
Wanelo: The First Million Users - kristynazdot
http://www.slideshare.net/500startups/eric-koger-cofounder-ceo-modcloth
======
sa2008
I am Sarvjeet Ahuja, on which this whole thread started. Want to clarify the
following:

\- Me and Deena are known to each other for many years \- I did the initial
coding without being the co-founder and executed it as a services business \-
I built the product with Java(Struts2, Hibernate, MySQL) and worked on it
single handedly for few years. \- Lately, when we started getting some
traction, we decided to persue it together full time, by taking equity and to
work as a co-founder and CTO of the company \- We got the first terms sheet
when I was the co-founder of the company. Someone has given the link to TMT
investments, which is correct. \- Due to some difference on how to grow the
company (particularly some investors were against me being in India), we
decided to separate. The entire discussion was initiated by me and I am the
one responsible for split. \- Deena is a wonderful entrepreneur and I have
very high regards for her. And I am proud of what Wanelo has become. Entire
credit goes to her. \- Constantin is an awesome Engineer and the current team
of Wanelo is killer. They have done a phenomenal job and much better than I
could have done it. \- I am currently working as a general partner with The
Morpheus, kind of YC of India. \- I still hold a fraction of percent in the
company.

Hope that clarifies everything. Please stop making un-necessary comments
against her and stop digging the past.

~~~
MicroBerto
Out of curiosity, why did VC firms not like you in India? What were their
_real_ objections?

Thanks for the good post and clearing things up.

~~~
sa2008
Probably there were different reasons for different VC Firms. Let it go, let
us not talk about them anymore :)

------
deenav
Hey guys, I'm the CEO and Founder of Wanelo, so I'll jump in here.

In 2007-2008, I actively searched for a technical cofounder, but I couldn’t
find one. I did have a false start of working with two great engineers, who in
the end weren't interested in taking this on full time.

In parallel, I started consulting as a UX designer to make money. I eventually
took on more projects that led me to hire a small team of designers to support
all the client work. The income generated from these projects made it possible
for me bootstrap Wanelo on my own and hire an engineer in India and a couple
people under him to start building Wanelo. This was a direct contracting
situation (he got paid and there was no equity involved) which went on for a
couple of years.

We built a bunch of features that nobody cared to use until, finally, at the
end of 2010, we launched a version (mentioned in the presentation) which
people started using for the first time. At that point, I closed down my
agency, which ended my source of income. I then asked the main engineer
(Sarvjeet) if he would come on board as a CTO/cofounder (since I could no
longer pay him or anyone else) and he said yes. This didn’t last for long.
After a few months, it became clear very quickly that we were not a good fit
for a cofounder relationship. We mutually agreed to end his involvement with
the company (there was a 3 months transition period for which he got paid),
and I went on solo to raise funding and build a new team, which took over the
technical platform. Two months later, we fully rebuilt the website on an
entirely new stack, leaving all the old code behind.

To elaborate on the “no team” comment, that comes directly from investors who
refused to consider me and a remote engineer in India as a real team. This was
the main challenge in raising money. Investors would literally call me a solo
female non technical founder because it was just me with no engineering
background and some remote contractors, and it took 40 rejections from
investors to close my seed round.

~~~
Geekette
Still somewhat amazed at how discussion around a successful example of
product-market fit degenerated into such bile, but glad to see clarification
from you and Sarvjeet.

Congrats on your hard work.

~~~
k-mcgrady
>> "Still somewhat amazed at how discussion around a successful example of
product-market fit degenerated into such bile"

The original title was the problem. Unfortunately the original title was
created by the HN submitter (as far as I can tell) and it wasn't 100%
accurate. If there's one thing people on HN do well it's pick holes in things
that aren't 100% correct. It doesn't excuse some of the bile you're referring
to but I think it reinforces the need not to create our own titles when
submitting and to follow the HN guidelines around submissions.[1]

[1]
[http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
jaredsohn
>and it wasn't 100% accurate.

The title came from slide 12 of the presentation. Based on the recent posts by
the parties involved, it seems that it was accurate with respect to the
hurdles encountered in getting funding, but the presentation slides didn't
express the context of how this event fit into the history of the company.

------
dogfood123
This is an entirely bogus history. She had a tech co-founder and cut him out.
I met him back in 2009.
[https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=8860093](https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=8860093)

Why lie about it?

~~~
downandout
I'm not sure that she - the founder - is lying in this presentation (though
she fails to mention her technical cofounder). I think it's more that the
title of this submission, which was presumably not made by her, was inaccurate
(and has since been changed to its current title which is more accurate).

Lots of companies screw their technical cofounders. I was the technical
cofounder of a company that was later acquired, but never received the $12.8
million check I was supposed to and didn't have the resources to fight back
against a maniacal cofounder flush with $60+ million in new cash from the
acquisition. That doesn't mean that others can't learn from the company's
story, even if only told selectively. It just means that the people that wound
up in charge are perhaps not the kind of people you would want to do business
with.

