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FusionCharts: Bootstrapped And (Very) Profitable Charting Company

How can an unfunded, first-time entrepreneur build a multi-million dollar business selling graphs?

You’ll hear how it happened in this interview with Pallav Nadhani, a Mixergy fan who created FusionCharts in 2002 when he was just 17. With happy customers such as LinkedIn, his business did $4.5 million in sales last year. I invited him to Mixergy to hear the inspiring story of how he did it. Also, since he launched a new seed investment fund (it’s like Y Combinator, but in India), I asked him why he thinks some entrepreneurs make it while others fail.

Pallav Nadhani

Pallav Nadhani

Pallav Nadhani is the co-founder and CEO of FusionCharts.

Full Interview Transcript

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Here’s the program.

Andrew: Hi, everyone. My name is Andrew Warner. I’m the founder of Mixergy.com, home of the ambitious upstart. How can an unfunded, first-time entrepreneur build a multi-million dollar business selling graphs? Joining me direct from India is Pallav Nadhani who founded FusionCharts in 2002, when he was just 17. Last year, his business did $4.5 million in sales. I invited him to Mixergy to hear the inspiring story of how he did it. Now that he’s making seed investments in other startups, I also want to ask him why he thinks some entrepreneurs make it and others fail.

Welcome to Mixergy. Thanks for doing the interview.

Pallav: Thanks Andrew. Thanks for inviting me up here at Mixergy. I’ve been a huge fan of Mixergy for a long time now.

Andrew: That’s great to hear. I want people to understand what your company does. Can you give us an example of a company that works with you that would illustrate what you do?

Pallav: Sure, we sell charting components for web and enterprise, that is we give people components which can better applications with charts and graphs. A simple example would Lincoln. If you see any of the Lincoln polls or any of the Lincoln charts and graphs, those are all formed by FusionCharts. They have their data and they want to present it better, that’s where we step in.

Andrew: Lincoln is a big company with really smart people inside, great engineers. Why can’t they do graphs themselves?

Pallav: Oh, the graphs they do it. It’s not their full focus. The reason why they would not want to do it is because they’ve seen that we do it the best possible way. For us, graphs are about two things. The best possible looks and the ease of integration, for them to focus something out of their whole domain might not be the best thing to do.

Andrew: Okay. All right. I want to find out how you came up with the idea, how you developed it. I never would have thought that this was a business. Before we get into that, let’s find out where you are today. Roughly what size sales are you guys doing today?

Pallav: We did $4.5 million last year, and this year we are pretty much on track to cover the same. It might not be double-digit growth this year, but this year has mainly been consolidation, trying to figure out where we are going. So I would say almost the same, but most likely more than that.

Andrew: I’m always wondering why American companies are willing to give out their finances publicly on Mixergy. But I have found that foreign companies are much more reluctant. Why are you so open here?

Pallav: We believe in a very transparent culture. That’s been the whole, that’s been our fundamental right from day one. As you mentioned, how can you make money selling charts? One of the simplest ways we do is we be transparent about what we do. One of the things which we also do is to share our finances, not only with people, with our employees and where we stand, what our profit numbers are, it’s all out there in the open.

Andrew: Why?

Pallav: Many people ask me, inspired by, a few of them actually went ahead and created competitive charting companies seeing that people can actually make money out of charting. So in a way that also gives me satisfaction.

Andrew: That gives you satisfaction? It doesn’t burn you that maybe your employees are copying you or potentially could. That maybe somebody now listening to this Mixergy interview will say, you know, I never thought of charts. I should go and compete with them. If he’s doing $4.5 over $5 million, maybe I’ll do $1 million, but that’s enough of a start. You’re not worried about that?

Pallav: Oh, absolutely not. I would say welcome to the canvas. Just to tell you some facts, we created attractive charting as a category. At that time, we were the pioneers. There was no one. Since then, there have been 10 or 12 competitors just in attractive charting not to mention mainstream charting. Our revenues have grown year-upon-year. The more players you have, they’re actually educating the market by telling the market this is what you should be doing rather than taking a share from us. That’s the way I like to view it.

Andrew: For the people who are listening to us on the MP3 or just reading the transcript, he’s beaming. Pallav is beaming as we’re talking about this. Usually people are a little reluctant when it comes to giving numbers or if I ask them about competition. Now you feel confident. Let’s find out how you got here and how you got so confident. You were 17 years old. Where did the idea come from?

Pallav: Okay. So actually I was 16 before this company started.

Andrew: Okay.

Pallav: I was in school. When you’re in school, you need a lot of pocket money to do whatever you want to do. There was a site called ASPTsptoday.com run by Wrox Publications. We used to get some money if you write innovative articles. In my school projects, I use to use a lot of Microsoft Excel, and man those jobs are boring, like really boring. I thought, hey, I’m a web developer, I could hack up some code. I used Macromedia Flash then and Microsoft ASP then. I thought why can’t I hack up something and something which could be used by everybody. There was this idea of charting. That’s how I wrote this article, got me $1,500 for that, which actually formed the seed capital for this company. And then people commented on my article. They said, “Oh, well, this looks good, why don’t we go ahead and develop this?” That is where this company was formed from, in a quest for pocket money.

Andrew: You got $1,500 for writing an article?

Pallav: Right.

Andrew: Why? How did you get so much money for writing just one article?

Pallav: They did pay that much. I think they paid on word count, so it was between $600 and $1,500. Initially, I wrote a couple of other articles and then I wrote this article. Yeah, I got that money.

Andrew: If I understand you right, the article was just saying we need better charting software. I think it could be done. It was just your idea?

Pallav: Oh, no, actually I did about, I wrote a charting component using Macromedia Flash back then. Microsoft ASP showed them how this could be done. I shared the source code on Vanguard, an application which I developed on that website so that people could go download it, modify and even use it. So that’s what I got paid for.

Andrew: I see, okay. All right. You see the people are interested. You decide to build the company right away, or do you just keep tinkering for a little bit and the company evolves out of that?

Pallav: I tinkered with the code for a little bit. So when I started I was 16. I had no idea about business. All I knew was how to hack up some code. Over the next few months, I would say, people gave me a lot of feedback on how I should be improving it. Then there came a point where they said, “Okay, fine. If you do this, I’ll pay you money. If you do this, I’ll pay you money.” I realized that so many people are willing to pay money for small features. Rather than doing individually for them, why not actually productize it. That’s how this whole idea came into play.

Andrew: Was it the audience who read your article who kept e-mailing you and saying, “Why don’t do you do this feature and I’ll pay you for it.”?

Pallav: Right. So then they refer it to their friends and it just kept on being viral at that point in time.

Andrew: What kind of people were they? What kind of customers were they?

Pallav: Primarily developers, Microsoft stack developers. People who were using ASP and building up web applications. Then since it was built in Flash and used XML, it could be used with another technology. Then PHP developers came in and said, “Hey, we could use that. Why don’t you do this for us?” Overall, it spread to a wide audience then.

Andrew: For the transcribers, you’re saying ASP, not ESP. I want to make sure that they transcribe it properly. What did that first version look like? When you had all these ideas coming at you, what did you decide to include in the first version?

Pallav: If I tell you now, I’ll be very embarrassed about it.

Andrew: Oh, good.

Pallav: It looked like a really bad column chart, but it was animated and attractive although way better than Microsoft Excel then. The story goes like this. Actually FusionCharts was not the first product out of that article. We created a product called fXgraph, and we ran it for six to eight months. We ran it for four versions. fXgraph Version 5, we were like, “Oh, boy, this is way better than previous four versions.” The first four versions of fXgraph were like very basic because we were starting out alone to productize a charting company. While it had more functionalities than Microsoft Excel but when we developed fXgraph 5, we said if somebody had seen version one through four, they might believe that it’s the same product. So we renamed fXgraph 5 as FusionCharts, and that’s how FusionCharts got started. In a sense, if we talk about the previous versions of FusionCharts, like Version One, if I look back at them, I would say, “Oh, my god, how did this product sell? Why would people pay money for that?” But it just happened.

Andrew: I think Eric Schmidt once kidded that if you’re a kid and you do goofy things on line, you might just want to change your name later on in life so that when people Google you they won’t find all the embarrassing stuff. Essentially that’s what you did with your product. You said if anyone Googles us or sees our past versions, they’re not going to have confidence in us. We’ll just come up with a brand new name.

Pallav: In a way, yes.

Andrew: I see. All right. But still, what did that first version look like? I want to understand what that embarrassing version is and I’ll tell you why. Because when I create something for the first time, I feel like it’s got to be perfect because my name is on it, because the world always says you have to take pride in what you create. I won’t allow anything out there that I’m embarrassed, or not that I won’t allow it, but it’s painful to allow it. If I hear from you what you did and what yours was like, I’ll remember it when I’m building my next version one.

Pallav: Right, because you’re Andrew Warner right now. Back then when you started, then you weren’t.

Andrew: When I was no one, it was easier.

Pallav: When you’re starting with your first product, your first venture, it’s a lot easier because then you do not have any legacy to take care of. I mean you can actually go out and give it your everything without worrying about the legacy factor. Gradually as you become more successful or you build a lot of products, then you have that external pressure, oh my god, I have to keep up with my name. I have to keep up with the quality that I’m doing. That’s pretty much what happened. I mean, I would say, a little knowledge was actually a positive thing for me back then, because I could get it out without knowing that this could be bashed around.

