Edit 14 - Origin Story (2023-2024).md

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---
tags: [theme, origin, history, archive, prequel]
window: 2023-04 → 2025-04
---

# Origin Story (2023–2024)

The pre-history of the channel and the current $3k-AOV brand. Reconstructed from the **archive transcripts** (~22k words of voice + round-video).

## 2023 — "10k in 3 months" challenge (the channel's original premise)

- Channel started as a public documentation: build an e-commerce brand from zero → $10k profit in 3 months.
- **Side hustle constraint**: Gustavs explicitly stated this was max ~2 hrs/day; not his main income source.
- **First product mentor**: **Alex Fedotto** — product-research expert. Earlier brands he helped launch: **Goodie**, **Snow**.
- Used Shopify (built around Shopify "for several years already" by 2023).
- Daughter born May 2023 ("two weeks ago she was birthed" — she's referenced multiple times in 2023).

### The challenge stalled

- **Aug 2023**: multi-week delay. Gustavs apologizes; cites "internal stuff."
- **Pets brand** was the chosen niche. Dropshipping via CJ → bad pricing → switched to a "WhatsApp-supported" supplier.
- Aug 2023: pivot — *Investment Fund* project announced. Found a brand doing $5k/mo, plan to scale to $100k in 4 months.
- **Dec 11, 2023** — explicit pivot decision aired:
> *"Every time when I try to put a brand together from zero, there's some kind of power holding me back. But when I take some good brand which is already built or has product-market fit, it's so easy. I see what should be upgraded, scaled. So my goal: next year, $1M in a month, then $1M a day. The only way to do that is with already-ready products and just scale them. This channel will change to that kind of information."*

## 2024 — The current brand launches and explodes

### Pre-launch (Dec 2023 → Jan 2024)
- New brand identified: **$2,000+ AOV** (not Aliexpress-cheap), high-profit, healthy margins.
- *"Everyone's focused on cheap AliExpress products. Small margins don't drive me."*
- Season expected April–May → ramp must finish by then.

### Launch (Jan 2024)
- 12 Jan: live ads going, 5 add-to-carts, no sales yet. Product over $2,000 → multi-day decision cycle.
- 19 Jan: first orders, **close to $10k week**.
- 20 Jan: customer recordings show 40-min sessions — *"they're eating every word."* Audience: 40–50+.
- 26 Jan: **$10k single day**. Plan: $100k day inside 5 days.
- 27 Jan: first phone-closed sale → triggers hire request for US-time-zone sales guy.
- 31 Jan: **Shopify Payments lost** (within first month of brand launch). $50k held for 4 months. → This is the ban that wouldn't lift until **31 May 2025** (16 months later).

### Feb 2024
- 24 Feb: ~$250k turnover one month after start. ~$15k personal investment. ~$100k held across Stripe ($20k), PayPal ($40k), Shopify ($50k).
- 26 Feb: 20+ k days. Goal: $500k/month.
- 28 Feb: $200k revenue *in one week* (compressing what took the first month to 7 days).
- Built on a 5-year-old team — *"I didn't find the team, I built it. Took me more than 7 years."*

### Mar 2024 — Dubai relocation
- Moves to Dubai (~floor 34).
- 14 Mar: ad accounts blocked again on the last day of a campaign. Frame: *"the world tests you."*
- 19 Mar: **$500k/month celebration livestream.**

### Apr 2024
- 03 Apr: first repeat customer (~$1.5k accessory order). New $1.5k product tested → first sale day one.
- 07 Apr: *"It's safer for them to hold money — if I disappear they're liable. Don't see this as a problem; become the person who solves bigger problems."*
- **Investor offer**: 12% for $200k → company implied at **~$1.6M valuation**.
- 24 Apr: investor's risk-hedge advice → *"Build a competitor brand to your own brand. Big companies always compete with themselves to take more market share."*

### May 2024 — Product Tree + more capital
- 01 May: **First "product tree" framework** introduced after a meeting with a product manager. Core product → satellite products → branches → niches deep, not wide.
- 14 May: **Stripe also blocked** (after Shopify Payments). Now using Stripe payment links with buy-now-pay-later.
- 16 May: *"Sometimes it's not a business problem — just cash. To print more money you need money to print it. I want to make $1M profit in a month — I need cash injections."*
- 18 May: **$10k bounty** offered for an investor referral; valuation ~$1.6M signal.

### Jul 2024
- 19 Jul: announced upcoming **D2C e-commerce community** ("lifetime deal for first 50").

### Aug 2024
- 07 Aug: **Multi-company / multi-account strategy** as payment-risk hedge. *"Have 2-3 accounts across 2-3 companies, switch when one freezes. Don't wait two weeks each time."*
- Continues stressing watching session recordings 20-30 min/day.

## Why this changes the YT narrative

- The "first $1M month" arc starts in **Jan 2024**, not Dec 2025. December 2025 is the *finish line*, not the start.
- The 16-month Shopify Payments ban = **Feb 2024 → May 2025**. The brand ran the entire scale-up *without* its own payment rail.
- The current "raising $5–10M" arc is the third capital round; the first was the Apr-May 2024 investor hunt at a $1.6M valuation.
- "Door-to-door US sales" in 2025 is a continuation of the Jan-2024 "we need a US-time-zone phone sales guy" line.

## Frameworks born in this era

| Framework | First aired |
|---|---|
| Belief drives execution | Jun 2023 |
| "Not how, but who" | Jun 2023 |
| Side-hustle execution model (2 hrs/day) | Jun 2023 |
| Find the existing offline product, take it online | Feb 2024 |
| Become the person who solves bigger problems | Apr 2024 |
| Product tree (core → satellites → branches) | May 2024 |
| Build a competitor brand to your own brand | Apr 2024 |
| 1% better every day | Mar 2024 |
| Multi-company payment-account hedge | Aug 2024 |
| Watch session recordings 20-30 min daily | Jan 2024 |

## People & places added

- **Alex Fedotto** — product mentor; backed Goodie, Snow.
- **The Drainist** — email-marketing mentor.
- **Dubai** — moved there Mar 2024 (long before the 2026 "stuck in Dubai").
- **Egypt** — visited Feb 2024.
- **Daughter born May 2023** — third or fourth child (4th was born ~Apr 2025).

## Related

- [[01 - Revenue Milestones & Numbers]]
- [[02 - Product Ladder & CPA Strategy]]
- [[05 - Capital & Financing]]
- [[../pre-2025/_index]]

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