Demo Day got the loudest applause and most interest. Sad to hear 99dresses didn't make it, but I'm sure Nikki will have a bright future. Few young women her age will have gained the experience and insight that comes from founding a company and seeing it fail. As Michael Jordan said "I'…

Man, that quote was awesome!

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#174

Post by rcaught »

nostromo wrote: post #137

Sometimes I wonder how non-technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. It elevates cofounder risk to a single point of failure for the entire company. Seeing through "developer bullshitting" is a dark art that is hard to master without spending a bit of time as a developer.

> Sometimes I wonder how non-technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. It elevates cofounder risk to a single point of failure for the entire company.

This is not exclusive to non-technical founders.

> Seeing through "developer bullshitting" is a dark art that is hard to master without spending a bit of time as a developer.

Within a group of people striving for the same success, the idea of "bullshit" is often coined by those not wanting to take the time to understand the perspective of others. There is a communication and priority disconnect in most companies between the technical and non-technical; with both sides to blame.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#175

Post by aagha »

7Figures2Commas wrote: post #172
nostromo wrote: post #137

Sometimes I wonder how non-technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. It elevates cofounder risk to a single point of failure for the entire company. Seeing through "developer bullshitting" is a dark art that is hard to master without spending a bit of time as a developer.

Sometimes I wonder how technical founders can sleep at night with all the stress. After all, the number of technical founders who can effectively sell is small, so most of them have a single point of failure too, just on the other side of the business. The harsh truth is that lot of non-technical founders set themselves up for failure precisely because they're limited to the pool of developers who will consider a co-…

Fantastic. I think technical founders think they're set, only to realize building something is only part of the equation. Marketing, selling, customer support, customer happiness/retention are all skills necessary skills to make a business successful.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#176

Post by danieltillett »

lubos wrote: post #109

So I see another startup failed story. Thinking I'll read it later after getting something done. an hour later, I start reading... Right in the first sentence I see "99dresses". I have to admit, it took me a minute to process what's going on. She has been receiving significant coverage in mainstream Australian media. As someone, who is running startup from Sydney (there aren't so many of us), this felt like someone i…

I am based in Sydney. I am not running what could be called a startup since my tech business has been running since 1999, but I do have a lot of experience with the the whole startup process. Is there a meetup of startup founders in Sydney?

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#177

Post by justathrow2k »

nikkidurkin wrote: post #126
[deleted] wrote: post #74

[deleted]

Just telling it like it is. I could have lied, but how does that help anyone? I'm a firm believer that with gender issues you can either whine about it, or you can find the positives in it. If your whole startup depended on you getting a visa approved, you'd use anything at your disposal to get the job done. If that meant fake crying, then so be it. It worked.

Good old manipulation, making the world go round.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#178

Post by wj »

matwood wrote: post #160
dopamean wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I like most about that MJ quote is that all the stats link up. If he has made those 26 game winning shots he would have had not lost "almost 300 games" and he would have missed fewer than the "more than 9000" shots that he missed. Man, he was awesome.

Also interesting is that he knew those stats in order to make the quote. He was known for remembering every little slight, stat, etc... in order to use as motivation. I picture a little piece of paper with 25 written on it, and him thinking he does not want to write 26.

I think that quote was from a commercial so he probably had some help remembering. Good quote though.

Re: My startup failed, and this is what it feels like

#180

Post by crdb »

andrewljohnson wrote: post #15

It struck me when she glossed over how/why her two co-founders left. There's got to be a deeper story to why two "co-founders" would leave right when 1.2M is secured. She said they decided to tell me they were leaving the company without even a hint of warning - my guess is there was no agreement in the first place or a lot of unnoticed warnings. To conclude she's just too trustful is almost certainly a flawed conclu…

But can you reliably judge the character of people who are incentivized to deceive you?

In my experience, most people are happy to keep their options open, and most people discount volatility pretty hard when forced to make their life choices path-dependent. Not just to start a company, but when it comes time to commit resources to something, you find that even those who you believed would carry through, whether thanks to their track record or particularly convincing talk, will drop out.

I think of it as them having a high discount rate. The NPV of choosing a riskier path with later reward is thus lower than the stable, short term higher returns of stability, and the cost of "flaking" (the likelihood of you choosing not to do business with them ever again if you get to a position of such success that you can afford it) very low, especially if you are not currently in a position of success. Plus, you'll "understand", right?

I've gotten better over time at spotting those who'd drop out, but still have a 30-40% failure rate. I chalk it up to flakers being good at convincing other people - too good for me to spot them - and factor that in as a cost of doing business with good people which pays off in the long term. If you have a reliable way to spot flakers early, I'd love to read about it.

(FWIW on the original subject - Noam Wasserman's data show the highest rate of failure for "family/friends who become co-founders", followed by "fresh hired co-founders" with "people who worked together before as co-founders" being a significant predictor for co-founding success.)

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