Best of Bootstrapping: VC-Funded Venture After Bootstrapping to Exit

A very effective way to dance the entrepreneurial Waltz is to do a bootstrapped company first, sell it, and then do another venture with a more ambitious agenda. From 2021, Jeremy Swift’s journey as Co-founder and CEO of Cordial is a great case study of this method. Sramana Mitra: Let’s go to the very beginning of

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We Like Bootstrapping to Exit

This week, we’re discussing how the Age of AI is also the golden age of Bootstrapping, and also of Solo Entrepreneurship. Yes, you CAN and SHOULD bootstrap with a Paycheck. Yes, you CAN and SHOULD bootstrap to an Exit. Are you trying to do a startup as a SOLO entrepreneur? Your time has come.

Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: So, if you’re comfortable disclosing, how much money did you raise during that ten-year period from 2010-2020, and what kind of exit did you get, numerically? Lance Newhauser: We ended up raising about $35 million for 4C specifically from 2010 to 2020. There was some debt layered on top of that as well.

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Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: How did you address this complex sales cycle issue? Because that could really block velocity.

Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: So then in this story, at what point did you raise the venture capital? Is this 2010? Lance Newhauser: Yes, 2010. Sramana Mitra: What did you do before going out to raise money? Did you do some amount of customer development, validation work? Whom were you selling to? What was the positioning?

Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: From your personal career journey point of view, I have gone through a similar journey. After I did three startups as Founder CEO, I started consulting because I just wanted to do something else and learn a different skill. I didn’t want to be a CEO, I wanted to learn something else. I

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Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: The track that we have is bootstrapping using services, which your story also speaks to. Services companies bring in revenues very early and that helps a lot. So bootstrapping using services to exit is a wonderful track actually.

Bootstrapping to Exit, Then Raise Money and Exit Again: Wendy CEO Lance Neuhauser (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: I assume that since it was a services company, you were able to bootstrap it, right? Lance Newhauser: Yes, it was a service company that we initially bootstrapped. We did bring on one investor who put a few thousand dollars into the company so that we could go get some office space and

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