We’ve got some big news: HubSpot Media is acquiring Starter Story, one of the most trusted and beloved media brands in the entrepreneurship space.
If you’ve spent any time in the world of bootstrapped businesses, online startups, or the indie founder community, you already know what a Starter Story is. But if this is your first introduction, go ahead, because this brand’s story is worth telling.
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What is the starter story?
In 2017, a software engineer named Pete Walls was burning the candle at both ends. His first startup had just failed to get into Y Combinator. He was spending his days at work and his nights trying to build something that would stick—a story most entrepreneurs know all too well.
Refusing to give up on entrepreneurship, Pat started a side project—something built on low-cost, scrappy, and genuine curiosity. He wanted to know how real founders built their businesses from the ground up. So he started calling them and asking.
He created the first version of the startup story from Starbucks, posting his initial founder interviews on Reddit and Hacker News to see what would happen. People loved it. He kept walking. As of October 2017, the starter story was live, and it grew from there to feel right at home on its own pages.
Today, Starter Story is a full-on multi-channel media brand that reaches more than 100 million people each year. It’s hard to argue with numbers:
- 800,000+ Combined YouTube subscribers
- 600,000+ combined social followers
- 300,000 Newsletter subscribers
- 4,500+ Founder case studies and interviews in its database
- 100M+ Content Ideas Annually
But what makes the starter story culturally significant isn’t scale—it’s confidence. For the bootstrapped founder community, being featured on the Starter Story has become a rite of passage. These are not successful success stories. They are honest and transparent about how the founders built their companies: what they charged, how they got their first customers, what almost broke them, and what finally clicked. Income figures are included.
That combination of radical honesty and practical insight is rare. This is why Starter Story has built such a loyal, high-intent audience.
Why HubSpot Media Got It
Let’s zoom out for a second.
The media landscape is changing in ways that marketers feel every day. Earning organic traffic is becoming increasingly difficult. The costs of obtaining payment continue to rise. Audience attention is fragmented across more channels than ever before. The playbooks that worked five years ago—keyword stuffing, algorithmic content at scale, banner ads—are facing rapidly diminishing returns.
What is working? Trusted, creator-led brands that audiences actively seek out. Brands that people subscribe to, share and come back to — not because they were served a retargeted ad, but because the content is genuinely worth their time.
That’s what HubSpot Media is moving towards. Instead of focusing on rentals through paid channels, we are investing in media properties. own The Hustle, Mindstream, and Now Starter Story are all part of the same thesis: If you want to reach the people who matter most to your business, create (or acquire) the media they already love.
The starter story fits this strategy exceptionally well. WHO It reaches. A Starter Story’s audience consists of early-stage founders—people just deciding what tools to build their business on. Preseeded by Series A, they are evaluating options, moving quickly, and forming opinions about which brands they trust. This is at the core of HubSpot, and the Starter Story reaches them in their element, when they’re actively learning and making decisions.
This demographic does not fit. This is one The mentality Fit and that makes all the difference.
HubSpot Media: A Track Record Worth Talking About
We don’t make these kinds of moves lightly, and we have results to back up why we keep making them.
HubSpot’s Media Network is now gone. 50 million engagements and tens of thousands of leads per month – a number that reflects actual audience behavior, not inflated impressions. On YouTube alone, HubSpot’s channels collectively move forward. 20 million views per month.
Hustle, which was acquired by HubSpot in 2021, is clear proof. It remained editorially independent, maintained its voice and community, and continued to grow. The same is true of Mindstream. We’ve learned how to be good stewards of the media brands we invest in—adding resources without being intrusive.
With Starter Story joining the network, our combined YouTube subscribers grow. 2.9 million. It’s a real, engaged audience of people who want to make things.
A note on why this matters
There’s a version of this story you can tell about media strategy and acquisition multiplexes. We’re not going to say about this version.
The version we care about is this: There are millions of people around the world who want to make something. Some side projects have a few months. Some are staring at a blank notion document, trying to figure out what to do next. Some have launched and are grinding in the middle of nowhere. And Starter Story has been one of the most honest, most generous resources available to all of them.
Investing in it – and helping it grow – is something we’re really proud of.
If you’ve never read a starter story case study, read it now. Then subscribe to the newsletter. Then watch some videos. Trust us on this.
And if you’re just creating something – welcome to the HubSpot Media family. We have created these things for you.
