

Ask HN: Do you want to be a billionaire? - biznerd

Not the typical question on HN. But just seeing so many people in the Valley aiming to be the next Mark Zuckerberg &#x2F; Bill Gates. Such a goal comes at a great cost. Not only the amount of work required but you&#x27;ll probably need to chase high risk opportunities which the vast majority of the time end in failure.<p>Or do you want something like 37signals? More of a lifestyle company, with 4 day workweeks on the Summer. Jason Fried is influential in many circles.<p>Or something like patio (kalzumeus.com)... solopreneur. I think I read he works 10 hours a week but stills makes an impact?<p>Pluses and minuses to each.
======
MalcolmDiggs
IMHO:

Reaching a level of success can still be "suffering" if that success is built
on the suffering of others.

So, while yes I'd certainly love to be a Billionaire in theory, I have a hard
time thinking of how that could come about in a way that wouldn't compound and
produce more suffering in the world. My own, and others'.

~~~
dylanjermiah
How does earning money cause others suffering?

~~~
tobylane
The difficulty of having an entire business that earns you a billion while
paying a living wage, let alone the supply chain. See Apple's efforts to be
green (eg mercury free in 2010-ish) but Foxconns' suicides.

~~~
linkregister
Are you talking about the suicide rate that's lower than the general Chinese
population?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn_suicides#cite_note-
eco...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn_suicides#cite_note-economist-6)

Does Facebook exploit any of its workers? (I'm not being rhetorical, I truly
haven't looked into it)

~~~
tobylane
Oh, fair enough. I just believed the media.

As for Facebook I haven't heard anything about non-US workers, barely anything
about non-tech workers except that painter who took stock.

------
daviross
Not given the ethical cost required to get anywhere near there, no.

Though "Do you want to" makes it sound like it's as much of a choice as "Do
you want to move to another country?" (Which is itself a rather restricted
thing)

~~~
dylanjermiah
What are the ethical costs?

------
kohanz
Is 37signals really a "lifestyle company"? Sure the founders are not
billionaires, but I think with the (what I assume are) 8-figure revenues they
must have, they'd be considered more than "lifestyle".

~~~
davismwfl
It depends on how far into the 8 figures they have made it, their headcount,
net income and their stated goals, in my opinion.

I have worked a lot with SMB market (as well as tech startups) and there are a
lot of smaller 7 and lower 8 figure type businesses where owners travel for
significant chunks of time and the business keeps running. That to me is a
lifestyle business, as the owner(s) aren't required to be sitting there
everyday. At the same time most that I have met that have this luxury aren't
going to be going public or seeking outside investments etc (nor could they
likely).

The first one I met I thought was a huge anomaly but after now having done a
lot of SMB work in the past 6-7 years, I have found a lot more of these types
of businesses around the US then I ever thought. They aren't usually glamorous
nor tech focused but they are "lifestyle" businesses in my opinion because the
owner can really set his/her schedule and doesn't have to be there daily or
worry about income. I also have seen a fair number of these businesses are
family owned and may go back 1-2 generations.

So not sure what 37Signals founder goals are, but they seem like the grow slow
(relatively speaking) and grow long, versus the typical tech company that is
trying to do it all in 3-5 years using OPM.

~~~
rudimental
Could you give more insight onto these types of companies? Employees,
industries, products, revenue/profit, everything. They sound interesting.

~~~
davismwfl
Sure. Like I said most aren't glamorous nor necessarily tech in their core
nature. I know some of the rough FTE counts, but also some of these used quite
a bit of part time help.

Electrical Contractor - ~$14M/Annual revenue, less than 30 FTE's. Honestly a
couple variations of this too around, one was a regional HVAC supply company
etc.

Small boat manufacturer - ~$25M annual revenue, less than 60 FTE's (IIRC)
Family owned, started only about 10 years ago. Owners worked their asses off
until the past few years (I think he said when he crossed the $18M mark as
that was some magic number for them).

Family that has purchased many Franchise stores from Texas to Virginia and
Florida - ~$8M annual rev and they never work in a store other than when it
opens to help set the tone. They visit them often though. I have no clue the
count of employees they have, but in the holding company we did work for it
was only about 4-5.

Plumbing contractor - ~$9M annually, they started as a pure service contractor
and then also opened up regional distribution of supplies. Supply side is the
higher growth side for them, even through the real estate market stupidity. I
guess everyone needs a toilet that works and pipes that don't leak though, so
makes some sense.

Financial Auditing Software - ~$14M annually, they wrote custom software 15-18
years ago (and keep updating it) that analyzes loan risks and compliance for
underwriters. Around a dozen FTE's, owner would rarely wear shoes when he came
to the office, always made me laugh.

Consumer wearables (shirts, hats, backpacks etc) - ~$11M annually, < 25 FTE's.
Actually a few of these types of business we have worked for, but they seem to
come and go more than others, so my sense is sustainability doesn't seem to be
really easy in that market place.

