14 turning points in the history of Chill Subs
We're turning 2 years old!
Hi, it’s our 2-year birthday on Saturday, and I’m just a tiny bit emotional (how has it been two years already?!)
So I thought the most appropriate post for this week would be some Chill Subs history, which includes a lot of people, places, ideas of different levels of success, and, of course, FEELS.
Enjoy.
1. January 2022 - THE BEGINNING
That’s the story I had to repeat over and over to the point where I started thinking about imagining a completely different ridiculous story just for fun. Like that I was meditating on a mountain in Italy or something and some unknown force told me to help writers get published.
But no, that’s not how it happened.
How it happened was my husband and I moved to Poland in December 2021. We spent a week quarantining in a small studio apartment in Gdansk, then spent $200 on COVID tests that were luckily negative and we were finally free to explore the holiday season city. I found a couple of bars that locals claimed to be a must-visit and made my husband go for a walk with me (he’d rather stay home and work) (who am I kidding, me too)
We got our beers and started discussing startup ideas, cause we’re both developers and that’s what we do. Here:
I caught myself thinking that all my ideas revolved around having a searchable database of some sort. Searching people, searching beers, searching concerts. And then I realized that I already had a database! It was my ugly spreadsheet of lit mags I had started a couple of months ago to research the whole indie lit world and how to get published! Okaaaay.
So on the way home, I was taking drunk notes until my hand almost fell off cause it was like -10°C (14°F).
Here’s the very first note, it was kinda boring but had the essence:
Then I came home and went completely bonkers with ideas and made a giant note with everything that really became Chill Subs in two weeks.
And this, friends, is the very first UI prototype:
The code name for this whole thing was Lit Mag Finder (thank god I knew the name had to be cooler)
Then I sent Veronica from Bullshit Lit some screenshots to check it out (this was super helpful to keep the drive going and also for spreading the word later cause I didn’t have any Twitter followers)
And then, THE ANNOUNCEMENT. Holy shit that was crazy.
This was us celebrating to Parks and Rec.
And the rest is history! (which you will now know more of)
2. April 2022 - Ben
In April, some dude started sending me these ridiculously long (but super exciting) emails with praise and ideas. They were amazingly reassuring and helpful, but I have this horrible habit where I don’t reply to messages until I’m ready to really think about it and give it the attention it deserves.
So I always replied in like two weeks. Then he emailed back with another awesome email.
Here’s A PART OF the very first one:
This lasted for about two months until I thought what the hell, let’s just do this together. If this guy stuck with me through my fantastic emailing habits, he’s gonna stick through all of it.
And he did! Man, I don’t know a person who got their shit together more than Ben. And even if he doesn’t, he sure knows how to make it seem like it.
Thank you Becky!
3. May 2022 - Quitting freelance
I’m gonna build this thing! It needs my full attention! Fuck the client, I’ll learn to earn money with chill subs!
But my client is a very persistent fellow, so the next Monday after I texted I quit, he was like “So, Karina, here are this week’s tasks!”
Took a few weeks of ghosting him till he got the message (was totally worth it)
4. October 2022 - UK startup visa (kinda)
So I always wanted to move to the UK or the US. Then in 2022 I found this UK startup visa program and thought ok. I’m gonna try to apply to this once Chill Subs is stronger. Then Ben came on board and said he was up for it too. And so we created a whole ass business plan and a pitch deck that was designed by Ben’s friend Nikita.
I even took the IELTS English exam and we had all the requirements ready.
And then in October right before thinking to finally apply we chickened out. The thing is, you need to get an endorsement first, either from a university if you’re a student (so much easier) or typically from some startup incubator. And here it’s either by giving up some equity or paying like $20,000.
We didn’t have any money (lol still don’t) and we didn’t want investors (this wasn’t the first time we said no to them, that summer there was also this rich guy who wanted to basically buy Chill Subs), and even if we magically got the endorsement some other way, we didn’t want the pressure of living in an expensive country not knowing how to make money yet.
Soo we thought ok, let’s figure out this part first! And so opened a company in the US and started planning the money stuff.
(By the way, my English exam expires in September 2024 and I still haven’t used it and I feel like an idiot, help)
5. January 2023 - Nikita and Shelby
Luckily, Ben has a lot of talented friends who are also okay with being broke for a while if they’re doing something cool.
So it was just a matter of time before they joined… Well, Shelby kinda had no choice. She moved across the globe to live in one-room apartments with Ben who talks about Chill Subs 24/7 so she might as well do this too.
And they’re killing it.
6. Winter 2023 - “Let’s merge with Write or Die”
I remember I was sitting in a cafe drinking one of my last coffees (I quit more than a year ago) when I got a message from Ben saying he wanted to pitch something to Kailey (who initially invited us to her online party for an interview and we thought she was fun so we started thinking of ways to collab)
Ben’s reasoning was basically “Well she’s like us and she’s not an asshole and she has the writing community while we are both bad at this so why grow apart when we can grow together”
And so a couple of boring and terrifying lawyer meetings later, we did!
