Whatnot founder: This is the future of e-commerce

Episode of My First Million · September 21, 2026 · 1 h 2 min

Whatnot co-founder Grant LaFontaine tells Shaan Puri and Sam Parr how a Funko Pop marketplace became a $20 billion live-commerce company.

Summary

Grant LaFontaine, co-founder and CEO of Whatnot, joined My First Million hosts Shaan Puri and Sam Parr to trace the company's path from a three-and-a-half person startup to a business Puri said was valued at roughly $20 billion. LaFontaine recounted the founding story — drinking in a Tokyo bar with co-founder Logan, buying about 50 domains, and briefly pursuing a "full-service Craigslist" before phone calls with delivery executives convinced him the unit economics were hopeless. He and his co-founder then studied eBay sales data through a tool called Terapeak, found collectibles categories growing rapidly, and chose Funko Pops as the wedge.

LaFontaine described the early growth tactics in detail: Whatnot itself acted as the only seller, listing items it did not own and sourcing them from roughly a hundred online stores with help from contractors in Brazil, backed by a scraped pricing algorithm with a liquidity floor. Demand came from partnerships with Funko YouTube influencers and a weekly "Grails" giveaway with unlimited share-based raffle entries, which he said let the company take over Funko subreddits and Facebook groups. The first giveaway flopped with 104 entries and no purchases; the second roughly 2.5x'd. He gave the revenue arc as about 30 sales in December 2019, $2.3 million in gross sales in 2020, $163 million in 2021, and $1 billion the following year, crediting the July 2020 launch of live auctions and the ability to launch many categories quickly.

On leadership, LaFontaine argued that founder-vision stories are largely "BS," that great consumer companies start in tiny niches, and that hiring executives from famous companies is often a mistake. He said his main skill is refusing to accept fancy language or A/B-test results at face value and pushing teams to explain findings as if to a middle schooler. He recalled leaving Facebook after a product review in which the leader yelled at the room, concluding that being combative rarely produces good work. Puri compared the approach to Emmett's Socratic questioning at Twitch, where Puri worked for two years after an acquisition.

Looking forward, LaFontaine predicted live commerce would reach more than 30% of all e-commerce over the next decade, up from single digits today, citing China's roughly 40% share. He said Whatnot has multiple sellers doing well over nine figures, that its largest operation grew from three or four people to 150–200, and that wholesale marketplaces and multi-channel networks serving live sellers are major adjacent opportunities.

Chapters

0:00
A $20 billion company and a missed investment
Puri frames Whatnot's valuation and recounts how LaFontaine declined his investment after a phone call he never followed up on.
2:00
What Whatnot actually is
The hosts describe the app's range, with Puri buying live crab from a fisherman and marveling at a seller who has made six figures selling crabs.
3:47
Founding in a Tokyo bar and the Craigslist dead end
LaFontaine describes buying 50 domains with co-founder Logan, attempting a full-service Craigslist, and killing it after calls about delivery costs.
10:14
Finding Funko Pops in eBay's data
He explains using Terapeak sales data and LA comic shops to pick collectibles, and specifically Funko Pops, as the wedge category.
14:07
Customer-driven versus vision-driven companies
LaFontaine argues founder-vision stories are largely rhetoric and that great consumer companies start in tiny niches, with Puri citing PayPal and eBay.
18:50
Being the only seller and the Grails giveaway
He details acting as the sole seller with a scraped pricing algorithm, influencer partnerships, and viral share-to-enter raffles that took over Funko communities.
29:13
30 sales to $2.3 million
LaFontaine walks through the earliest transaction volumes, mispriced items, and the July 2020 launch of live selling.
30:39
Y Combinator and the billion-dollar ramp
He describes YC's repeated bets, the seed round, and growth from $2.3 million to $163 million to $1 billion in sales.
37:29
What changed as CEO of 1,400 people
LaFontaine says he changed less than expected, but had to build an operating system for the company and soften his feedback style.
42:29
Getting to the root: elasticity curves and plain language
He explains distrusting A/B tests on network systems and forcing smart people to explain work in middle-school language; Puri recounts similar sessions at Twitch.
50:19
Disagreeable but likable, and leaving Facebook
Parr asks how LaFontaine challenges people without being rude; LaFontaine describes the hostile product review that pushed him out of Facebook.
55:31
Squishies, gold bars and the future of live commerce
LaFontaine names odd trending categories and predicts live commerce will exceed 30% of e-commerce, creating nine-figure sellers and adjacent businesses.

Key points

What was said, by whom, with the exact words. Timestamps jump to the moment.

Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said he avoids focusing on the company's valuation because Whatnot is only six and a half years in with much left to do.
“we started this thing six and a half years ago. There's still a lot of work to do”
Listen from 1:00 · Whatnot
Sam Parr
Parr argued marketplaces are both the most durable and the hardest kind of business to start.
“I think marketplaces are probably the most durable and also the most challenging”
Listen from 3:55 · Online marketplaces and the chicken-and-egg problem
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said the team abandoned their 'full-service Craigslist' idea after calls with delivery executives showed the cost per delivery exceeded the margin on used goods.
“the cost per delivery relative to the value added on the used item is just, there's no margin there for the business”
Listen from 7:13 · Craigslist
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said he funded the earliest work himself with roughly $100,000 to $200,000 in savings, paying check by check.
“Yeah, probably, I don't know, $100,000, $200,000 in the bank. Okay. Not including my 401k”
Listen from 8:56 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said the company maintains an extreme bias to action because doing things is how you learn, provided you admit mistakes and change course.
“we try and have an immense bias to action because you just learn things by doing things”
Listen from 10:02 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said eBay sales data showed every collectibles category growing and more Funkos selling than comic books, which drove the category choice.
“there were more Funkos being sold on eBay than comic books, which is one of the reasons we ended up choosing Funkos over, say, comics”
Listen from 12:45 · Funko Pop
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said Whatnot deliberately defined itself as user-driven rather than vision-driven, staying willing to change the idea if users did not love it.
“One of the things we always said is we're not a sort of vision driven company. We're a user driven company”
Listen from 13:50 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine argued that business stories are mostly a device for recruiting followers rather than substance.
“stories are sort of BS. You know, a lot of stories in terms of like business are really a mechanism to convince people to follow you versus something of like real substance”
Listen from 15:13 · Company culture and management
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine argued that nearly every great company begins in a very small niche because small teams cannot create value in a mass market.
“And almost every great company starts an incredibly niche or small area and then takes that and catapults it forward”
Listen from 16:36 · Online marketplaces and the chicken-and-egg problem
Shaan Puri
Puri cited PayPal as a case where the founders' broad banking vision lost out to the narrow eBay-seller use case that users actually wanted.
“And then here was PayPal, this little tool for eBay sellers”
Listen from 18:11 · PayPal
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said Whatnot solved the chicken-and-egg problem by being the only seller itself, listing authenticated items it sourced after purchase.
“So we were initially the seller on whatnot. And so all of the early inventory was us”
Listen from 20:29 · Online marketplaces and the chicken-and-egg problem
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine described building a pricing algorithm from scraped listings with a liquidity floor so items could be secured and resold profitably.
“we ended up having to build like a pricing algorithm. We basically scraped all of the sites that had various Funko Pops”
Listen from 21:27 · Growth hacking
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said a weekly giveaway of high-value 'Grail' Funko Pops with share-based raffle entries let Whatnot dominate Funko subreddits and Facebook groups.
“once a week, we'd give away like a $500, $1,000 Funko Pop. And in order to be able to enter, you would have to share it”
Listen from 23:08 · Growth hacking
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine argued early-stage startups must find unconventional advantages because copying obvious channels like paid ads leaves them outgunned.
“which is if you try and copy the obvious pathways, you're basically going to get stonewalled because you don't have the resources”
Listen from 25:34 · Growth hacking
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said the first giveaway failed completely, with 104 raffle entries and no purchases, but the second roughly 2.5x'd entries.
“So we gave away this like $500 item and I think 104 people, there were 104 entries total in the raffle”
Listen from 26:28 · Growth hacking
Linked moment · 29:21Skip to 29:21 using a listen link in the info box.
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said Whatnot did about 30 sales in its first month of December 2019, many of them mispriced items.
“So sort of the journey for us was December 2019, we started it, and I bet you we did 30 sales”
Listen from 29:21 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said Y Combinator backed Whatnot repeatedly and added money when better-known investors were passing.
“they were like tremendously helpful and helped put in more money into the business ahead of when many of the other investors who you would know their names were passing”
Listen from 31:18 · Venture capital fundraising
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine gave the revenue trajectory as $2.3 million in total sales at the end of 2020, rising to $163 million the following year with about 100 employees.
“By December of 2020, we sort of ended the year at $2.3 million in total sales”
Listen from 34:58 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said scaling to 1,400 people forced him to build an explicit operating system and rhythm for running the business.
“the company's 1,400 people today, as an example, and you do need really good systems and process to run a company at this scale”
Listen from 37:49 · Company culture and management
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said an early mistake was hiring executives from big-name companies on the assumption that a good résumé meant competence.
“oh, you ran such and such at this big company. You must know what you're doing”
Listen from 38:44 · Company culture and management
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said blunt early-stage feedback no longer works at scale and he has had to soften his approach to get the best work from people.
“Someone might cry today if I do that. We don't want anyone to cry. And so you just sort of have to like know how to flex a little”
Listen from 39:03 · Company culture and management
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said A/B tests are unreliable on network systems because changing the feed alters seller behavior and pollutes both arms of the test.
“So A/B tests are notoriously bad on network systems”
Listen from 42:52 · A/B testing
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said smart employees use big words that obscure meaning, and he insists on explanations a middle schooler could follow.
“And if you can't explain it to me like I'm in middle school, you probably actually don't know what you're talking about”
Listen from 47:02 · Company culture and management
Shaan Puri
Puri said watching Twitch's leader ask simple questions until teams' answers collapsed showed him that base-level understanding is a virtue for a CEO.
“So we got acquired by Twitch, and I got to be at Twitch for two years”
Listen from 47:11 · Twitch
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said a product review in which the leader yelled at everyone was one reason he left Facebook, convincing him hostility never produces good work.
“the way that was handled was never going to make me want to do more great work”
Listen from 50:51 · Facebook
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine argued that anyone who has to talk about moving fast is in fact moving too slowly.
“If you have to talk about it, you're moving too slow. If you don't even have time to think about it, you're moving too slow”
Listen from 54:31 · Company culture and management
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine predicted live commerce will exceed 30% of all e-commerce within a decade, up from single-digit percentages today.
“I think you're going to see over the next decade that live commerce will be 30 plus percent of all of e-commerce”
Listen from 56:48 · Live commerce
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine cited China, where live shopping is about 40% of e-commerce, as the comparison for where Western markets are heading.
“So in Asia, in China, it's about 40% of e-commerce”
Listen from 57:25 · Live commerce
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine said Whatnot has multiple sellers doing well over nine figures, with its largest operation growing from three or four people to 150–200 built almost entirely on the platform.
“It's now probably 150 to 200 people, almost completely built on Whatnot”
Listen from 58:36 · Whatnot
Grant LaFontaine
LaFontaine identified wholesale marketplaces supplying live sellers and multi-channel networks as major adjacent business opportunities.
“wholesale marketplaces directly supplying our sellers is a really big opportunity because they need a lot of inventory”
Listen from 59:11 · Live commerce