Andrew: So what did you include in it? What was in version one? Do you feel comfortable saying it?

Pallav: Oh, absolutely. Funny story. When I released version one, all I knew was, all I thought was there are only six types of charts in the world — pie, column, line, bar, and area. I thought that is it. That is the end of charting universe. Version one contained just these six charts and that’s pretty much it. I was confident, in fact, I was, at times, thinking if version one covers all the charts, what am I going to do in version two? When we released version one of FusionCharts, people said I need this chart and that chart and this chart. And then my eyes opened. “Oh, my god, there’s so much more to do.” Then we kept on creating, and still today, while we call ourselves a really comprehensive charting solution, there’s so much more in data visualization which could be done, because everyone attempts to view their data from his own perspective from his own angle. That gives us the confidence and ability to keep growing every single day.

Andrew: So the charts that you mentioned are the ones that are included in Excel. Most people are all familiar with them. What did you do that was different in your, in the limited charts that you created?

Pallav: Okay. Number one we added attractivity. Number two, we made it look much better than Excel charts. Number three, we added animation. Number four, we took it on the Web and allowed it to be connected to any Web technology. For example, if you tried to build, back then if you wanted to build a chart in your Web application it was really a complex process. You would have to go with comp libraries or wrap up the Excel component, that’s for the technical guys. Most people were on shared hosting, where some of the providers would not allow you to install any of these components. We said, “Here’s an easy way. All you need to do is copy, paste, upload it, provide the data, nothing else, I need it done.” Essentially you could start it in 15 minutes and that has been our USP right since then.

Andrew: Okay. All right. So you came out with that first version. What did you, how did you improve on it in version two?

Pallav: In version two, we improved on the usability aspect. We made it look better again, and we added more chart types.

Andrew: Okay. All right. When you had version one, how did you get it out to customers? How’d you get it out to people beyond the ones who e-mailed you and asked you for features and were willing to pay for it?

Pallav: We did multiple things. I did not have too much cash to spare on marketing. What I did was, I wrote a couple of articles on the product itself and published it on various websites. People who were willing to take content for free. In fact, some of them even paid me for an article which actually was about my product. So it was a double bonanza for me. Apart from that, there were a lot of directories. I e-mailed a lot of people that, “Hey, this is a new charting component. I know you might not be able to include it in your product because that means additional development experience, but guess what? I’ll develop it for you for free.” I did a lot of free quoting for other products and projects that I embedded FusionCharts as part of their product. This went on for like three to six months, and then people started liking it. Eventually the word started spreading out.

Andrew: When you’re developing for someone else, who just to get them to buy your software, that doesn’t seem to be much money in that? Why would you do that? Or was it because of the money?

Pallav: Two things here, $800 when you are 17 is a good amount of money.

Andrew: Is that what you sold version one for?

Pallav: No, actually version one was sold for $15.

Andrew: $15?

Pallav: $15, yes. There was a reason because I was contemplating on selling it at $4, and so the payment provider said, “I’m sorry the minimum we accept is $15” back then. So I said, “Okay, $15 it is.” It started with $15. Then gradually we increased our pricing from version one to what we have today.

Andrew: The question I was asking earlier was you were willing to develop for someone who bought the software? That’s just $15 that they’re paying you and you’re willing to do the development?

Pallav: Right.

Andrew: It’s got to be more than the money you’re interested in, isn’t it?

Pallav: Well, absolutely, because every time I develop for someone, I get access to real live data. I get access to understanding how they’re going to be using the product. That is one of the things which we, like if you look back at [inaudible 15:03]. The product was conceived and conceptualized by developers who commented on my article. Right from day one, the product had been driven by users’ feedback. They told what they want in a product, what they never wanted in the product. Even when I was developing for these guys, for these customers, they told exactly how they would like this to be implemented in the product. That gave me real life insights into what the product could be used. That was the most valuable lesson I learned throughout the development history.

Andrew: I could see that. Do you remember one thing that you learned by actually implementing your own software in someone else’s system?

Pallav: Yes, make it very easy to use. That’s one of the key lessons I learned. Even if I develop and give it back, people will need more and they’ll come back to you at a point where you do not develop it anymore. You have to make sure that it’s very easy for them to pick it up and then learn from where you have left it.

Andrew: How does a teenager get a payment processing system?

Pallav: Funny story behind it. Before my product, I actually had written a book, a book on Flash, ASP.net. The publisher couldn’t pay me because I was under 18. I had to get the money in my name, in the name of my dad because the laws here do not allow you to do that. For the first version, I think I used my dad’s name to open an account. On a payment provider, the name, it went by the name of Virtual Software Store. VSS.com or something like that. We opened an account in the name of my dad, and that’s where I got my money from.

Andrew: By the way, I’m hearing honking horns in the background. Where are you? What city are you in India? What’s going on outside your window?

Pallav: I’m in Calcutta, that’s eastern India and I am in my room. There’s a street right beside me.

Andrew: In your room meaning your bedroom?

Pallav: My bedroom, right.

Andrew: Your bedroom, okay. Wow, so what’s the environment like in the city that you’re in? We’ll get back to the story, but I’m curious about where you are.

Pallav: Environment, in terms of whether it’s very hot, like, it’s 45 centigrade with 25% humidity?

Andrew: I mean like the entrepreneurial community. The community, the community in general, the city.

Pallav: Calcutta, it has a lot of services. Infrastructure like a lot of companies set up shops here because there’s a lot of, there’s plenty of low cost labor here. In terms of entrepreneurial, over the last few years, it has been developing, but still I say it does not compare with some of the cities like Bangalore or Delhi or for that [inaudible 17:27] in India. The way I see in the next few years the momentum is strong and it will catch up eventually.

Andrew: All right. And after we get past this story, I’m going to ask you about how you’re making seed investments and what the entrepreneurs are like there. I’ve got to ask you about the window? Would it be possible to shut the window?

Pallav: It is actually shut.

Andrew: Oh, it is shut and you’re still hearing all that honking noise, okay. That’s like New York City.

Pallav: Oh, for some reason, I’m not hearing it. Probably the speakers are amplifying it.

Andrew: Maybe because you’ve got me on earphones. Can you roll up the window and tell them, “Listen, I’m on Mixergy.com guys. If you could just turn it off for a half hour or maybe an hour, we’ll be fine.” All right, we’ll continue with the interview.

Pallav: Let me try that.

Andrew: Okay. So that’s how you got the payment provider. How well did the first version sell?

Pallav: The first version, the day after I put my product up for sale, for seven days actually nothing happened. Those seven days were the most nervous days of my life because I was thinking here’s a good product that I thought was better than the earlier four versions, why aren’t people buying it? When the first sale happened after a week or so, thereafter a sale happened almost every alternate day. I think the first one, I grossed around $1,000 from the sale of the product. Thereafter, it just kept multiplying, like 100% growth, month-on-month, year-upon-year.

Andrew: The way people found you is just through the articles that you were writing?

Pallav: The articles, word of mouth, a lot of directory listings back then. We also did put up some banner ads on some of the sites, which we thought were influential in the developer work space, not so much in the CIU or the CPU work space because any of those ads would have cost us thousands of dollars and that was money in our revenue.

Andrew: When you say us, was it just you from version one to version four?

Pallav: From Version 1 to Version 4 of fXgraph, yes, and from Version 1 to 2.3 of FusionCharts, yes. After FusionCharts, I worked three years alone just trying to keep up, just trying to make some cash so that I could put that money to hire employees to build up an office. So from 2002 through 2005, it was just me working on all the coding, development, sales, marketing, customer support, and everything.

Andrew: Wow. How many hours a week were you spending on this?

Pallav: I think anything between 110 and 120 a week almost.

Andrew: You were still in school at the time?

Pallav: I was. Actually, I switched a couple of colleges just to make sure that I get adequate time, so I switched my subjects, switched my colleges. Finally went into [inaudible 20:03] because that allowed me to get maximum time on work. It would easy here to study. I mean, you put in like maybe an hour or two or four in a week and you’re done with that. My family background is more into business like accounting and things like, so it’s relatively easy for me because my dad would me guide me on this is what you should be studying.

Andrew: Why didn’t quit school and focus on this full time?

Pallav: Putting in two hours of school time a week, why do you want to quit school?

Andrew: Oh, I see. You don’t need that much more time anyway, I see.

Pallav: Right.

Andrew: Okay. What happened between Version 4 of fXgraph and Version 1 of FusionCharts? Why did things change so much that you, that it was like a brand new product?

Pallav: (A) a lot of customer insights. (B) more R&D. I was able to put more time and understand what a customer is looking at, and (C) one year time gives a lot more technical experience, because when I started fXgraph I actually had more real life experience of coding and applications, but within the year of coding and of reading intensively I got a lot of ideas on how we could improve that. After Version 4, I put a lot of time into development, and it substantially changed the output of the next version. Customer inputs and a lot of R&D, I would say.

Andrew: What was different about it?

