I wrote much of this in Summer 2001 in response to an acquaintance whom I didn't know very well who was interested in why I was starting three companies simultaneously.

She wanted to learn more about my "trying to get venture capitalist odds instead of entrepreneurial odds."

A lot of people have found that particular concept pretty interesting, the idea that if your chances of success in starting a business are one in three, then you'd better start three companies to ensure that you have a good chance of being successful at one of them. To me, despite some obvious pitfalls to be avoided, it makes a lot of sense.

This acquaintance was also interested in how I went from being an entrepreneur doing 3D software to being an entrepreneur in the beauty business. I guess most people don't jump industries like that too frequently and she wanted to hear about how that happened. So, I got to thinking about my entrepreneurial evolution.

Anyway, here's the text of that long email, my answer back to her, which may be an interesting read and gives you some background on where I've been before this and why I am now becoming a "multipreneur" and am starting three companies at the same time.

The Email

Dear [NAME DELETED],

Here's my entire entrepreneurial evolution. Thanks for your interest. It took a while but it was good for me to write it down. Sorry that it's so long.

I'm not sure that it'll be of much interest to you. My 1993-1996 and 1999-2000 entrepreneurial experiences are ancient history now -- I don't want to dwell on them like the guy in Bruce Springsteen's "Glory Days" song -- and my new companies are at a very early, fledgling, bootstrap startup stage.

Not only that but they are decidedly unexciting companies, so called "lifestyle" companies that are intended principally to provide good value to customers and generate reasonable cash flow that will allow me to earn a decent living (in contrast to venture-backed companies that go for the big score and try to change the world). I'll get to that again later.

[SOME DELETED STUFF]

All for now!

Best regards,

Ken

--

VREAM (1993 to 1996)

I was a co-founder of VREAM, along with a friend who initially conceptualized and started fleshing out the idea while I was finishing up my management degree at Yale University's School of Management.

In 1993 VREAM positioned itself as a "virtual reality" software company. Today most people know what virtual reality is - it allows you to get inside of a computer-generated 3D environment and then move around and interact with computer-generated objects (and even interact with other people) in a computer-generated world. At that time, however, the average person had no clue what virtual reality was. It was restricted to the domain of research scientists who could afford expensive computers.

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This article was written by Ken Gaebler. If you like this article, you can find others like it in the Private Thoughts section of this website. If you have comments or questions concerning this article, feel free to email Ken.