~~~
chasing
> I was the technical cofounder of a company that was later acquired, but
> never received the $12.8 million check I was supposed to and didn't have the
> resources to fight back against a maniacal cofounder flush with $60+ million
> in new cash from the acquisition.

Not to derail, but let's hear that story. Seems like hiring a lawyer would be
a no-brainer if you were due $12.8m.

~~~
downandout
It's a long story, but I am still in the process of pursuing it legally. When
I first learned of the acquisition, I didn't have the resources to pursue it,
and even today don't have millions sitting around to pay attorneys. I sent a
letter to the acquiring company explaining the situation and demanding that I
receive my cut, and they actually responded with an extortionate threat in
writing. We are now pursuing a civil federal extortion case against both the
acquirer and my cofounder.

But, as of this moment, despite my name being on the company's first and
primary patent, having written all of its initial code, having envisioned the
entire concept of the company myself, and even having named the company, I
have seen exactly $0 from an acquisition I was supposed to receive 20% of.
Even better, with $60 million in his pocket, my womanizing, alcoholic,
conniving cofounder suddenly found Jesus and now fancies himself a
televangelist of sorts. At last contact with him, he was "praying for me". Go
figure.

So yeah, be careful when working with others. My cofounder would have been
considered by anyone that looked at him to be beyond reproach. He was not.

~~~
xux
Just a word of caution, if you're pursuing legal actions, you might consider
not posting about any details publicly. Talk to your lawyer before you do
anything...

~~~
downandout
I thought about that, but I've said nothing here that would hinder my case.
They outright stole from me, and then when I called them on it, they responded
with extortion. They aren't in a great legal position.

~~~
peterwwillis
> I've said nothing here that would hinder my case

Any good lawyer will tell you the same piece of advice: "never say anything."
It does absolutely zero positive good for your case and can only serve to
hinder it later. It's very difficult sometimes to keep from providing what you
consider to be valuable feedback for others, but you have your own interests
to consider first.

------
squigs25
This is a really impressive story. I wish we got more background about the
2010 era, before she hired engineers in San Francisco? Was this site
completely freelancer developed initially? How many users did she get before
shipping out to cali?

BTW, this site is really taking off with young, social-media crazed teenagers,
so keep an eye on it! Already at 8MM users, it's similar to pinterest with a
business model that really makes sense.

~~~
deenav
Yes, completely freelancer developed. I closed the agency and moved to SF from
LA when we got to 30k monthly uniques.

Overall, the two years prior to the inflection point and the first users were
pretty inefficient. The vision was actually always the same (a universal
social platform for all of shopping), but the execution changed dramatically.
We literally just kept launching features around this concept, but they were
pretty unfocused, until the minimalist redesign.

On the other hand, this 2 year period allowed me to make lots of product
design mistakes and learn from them and to develop a personal philosophy and
approach to product design.

------
luxpir
6 years. That's my favourite part. Kudos for sticking at it throughout when
I'm sure there were times it felt less than certain it would work out.

Been working on my own startup for (what feels like) too long, having to
actually earn a living in the meantime, so appreciate seeing another business
go from seed to growth in a similar time scale.

People always laud the internet for allowing ordinary people to do all sorts
of exceptional things. This is an example of one of those things, and it
shouldn't be taken away from its creator for any of the infinite trivial
reasons that could be imagined.

~~~
ballard
One thing is to keep ongoing tech (servers etc) costs low so it can simmer.
Shutting apps down just destroys value.

------
skizm
Slide 8: no one cares. Slide 9: not interesting. Slide 10: 30k monthly
uniques. What happened there? That is all I really care about.

~~~
deenav
:) What happened was that we removed the crap that was built before. Only 2
things could not be removed: products and people, so the homepage became a
precursor to what it is today: a minimalist grid of products posted by users.

I then spent $20 a day on Facebook ads. The goal was simply to get a small
stream of people to check out the website and to see if they would use it. I
didn't think I could actually grow a community by spending on ads since I
didn't have that much money to spend. To my shock, people actually started
using it and were sticking around. The reason was that the website exposed
them to surprising, unique products from stores they've never heard about.

It's also worth noting that I optimized the ad a lot, tweaking all the details
(targeting, image used, copy, where the ad clicks to) until I had an ad that
was performing really well, meaning that I was making that $20 count.

~~~
skizm
Thanks for the reply. I appreciate it. It is amazing that you got the growth
you did by only spending 20 bucks a day on FB ads. People must really like the
product! Great job.

