[mazumdar]

Nearly 5 years ago, a few months after being rejected from YC for the first time, I came across your Show HN and started using Webflow to build a mockup of my product's sign-up page (I did not know how to code at that time).

Over the next 2.5 years, I reapplied to YC five more times. I interviewed twice in the second round. I eventually got rejected every time. From the ideation stage, to $1M in revenue, YC has an application of mine for every milestone in between (until I did not need to raise money anymore).

My company, Y Athletics (https://yathletics.com), is a profitable business with no investor funding and 7 figure revenues. We've delivered products to over 25,000 paying customers all around the world. We don't solve problems, but we create some amazing products that people want.

This post about Webflow made me nostalgic as it was during that time that I started to read HN religiously (and now I discovered that Vlad and I applied and were rejected in the same batch as well). My first landing page was made on Webflow. I learned how to code using Codeacademy. My first 100 users came from a comment I posted on an Ask HN thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6617551). Seeing others building their startups inspired me to continue building mine. My company would probably not exist if it wasn't for HN. Thanks for everything!

[zillionize]

As an angel investor solely focused on Y Combinator with more than 100 startups under portfolio, my observation indicates being rejected by YC can be equally inspiring as being admitted, because over the time, I found out some startups may survive and then thrive better if they are not admitted by Y Combinator. Therefore, I feel great that Y Athletics has been a $1m profitable business without YC or any other angel investor like Zillionize!

[subroutine]

There are some really amazing stories in this thread about how HN helped launch some really great products. And such a variety of innovation. Really the only thing I can find in common is that their websites allow you to enter a discount code. I can only assume these benevolent entrepreneurs pass out these codes to give a little back to loyal customers, or maybe even a small community who helped spotlight their company. Anyway, I'm just thinking out loud ;)

[mazumdar]

Try “HN” in the next 24 hours ;)

[andrea_sdl]

nice to see yathletics here :) I'm a customer.

It's a pain to ship outside US (because of taxes/shipping prices) , but aside from that you make great products. keep going, and it's nice to see some bootstrapped examples too.

[mikeokner]

> We don't solve problems, but we create some amazing products that people want.

Sure sounds like you're solving someone's problem ;)

[callmevlad]

Thanks for sharing this, Sam!

[rw2]

The crazy thing here for me is that YC rejected you as a business with $1M in revenue. I think any business with $1M in revenue has tremendous potential.

[lawnchair_larry]

It’s not that crazy. YC wants businesses with the potential for billions in revenue. If your ceiling seems like it might be millions or tens of millions, you don’t meet their criteria.

[rkuykendall-com]

Sorry if you've answered this elsewhere before, but what's with the logo? It almost looks like an exact copy of Y Combinator. Was that the case when you were applying?

[hanspeter]

The only resemblance is that both are a "Y". It's not the same font and it's not the same colors.

[mazumdar]

Yeah our logo has not changed since inception but it’s not a copy of YC or anyone else. Take a closer look here - http://bit.ly/2obM60y (first image is our logo)