Original post by OnStartups
“He who sleeps on the floor will not fall off the bed.” ~Robert Gronock
“I quit my job today,” announced my husband, Seth Rosen, as he casually dropped his briefcase and strolled through the front door of our apartment. As if it was no big deal. As if quitting one’s job is a routine occurrence. To be fair, Seth had talked about leaving his day job to work full time with his best friend, Mike Salguero, on CustomMade.com, a website they had recently purchased. And, to be fair, Seth had asked me repeatedly how I felt about the move. I had assured him that, in no uncertain terms, he had my unequivocal support — mostly because I didn’t think he would actually do it. Yet, here I was, staring at my newly-minted entrepreneur, unsure of whether I should throw up my arms to hug him or strangle him. After all, lots of people talk about starting a company because they think they have a million dollar idea, but very few pull the proverbial trigger. There is a reason for that. Leaving a seemingly safe and reliable salary for the uncertainty and potential perils of a startup company is risky. More startups fail than succeed, especially if a business requires venture capital. A quick search on Wikipedia told me that there are around two million new businesses started in the United States every year, of which less than 800 receive venture financing or 0.04%. CustomMade was already doomed. To make matters worse, it was the summer of 2009 and the US economy was in a deep recession. Was he nuts?
Contrary to popular belief, Seth and Mike argued that the height of the Great Recession was an opportune time to start a company. In 2009, talented people were being laid off and investors were looking for better deals. Companies like Disney, Hewlett-Packard, and Microsoft provided ample precedent that great companies were born during hard economic times. Seth also convinced me that the timing was perfect for a young, well-educated couple with no children and decades of future earning potential to make the leap. Still, trading a plump six-figure salary (and health insurance, as my mother would rightly later point out) for an emaciated startup seemed irrational and incredibly risky to, well, everybody else.
