Lessons Learned from Shipping My Third Startup: [bistroai.cc]

Shipping a startup is never just about code—it’s about lessons that cost sweat, rejection, late nights, and moments of breakthrough. With BistroAI, my third startup, I’ve collected lessons that I wish I knew earlier.

1. People Will Help You—for Free

The best way to validate an idea isn’t a spreadsheet, it’s people. Jump on calls, connect, ask for advice. Yes, you’ll face a lot of rejection, but you only need a few “yes.”

When you do get someone’s time—even 5 to 15 minutes—be direct. Say: “I can’t pay you now, but this could turn into something valuable for both of us.” Take notes. Refine your idea based on their feedback.

Industry experts are gold because they reveal blind spots you’ll never see from the outside. And the right conversation can shift your entire roadmap.

2. Scalability Is Misunderstood but Critical

Founders love to throw the word scalable around. In reality, very few understand it. Your startup probably won’t hit Google-level traffic anytime soon, but challenging yourself to build with scalability in mind will set you apart.

It’s not about premature optimization—it’s about building a foundation that doesn’t collapse at the first sign of growth. A few rules I’ve learned:

Follow the guidelines of your stack. Don’t create bottlenecks with careless code.
Build modular. Teams—or even future you—shouldn’t step on each other’s toes.
Think in systems. 99% of scalability comes from strong system design.
Find bottlenecks early. Fix them before they choke you. Choke them with tests.

Unicorns fight over talent for a reason: solving hard scalability problems is what gives a company long-term defensibility. If you want your product to last, scalability can’t be an afterthought.

3. Painkillers Win, Candy Fails

Your product has to be a painkiller a must-have, not a nice-to-have. Nobody buys candy when they’ve got a headache.

In food industry, the pain points are everywhere:

Small restaurants can’t afford pro chefs or food photographers.
Chefs need ways to pitch irresistible menus to clients.
Consumers are cooking less while eating out gets more expensive.

BistroAI works because it hits real pain: turning food creation and presentation into something faster, cheaper, and more creative. Even then, it could fail—but being a painkiller gives it a fighting chance.

4. Don’t Get Stuck—Keep Moving

Most ideas won’t hit big right away. Unless you’re lucky or burning cash on ads, you’ll plateau. That’s fine. The danger is staying stuck.

Before I even deployed BistroAI, I was already charting the next project. That doesn’t mean abandoning things quickly—it means momentum is your greatest ally. You’re not a tree. Move.

5. Experience > Money

Money matters. But experience compounds. Every startup you ship is like a bank account of hard-earned skills you can cash out later—knowledge of product design, deployment, user psychology, scaling, hiring, marketing.

If you chase only money, you’ll burn out. If you chase experience, the money eventually chases you.

That said—don’t cheap out on the quality of your experience. Build landing pages with care. Make your SaaS feel like it was built by someone who gives a damn. When people visit, they should feel the effort behind it.

6. Reward Yourself the Right Way

Reward doesn’t always mean luxury. It means meaning.

Don’t blow cash on distractions that set you back. Instead, reward yourself by setting the next path: a new project, a new skill, a milestone worth chasing.

The best reward is knowing the work itself is the joy. If you need extravagant escapes just to cope, maybe you’re on the wrong path.

7. Your Story Is Part of the Product

One lesson I’ve learned is that your personal journey sells as much as your product. People connect with you—your persistence, your failures, your principles.

BistroAI isn’t just about AI-generated food concepts. It’s about the story of building something that helps creators, restaurants, and food lovers unlock new possibilities. Share your story, not just your features.

8. Shipping Is the Best Teacher

No course, no book, no unicorn job can replace the lessons you learn by shipping. Every deployment teaches you what scales, what breaks, what users ignore, and what they love.

Startups are the fastest way to compress 10 years of learning into one. It hurts, but it’s worth it.

🚀 Final Thought:
Shipping BistroAI taught me that the work itself is the reward. You can’t control outcomes, but you can control motion: keep moving, keep solving, keep shipping. The rest follows.