Post-Mortem: Lessons Learned from the journey of Trashre UG

As we close the chapter on Trashre UG, I wanted to reflect on the highs, lows, challenges, and valuable lessons learned throughout our startup journey. While the closure of our company may mark the end of one chapter, it also represents an opportunity for introspection, growth, and the identification of key takeaways that will shape our future endeavors as entrepreneurs.

This post-mortem serves as a candid reflection on the successes, failures, and insights gained from our experience building Trashre UG.

Vision and Strategy

Looking back, one of the key lessons learned was the importance of having a clear and compelling vision for our company, supported by a robust and adaptable business strategy. While our initial vision was ambitious and inspiring, we faced challenges in effectively translating it into actionable strategies, scalability plans, and revenue models. Moving forward, we recognize the need for a more data-driven approach to strategy development, market validation, and product-market fit.

Team Dynamics and Culture

Our team was the heart and soul of Trashre UG, and the strength of our team dynamics and organizational culture played a significant role in shaping our company's trajectory. In hindsight, we acknowledge that effective communication, collaboration, and alignment among team members are essential for sustainable growth and success. Investing in team building, professional development, and fostering a culture of inclusivity and innovation is a priority for future ventures.

Market Validation and Customer Feedback

One of the critical insights gained from our startup journey was the importance of market validation, customer feedback, and iterative product development. While we were passionate about our solution, we encountered challenges in articulating its value proposition, addressing customer pain points, and adapting to changing market trends. Moving forward, we are committed to prioritizing customer-centricity, conducting thorough market research, and leveraging feedback to drive product innovation and refinement.

Financial Management and Sustainability

In retrospect, financial management and sustainability were areas where we faced significant challenges and setbacks. Securing funding, managing cash flow, and achieving financial sustainability proved to be daunting tasks that impacted our ability to scale and grow.

An area in which we were too optimistic was our ability to finance our own lifestyles while working full-time without pay. We thought we could invest the whole amount of our revenues into the start-up to scale faster as we each had personal savings to rely on. Those savings, however significant they were (knowing that none of us were Millionaires), turned out not to be sufficient to sustain us over long periods of time. We had to take side jobs to pay for our living costs, which took away our focus from the development of our business, starting a vicious circle. We forgot rule nr1 in business: you need money to make money. We had funds, but they were not sufficient to cope with our ambitions and survive a long time without profits.

The timing of the foundation of our Start-up also turned out to be critical in our fate. We founded a microbiology start-up that was both capital- and personal-intensive right before the outbreak of COVID-19. The pandemic had an adverse impact on the funding we secured. We lost our investors as their businesses were also impacted by this unprecendented event.

Moving forward, we recognize the importance of prudent financial planning, diversifying revenue streams, and building a resilient financial foundation for future ventures focused on planning for unprecendented crisis scenarios.

Last Thoughts

Throughout our startup journey, we demonstrated resilience, adaptability, and a steadfast commitment to overcoming obstacles and setbacks. The closure of Trashre UG may mark the end of a chapter, but it provided us with very valuable knowledge on which to build our future ventures.

This was a fantastic adventure whose end does not take away all the good moments we had in pursuing this venture. Every failure is a step to sucess. We are today a little bit closer to make our dreams come true - and we hope our experience will help you get closer to yours ;)