The Ledger
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Allebest: We tell every hire that Chess.com will never be their highest-paying job
“One thing we tell people who work at chess.com, every single person who gets hired,
They hear the same thing, which is chess.com will never be your highest paying job. We're just economically not set up for it.”
Allebest: Founders are naive about the friction of forced VC exits
“I think people are a little bit Naive about the downsides of raising money. Ultimately your investors will want an exit and it may not be at the same time as you. And for a business that's as mission driven as chess.com is, it's, it has at times been irritatin…”
Allebest: Running Chess.com today is much more stressful than his earlier ventures
“I, you know, in, in many ways I was happier than I am today because the stress of chess.com today is so much more than it was back then. So, you know, I don't wish a huge success on anyone. It can be quite a burden at times to be totally honest.”
Allebest: Chess.com will have single-digit revenue growth in 2024
“I think a lot of people would look at, you know, single digit growth, like we're going to have this year and say, ah, well, you're not ready to be a public company.”
Allebest: Chess.com is ready to reach 20M DAUs and 100M MAUs
“I think we're ready for twenty million daily active users and a hundred million monthly active users. I think we're ready for that. And I think it's coming.”
Allebest: Chess.com took primary and secondary funding from WME and Endeavor
“That's why we recently did you know take money, a little bit of cash, and then some secondary from WME and Endeavor which is a large media company, and we're working with them to, you know, look at different ways we can grow the game.”
Allebest: India is not a top monetizing market for Chess.com
“Interestingly, India is not a top monetizing country for chess.”
Allebest: Multiple VC-funded chess startups raised millions and flamed out
“I mean, we've seen many businesses come into chess, having raised millions of dollars and seen them flame out.”
Allebest: Chess.com relies on media partnerships for top-of-funnel growth
“We're only really looking for media partnerships at this time, because we believe that while we work on our core business, our top of funnel And new, new users are going to come through media partnerships. And luckily we have some amazing great media partnersh…”
Allebest: A TV show on the Hans Niemann cheating controversy drops in 2025
“Wait for the TV show next year. You'll, you'll, you'll hear more about it.”
Allebest: Chess.com maintained a flat reporting structure until reaching 400 employees
“Up until about 400 people on our team, We had a kind of everybody was reporting to me in some ways. It was extremely flat company. You know, everybody was emailing me their weekly reports. I was responding to, you know, two, three, 400 emails every weekend.”
Allebest: Nearly half of Norway's population has Chess.com on their phones
“A some ridiculously large number percentage of people in Norway have chess.com on their phone. It's like, it's massive. I don't want to say it's half, but it feels like it's close just because of Magnus Carlsen. And probably 10% of them are paying subscribers”
Allebest: Chess.com will eventually become a public company
“But I do think we'll be there one day.”
Allebest: I have received death threats as the CEO of Chess.com
“Yeah, I mean, I've had death threats.”
Allebest: Chess.com has been profitable since the very beginning
“We have been profitable basically since the very beginning.”
Allebest: Chess.com does not maintain massive excess cash reserves
“We've been growing at the speed of cash. And so we don't have just tons and tons of excess cash.”
Allebest: Chess.com has 5M DAUs and 40M to 50M MAUs
“We're at five million daily active users now, you know, 40, fifty million monthly active users.”
Allebest: Most PE and VC Firms Passed Before General Atlantic Buyout
“Met with a lot of private equity and venture firms. And, you know, most of them passed. They still couldn't see the vision of where chess could go. They still thought they said the same things, you know, the market isn't big enough, et cetera. But, you know, G…”
Allebest: Chess.com settled an early lawsuit for two cases of vodka
“And we ended up we ended up settling that lawsuit in exchange for two cases of vodka. That's what he wanted. And so no money, just had to ship two cases of vodka. And then he settled the lawsuit.”
Allebest: Seeded Chess.com with $700k leftover from prior e-commerce sale
“I think I sold the business for a little under two million dollars, something like that. It was actually less than that. It was like one and a half million, if I remember correctly. And then I paid, so after I paid taxes, I had about a million dollars. And the…”