SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders
He sold his bakery to launch software for Restaurants, $36k in revenue already
10 Jul 2022
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
So in Malaysia, we've done about 10,000 ringgit, and in Singapore, it's between $500 to $800. Okay, got it. So you're doing $500 to $800 per month right now? Yeah, that's our sort of take home. You are listening to Conversations with Nathan Latka, where I sit down and interview the top SaaS founders, like Eric Wan from Zoom. If you'd like to subscribe, go to getlatka.com.
We've published thousands of these interviews, and if you want to sort through them quickly by revenue or churn, CAC, valuation, or other metrics, the easiest way to do that is to go to getlatka.com and use our filtering tool. It's like a big Excel sheet for all of these podcast interviews. Check it out right now at getlatka.com. Hey folks, my guest today is Aaron DeCruz.
He's an ex-restaurateur of 15 years, turned self-taught web developer. He's now building tools for small restaurant owners at maynuu.com. That's maynuu.com. Aaron, you ready to take us to the top? Yep, let's go. Okay, so what came first, writing code or running a restaurant? So,
I started coding in 2001, but I didn't kind of, I didn't go all the way cause, um, uh, you know, I had to get a job and stuff. So then I went into the restaurant business for 15 years. Um, after that I sold it and then I went, you know, full, full, full on in deep dive into web development. That's amazing. Okay. So what is the tool that small restaurants are paying you for today?
Uh, so basically, uh, we help small restaurants make more money online. How it works is restaurants can use our system to digitalize their menu and streamline the entire online ordering process. So it covers everything from deliveries to takeaways to reservations, as well as QR code ordering for their in-house customers. Oh, wow.
And what do they pay you per month on average to use the technology? We take a percentage platform fee. Uh, on the, on every transaction. So it's 8%. 8%. Okay. And it's 8% across all the, all the restaurants. Yes, that's right. About half of that goes to Stripe. We don't make, we don't make very much. 4% goes to Stripe. Yeah. Around that. Interesting. Okay.
So I guess, um, let's get more of the origin story here. When did you launch the business? What year? Um, it launched in May, 2020 in Malaysia. And then about six to eight months ago, we decided to branch out into Singapore as well. So 2020, and then have you decided to bootstrap a company or raise capital? Uh, we're self funded. Yes. Bootstrapped. We love that. Congratulations.
Now, how many, how many of these restaurants are paying you today are using you? So we've got about 1800, uh, signups across two countries. And in, in, uh, well, we just finished the month of may. So in may, how many total sales to those 1800 signups put through may new. Um, wow. I've, I've got to check. I don't have the number off the top of my head. Um, what's the range. What's the range.
What would a range be? So the ticket average is about $80 per restaurant. Yeah, but I don't have a full figure for me. Yeah. Sorry?
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Chapter 2: How did Aaron transition from running a restaurant to developing software?
Per month? No, per order. Okay. So I guess the reason I'm asking this is obviously if you charge off a percent of volume, this is critical for you to understand. I find it hard to believe you wouldn't know what that number is, right? So how do you know if the business is doing well or not? So I don't know the total volume of what all the restaurants are doing, but I know how much we're making.
So in Malaysia, we've done about 10,000 ringgit. And in Singapore, it's between $500 to $800. Okay, got it. So you're doing $500 to $800 per month right now? Yeah, that's our sort of take home. Okay. So I guess if I convert 10,000 Malaysia ringgit to United States dollars, it's about $2,300 United States dollars per month. And you're saying you keep about 25% of that. So $500, $600 per month.
No, no, sorry. So in Malaysia, we're doing an average 10,000 ringgit per month. And in Singapore, we're doing an average of $500 to $800 per month. Got it. So together, you're doing about $3,000 per month across the whole business. I see. I see. Okay. Now, are all 1,800 restaurants putting dollars through you right now, or are some of them not activated yet?
So I think only about 10% are active users. And what we mean by active is they're getting daily sales. So because our system is very flexible, some of them use it for maybe seasonal sales only or once a month sort of events.
Chapter 3: What does Maynuu's online ordering system offer to restaurants?
So I count about 10% of that have daily active sales now. So 10% of 1,800 is 180 restaurants. You're making $3,000 a month right now total. We could take $3,000 a month total divided by 180 restaurants. You're doing about $17 per restaurant per month right now, correct? Thereabouts, that sounds right. This is amazing. How did you get 1,800 signups? That's a lot of restaurants.
