When you hear the word startup, what comes to mind? Wikipedia describes a startup as a business looking for a repeatable and scalable business model. However, for many, the term brings to mind specific ideas: Venture capital. Funding. Technology. Silicon Valley. The big IPO. Perhaps even Mark Zuckerberg.
I have started my own businesses, which initially would have matched Wikipedia’s definition of a startup. Still, none of these labels really applied to me. I don’t mind this widely accepted startup model, but rapid growth, tech innovations, and going public were never my goals. I just wanted to work independently and make the decisions at my own small company.
So, if more and more, a startup is about technology, funding, hyper-growth, and the eventual IPO, then what do the rest of us call ourselves? What about new companies with traditional products, or perhaps with more traditional goals? Companies with great ideas, vision, and ambitions, but perhaps different ambitions than those that characterize the typical startup?
What about the new food truck selling just cupcakes, the contractor who decides to hire a second crew—or even the Shamwow?
It seems as though startup culture has exploded, but it has focused on only one segment of new businesses. How do the rest of us foster our culture when we don’t even have a name that captures our unique identity?
I almost feel like I’m living in a separate world—that you have startups on the one hand, and then the “new business” community on the other. I’ve got nothing but respect for those who dwell in the former, but I myself happen to live in the latter.
I’m happy to concede the title of startup. I’m not sure what you want to call entrepreneurial enterprises like my own; I just know that the term startup feels less and less appropriate.