I put $73K of my own money into this media company. Here's where we're at 6 months post-launch

We're bootstrapping They Got Acquired.

Here's how much money I've put into the media brand so far and what our finances look like 6 months after launch 👇

(This feels vulnerable even for someone who shares a lot online, but here goes...)

⌛ Our timeline:

September 2021: Began building (pre-launch)

January 2022: First revenue (we pre-sold sponsorships)

February 2022: Launched the brand

By launch, we'd spent about $30K.

This graph shows what we spent it on.

Mostly content and site design/build.

How much have we spent since then?

💰 Here's a financial overview from the last year, ending in July 2022:

Spent so far: $115,000

Revenue so far: $42,000 (reinvested into the brand)

My investment: $73,000

That's right: I've put $73K of my own money into the brand...

That money came from a content site I sold last year.

I re-invested it into this new company.

It's a lot for a bootstrapper!

But a fraction of what VC-backed media brands raise and spend.

Over the summer, our burn rate was about $13,000/month.

So I went through and trimmed expenses, reducing our monthly spend to $10,500/month.

The goal is to get to profitability as quickly as possible.

In fact, that's my end-of-year goal...

🏆 End-of-year goal:

Bring in enough revenue to consistently cover our expenses: $10,500/month.

(That doesn’t include paying myself; that's a 2023 goal.)

I planned from the beginning to invest money from my previous business sale into @They Got Acquired, but...

It still feels scary to invest that much money.

On some days, the investment feels scarier than it did months ago, because we’re at an inflection point. We need to begin to consistently cover costs.

We’re moving in the right direction, but I wish we could get there faster.

On other days, the investment feels less scary than it used to, because we have traction.

Our revenue is increasing and diversifying, and our audience continues to grow.

This financial update is thru the end of July.

We've already had some big wins in Aug & Sept that I'm excited to share soon!

To stay updated:

• Subscribe to our newsletter. I include a "behind the business" update every Tuesday.

• I post a lot of mini-updates here on Indie Hackers

• Or follow me on Twitter @alexisgrant

Always happy to answer questions, too!