Fluffy Duck - Pt 1

I'm writing this for my boys, and for anyone else who's ever wondered how to get something going when you're starting out with pretty much nothing.

Universal Pizza

Back in 2003, I walked into an accountant’s office with a stapled document titled Universal Pizza. A space themed restaurant, with planet names for meals. Saturn Rings as onion rings, Mars Bars on-theme for dessert.

He flipped through my masterpiece. Looked up at me and said, “You’re just a fluffy duck.” That’s it. No tips, no “fix your numbers.” Just fluffy duck.

I left that office feeling about two inches tall. Not because the insult hurt, but because I knew he was absolutely right. I'd walked in asking someone to believe in something I'd never even tested. I had no capital, no experience, no proof. Just enthusiasm and a stapler.

But here's the thing. That fluffy duck comment became the best business advice I never asked for. It was in that moment, I'd realised that walking into rooms with stapled dreams gets you exactly nowhere.

My First Startup (Age 6 or 7)

I’ve always been into making things. I was a notoriously bored child who always needed something interesting to do. Bugging my parents constantly, “I'm gonna invent something!” because Doc from Back to the Future did. The urge to invent was already there. I just didn’t have the tools or the thinking framework yet.

Well, that’s not entirely true. When I was about six, I built a lolly machine out of a empty ice-cream cone box and a Gladwrap tube. My brother would use his pocket money and put coins in. I’d roll a lolly down the tube from the back of the box and it would land on a small plate at the bottom.

Woah! he'd say. And yeah, little ol' me felt pretty chuffed about it all.

I'd made profit from that, but the main thing was, I'd figured something out, and that was how to make money. I just kept buying more lollies and repeated the process. So technically... I did invent something. I just didn’t know yet how to scale cardboard operations into the real world.

Starting From Scratch

That fluffy duck comment didn't bug me for too much longer, however, I did spend the next couple of years trying to get hired. Retail, hospitality, literally anywhere that would take someone with zero full-time work experience and a failed galaxy pizza concept on their CV (not that I actually put that on there).

Instead of waiting for someone to validate me with a job, I started validating myself through what I could actually build. Small things at first. Experiments. Tests. Scrappy little projects.

I tried new ideas, and became profitable, and also made a ton of mistakes, something I'll share more about in the next parts of this series.

But first...

Lesson 1: Proof beats vision every time. Before you ask anyone to believe in your idea, build something small that shows it works.