Here is my answer on a question on Quora https://www.quora.com/What-does-it-feel-like-to-be-poor
I was born to a well-to-do family. I am 30 now but for most of my life (till age 28) I had almost everything I wanted. Thankfully my wishes were not crazy. My passion with computers had me acquire 4 laptops, 2 expensive desktops, Used to change my phone atleast twice a year. Somehow I managed to do well in my career towards later part and landed a good job in world’s largest software company. With good salary, I enjoyed privileges like “Only-flight” travels, foreign leisure trip, car of my own, high -end restaurant dinners/lunch atleast 5 days a week. XBox, PS3 games on weekend, online shopping at will and lots more.
So why I am showing off? Well because life turned on its head in last 2 years. While being born in a poor family is difficult but becoming poor after enjoying a prosperous life for sometime, is mentally very painful. I got married, had a baby and unfortunately around that time I could not resist my life long aim to become an entrepreneur. I left my job and started in an sector in which I had no idea whatsoever. I had to force/convince my wife to quit her job as well and work on my startup. So here are two people who are jobless and have to manage a company and a family.
Now over the past years, I have used up all my savings. The bank balance has steadily deteriorated. Its been two years since we have left our place of dwelling. When my parents visit us or my In-laws visit us, its they who takes care of monthly expenses. I sold my car, very soon will be using OLX to sell my home gym and PS3. We have now degraded our internet connection from 16 mbps to 4 mbps, We have now resorted to Rice and 1 curry or Rotis and 1 curry. I haven’t bought any new dress for me or my wife for past two years. We are now not attending any friends or family get together or events like marriages as we cannot afford the cost of travel, gifts etc.
But I am still thankful, that we are getting food 3 times a day that millions other do not get. I am thankful that I am able to write this post with my laptop and internet connection. In coming days we will cost further costs and continue to grow poorer financially , but my passion for my work and start-up makes me feel richer day by day. So when I am not working, the feeling of being poor and getting poorer each day is taking its toll mentally. Thankfully the moment I get back to work, I feel all charged up and enthusiastic to change the world.
–Gourav
www.groupshoppy.com
Image Courtesy: https://www.vipvirtualsolutions.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/time-poor-businessman.jpg
asha chaudhry
gourav…. it takes a LOT OF COURAGE to post and share what you have!
i’d like you to update your post with your PAIN POINTS. what issues are you facing? what are your road blocks etc etc. i would urge you to tell us or ask everyone how you can improve your situation? where are you STUCK? is it only funding-related or something else? i’m sure some rodinhooder can help you solve some issues?!
paritoshsharma1231
Hey Gourav,
Welcome and KEEP AT IT. You and your wife have already said FU*K you money. This is a brilliant state to be in, especially coz, this brings you and your wife much more closer. It makes happen a lot of other good things in life.
Let me explain why I said welcome: https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/what-to-do-when-you-are-broke…
Read the post above, which I did a few days back on RH. I am in a similar state, that you are, though I haven’t sold anything as of yet. Just coz, I made a promise to myself, that for my choices, I won’t ever make my family be affected by them. My choices are mine. Not anyone else’s.
Anyway, no1’s right, no1’s wrong. Its all about the CHOICES we make in life.
Lets get to business. What are the OBSTACLES that you are facing in your venture?
Why am I asking this?
So let me be the first one to help you.
Also, GO and watch the Wolf Of Wall Street and get this being “poor” off your head. I took it off the day I wrote the post on RH.
Trust me, since that day, Iv realized, its on my head now to make it happen. My life, my family, people working with me are at stake.
There’s no fuc*ing way I can throw in the towel. Don’t you dare do that. Go WIN! God Bless…
CS Taher
The Mantra for startups –
Be cruel on your mind, never isolate yourself
Whatever the mind can conceive THE MIND CAN ACHIEVE
Gourav Das
Yes, fund raising is definitely one of the road blocks. But in true sense its the cliched “building a team” that’s causing huge head ache. In past I have found few good people but unfortunately by the time I reach them, they already start with their own startup or their friend’s. Now I am unable to find people who can work with us but only expect equity as of now.
