Disclosure certainty 4/5 debate potential 1/5

Apt2B stayed cash-flow positive by collecting 100% upfront customer deposits

Alex Back · Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show · Mar 25, 2024 · at 13:21

Alex Back, co-founder of Apt2B, describes how the bootstrapped online furniture startup managed working capital in its early years.

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“We were able to time it properly so that we were always stayed cash positive. So we would take a hundred percent customer deposit at the time of border placement.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

More from Alex Back

Assertion Supported
Brick-and-mortar stores still drive the majority of furniture industry sales
“They saw it as a threat to their brick and mortar businesses, which still, by the way, 20 years later, drive the majority of the business in the furniture industry.”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 8:38 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
Insight
Furniture buyers care more about discount percentage than total dollars spent
“That's what people are focused on in our industry. They want to know how much they're saving so much more interested in that than how much they're actually spending. They just want to feel like they're getting a good deal. We basically realized there was a dir…”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 27:36 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
What-if
Alex Back says Apt2B would be 5x larger with early SEO investment
“We were just, we would have, I mean, that company would have been, I don't know, five times the size of what it is right now, probably. Just based on organic traffic alone.”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 37:35 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
Assertion Contradicted
IKEA did not have an online checkout system in 2010
“At the time, Ikea, for instance, the biggest furniture retailer in the world, they weren't even transacting business online. Like there was no online payment gateway. It was just like, A store finder, essentially, an online catalog.”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 2:19 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
Disclosure
Alex Back launched Apt2B on just $125,000 of friends-and-family capital
“I think it was a 125,000 dollars total. We did like just my friend and his dad were the initial 50,000. And then we Raised from another friend of my partner's. Another 75. And that's it.”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 13:59 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Apt2B generated $40K weekly at Costco roadshows for a 14% commission
“We would do, you know, 2030, 40,000 dollars in a week at Costco, and they take 14%. There's no other participation fee. They just want a cut.”
Alex Back Mar 25, 2024 ▶ 18:29 Alex sold couches online before IKEA did. He grew to $40M in revenue and exited for millions. | A... · PMF Show
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