Pallav: It was, again like, after Version 1, we knew there were two things we should be focusing on — good looks and ease of use. Why good looks? Because there are a lot of charting companies out there, as you mentioned, how can you make money out of charting company. We have to have one USP, like charting something which is always present in the presentation layer of any of the applications. You have to absolutely nail the good looking factor. We improved looks. We drastically improved the looks there. We kept on making it easier to use because we have a thought if a customer can not get started with FusionCharts or fXgraph in less than 15 minutes, that means we had failed. We kept on working on these two parameters then. That is something we have been driving throughout the development cycle.

Andrew: In your earlier versions, Version 1 through 4 under the previous name and Version 1 and 2 of the new name of FusionCharts, did you ever go, did you ever stray from your core competency? Did you ever add anything that now in retrospect feels like it was inappropriate?

Pallav: Not really. In fact, the good part has been that we actually didn’t do anything else apart from charting, so we never got an opportunity to stray. We have actually kept our focus right from day one until today. All we are is a data visualization company. We don’t know anything else. We don’t do anything else. Lack of knowledge has actually helped us keep our focus.

Andrew: When you build based on customer feedback, how do you know which feedback you should listen to and integrate into your product and which is just not right for you?

Pallav: The way we evaluate our feedback is we try to figure out if it’s something very generic. We wait for a few more customers to get back to us on that if there’s something which they can use. Now that we have a very wide customer base, we can easily contact people and ask them what they think about this feature. Or how do you think this should be implemented? If people say, no, this is not something which we could use or it’s not something which would necessary as of now, we go back to the customer and say, “Hey, look here, it’s not something that goes into the main product, and eventually if we implement it, we’ll come back to you.” Mostly because we are a small team, we try not to do any service implementations like customer implementations unless it’s absolutely necessary for a bigger client.

Andrew: I think there’s a stereotype, or a misconception out there that makers can’t be sellers or can’t be promoters. If you’re a developer, you can’t go out there and also sell and learn how to increase conversions and so on and vice versa. You seem to do both. How did you learn the marketing side of the business?

Pallav: Just go with the flow. I mean, effectively, if you made a product and put it out there, customers come to you and tell this is what I like, this is what I don’t like. I feel marketing is a good part of that. If you understand what customers want and you can reposition your product and message according to the customer’s need, that essentially is marketing. When it comes to selling, again, it’s all the same thing. What is the pain point that customers are looking to fulfill? If you can identify that, fix your product accordingly, rebrand and message it accordingly, essentially that’s the same thing. It’s not very different from development, because in development you’re looking at the pain point, you’re looking at features. Rather than looking at features, look at the benefits you can get across to a customer. Those benefits, in effect, form the sales pitch, the marketing pitch. All of those are interconnected. If you ask me can I call up someone and possibly sell a [inaudible 25:01] of FusionCharts, possibly yes possibly no. I don’t know yet if I’m good at that. The way I look at it is if I know what they’re looking at and what are the pain points they are having, yes, I’ll have a lead there and I’m very sure I’ll be able to close that.

Andrew: You said that your messaging was influenced by what people told you they wanted from the app? Can you give me an example of that?

Pallav: Right. When we started out, we said we are an attractive charting component, and people’s . . . so another example, our first tag lines was, “Real Time Animated and Attractive Charting Solution Program”. Because we thought it was real time, [inaudible 25:36], it was attractive, and it was a charting component. This is not a 30-second elevator pitch which anyone would remember. This is not even a three minute elevator which anyone would understand. Then when we talked to the customers, they said, we come to you for two things. (A) you’re very good to look at. People said we want your component because they’re good looking. We said and you guys are really sweet to implement. We knew these are our two USPs, and we rebranded our product and our tag line. Today you see our product tag line, it’s very simple, “Stunning Charts for Web and Enterprise.” That’s very much it. That’s how we positioned our product.

Andrew: That’s a great example. USP, unique selling proposition?

Pallav: Right.

Andrew: Okay. Do I have anything else here? Sorry?

Pallav: Are you asking what the USP is?

Andrew: No, I just wanted to explain what the initials stood for.

Pallav: Oh, okay.

Andrew: What else? What about the idea of selling the benefits not the features? Where do you learn that? I know a lot of people who read lots of business books, and it’s still not a point that gets driven home. For you, it seems natural. How’d you get at that?

Pallav: I will say when you’re selling something as commoditized as a charting component where most of it is available for free, you eventually learn that. Having said that, effectively this was also driven by a lot of our customers. Like what our customers have said to us. We are a very customer centric organization. Whenever a customer says this is what we need, we do have a very hard look at that and then take thought on it. We realize that customers are not looking for a charting component. They’re looking for something which makes their apps go “wow.” They’re looking for something which is easy to implement which they can download, get started very easily, go to the bosses, managers, and customers and show, “Hey, this is what I have done.”

The best part, since all of FusionCharts is in the presentation layer, this forms a very good starting point for the presentation to the client. That is where we realize where the benefits are. Rather than giving them a feature list, a huge feature list, like if you go to our website, we still do not have a feature list or a data comparison sheet or a data sheet for the product. We give you a feature tour, which is more benefit driven. We give you a lot of case studies. We give you a lot of demos. The best part about demos are they are real life demos. People can download . . . all our demos are downloadable. You can download a demo, just plug in your data, change the parameters, and there you go, get started. What took us maybe a week or so to develop, you could just change that and get started in maybe an hour or so. That’s a huge benefit maker. This has resulted in a lot of good feedback and sales for us.

Andrew: We talked about how you did $5 million, or you’re going to do $5 million this year. What about the first million? When did you make that first million?

Pallav: You mean first million hitting the bank or first million in revenue?

Andrew: How about let’s go first million in the bank.

Pallav: First million in the bank was when I was 21. Just crossed 21, I think. First million in revenue was 2006/2007, as in financial year.

Andrew: Gotcha. So what was it like when you did that? When you did the first million in sales?

Pallav: We didn’t celebrate because for us those numbers were not, they were not the only driving force. Our driving force is how many customers are using it and what are the download numbers and how actively people are using it? First million was a good validation point, yes, there’s a good market for it and we can keep investing into it. But apart from that, it didn’t mean much part from being just able to, “Hey, I’m a millionaire now.”

Andrew: Was there a moment where you knew that? Where in the back of your head you said, “Ah, I hit that milestone, not my company worth a million dollars, but I did it in sales and cash in the bank.”

Pallav: Yes and no. For a brief moment, yes, there was a feeling, but beyond that it didn’t mean much. It didn’t mean too much, because I’m not a finance guy. So for me a million dollars does not hold as much value as the impact of FusionCharts or the impact of what we can do with technology and improve people’s life. It’s a feature that we’re improving. You can call it an feature that we are saying that we are improving people’s life by delivering charting components, but I would like to think so. With better looks, with better ease of use, we are actually affecting a lot of lives.

Andrew: Why is that the motivation? Actually is that your main motivation?

Pallav: Absolutely. I cannot tolerate bad looking things. The motto behind FusionCharts is make good looking things. This is not only the motto of the product, if you look at our website, anything that you see which comes from our stable, we try to ensure that it looks good. The eye is your window to everything that is in the world. So if you can pleasure the eye, there is a lot more satisfaction to be attained.

Andrew: I think Mark Zuckerberg at Y Combinator’s startup school said that, “The outside world doesn’t understand developers and the way that they think. The motivation isn’t more money in the bank. It’s to create something.” Why does that make you happy? I understand why money in the bank makes people happy. It means fewer worries. They don’t have to worry about medical expenses if things go bad. They can buy more things and have access to more things. Can you describe the reason for this motivation?

Pallav: It would be tough to describe, I mean, because everyone has their own motivation. The way I look at is if you’re a good developer, you can make money at any single point of your life. You never have to worry about money. Not only a good developer. If you’re a good marketer or if you’re a good salesperson, if you’re good at anything, money should be the last concern you have on your mind. What you should rather be passionate about is, what is that single thing which you think you’re the best at and which you could utilize to affect people’s life and how it works along the way. I think that’s one of the most important driving factors that has been for us. We want to make things look good. We want to make charts look good. We want to make sure that people build better web applications using our components and that prides us.

Andrew: Are you someone who wants to make everything look good, who just design and beauty is part of your makeup? Or are someone who just said I found something that makes people happy. I understand how to give them more happiness. I’m just going to keep working on that.

Pallav: Would you not say they’re inter-related? Anything which looks good also makes you happy. You look at an Apple product and think, “Wow, this looks good.” You’re happy at that very single moment. I’ll say they’re very inter-related. If you can make something look and as well function good, people will be happy eventually using that.

Andrew: Does this go beyond your work? Are you doing this around your house? If the camera were to pan around your bedroom right now, would everything be well-designed and ready for Architectural Digest to come in? Or is it just in this one area? When it comes to work, this is where you have to put everything.

Pallav: Okay. I think it’s primarily my work and not my home definitely. It’s kind of in a state of clutter right now. So, I’m not going to show you around. I’ll say it’s mostly work because I’m very passionate about technology and it applications on the Web. That being said, if I get time to do my room, to do my house or whatever, I’ll probably do it in the best possible way.

Andrew: How did you decide to or why did you decide to bring on your first employee?

Pallav: Because of two things: (a) I was slightly getting overloaded, I mean after 110 to 130 hours a week, there’s only so much more you can put. Secondly, at that point in time, I knew I had the cash to be able to fund someone full time. If that guy’s dependent on me, I better make sure that I have enough cash in the bank to pay him and make sure that he has a good life. That was one of the reason. Secondly, I knew that there’s only so much I know about charting. There’s only so much I know about technology. The Web is evolving every single day. Since FusionCharts is a cross platform charting product, you can use it with multiple technologies, I only knew a very small subset of that. So I knew I had to get people who could complement my skills and not just expand on what I already know.