With just 2 full time members, our development is crawling as majority of our time is getting spent on Seller followup, order management, inventory management, customer calls, bug fixing. So the game changing ideas which we plan to push into our production is getting delayed each day.
While we should be happy as our number of orders increase steadily, we are very dissappointed that product wise, we are at the same stage when we launched 3 months ago. If this continues that way, we will end up being just another marketplace/platform.
So I am actually looking for funds to hire engineers (as I am not able to find people who will work for just equity), 2-3 Support staff and support our growing infrastructure needs.
Sanchita Dutta
Logging on to rodinhoods after a long time just to reply to this article!!
Really sad to hear about ur story. i clearly remember when u shared ur groupshoppy story for the first time here. with the benefit of hindsight though, i must say i had an uncomfortable feeling about where and how will this venture go. most deal sites have shut shop or changed themselves completely. on e-commerce, only big sites are working with most smaller, and even niche products e-com sites remaining on fringes with low and insginificant traction.
with this as background, i must say that it was a bit too risky to put all eggs in one basket by leaving two jobs to pursue this one. perhaps a better option could be that one job remains and one pursues this!
with a family to fend, i think it would be most sensible thing to do.
what i suggest is only out of my own experiences of e-com. we went down drastically losing more than 100% of the capital invested and revenues earned, but were lucky to rise up again within a short time. but this has taught to always spread our risks.
so while we are passionately pursuing our own e-com site http://www.indiacod.com, we have not deserted our cash cows or other source of income namely our ebay accounts indiacod and gizmobhai. Infact we have further expanded to other marketplaces like flipkart, amazon, snapdeal and shopclues just to ensure that we have multiple strings to support us and are not dependent on any single factor or source.
i strictly feel, it is still a good idea to have a little course correction.
best wishes
Sanchita (http://www.indiacod.com)
paritoshsharma1231
Wooah, Gourav.
Love your passion. I’d only say this: every entrepreneur out there is building the NEXT BIG THING. Each one of us, ha ha!
You know, you can hack PR if you’re worth it and get mentions by real reporters. Anyway, no more advice.
The thing is simple: you shared an experience, people as always took it in an emotional state and reacted back to you.
That you are so clear about the NEXT BIG THING, you’re building, I wish you all luck and with the fire and passion anything can be done. Funds, PR, whatever…! Go talk to investors and ask them if they will clearly write you checks. If not everything else is bull crap.
You completely lost Sachita’s comment earlier:
She gave sane advice of not putting all your eggs in the same basket 🙂
God Bless..
Gourav Das
Yes you are absolutely wrong :P. Not everyone wants to build the next big thing. Many want to build a business and hope it to become next big thing.
I posted a quora response, people connected and reacted emotionally. I connected their replies and reacted too. So no big deal, All’s well.
Sachita’s advice is just an entrepreneurial version of my Mother’s advice – “Drop the business and get back to job. Do great work and get promoted”. Tell me what’s wrong with that? If you say you would not be able to do what you want, I will say that is crap. Expedia founder while working at Microsoft, raised money for from Microsoft for a business which had nothing to do with Microsoft(Expedia). The thing with advises is that the probability of it being right is 0.5 :). Anyways I believe that if I prove Sachita’s analysis wrong, she would be more happy to see us flourish than perish.
Also makes me wonder why you think for Investors, apart from writing checks everything else is “bull-crap”, I have gained more from some of the Investors advice, than others.
Most interestingly even if I raise the amount I am going to raise, I am still going to be poor, because it does not have founder’s salary.
Gourav Das
Reposting an edited version of a previous reply as a well wisher informed me that I m giving out too much information and I sound rude too. So please pardon, I m just a bad writer.
