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How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

blog.awesomeinc.org

11–20 of 26 posts

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#11
post #8

So if each member of the team worked for that entire 26 hours they worked 208 hours total. Because their version of 'profit' does not seem to factor in wage for the 8 people involved. Their 1095 'profit' came out to a wage of just under $5.27 an hour for each of the 8. The amount made in the time period should not be viewed as a victory in this situation. There may have been an educational or other victory for team m…

That was also my first thought. Kudos to the OP in that you managed to build a product people wanted and paid something for. For creating something you could sell. And then went ahead and sold it. And made a profit. That's better than most wantpreneurs. But you didn't do better than minimum wage. You could have just done a bunch of TaskRabbit or Odesk or Elance gigs and for the same 26 hours ended up much farther ahe…

You guys are right in that the total profit was probably nil for the weekend (but that doesn't sound cool). However, you're not considering this is a subscription service. The idea is that the work put in initially returns revenue every month indefinitely. If the work this month returned $1K, then the same amount of work next month should return $2K, etc.

That's how most monthly services work. It takes a lot of work up front to make a product successful. You will almost always in fact be working for almost nothing when you start a company like this. That's why people raise money. But that initial work returns exponential value in the long term.

So yes, if you want to attack something you can attack the $1K in profit, go for it. But you're missing the point. The point is that making money takes work, and if you put in the work, you can make money doing anything. Like selling Jerky. Imagine if you actually have a good idea.

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#12
post #11
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was also my first thought. Kudos to the OP in that you managed to build a product people wanted and paid something for. For creating something you could sell. And then went ahead and sold it. And made a profit. That's better than most wantpreneurs. But you didn't do better than minimum wage. You could have just done a bunch of TaskRabbit or Odesk or Elance gigs and for the same 26 hours ended up much farther ahe…

You guys are right in that the total profit was probably nil for the weekend (but that doesn't sound cool). However, you're not considering this is a subscription service. The idea is that the work put in initially returns revenue every month indefinitely. If the work this month returned $1K, then the same amount of work next month should return $2K, etc. That's how most monthly services work. It takes a lot of work…

First off I think doing Startup Weekends is awesome (I believe the author would approve of that descriptor), just focusing on turning a profit during them I do not see as a worthwhile focus(with exceptions of course), and it seemed to be the author's focus.

As per your point of recurring income. No, I am not taking into account recurring income, because the author does not make it clear what the '267 subscriptions sold' constitute.

For instance he says: And when I say “what Noah did” I mean exactly what Noah did. Beef Jerky Subscription Service. Period. I “iterated” on the idea exactly zero. Just ‘stole it’ and executed like crazy for two days, along with the seven other people on my team.

However Noah http://www.appsumo.com/sumo-jerky/ required a 3 month minimum subscription with that 3 month period paid up front.

Now in the author's post they mention they sold 3 month subscriptions however the $5340 divides by 20 as exactly the number of subscriptions sold.

So did the author count the 3 month subscription as 3 subscriptions?

Did the author count it as 1 and not count $40 of the revenue?

Did the author do something else, there is not enough information for me at least to determine how the recurring income would be handled next month. So while you can estimate it would double, I do not feel safe making that estimate.

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#13
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You guys are right in that the total profit was probably nil for the weekend (but that doesn't sound cool). However, you're not considering this is a subscription service. The idea is that the work put in initially returns revenue every month indefinitely. If the work this month returned $1K, then the same amount of work next month should return $2K, etc. That's how most monthly services work. It takes a lot of work…

First off I think doing Startup Weekends is awesome (I believe the author would approve of that descriptor), just focusing on turning a profit during them I do not see as a worthwhile focus(with exceptions of course), and it seemed to be the author's focus. As per your point of recurring income. No, I am not taking into account recurring income, because the author does not make it clear what the '267 subscriptions so…

You're still missing the point. It was an exercise, or a "challenge" as the author states. The point of the post is that sales are hard, and awkward, but very possible if you focus on it. If you can sell jerky, you can sell anything. That's the point. Forget the jerky business, it's just an example of what happened to prove what people can do when they put the work in.

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#14
post #6
post #3

This seems like a very low ceiling ($$$) business, which I always find "meh" at Startup Weekend. At Startup Weekend Missoula, a lady was selling compost bins with worms. Another team worked the whole time on a project that would at best make $70,000 a year. Both of those are great individual businesses, as is selling beef jerky, but they're not the next Facebook.

Both of those are great individual businesses, as is selling beef jerky, but they're not the next Facebook. Who's to say that Startup Weekend is only for the "next Facebook"?

It should at the minimum strive to create a business that could potentially support the team working on it? $1000 profit from 8~ people working 2.5 days isn't scalable to even the size of their team, let alone anything bigger.

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#16
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was also my first thought. Kudos to the OP in that you managed to build a product people wanted and paid something for. For creating something you could sell. And then went ahead and sold it. And made a profit. That's better than most wantpreneurs. But you didn't do better than minimum wage. You could have just done a bunch of TaskRabbit or Odesk or Elance gigs and for the same 26 hours ended up much farther ahe…

Wow guys - cut them some slack. Making profit at a Startup Weekend is a gargantuan accomplishment, considering that most teams only get to the point of having a powerpoint demo / half finished prototype. Sure they didn't actually make that much compared to a real job in an established workplace, but this is still an awesome achievement.

I could pay $1 dollar to my team to subscribe to their service and call it "profit". But I do agree that most teams spin their wheels without actually executing much.

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#17

Most of the lessons learned by this 208 hour exercise could have been learned by spending one hour talking to a seasoned salesperson.

I can´t agree. THE most important thing is not what they learned, but how they learned it. They went out and did the difficult stuff, they started selling, and kept doing it till the end. The point is to sell, afterwards you´ll be able to improve your technique and the theory behind...

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#18
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First off I think doing Startup Weekends is awesome (I believe the author would approve of that descriptor), just focusing on turning a profit during them I do not see as a worthwhile focus(with exceptions of course), and it seemed to be the author's focus. As per your point of recurring income. No, I am not taking into account recurring income, because the author does not make it clear what the '267 subscriptions so…

You're still missing the point. It was an exercise, or a "challenge" as the author states. The point of the post is that sales are hard, and awkward, but very possible if you focus on it. If you can sell jerky, you can sell anything. That's the point. Forget the jerky business, it's just an example of what happened to prove what people can do when they put the work in.

[deleted]

Re: How we did over $1K in profit during Startup Weekend

#20
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First off I think doing Startup Weekends is awesome (I believe the author would approve of that descriptor), just focusing on turning a profit during them I do not see as a worthwhile focus(with exceptions of course), and it seemed to be the author's focus. As per your point of recurring income. No, I am not taking into account recurring income, because the author does not make it clear what the '267 subscriptions so…

You're still missing the point. It was an exercise, or a "challenge" as the author states. The point of the post is that sales are hard, and awkward, but very possible if you focus on it. If you can sell jerky, you can sell anything. That's the point. Forget the jerky business, it's just an example of what happened to prove what people can do when they put the work in.

[deleted]
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