The Power Of The Pivot – Techstars Grad ClassPass sees $60M Run Rate – Acquires Biggest Competitor FitMob

Classpass Website

Techstars grad ClassPass wasn’t originally called ClassPass, they were called Classivity and they started as a marketplace for people to find guitar classes, ballet classes, etc. The only problem was, nobody wanted to use their marketplace, in an 18-month period they had only 100 signups. This is the point where many people would throw in the towel, shut their doors and move onto the next thing.

However some entrepreneurs take a different path and try to take what they’ve learned and use this to create something that people truly love. Often it’s something fairly different but it was the lessons they learned getting there that allowed them to make the move with confidence. That’s exactly what happened with Classivity.

After 18-months and only 100 users CEO Payal Kadakia realized that something she was doing was working, it was called “Passport” a bundle of classes sold to new users to encourage people to join the platform. What she realized is that rather than using Passport as a way to get new users, it could be a business onto itself.

Fast-forward to today and ClassPass has raised $54M and they’ve just acquired their biggest competitor, FitMob. It just goes to show, if at first you don’t succeed, don’t give up, just try to look at things a bit differently, the key to success might be sitting there right in front of you.

Huge congrats to ClassPass and to FitMob, well-deserved on both fronts!

Morgan Linton

Morgan Linton