$144M/year solo founder, $360K/year SaaS for personal trainers, $160K/year magician

Hey starters - happy Thursday!

This week, we're featuring 5 inspiring stories!

Starter Quote of The Week:

❝ There is an opportunity in adversity. During the bad times, the competition shrinks, and the cream rise to the top.

- Mark Mesrobian, founder of Fifth & Ninth ($300k/year) tweet this!

#1: Dylan increased sales from 12M/year to $144M/year at 25 years old:

Remember our wildly popular interview a few years back with BruMate, the boozy drinkware brand?

We just caught up with Dylan, and they've now grown their team to 20 employees and are projected to reach $144M/year in revenue.

Dylan explains the three reasons behind their huge jump in sales within the last two years:

• Building a massive wholesale distribution channel
• Building a direct to consumer sales channel with a BIG focus on relationships with customers.
• Growing + focusing largely on amazon sales + reviews (see below chart) 

Check out Dylan's growth story here - you do not want to miss this one!

Pat @ Starter Story: Want to learn about more drinkware business ideas you can start? We put together a full list here.

#2: Dan makes $160K/year performing magic shows:

We just published our interview with Dan Chan Presents - magic performer and entertainer. 

Due to the pandemic, Dan was the first in the magic industry to completely pivot to virtual zoom shows.

As a result, he was able to expand his reach and perform internationally in Europe, Australia, Africa, and China - all from the comfort of his home office.

His secret? Media attention - Dan pitches his story on how he's transitioned the magic entertainment field entirely to zoom and has been featured in several prominent publications. 

Check out Dan's full story here!

Pat @ Starter Story: Want to learn more about how to get free press? We put together a step by step guide here.

#3 Jacob turned his side hustle into a $300K/year business

Jacob started FITSW - a software that helps personal trainers grow their business.

In just a few years, he completely bootstrapped his business and has worked with over 20,000 personal trainers. 

He's now doing $300K/year with just four employees. 

His secret? Educational content - Jacob creates valuable blog content for his customers and has seen a huge spike over the last year in new & organic traffic:

Read Jacob's full story here.

Pat @ Starter Story: Here are 50 lucrative business ideas you can start as a side project.

#4: Howard launched a home-products business and is doing $5M/year:

Howard started Magnus - a unique kitchen and bath products business. 

After working for a big player in the industry, Howard and his partner decided it was time to go out on their own.

In just three years, they've been able to double their sales YOY and plan to do $5M this year with just 10 employees. 

Check out Howard's full interview here.

#5: 26 profitable online course business ideas you can start:

The online course business is currently valued at $171B and that number is projected to increase substantially in the next 5 years.

We went through our database of our most successful online course businesses and list 26 different ideas you can start (or add to your current business model).

Check out the full list here.

#6: Are you ready to boost your revenue?

I want to give a shoutout to our long-time sponsor Klaviyo.

Using Klaviyo will open up a massive, untapped sales channel and bring you closer to your customers!

I'm a huge fan of the product (I use it for Starter Story and love the segmentation/drip features). I've also been able to collect so many emails using their website form integration - my list growing over 3k/month now 😲

Here are just some of the impressive businesses we've interviewed that use Klaviyo for email marketing and are raving about the product - all great interviews you should check out as well!

• Brumate ($1.1M/mo at 23 years old)
• Sheets & Giggles ($76k/mo in just 6 months)
• Beardbrand ($100k+/mo - 1.5M YouTube subscribers)
• Abs Protein Pancakes ($25k/mo passive income business)
• Xero Shoes ($460k/mo - featured on Shark Tank)
• The Longhairs ($30k/mo)
• Framed Tweets ($25k/mo)

Level up your email marketing with 👉 Klaviyo!

(And thank you for your support 🙏)

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Thanks for reading! See you next week.

- Pat Walls, Founder @ Starter Story

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