I must be a really bad writer otherwise why would anyone think that groupshoppy is a “deal-site”. We never were, not are, a “deal-site”. Neither are we sellers. We are at best an eco-system that promises to bring real life shopping experiences to web among other things. I should write about GroupShoppy again, so that I pass the correct information.
Yes most deal sites have shut shop and in next 2 years most Price comparison sites will shut shop too. Most “niche” shops will also start selling everything and eventually start selling on Ebay, GroupShoppy. Only the ones that are able to provide ways to increase sales consistently will stay. i.e. Only the platforms will stay and all others will use these platforms to sell.
Again what you did with your E-Commerce venture draws no parallels to ours. Its like comparing apples and oranges. If at any point I realize I cannot take my venture to top 3 in my sector, I will quit.
We work out of our home. Bluedart refused to provide their services as we don’t have an “office”. Till August, no payment gateway was ready to provide us their services. Its Alok, Asha who helped me there. Now we are getting almost 30 COD requests that we cannot serve. Indians in US/Canada/UAE want to order but we cannot serve them. If our growth is not optimal its also mainly because we do not have the support of required partners.
All I can say is that you completely misunderstood GroupShoppy. Yes the name is misleading too and looks like my post about GroupShoppy did’t help the cause either. Hope some other day I post about GroupShoppy again, so that people know what GroupShoppy is about. And ofcourse when we decide we also want to expand our categories, we will reach out to IndiaCOD and then you would come to know about us more.
Anamika Joshi
Hey Gourav
Just to mention, you are not a bad writer. The most perfect line echoing the crux of entrepreneurship was – “but my passion for my work and start-up makes me feel richer day by day.”
It could be a phase, a block you are unable to identify, an idea waiting to strike and make the way ahead smoother or anything that’s not working as of now in your favour. But if you do find what it is, share it over here. I bet you would find a bunch of awesome people to lead you ahead.
Saraswathi Pulluru
Gourav, it’s heartbreaking to see the deteriorating condition which very few dare to undertake, with their family at stake.
In one of your responses, you said that if GroupShoppy is not in the top 3, you will quit. How far are you from there?
I understand that Hiring is one of your major pain points.I presume you tried all the new-age portals and networking to find people. Hire college freshers and train them? Not sure, just giving ideas.
Although you didn’t like what Sanchita said – I would tend to agree with her partially. If you do not like the idea of going back to a job, would some part time consulting help? Your corporate experience must have given you good network to fall back on, anyone you could use here?
Bad times test people like no other, All the best!
Alok Rodinhood Kejriwal
My God.
I’m sorry, but I also think you have been foolish.
While you may have ‘wanted’ to be an entrepreneur, that does not mean that you were entitled to make your wife and kid suffer.
Now, what is done is done. HOW CAN I HELP YOU GET A JOB??
PLEASE PLEASE MAIL ME – alok@rodinhood.com with your expertise and CV and let me try my best.
JGD.
Gourav Das
🙂 . I have always been an entrepreneur and never “wanted” to become one. I created and sealed a deal with Strategy First Games Inc. during my engineering days (2003-2004) for a Cricket game emulator. Created and pitched couple of enterprise level SQL enhancing products to MS top management.
Off late I wanted to “start an organization” and that’s what been done. My wife’s an entrepreneur too, at heart, so she loves the new challenges we face each day. Of course we are able to make sure we had saved aside some for our 6 month old daughter.
I thank you for extending your help in getting me a different job. But trust me, I am really happy in my current job of developing the organization and product, If I don’t do it, someone else will do it. Getting another job is still a cakewalk (well almost). Instead of my CV, I would rather email you the CV of our product. But if you can help me in finding the right places to look for good engineers for our startup, who don’t mind working for an equity, it would be the most valuable help right now
Gourav Das
Well I actually said that at any point if I feel that GroupShoppy cannot make it to top 3 I will quit. I guess I am 2.5 years away from actually making GroupShoppy in top 3. But in between if I see growth recession , no other avenues remain unexplored and making it to top 3 is not possible then I can call it quits too. If I call it quits, my next innovation in “City traffic routing” awaits me.