Andrew: What was the position, the first position that you hired for?

Pallav: The first positions were actually developers. You’re talking about hiring. We hired our first salesperson after we reached 10,000 customer organizations. Before 10,000 customers, we never had a salesperson.

Andrew: So, before then if I were to consider buying your software, I would talk to you or one of your developers and you’d give me feedback on it. If I had any questions, you’d answer them.

Pallav: Right. On the technical side, yes. On the sales side, why do we need to? It’s a $100 product or maybe $400 by the time we were Version 2.3. We’d go to our website, download, unlimited trial. That’s one those things we also offer. We never put any restrictions. No feature restriction, no time restriction on our trial, because we realize that charting is not something which you might need right after downloading. You might use it in a product three months down the line, six months down the line, whenever you have the need for it. We created unrestricted trial, unlimited trial. You use it. Once you like it, you go back to our website and purchase it. So most of it is automated. In fact, the majority of Fortune 500 companies are our customers. We’ve come to know about their purchase of FusionCharts the next day when we go back to the office. There was one morning I would go back to the office, I’m like today is Facebook is our customer. Last night they purchased it. Facebook when they had the [inaudible 35:00] they were using FusionCharts [inaudible 35:03] So that’s how it functions automatically.

Andrew: There’s no way to keep somebody from using this without paying. It’s just the license that obligates them to pay.

Pallav: Absolutely. In fact, we are a commercially open source company. Whenever you buy a FusionCharts license, you get the entire source code of FusionCharts for free. Sitting in India, a 17-year- old kid, nobody would have trusted me if I don’t give them the necessary credibility off of my product. Right from day one, I took the decision that this is the only way to influence them. Give them the entire source code. Let them be comfortable using the product. That fundamental has been followed right from day one until today. Today also, if you buy a license of FusionCharts, you have access to the entire source code. You can modify it and use it the way you want it.

Andrew: How did you come to that decision? Why not restrict it somehow and make sure you get paid?

Pallav: On the licensing part?

Andrew: Mm-hmm.

Pallav: Two things here. (A) FusionCharts, number one, it was to be for [inaudible 36:00]. It’s not like an enterprise product where you give a limited time trial and you say, “Hey, now you sign up.” Just pay us, because people would dump us then. They would not be motivated. There would not be enough emotional lock-in. That is what I like to call with the product. We want you to believe and be happy. If you’re happy, you’ll be as [inaudible 36:19]. If you’re not happy, we don’t want your money. Simple as that. In fact, we also have an unconditional money-back guarantee. I mean, publicly we say it’s a 30-day, but we have had cases where customers first used it almost 16 months back. They say, “Hey, I’m not using it anymore.” I download it once and then the project ended. We said, “Fine, take your money back. We don’t need it.” If you’re using it, we want your money, we’ll take your money. If you’re not using it, we don’t want to take your money. You have to be happy before you part away with your money.

Andrew: Wow. You said your first hires were developers. What kind of developers did you hire first?

Pallav: ActionScript developers, Flash developers because that is what our core product was. Even that guy was fresh, right out of college. There was this whole bonding. I never knew how to hire people that I had started hiring, and I was scared of hiring senior people because I never knew how to work with them. I never had an office. I never knew what HR policies were about. I didn’t know when you have to give the money. I didn’t know about pay slips, none of that. I thought, okay, here’s a guy who doesn’t know anything about HR policies. He has never worked in a company. Let’s go hire him. Make sure that he’s absolutely passionate about the technology as I am. That is how I did it. Everything worked out pretty well.

Andrew: I’ve talked to developers who made their first hire who was another developer. It’s exciting. They’ve told me about having somebody else to talk to, somebody else to bounce ideas off of, some new insights that only someone else that works side by side with them in the code would have. Can you describe some of those? What was that like?

Pallav: Absolutely. It was very insightful, because a lot times you actually need someone to talk to and say, “Hey is this a good thing? Is this is a bad thing?” When you have somebody sitting right beside you, you can do a lot of that. Also, there are moments where both of you are on the other side of the same thing and it does lead to some confusion. As a company owner, you tend to have the upper side. You say, “No, I’m sure of what I’m doing.” I would say with a little discretion and with a little bit of experience, all of that sorts out. One moment, which I like, if you ask me to pinpoint one moment, I would say we were building on a new animation type for a line chart. The animation which I had put in was pretty basic and decent if not the best. The first developer I hired, he came up with a new idea. I was jumping on my seat, “Wow, this is awesome.” I had to go and drop my mom to the railroad station at that point in time. I was constantly asking, “Give me five more minutes. Five me five more minutes.” And she kept on shouting, “I’ll be late for my train. If you don’t drop me now, I’ll actually be late for my train.” So on the way, I was on the phone with this guy, like my full developer and just sharing. Those moments of excitement are like very relevant in the early days and you get to learn a lot from that.

Andrew: Any big mistakes along the way? What’s the biggest?

Pallav: I’d say, I’ve made a lot of mistakes. Pinpointing the biggest one would be, I don’t know, I don’t know the biggest one, but I would say one of the bigger mistakes, which I have made and which I’m still figuring out, is how to hire senior people. I’ve done a few bad hires and they have not worked out, like very senior hires. I’m still trying to figure out what the reasons are. What I’ve figured out is, for me being able to work with a lot of age difference, I find tends to get kind of messy because there’s a whole generational gap, a whole mindset gap, the whole [inaudible 39:48] gap. So I try to stick to a fair figure. Any guy who’s between 25 and 40 years of age, I can work with him. Beyond that, even though my dad is a part of my company, he handles the finance and administration, I still have not been able to figure out how to get that to work.

Andrew: Is it something you can talk about? Can you talk about some of the hiring mistakes you’ve made? If not, it’s better not to.

Pallav: Sure.

Andrew: Go ahead.

Pallav: A couple of years ago, when I thought, hey, we do not have a sales team and I think we should build a sales team because everybody has a sales team. Probably this would help us sell more. I went and hired a guy, 30 years of experience in sales. The mistake I did, and he was selling enterprise software at multiple locations, some of the best companies in the world. What I didn’t realize was that you cannot take a guy out of a big company and get him as a [inaudible 40:44] kind of sales team. More so when he’s experienced of selling enterprise software but not a product like yours. The reason why I had to do, because in India, we still don’t have a lot of product companies. Product talent is still very hard to find. I had to pick up talent from a different industry, which was enterprise software product. That fit terribly, (a) because he was very senior and the ideas which he give were not matching with mine.

We were working on a more mass distribution channel. He was more like one-to-one sales. Let’s talk to this client and do a $100,000 deal. I’m like no client would pay us $100,000 for a charting component. Eventually clients did, but there was the whole difference of mentality. Then his way of working. When I was putting in 110 to 130 hours a week, I was expecting everyone to put at least somewhere near that. Again, you don’t realize that people have families, people have lives beyond work. That became an issue. He was putting a fair 50 hours a week and I respect him for that. Looking back, that was a major mistake I made.

Few more in terms of like product management and product management guys. The difference, like the mistakes which I didn’t realize, was like I went after big names hiring from this big company or hiring from that big company without trying to understand is this guy really a good fit for a startup? All these were a few years ago, and ever since then I’ve been trying to refine my hiring strategies. Today I have a good team of 45 people who absolutely love what they do.

Andrew: Where do you guys work out of? Do you work out of your home usually?

Pallav: Oh, no, no. I go to office. I have to travel a lot. We have an office in Calcutta where we’ve got 45 people. We’ve got quite a few offsite employees like, we’ve got one in Heidelberg, one of our marketing consultants. We have got sales in the U.S. We have a small team in Eastern Europe. I’m setting up a new office in Bangalore. So finally I go to the office if I’m in the city. Otherwise, I keep traveling, meeting clients, taking part in trade shows.

Andrew: Did you say Calcutta’s the office that you go to?

Pallav: Calcutta is the office that I primarily go to, but now I’m setting up a Bangalore office, so a good chunk of my time will be spent there as well.

Andrew: Before the interview, you and I talked about how you’re getting into the consumer market. Can you tell us about that?

Pallav: Sure. FusionCharts was used in large web applications, and our core functionality is our USPs, which is good looks and easy to use feature. We’re loved by a lot of people who are web developers as well as they give a lot of PowerPoint presentations. They came back to us and said, “Hey, we’ve got the best looking charts on the website.” Now we want to get that inside PowerPoint. We want to use FusionCharts inside PowerPoint. It was a complicated [inaudible 43:21] for them. There’s still a lot people who actually did that. We’re like, these people are putting in so much effort to get FusionCharts inside PowerPoint. Why can’t we make it easier for them because that is our second use, to make it easier for them. We put a lot of effort in figuring out how we can do that.

One of the funny things is actually this product idea was born as experimentation for other products. We were trying an experiment for another product and that experiment did not work out, but eventually resulted in a component for this product. We picked up the idea from there, nurtured it for the last two and half years. We built this product called Oomfo which people can download. It’s a plug-in to PowerPoint. You can start using FusionCharts inside PowerPoint without having to write a line of code. Currently, we have 10,000 beta users for this product. People are liking it. The whole aspect of creating more chart types and creating more attractivity within PowerPoint is something they’re not use to. We’ve got a fairly decent response out of it.

