Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

thebluehouse.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 156 posts

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#141

Post by Animats »

Well, if you're looking for a location like that, consider Pillar Point Harbor in California. There's a small industrial area with cheap space, 2-3 short blocks from the ocean. It's adjacent to Mavericks Beach, one of the world's great surfing spots. There's a small-boat harbor. Several riding stables. Some nightclubs. Decent restaurants. A small airport. Housing prices aren't too high.

It's a half hour drive from there to Silicon Valley. 45 minutes to San Francisco. There's bus service to both places. 10 minutes to Half Moon Bay with supermarkets and hardware stores.

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#142

Post by tracker1 »

atmosx wrote: post #6

Hm, sorry but ages of experience show that what mostly works is the other way around: You want to be a big city because you can find clients (users), meet people (e.g. possible investors) and generally speaking do any sort of networking that would be otherwise impossible. The internet is what it is, but you can never match the face-to-face relationship with an online approach. I totally understand that this is a drea…

It doesn't need to be all or nothing... Portland, Denver, Boise and a bunch of other places are still cities while still able to provide some nice quality of life features over the likes of Seattle, San Francisco or New York City.

You can have a much shorter commute. Lower cost of living. And some really nice community aspects.

I've never understood why the likes of Facebook or other large tech companies wouldn't build infrastructure in the some of the smaller cities as opposed to already over-crowded and much more expensive cities.

Intel and Motorolla built out in Chandler, AZ which brought in a lot of technology companies and built the city to what it is today. It makes perfect sense for a large company to do the same someplace with a limited market where they can build out a community.

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#143

Post by metra »

icebraining wrote: post #126
metra wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just got back from 5 weeks in Morocco, 2 of which were in Taghazout. My girlfriend and I were living very, very simply -- shared bathroom, toilet didn't have a tank, no meals included, internet only in the restaurant downstairs -- but we were paying 10 euros a night, each. You can actually see the place in the pictures they've put up, it was very beautiful, right on the beach. There was a surf hostel that we also sta…

20€/person/night is cheap, but you can definitively find the same prices in many of the cheaper European countries. Here in Portugal you can rent a double bedroom in a nice rural house with all the commodities (AC, pool, etc) for that price, and when I went to Budapest in April, we rented a 3-person apartment (with heating, Internet, etc all included) for a week for less than 400€.

20 euros total so 10 euros per person per night. Sorry that was confusing in my original comment! Having been in Portugal and Budapest on that same trip I can say that Morocco is definitely cheaper. But Portugal was my favorite :) Great people, great waves, great coast!

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#144

Post by tracker1 »

tjradcliffe wrote: post #117
mironathetin wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Hm, sorry but ages of experience show that what mostly works is the other way around …" I think it is a business by itself: you pay for your exotic startup location. What we just read is a travel agency that focuses on startups. I agree with atmosx, that towns are better suited for startups. When we worked on our startup many years ago, one of the largest obstacles for investors was the location: a mid size sleepy t…

Same experience here. Investors like to be close to their money. Being in a city that is easy traveling distance from a major international airport hub means that any investor in the world is one plane flight away. being one short hop beyond that means the number of available investors becomes limited to the people who are very local.

Even then.. Are the airports in NYC, SF or Seattle really that much better than say Portland, Denver, Boise or a number of other smaller cities that aren't as packed?

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#145

Post by metra »

scourge wrote: post #122
metra wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just got back from 5 weeks in Morocco, 2 of which were in Taghazout. My girlfriend and I were living very, very simply -- shared bathroom, toilet didn't have a tank, no meals included, internet only in the restaurant downstairs -- but we were paying 10 euros a night, each. You can actually see the place in the pictures they've put up, it was very beautiful, right on the beach. There was a surf hostel that we also sta…

What, you didn't go to Essaiouira? newb :)

Not having enough time to go there and not being in the right season to hike Toubkal were my biggest regrets! Always a next time.

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#146

Post by tim333 »

codyb wrote: post #136
santoriv wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

12 mbps for ~$10 a month. Arguably that's burst and in the evening I can't Skype effectively because of the congestion. But it's good enough for what I'm working on.

Wow $50 - $125 a month? Sounds like a great way to set up for six months and just have a crash pad to explore Asia with for a while. Any pointers on visas?

>Any pointers on visas?

You can get a 3 month multiple entry tourist visa pretty easily. It cost's about $140 for the various fees. You have to google visa agencies and fill the form online. Sometimes you can get 6 month visas also though I can't seem them on line at the moment. When it runs out you can fly to Singapore or similar and apply for another. The Vietnamese don't seem to worry too much what you do once you are there. I'm probably off there soon to hang out in Saigon which is quite fun but more expensive.

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#149

Post by pnathan »

blueskin_ wrote: post #45

Sounds like a great way to selfdestruct. "Hey, guess what, you have to move to $middleofnowhere." "Hey, guess what, I quit." Exactly how the conversation would go if it ever happened to me. What would happen in such a situation is the good employees would quit because they wouldn't want to compromise their salary, marketability, and ability to take a new job, while the dead weight would go with it because it's still…

I've worked in a remote-ish location in the middle of farms. Part of my work there involved some recruiting for my team. Let me tell you, moving to a place where the only career opportunity was the company talking to the candidate was basically a deal breaker. I left them because, broadly, it would have broken my career too.

" the good employees would quit because they wouldn't want to compromise their salary, marketability, and ability to take a new job, "

The good candidates wouldn't touch us with a 10ft pole, the ambitious graduates were getting out of the farmland and over to the cities. So we generally had a great intern pool (lots of sharp people in financially strapped situations not wanting to move) and second to third rate hires. Not bad hires, but... not close to best in class. So while I can perfectly understand bootstrapping or running a (very) small business in the boondocks (many many reasons to do so), I can not advise locating an office there. Nor can I advise any enterprising and ambitious student to move to the boondocks for a job. Networking matters.

Re: Why you should move your startup to a small fishing town

#150

Post by santoriv »

tim333 wrote: post #146
codyb wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow $50 - $125 a month? Sounds like a great way to set up for six months and just have a crash pad to explore Asia with for a while. Any pointers on visas?

>Any pointers on visas? You can get a 3 month multiple entry tourist visa pretty easily. It cost's about $140 for the various fees. You have to google visa agencies and fill the form online. Sometimes you can get 6 month visas also though I can't seem them on line at the moment. When it runs out you can fly to Singapore or similar and apply for another. The Vietnamese don't seem to worry too much what you do once you…

Yes Saigon is quite a bit more expensive than where I live. But there is a lot more going on there too.

Regarding visas - the parent is correct. I would only add that you can also make border runs to Cambodia from Saigon - which is a few hour bus ride and quite a bit less expensive than flying some where (around $10).

Post reply on HN