And I like Sanchita’s advice, contrary to what I may sound like. Its just that its too early and too safe to follow her advice and it hampers the Startup’s prospects, though her advice will ensure we resume our sane life.
Rahul narvekar
Love your spirit man
Gunjan Kejriwal
Hi Gourav !!!
At the outset , thanks a lot for sharing ur pain. It’s not always very easy to accept in front of the world…well i am a firm believer of the fact that when we let out our true feelings in the universe..the energy of all the people that care and the unknown start working in favor of healing ur pain. I have no doubt whatsoever , let me say that again , no doubt whatsoever that this is not a permanent state and things will change and for the better. It is also wonderful to know that u still value ur present condition and understand how well off are u in comparison to the millions of people even less fortunate.
“Joy shared is joy doubled and sorrow shared is sorrow halved” . well i/we might not actually live ur pain as u sell away few things close to u, but we all understand ur situation and wld be glad to help u in any way possible.
Every day and every experience does teach us something…m sure there is a reason for this..me n u wont be able to comprehend , that’s for the Masters’ to know.
Keep at it…i m sure..life will take a u turn once again..
lots of regards , love , wishes and hugs !!!
Chetan Vashistth
Dear Gourav,
I am not big enough to offer help to you but I will be more than happy if can do something on equity basis. I am running a training center in Noida and teaching engineers to code PHP, Android, iOS, Windows app. So we are with a number of interns always, so if you need then we can talk about this option.
please shoot a mail at
v.chetan@adleaf-tech.com
Geetha Ravi
Nothing is permanent in life. this too will pass you will be rich(financially) as still you are rich in your attitude towards life.
This kind of change is only to learn something which was not possible otherwise.There is something that God wants you to know & learn.
You have lot of ” Rodinhooders ” to support you in many ways.You are sure to come out of it.All the best!
Sushrut Munje
Hey, I was biting my lips after reading all the emotional replies but Alok’s resonated most. Echoing his words- you simply have no right to let your family go through this. Entrepreneurship is all about making money and more of it. It is all about luxury and living in abundance. And though it takes a few years to reach that stage, YOU GOT TO MAKE MONEY.
Please get a job and live a comfortable life.
Experiment with a financial cushion please.
You have a family to take care of.
Sorry if I sound harsh. Best wishes.
vipin garg
“Now we are getting almost 30 COD requests that we cannot serve. Indians in US/Canada/UAE want to order but we cannot serve them. If our growth is not optimal its also mainly because we do not have the support of required partners”
Gaurav, Can u explain what kind of partners you need to complete the COD cycle in India and abroad.. Spl UAE .
Sanchita Dutta
Well Gaurav, u r extremely motivated, passionate and driven about ur venture which is heartening and thats what it takes to succeed in a venture like yours. May you succeed like anything soon.
but the point i was making is that, MOST ENTREPRENEURS if not all , feel the same way about their projects and most (% someone more current can add) fail. this in no way doubts or belittles ur idea or venture. the aim is only to spread the safety net.
Regarding entrepreneur’s version of mother’s advice, i may add a little, there is subtle but distinct difference. Mother would like u to leave all this and go to a job. What i hinted was to have one job. and its a BIG Difference. The safety and support of a job will GREATLY ENHANCE the longevity and probability of the success of ur venture. here longer u sustain, higher the chances to succeed. that’s exactly what i meant. let one hand(job) support another(venture).
In “starting something new and revolutionary” and “High Stakes decisions ( all or nothing)”, Successes are far, few but stupendous, BUT FAILURES are far too many, sudden, quiet, lonely and depressing.
Given your belief that what you are pursuing are revolutionary ideas, sustenance will go a long way to help you.
