Founder Interview with Michael Mayer
I had the privilege of interviewing our Co-founder and CEO on his birthday last week. Please enjoy our candid chat!
“I firmly believe we have a responsibility to succeed. Consumers are way better off with this new type of subscription, and we could set back the subscription universe for decades by failing.”
Michael working our newest hardware.
Michael, can you share a bit about your background before starting Bottomless?
I am a self-taught software developer. I first encountered software in college when I took an econometrics class. I remember while I was doing an assignment, I had an epiphany.
In programming, there is an “import library” option. It gives you access to tons of third-party code. There are thousands of libraries, they are all free, and I realized I could do anything I wanted with them.
I became obsessed and did dozens of throwaway projects that I took very seriously at the time.
One project is still up, but I stopped maintaining it a while back. It’s called “Front Page New Tab.” I was a news junkie back then, so I built a configurable new tab page where you could add the news sites you liked and it would constantly refresh all of the sites quietly in the background.
Was programming just a hobby or did you know this was something you wanted to pursue?
It was a hobby, but it was also something that I knew I wanted to get into. I was an economics student, but when I discovered coding, it was way better. I knew I was either going to have a career making spreadsheets in a financial department or I could build cool shit.
I never had the motivation to do a course. I just enjoyed building stuff.
It worked out. I managed to get a job as a software developer, which made me credible as a tech founder. I built the first version of everything we had at Bottomless.
Your co-founder told us that you are a natural entrepreneur. What was your earliest sign of entrepreneurship?
This is a ridiculous story, but it is true.
When I was 4 years old, my family had backyard chickens, and I had a business selling the eggs door-to-door. I don’t know whose idea it was, maybe my mom put me up to it, but I continued to do it for years.
The legendary story in the family is that I overcharged for the eggs. I didn’t give the customers a price. Knowing they wouldn’t want to rip off a little kid, I asked them what they wanted to pay, and they offered way above the going rate.
Again, this is all family lore.
I took care of the chickens, cleaned the eggs, and once we had enough eggs in stock, I would go door to door to the neighbors. I saved up a ton of money from it.
What was your dream job as a kid?
I wanted to be an inventor or an entrepreneur, but society beat the idea out of me to the point that when I was 18, I decided they were both absurd things to want to be when I grew up.
I remember teachers at school would say, “Maybe a doctor or lawyer is more realistic.”
That says a lot more about the nature of schooling than anything.
I am sure you have a lot of ideas for different businesses. What gave you the idea for Bottomless?
It’s actually kind of complicated. For most businesses, you can condense this down to a nice story, but there were a lot of things floating around for us.
We had problems with our subscriptions and kept canceling them. We knew that was a big problem for both consumers and businesses.
We threw a few solutions around, but a restaurant job I had in college inspired me to use weight sensors. I was familiar with how the restaurant restocked. For certain items, they would take inventory by guessing the weight.
Our concept was like an automated, weighted inventory system for your home.
Stay tuned for the full founding story in an upcoming post!
How did you come up with the name, “Bottomless?”
It needed to be a word that didn’t have a lot of companies around it already. When we searched “bottomless” before we got started, we got a lot of photos of people without pants.
We bet we would get a lot of traction after we started, and it worked out because we’re the majority of the results that come up now. It takes a long time to find someone without pants.
What motivates you in your role as founder?
People have some weird idea that just because a company tries a concept and it doesn’t work, the idea is bad. It is pretty naive. It is possible to fail and have a good concept.
Still, because of that, I firmly believe we have a responsibility to succeed. Consumers are way better off with this new type of subscription, and we could set back the subscription universe for decades by failing.
Keeping that in mind, how do you keep a company culture centered around those responsibilities?
I think our team cares about the company because Liana and I care so much, and if people don’t care, there is too much culture clash. It doesn’t work out.
Hiring is hard. It is one of the main things I’ve learned from founding a company.
It is important in a startup that people can think on their toes. People are asked to do more with less instruction, so that’s what I try to screen for:
Can you think for yourself and are you independently motivated to get stuff done?
Those are the most important qualities and are often opposed to each other. There are a lot of people who can think for themselves, but have a hard time executing and vice versa. We try to find people who have both.
Today is your birthday, so I wanted to ask a reflective question.
How do you hope you’ll be remembered?
I hope I’ll be remembered at all!
I just read a biography about James Garfield who was the fucking president, and no one knows about him at all. You mention the name and people say, “The cat?”
I don’t think any of us will be remembered at all.
One personal anecdote is that my uncle invented something you probably see weekly. It sounds silly, but do you know when you go to a grocery store and sometimes the misters turn on in the produce section? He invented that.
In high school, he worked at a grocery store, and they used to hose the produce, and he was like, “What the hell is this? We can do better than that.”
He invented a thing that will live well past him. That would be pretty cool. It’s not about being remembered. You don’t know my uncle, John Mayer.
I want people to have automatic replenishment with weight-based devices - anywhere. I think it works, and I want that to be a thing!
We’re going to try! On that note, what’s next for Bottomless?
Right now, we want to get partners in new verticals.
I don’t think about what’s next after that. I am just focused on the now.
However, in the very long term, I want what we’re doing to be a basic aspect of what people think is possible.
People will think, “I want this physical good to be in stock. How do I do that? Constantly checking it… or setting up a device to do that for me?”
The second option is better.
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