Turning one is always the hardest

The last year has seen several ‘firsts’- the first provider, the first customer, the first employee. And let’s not forget the first office; the story of the tiny, cramped room with 6 chairs has already grown to be the sort of company fable that’ll still be in circulation at parties ten years from now (who wants to bet on

Then there was the moment when we launched the first version of the app, and the moment we closed our first round of funding. For the record, that was probably the precise moment at which UrbanClap became a living breathing entity.

In Raghav’s words, “We went from being an unfunded startup to being a company.”

And now, suddenly, we’ve turned one.

It’s a given that the first birthday is always the most special- after all we’re celebrating the app launches, city launches, 10,000 providers, 4000 requests a day, on-demand partnerships and a thousand other things. But, if we’re being honest- it’s a little bit more complicated than that.

Whether it’s those sleepless nights and weekends spent in the office, or the tough decisions that we’ve all had to make in the past year (obviously, we’re counting the move from Delhi to Gurgaon among them), there was a long, sometimes hellish journey before we finally reached each milestone- out of breath and just about to collapse, but with the euphoria of a mountaineer reaching the summit. So yes, please forgive the cliché, but it is about the journey.

From building a team from scratch to on-boarding providers, increasing the number of requests to dealing with irate customers, building a product to continuously innovating to deliver the perfect user experience- every single day was a struggle.

There were days when the app broke down and the entire day (and night) would be dedicated to finding a solution, and then there were days when Facebook wouldn’t allow any more ads to run, effectively eliminating every possible chance of achieving the week’s target. There were also days when every customer that you called was shouting at you, and no matter how many calls you made not one provider seemed to be willing to listen to what you were saying.

But here’s the thing- we never did it alone. We weren’t the only ones in the office over the weekends and we weren’t the only ones leaving at 10 pm. If we were up at 3 am in the morning, we were probably reading a mail sent by Abhiraj just two minutes ago, and if we were panicking when the shit hit the ceiling (pardon the French) we were most definitely not alone.

Today- after we’ve moved 3 offices, expanded to 5 cities, achieved 4000+ requests a day, on-boarded over 10,000 providers, and worked non-stop for 14 hours a day for 365 days straight- when we ask ourselves what we’re celebrating, maybe that’s what we should remember. The fact that, even though surviving the first year was probably the most painful, most difficult thing we could imagine, each time we stumbled and fell we picked ourselves up and kept on moving (just ask the first employee about this). And we weren’t the only ones doing it.

So now, after surviving one year, naturally we’re asking ourselves what the second year is going to hold.

We might think we’re better prepared, and that this year is going to be easier. Maybe the hardest part of the journey is already over. But, before we move on, there’s two questions we should keep asking-

Would we do it again if we had to? And, how many times are we willing to do it again? Because, ultimately, turning one is always the hardest- until you turn two, that is.

“It’s a great feeling to have turned one. Very few companies in the world would have achieved what we have, in such a short duration. However we have our work cut out for us. We have to keep firing all cylinders and keep going harder and stronger, so that we celebrate our second, fifth, twenty-fifth and hopefully hundredth birthday someday.”

— by Kriti Omprakash