Andrew: Before I ask you about your investments, I want to ask you why do you think your company made it? What do you think you had that was the “it” factor?

Pallav: Hard to say. I would say maybe two things. Maybe sticking to the focus. right from day one we knew we just have to do data visualization, nothing else. We stuck to that focus. Number two is following parameters, like creating the right differentiating factors. Even though we have one of the powerful charting suites with this company, I would say we have [inaudible 44:58] and bunch of those so-called features in the product. We never [inaudible 45:04] those features. We have two benefits. We have the best looking charts, and we have the easiest to use, period. That is what customers love about us. That is how we got started. Consistency, like when we say we make it look good. Like I mentioned, not only our product, our documentation, our demos, everything looks good. When we say we help you get easily started, which is not only our product, it’s also our demos, our live examples, our customer support, everything makes it really easy for you to get started. That consistency probably has helped us to achieve [inaudible 45:36] charting components.

Andrew: If you see me looking down, it’s because I’m an obsessive note taker. I can’t stop taking notes. I do it in the interviews, and when you make great points like that, I have to take them down. At what point did you decide to make investments in other companies? I think it was a year and half ago, did you launch Seeders Venture Capital? Or are you a partner there?

Pallav: Yes, we did. It was me and another partner. My partner comes from a service background, and I come from a product background. What happened was we were, for the last few years I’ve been interacting with a lot of fellow entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs in the city and in the country. While the ecosystem has developed a lot in the last few years, there’s still that last mile push, that last mile motivation they need before they quit the jobs and go and start their own. Of course they have their own ideas. This is where we thought, we have got the experience of running however small our companies are. We did it and people look up to us. Why don’t we actually take this forward, put in our own money, behind these guys, the good guys with good ideas and see what we can come up with. That is how this whole idea started. It’s me and my partner, Abhishek Rungta, we put our own money as the seed capital for this seed fund. We started conceptualizing a year and half back. We have been receiving business plans the last couple of quarters. Next month, we are doing I’d say three deals in different sectors.

Andrew: Next month, first three deals.

Pallav: First three deals, right.

Andrew: What size investments do you make?

Pallav: Typically our investments range from $10,000 to $30,000, $30-$35,000 going by today’s conversion. In certain cases, we make exceptions about like extending it to $50,000.

Andrew: What kind of companies are you interested in?

Pallav: Primarily [inaudible 47:29] software because those are the only domains which we understand, so we cannot invest in health care or construction because we have absolutely no idea about it. Anything where the Internet is an enabler or which is a software play which is what we understand and we can add value to, that is where we invest.

Andrew: How far will $10,000 to $30,000 get the entrepreneurs that you’re investing in?

Pallav: First thing is it will give them the push to actually pursue the idea. Right now they’re very scared of what happens if I quit my job, who’s going to fund me? I don’t have enough savings. That first push, which is the most important push for an entrepreneur. Let’s go ahead and follow my dream. This $10 to $30,000 will give them the push. The second thing is the validation. If I’m a full-time entrepreneur, I always have this doubt. Is this a good idea? It’s my idea, so I’m biased toward it. When we give this money, we are also acting as validators by putting in our money. The entrepreneur has an increased level of confidence that these guys are backing me. Third, we open our small [inaudible 48:31] to them whenever they need the help and our guidance to them. Money is, I would say, the last part we give. We give them incubation incentives. We give them mentorship. We give them guidance, our network. We increase the confidence levels.

Andrew: So they come to you with just an idea and you give them enough money, mentorship, and other resources to get them to the equivalent of fXgraph Version 1.

Pallav: I would say Version 4.

Andrew: Version 4, okay. That makes sense. All they have is an idea.

Pallav: Absolutely.

Andrew: What kind of advice do you give them? I can understand now that maybe the first three entrepreneurs you’re going to back in the next few weeks and definitely the ones who are going to come to you in the future for money are going to be watching this interview, reading the transcript carefully. What advice do you have for them?

Pallav: From my own experience, I would say solve the pain point. I mean a lot entrepreneurs come with very technical ideas. They do not know who they are going to sell it to. I say backtrack it. Figure out who the customer is, what is the pain point, and then try to build a product or service around it. That’s one of the most important things. Second thing is don’t make the world as your market. If you’re trying to address the entire world, you will not have enough budget for your marketing. Try to focus on a very niche segment, like for charting, we looked at a very niche segment, because then you know exactly what is the addressable market is and you can devise some strategies around it without having to spend a lot of money. The best part is if you’re targeting a niche market, you can make a torpedo in that. Whereas in an enterprise market or a multi-billion dollar market, you’re just a fish in the sea. No one is going to notice you. That’s something which I tell to people who come to me as well.

Andrew: Here’s some of the notes that I have on this interview. I know people like when I sum up the notes. Here’s what I got. Live with your customers, that was stunning that you would actually go and implement your software in other people’s systems. Just live in their homes the way that Airbnb people will go and live in the homes of the people who post their apartments on Airbnb.com. You say focus, focus, focus. I kept waiting for you to tell me about a product that you did that had nothing to do with charts, nothing to do with visualizing data. You didn’t even have an example of one that you got into and failed. You are that focused. Launch small. Your first version was basically an article. Then the real first version was something that you were a little embarrassed by, I think it took me three or four times to ask you the question to find out what was in it. It was small, doesn’t sound embarrassing to me but it was definitely very small and focused, of course.

Rebrand, one of the things I keep asking entrepreneurs is if you come up with something bad, aren’t you going to be embarrassed by it? You came up with an interesting solution. You said, you know what, worst case you can always rebrand it. When you get it right, you come up with a brand new name. It’s like that other stuff didn’t exist. It’s like that other stuff was just high school, college, your learning experience.

Be careful when you’re hiring from marquee companies. We’re always, as entrepreneurs, impressed by the big companies. Steve Johnson even, I think, went after the CEO of Coca-Cola, I believe partially because those big, experienced companies and the people who work at them seem like they’re better, like they know something much more. Maybe they do but they’re not always a good fit, and in your case it wasn’t.

Focus on the benefits, I heard you say that so many times. You don’t want to tell them what the features are. You still don’t have a feature list. You want to tell them what they’re going to get out of it. Find the pain point. That’s advice that you’re going to give entrepreneurs who are going to get funded by you. Don’t make the world your market. Again, that goes back to focus. You specifically wanted to work with specific kinds of people. Now that you’re expanding even a little bit further, you’re still expanding within your area to people who are using PowerPoint like me and want to visualize their data. How did that do?

Pallav: Absolutely. Possibly, I missed one more point and give the company a personal face. That’s something which we like to do. I mean, sitting in India, if you do not give it a face, we do not want it to be an unnamed entity out there, just like any of the outsourcing companies. So if you go to our website, you can see every single party we have hosted on in our company. We have like VP parties, monthly parties. You can see pictures of that. Every single person on the team is listed on our website. We are not afraid [inaudible 52:45]. We make sure our guys, have the best possible environment here. It’s a funny introduction or a funny explanation for each of them, even for our company. You have a lot of times where people come to us and say, “Hey you guys are free loving guys just like we are. I like to be with you.” That one moment of click, like, that one moment of feeling the same as the customer or the customer feeling the same as us has helped us in a lot cases. So try and give your company a personalized face rather than looking like that big company up there.

Andrew: Are these parties just for you, or if I have a developer in my audience or an entrepreneur in my audience and he happens to be in Calcutta, can they stop in too?

Pallav: Absolutely, by all means. We would love to host you.

Andrew: All right, awesome, great. One final selfish question. You’ve seen my interviews, you’ve now lived through one of my interviews, which is the best way to experience it. Any advice for me on how I can make these programs more useful for entrepreneurs like you?

Pallav: Good question. I have already been finding it very helpful. The only thing is on the transcripts. They tend to get very long, so maybe a smaller version of the transcript with the key sections, because putting in one hour every time is not possible, like you did the last seven points from this interview, you repeated them. How about putting them in a concise format as a part of the interview rather than the entire transcript.

Andrew: I see, give it the key points, what they use to call the executive summary.

Pallav: Right.

Andrew: Makes a lot of sense. All right. I’m glad I asked. How can people and I’m glad I asked you for this interview, you’re in India, it’s 9:00 your time right now. After a day or work and we know you put in a lot of time, you came and did this interview. I’m really grateful. People want to check out your sites or want to connect with you what’s the best way for them to do it?

Pallav: You can go to FusionCharts.com if you want to check out FusionCharts. My direct e-mail is pallav@fusioncharts.com, or you can follow my twitter handle which is pallavn, which stands for my surname, Nadhani. And if you want to reach me by phone, drop me an e-mail and I’ll send you my number based on which city I am in.

Andrew: All right. Thank you very much. Thanks for doing the interview, and guys thank you all for watching. Just as I ask Pallav for feedback, come back and give me feedback. I love your feedback on my interviews. How can I make it better? Thank you and see you on the website.

Pallav: Thank you, Andrew.

Who should we feature on Mixergy? Let us know who you think would make a great interviewee.


