Airbnb is an online platform that allows people to rent out their homes, apartments, or spare rooms to travelers. The company was founded in 2008 by Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk, and it has since grown to become one of the world’s largest lodging companies. Airbnb operates in more than 220 countries and regions and has facilitated over 1 billion guest arrivals since its inception. The company’s mission is to create a world where anyone can belong anywhere, and it aims to achieve this by providing unique and authentic travel experiences that connect people from different cultures and backgrounds.
Bumble, on the other hand, is a dating app that was founded in 2014 by Whitney Wolfe Herd. The app is unique in that it requires women to make the first move when initiating conversations with matches, making it a popular choice for women who are tired of traditional dating dynamics. Since its launch, Bumble has expanded beyond dating to include networking and friend-finding features. The company’s mission is to empower women and create a safe, inclusive space for people to connect and build meaningful relationships.
Both Airbnb and Bumble have experienced significant success in their respective industries. Airbnb has disrupted the traditional lodging industry and has made travel more accessible and affordable for millions of people around the world. Bumble has challenged societal norms around gender roles in dating and has become a popular alternative to other dating apps that can be rife with harassment and other issues.
How did it all Start?
However according to a report by CNBC (Sauer, 2023), success of both Airbnb and Bumble was not straight forward. The story of how Airbnb co-founders Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk secured their startup investment is a unique one. When the trio launched their company in 2008, investors were hesitant to buy into the idea of strangers staying in other people’s homes. Rejected by the VC world, they turned to their own customers for fundraising dollars and sold self-designed cereal boxes featuring then-presidential candidates Barack Obama and John McCain as a breakfast option in Airbnbs.
The cereal was a hit, selling over 1,000 boxes and making $30,000 for the company. The success caught the attention of Paul Graham, co-founder of tech startup accelerator Y Combinator, who offered them an investment specifically because of the cereal. “If you can convince people to pay $40 for $4 boxes of cereal, maybe, just maybe, you can convince strangers to live with each other,” Graham said.
Y Combinator was responsible for one of Airbnb’s earliest investments, giving the then-startup $20,000 in exchange for 6% of the company. Today, Airbnb has a market capitalization of $75.13 billion, helping to create and popularize the modern on-demand lodging industry.
But what can we learn from this story? First and foremost, rejection is not the end of the world for startups. The trio behind Airbnb faced multiple rejections from major investors during their first year of operations, but they didn’t let that stop them. Chesky noted in a 2015 Medium post that the investors who rejected them were smart people, but they didn’t look very impressive at the time. Instead, they used their rejection as motivation to keep pushing forward.
Similarly, Bumble CEO and co-founder Whitney Wolfe Herd was rejected by investors several times while trying to launch her dating app. Investors weren’t keen on the idea of women solely initiating conversations with matches and told her the platform would fail because it defied social norms. But Wolfe Herd used the rejection as motivation and evidence that her ideas were future-facing. She believed in herself and her vision, and it paid off. Today, Bumble is a successful dating app with over 100 million users.
The lesson here is clear: don’t let rejection discourage you from pursuing your dreams. Believe in yourself, believe in your ideas, and keep pushing forward. You never know what unexpected opportunities may arise, just like a $40 box of cereal that led to a multimillion-dollar investment in Airbnb. So go ahead and take risks, be creative, and never give up on your vision. Who knows where it might take you?