EP 75: Wade Foster (Co-founder and CEO, Zapier) on Nearly Bootstrapping to $5B
The Logan Bartlett Show
Benchling: The Last Money You Ever Got
There just wasn't a lot of breathing room for us. We had spouses and stuff like that. And it's like, so that's where we were like, okay, we'll go raise a little bit of something. Hopefully no future entrepreneurs listen, or you can do it. Just, just talk to me first.
Wade Foster is the co-founder and CEO of Zapier, an automation business most recently valued at $5 billion.
In the episode, Wade discusses why Zapier only raised around $1M and unpacks Zapier’s strategies for growing profitably. Wade shares lessons from building one of the first remote-only companies in tech, including key tips for hiring, onboarding, building a great management team, and much more.
Wade is definitely a first principles thinker around all things business. One of the most raw and engaging episodes to date.
(0:00) Intro
(0:50) What does Zapier do?
(4:06) $1.3 million to $5 billion
(12:27) Lessons learned from starting Zapier
(17:23) Zapier's ecosystem and partners
(23:24) What made Zapier outperform competitors?
(28:31) Three friends from Missouri
(32:35) Was it obvious who the successes were going to be?
(40:36) Foundation of the board
(45:18) The Ultimate Guide to Remote Work
(50:45) Building trust among a remote employee base
(53:47) Importance of onboarding experience
(1:00:57) The future of remote work
(1:06:06) Advice for new founders
(1:08:50) Wade's interview style
(1:15:30) Setting goals as a company
(1:18:30) Are CEO coaches just snake oil?
(1:23:44) SEO Landing Pages
(1:27:47) What has you excited about artificial intelligence?
(1:33:29) Relationship with Sam Altman
(1:39:45) What would you tell 23-year-old Wade?
Mixed and edited: Justin Hrabovsky
Produced: Rashad Assir
Executive Producer: Josh Machiz
Music: Griff Lawson
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About the Show
Logan Bartlett is a Software Investor at Redpoint Ventures - a Silicon Valley-based VC with $6B AUM and investments in Snowflake, DraftKings, Twilio, and Netflix. In each episode, Logan goes behind the scenes with world-class entrepreneurs and investors. If you're interested in the real inside baseball of tech, entrepreneurship, and start-up investing, tune in every Friday for new episodes.
Executive Producer: Rashad Assir
Producer: Leah Clapper
Mixing and editing: Justin Hrabovsky
Check out Unsupervised Learning, Redpoint's AI Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@UCUl-s_Vp-Kkk_XVyDylNwLA
🎥 Subscribe on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCugS0jD5IAdoqzjaNYzns7w?sub_confirmation=1
Follow on Socials
📸 Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/theloganbartlettshow
📱 X - https://twitter.com/loganbartshow
🎬 Clips on TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@theloganbartlettshow
About the Show
Logan Bartlett is a Software Investor at Redpoint Ventures - a Silicon Valley-based VC with $6B AUM and investments in Snowflake, DraftKings, Twilio, and Netflix. In each episode of The Logan Bartlett Show, we sit down with the people behind today’s most important startups and extract the tactics, lessons, and frameworks they’ve learned the hard way. Conversations span hiring to GTM, product, growth, fundraising and everything in between - collectively forming the ultimate playbook to make you a better CEO, investor or board member.
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