Product Failures: Webvan

Business schools around the nation study Webvan’s overly ambitious rush to the biggest IPO to date in Silicon Valley, as a prime example of what to avoid doing while scaling.While it’s true that the impatience to go public helped steer Webvan off a cliff, the once darling company made three critical, but often overlooked mistakes when it came to revolutionizing home grocery deliveries. We'll talk with Ben Foster about his experience leading product teams at Webvan. BIG NEWS We've officially launched the Rocketship Premium Podcast feed! Join today for $5/month or $40 annually, and get access to exclusive bonus shows of Rocketship, previews of new seasons, and an ad free version of every episode of the podcast. Check it out today by clicking here. This episode is brought to you by: DigitalOcean, the cloud platform that makes it easy for startups to launch high-performance modern apps and websites. Learn more about DigitalOcean and apply for Hatch at do.co/rocketship. App & Flow. If you're a startup founder, App & Flow will help you build an app that's ready for takeoff. Rocketship listeners get 25% off of their first month by going to rocketshipfm.appandflow.com. Augusto Digital. Augusto Digital is a product engineering team that creates web, mobile, and cloud based digital products. Rocketship listeners get $1,000 off by going to augusto.digital/rocketship. Logi Analytics is the leading platform for embedded analytics. Take your dashboard and reports to the next level. Rocketship listeners get free access to the Logi Analytics library of product demos by going to logianalytics.com/rocketship. Rocketship is brought to you by The Podglomerate. *** This show is a part of the Podglomerate network, a company that produces, distributes, and monetizes podcasts. We encourage you to visit the website and sign up for our newsletter for more information about our shows, launches, and events. For more information on how The Podglomerate treats data, please see our Privacy Policy. Since you're listening to Rocketship, we'd like to suggest you also try other Podglomerate shows surrounding entrepreneurship, business, and careers like Creative Elements and Freelance to Founder.