The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 176 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Blakely: Spanx wouldn't exist if she shared the idea too early
“And I think, I really believe, Guy, that had I heard that in the minute that I had the idea and cut the feet out of my pantyhose, I really think I would Not have started Spanx.”
Carpenter: Ski Companies Could Have Destroyed Burton Early On
“They could have destroyed us, and there were all these rumors that some ski companies were going to start making them.”
Tobaccowala: VCs Forced Evite Sale After Dot-Com Crash Erased Valuations
“We definitely could have continued with a thinner staff, but the main concern was from the venture capitalists in the sense that they are looking at, can this become a billion-dollar valued business? And given that, all of a sudden, valuations had fallen throu…”
Holden: 2008 Recession Was Essential to Securing First Lease and Talent
“Without a recession, there's no way a landlord would have taken a chance on us. There's no chance that I would have found smart, motivated people that needed jobs or were out there and available.”
Jones: Having $100K in savings might have deterred starting Dippin' Dots
“I sometimes say if we'd had a 100,000 dollars in the bank, we might not have wanted to risk it, but I felt like if it didn't work, I was still young enough that I could probably still get a job somewhere.”
Curt Jones: Would fight $10M patent lawsuit again rather than settle
“What would you do different if you know, if you look back now, and I suppose the correct answer is like, well, I would have settled, and then it wouldn't have cost me ten million dollars, but my answer is that I probably would do the same thing again, because …”
Lütke: Shopify could not have succeeded if launched two years later
“This is not a kind of company that could have been started even two years later, right? It needed to be started right then, and it needed to be ready and good by the time the opportunity around the financial crisis came around.”
Tynan: Framebridge would not have worked without venture capital
“I don't think it would have worked unless we had done it in this really Full way, this really high quality way, and the money allowed me to recruit truly the best people, these terrific people, and use very good materials, and, you know, have a very open liber…”
Canion: IBM could have easily put early Compaq out of business
“They could have easily put us out of business if they had come out with a real comparable product.”
Dunn: Knowing what he knows now, building Bonobos required only $30M
“I can't go back in time and do this company on 20 to thirty million. Which is what I think it would take, knowing what I now know”
Cutler: SoulCycle could have scaled without outside investment
“The truth is, looking back, yes, we could have done it.”
Madden doubts he would have had children without his prison sentence
“I don't know that I would have had children had I not gone to prison.”
Goldman: Adding sugar would have accelerated Honest Tea's growth but diluted brand
“Well, there's no question that would have led to faster growth, but it would have diluted what we were building.”
Lake: Building Stitch Fix would have been very difficult outside Silicon Valley
“Like, I think it would have been really hard to do what we did anywhere else because we have many, many data scientists and many, many engineers and, you It was not just about me being comfortable, but if we wanted to fulfill on the vision of using technology …”
Michael Dell admits Dell underinvested in innovation prior to 2007
“There were definitely some areas where we could have been investing more in innovation.”
Bob Johnson: CBS Could Have Launched 24-Hour Cable News Before CNN
“CBS with the Walter Cronkite, the brand as a father of news, could have launched on cable a CBS news network instead of letting Ted do it, but they saw themselves as a thirty-minute Six p.m. Period of news. They just didn't see news as a 24 hour audience produ…”
Ben & Jerry's would not have succeeded if founded in New York
“I think if we had started in New York, we never would have gained the local following that we gained in Vermont. In Vermont, it would, we could be A bigger fish in a smaller pond.”
Wendy Kopp believes someone else would have founded Teach For America
“Like, I mean, it's one of those ideas that if I hadn't pursued it, someone would have figured it out in the couple years after. I'm really convinced of that.”
Huffman: Starting Reddit over with perfect hindsight might still fail
“If I went back 10 years ago and knew everything I knew now and had to start Reddit all over again, I don't know if we could succeed.”
Peretti: BuzzFeed Could Not Have Raised VC by Pitching Journalism Hires
“Cause we probably wouldn't have been able to even raise money if we had said, oh, our plan is to hire lots and lots of journalists and reporters.”
Canion admits IBM could have easily put Compaq out of business
“IBM maybe underestimated us. They didn't really study what had made our product successful. They could have easily put us out of business if they had come out with a real comparable product.”
1-800-GOT-JUNK? was 90 days from bankruptcy before laying off 52 employees
“We couldn't have been closer. I mean, I would have given us another 90 days if we'd continued down that path. We had overspent so drastically. On big bets that didn't pay off, and I had to hunker down. I had to lay off 52 people.”