People

In the conversation

Shaan PuriEntrepreneur and investor, co-host of My First Million, former Twitch executive
Sam ParrEntrepreneur, founder of The Hustle and Hampton, co-host of My First Million
Grant LaFontaineCanadian entrepreneur, co-founder and CEO of the live-shopping marketplace Whatnot

Discussed

Logan HeadCo-founder of Whatnot and LaFontaine's business partner
Mike PosnerMusician who topped iTunes U as a student, cited by Puri as an example of growth hacking
Emmett ShearTwitch co-founder and CEO, described by Puri as relentlessly questioning teams in meetings
Warren BuffettAmerican investor and chairman of Berkshire Hathaway
Steve JobsCo-founder of Apple
Elon MuskEntrepreneur behind X, xAI and SpaceX, discussed in AI competition

Topics

From the publisher

$1M Attention Guide: 15+ ways to get eyeballs on what you're building https://clickhubspot.com/brcv Episode 863: Shaan Puri ( https://x.com/ShaanVP ) and Sam Parr ( https://x.com/theSamParr ) talk to Grant Lafontaine ( https://x.com/GrantLaFontaine ) the founder of Whatnot. — Show Notes: (0:00) Intro (1:00) Grant turned down Shaan’s investment (2:12) Shaan buys a crab on Whatnot (3:58) First 1,000 users (19:07) Black hat growth tactics (28:52) 30 sales to $2.3M in year 1 (34:03) $2.3M to $163M in year 2 (34:56) $163M to $1B in year 3 (37:02) How to be a billion-dollar founder (42:04) Going all the way deep on a single problem (45:44) Don’t let people use fancy language (49:48) Being disagreeable but likable (50:43) The reason I left Facebook (53:39) “If you think you’re moving fast, you’re probably not” (54:13) Trends: NeeDohs, squishies, gold bars (56:21) 9-figure sellers — Links: • Whatnot - https://www.whatnot.com/ — Check Out Sam's Stuff: • Hampton (joinhampton.com): My community for founders. Average member does $25m/year. Many of the guests are members. Get after it...apply: http://joinhampton.com/mfm — Check Out Shaan's Stuff: • Shaan's weekly email - https://www.shaanpuri.com • Visit https://www.somewhere.com/mfm to hire worldwide talent like Shaan and get $500 off for being an MFM listener. Hire developers, assistants, marketing pros, sales teams and more for 80% less than US equivalents. • Mercury - Shaan uses Mercury across all of his companies. you can too: http://mercury.com/ Mercury is a fintech company, not an FDIC-insured bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group, Column, N.A., Members FDIC • I run all my newsletters on Beehiiv and you should too + we're giving away $10k to our favorite newsletter, check it out: beehiiv.com/mfm-challenge My First Million is a HubSpot Original Podcast // Brought to you by HubSpot Media // Production by Arie Desormeaux // Editing by Ezra Bakker Trupiano /

Summary, chapters and key points were generated from the episode transcript on September 27, 2026. Quotes are checked word for word against the transcript.

Categories: Entrepreneurship·Business·Technology