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1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (19 votes, average: 2.58 / 5)

Webzen Inc. is a South Korean developer and publisher of MMO's. With headquarters based in South Korea, bring and develop games to a global audience spanning from Asia to Europe to America. They run over 8+ free to play games which all share the same currency, Wcoins, that can be used in micro-transactions for each and every one of their client-based games.

Official Site: Webzen.com
Company Size: Large (Over 300 Employees)
Region(s): Worldwide
Year Founded: 2000
Phone Number: +82-31-6276600
Email: pr@webzen.com

Webzen was founded in 2000 as a software licensing company but soon released their first title in 2003: Mu Online. They're also one of the few companies who have both licensed and published MMOs, and have gotten bigger since their merger with NHN Games in 2010. They also acquired Ymir games in 2011 and acquired their games, Metin and Metin2.

Client Games

Client Games (Download to play) From Webzen currently in service:

MU Online
Continent of the Ninth Seal (C9)
MU Legend
Age of Wulin (Same game as Age of Wushu)
Elite Lord of Alliance (Inspirit Online)

Browser Games

Browser Based Games (No Download) From Webzen  currently in service:

Mobile Games

Mobile Games From Webzen  currently in service:

Upcoming Games

Games Coming Soon from Webzen

Retired Games

Games no longer published by Webzen. Some of these are available through other publishers.

Arctic Combat
Terra Militaris
Huxley: The Dystopia
R2: Reign of Evolution
Archlord 2

Contact Information

Webzen Contact Information

Email: pr@webzen.com
Phone Number (KR): 82-31-627-6600
Fax Number (KR): 82-31-627-6700
Corporate Address (KR): 242, Pangyo-ro, Budang-gu, Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea

Useful Links
Webzen Official Page
Webzen Wikipedia Page

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This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Thank you for visiting my personal blog about the highs and lows of motherhood. There are topics here about breastfeeding, baby wearing, cloth diapers, maternity, home learning, infant food and nutrition, recipes, and everything else that mothers do.

Feel free to browse through the different pages and please leave comments and suggestions about any topics that you’d like me to come up with.


text:
December Gathering: Stay With Me Awhile

A new play titled Stay With Me Awhile, by Mary E. Johnson and Barbara Means Fraser had its world premiere at the Rochester Civic Theatre in February of this year. The play focuses on the stories told by family and friends as they face the approaching death of their loved ones.

Vignettes from Stay With Me Awhile will be presented in Reader’s Theatre format at the next meeting of

Minnesota Threshold Network
Tuesday, December 11, 7-9:00 pm
Spirit of St. Stephen’s
2201 1st Ave S, Minneapolis 55404
(Entrance is on the corner of 1st Ave and 22nd St
street parking and a small lot for St Stephen’s is adjacent)

Following the readings there will be time for group discussion. Please join us as we hear the compelling stories of people leaving this life.

Minnesota Threshold Network meetings are free and open to the public. Donations of the heart accepted.

Notes from the Regional Gathering

Regional gathering attendees. Photo by Linda Bergh

On Saturday, October 6, 2018, the MTN Twin Cities hosted our third regional gathering. The event brought together people from throughout Minnesota and Wisconsin to discuss what’s going on in our communities around conscious dying, family-directed after-death care, and green burial. The meeting was held at the home of Linda Bergh. Nineteen people attended.

In the morning, each group checked into to tell us all about what they’ve been up to. Here are some general notes from those reports, although no notes can ever capture the true richness of experience represented in that room.

Southeast Minnesota Threshold Network (Rochester area; Deah reporting)

  • Feeling of dwindling. Would like thoughts on how to grow the network and do work in the community.
  • Series of meetings to get to know each other by talking about what each person wants for their own death.
  • Decorated a “coffin” and had each person lie in it. Others talked about what they would miss about the “dead” person
  • Trainings in body-washing and supporting grieving families
  • Sunday, November 4: death open mic in Rochester
  • Elephant in the Room is a local collaboration of hospice, library, medical society, SE MTN, & many others who have worked together for several years. They’re planning a month of death-related events in November called Community Reflections of Living & Dying. Kickoff on Thursday, November 1.
  • Question: how can groups support each other?
  • Facebook: SE Minnesota Threshold Network, Elephant In the Room Network – end of life planning

Threshold Care Circle (Viroqua, WI; Liz reporting)

  • Groups size has ebbed and flowed. In a “small” phase right now.
  • No green cemetery in the area; in Vernon county, people can bury on their own land.
  • People are now contacting them for help with both personal and policy questions. Helping get laws changed/helping people understand the law in their area
  • Group has diversified, which has allowed them to offer different kinds of workshops
  • It may seem like not much is happening, but you never know what the impact has been and how far the ripples have gone out
  • Question: when we have materials, how do we most effectively get them where they need to be?
  • Facebook: Threshold Care Circle

Tabooyah (Menomonie, WI; Terri reporting)

  • Small core group
  • See themselves as a resource group
  • Name comes from “taboo” + “booyah” (how cool is that?)
  • Rochelle Martin TED Talk, “Let’s Talk About Death
  • Had a table at local farmer’s market to Tell your Story on end of life
  • Investigated and learned that  residents of their county have a choice to be buried on homestead property. Easements may be required if the land is subsequently sold.
  • A lot of personal growth and commitment to the work
  • This work happens all the time. People die whenever they do; they don’t wait for a convenient time
  • Want to do more work in their community. Want to get ideas and energy around what they’re doing.
  • Question: how can groups offer each other energy and support?
  • Email address:

Duluth, MN (Dana reporting)

  • Dana is new to this and very excited.

Mankato, MN (Mary Ann reporting)

  • Deva Nation. Nonprofit linked to an international movement of compassionate communities. A public health movement.
  • US is the only country with a for-profit healthcare system, which is why we don’t have any compassionate communities for end-of-life.
  • Public Health Palliative Care International
  • Want to create a compassionate town council. Each sector comes forward with policies to create a town charter that will be reviewed each year.
  • One Bright Star: nonprofit for families who have had a child die.
  • The vision: when anyone in the community is dying, caring, or grieving, we will all know what to do.
  • Question: how do we get Mary Ann some more people?!?
  • Birth, Breath, and Death, Amy Wright Glenn

Mind-Body Solutions (Minnetonka; Catherine reporting)

MTN Twin Cities (Linda, Karen, and others reporting)

  • Stay With Me Awhile, Mary Johnson and Barbara Means Frasier. New thirty-minute version on December 11 at Spirit of St. Stephen’s Catholic Community
  • Opening up the leadership team, restructuring the leadership team, reconsidering the mission
  • Question: how does leadership move into this new time with authenticity? How to do organization differently?
  • Question: how to bring younger people into this conversation?
  • Question: how to balance people who do this as a side passion with people who are doing it as a job and need to make money from it?
  • Started a mentoring framework: one person who’s been doing this for a while partners with one new person for each meeting

General Thoughts

After lunch, attendees held a planning discussion regarding the National Home Funeral Alliance 2019 national conference, which will be held in Chaska, Minnesota from October 4-6, 2019. Anyone who’s interested in helping plan and/or volunteer during this event is asked to contact Mary Ann Boe at maryann @ devanation . com

We are grateful to everyone who made the trek to this gathering, and to Linda for hosting. Let’s keep the ideas and enthusiasm flowing between us.

Regional gathering attendees. Photo by Ellen Hufschmidt

MTN Field Trip: Stay With Me Awhile at Rochester Civic Theatre

“The Sick Child,” Edvard Munch. A publicity image for STAY WITH ME AWHILE at the Rochester Civic
In 2018, the Rochester Civic Theatre will premiere Stay With Me Awhile by Mary E. Johnson and Barbara Means Fraser. The play tells the stories of death, grief, and healing, collected from Johnson’s Vigil Project during and after her time as a Mayo chaplain.
MTN is organizing a group trip to see this unique and moving play on Sunday, February 11, 2018, at 2:00 p.m.
Karen Greer is our coordinator for this outing. In order to gauge interest, we are asking that folks who want to go with the MTN group contact Karen at no later than Wednesday, November 22, 2017. This will allow plenty of time to coordinate transportation and determine whether we will have enough attendees for a group ticket rate. If we don’t have enough for the group rate, we will be asking folks to reserve tickets at
To find out more about the play or the Rochester Civic production, visit For more information about the planned MTN outing, contact Karen ( or Eli (
Karen, Eli, & Kathy attended a staged reading of this play in April of 2016 and found it to be a moving and well-crafted piece of theater. Seeing it fully staged with a larger MTN group should be a very enjoyable experience. We hope to see you there!


text:
Greg Schindler

Technology has made it possible to instantaneously connect everyone, just about everywhere at any time. Today we seem to communicate less and less as we seem to be forced to be brief and to the point.

We live in a world where 140 characters in a tweet motivate many people in a variety of ways. That word “motivate” may easily be substituted with “manipulate” depending upon your view of the world “half-full” or “half-empty.”

Stay with me for a moment, take a deep breath, and become an observer. As an observer, there are strict rules not to engage in the process or influence the situation in any way. Just sit back, watch and take notes.

There was an article written on a social media site last month regarding a benevolence activity. The intent was simply to motivate some of the readership to participate in a fundraising event. Then there was a response written, just a “few sentences” trying to convey a concern that the recipients of the benevolence activity may have a negative impact to our neighborhood. At this point, there were several written responses taking offense to this concern.

