Avni Patel Thompson at the Seattle Female Founders Conference

Poppy connects families with vetted caregivers when they need childcare, drawing on people such as teachers, stay-at-home parents, and camp counselors. After her first startup, Papaya Post, struggled with customer acquisition costs and low lifetime value, Thompson heard parents repeatedly describe missing their village. She saw an opportunity to use vetting, matching, and scheduling to recreate some of that support.

With limited money and no technical co-founder, Thompson focused on the problem in front of her: proving families wanted the service. She set a four-week goal, recruited three UW students, vetted them, and invited 15 Madison Park families to request care by text. The first week brought four bookings; she used weekly growth targets and customer behavior to assess demand.

Early demand helped Thompson keep Poppy running while she searched for a technical co-founder. She favored finding a co-founder who could shape the technology alongside her, and tested the fit with CTO Richard through six weeks of working together. Growth also helped Poppy’s YC application and fundraising by showing that customers wanted the service.

After YC, Poppy raised a little over $2 million and shifted from survival toward building a team and a sustainable business. Thompson learned to prioritize commitment, resourcefulness, and mission fit in hiring, including when she hired a Poppy user to lead operations. When the original membership pricing proved insufficient, Poppy began taking a share of transactions; she says founders should explain such changes transparently to early users.

Thompson recommends finding trusted people who can challenge a founder’s assumptions and using investor updates to create accountability. She also urges founders to decide whether they want the long commitment, make space for it with family, and take care of themselves. For her, yoga provides exercise, a mental break, and time to reassess.