David Barrett
Founder & CEO, Expensify. On 4 shows, 7 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
founderexecutiveengineer@dbarrett ↗LinkedIn ↗expensify.com ↗
David Barrett is the founder and CEO of Expensify, a cloud-based expense management platform launched in 2008 that went public on the Nasdaq in 2021. Before creating Expensify, he led engineering at peer-to-peer file-sharing company Red Swoosh, which was acquired by Akamai Technologies in 2007.
4shows
7appearances
112statements
8resolved
5supported
1contradicted
63%fully supported
14said about them ↓ Everything David Barrett said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Barrett: Startup complexity is invented by people who profit from it
“Starting a business is so much easier, ah, than it's made out to be. It's so much easier than, it's like all the complexity is invented complexity. It's a complexity, I would say, being sold to you by Primarily with people who profit from that complexity. Who …”
Barrett: Nothing of value happens inside board meetings
“Nothing of interest or value happens in the board meeting itself.”
Barrett: Venture capital as an asset class underperforms the S&P 500
“And I'd say like as an asset class, venture capital returns less than, you know, S and P 500.”
Barrett: Profit is essential for startups to achieve scale and sustainability
“And I think the only way to achieve a broad scale and a long-term sustainability is profit.”
Barrett: An IPO is just a state change to get capital, not an exit
“I think that an IPO for a truly successful company is just a state change. It actually doesn't really mean anything too much to the company overall. It's just a way to get money.”
Expensify Caps Annual Hiring at 12 Employees
“This past year we put in a cap. We said this year, we're only going to hire 12 people.”
Barrett claims Expensify has more customers than Concur
“We have more customers than Concur, and we're the fastest growing in our space”
Barrett: Expensify does zero advertising or outbound sales
“We don't advertise. We're a hundred percent organic. There's no advertisement whatsoever. And so things like churn was like these numbers, which seems so absolutely critical to your business. They actually just don't really matter to us at least because they d…”
Barrett: Expensify does not employ commissioned salespeople
“We don't have any commissioned salespeople, and so that, like, that screws up everyone's models as well.”
Barrett: Expensify's support team is its primary revenue generator
“Actually, our primary revenue generator is our support team. The vast majority of our revenue comes after you've interacted once or twice with our support team, but almost never with, like, a salesperson going through a demo and things like that.”
Barrett: Expense management SaaS is underpriced and should be 10x higher
“Candidly, I view our entire space is vastly underpriced. Like the idea that you can get full expense management, mobile apps, all this automation for nine bucks for active and a third of your company's active. It's really like three bucks for head. That's like…”
Barrett: Keeping subscription pricing low deters SaaS competitors
“It's like about dominating the space and maintaining an incredibly low price right now for the industry actually helps keep the competition out. And so yes, there will become a time where that's the most important thing, but it's just not right now.”
Barrett: Formalized Education Is the Biggest Scam Today
“I think that formalized education is the biggest scam that we're facing right now, and I just am horrified by it, and I'm so glad that I didn't get trapped in the massive debt cycle that everyone else does.”
Barrett: Seed and Series A rounds are driven by storytelling, not meaningful numbers
“This, like, the seed and A are primarily just about, like, you and the story you tell. Like, especially the seed. A, it's like you have to have some evidence that, like, you know, the story has some anecdotal evidence of some kind of traction. And then, like, …”
Barrett: Never email pitch decks ahead of VC meetings
“Never mail your deck ahead of time, because then they'll make their decision before they see you.”
Barrett: Software differentiation requires business model and acquisition, not just functionality
“Cause if you're gonna differentiate, you can't differentiate through functionality alone. It has to be through acquisition, through business model.”
Barrett: Expensify has 45,000 paying companies, beating top four competitors combined
“I would say like, so we think about 45,000 paying companies. So basically... So we've got more More companies is expensified than the next four expense reporting companies.”
David Barrett argues basic internet and mobile startup ideas are exhausted
“I think right now is a really hard time to start a company because any company that just involves like the internet and mobile and things like that, it's like, it's been done. It's been done like 10 years ago. And so I think we're seeing like this whole series…”
Barrett: Expensify Does Zero Paid Advertising, Grown 100% Word-of-Mouth
“No, we have no advertising going on whatsoever right now. It's all a hundred percent word of mouth.”
Barrett: Expensify's growth slowed only due to enterprise distraction
“The only reason We slowed down at all. It was because we got distracted by the enterprise.”
Barrett: Reaching $1M revenue is the startup valley of death
“It is just a brutal, awful slog in the start, and so as much of this conference is about getting to that hundred million, really, I mean, the hard part is getting to that, that one million. Like, that is the valley of death that basically will wipe out probabl…”
Expensify intentionally has zero independent directors to avoid wild cards
“Actually I have no independents on my board, because I don't like wild cards.”
Independent board members brought in by investors aren't truly independent
“And I think they're brought in by the board, and if they're brought in by the board, that means that they're not really independent. They actually just kind of work for the board. Now not really, it's not quite the same, but it's similar.”
Barrett: The greatest companies are built on controversial decisions, not boardroom consensus
“The greatest companies don't happen because suddenly, miraculously, everyone in the boardroom always agreed on every single decision. That's never happened. The way it happens, great decisions are always controversial.”
The other half of the tape: David Barrett's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 14 times in 9 episodes across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Nathan Latka 10Harry Stebbings 3Kip McDaniel 1
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
Top Founders 10
20VC 3
Capital Allocators 1
2021 1 mention in 1 episode
2019 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2018 5 mentions in 2 episodes 3 per episode
2017 5 mentions in 4 episodes 1 per episode
- 656: How to Win VR Gaming Space, $500k Raised, Team of 12, First Release This Year with CEO Peter Kortenhoeven
- 20VC: Why VCs Fundamentally Assess Founders The Wrong Way, Why VC Needs To Innovate On The Scouting Model & Why SAFE's and Convertible Notes Are The Future Of Investing with Elizabeth Yin, Founder & General Partner @ Hustle Fund
- Kip McDaniel – CIO Whisperer (Capital Allocators, EP.20)
- 654: $100k at Age 19, Now $1.2 Million From 16 Best Selling Books and New Smart Business App, Brin with CEO Dale Beaumont
- every mention in 2017, scene by scene →
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens David's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| TOP FOUNDERSLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Expensify | 3 | 57 | 83% 5/6 | full record on Top Founders → |
 SAASTRLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Expensify | 2 | 27 | — | full record on the Official SaaStr Podcast → |
| 20VCLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Expensify | 1 | 16 | 0% 0/2 | full record on 20VC → |
| CAPITAL ALLOCATORSLEDGER | Founder & CEO, Expensify | 1 | 12 | — | full record on Capital Allocators → |