Black Entrepreneur in North Carolina Says No Bias: Rod Brown, COO of OnceLogix (Part 3)

Sramana: How did you balance starting a company in your off hours as a collective team?

Rod Brown: We mapped out a plan. In the first month that we rolled out our product, we signed up 5 customers. We felt like that was a good start and we knew we could make money after that. We mapped out a plan to have each person quit their full-time jobs once we hit a certain revenue mark. Trinity was able to quit first, followed by Ty, and finally myself.

Sramana: How long did it take you to go from the initial launch to having all three of you as full-time jobs? What were the cycle points in the company at which each of you were able to quit and work for OnceLogix full time?

Rod Brown: We started out the company in August of 2005. I was the last person to quit my original job and I joined the company in July of 2006. We made that transition with a year. All three of us had left our full-time jobs and moved over to working for this company full time by that point.

Sramana: To the extent you remember, can you talk a bit more about what happened in that 12-month period that allowed you to bring this company together?

Rod Brown: We squeezed every ounce of our time to work on the business. For a long time, we did not take any money out of the business. We put every single dime back into the business. We lived off of our individual savings. The first check I received from the company was $600. One of the good things we did during that time period was re-invest every possible cent back into the company.

Sramana: How many clients were you able to obtain during that 12-month period?

Rod Brown: In the first year, we brought on 50 or 60 clients.

Sramana: What was the price point? How much did you charge them?

Rod Brown: We were so excited about having a business that we were almost giving the product away. We operated off of a SaaS model so we sold licenses by the seat. We sold them for $15 per user, per month. Our driver is clearly users. We have a recurring revenue model so our goal is to add as many users as possible to the system.

Sramana: How much revenue were you able to bring together in the first year period?

Rod Brown: I think in our first full year, we did $320,000. That would have been 2006. I think in 2005, we got to $70,000 or $80,000.

This segment is part 3 in the series : Black Entrepreneur in North Carolina Says No Bias: Rod Brown, COO of OnceLogix
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