[karambahh]

«Bootstrapped» with 55k$ and an already succesful business is not exactly boostrapping to me.

This achievement is very impressive nonetheless. Growing a business even in a known environment is very hard, I know it first hand.

It's especially interesting that he shares numbers, some I'd love to be able to do but money is particularly taboo in my field. Having your accountant and banker tell you that your numbers are actually very good compared to others despite being under the target you set to yourself is especially comforting.

Having your banker call you and congratulate you because you're now largely cash flow positive is exhilarating.

[jacquesm]

> «Bootstrapped» with 55k$ and an already succesful business is not exactly boostrapping to me.

That's exactly what it is. $55K is next to nothing for starting any kind of company, even if you quit your job and start as a freelancer (arguably the simplest kind of company) you'll need some capital to catch you if you have a dry spell.

Business that get started on $0 are extremely rare.

[karambahh]

It is ten times the median savings an american family has [1]

Once again I am not diminishing his accomplishments. I started my own company with the same amount of money but never claimed to have "bootstrapped"it.

We on HN live in a bubble that amazes me. I know first hand how much it costs to start a company and how hard it is to raise a 1M€ (I heard it is as hard as raising 10M$ in the valley, but never tried to raise in the US so take that with a grain of salt!). I also know it is much, much harder to get your first 1M€ of revenue. Like one of my business angel once told me "il nest de bon argent que celui du client": the only good kind of money is the customer's.

[1]http://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/12/heres-how-much-the-average-am...

[jacquesm]

> It is ten times the median savings an american family has

The median American family is not trying to start a business.

Also: if you can't manage your own funds and save please don't start a company, it will most likely not work and create misery for yourself and others.

> Once again I am not diminishing his accomplishments. I started my own company with the same amount of money but never claimed to have "bootstrapped"it.

Well, that's a problem of definition more than anything else. If you want to use the term bootstrapping as starting with nothing that's fine by me but I do note that even the word assumes the presence of boots and straps.

The key question is if the money was yours or not. If it wasn't then you weren't bootstrapping.

> We on HN live in a bubble that amazes me.

No, you choose to use terms in ways that are different from the rest of us. That's not a bubble, that's a terms issue. This can make communication hard.

> I know first hand how much it costs to start a company and how hard it is to raise a 1M€ (I heard it is as hard as raising 10M$ in the valley, but never tried to raise in the US so take that with a grain of salt!).

That depends. There is a lot of 'stupid money' floating around.

Besides, raising money is explicitly not part of bootstrapping.

> I also know it is much, much harder to get your first 1M€ of revenue.

Yes, that's true.

> Like one of my business angel once told me "il nest de bon argent que celui du client": the only good kind of money is the customer's.

Yes, that's good advice, but it comes from an investor.

[karambahh]

Please bear with me, I am not trying to be a smart-ass like many seem to think, these are honest questions and I think that they also come from using a foreign language and coming from a different culture. I think you're right in calling that a problem of definition.

I agree with everything you said about money and investors management. I'd just add that "stupid money" probably isn't the good kind of money :-)

At least I know that I would have made a mistake accepting a large amount of that kind of money. Choosing a smaller amount coming from people I trusted more probably helped me a lot in my beginnings.

Now to my honest follow-up question: let's say a billionaire puts his 1B$ into a new venture, would you call that "boostrapping" as well?

[jacquesm]

> let's say a billionaire puts his 1B$ into a new venture, would you call that "boostrapping" as well?

Depending on how he got the billion and whether or not there is outside investment involved, possibly yes, but the term is usually used for small amounts of money (say < $100k or so). But that's a technicality.

But truth be told very few people are in that luxurious position and those that are will almost never risk all (or even a substantial part) of their private capital on an entirely new venture. So that's highly hypothetical and would take the better part of several decades before you'd be in a position to execute that phase of your bootstrap. Elon Musk comes close but even he routinely uses outside capital and so is not really bootstrapping (though I'm not aware of anybody else that is so willing to put most or all of his own money into new ventures).

Bootstrapping comes from the imagery of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.

You come into the world naked, without substantial inherited money, you become employed somewhere, you save some money, maybe do some side jobs, one day you jump ship and go full time into your own business and your savings provide your runway. That's the textbook definition of a bootstrapped business.

It tends to produce small to mid-sized companies ($100K to $10M) in revenues and anywhere from one to 50 or so employees. It's the most sure-fire path to any kind of independence for skilled workers and has a totally different risk profile from a business that takes on outside investment. (Larger risks of failure, potentially larger returns)

[karambahh]

Agree that is entirely hypothetical and Elon Musk is an interesting example. I know he is sometimes risking a very large proportion of his private capital on his new ventures, but I would never have called that "bootstrapping".

