From eBay Seller to Software Entrepreneur: Seller Labs CEO Paul Johnson (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: What was the trajectory of the revenue growth? How did you do year after year?

Paul Johnson: 2011 was when we first started doing this. In our first year, which was not a full year, we probably sold $50,000 worth of merchandise. Then in 2012, we were around half a million dollars.

By 2013, we were over a million. By 2014, we were starting to shut the business down. That was when the auction went online. It was time to move on. The next would be the software.

Building a High Impact Social Enterprise over 20+ Years: Roberto Milk, CEO of NOVICA (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: It was going to be an artisan marketplace, right?

Roberto Milk: That’s right. We were leaving these corporate positions for that.

Sramana Mitra: How did you get your first set of artisans to come on board and start selling on the site?

From eBay Seller to Software Entrepreneur: Seller Labs CEO Paul Johnson (Part 4)

Paul Johnson: We built our own software to manage everything. We built a smaller version of Amazon’s software where we would bring in inventory, sticker it, and then shelve it. We built software that would list that stuff.

We had two divisions. One was books and the other was everything else. We sold about a million dollars a year on both sides of the business. The books were the ones that were more scalable and easier to do because every book has an ISBN. The physical merchandise was much harder.

Building a High Impact Social Enterprise over 20+ Years: Roberto Milk, CEO of NOVICA (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What did you do during those four years?

Roberto Milk: I was working 100-hour weeks. 

Sramana Mitra: You were doing this full-time before launching the site?

Roberto Milk: I was learning as much as I could. I speak with entrepreneurs a lot and just try to think about how to codify this. First step is finding an idea that really is your calling. Next step is building skills if you don’t have them.

From eBay Seller to Software Entrepreneur: Seller Labs CEO Paul Johnson (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: You shut down that business?

Paul Johnson: We did. We sold all the inventory that we had and cashed out. I met up with a business partner and went for the most peculiar e-commerce business anybody has ever done.

While we were still operating the guitar store, I was looking for something else. I knew that there was a time for it. I would say that this is one of the important things in business – to be able to understand the horizon and what’s coming next. I could see the price erosion that was starting to happen.

Building a High Impact Social Enterprise over 20+ Years: Roberto Milk, CEO of NOVICA (Part 1)

Not all high impact businesses need to go from 0 to $100 million in 5 to 7 years. 

NOVICA has built a tremendously important, high impact social enterprise that did $30 million in 20 years. It’s a fantastic achievement.

From eBay Seller to Software Entrepreneur: Seller Labs CEO Paul Johnson (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Talk about the specifics of that business in terms of metrics. How many transactions were you doing?

Paul Johnson: This is a long time ago. I’ll see if I can remember. We started off with a $1,000 or $2,000 order. Guitars are a high-ticket item. We would sell them for $200 to $1,000 per guitar.

From eBay Seller to Software Entrepreneur: Seller Labs CEO Paul Johnson (Part 1)

Paul started as an eBay seller and then developed software to help other sellers sell online. 

A classic case study of an entrepreneur solving problems he faced himself and building a business based on deep domain knowledge.