Scudamore admits an IPO and VC funding would yield more personal wealth
“I probably would have made more money in the long term if I'd done a corporate model and an IPO and raised money.”
Kate Spade says keeping her magazine job would have prevented brand success
“The truth is, you would never have done it had you stayed, because I wouldn't have been as scrappy or as, I mean, it was kind of, you know, do or die, so I think if I'd still been working, I would have been like, ah, a little bit more lackadaisical about it, w…”
Goldman: Adding sugar would have accelerated Honest Tea's growth but diluted brand
“Well, there's no question that would have led to faster growth, but it would have diluted what we were building.”
Toast may not have survived COVID-19 without a timely pre-pandemic fundraise
“Like, I think, had we not raised that capital right before the COVID may not have survived.”
Toast's business model relied on payments infrastructure opening up around 2012
“You know, back in 2012 and 13 is when payments were opening up without which the business model may not have worked.”
Dan Bastian: We would take more personal time if building BOOMCHICKAPOP again
“And I think both Ange and I probably would have tried to spend more time with each other, taking a step back. For us, it really did damage to us in, in the sense of just Physically, you know, our bodies, and emotionally, and all of that, and I think, you know,…”
Healy: Kettle Chips would have failed without profits from nut business
“Kettle chips would have never made it. Without the nuts. We had the nut operation.”
Joanna Gaines almost quit retail until her father secretly bought her display
“If he would not have fake, you know, sold that thing, I would have quit and said, I'm not doing this, Chip.”
Patel: Passed PE Consumer Deals Are Worth Over $5 Billion Today
“I think sometimes about all those companies we could have backed in that basket, And it's probably north of worth more than five billion today.”
Mei Xu: Early Fundraising Would Have Provided Crucial Scaling Insights
“I did not do any fundraising when I was building my first business, and I feel it could have given me a very interesting sort of insight into how to scale.”
Starting Figma a few years earlier was impossible without WebGL
“I mean, if we had started this a few years earlier, we wouldn't have had WebGL.”
Scaringe: Rivian would not exist if it produced its original vehicle design
“If I was making what we first thought we were going to make, the company wouldn't be here.”
Winer: Hexclad Benefited From the Failure of His Prior Venture Juicepresso
“If Juicepresso hadn't failed, HexCloud would not be as successful.”
Alexa Hirschfeld: Paperless Post should have charged consumers directly from the start
“I think I should have listened to James's instinct, which was always originally to actually charge for the product itself, but the truth is that Because we were able to see the value that the users were getting, it gave us this confidence that, you know what, …”
Berkowitz: Food trucks were a two-year distraction Insomnia Cookies shouldn't have taken
“Vending trucks ended up being a right turn I wish I hadn't taken. It was like a two-year real distraction.”
Sonos Would Have Shut Down Without Early Mesh Wi-Fi Success
“And that, that was a big effort which had we not been successful, we probably would have stopped doing it in the early days.”
Sewitz: Magic Spoon could not have launched 10 years earlier
“10 years ago, we really couldn't have launched this business with a formulation that we felt was close enough to really make that trade-off worth it of, you know, nutrition for flavor.”
Norton: Sir Kensington's board would have advised against Unilever meeting
“Our board would have told us not to take the meeting.”
Mielle Organics was founded after the traumatic loss of Rodriguez's infant son
“Miel wouldn't exist if it wasn't for what I went through.”
Rodriguez pivoted from opening a salon to products after a stylist's advice
“I mean, I wouldn't have started my L and blew up how I have if it wasn't for me talking to her because I clearly wanted to start a hair salon.”
Woolverton credits the Greek yogurt boom for enabling Halo Top
“I don't think there would be a Halo Top without Greek yogurt.”
Severe burnout forced Woolverton to sell Halo Top instead of competing
“If I were refreshed, I probably would have just held onto the company and kind of relished the challenge of getting through all these competitors and having a competitive market, but I was just burnt out, to be perfectly honest, and I was like, I cannot deal w…”
Xero Shoes would not exist if Vibram FiveFingers had fit Sashen properly
“Had those things fit my feet, we would have never started Zero Shoes.”
VandeHei: Politico would not exist without Robert Allbritton's financial backing
“And Robert, who, you know, if it weren't for his money and his courage in, in taking a chance on us, Politico doesn't exist.”