Bootstrapped SaaS: 5 Years of Nights & Weekends to $10M ARR | Accelevents

Jonathan Kazarian built Accelevents to $10 million ARR working nights and weekends for five years while keeping his hedge fund day job. But when COVID hit just as he went full-time, every event worldwide got canceled and revenue dropped to zero – forcing him to borrow $75,000 from his father's retirement to survive. In this episode, Jonathan reveals the reality of bootstrapping a global platform without quitting your day job. He shares the brutal truth about hiring remote developers (firing 21 Upwork contractors to find one good one), the "19-Second Support" strategy that wins enterprise deals, and how they survived their entire revenue stream vanishing overnight during COVID by pivoting to virtual events. 🔑 Key Lessons ⏰ The 5-Year Grind: Balancing a hedge fund job with a growing SaaS (and why he didn't quit sooner). 📉 The COVID Crisis: Losing 100% of revenue in March 2020 and 10X'ing it by December. 🛠️ Hiring Mistakes: Why he had to fire 21 remote developers to build a stable product. 🍽️ Event-Led Growth: Hosting intimate dinners to close high-value customers without pitching. ⚡ 19-Second Support: The customer success metric that beats competitors with bigger budgets. 📖 Chapters Introduction & The Charlie Munger Quote The Origin Story: A Cancer Fundraiser Event The 5-Year Grind: Nights & Weekends Hiring Disasters: Going Through 21 Upwork Contractors The COVID Crisis: Revenue Going to Zero The Pivot: Pre-Selling Virtual Features Before Building Them Event-Led Growth: Hosting Dinners to Win Customers B2B Sales Strategy & Consolidating Tech Stacks The "19-Second" Customer Support Standard Advice for Founders on Focus This episode is brought to you by: 💖 ⁠⁠Gearheart⁠⁠ → ⁠⁠Book a free strategy session + get 20% off select services⁠ 🚀 SaaS Club Launch → Build your SaaS to $10K MRR Resources: 🎧 Full Show Notes: saasclub.io/455 🎤 Subscribe to the Podcast: saasclub.io/subscribe 💌 Get weekly 5-minute SaaS insights: saasclub.io/email 💡 Join the SaaS Club founder community: saasclub.co/plus