She Had ONE Month of Rent Left...

26 Jul 2026 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:00

In this interview segment, the founder (Speaker B) recounts the precarious financial situation faced while building their business. They lived off personal savings and withdrew funds from a 401(k) to sustain themselves. The audience-building effort began in May 2023, leading up to a product launch in December 2023. At launch, the founder had only one month’s rent remaining, describing intense fear and a sense of hanging by a thread. The conversation highlights the timeline of planning, the financial pressures, and the emotional stakes involved in early-stage entrepreneurship.

So you were living off of savings while you were building the business?
Savings. And then pulled like my 401 money out. Wow. My inventory. Yeah.
Were you scared?
Oh yeah, I was so scared. So I started kind of building the audience in May, and then when I launched the product in December, I had like 1 month of rent left. I needed it to work.
You were hanging by a thread.
Pretty much. Yeah.
Okay. I didn't know that part of your story. You started planning and building in May of '23?
Yeah. So let's say I like found your book and like the framework, The 1% Community in March. I started thinking about it for, you know, like a month and a half. I think I made my first video end of May 2023, and for 6 months I was documenting the journey, building the audience until launching in December. But because I was building the audience, I felt pretty comfortable that I could at least get one-time sales. I wasn't sure about repeat sales, but I knew like I've built enough awareness and enough of a community that at least some people would buy one time.