We didn't pay ourselves until the company was profitable. This was somewhat easier since we started the company while in college and had pretty much no standard of living to maintain.

We didn't take any funding, so it really wasn't possible to pay ourselves before becoming profitable unless we took on other debt. We decided we'd rather be individually poor with a company than individually wealthy with no company.

Once the company was profitable, the partners agreed on a goal-oriented pay structure. The base was under market value compared to other opportunities, but was still more than enough to easily live on. Then, by hitting reasonable revenue targets, salary would increase quickly.