I guess if I were not in the observer mode, I might have jumped right in with the offended and provide my two cents. I thought about the words in those few sentences made by the offender and then spent some time trying to understand the individuals that were offended.

Reading each sentence carefully, this person had a genuine concern or fear. Have we come to the point that we no longer take the time to understand intent?

How about a committee of volunteers who decide that several trees on a median should be removed? Because we don’t understand intent, should we quickly respond with outrage? Do we fully understand the consequences of our response? Who will volunteer if the thanks you get are lots of criticism?

I think Eleanor Roosevelt’s quote is more relevant today than perhaps in her time; “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” The word “inferior” may as well be substituted with “outraged,” “offended,” “angry,” etc.

Assuming “good intent” is much more important with your neighbors than anywhere else in our social media lives. We will never understand intent if we don’t spend more time listening to each other or participating in the process.

Perhaps prior to giving “consent” to how you feel and respond, perhaps ask a few key questions: Can I make a difference? Am I willing to participate? What are the possible consequences of my response?

Because you are my neighbor, whatever you choose, I will always assume good intent.


text:
Summer Nature Study: Dragonflies

Last week, we were lolling around in the morning when I looked outside and saw fifty dragonflies hanging out on our porch.  Literally.
Everyone hurried out to see them.  Another hundred or so were roused out of the plum tree when O walked toward it.  They flew around– too big to be annoying– and parked periodically on the wires.

One of the kids ran inside to get the bug book, where we learned that dragonflies live only 2-3 weeks; lay their eggs under water; catch and eat flies in mid-air (hooray!!); and that their wings make figure-eights.  Not bad for a summer morning.

Sadly, they’re mostly gone now, and the flies are a-comin’.  But it was great while it lasted!

6 thoughts on “Summer Nature Study: Dragonflies

  1. WOW! That is so cool! We have noticed a lot more dragon flies this year too, but NOTHING like this! SO cool! And I didn’t know they ate flies – Hooray!!!

  2. Pingback: Grateful: this week | Learning As We Go

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Busy Busy Busy

Hello Momu Fans!

We are really ever so sorry that we have not written for a little while – we will try and be a bit better about that.

The humans have been ever so busy getting things ready for some Christmas fairs at the end of this month and the beginning of December.  We have been helping a lot, and we are also very excited about things to come.

The fairs are one thing – but much more importantly for lads, Christmas is very nearly here really.

There is talk of a couple of weeks off for the humans – which means more mooching time for the lad (which is always a good thing) – and some films to watch and some nice food to eat (for the humans, not for the lads.  Lads do not like food near their fur).

More soon,

Love Momu. x

Chilli Madness

Hello Momu Fans!

Bluey wanted me to write a little bit about how good he is at growing chillies with the boy.

He really is quite good and seems to have got the hang of growing them now.  They brought them in from the cold the other day (we are a bit miffed that there is not much sunshine around at the moment) and put them in the office room.

You can hardly see Bluey in between all of the plants!

The lads reckon the boy should get some lizards to mooch around because the room looks like a jungle. Yippee!

More soon,

Love Momu. x

Bluey and the Chillies – update

Hello Momu Readers!

We have just had a little message from Bluey  updating us on his Chilli plants – they seem to be growing very well.

The Smallest chillis

These ones are the littlest ones, aren’t they cute?

The middle chillis

Then there are some medium sized ones.

The biggest chillis

And then there are some monster ones! Yippee! That book from last week obviously had some tricks in it.

Do you grow things too? We don’t like to get our fur dirty as a rule, but Bluey seems to be very much enjoying growing these chillies.

More soon,

Love Momu. x

Birthday Treats

Hello Momu Fans,

It was Whitey’s birthday a few days ago (and the girl’s of course too) and some of us went out with the humans for tea.

Whitey was ever so excited – he is putting on his best photo face here. He says it is difficult to change his face much after all these years, but he hopes you can tell he is happy!

Flynte and Moomin came with us too because they are newish lads and wanted to see what all the fuss about birthdays was. They say they like the idea of them and are looking forward to the next one.

Corey Feltdog celebrated his first birthday at the boy’s house with some of the lads, he says he forgot to take any pictures in all the excitement, so you will have to imagine him having lots of moochy fun.

More soon,

Love Momu. x


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Capturing the best of your life...

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Welcome to Monterrubio Photography, where you would experience the best quality for photos and video for your special event, weddings, quinceañeras, baby showers, baptism, birthdays, graduations, prom and senior pictures and any special event that you need to be capture for the best photographer in the area, enjoy!

Jessica & Brian

One of the most special weddings from march 2018 in Chattanooga, Tn. The couple decide to take a break in the middle of the wedding to talk about how they feel about starting a new chapter in their life.

Monterrubio Photography

Capturing the best of your life...

Capturing the best of your life...

Our beautiful quinceañera from February 2018

Jackie Venzor in Chattanooga Tn

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LUCI’S LULLABY by Leaona Luxx releases October 4th!

Add it to your TBR- http://www.bit.ly/LucisLullabyTBR

You know that old saying… He’s the next big thing.

Yeah, that was me. I was a rising star, and I couldn’t have been happier.

Fame, money, women at every turn. I had it all, until the day my world came crashing down.

I never fathomed this would be my life.

But here I am, a single dad at twenty-eight and I have no clue what I’m doing.

I pray every day I’m giving her the best life, ’cause it’s the only one I know.

The minute I lost everything and had nothing left to give.

Charlee showed up.

She restored my faith and gave us so much more than I ever deserved.

So can you tell me why I’m sitting here alone?

Every single day that goes by without them, I lose more of myself.

It’s hard to imagine a world they’re not part of.

So I pick up my old guitar and tell them both how I feel.

Turns out, lullabies aren’t just for children.

I take another minute to myself as the warm water runs over my shoulders and down my chest. Honestly, I’m simply trying to waste enough time for the girl in my bed to leave.Turning the water off, I reach for a towel, only to be met with long, red nails. I pull the curtain back to a naked body that doesn’t include mine.

“Mornin’.” I wrap myself in the cloth and step from the tub.

She crowds me as I try to reach for my toothbrush. “If I had known you were showering, I could’ve joined you.”

“It’s a small space.”

She brushes her breast against me as she moves closer. “We’ve been in tighter situations.”

“Yeah…” Before I can offend her, I’m saved. The front door opens and closes with a slam. Followed by the voice of a saint.

“Hey, baby. Where are you?”

The redhead on my left turns a deep crimson. “You’re married?”

I shrug. “I’m in here, honey.”

“How dare you!” She snaps, grabbing my shirt from the floor and dragging it over her head. “Let me out.”

“No problem.” I step to the side as she swings the door wide and runs into the other redhead in the hall. Her mouth hangs as she stares at her before turning to me. “I look just like her!”

“Not really.” I smirk.

“I am so sorry, he never said he was married.” She stumbles through to my room, yanking her clothes on.

“I’m Reese. You are?” She crosses her arms with a smug look.

The redhead in the bedroom gapes at me when I don’t answer. “Aren’t you gonna tell her my name?”

“I would…if I could remember it.”

Her face flames as I struggle not to giggle. “You are disgusting.”

“Yes, you are.” Reese place her fists on her side, playing along. My body jerks as I fight laughing in her face.

“For the record, you’ve lost a fan.” She storms past us.

I jog after her. “Michelle, wait.” She turns to me, glaring. “See, I know your name.”

“What’s the point now?” She fumes.

“I was just wondering, are you still my number one fan?” Reese bursts into a fit of giggles as I watch Michelle’s eyes as she plots my death.

“Fuck you!” She slams the door against the wall as she rushes out it.

“Dear Lord, will you ever learn?” Reese joins me as I walk into the kitchen.

Leaona, also known as Lea, lives with her husband, Lu in southern WV. A mother of three sons and mother in law to three amazing woman. She enjoys spending time with her furbabies, Kaylea (cat) and Frankie (beagle), watching Carolina Panthers and Marshall University Football, reading, writing, gardening, crafts, NASCAR, TWD, HGTV, hot rods, and surf fishing.

Lea was inspired to write while she raised her family, never dreaming one day, she would be published. While loving all genres of books, Lea writes redeeming contemporary romance that are gritty and true to life. She draws from her life and loves to create her characters from everyday situations, proving everyone can be redeemed.
Leaona (Lee-aw-na) released her first book in June 2016 upon the encouragement of her father, who passed away before seeing her dream come true. The Cove Series was followed by Highway 17 Series, all are standalone family sagas and intertwine.

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text:
Croagh Patrick 764m mountain, Croagh Patrick Ireland at
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Near Dublin/Wicklow (Ireland)

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Seefin: "Megalithic Fallout Shelter"

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Croagh Patrick Area
Place count in area: 12, OSI/LPS Maps: 30, 31, 37, 38, CBE, CBW, MSW
Highest place:
Croagh Patrick, 764m
Maximum height for area: 764 metres,     Maximum prominence for area: 639 metres,

Note: this list of places includes island features such as summits, but not islands as such.
Rating graphic.
Croagh Patrick Mountain Cruach Phádraig A name in Irish
(Ir. Cruach Phádraig [GE], 'Patrick’s stack') Mayo County, in Arderin, Vandeleur-Lynam, Irish Highest Hundred Lists, Quartzite, psammite, basal conglomerate Bedrock

Height: 764m OS 1:50k Mapsheet: 30 Grid Reference: L90584 80197
Place visited by 1119 members. Recently by: Daingean, Patbrdrck, mcdonna3, sharonburns, MagdaK, Atlanticstar, jamesmforrest, joanfahern, EugeneHendrick, toomanyhills, therealcrow, rollingwave, Manda, endab1987, ilenia
I have visited this place: YES (You need to be a logged-in member to change this.)

