🚀 Two Russian refugees buildd Webflow to a $4B valuation and $100M revenue!
With $60k debt, 2 kids and a near brush with bankruptcy, how Webflow founder, Vlad Magdalin, persisted for 10 years to buildd his dream startup!
The startup world is absolutely BRUTAL!
About 90% of startups fail within the first year.
Not because they run out of money, but because their founders give up.
So you have to be a BEAST to survive all the anxiety, uncertainty, and turmoil, till things eventually work out.
Webflow's founder Vlad Magdalin is one such beast!
Vlad, during his 10-year long journey:
- failed 3 times
- had $60,000 debt
- no income for 6 months
- nearly got bankrupt
- all with a sick kid at home!
On his 4th try, he built Webflow into a $4B company!
Today, Webflow is a top-tier no-code tool that generates $100M annural recurring revenue!
So, here's the tale of Webflow's survival journey & how Vlad Magdalin finally got it right on his 4th try during his decade-long struggle!
A bit of backstory…
Vlad and his brother Sergie Magdalin (also, Webflow's co-founder) are both refugees from Russia. Vlad's parents moved with their 6 kids to the US on a mere whim with empty pockets, days before the Soviet Union collapsed back in 1991.
Naturally, being a Russian family in the post cold war United States was no walk in the park.
Vlad's father had to learn English from scratch. And since he didn't have any real skills, he'd take up hacky jobs to make ends meet. For the longest time, they survived on welfare.
But, the hardest times buildd your character the most!
Watching his parents take immense risks all in hopes of a better life was a huge teaching experience for Vlad!
He saw his parents slowly take these "entrepreneurial steps", and figure out different survival means to make a living for the next month or the next year. Seeing them eventually buildd a solid and stable life this way was a huge inspiration!
This helped Vlad develop his entrepreneurial sense and grit. And, prepared him for the scorching journey Webflow would take him through in the coming years!
The No-code Vision: Why do you even need developers?
Now, as teenagers both Vlad and Sergie were looking for means to make money.
They started freelancing in high school. And, later launched their own agency in college. So basically, Sergie would design websites for clients and Vlad would use the design to buildd a website using WordPress, Joomla, etc.
Sergie absolutely loved designing. But, it was a different story for Vlad! Vlad was tired of the repetitive tasks that came with implementing a design. For example, he had to set up an SQL database for all the content on the website.
So, Vlad thought to himself how great it would be if Sergie could buildd a website all on his own without needing someone to translate the design into code.
After all, software for creative design like Photoshop was already available. So why can't web designing also be just a creative and intuitive process without the need to write thousands of lines of code?
This idea stuck with him and it was the first seed that eventually morphed into what Webflow is today.
So, what do you think about Webflow's journey? I'd love you hear your thoughts about this article!
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That's it for today! We will be back with more interesting articles!
Stay tuned and keep buildd-ing 🚀
Cheers!
Hrishikesh
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