The Startup Playbook Podcast

Insights and lessons from the world's best entrepreneurs and investors

Ep210 – James Fuller (Co-founder & CEO – Hnry) on turning a spreadsheet into platform processing $2.6B

My guest for Ep210 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was James Fuller.

James is the Co-founder & CEO of Hnry. Hnry automates taxes for sole traders, so they never have to think about tax again.

The company started from a spreadsheet that James and his wife and Co-founder, Claire, created to solve their own problem.

They shared these spreadsheets with friends who passed it on to other friends before realising that there was a real business opportunity underneath these spreadsheets.

Today, Hnry has 150 staff across 3 countries, has raised over $60M in funding and processes $2.6B in payments every year in Australia and New Zealand.

In this episode, we dive deep into a range of topics including:

  • The advantages that come from being a husband and wife founding team
  • The opportunities and challenges that come from being first to market
  • How the value of fairness is embedded not just into their company culture, but also their pricing strategy
  • How James and Claire have overcome some of the more challenging periods of their business, including times when they’ve both wanted to quit the business
  • And much more!

Timestamps:

  • 1:57 James’ background.
  • 3:19 Being co-founders and spouses: pros, cons, and how they navigate disagreements.
  • 12:29 Hnry’s growth over the years: 150 staff, 3 countries, billions of dollars processed.
  • 18:13 Customer led product development, building trust over time, high referral rates and strong NPS as proof points.
  • 22:43 Overcoming traditional industry challenges, educating the market about a “new category” of full-stack service.
  • 32:43 Fairness & Hnry’s Unique Pricing Model.
  • 38:37 Culture & team building across three countries
  • 42:53 Balancing parenthood and startup life

Our partners:

A big thank you to Karan Anand for his help with this interview!

Also a big shout out to our long-term partners for the show:

Scendar 

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
The Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/podcast to get access to this exclusive discount.

Links mentioned:

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Credits:

Music: Paycheck

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