Sahil Lavingia, founder of Gumroad, reflects on his failure to build a billion-dollar company:
I was just 19, a solo founder, with over $8M in the bank and three employees. The world was starting to take note.
Fast forward a few years and the company was bleeding $100,000’s every month and had to lay off all 20 employees 😔
Gumroad made it through the gauntlet and can be considered a very successful business, but it will never be the billion-dollar company 19-year-old Sahil envisioned.
Key takeaway, even if you’re only looking to earn a few thousand dollars a month:
It doesn’t matter how amazing your product is, or how fast you ship features. The market you’re in will determine most of your growth. For better or worse, Gumroad grew at roughly the same rate almost every month because that’s how quickly the market determined we would grow.
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