(Once again, let me re-iterate that I have understood that "my" definition of boostrapping is not correct)

To me, a billionaire going all out on a new project is in a better financial, business & social position. "hey look, Elon Musk has launched a new thing, took his own billion to build it, must be awesome like his past ventures" compared to "hey, here is that John Doe we never heard of with his project he built in his home. To me, with financial capital comes social capital. When you invest all your money in a project, if it's 1B$ your social status "highly affluent guy with connections up to the white house and every Fortune 500 companies" does not change and is immensely useful. If it's your 5k€ your social capital is low and will get from "successful salaried software developer" to "the noodles-eating guy who didn't have a shower in 4 days". Guess which one is most likely to win deals?

[codegeek]

You seem to misunderstand what the word "bootstrapped" means and I don't mean disrespect. Just because he put $55K of his own money does not make it any less bootstrapped. In fact, that is the definition of bootstrapped. He used his own money. He did it fulltime. You seem to have this notion that to bootstrap a business, you have to start from $0 or perhaps a very small amount.

DISCLAIMER: I bootstrapped a business with similar amount to his but nowhere near his level of success (embarassing but happy with what I have done so far in 2.5 years). We are a much smaller team though so yes, I have not spent too much on growth yet.

[civilian]

Just a quick definition: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/bootstrap.asp

> Bootstrap is a situation in which an entrepreneur starts a company with little capital. An individual is said to be boot strapping when he or she attempts to found and build a company from personal finances or from the operating revenues of the new company.

[nathanbarry]

Huh, this is the first time I've heard it suggested that putting all of your savings into a company is not bootstrapping. And to add some detail, it was $5k initially, then $50k when it was time to focus on growth.

[sixQuarks]

are you kidding me? This guy is the definition of bootstrapped. How do you think he got that $55K? He was bootstrapping design courses - I've been following this guy for a few years.

[vram22]

In fact (don't know full facts, but I too have been reading his blog for some time), I think he was a designer (of mobile apps and web sites, maybe had dev skills too), then wrote a few books for a while (on areas where he had skills, like design, later on other areas too), then used the earnings from that to start Convertkit. IIRC he even mentions this approach in one of his blog posts. Bootstrapping all the way, seems like, to me :)

[karambahh]

I am absolutely not claiming he didn't work very hard to start his company or earning his money.

I am neither claiming he's bad or wrong or anything like that. Like jacquesm said it's probably more of a problem of definition between a dominant one and mine (in other words, looks like I am wrong). I have seen people starting companies with nothing, not even a roof on their heads. I started a company with the amazing comfort of 50k€. I am working hard to make my company a success, but I command the efforts of the guys I have seen eating noodles for years before their company finally took off. We are talking living way below the poverty line here, which is not what I lived when I started a company with 50k€

[charlesdm]

Given how easy it is these days for a developer to make €50k (e.g. by contracting on a day rate fee for a company), there really is no need to eat noodles for years. You do work for 6 months, save up €50k, and live frugally (but not crazy frugal) for a while.

[karambahh]

Let's say 500€ daily rate (which is probably average in France with a very large standard deviation between Paris and deserted zones and factoring varying daily rates which are domain specific and experience related. No way a junior RoR freelance would make 500€ in Massif Central for instance. Likewise, 500 is low for an experienced data science freelance working in banking in Paris). 206500=60k€ gross

After social contributions, 30k€ net revenue in France (actually a little more but I take the liberty to round that down).

In large cities, 33% of revenue for housing is not uncommon. We're left with 20k€, of which we have to substract revenue taxes (rule of thumb in that revenue range, about 1 month revenue per year) so here 5k€. 15k€ for 6 months. living frugally you can probably save 2/3 so you can save 10k€ in 6 months.

Assuming these ratio, it would take 2.5 years of steady, near fulltime employment as a contractor to save these 50k and go all out on your project.

[charlesdm]

1. Assuming you keep it in a company, and actually are smart about releasing it when you need it, so you don't have to pay all the tax upfront.

[karambahh]

"keep it in a company" at least in France won't really help you, as social contributions are collected every 3 months.

They are very good at hounding you to pay (and inversely keen on giving you back any overpaid amount ;-) ) so the incorporation does not really help here. You still owe them about half the gross revenue.

[elastic_church]

Yeah thats what bootstrapping is, having enough money to sustain yourself and capitalize the business without outside investors.

[civilian]

There will also be a bit of a taboo around talking about money, but this site (indiehackers) make it a point of talking about numbers. It's great information, and we should be trying to tear that taboo down.

[borisyankov]

This absolutely falls in the 'bootstrapped' category, as long as these are not $55k of VC money, but your own.

[bbcbasic]

The book sales created enough profits to bootstrap the email business.

To stretch the analogy it like the Power Supply bootstrapping the BIOS bootstraping the Operating System loader.