Welcome to The Pocket Fund Edition — and a big shout out to the 88 new subscribers this week! (I had 100 before so this is a big increase lol.)
Sorry about the month-long break. Fortunately, when you work for yourself, you can do whatever you want to. I was working on a lot and needed to take a break to focus on the businesses. I have many exciting things coming and we’ll be back to regular programming this week onwards. I’ve been waiting a while to write this edition — let’s get right into it.
What Is Pocket Fund?
Pocket Fund is a home for a new kind of entrepreneur — where success isn’t defined by how much VC funding you raise.
Pocket Fund will start with a focus on acquisition entrepreneurship with a $5,000 search fund for small online businesses. The first chapter of Pocket Fund will operate as a club out of Claremont McKenna College.
Money isn’t the motivating factor here. Do it for the love of entrepreneurship.
The Simple 3-Step Plan
The model is deliberately simple:
- 1. Find & buy a business on Acquire.com
- 2. Run the business for 12–18 months
- 3. Sell at a 5x valuation
- Bonus: Repeat
Pocket Fund has been started to combat what I feel is a lack of recognition given to student entrepreneurs who aren’t looking to raise millions to found a ‘moonshot’ startup. Entrepreneurs who are just looking to follow their passions, start their own businesses, and define success in their own way.
Pocket Fund is committed to open-source practices — all activities and learnings are shared openly with members and the broader community.
What Kind of Business Will We Buy?
- Online business for <$5,000
- Solving a niche problem with little direct competition
- Focus on finding untapped potential
- Takes advantage of the existing strengths of members
- Bootstrapped, run with an eye on profitability and sustainable growth — focus on systems and automation
We believe in growing a healthy and profitable business and are not trying to raise money for a moonshot start-up.
Why Us?
We aren’t entirely sure how — that’s kind of the fun of it. If we knew exactly what to do, then what’s the point? But here’s some success I’ve had in the past:
- Built a side hustle to $25,000 at age 18
- Acquired Sourcely.ai for $4,000, grew it to a valuation of $100K in 3 months
Future Plans
We’re only just getting started. We plan to open chapters in colleges across the US with a focus on recruiting genuine leaders, rather than school prestige.
Where we’re at right now: raised $4,000 out of the $5,000 goal.
