We continue the story of a fledgling dotcom, Luluvise, through the eyes of its founder, Alexandra Chong. The private social network for women is growing too big for its home . . .
Looking at the Luluvise team, I am most struck by how fast we are growing. We’re up to 15, and we’re still interviewing for positions such as javascript engineers, an art director and a business analyst.
Happily, I’ve just found a girl geek. When I started Luluvise, we talked about whether it was important to hire girl geeks. Now we’ve got one.
Jodie Humphreys is an American mobile developer. Mobile engineers are in high demand and can command £80,000 salaries. Everybody’s looking for them. It’s even rarer to find a woman engineer.
As a start-up, we can’t afford that level of pay. Fortunately, the people who join Luluvise have a different mindset. They come because there is an exciting proposition to build something disruptive. The salaries are lower but the upside is that they get equity in the company.
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There has always been a question of whether we should establish operations in New York or California. America is the biggest market and we see a great opportunity to tap into the university sorority system to reach hundreds of thousands of young women. But a social networking product can go viral regardless of where it is based, and the product depends on the people who build it. So, for me, the question has always been: where can Luluvise attract, and retain, the best talent?
The fact that I’ve been able to hire such talented people in London is a key part of our success so far. There are more engineers in America than in England, but there are also many more start-ups and huge companies to hire them. In America, I see a much more aggressive recruitment culture that lures engineers to the next, newest hot start-up.
But in London, my team is loyal and dedicated. I’ve just hired a mobile engineer from Italy and a web designer from Brazil and they both relocated to London for the job, proving that London is an attractive place for tech talent.
However, we’ve outgrown White Bear Yard, our central London base. Here we pay by the desk: £350 plus Vat a month. For a small team it makes sense, but grow past five or six and it’s no longer cost-effective. Amazingly, I’ve seen an office in Notting Hill that’s a good 20% to 30% cheaper than east London. Silicon Roundabout rents are soaring.
Would we want to move out of Tech City? If we can be close to other start-ups — and there are five in this new building — then I don’t think it matters.