Cheers n best wishes
Sanchita (http://www.indiacod.com)
BTW: we are also “wannabe entrepreneurs” and strictly not trying to invent anything new. Just trying to do now often done n repeated things in a different way 🙂
Naresh Saklecha
Hi Alok,
Can you come up with some do’s and dont’s on how to experiment with yourself before going all in?
I honestly don’t think putting your family at risk is any piece of excuse for being an entrepreneur.
Please,
Thanks
Alkesh T
Hey Gourav,
Somewhere I read below lines, sharing them with you.
“The capability of a person is not how well he prepares for evrythng to go right..
Bt how he stands up and moves on after evrythng has gone wrong..:-)”
I wish you all the very best for your hard work and I hope and believe your hard work and sacrifice will reap you good returns.
Gourav Das
COD requests are for India only. We are looking for Shipping partners who can provide COD facility in India.
Gourav Das
Yes you are absolutely correct. Most likely if I am not able to sustain for 1+ yr, will ask my wife to get back to work. If I fail to sustain for 2+ yr, will get myself some parttime job. If cannot sustain for 3+ yrs, will go back to day job and continue working at nights (like the way we all start). By then I know I am the best fit to run this this specific product, in this market at this time. As said earlier, then will start on my second “Traffic” based innovation, if others haven’t started working on that yet..
Haardik Joshi
HI Gourav,
I am a start-up Entrepreneur myself….non-tech , not online ( though i tried to get-together a ticketing portal sometime back!!).
Let me start with this my sympathies & good wishes with you, may god help you achieve, what you think is yours!!
First things first – my respects to ALOK KEJRIWAL, he is someone i am not very fond of (i thought he was rude to me when i met him at his office, but i may be over analyzing or in a bloody phase when i wanted empathies from people) , but the man talks only sense!!
Lesson One – keep your business & your EGO as apart as possible!!
Lesson Two – Kids know this # dont keep all your eggs in the same basket #
Lesson Three – Not everyone is born to achieve glory….
Lesson Four – Be realistic, Be focused, Be evaluative, Keep time frames for everything that can happen or otherwise.
Lesson Five – Not all techies are good businessmen !!
I did go thru your site, its OKAY – to a layman like me nothing WOW!! Also brother this “money mess” is just too bad, so either stick to your guns forget about the bloody PS3 getting pawned !! Or just take a hot shower & float that CV…. i am sure that PS3 session on weekends will be fun!! “:)
JGD
HJ
Gourav Das
Thank you for the advice. Though I would like to say couple of things on two of your comments –
1) Lesson Five – Not all techies are good businessmen
Right. I don’t intend to become one. I believe in an idea that can be materialized. I am no star CEO but looking for one.
2) “I did go thru your site, its OKAY – to a layman like me nothing WOW!!”
This is exactly my problem, both we founders are so stuck up in the day to day operational work, all our features implementation dates keep postponing. We also hid lot of our “social” features because they make sense only when all the features come together. So as of now the site is “just” a marketplace.
So the advice is not going to help me. But if you know someone entrepreneurial in mindset and great in developing and implementing stuff, let me know. That will really help.
Alok Rodinhood Kejriwal
I was rude to you?!
IN MY OFFICE?!
Sorry boss for my mistake. I can’t remember, but would like to apologize anyways.
Haardik Joshi
Will surely…mail you someone apt, soon…. HJ 🙂 cheers
Haardik Joshi
Hi AK,
Thanks for replying & i appreciate this revert more than i remember that incident….anyway i always thought highly of you as an entrepreneur, guide & above all you are a good guy!!
Keep spreading knowledge….add a little warmth & goodness wherever possible..
JGD
Ashwin C Parulkar
Well all my sympathy with Gourav , but need off the hr is one your spouce to take up job,if necessary you can …if you continue like this the impact of this will be very long term on your entire family…I think u consider going two steps back for a bigger leap
Recently saw The wolf of wall streets : Jorden Bellford says – there is nothing noble about poverty!
Anil Kumar
Hi Gourav,
I went through your story. I see your passion in this.
