My Life in Hollywood C28 Press Junket (Patreon)

By September 7th, school was back in session. Marcus walked through the gates of NoHo High with Arya and Ryan, joining the flood of students returning after summer break.

Most kids had spent their vacation doing nothing. Beach trips, video games, sleeping in.

Marcus and his friends? They'd built a company.

The $7 million from Jefferson had been put to work. Warehouse lease in Van Nuys. Hired a dozen employees. Licensed over a hundred indie films. Expanded the DVD library to fifteen thousand titles. Upgraded the streaming infrastructure. Ran marketing campaigns across LA.

They'd burned through $4 million over the summer. $3 million remained.

But the results showed. The subscriber base had exploded from 3,678 in early July to over 12,000 by September. Monthly revenue hit $108,000—roughly $1.3 million annual run rate.

They still weren't profitable. Not even close. Between salaries, warehouse costs, hosting fees, DVD inventory, and licensing deals, they were burning $150k-200k per month.

Startups don't make money at first. They burn cash building something worth owning.

But the trajectory was right. Growth was accelerating. And if they kept this pace, they'd be cash flow positive by early 2011.

"Hey, Marcus! I saw your movie in a commercial!"

Before he could even reach the main building, students swarmed him.

"Dude, people are saying your movie makes them faint in theaters!"

"My friends and I went to see it last weekend. Scared the shit out of us!"

Marcus found himself surrounded, but he stayed calm. These were just kids. He'd been an adult in his previous life—handling a bunch of excited teenagers wasn't hard.

"You're famous now! Can we get a picture?"

Marcus chuckled. "Sure, why not." He took someone's aPhone—this world's equivalent of the iPhone—and posed with a group of students.

Full chapter: NewComer714.com