The business of winding down startups is booming

There are companies that specialize in buying up office furniture being liquidated. They buy it at a discount and sell it to the next company.

The thing is that sometimes they have leftovers that they can't really sell to another company and these will often be very cheap. I bought a used Steelcase Leap from one of these places that operated out of a nearby warehouse. A new Leap sells for $1000+. It was in near perfect condition, but it was a different color then the rest of the Leaps that they had, so no one buying in bulk was likely to purchase it. I bought it for about $200. They even steam cleaned it for free before I picked it up.

Search for office supply places in your area. Look for something that’s “second tier”. Lacking a fancy store front, maybe in a warehouse, or an office that hasn’t been updated in decades. Even when I lived in rural parts of the country, I could find several with 2 hours drive.

Alternatively, searching Craigslist for Herman Miller or Aeron will likely turn up results from these resellers.

I never understood the obsession with the chair type, model, or manufacturer. I have a normal office chair whose brand I don’t know, and I never had issues despite sitting for long periods of time. The trick first me is to never stay still in one position for more than 30 minutes and to rotate between different positions, leaning forward or backward, and other positions as if I’m sitting on the floor. For example, like the ‘Burmese’ or ‘on a stool’ positions in this picture (1). I also do the usual stretches from time to time.

(1) https://64.media.tumblr.com/fd311523b5965df9b1ff0682c0041c96...

I am sitting in a Herman Miller Aeron chair acquired during the ~2000 dot com bust at auction for next to nothing. Highly recommend.

The SV ecosystem has long had firms that handle that stuff and make it available to new startups.

For chairs, look up office furniture rental companies. They often sell 5+ year old office chairs for steep discounts and they are usually in pretty good condition.

Just check your craigslist equivalent (marktplaats in my country). I got a really nice desk+lamp for $100 when they had to liquidate their furniture

I bought a standing desk here in the Bay area - saw an ad on FB marketplace and went to this warehouse - they had tons of office stuff, got a really nice standing desk for a fraction of the price, this was during covid when lots of offices were going remote.

https://www.yelp.com/biz/berkeley-office-interiors-berkeley Gets a lot of furniture from big offices in San Francisco every time there's a downturn.

just look for auction houses in your area. You don't have to buy these from tech companies. I'm signed up with a few local ones and I get notifications whenever there's a business going-out-of-business auction. I've gotten weights, computer parts, chairs, etc.

Some office furniture retailers have outlets where they sell second hand stuff at slight discount. This often comes with some level of warranty and might have even gone through proper refurb process.

State side anyway, all the good stuff almost always goes through HGP: https://www.hgpauction.com/

When YC had their headquarters in Mountain View there used to be a warehouse about a block away from there called Desk Depot - https://maps.app.goo.gl/GL9YpxsBt79M1Rxi7 - Google thinks it may be permanently closed now.

It specialized in second hand furniture from tech companies. It was AMAZING. The owner could tell the story of the past few decades of Silicon Valley illustrated by second hand desk furniture - like that corner over there is Sun Microsystems, this corner is Yahoo! etc. He had the full chronology of Herman Miller chairs as well.

Practically a museum. I'll be said if it's really closed for good.

https://www.yelp.com/biz/desk-depot-mountain-view says it's closed but has a comment from someone in 2021 saying "This place is NOT closed. WTH is Yelp reporting it as closed?"

Payment in advance.

Bankruptcy courts don't claw back payments to vendors who are legitimately attempting to assist with an orderly wind-down. From the perspective of a bankruptcy judge that would just be them shooting themselves in the foot.

this is likely "business confidential" since it is deeply competitive! I suspect a) court order b) personal and private arrangements with legal decision makers c) contract law d) "lies"

certainly knowing and using these techniques is the difference between being an amateur and being successful

The customer just probably takes on more debt

Yes, but it also sounds like VC necromancy. Investing in a startup undertaker gets them on the hyperscale train, preying on the death of other startups. Eventually, they need to find new and innovative ways to make startups die so they can feed off them. They become homicidal undead unicorns.

What's the exit plan for a startup vulture?

At least when those startups have to wind down they will know exactly what to do.

“We dogfood our own product to shut ourselves down”

PE: hello

I agree in spirit. Practically though, a lot of “closed” software are complex, nonsensical messes that can’t really be released as a usable product without significant revision. Mozilla was a good example.