Bootstrapping to $7 Million: Constellix CEO Steven Job (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Were you doing this out of Washington DC? 

Steven Job: Yes, I used to live in a town called Centerville, a suburb of DC. By 2006, it was at a point where it was making several hundred thousand dollars a year, so I hired my first employees who still work with us today.

Bootstrapping to $7 Million: Constellix CEO Steven Job (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What year are we in now? 

Steven Job: While I was working those crazy hours, I developed a service called DNS Made Easy. It’s still around today. At that time, I was creating it as a side project where I could make a little extra revenue. It was a passion project.

It all started because I wanted to host a website at home. Back in the day, hosting was not for free, but now you can buy a domain name for ten bucks and get hosting and email for free.

Bootstrapping from Guwahati: Anjan Pathak, CTO and Co-Founder of Vantage Circle (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: How many companies do you have today?

Anjan Pathak: In India, we almost have all the big IT companies as customers except TCS and IBM. Tata has selected us as their preferred vendor. 

Sramana Mitra: What revenue level are you at right now?

Best of Bootstrapping: Discussing Seed Rounds with Bruce Cleveland, Wildcat Venture Partners

If you have been bootstrapping and think you are ready for investors, you need to learn how investors think. First, please study our free Bootstrapping course and Investor Introductions page. Then start looking for entrepreneur – investor fit. Today I introduce you to Bruce Cleveland.

Bruce Cleveland, Founding Partner at Wildcat Venture Partners, is one of the early employees at Oracle, as well as a co-founder of Siebel Systems. His book, The Traction Gap, shares the framework that his firm uses in its venture capital practice. You can listen to a podcast of our conversation here and watch the roundtable video below:

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Bootstrapping to $7 Million: Constellix CEO Steven Job (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our free Bootstrapping course and the Investor Introductions page.

Steven has built a lean company with 37 people and has scaled it to $7 million. Read on to learn how.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born and raised? What kind of background did you have?

Bootstrapping from Guwahati: Anjan Pathak, CTO and Co-Founder of Vantage Circle (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Was Infosys paying you extra for doing this? 

Anjan Pathak: No, they were not paying, because they were our first customer. We used to get a 5% discount on the gift vouchers. That was our primary revenue. Of course, there was a lot of incoming cash flow, but the primary revenue was anything that they gave. 

Best of Bootstrapping: Bootstrapping E-commerce Company Fun.com

If you haven’t already, please study our free Bootstrapping course and the Investor Introductions page.

Tom Fallenstein, CEO of Fun.com, has built a kick-ass e-commerce company out of rural Minnesota.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start with your personal journey. Where are you from? Where were you born and raised, in what kind of environment?

Tom Fallenstein: I was born in Minnesota in a small town about an hour and a half south of Minneapolis. I’ve lived here all my life. I grew up just outside of the city. I went to school in Mankato for Computer Science and Graphic Design. Our mom was a seamstress. We loved Halloween. We always had the best costumes when we were little. When we got older, all of our friends wanted to borrow those costumes, so my sister decided to rent them out. That’s how the business started.Sramana Mitra: What year are we talking when you were starting this business with your sister?

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Bootstrapping from Guwahati: Anjan Pathak, CTO and Co-Founder of Vantage Circle (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What was the business model? 

Anjan Pathak: It’s very simple. Samsung might have a new phone on their website. They want to sell it directly to corporate employees, but they cannot. They need a medium to market themselves, so they give the deal or coupon to us which can be redeemed on their website. 

Sramana Mitra: Does Samsung pay you for this?