Bootstrapped, Profitable, & Proud: Alien Skin Software - (37signals) - The Diigo Meta page

• 27 Aug 10
  

  Luis Oopsh

  How successful is the business? The company became profitable in 1994 and has been profitable every year since then. We passed the $1M revenue mark in 1996 and have remained well above that ever since. The most important measure of success to me is wheth

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• 26 Aug 10
  

  Alex Ko

  entrepreneurship

  • I enjoyed computer graphics research, but I didn’t like the unfinished state of most software created in academia
  • The most important measure of success to me is whether everyone in the company enjoys their work
  • One area where I am glad I went my own way is in reigning in head count.
  • Partly it is just my personal preference to have a company I can understand. I like to get to know everyone, understand their challenges, and see how their work fits into the overall effort. I think that gets hard to do with more than about 15 people. Also, the smaller a team, the less effort is needed for coordination. It is just more fun for us to spend our time creating things rather than in meetings.
  • the silence of a private office is necessary for most intellectual pursuits. I think the productivity gains far outweigh the savings of an open plan office. Profit sharing is crucial for keeping everyone’s interests aligned. The other benefits keep us competitive with other employers. We used to have free junk food until everyone got fat. Now we have free health club memberships.
  • Profit is only sustainable if everyone involved is thrilled with the enterprise.
  • people least willing to stick around with lame coworkers are the smart, productive, creative ones
  • Don’t undercharge. Once you are confident that your product is great, don’t be shy with your price. The smart people will pay for it.
  • Don’t do any cooperative product development. You have enough problems coordinating the efforts of your own team. No one else is going to make you rich. Do it yourself.
  • In my experience, productive people like to have a manager to discuss their challenges with.

  8 more annotations...

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  Felipe Tofani
• 

  A great article with advice for starting a small, simple and profitable business. Don't create a huge scope for your envisioned service or product. Be very realistic, and love what you're doing. Team size should be less than 15 people at peak.
  
  Also, don't be afraid to charge money. People WILL pay!

  blogpost entrepreneurship

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