Longitude: -9.659247, Latitude: 53.760033 , Easting: 90584, Northing: 280197 Prominence: 639m,  Isolation: 0.9km,   Has trig pillar
ITM: 490593 780213,   GPS IDs, 6 char: CrghPt, 10 char: CrghPtrck
Bedrock type: Quartzite, psammite, basal conglomerate, (Cregganbaun Formation)

Saint Patrick is said to have fasted for forty days on Croagh Patrick. It is from here that he is said to have banished a flock of evil black birds as well as the serpents of Ireland (a hollow to the north of the summit named Lugnademon commemorates this story). This explains its significance as a place of pilgrimage, though it was already sacred in pagan times, being a Lughnasa site [see MacNeill, 71-84]. Locally Croagh Patrick is called ‘The Reek’, a variant of the word ‘rick’ (i.e. a hayrick or haystack). ‘Cruach’ has the same meaning. In pagan times the mountain was known as Cruachán Aigle or Cruachán Garbrois. Garbros seems to be a place-name for the locality.   Croagh Patrick is the highest mountain in the Croagh Patrick area and the 66th highest in Ireland.

COMMENTS for Croagh Patrick << Prev page 1 2 3 4 5 .. 9 Next page >>
Good Friday on Croagh Patrick .. by Homerclesse   (Show all for Croagh Patrick)
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Had To Be Done, And Glad I Did .. by Aidy   (Show all for Croagh Patrick)
If you have the time it's a far better climb from .. by gallaga   (Show all for Croagh Patrick)
Magnificent from many angles. .. by simon3   (Show all for Croagh Patrick) Picture about mountain Croagh Patrick in area Croagh Patrick, Ireland
Picture: The clew bay
pazapas on Croagh Patrick, 2005
by pazapas  2 Jun 2005
For the sixth times, I was on the top of the Croagh Patrick but in the clouds this year. I am still surprised by people who climbs it with inappropriate clothes and light shoes... Trackback:
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(End of comment section for Croagh Patrick.)

OSi logo OSNI/LPS logo
Some mapping:
Open Street Map
(Various variations used.)
British summit data courtesy:
Database of British & Irish Hills
(Creative Commons Licence), a Hill-walking Website for the island of Ireland. 11 Million Visitors Per Year. 1300 Contributors.


text:
Kitayama might be taking a picture of this

  • Mood:

25 Questions meme stolen from Kira_Shadow

directions: pick 12 names at random and then answer the questions.

1. Goseki
2. Kitayama
3. Yokoo
4. Totsuka
5. Tsukada
6. Fujigaya
7. Kawai
8. Miyata
9. Tamamori
10. Nikaido
11. Senga
12. Hasshi

I just put them in age order, so this is what you get. Here's a hint: I wish that I had put Takki as 1 pretty intensely. But Hasshi was a really good choice for 12.

1. Who would make a better college professor, 6 or 11? What subjects would (s)he teach?
Lol, since Fujigaya has actually GONE to university, I will say he would probably be better at it than Senga would. History, but all they'd do is watch DVDs of Kabuki and Enbujou.

2. Do you think 4 is hot? How hot?
Tottsu is very, very hot. Hot enough that I'm still willing to say this despite his Britney head-shaving stunt.

3. 12 sends 8 on a mission. What is it, and does it succeed?
Hasshi totally sends Miyata on a mission to get him stuff from the vending machine, and Miyata completely does it because he's way too nice and he's used to brats.

4. What is or would be 9′s favorite book?
Probably whatever manga Miyata is reading would be Tamamori's favorite, because I bet he makes Miyata read it out loud (and do voices).

5. Would it make more sense for 2 to swear fealty to 6, or the other way around?
Ho shit, Fujigaya and Kitayama? Now it's ON. As Leader, I think Kitayama is going to win this one, but Fujigaya would never swear fealty out loud where anybody could hear it.

6. For some reason, 5 is looking for a roommate. Should (s)he share a studio apartment with 9 or with 10?
Tsukada with either Tama or Nika...I'll go with Tamamori on the grounds that both of them are complete weirdos.

7. 2, 7, and 12 have dinner together. Where do they go, and what do they discuss?
Lol, Kitayama, Kawai and Hasshi. Actually it makes sense, since Kitayama knows good places to eat always. They go to some shady and totally delicious noodle stand, and they totally talk shit on Fujigaya.

8. 3 challenges 10 to a duel. What happens?
I bet it's because Nika is too fucking loud in the hotel room next to Yokoo's. Nika totally loses because Yokoo points over his shoulder and yells "Ghost!" but then Yokoo isn't exactly a winner when Nika refuses to sleep on his own after that.

9. If 1 stole 8′s most precious possession, how would (s)he get it back?
Well I'm not sure what exactly Goseki would be doing with Tamamori, but Miyata could probably get him back by either negotiating a trade for Hasshi, or else just playing along.

10. Suggest a title for a story in which 7 and 12 both attain what they most desire.
Kawai and Hasshi? Uh, right now I'm pretty sure that story would be called "Kawai Stops Breaking Shit and Comes Back to Work."

11. What kind of plot device would you use if you wanted 4 and 1 to work together?
Goseki and Totsuka would probably require nothing other than Hasshi pouting. Or Yara shouting at them.

12. If 7 visited you for the weekend, how would you get along?
Haha, I think Kawai and I would have a good time. At bare minimum i would totally take him out for wings and beer with all three of my brothers.

13. If you could command 8 to perform any one task or service for you, what would it be?
For's a toss up between getting a kiss from him, or watching him kiss Tama. Actually maybe I'd ask to watch one whole anime series with him (but I'd totally pick One Piece).

14. Does anyone on your friends-list (LJ F-List) write or draw 11?
Senga gets written quite a little bit~

15. If 2 had to choose sides between 4 and 5, which would it be?
I'm pretty sure Kitayama would pick Totsuka over Tsukada without thinking for even a second.

16. What might 10 shout while charging into battle?

17. If you chose a song to represent 8, which song would you choose?
I feel like Miyata has had way more answers than anybody else. It's definitely the Wotagei song/dance thing.

18. 1, 6, and 10 are having dim sum at a Chinese restaurant. There is only one scallion pancake left, and they all reach for it at the same time. Who gets to eat it?
Goseki, Fujigaya, and Nika? Well...i want to say Nika as kouhai, but I think that he is maybe smart enough to know that paying Goseki back later isn't worth it.

19. What might be a good pick-up line for 2 to use on 10?
Kitayama to Nikaido: "My place later. Winner is declared senpai."

20. What would 5 most likely be arrested for?
drugs. I'm willing to bet that Goseki would be involved, now that Hasshi isn't young enough to get arrested for.

21. What is 6′s secret?
Fujigaya's secret is that he is totally glad that Kitayama is Kisumai's (and his) leader, and that somewhere deep down I bet he totally wishes they had been much closer this whole time, even if the way it is now is fine too.

I saw Kira said about his animal-print underwear, but after you publish something in a magazine, I don't think it's a secret anymore.

22. If 11 and 9 were racing to a destination, who would get there first?
Senga would beat Tamamori by a mile. I would have said that even before I saw Senga beat Nika in a race around YokoAri, where Senga was on foot and Nika was on skates. Senga is fucking fast.

23. What would 1 most likely give to 7 on his/her birthday?
I'm really starting to wish I had put Kitayama in 1 instead of Goseki. Goseki would give Kawai...a lot of disturbing pornography. Or maybe just Hasshi and use of the showers. I think that's the same answer.

24. “1 and 9 reluctantly team up to save the world from the threat posed by 4′s sinister secret organization. 11 volunteers to help them, but it is later discovered that 11 is actually a spy for 4. Meanwhile, 4 has kidnapped 12 in an attempt to force their surrender. Following the wise advice of 5, they seek out 3, who gives them what they need to complete their quest.” What title would you give this fic?
“Goseki and Tamamori reluctantly team up to save the world from the threat posed by Totsuka′s sinister secret organization. Senga volunteers to help them, but it is later discovered that Senga is actually a spy for Totsuka. Meanwhile, Totsuka has kidnapped Hasshi in an attempt to force their surrender. Following the wise advice of Tsukada, they seek out Yokoo, who gives them what they need to complete their quest.”
I feel confident that Tottsu in no way had to kidnap Hasshi, that Senga would be the worst spy ever, and the only helpful thing Yokoo would give them would be the roomba to help clean up the dressing room in the aftermath. I will call it "While Kitayama was Sleeping."

25. If you had to walk home through a bad neighbourhood late at night, would you feel safer in the company of 7 or 8?
I'm seriously not sure whether Kawai or Miyata would be of more help. Otoh, Miyata has been doing muscle training with Nikaido, but otoh Kawai is obviously not afraid to put himself in physical danger. So I think this is a tie.
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