For reference, we started offering the 401k before our A round. At that point, we had raised $2M and were still under $1M ARR run rate. Based in the Bay Area.
I don’t get the narrative that startups pay very little or don’t offer any benefits. We pay competitive comp and offer good benefits to get great people. We’re an enterprise SaaS company, so maybe pre-revenue or consumer or hit-based companies are different. But even our first employee was well compensated. Though at that point, my cofounder and I were paying ourselves well below market and were living off savings.