Some of these numbers are old and I know at least 2 of these are likely doing
considerably better now. The things I noted when I was doing work for these
and others is how they structured their companies. They always focused on
hiring people to manage things for them and focused on training the
leadership. They never made the business all about them, maybe to help get it
off the ground but not after. That lets them pick and choose what they do and
allows them the freedom of the "lifestyle" business. I probably have done work
with 25-30 over the past 7 years that would fit into this category now. I
can't say I have seen too many with > $25M in revenue, as that seems to be
when people start selling out or they have to jump back in 100% and push to a
new level (just my observation/guess).

Also, in talking to them the other common theme is it was never "lifestyle" in
the early days, it was only after they hit their magic tipping number or a
certain number of years of profitability at a certain level that it became
"lifestyle" for them.

~~~
cylinder
All the rich people I know IRL have businesses like this. None are in websites
or startups. I know millionaires who don't have an email address. I wish I had
gone into one of these fields, the web feels like the most saturated place on
the planet right now.

~~~
davismwfl
Almost all the wealthy people I know did it through a combination of real
estate and small businesses too. Only a few came directly from anything
technology based.

I don't necessarily think the web is saturated it is more that the tech media
and places like HN have a small but very active community and so things seem
very crowded. I personally intentionally sought out a lot of the traditional
companies to consult with because I knew they have been underserved and
frankly not well appreciated by the general tech community. Sure, lots of SaaS
solutions get built but many times they are 65% of what the company needs etc,
and with a little extra help and integration work we can give them a cost
effective, 98% solution that they can live with and helps them make more
money. It comes with challenges though too as these same small businesses can
be a challenge to work with at times more than a startup or an enterprise
client, so its not a panacea by any means.

Personally, I have been diversifying for years and working to acquire real
estate and work in markets that have little to do with technology as a core.
Not because I don't love the tech industry, I just am playing the odds,
diversifying and doing stuff that I love so it all works out for me. Plus
something appeals to me at some level not to be behind a computer day in and
day out the rest of my life.

------
icpmacdo
I dont think there would be any difference in my lifestyle between 50 million
in the bank and 5 billion. It would be cool to be able to donate hundreds of
millions of dollars to charities though.

------
brudgers
The 37signals people probably got where they are via long stretches of living
the consultant life style (since they were consultants). Before things scaled,
they weren't working Ferris-Four-Hour-Work-Weeks but grinding for clients.

I've been thinking about the next company I try to build a lot lately. I don't
really care about being a billionaire nor do I care about emulating
Zuckerberg...it's too late for me to get admitted to Harvard, much less drop
out. But winding up with a fuck-you money sized exit would be nice and what
I've come to believe is that it's not appreciably more work to build a $2
billion company than a $2 million one. I'll probably have to work my ass off
either way, and there's still a lot of risk that either winds up a $0 million
company in the end.

People can work decades to build a company that makes them a multi-
thousandaire. Scale comes from businesses that scale not in proportion to hard
work.

------
throwaway1410
> Or something like patio (kalzumeus.com)... solopreneur. I think I read he
> works 10 hours a week but stills makes an impact?

Let's not give in to SV newspeak where running a business means "making an
impact".

~~~
dylanjermiah
Creating a product or service which people find valuable enough to purchase is
'making an impact'.

~~~
throwaway1410
Really? So literally every business activity (e.g. running a small grocery
store on the corner) is 'making an impact'? For me, this term implicitly means
making SIGNIFICANT impact, not just any impact.

~~~
dylanjermiah
Yes. There was no prior mention of magnitude. I benefit vey greatly from my
local grocer, s/he provides with quality goods at a reasonable price -- making
an impact on me.

Now, how do you draw the line with 'significance'?

~~~
throwaway1410
I think it's purely intuitive concept, with no clear definition. But without
it, literally every particle in this universe is making an impact.

~~~
dylanjermiah
In other words, it's a hazy and easily misinterpret-able term. No, defining a
prerequisite/s instead of relying on an general idea of 'intuitiveness' would
be a more appropriate approach.

Everything 'makes an impact' the magnitude of the impact makes all the
difference.

------
burger_moon
I don't think many people will outright say on the record they want to be
billionaires on here because then it looks like they're just in it for the
money. There's a stigma against wanting to be rich in this industry over just
'passionate'.

I wonder how many people say internally to themselves they want to be like one
of those people, but are willing to put in the work to get there. How many
people are really willing to make the sacrifices to be at the top.

------
programmernews3
I do want and I;m putting the time, effort and thinking into it to be a
billionaire. At the same time I'm absolutely enjoying the route towards it and
really like how I spend most of my time just working in the right direction.

------
J_Darnley
> Do you want to be a billionaire?

Yes but it will never happen. I will never even see 1 million, unless economic
collapse starting in Greece causes rampant inflation here.

