How Questioning Basic Assumptions Made StubHub A $310 Million Company – With Jeffrey Fluhr
In 2000, people had all kinds of assumptions about buying and selling tickets to events. They assumed it was illegal or that they’d get ripped off or that it was a small-time business run by guys who stood outside of stadiums.
Jeffrey Fluer noticed this chaos of assumptions and discovered an opportunity. He, and fellow Stanford student Eric Baker, raised some money and hired lawyers to clarify the law. When they told him that it wasn’t illegal to resell tickets, they created an online, trusted marketplace for tickets.
In 2007, the business was sold to eBay for $310 million. I invited Jeffrey to Mixergy to teach how he thought about the opportunity when he first discovered it and how he implemented it.
Jeffrey Fluhr is the co-founder of StubHub, an online marketplace where you can buy & sell concert tickets, sports tickets, theater tickets and Broadway tickets.
Andrew:
Hey everyone, it’s Andrew Warner, founder of mixergy.com, home of the ambitious upstart. And in this program you’re going to hear one of the great success stories of the internet. Jeff Fluhr and his friend from school got together and created a company called StubHub which they built up and sold to eBay. StubHub was a market — in fact it still is a marketplace where you can buy and sell tickets to live events.
In this program you can hear about his career before StubHub; I mean going all the way back to elementary school how he had the entrepreneurial experience even back then. Did you by the way, did you sell candy back in elementary school? I’m hearing more and more entrepreneurs tell me that they had these little side businesses back, even as far back as elementary school.
You’re also going to hear him talk about how he thought through the business opportunity. If you want a great example of how to...
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Full program includes
– Hear about the candy business he started as a kid. If you’re someone who thought about business from an early age and were discouraged by teachers and other adults, you’re not alone.
– Learn how he thought about the market size and opportunity before he launched the business. If you’re considering a new business idea, you’re going to think a lot clearer about it after hearing this section.
– See how he marketed his business. If you’re trying to grow your audience, hearing how he attracted customers will inspire you.