The World’s First Airbnb Host
In March 2008, TienDung Le (or TJ) hosted an Airbnb founder on his lounge room floor.
On March 7, 2008, Brian Chesky — the co-founder and current CEO of Airbnb — slept on a stranger’s air mattress.
Tiendung Le (or TJ), who now lives in Australia, was his host.
The occasion was a special one. It was the first time Airbnb (or AirBedandBreakfast.com as it was then known) had an actual host.
It was the very beginning of Airbnb.
TJ remembers the event well. As a student at the University of Texas, he would sometimes list his lounge room on Craigslist for a bit of extra cash.
In Austin, Texas — Airbnb was attempting to capture attendees going to SXSW’s 2008 event.
Airbnb’s planned strategy at the time was to associate itself with conferences and festivals and attempt to provide accommodation to their attendees.
The website was pulled together and launched just 4 days prior to the festival. In the lead up to the festival Brian Chesky sent personal emails to hosts listing short term accommodation on Craigslist asking them to signup to the AirBedandBreakfast.com platform to respond to a reservation request.
That reservation request was for Brian’s own accommodation for his trip to SXSW in Austin, Texas.
“I got an email asking me to create a profile on AirBedandBreakfast.com to host a guest that they found for me” TJ told me. “So I signed up.”
TJ accepted Brian’s reservation request. Brian stayed there for two nights on an air mattress in the lounge room.
TJ and his girlfriend (now his wife) did their best to provide a homelike experience. In the morning, they made him an espresso — later on, they made him a bowl of pho. TJ even gave Chesky a ride to SXSW.
TJ told me that at the time, he didn’t expect the business idea to turn into the success it is now.
“I didn’t expect it to take off the way that it did. I didn’t follow the company closely for a few years following Brian’s stay, but when I saw the growth that they’d achieved I was a bit shocked. In America, people are more open to experimenting with new ideas. I just saw this as a few young guys wanting to experiment with something new.”
Fast forward nearly ten years, the company has been valued at over $31 billion USD with more than 1.5 million listings in more than 34,000 cities.
As Airbnb’s earliest host TJ has seen the startup grow from almost nothing into a global accommodation empire.
He and his partner describe the initial version of the website as ‘primitive’ and say that the website and business has improved significantly since those early days.
As I meet TJ and his partner for coffee in Sydney, Australia they highlight that they’re still active users of the platform and if you look closely at their account, it says “Joined in March, 2008” the month that the global accommodation unicorn was born.
You can also see a brief exchange between Brian Chesky and Tiendung Le on this topic via this Medium page.
