Sramana Mitra: Talk to me about revenue ramp. You talked about hitting $1 million in 2009. How did the business accelerate from thereon? What were the drivers? Philippe d’Offay: We’re a four-time Inc 5000 nominee. That is one distinction that we’ve had. Last year, we generated $6.4 million in revenue. From 2009 to 2015, there was
Sramana Mitra: It was the height of the bubble. The market was really crazy. It’s no longer possible, thankfully. But at that time, it was possible and a lot of crazy things were going on at that time. Did you blow through all those dollars and not make it? David Stubenvoll: Pretty much. We had actually
Sramana Mitra: What you described is a very interesting organizing principle for organizational behaviour. Philippe d’Offay: It was fascinating. I’m one of those people who can’t just stop thinking about identifying the solution to the problems. Sramana Mitra: When you figured this out, you were able to put back the right dynamics in place? Philippe
Sramana Mitra: What year did you start selling products as opposed to just services? Chris Taylor: We started that shift in 2010. The journey was a much longer one that I expected. We were running at our typical parent consulting margins of 20% to 40% depending on the project and the year. We decided that year
Sramana Mitra: Who were the target audience for this product? David Stubenvoll: We wanted the interest and attention of consumers in order to sell advertising to various financial players. One of our biggest advertisers were mutual fund companies and brokers. Sramana Mitra: How did it ramp? How did you get the consumer base to attract
Sramana Mitra: After you moved to the Bay Area, what were the next major strategic moves? Philippe d’Offay: After moving to the Bay Area, we had a product that physicians were very happy with. We were cash flow positive for four straight years. I talked about almost being bankrupt when we were in Atlanta. The
Sramana Mitra: What year was this when you were the only employee? Chris Taylor: 2006. That’s how it started. For the first couple of years, I did a lot of different projects around the auto industry and also for a lot of startups out in the West Coast. Sramana Mitra: You were consulting at that
Entrepreneurs are invited to the 317th FREE online 1M/1M roundtable mentoring session on Thursday, August 18, 2016, at 8 a.m. PDT/11 a.m. EDT/8:30 p.m. India IST. If you are a serious entrepreneur, register to “pitch” and sell your business idea to Sramana Mitra. You’ll gain straightforward feedback, advice on next steps, and she’ll answer any