So when we first started out in Malaysia, we hired a sales consultant to do the work. How did you find the sales consultant? Um, I think it was a friend of a friend, you know, local networks sort of thing. How did you pay them? Was it a flat fee or a percent of sales or what? We paid them a flat fee. We paid them, uh, I think about 15,000 ringgit a month. It was very costly. So, um,
this year onwards I actually signed up for a growth accelerator by Dan Martell and we're trying out a different way to, um, you know, grow and scale our business. How'd you find Dan Martell? Um, he approached me on Twitter. Ah, very cool. How did he approach you? He runs a great business. Did he just DM you? Yeah, they just DM me. And what does he say? What's the, what's the copy?
Chapter 4: How does Maynuu generate revenue from its restaurant clients?
Uh, Don't remember exactly, but I, you know, I'm on Twitter quite a bit and I do the whole building public thing. A few of my tweets maybe, you know, got people's attention and I think it happened from there. I see. I see. And so what does, what does growth, I mean, you, you paid this person 15,000 ringgit, which is $3,400 United States dollars per month. That's expensive.
What is growth accelerator by Dan Martell cost? It's 500 a month. Okay, so cheaper, much cheaper. Much cheaper. And I think it's also we learn things that we can take away for life. Like we're not just dependent on one person to do all the work. So we learn how to put in systems that can properly run perpetually if we do it right.
Now, how do you, I mean, do you anticipate using growth accelerators for a couple months? Because $500 against your $3,000 a month in total revenue is actually a big percent of your revenue. That's right. Yep. But I think it's worth it. And I've committed for one year. Okay. So what is that? Sorry? So one year is $500 times 12. So you've committed for $6,000. I see. I see. Very good.
And are you putting your whole team through it or just you?
Chapter 5: When did Aaron launch his software business and what was the initial strategy?
It's just me. Just you. Okay. And what does your team look like today? How many folks? We've got five. Five. Okay. And how many founders? Just you? There's two of us. There's me and there's Wafik, who's based in Malaysia. Do you guys care about valuation right now, specifically your valuation? Do you think you might raise soon or sell a portion of the company?
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Again, both plural founder path.com forward slash products forward slash valuations. And, and how did you guys, you know, the equity conversation at the beginning of a company is really difficult sometimes. How did you guys decide to have that conversation and split equity? Um,
Chapter 6: How many restaurants are currently using Maynuu's platform?
I think it was, um, I think we're both pretty easygoing people. So we just decided to keep it simple. Yeah. Which is what? 50, 50. Um, yeah, thereabouts. Okay. Do you regret that? Like looking, you know, you're two years into the company today. Would you do the same thing again today? Do I regret what? Splitting it 50, 50. Exactly. No, not at all.
So what happens when you guys disagree on something? How do you work through an issue? Um, good question. Um, we haven't, we haven't actually, uh, encountered that yet. Um, I think we've, you know, this is not our first rodeo. So, um, so far, so far we've been on the same page about pretty much everything. Mm-hmm.
It's very rare, though, that two co-founders are on the same page about everything, especially as the company grows and there's more to lose, right? There's not a lot to lose right now. You're doing $3,000 a month in revenue. But as you grow, there may be disagreeances, right? So how do you break a tie? How do you anticipate having that tough chat?
So I think it's probably part of my personality to kind of give in to the other person. Yeah. Okay. At the end of the day, nothing is that important. It's not worth making enemies for, if you know what I mean. And we can always find ways around things. Fair enough.
So between the growth consultant that you used to sign up your initial restaurants and you learning from Growth Accelerator, how are you getting customers today? What strategy are you using? So currently, the one that works best is cold outreach. I do a lot of cold DMs on Instagram.
And but apart from that, it's a lot of word of mouth referrals from people that I know, my friends and people that have signed on. They tell other people as well. So, you know, nothing beats that. Yep. This is a great story. Now of the five people, folks, uh, how many, how many, uh, Aaron, how many of them are engineers and are you an engineer?
Uh, I like to say two and a half cause I'm, I'm the half, I'm the 0.5. Self-taught, self-taught, right? Yeah. That's awesome. That's great. Okay. Very cool. And I mean, what's it like in Malaysia right now? Are there a lot of software companies popping up? Do you sense, do you sense momentum? I would say yes. Yep. It's a developing country. And so, um,
They're definitely trying to model themselves after Silicon Valley. We actually have a place called Putrajaya, which we call the Silicon Valley of Malaysia. So yeah, a lot of very ambitious and very talented people there. And I guess last question here, if you're doing about $3,000 a month today in revenue, do you remember what you were doing exactly one year ago?
One year ago, I think we were doing a third of that. Okay. So about a thousand a month. So, I mean, let me ask you a question. It sounds like you sold a restaurant business before, so maybe you have some savings, but you're building in public, you're being very vulnerable. You don't have enough revenue yet to pay yourself really a real salary.
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