------
antr
I saw Deena's presentation at 500's Commercism conference and it was really
inspiring. An entrepreneur that doesn't fit the stereotypical valley
entrepreneur has executed an idea that users really seem to use and love. Good
for her.

------
mcintyre1994
Slide 5, is not identifying Amazon there some kind of joke? I know they're not
the same but I'm not sure how you say online shopping is completely without
any answer without looking daft.

Anyway they seem to be doing well and they have amazing reviews and a great
brand. I'd really like to know how they decided not to show pricing in their
feed though on the mobile app. When I joined I followed lots of companies,
those I shop at and those I'd like to shop at mainly - it got really old
really fast clicking through to see pricing. Just my opinion though, like I
said they get great reviews so maybe these people use it differently, only
following stores they use or are less price sensitive. Also I'm male so I know
I'm not really their target audience, but they do have a lot of men's stores
on there.

~~~
deenav
Amazon is not a social platform.

~~~
mcintyre1994
Fair enough if that's what she was going for, I didn't see the talk so I'm
just going from the slides. Interestingly shopping is probably where the new
players have made the biggest impact on the 90s players (where they existed)
in that list though.

------
cfontes
Non-tech and the first site was made using what? Her mind power? Wordpress?

~~~
igvadaimon
That's what I wanted to ask.

All that "single, female, non-tech" doesn't make much sense to me if a team of
developers was hired to create this website.

~~~
ballard
And she takes credit for it personally.

Gotta promote the team members or it looks like they're replaceable cutouts.

------
loceng
I enjoy seeing the holistic progress / story of a startup. It's comforting to
see for others that things do take a long time.

------
GBKS
Wanelo has a great conversational tone in it's copywriting. Check out the
iPhone app update descriptions: [http://www.appannie.com/apps/ios/app/wanelo-
shopping/](http://www.appannie.com/apps/ios/app/wanelo-shopping/)

I believe I've read somewhere that Deena writes those descriptions herself.
She doesn't talk about it, but I think this personality goes a long way with
her audience.

------
joshbert
Can someone tell me why it could possibly be relevant to say that she is
single?

~~~
squigs25
Why is it relevant that she's female?

~~~
AdamFernandez
Specifying characteristics of exemplary people, can serve as an encouraging
example for others with those characteristics. Maybe another potential future
female founder will read about her example, and decide to pursue the same
path. Not everyone needs that, but sometimes it helps.

~~~
nyrina
Which is a great thing, due to the massive lack of female founders in the tech
world.

Males and females look at things differently, too, so there must be huge
markets for female founders, who really understands women much better than
males does.

This was a perfect example, too, as shopping is something the female
population really... Excels at. :)

------
caio1982
Loved a particular slide about how they (she?) did it: "The right people:
builders and get-shit-done-ers, pragmatic, non religious about tech, move
fast, team over rockstars"

~~~
eddd
I saw a few projects where "developers" were not religious about tech.. they
still using ftp for php files deployment, "BUT HEY! THE SHIT IS DONE!" :). I
don't want be sarcastic, but i think every startup team should have at least
one engineer who will know what to do, at every iteration of the project.

~~~
poweribo
whats the "preferred" way nowadays? commit source using git to server and let
it autodeploy?

~~~
eddd
If you can deploy: fast, atomically, without downtime and can revert your
changes at any given moment, then it is not that important :)

------
ohwp
About rebuilding from scratch: Most of the time this is a big NO in software.
But I think a demo product is an exception.

A demo is just a demo. Quickly put together as a proof of concept. And I think
going from demo to product is the one and only time when rebuilding from
scratch makes sense.

So I think they made the right choice.

------
wiradikusuma
Call me skeptical, but it reminds me of
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO5sxLapAts](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO5sxLapAts)

Like other commenters have said, how did she, being a non-technical founder
with no team, could set up the (what appears to be custom-made) website? It's
like going to a hackathon and claim that you build an app within 24 hours, but
actually have implemented majority of it beforehand and making it a "library".

Anyway, looking at the positive side, had the slides contain more detail, I
believe it can be inspiring for many people and not received with skepticisms.

~~~
antr
at the presentation (not the doc, but the video) she is pretty clear that she
didn't built the thing. she says this a couple of times at least

------
borat4prez
Very interesting, although someone claims the history to be bogus.

I currently have a website that gets over 500k Uniques per month and over 5m
pageviews a month, so it's interesting to see what the future could hold!

~~~
winslow
I'm curious. What's the website? How'd you reach that audience? Short story?

~~~
borat4prez
A little luck and a little experience. Plus 4 years of community growth.

I prefer not to say the site if you understand.

~~~
winslow
Of course. Thanks for the response.

PS. How's the Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan?

------
eddd
"I am not tech, but i started with doing tech (website?) stuff". Am i missing
something?

