Everyone says you need a huge team to scale, but my solo run in Austin says otherwise

Last month, I hit $80k in monthly revenue running my web design business completely alone. Three years ago, I was in a co-working space in Austin listening to founders talk about hiring as the only path to grow. I bought into it, hired two junior designers, and my profit tanked for six months straight. The overhead killed me, and managing people took me away from the actual client work I'm good at. So I fired them, went back to solo, and focused on systems and raising my rates. Now I use a few key tools like Calendly and Notion to handle everything myself. My clients get better work because it's all from me, and I keep way more of the money. Has anyone else found that staying small and lean actually worked better for their growth than the usual 'scale up' advice?

2 comments

2 Comments

jones.mason9d ago

Wait you FIRED people to go back to solo? That's a wild move.

nora_chen9d ago

Yeah, it sounds crazy when you say it out loud... I basically had to admit I'm a control freak who can't delegate to save my life. The team was great, but I spent more time managing than doing the actual work. So now it's just me, my bad decisions, and a lot of coffee again. Honestly, it's a relief to only have myself to blame when things go wrong.