Summary Notebook

The Minimalist Entrepreneur

The Minimalist Entrepreneur

by Sahil Lavingia

8 min read

The barriers to starting an online business are coming down faster than we can imagine.

Sahil, the founder of Gumroad, shares his experiences of building small but profitable businesses without raising VC funding.

Let's start with this understanding:

The Small Business Club

Let’s get this straight:

You don’t have to build a billion-dollar business to be successful.

You don’t have to be a Silicon Valley unicorn.

Most Silicon Valley startups have the same story:

They raise millions of dollars of VC funding, hire hundreds of people, set unrealistic targets, and crash and burn within a couple of years.

As I’m writing this, Fast Checkout shut down after raising $102 million in VC funding.

Instead, you can be a minimalistic entrepreneur and build a sustainable and meaningful business.

How?