------
jw2013
Deena Varshavskaya (Wanelo) at Startup Grind 2014
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgtHV8DSrgI](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgtHV8DSrgI)

Glimpse Conference SF 2013: Fireside Chat - Wanelo
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1g4s4HmLIU](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1g4s4HmLIU)

------
ballard
Look up their stats on quantcast and compete, tells a different story.

~~~
keule
"This publisher has not implemented Quantcast Measurement. Data is estimated
and not verified by Quantcast"

------
MCarusi
Churchill was right. Success consists of going from failure to failure without
loss of enthusiasm.

------
MicroBerto
Seems like a cool tool for people who like to shop for visually appealing
stuff, but I don't think it's really "fixed" any problems or truly modernized
e-commerce.

It's basically a clever front for a ton of affiliate programs, which interests
me because my startup does something similar. I just wouldn't go so far as to
consider it the "YouTube of Shopping" (slide 5).

If anything, Amazon Prime belongs in that position on slide 5.

~~~
deenav
We're just getting started. Amazon Prime is not a social platform. Slide 5 is
all about the web becoming social.

~~~
treaclesmuggler
It's a nice assertion you make that "Amazon prime is not social".

I find the opposite to be true.

~~~
MicroBerto
Yeah I wouldn't call it social in the 'growth hacking' sense... but it's
certainly social in that it comes up in conversation nearly as often as
Facebook or Twitter (in my non-tech circles).

~~~
treaclesmuggler
It's been around since the 1990s, so it's not "sexy".

Even though Amazon has been an important part of my own business for actually
selling stuff, Amazon Prime has revolutionised the ability for small sellers
to move volume (and solved the logistics hurdles), and Amazon's cloud
computing is critical for tons of other startups to run their infrastructure--
not to mention is being chosen by established players.

But, no, it's not "social".

------
PalUk
What would be really cool is if I could use wanelo as a search engine for
something I'd like to buy but I don't know where. Like I want to buy a pair of
striped shoes with butterflies on for a kid. I put the description somewhere
-and I get pictures of the products available. Is it something you are
planning to add?

------
melindajb
Great deck. Congrats on your success. I briefly met your sister in a ruby
class a couple of years ago and was impressed by the work ethic both of you
displayed.

Could you talk more about how you got from "nobody cares" to the first funding
that attracted your CTO? Was that the $20/day in FB ads?

------
RealGeek
The video of this talk is available at
[http://livestre.am/4OaXa](http://livestre.am/4OaXa)

Deena's talk starts at 31:00 mark.

------
sergiotapia
It's really inspiring to see an idea go from conception to 'success'! Thanks
for sharing your timeline!

------
locusm
Having to sign in to view a single product flies in the face of everything Ive
read about successful ecom sites.

------
jsudhams
Just tried signup and sign up is over http and https... ooops that does not
sound good.

------
wahoo1000
$20 a day on FB ads for a few months. This.

~~~
treaclesmuggler
There was a period in time when $500 or so in FB ads would result in a $5000
sale, so the math worked for me. FB ads work surprisingly well if you target
them properly.

In my case, targeting males who were either married or not in a relationship,
age 21-40, and then had a variety of interests really narrowed things down.

I gleaned the approach from looking at our 50 or so past customers who all fit
that demographic.l

------
shangxiao
Title changed now?

~~~
borat4prez
The original title was linkbait.

------
kyro
Lesson learned: Don't upload a fun, story-telling presentation online for fear
that a third-party may submit it to HN where you will likely be ridiculed not
only for not applying scientific-study-level-rigor to every bullet point and
image you've placed on your slides, but also for events of your past that are
constructed from nothing more than tenuous inference and speculation.

You guys are a lovely and welcoming bunch. I'm sure YC, successful startups,
and potential founders really desire rockstars like you who've got this
wondrous natural ability for unnecessary criticism.

~~~
thegorillamofo
More like Lesson learned: Don't upload a story board full of blatant lies,
misrepresentation of facts and half truths and expect people to just fall down
and worship the ground you walk on.

~~~
kyro
Big words for someone who just created an account to critique this submission.

------
thegorillamofo
So, she's non technical and somehow has a website that someone presumably set
up, installed on a server and maintained etc? Or she's 'solo'? There's talk of
a founder being cut out early on (cannot confirm or refute)... In short,
there's parts to this story that are missing.

You can't just throw up your favourite flavour of CMS with a theme from
themeforest and magically hit it off, there's technical considerations that
need to be made.

3 Options really.

1\. She is technical and knows all about web development (no idea why she'd
lie about that though)

2\. She did indeed have a founder she cut out.

3\. She wasn't solo on the project.

Something doesn't gel here.

~~~
dmor
She was running an agency before, it's possible she just just hired people to
do work for her but they weren't a permanent part of the team.

