– By Sudipto Roy
Brand love is intoxicating.But profitability is oxygen.
The startup ecosystem has seen this movie more than once iconic brands, cult followings, glowing press, and yet silence in the P&L.
Howard Marks once said:
“Being early is the same as being wrong.”
In startups, being loved without sustainable economics is often the same as being fragile.
Brand love does not guarantee profitability
Customers may adore you. Twitter may celebrate you. Panels may quote you.
But none of that pays salaries or interest.
We’ve seen startups with millions of users struggle because every transaction lost money. Love created buzz, not balance sheets.
As Warren Buffett reminds us:
“Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.”
When funding tightens, brand stories get audited by cash flows. Unit economics must work before scale Scale is not a strategy it’s an amplifier.
If your unit economics are broken, scaling only helps you lose money faster and louder.
A seasoned VC once told a founder:
“Growth is vanity. Profit is sanity.” Path-breaking startups obsess early over contribution margins, repeat behavior, and cost discipline not because they lack ambition, but because they respect gravity. Expansion without operational discipline destroys value Geographic expansion, product sprawl, and headcount bursts look impressive on slides.
But without process, controls, and execution muscle, expansion becomes entropy.
Andy Grove put it bluntly:
“Growth will come from disciplined execution or it won’t come at all.”
Many promising startups didn’t fail due to lack of opportunity, but due to operational chaos masked as ambition.
Governance and capital allocation matter especially in downturns Good times hide bad governance. Downturns expose it.
Who approves spends? How are incentives aligned? Is capital being allocated to learning or just to noise?
Ray Dalio’s timeless truth applies here:
“Cash is like oxygen. You only notice it when it’s missing.”
Strong governance isn’t bureaucracy it’s survival architecture.
Investor patience is real but not infinite
Even the most founder-friendly investors eventually ask the same question:
“Where is this heading?”
Capital is not charity. It’s belief with milestones.
As one global investor famously said after walking away from a beloved brand:
“We didn’t lose faith in the founder. We lost faith in the math.”
The path forward
The next generation of enduring startups will be built by leaders who can hold two truths at once:
Dream boldly Execute ruthlessly
Brand, purpose, and culture matter but they must rest on sound economics, disciplined operations, and honest governance.
This isn’t a warning. It’s a compass. For founders. For teams. For investors. Because building something iconic is hard. Building something iconic and sustainable that’s leadership.