We bootstrapped to $11M in ARR

Seems to be a lot of questions about how bootstrapped startups handle customer support.<p>I&#x27;m the cofounder of Eureka Surveys. We&#x27;re bootstrapped, profitable, and just crossed 1M+ users. We&#x27;ve had an amazing experience hiring customer support in the Philippines. I have a thread about it on Twitter: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;t0mstah&#x2F;status&#x2F;1356296043009253382" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;twitter.com&#x2F;t0mstah&#x2F;status&#x2F;1356296043009253382</a><p>The tl;dr is that you can hire cheap ($3.50&#x2F;hr), high quality virtual assistants from the Philippines to handle customer support for you, all from day one. Having CS has really made a difference for us in our business and is one of our main differentiators as we&#x27;ve scaled up the CS team. DM me on Twitter and I can connect you to some excellent VAs looking for jobs!

Many of the customers of my B2B SaaS are the type of company from the article.<p>We&#x27;re small enough that I check out the website of every new company. I continue to be amazed at the sheer breadth of small-ish, profitable companies, often bootstrapped, that I would normally never encounter.<p>Also, a shameless plug for my podcast for people running bootstrapped software companies: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bootstrapped.fm&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;bootstrapped.fm&#x2F;</a>

Nice writeup!<p>Speaking as someone that tried to be a founder from Brazil: I imagine that making it on Silicon Valley must be hard task on itself but making in an underdeveloped country makes odds stacked against you.<p>We compete with companies founded with people that have access to clients with way more purchasing power and better supply pipeline.<p>I&#x27;m a bit curious on how the team got overcame this issues, and would suggest you to repost this on a time that gets more traffic in americas, since is 3AM here.

I love the <i>Giving back</i> section &lt;3<p>&gt; over the past 2 years have managed to donate over a million dollars to local charities<p>I wish more companies were doing this. There are many already -- consider joining the <i>Fouders Pledge</i> <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;founderspledge.com&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;founderspledge.com&#x2F;</a> if you&#x27;re thinking of doing the same.

I got a question for which I don&#x27;t see the answer in the article.<p>What about employee compensation? Is it just a fixed salary or? Since I do not see any mention of going public in the article, so I&#x27;m curious what is the motivation for employees.

The best part? Every penny of that $11M ARR is yours to spend however you wish. Nobody&#x27;s going to question you if you take your company&#x27;s money and spend it on a private helicopter or a summer beach home in Cyprus (all easily affordable for $11M). If you had accepted even a tiny pre-seed investment, you wouldn&#x27;t have that freedom - the company&#x27;s money is not yours, and although you could live comfortably on executive salary, bonuses, and stock sales, you can&#x27;t avoid scrutiny until you&#x27;ve sold the company or IPO&#x27;ed.<p>The second best part about bootstrapping (specifically: solo bootstrapping)? The immense satisfaction of eating from the work of my own hands. I finally launched my side project last month, and it&#x27;s making enough to pay for rent and food. I have no other source of income or savings, and the feeling is fantastic -- even though the amount I am earning right now is tiny, far less than what I earned as a private consultant or employee of a VC-backed firm before. I wouldn&#x27;t trade this feeling of satisfaction for any other job in the world. The freedom of 100% ownership: earning, managing, and spending every dollar without having to answer to anyone is priceless.<p>Taking VC money is just a glorified type of employment with lottery returns.

I&#x27;ve used the canary tokens and they are probably the most elegant security tool I&#x27;ve seen in the business. What a pleasure to read.

Is it possible to bootstrap a consumer startup in the same way as a B2B SaaS? Seems a lot harder, given that revenue from day one is not easy.

This is a pretty exciting blog post. I&#x27;m totally stealing the customer swag idea, it&#x27;s great.<p>Fingers crossed on 100M ARR!

The vast majority of businesses....<p>1. Are outside the valley<p>2. Started with minimal or no funding<p>3. Hire a ton of employees overall<p>4. Give their founders comfortable lives.<p>5. Do their thing very quietly without anyone really knowing.<p>6. You&#x27;ve never heard about.

Frankly, minding the existing solutions on the market, the product idea sounds extremely useful. No wonder you were able to acquire customers and grow quickly!

One thing I don&#x27;t understand is this notion that any startup can happen only in the valley,or if someone starts there, it&#x27;s 100 times easier. The main benefit,which the US startups take for granted is the market size. You don&#x27;t need to learn German, French ,or Spanish just to sell to your neighbors.

Congrats fellow mh!

This is awesome

Great product, great company, terrible parties

From friends I&#x27;ve talked with, the benefits of the valley are real, but diminishing. At the same time downsides are increasing: cost of living, homelessness, real estate prices (though I read these are coming down a bit). I&#x27;ve been told the benefit has been the ease of networking, and likely will always be so. As startup hubs grow around the country this networking benefit will start to be there. It is already there in some places such as Austin and Boston.<p>There are a number of hubs in the country now, with most outside the valley focusing on one or more niches. Some of these are:<p>- Nanotechnology in Boston and Middlesex-essex, MA<p>- Healthcare Boston, New York City, and the Twin Cities of Minnesota. Big investments though are being made in Kansas, Ohio, Texas, and Pennsylvania<p>- SaaS in Austin,TX<p>- Education in Boston<p>- Fintech in New York City

Congrats mh_ and team.