What Works for Startups Like Yours?

Doug DeMuro, a popular YouTube car reviewer with 4 million subscribers, launched Cars and Bids in June 2020 as a modern alternative to Bring a Trailer. The platform focuses on 1980s-onward cars and generated 75 million in gross sales in 2021. In 2022, Doug sold a majority stake to Churn Group (a PE firm specializing in creator-led businesses) for approximately 40 million dollars, allowing him to scale operations while maintaining creative control.

First customers: Incentivized submission program - offered $1,000 for first 50 cars and $500 for next 50 cars listed on platform

BillB is a bootstrapped B2B SaaS platform launched in 2015 that provides e-commerce backend tools (invoicing, shipping, inventory management) for small businesses selling across multiple channels. Growing 70% year-over-year with 9,000+ paying customers, the company generates $2.2M ARR while maintaining 25-30k monthly profit through platform partnerships—particularly Shopify—which drive over 50% of signups.

First customers: Community engagement in the DIY e-commerce niche on Davanda (German Etsy clone)

ParkMobile is a mobile app and web platform that enables drivers to find, reserve, and pay for parking across nearly 300 U.S. cities by contracting with municipalities and private parking operators. Launched in 2009, they generate revenue through a flat convenience fee (typically 30-45 cents per transaction on-street, and percentage-based fees on off-street reservations). With 7.5 million registered users, 1.5 million monthly active users, and 250,000 new registrations per month, the company does well over $500,000 in monthly revenue and operates with a team of 106 based in Atlanta.

WePay was founded by Bill Clerico and Rich Aberman in August 2008 as a group payments platform, but after struggling to monetize peer-to-peer payments, they pivoted to become a payments API for platform businesses like marketplaces, crowdfunding sites, and SaaS companies. Growing to low single-digit billions in total payment volume by 2016 and nearly $400M in reported acquisition price by JP Morgan Chase in October 2017, WePay became one of the most successful fintech APIcompanies by focusing on providing valuable payment infrastructure to software platforms rather than competing in the saturated consumer payments space.

First customers: Friends and early users on the group payments product before pivoting to B2B API

Distillery is an applied data science company in the ad-tech space, launched in 2008 as a pure-play demand-side platform (DSP). After 10 years, the company pivoted in late 2017 to decouple its core product—high-performance behavioral audience data—from its own activation platform, allowing brands to use Distillery audiences across third-party platforms like The Trade Desk and AppNexus. The company takes a 20% revenue share on media spend, generating approximately $5 million in annual revenue from its data product line on $25 million in processed spend, while its legacy DSP business generates $27 million in net margin on roughly $55 million in platform spend.

Chad Whitman is a serial entrepreneur who first built Edranck Checker, a Facebook analytics tool that grew to $60K MRR before selling to Social Bakers for approximately $2.8M in 2014. He then co-founded Dolly, an on-demand moving marketplace that leverages pickup truck owners as a unique asset class, raising $1.7M seed and $8M Series A (valuation ~$50M range) by taking a 20% cut of jobs on the platform.

Bellhops is a tech-enabled marketplace connecting DIY movers with local, vetted college athletes who provide affordable moving and lifting help at $40/hour. Operating in 128 US cities with nearly 5,000 active service providers and processing 3,000-5,000 bookings weekly, the company has raised $8M+ in funding (including a $600K seed from Lampus Group and a $6M Series A led by Binary Capital).

Benja Commerce Network was a gamified mobile shopping app and shoppable media ad network that helped define the interactive advertising space. After initial traction from a Product Hunt launch, Andrew pivoted to an ad network model with promising unit economics, but cash flow challenges and fundraising rejection led him to make material financial misrepresentations to investors, ultimately resulting in SEC/FBI investigation, shutdown, and his conviction for securities fraud in 2020.

First customers: Product Hunt launch and earned media coverage in mid-2010s