You know the success stories of each of these individuals — you know that they are now household names in their respective industries.
But do know their complete stories? What were these seemingly easy successes doing before their businesses took off?
Read on to find out!
Do Won Chang — Janitor to Founder, Forever 21
When an immigrant from Korea migrated to America with his wife, he had hopes of building himself a better life than the one he had had while in Korea — serving coffee and juice to customers.
But luck didn’t smile upon Chang in a hurry. He held 3 jobs in his initial years in the new country; working in a coffee shop in the morning, a gas station in the afternoon and as a janitor at night.
These were in addition to the array of other odd jobs he held — dishwashing, delivery, anything physically demanding.
Eventually he decided to give the fashion industry a go as, to him, all the owners of luxury cars seemed to belong to the garment industry.
And so it was that Chang and his wife opened the first store in Los Angeles called Fashion 21. Later they changed the name of their brand to Forever 21 and have now increased operations to over 50 countries and 480 stores.
Howard Schultz — Bartender to CEO, Starbucks
When you come from ‘the other side of the tracks’, there isn’t a lot easily available to you in the way of opportunities and resources.
But for Howard Schultz, a boy who grew up in housing projects in Brooklyn, limitations were not to stand in the way of his ambitions.
Though he had won a Football Scholarship to college, he didn’t want to keep playing, so instead paid his way through bartending gigs and even selling his blood.
Later he held a job at Xerox before moving on. It was only by the age of 29 that Schultz encountered Starbucks, a chain of 3 coffee shops, mainly selling ground coffee for home usage.
Soon after, Schultz had the epiphany of people having a personal relationship with their coffee, and the rest as they say, is history!
Jeff Bezos — Rancher to Founder, Amazon
Shopping online for books was synonymous with Amazon till shopping online for anything at all became a part of the Amazon experience.
But before Jeff Bezos became the man behind the incredible shopping experience that is Amazon, he was Jeff Bezos, a young boy working on his grandfather’s ranch in Texas.
He was a right little farmhand, doing odd chores around the ranch, vaccinating and castrating cattle and fixing windmills.
He also spent a summer during school taking up a unfulfilling job as a McDonald’s empire.
Nowadays he sits atop his $4 billion dollar worth throne and enjoys as a hobby his fascination with rockets.
Jack Ma — Tourist Guide To Founder, Alibaba
When Jack Ma was a little boy riding his bicycle in isolated communist China, he’d have hardly imagined himself soon emerging as the face of Chinese e-commerce.
Before Alibaba was born, a few decades back, there was a time when Ma, a conscientious little boy, would ride his bicycle around his hometown of Hangzhou, guiding tourists to different spots in the city, in exchange for being tutored in English.
It was during his stint as a tour guide that Ma was christened ‘Jack’ by a tourist he befriended because his original name in Chinese was too difficult to pronounce.
Reed Hastings — High School Math Teacher To Co-Founder, Netflix
Americans equate watching a movie or TV show with Netflix, that’s the extent to which the company has grown and become a part of people’s daily lives.
Today, of course, co-founder Reed Hastings is reaping the benefits of the genius idea he had to provide on-demand internet streaming, but there was a time when he was more modestly employed.
He was once a member of the Peace Corps and through them went to Swaziland where he ended up teaching maths to high school students.
It was this experience that emboldened him when it came to starting a business of his own.
Peter Thiel – Chess Master To Co-Founder, PayPal
What better game than chess to develop a sharp sense of competitiveness and intellectual prowess?
It should come as no wonder that the Co-Founder of PayPal, was a US Chess Master and one of the highest ranked under 21 players in the country in his heyday!
He went on from conquering chessboards to creating PayPal and later becoming one the first outside investor in Facebook.
Jimmy Wales – University Teacher To Co-Founder, Wikipedia
When in doubt, ‘Wiki it’, is something all of us do almost as second nature now. Wikipedia is the biggest non-profit online encyclopedia that exists today, and we have Jimmy Wales to thank for it.
But before the creation of this open content site, there was a time when Wales was preparing for his Ph.D and teaching graduate students in the meantime.
Eventually, he discontinued his Ph.D and with that his teaching career in exchange for a job in finance.
Jonah Peretti – Computer Science Teacher To Founder, BuzzFeed & Huffington Post
This is a man whose career has been dictated by the desire to learn why people share things on the internet.
It was his experimentation with what made for viral content that led to the creation of BuzzFeed, a site that enjoys about 30 million visits a month, mainly on the basis of recommendations by friends, family and colleagues.
But before Buzzfeed was born, Peretti was trying to figure out the answer to a different question – how best to engage young, creative minds.
He was once a teacher at a school for 3 years before moving on to MIT and later the development of 2 of the most widely read websites online.
Nick Woodman – Selling T-shirts To Founder, GoPro
Woodman started to take an interest in surfing during his high school years and it was during this time that he decided to form a surf club.
However, lacking the necessary funds to get the club started, the young Woodman would sell t-shirts at high school football games.
Later on, he found himself wanting to, yet unable to take a photo of himself while surfing as the required equipment just did not exist in the market then.
What’s a guy to do but create one for himself, of course! And so what GoPro introduced to the world.
David Karp – Intern To Founder, Tumblr
As far as getting an early head start goes, Karp got in at ground floor. At the age of 11 he was teaching himself to write code, and at 15 he dropped out of school.
He then took up an internship with an animation company and this was his first exposure to web development.
So by the time he turned 20 and created Tumblr, it seemed like the natural move for his career and not something out of the ordinary.
This is why they say it’s never too late to start. Your big idea is probably still yet to hit you. So wait for the epiphany and work wonders!
[This article is contributed by Explara]