I like your site. I am sure you will achieve glory. It is all matter of time. There is nothing wrong in trying what you really passionated about.
Do you have any link where I can know more about the product. I would like to know how your product is different and how do you think this will stand out of the ecommerce crowd.
Cheers,
Anil
Gourav Das
Sure Anil, please share your email Id, I will share details on email.
Gourav Das
Thanks a lot. Now that cheers me up more.
Chetan Kaushal
If for the past 2 years you’ve been continuously working on your start-up and still not being able to reap-out sufficient profits then you need to re-think what your are doing.
Try to take benefits of accelerator programs offered around you. They’ll invest, mentor and guide your startup to success. And in return they’ll take 6-12% equity.
Gourav Das
Working on it for 2 years does not necessarily does not mean it was launched 2 years back. I released it in Oct 2013 only. What I was working for 2 years is a different topic, but you can think of as an final experiment for 1 yr on a different project and this product was a by-product of the earlier experiment.
So technically I have been working 2 yrs on my startup but not on this specific product. I was working on a Sports Game Engine for PC and Xbox360 with moddability being the main feature. So for that we had to ideate and build a marketplace where content creators and content buyers can interact at realtime both within and outside the game and share and use content created by them, starting from rules, animation, models etc. .That’s where the whole idea of GroupShoppy was born.
Chetan Kaushal
That’s Good.
Your concept of GroupShoppy is awesome, even I had this same idea about making such a website but I arrived at it after studying groupon.com success and other similar websites. I didn’t do it because I’m too lazy to handle the inventory management and all the things which are highly dependent on people.
But I’m sure your company has very good future and you should not give up on this. Also you need to take “move fast – break things” strategy as its very easy for your giant competitor to copy it.
I saw you website and to tell you the truth the layout is not that good. Website takes too much time to load and the menus are really poorly done.
Its useless to show so many things on landing page, it just increases the upload time. Try to keep it minimum. The average Indian internet speed is around 30-60 kbps. You’ll lose customer if you don’t consider this.
You’ll have to assume that your customer knows what they want to buy so focus on menus i.e men wear, etc etc. It should be as clear as possible so that customer can very easily navigate to the desired product.
Also check this out http://www.definitecommerce.com for more tips and tricks from Industry leader.
Also be ready for M-commerce.
I wish you great success. Good Luck 🙂
Gourav Das
Of all the advices received so far, yours is truly helpful. Noted your points and started working on them.
1) Already started working on new static menu today morning. Your point re-instated the importance of good menu.
2) We are consolidating categories as of now. So content is going to reduce more.
Chetan Kaushal
Always happy to help 🙂
Naresh Saklecha
By Chris Dixon:
There are two kinds of people in the world
You’ve either started a company or you haven’t. ”Started” doesn’t mean joining as an early employee, or investing or advising or helping out. It means starting with no money, no help, no one who believes in you (except perhaps your closest friends and family), and building an organization from a borrowed cubicle with credit card debt and nowhere to sleep except the office. It almost invariably means being dismissed by arrogant investors who show up a half hour late, totally unprepared and then instead of saying “no” give you non-committal rejections like “we invest at later stage companies.” It means looking prospective employees in the eyes and convincing them to leave safe jobs, quit everything and throw their lot in with you. It means having pundits in the press and blogs who’ve never built anything criticize you and armchair quarterback your every mistake. It means lying awake at night worrying about running out of cash and having a constant knot in your stomach during the day fearing you’ll disappoint the few people who believed in you and validate your smug doubters.
I don’t care if you succeed or fail, if you are Bill Gates or an unknown entrepreneur who gave everything to make it work but didn’t manage to pull through. The important distinction is whether you risked everything, put your life on the line, made commitments to investors, employees, customers and friends, and tried – against all the forces in the world that try to keep new ideas down – to make something new.
All the best!
Gourav Das
Motivating. Thanks for sharing this piece