SF Man Survives Off Tech Freebies For A Year
SAN FRANCISCO, CA — Many have decried the unreasonably high cost of living in San Francisco, but one man has found a unique way to afford the basics and the luxuries of The City — for free.
Ahmed Hamzi recently claimed on Twitter that he has survived — and thrived — entirely off of tech freebies for an entire year. Mr. Hamzi, a Potrero resident, first figured out how to live life to the fullest when he was checking his mail.
“At the time, I would get all these advertisement mails from startups that were filling my mailbox, and I would throw them away immediately,” said Mr. Hamzi. “Then I started reading them before I threw them away, and I thought, ‘Wow, I could actually save a lot of money with these coupon codes!’”
Many Silicon Valley startups geared towards the sharing economy have been frantically been trying to acquire users. However, due to stiff competition and an overabundance of venture capitalist money in their war chests, most of these startups give prospective users ridiculous amounts of coupon codes, discounts, and referral bonuses at the expense of any semblance of profitability.
Mr. Hamzi now eats for free thanks to new user deals from Grubhub, DoorDash, Spoonrocket (now defunct, probably from the freebies), and Eat24. He gets driven around the city for free thanks to Lyft and Uber referrals. He gets his laundry cleaned with free Washio trials, his home cleaned with free Handy coupons, and even free booze delivery from a startup called Winc. Indeed, Mr. Hamzi’s freebies rival the free perks of a certain corporate retirement home for startup employees. When his free trials run out, he simply creates more email accounts to qualify for new user deals again.
Mr. Hamzi is not the only person taking advantage of startup money. One industry analyst with knowledge of the matter told Halting Problem that around 2–5% of these startups’ customers are “free riders on VC-sponsored meal plans.”
“If you look at the portfolios of many venture capitalist firms in Sand Hill, it’s like a fantasy football roster of sharing economy startups. And all the money these investment firms have put into Series B rounds are being redistributed to San Franciscans as freebies. If anything, VC subsidies are solid proof that trickle down economics work.”
However, there are some things that Mr. Hamzi still has to pay for. He used to take advantage of Airbnb credits but got tired of moving around from one house to another. He is thinking of founding a startup that aggregates tech freebies for users. Mr. Hamzi is planning to eventually charge users for this service, but, after raising a seed round with the help of Cayenne Capital, is currently making the service available for free with the use of referral codes.
When we asked Mr. Hamzi about whether his startup idea would be sustainable, he only laughed. “The only sustainable business model in Silicon Valley is VC management fees.”
