A quick introduction – I’m Justin, CEO and Co-founder of PerBlue, a video game developer based in Madison, WI. I started PerBlue in 2008 with my friends while attending the University
of Wisconsin-Madison. I’m delighted to join the conversation here at Young Go Getter and I hope
you find my blogs to be valuable. I’m passionate about entrepreneurialism and look forward to
sharing my view with you.
A couple weeks back, PerBlue Founding Employee Forrest Woolworth and I participated on
the “Campus Entrepreneurism: Fad or Fixture†panel at the Wisconsin Early Stage Symposium . We had a great time, and I’d like to share with you some of the great entrepreneurial advice that came from the event. Watch the full video from the panel at the end of this post.
How did PerBlue start?
Justin: When we first started, the idea was really simple. We wanted to make another game.
There were 4 goals in mind: the game would be played on the phone, it had to be fun, it had to
make money, and just for kicks, it would use the phone’s GPS. We were bored with homework
at about 4 am, and decided to start right there and then.
What was the key turning point of success for PerBlue?
Justin: My key moment was November 23rd, 2009. At that point most of us were still in school,
we had been working insane hours for no pay. We were trying to ship a new age, one that
would integrate our Virtual Good business model and finally make us money. I remember telling
myself, “If we don’t make any money tomorrow, we’ll shut the whole thing down and I will be
very happy. This has been fun, it was a great adventure, and we did our best.â€
We woke up the next morning and we had made about $5,000. That was the turning point of
success for PerBlue and Parallel Kingdom , because revenue is my biggest metric for success.
It showed that my time spent productizing something, and then putting it on a shelf and selling
it, was ultimately worth it. Earning revenue after productizing time and talent, was a key
benchmark of success for me and the company as a whole.
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