I studied how AirBnB went from zero to a $98 billion company

[alfie13]

@raccko Haha I'll keep it in mind

 

[yana2]

@alfie13 Excellent write up! Love the story. Creating medicine for your own pain is almost always a good strategy.

 

[alfie13]

@yana2 Scratch your own itch!

 

[latonyatef]

@alfie13 You didn’t mention the crimes

 

[mandyde5]

@alfie13 Good write up!! Would love to read more!

 

[alfie13]

@mandyde5 You can check all previous teardowns at marketcurve.substack.com

 

[micah1]

@alfie13 you forgot to mention that paul graham didn’t think the concept of airbnb would take off, he just accepted them to yc because he was so impressed they were able to sell political cereal for $40 a box.

 

[satanscumfuck666]

@alfie13 Good write up.

Some things to consider…

Airbnb is old news. Everyone worthwhile knows its story. Find something more niche and particular. An investor won’t be impressed if you know airbnbs backstory because everyone knows it.

If you want to make a due diligence memo, make it into shorter bullet points, add metrics, and include weaknesses, risks, and competition. Don’t make it all positive. You hear more no than yes in investing. It’s important to show that you understand how to be critical of an idea.

 

[alfie13]

@satanscumfuck666 Great feedback thanks! But tbh it's not exactly a due diligence memo aimed at investors - its more of blueprint/playbook to take inspiration from while building a startup (esp a marketplace) but i get where you're coming from

 

[satanscumfuck666]

@alfie13 It’s more of an article that pushes a narrative. It doesn’t detail struggle or challenges which is what a playbook does. It doesn’t have action items. It’s a story and what you want to be able to build is an evaluation and projection.

Does it talk about flirting with investors at key locations? How about email open rates or firing their first employee?

 

[amandasaved77]

@satanscumfuck666 I think you are missing the point of this post. It’s very helpful and contains lots of lessons. Just because it doesn’t meet your standards doesn’t mean other people won’t benefit from it.

 

[satanscumfuck666]

@amandasaved77 I think you’re missing the point of my comment.

 

[amandasaved77]

@satanscumfuck666 But your comment is missing the point of the post so…

 

[satanscumfuck666]

@amandasaved77 And the point of the post is to highlight a company whose growth happened 10 years ago that everyone knows about?

 

[amandasaved77]

@satanscumfuck666 No, it’s to deliver value. And it clearly does based on looking at all the positive response, except yours lol.

 

[satanscumfuck666]

@amandasaved77 So much value. So many worthwhile responses from real successful people.

 

[amandasaved77]

@satanscumfuck666 From your sarcastic response, it sounds like you are determining the value of this post based on how “successful” the people who respond to this post are.

There’s actually a lot of flaws to this logic.

First, can you mind read and see everyone’s success story?

Second, even if they aren’t successful financially, what does that have to do with the value of the post? Can someone starting off benefit from reading a case study? Of course.

You make it sound like you are the only successful person, and no one else is. Even if you are (highly unlikely lol), it doesn’t matter.

People benefit from the post, which has already provided more value than everything you wrote combined lol.

 

[britmark]

@satanscumfuck666 I disagree. I think it was wonderfully written and I enjoyed reading the story. It’s interesting to read how marketplaces overcame the cold start problem and got that flywheel spinning. I think OP did a great job of explaining the challenges air bnb faced and how they overcame them. Thanks for taking the time to write this OP I thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[alfie13]

@britmark Thank you for reading! I'm glad you enjoyed it!

 

[hirono]

@satanscumfuck666 Im an Airbnb fan girl. I started reading it expecting the standard stories about “cereal” and “Covid” but I am impressed with this breakdown as it went over and beyond.