We failed twice, then built something users actually love.
Featured: Exclusive interview with childhood friends turned co-founders of ReadyBase that's revolutionizing document creation.
Hey everyone 👋
Today, I wanted to publish a special featured interview on my newsletter that highlights the story and lessons from founders Jake and Hayden, the duo behind ReadyBase.
ReadyBase is a platform that turns any user inputs into page-perfect PDFs in seconds. Whether it's a rough proposal outline, meeting notes, scattered data, or event details — they transform it into something you'll be proud to share and others can easily digest. No templates, no drafts, just polished documents ready to use.
What started as a 25-year friendship has evolved into a startup journey marked by two failures, hard-earned lessons, and now a product their early users genuinely love. After leaving their jobs earlier this year with a "let's send it" mentality, they're launching on Product Hunt to share their creation with the world.
I was curious about their journey from childhood friends to co-founders, so I sent them a few questions that turned into this interview.
Here's the transcript of my interview with the ReadyBase team. Enjoy!
In simple terms, what does ReadyBase do?
We turn any user inputs into a page-perfect PDF, in seconds. Whether it's a rough proposal outline, meeting notes, a bunch of numbers/data, or a blurb about an event you're hosting; we turn it into something you'll be proud to share, and know whoever is reading it will be able to digest it.
Tell us a little backstory of how you got to this launch. What were a few inflection points in the journey?
This has been a 25-year journey. Jake and I grew up together, lived together, and now we're doing this together. We've always wanted to create something, so we left our jobs earlier this year and just said "let's send it" and build something people will love.
We flopped twice; once the product sucked, next no one wanted to use it. We went back to the drawing board. We decided our next product needed to: 10x a user's capability, wow users in the first few minutes, and have properties where the product improves as AI models improve.
After 3 months of building, we're here with a product we're proud of and our early users love! We're launching on PH to keep the momentum rolling and share it with the world!
Are you creating a new category or building within an existing category? How are you unique?
We think it's a bit arrogant to say we're building a new category — that's reserved for the likes of OpenAI etc. We're building in the document creation space like Gamma, Adobe but we're putting a spin on it with vibes.
What makes us unique is that we don't use templates, we give the LLM creative control to create something that will fit the user's given context. Also, importantly, our users walk away in minutes with something they can use, not a draft to work off of.
How were you able to get past the technical barriers/challenges in building ReadyBase?
We've learned that with patience and good prompting, there's nothing you can't figure out or teach yourself with AI.
Can you share 1 example of a wild story or fun memory that you shared with your team in building your startup so far?
While working at a WeWork we overhear or involve ourselves in a lot of random interactions. The funniest so far has been the company on our floor doing their headshots in a conference room that looks right at us. It was really disruptive to us with the flash and all... we decided to photobomb their first session. After the photographer looked and saw Jake making funny faces in the background, let's just say he was not too happy... and they moved.
What's been the most surprising or unexpected feedback from an early user for ReadyBase?
The #1 piece of feedback is that people LOVE the fun facts when they're waiting for their document. This was really just a gag Hayden put in our MVP because we were worried about losing attention during the generation time, but we've heard way more "we love the facts" than "that took too long."
What are your thoughts on MOAT in the age of AI? What would be your MOAT?
People say "distribution" is the MOAT, that's true to an extent... but we've found that the real MOAT is vibes/taste. If someone feels good and gets a rush of dopamine early on in the product journey, they will come back, and that's more important than impressions. Our technical MOAT is that it's just really damn hard to get the LLM to understand what fits on a page... and we don't use templates which is also hard.
What specific advice from your lived experience would you give to founders starting their startup?
You hear this a lot, but it's true... You can just do things. It takes a lot to get over the imposter syndrome, but everyone started somewhere and if you just keep doing things you will start feeling like you belong and you will win.
Where can people learn more about ReadyBase?
Check us out at readybase.ai and support our Product Hunt launch here. We'd love to show you what we've built!
That's a wrap on this week's featured interview — hope Jake and Hayden's journey from lifelong friends to co-founders sparked some ideas for you on how persistence and authentic partnership can overcome early failures.
Try It Yourself
Earlier today, I helped ReadyBase launch on Product Hunt as a Hunter, and I couldn't be more excited to support it. I loved ReadyBase so much and was instantly hooked when I saw the demo a couple weeks ago.
Would love for your feedback, support and comments on the launch page as it can help more people discover ReadyBase! Link here.
Thanks for reading!
