My startup failed, and this is what it feels like (2014) | Hacker News Reader

My startup failed, and this is what it feels like (2014)

medium.com

79 pointsjeremylevy21 comments

Here is the previous discussion:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7933155

Interesting, but in the first place - why did they move to USA/NYC? Why they couldn't launch the mobile app or website from Australia? Maybe this is related to that solving of chicken and egg problem they mention...

The model appeared to be a very niche specific eBay/craigslist of sorts. Enabling women to buy (used) clothes from other people...not a retail sales model.

That would explain the need for doing it in the US...larger market.

Of course, that also meant she would enter into a market where she had no practical experience. She also mentions that she had no tech experience, and so had to hire on the tech talent.

I admire the ambition, but I don't see how she was able to get investors at all. Sounds high risk with a pretty hard ceiling on potential.

Well if their business model was around selling high priced fashion clothes, I suspect NYC has a much much bigger market over Australia.

Yes, but as I understand they had an app/website, not a retail shop in NYC, right?

So, maybe I'm naive but why they couldn't upload the mobile app on the app store and website's HTML/CSS/JS/back-end files from Australia?

They needed to build buzz in the US. That means talking to people, getting your first traction, people discussing the app on the subway, pitching it to women at bars, college campuses, etc.

Could've payed some some student beer money to pitch it in bars.

I am glad to see female founders getting a little more attention here these days, but I wish more attention were given to why they fail and how to do it better. Here was my take on this piece:

http://micheleincalifornia.blogspot.com/2014/07/a-decade-lat...

What's Nikki up to now?

Great question. A quick web search shows that she is giving talks about her start-up that failed about two years ago, but I could not find much else.

In a recent bio her article on medium is listed prominently:

Nikki was the founder & CEO of 99dresses, a Y Combinator-backed startup that allowed women to trade fashion with each other using a virtual currency. She started the business as a naive 18-year-old fresh out of high school, and experienced a roller coaster 4 year journey before shutting down 99dresses in 2014 and writing about it in a wildly popular Medium post entitled 'My Startup Failed And This Is What It Feels Like...'.

Needs a [2014] in the title. In light of current discussions about a current startup crunch, it'd be nice to make it clear that this one isn't part of it. Good postmortem, though.

Added.

Startups don't fail. Founders just stop doing their work. You can't succeed if you give up.

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