After I stepped away from Firstbloom, I told myself I probably wouldn’t found a company again for a while. Maybe never again! The experience at the end of Firstbloom was very not good. The details are for another post but suffice to say ~3 years of burnout and recovery can really turn you off the scenario you were in that led to that state.

However, for the past few months I’ve been opening myself up to the idea of starting something again. I’m mostly recovered now, and I feel the itch to build again. There are a lot of lessons I learned while building Firstbloom—and having since worked at/with other startups/companies—that I think the second time around would be much better, too. I also have a few preferences for the next thing I build that should hopefully act as guardrails against burning out.

I don’t know what the “thing” is yet since I’m just starting to open myself up to the idea. So, this post is mostly me putting the intent out into the universe—if that’s even really a thing. I wanted something I can point to the next time someone asks me: “so, what’s next?”

With all that said, here are the preferences I have in mind for the next thing.

Guardrails

B2B

I’ve realized I’m kind of annoyed/over building consumer technology. Which seems to be a common thread among people in tech. Especially founders. I don’t have receipts for that claim, but I have hazy memories of seeing posts and hearing things in passing around founders ditching B2C for B2B. Honestly, I totally get it! B2C is hard.

Don’t get me wrong, I fucking love building for humans. But, to build something sustainable in the consumer market is rough for a lot of reasons. And it’s only getting harder. Consumer dollars are being bargained for probably more than ever. I’m sure B2B is difficult, too. However, general wisdom is B2B is simpler. It seems a lot of indie hackers have more success selling to other businesses as well—even if it’s other single-person businesses.

There’s probably a ton of room for human-centred product thinking in the B2B market for a lot of verticals, too. Which means I’d probably have an edge in finding a 10x more useable solution.

Open-source component

Like I mentioned in my post “There’s no money in open-source”, I think there’s a big opportunity for open-source offerings that generate healthy amounts of revenue. I just recently came across another company, Keygen, that open-sourced their software and allowed for self-hosting in 2023, and they seem to be doing very well still.

Part of this requirement is also this growing anti-late-stage-capitalism sentiment I’ve been feeling. Despite not being in the most affected wage class by a long shot, I still see the affect it has on communities and people. And, in some convoluted way, I find open-source work to be a very fun way to subvert that way of thinking.

Admittedly, I’m not sure how this is a guardrail yet—if at all. Building in public with the focus on open-source is more around accountability and being able to work with people who might use my product directly. This is also, in some ways, a nice to have. Not all B2B software being open-source is useful.

Bootstrapped

Firstbloom was originally going to be bootstrapped forever. It was something I was doing on the side for an, at the time, pretty niche but growing segment of the coffee market. I started to get pretty disenchanted with my full-time job at the time, and took the plunge going all-in on Firstbloom with the saving I had, thinking maybe I could raise some money to build this thing.

All going all-in did for me was create a bunch of financial stress. That stress then clouded the way I was thinking/feeling about, well, pretty much everything. I made decisions I shouldn’t have in hind-sight, and had I not gone full time, pivoted to something I thought I was capable of doing, and run down my savings, I’d probably still be working on it today.

This time around, I won’t be making that mistake! Slow is smooth and smooth is fast. I’ll build whatever it is on the side while I still have a steady income. The only time, I’d take on money is if growth is extremely solid after a few years and I could pitch with all the leverage. Even then, I’d be extremely picky about the investors I’d bring on.

It’s dangerous to go alone

Granted, Firstbloom wasn’t built alone. Originally my partner, Stefanie Viens, was a co-founder with me. Then not too long after she left, my friend Vithu Namasivayam joined me on the adventure. However, the time in-between kind of really sucked. Even when Vithu and I were working on Firstbloom, it was mostly during the pandemic, which meant it all felt really weird.

This time around, I’d like to build it with someone else. Ideally co-located. While I’m a big fan of fully distributed teams, I’ve come to realize that until you hit some sort of PMF, being co-located is really helpful. Especially for managing mental health and balance. Tensions can build incredibly weirdly when you’re fully distributed, and in the early days of a company, there can already be enough tension.

Enough yapping, what’s next?

For the next little while, I’m going to focus on getting back out there and trying to meet people. I want to focus on learning about new industries and seeing their pain-points. I’m heavily in discovery mode, and trying to keep my eyes and mind open to new possibilities while working full-time.

If you, or someone you know, have an idea for something you think I might be interested in, that fits the list above, reach out! Let’s chat.