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Bootstrapping
Building a business with your own savings, your customers' payments, and discipline. No outside investors.
Example
A friend starts a tutoring business with $200 of her own money for flyers and a website. The first ten paying students fund the next ten. Two years in, she has thirty students and never borrowed a cent. That is bootstrapping.
How it fits in
Bootstrapped businesses grow more slowly and have fewer second chances. They also keep ownership, control, and the freedom to choose any path that pays. Many lasting profitable businesses started bootstrapped. Not all of them needed outside money even after they could have raised it. Bootstrapping suits founders who care more about ownership and pace than about racing to be the biggest.
Where this is taught
Related terms
Someone who builds a product or service to solve a real problem and tries to make it pay for itself and grow.
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