Since Tom has been too busy/lazy to start his “Weekly Updates” yet, we decided to break the silence with the story of our acceptance into YCombinator – enjoy!

The Story

For those of you that don’t know, our investor is YCombinator (YC), a seed stage investment firm started by Paul Graham, Jessica Livingston, Robert Morris and Trevor Blackwell. Since 2005, Y Combinator has invested in two startup batches (8-22 startups) per year and has over 100 investments to date. Our company, TicketStumbler, was part of the Summer 2008 batch. Since the selection process for the Winter 2009 batch is underway, we’ve received numerous inquiries about our backgrounds, interview experience and the origins of TicketStumbler.

My cofounder, Tom, and I have known each other since 3rd grade when we spent the next 8 years playing Starcraft, neighborhood street hockey, various iterations of every EA NHL game, and trying to join web rings, of course. Childhood in the sleepy town of Sylvania, OH – it doesn’t get any easier. Sometime in high school, Tom moved away and we sparingly, but consistently, kept in touch via internet. Following high school, our paths were quite different as I opted to attend college at the University of Dayton while he joined the Army. Less than a year ago, I was a financial analyst working at a boutique transaction services firm just outside of Washington DC while Tom was stationed in Afghanistan as part of the PSYOP mission there.

While Tom was overseas, we kicked around a few startup ideas before finally settling on TicketStumbler. Tom thought of our wonderful name. As a sports fan and frequent business traveler I was very familiar with the secondary ticket markets as well as the lack of a “Kayak” or “Expedia” to help ticket buyers compare multiple ticket providers at once. (Note: It turns out there were competitors doing this already; we just didn’t know it at the time).

Tom returned to the states in February 2008 and took about a month to recharge his batteries through beer consumption, intense video game playing and couch time. After that, we decided to start working on TicketStumbler. Concurrently, YC began accepting applications for the Summer 2008 batch. Before Tom told me about them, I had never even heard of Paul Graham or YCombinator. I had heard of the Morris worm, however. At first I was skeptical about giving up equity so early in the process, but eventually we reasoned that filling out the application was a good exercise and the worst thing that could happen was a “No” answer – just like dating in high school. Also, filling out the application sure as hell beat doing a business plan.

After submitting our application, we were pleasantly surprised when Paul Graham asked us a question about some of our project details. We were even more surprised when YC wanted us to talk to two current YC portfolio companies, Draftmix and Songkick (Note: YC is not doing this for Winter 2009). Our interviews went pretty well despite getting absolutely grilled by Pete from Songkick. It was probably one of the sharpest, toughest interviews I’ve ever had. At this point, we thought our acceptance chances were slim to none and were just happy that two Ohio kids (that’d be us) had made it this far.

Less than a week later we received an email from YC asking us to fly out to San Francisco for final round interviews. We both flew out to San Francisco and were able to stay with an old high school friend. Tom and I hadn’t seen each other in 7 years, which was a little weird at first, but luckily our interests and senses of humor had remained largely unchanged. Our interview was Saturday afternoon, and I’d be lying if I told you I did anything to prepare for it other than reading more about YCombinator (Note: I would recommend preparing. We just tend to be at our best “winging it”). Tom had spent 40 of the past 48 hours finishing up a bare bones working prototype and was tired as hell. We arrived fifteen minutes early and were greeted by the warm, smiling face of Jessica Livingston.

Eventually, after what seemed like an eternity, we were called in for the interview. What transpired was a rapid fire Q&A session. Tom was out of his mind tired – I think he only said a sentence or two – for all I know he could have been sleeping during the interview. Despite having a working prototype, they only looked at it for maybe 15 seconds, but I think it really showed we could execute. At one point I remember fielding 3 or 4 related questions at once until I finally said: “Because the markets aren’t efficient”. I don’t know if that was the turning point or “aha” moment, but it sure felt like it. Other than that, I don’t remember much other than talking fast.

The interview was concluded once everyone realized it had gone a few minutes over the time limit and we were ushered out of the room, reimbursement check in hand. We boarded the Caltrain in good spirits and I told Tom: “Hey, that went pretty well, I’d bet $500 we got in”. Tom, taking my statement literally, looked at me, then looked at the reimbursement check, and readily agreed to the deal. What a bastard – although I can’t blame him for hedging. Upon arriving home, Tom went to bed and I went with my buddy to the bar. Around 6:30 pm that day I received a phone call from an unknown number. Paul Graham. I answered the phone and the words on the other end of the line will stay with me the rest of my life: “We’d like to fund you.” I immediately texted some close friends and called my cofounder. Tom was still so out of it that after hearing the news he uttered some swear words and told me to stop messing with him. I laughed to myself and headed back into the bar. Like any good friend, my buddy had shots of triumph or potentially, despair, waiting.

For us, the decision to do YC wasn’t a hard one. Neither of us had/have a wife or kids. Tom wanted a change and any excuse to leave Ohio. I had lived in Washington DC for two years and although I had a solid, well-paying job and a great group of friends, it was time to try something new. Based on my uh, skills, a career in finance didn’t seem very promising and I was worried about the direction of the finance industry (Note: I had no idea the markets would turn bad this quickly although a downturn was obvious. You mean people making 50k per year shouldn’t own 600k houses?). In retrospect, swapping a finance job for a startup may now be considered the “safe choice”.

From there, we haven’t looked back. Founders accept YC funding for various reasons. For some, it’s investor exposure. For others, it’s a chance to be guided by YC. For TicketStumbler, it was for the people, and we’d do it all again in a cokehead heartbeat.

The Advice

If you’re a YC hopeful, you probably expected to find some interviewing advice here. Unfortunately, it’s quite difficult to provide over-arching advice on how to win a game that is highly subjective and imperfect. However, if we had to pick one piece of advice it would be: Have your shit together.

Paul has always said YC is more about finding “good” people than “good” ideas since ideas can (and, in YC, often do) change. If you present yourself as knowledgeable both in general and with regard to your chosen problem domain, you’ll vastly increase your chances. Additionally, be confident. You’ve done your homework, you know your shit, so act like it. As previously stated, I didn’t do much preparation for the interview because I already knew our market in and out and knew how to explain it.

Having your shit together also means making sure you can convince YC that your team is solid, capable and dedicated. Starting a company isn’t a seminar; it’s not a goddamn weekend retreat. Convince them that you’re going to make SuperPoke2 whether YC funds you or not and it’s going to be awesome. Be solid, but not arrogant — take criticism with grace and pragmatism.