How Did Bathroom Notes Get Airbnb Funded Early?

The weekly growth chart on bathroom Post-it notes is why Airbnb raised from Sequoia before demo day. Garry Tan says they needed revenue on the site to grow 10% every single week, and they nailed it.

He says the number one thing is that objects in motion stay in motion, and objects at rest stay at rest. Y Combinator is the moment founders learn to run fast. Billion dollar companies look back when a thousand person company is going slow and try to tap the energy of the first week and the first eight weeks. Airbnb got rejected by all the legends too. Brian Chesky used to obscure who the people were. Mike Maples later posted that he was the one who said no. He is one of the biggest legends in venture, and the story is lore now.

Saying no to a founder who ends up creating the next Airbnb gives Garry Tan heartburn. He is sure the miss will happen, and he turns the shame into energy so Y Combinator fixes the miss and funds the next founder. Brian Chesky taught him to exercise founder mode. Then Y Combinator will fund 30 to 50% of all the companies that matter. They have to take their own advice and do the startup way 10 times out of 10: quick and dirty, then feedback, then a fix the next time, rather than spending a whole bunch of money to hire a bunch of people. At 20 years, post-product market fit, the default is manager mode. He pulls Y Combinator back to founder mode.