Startup Spotlight #88: Kanary

Kanary makes it possible to find and remove the personal information that puts your privacy and security at risk - with one click.

Feb 19, 2021

Latest F2F Case Study - Case Study: This Founder Doesn't Believe In Product-Market Fit. Yet His Startup Is Growing Rapidly.

I got the chance to speak with Rachel Vrabec, founder and CEO of Kanary, about what she’s working on at her startup, and any advice she has for emerging entrepreneurs.

Kanary protects your digital privacy and security. It takes the hassle and uncertainty out of staying safe online by monitoring for risks, removing personal information from sites, and looking out for loved ones who may be less digitally-savvy. The company was founded in 2019 in Chicago, IL. Before launching Kanary, Rachel spent a year launching various software projects focused on personal data and returning control and privacy to individuals online. Prior, she was a solution architect at a data science startup and IBM.

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Startup Spotlight: Kanary

Problem: When your information is breached, it’s hard to know what to do to prevent someone from threatening your safety, privacy, identity, or finances. It’s even harder to look out for loved ones like aging parents who may not be the most online-savvy.

Market: The Total Addressable Market is 2.5 billion people impacted by account hacks. The Total Serviceable Market is 1.8 billion people impacted by data breaches.

Solution: Kanary actively monitors for leaked personal data and removes it from any website that puts you and your loved ones at risk. As your authorized agent, it triages and escalates requests across hundreds of thousands of websites.

Team: Kanary’s core team is Rachel and Devin, former coworkers from Chicago. Their advisors, investors, and contractors help them strategize and execute. They are actively growing the team!

Recent Success:

Vrabec: Since launching, we've attracted an enthusiastic group of early members. Their positive experience has turned into inbound interest from companies who want to partner with Kanary. Partnerships are a great way to grow without having to spend on outbound marketing.

We continue to stay focused on solving the core problem in an iterative way. We launched the idea as a super-simple email service on Reddit in 2019. We learned from the feedback and support on Reddit and built a basic app. Then we launched a paid product. As we've grown, I've emailed every one of our members when they join to see how they're doing and if we can do anything differently or better.

Recent Struggle:

Vrabec: Iterating on the business model is difficult. When we launched our subscription, we quickly learned most people really don’t want another monthly charge on their credit card even though they liked the product. To stay focused, we remind ourselves that business model-market fit is just as important as product-market fit. It can feel awkward charging different people different prices or telling people that something they liked is going away but having the conviction to experiment then pick a new direction is important for building a sustainable business.

Founder Advice:

Vrabec: Build a financial model early. It lets you plan out scenarios before you start executing. Likely all of the outcomes will be wrong but it’s useful to understand where your revenue and costs will come from. Our early model helped us make an important product decision. We were debating whether to scale our free product or shift to a paid product. Looking at our model with a scaled free product, we realized we'd need to target users with ads or sell their data to support the business. As a privacy service, that was not true to our mission. We dropped the free product, lost most of our free members, but it was the right decision for our company.

Three Cool Founders You Should Know About:

Vrabec: Here are three founders you should check out next!

Jeff Kahn, Founder of Rise Science: Rise is the only app that unlocks the real-world benefits of better sleep.
Ishan Daya, Founder of Crafty: Crafty is a workplace food, beverage, and events provider based in Chicago, IL, USA, that helps companies create healthier office cultures that go deeper than just 9-5.
Christina Bellman, Founder of LĒVO Oil: LĒVO takes infusion craft to the next level, smartly infusing your oils, butters, honeys, and more with the essential flavors and nutrients of your favorite herbs, fruits, and other ingredients.

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