The Billion-Dollar Startup That Almost Never Was

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-billion-dollar-startup-that-almost-never-was-2011-6

by turoczy • 15 years ago

56 14 15 years ago

npollock• 15 years ago

Any startup that relies on the network effect to provide value is a daunting challenge. Your product can be amazing, but without the right user acquisition strategy, you'll be left spinning your wheels. Kudos to the AirBNB team for having the vision and determination not to quit.

brandnewlow• 15 years ago

Unfortunately, the article never explains what that strategy was. "Getting into YCombinator" is posited as the solution to their problems, yet "getting into YCombinator" is not a user acquisition strategy.

VladRussian• 15 years ago

>the article never explains what that strategy was.

if memory serves me right it was already discussed here. Just google "airbnb craigslist spam". They admitted it themselves :

http://venturebeat.com/2011/06/02/airbnb-admits-gaming-craig...

imjk• 15 years ago

Is this a story about a story, from the same day?

ninjoah• 15 years ago

Yeah, where's the beef?

dougws• 15 years ago

Seems like most successful companies of any kind "almost never were." Is there any company that was successful right from the beginning, with no real hurdles?

SatvikBeri2• 15 years ago

Depends on what you mean by successful.

I know a small company that makes about $300-500k per person year and several smaller ones in the range of $100k per year that never had any major problems. They are not particularly interesting stories, so you'd probably never hear about them otherwise.

pbhjpbhj• 15 years ago

>I know a small company that makes about $300-500k per person year

I'm interested ... go on.

timerickson• 15 years ago

37Signals?

hnsmurf• 15 years ago

Interesting that it doesn't mention the craigslist spamming. I'd wager that's far more responsible than YC. As great as YC is for many things it's not a significant source of traction for most startups.

Timothee• 15 years ago

It's mentioned through that part: "Airbnb contracted outside sales people to generate leads". This was pretty much the response from the company to the craigslist spamming story.

To be honest, while reading that line, I thought it was slightly odd because it was pretty specific (e.g. "outside" could be removed, but it clearly distances Airbnb from said sales people) and didn't necessarily bring anything to the story, especially since Airbnb has said the efforts were "largely ineffective".

The cynic in me feels that it was included specifically to add weight to the company's response about that craigslist story.

nswanberg• 15 years ago

The cereal fundraising story is mentioned here as evidence of desperation, which it might have been, but Fred Wilson paints the move as an indicator of a great entrepreneur: http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2011/03/airbnb.html

The Billion-Dollar Startup That Almost Never Was

Related Stories