On Sept. 10, Patrick Lee, co-founder and founding CEO of movie review site Rotten Tomatoes met with 43North portfolio companies, including Twipes, to discuss his success with some of the seven companies he’s founded.
He chronicled his journey, from dropping out of University of California Berkeley two years into his time there, to starting a computer part reselling company, to a design firm, to working for Disney Channel and then founding Rotten Tomatoes.
Lee began in the Berkeley area, which interested him because of its large Asian population, as he wanted to work in a place with people who had similar experiences. His first company began out of an apartment, but he realized as the cost of computer parts went down, unsold inventory began costing the company money. Though he said it was enough to make rent, he realized the company didn’t have much of a future.
Following the computer parts company, Lee’s design company Design Reactor began, working in print, 3-D and web design, ultimately pivoting to web only, earning between $1,000 and $1,500 per site. After a client connected Lee with an employee of Disney Channel, the firm designed a mock-up site for “D2: The Mighty Ducks,” which, after being redesigned to fit the Disney style guide, earned the firm $12,500 and gave them an in with Disney. That partnership led to work for ABC’s “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” as well as deals with MTV, VH1 and Warner Bros.
Rotten Tomatoes began with a site designed to compile movie reviews from different sites and news outlets for the Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker buddy cop film “Rush Hour.” Lee said he and friends realized they could run the company as a business, continuing building on the site with reviews from “A Bug’s Life.”
A big part of what helped the company build credibility was different movies including the Rotten Tomatoes logo and scores in their respective trailers. This helped get people talking about the site and had major studios marketing the site for free.
Despite many offers to buy the company, Lee said he and his co-founders wanted to wait for the right one, ultimately selling to IGN Entertainment. After multiple sales and an acquisition, the site fell under the ownership of Comcast’s Fandango Media.
Lee said one of the biggest lessons he learned was to start with a single feature, master it, then expand to other ideas as the company grows. For example, Rotten Tomatoes started with just reviews of movies for movie buffs.
Lee also pointed out different social media apps each starting with their own unique features — Instagram was a photo-sharing app, Facebook was for posting long updates, Twitter was for quick updates, Snapchat was for sending short and limited photo messages. After their initial success, each app began to replicate features of the others.
Twipes is following a similar idea to Rotten Tomatoes, first having released our truly flushable and truly biodegradable wet wipes, and after five years on the market, moving to development of truly flushable and biodegradable feminine hygiene, baby diapers and dental floss.