7. February 2023 - fuck you Poland
Got rejected Polish residency again and we didn’t have a strong enough case to reapply cause our income was even less than in 2022 so had to plan to leave till August.
I could keep fighting this, but that would mean being stuck in Poland for longer and not being able to leave the country and I was tired. So a small sabotaging part of me thought “Well fuck it, I’m gonna finally travel somewhere again!”
8. April 2023 - coming back to freelance
Sooo I ran out of money.
To compensate for my limited availability we decided to hire another developer, and that’s where Marcin comes into the picture! I found him on like page 90 on LinkedIn because I never give up (on having a headache while browsing search results).
And thank god he had a sense of humor and was killing it with silly memes the moment I invited him to the Slack channel. Vibe check - done!
May 2023 - money, we started earning money!
Write or Die merge was announced, our confusing Sub Club membership was announced, and sandwich recipes were shared. The future was bright!
10. July 2023 - moving
Left Poland, came to Istanbul to recharge at my mom’s for a bit, thought we’d live there for at least 3 months (that’s the limit if you don’t get residency), but it took about 10 minutes of remembering what it’s like to live with my mother to open Airbnb and book an apartment in...another country.
Now, I wouldn’t have done this if Ben hadn’t constantly told me to come to Georgia while he, Shelby and Nikita were there. At first, I was stuck in Poland and then just wasn’t sure what to do. But there in that very moment, it was perfectly clear. Thanks mom!
So this gave us 3 months of real-life Chill Subs coworking! And knowing that I’d get the fuck out of Turkey soon allowed me to enjoy it more!
And there’s a lot to enjoy. Mostly, food. Like this one:
Or this 3 dollar smoothie the size of my head
Or the fact that this can be your workplace
And of course, CATS.
Yes, I needed all this very much. Being stuck in Poland for more than a year wasn’t fun.
11. August 2023 - CHILL SUBS RETREAT
When I knew I’d be in Turkey, we immediately decided to book a Chill Subs retreat there, cause fuck, we deserved it! At that point we had been earning money for like 3 months and didn’t use it on anything other than services, Marcin’s salary, and paying writers.
And soooo. WE SAW EACH OTHER’S FEET!
I know, I know. You don’t even see our feet here. But we didn’t take better photos and it’s also reserved for people who see us in real life.
That was a dream come true and definitely cemented the whole feeling of it being the real thing. Gosh, we were a team sitting in a room discussing plans and shit!
(Speaking of, this was a 3-day planning session for the upcoming 3 months. It was hot and very exhausting but we were so happy to be together that we didn’t care)
12. September 2023 - priorities and salaries
I fell asleep twice during the day while my to-do list kept piling up and honestly, I didn’t care about anything at that point. (whenever I’m stressed, I just shut down and avoid everything I can avoid)
Then Ben texted me and we discussed wtf and we needed to do something about it so the next day Ben, Shelby, Nikita and I came together to talk about our feelings and things we needed to do/have to feel better.
That’s when we realized we probably had enough money to start paying ourselves enough to cover our mostly Eastern European rent, and so even though it was a lot less than I had with my client for way less work, I could finally leave and focus on Chill Subs again. And also this meant normal weekends. Saturday and Sunday! Wow.
We also decided to take things slower and not rush to make decisions we’ll later regret or make promises that would make us stressed and fuck with our schedule. (still learning)
13. Nov 2023 - who are we
In any company’s lifetime, there comes a point when you talk about who the hell you are (bRaNd ImAgE and VALUE PROPOSITION). That was our time.
Like obviously we knew what we were doing (kind of). But it felt like we weren’t on the same page about what our core message and strengths and voice were.
That’s when we met again and basically convinced Nikita to bring back the fucks and the fun text on the home page.
Kidding, not just this. But this is all you need to know. This was a very useful meeting.
14. Dec 31, 2023 - “I gave it a shot”
“your website sucks too many bugs you should relaunch and probably with a different name”
RUDE. But there’s some truth in it. We spent most of 2023 learning to survive managing a growing startup with very limited resources and also changing places of living, so that resulted in neglecting some parts that really needed our attention.
That’s why we decided to spend the next two months not developing anything new and just improving what we already have to not give someone a reason to send us mean messages on New Year’s Eve (thank god I didn’t check the email that day, I swear I would have spent the whole night crying to my husband and begging him to sit and fix bugs with me)
Final word
If I had to describe each Chill Subs year in only a few words, I think this would be:
- 2022 - WOW THIS IS SO FUN ALSO AM I FAMOUS
- 2023 - OOF MONEY!?! people, growing pains
- 2024 (hopefully) - having our shit together, no longer looking like kitten Earl every day
P.S. If you want to buy us a present and help us on this journey of being able to afford not just rent but maybe even FOOD (we’re not picky, we can eat eggs every day), here’s what you can do. Head over to our website and try out some of the things we created for premium & supporter members:
Love you
The fact that Ben sent you a spreadsheet in his first email to you is killing me. He is so on brand