He moved to the US with nothing. Now he does $750M ARR. | Mateo Marietti, Founder of CookUnity

Mateo had already built a successful food company in Argentina. But he wanted more. So he moved to New York with no network, no credibility, and a dream to build the "Spotify for Food."

The first two years were messy. He nearly ran out of money multiple times, relied on corporate expense accounts to keep the lights on, and failed a major expansion into LA. But then, he noticed a strange behavior: some customers were ordering 10 meals at a time. That single insight led to a massive pivot, a partnership with world-class chefs, and eventually, a $750M run rate.

In this episode, Mateo breaks down the gritty reality of building a marketplace from scratch, how to survive the "messy middle," and why sometimes you have to kill your revenue to save your company.

Why You Should Listen

• Why he shut down a $2M revenue stream to pivot to a model with $0 ARR.
• How identifying the small group of users who would be "very disappointed" unlocked massive scale.
• Why he failed at expanding the first time, but succeeded the second time by changing just one variable.

Keywords

startup podcast, startup podcast for founders, product market fit, food tech, marketplace startups, pivot, founder story, CookUnity, scaling a startup, immigrant founder

00:00:00 Intro
00:02:50 Moving from Argentina to New York
00:07:43 Why Leave a Successful Business?
00:13:37 The "Airbnb for Food" Vision
00:22:44 Faking Traction with Corporate Stipends
00:28:41 The $2M Pivot: Shutting Down On-Demand
00:34:54 Why Unit Economics Mattered More Than Revenue
00:42:14 The COVID Inflection Point & Chef Partnerships
00:48:09 Failing Fast in LA vs. Succeeding Later
00:51:54 The Moment of True Product Market Fit

Send me a message to let me know what you think!