Hangry

A Startup Journey

By: Mike Evans

Narrated by: Mike Evans

Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

GrubHub founder Mike Evans reveals the inside story of how he grew a multibillion-dollar behemoth that changed the way we eat.

Hungry and tired one night, Mike wanted a pizza, but getting a pizza delivered was a pain in the neck. He didn’t want to call a million restaurants to see what was open. So, as an avid coder, he created GrubHub in his spare bedroom to figure out who delivered to his apartment. Then, armed with a $140 check from his first customer and ignoring his crushing college debt, he quit his job. Over the next decade, Mike grew his little delivery guide into the world’s premier online ordering website. In doing so, he entered the company of an elite few entrepreneurs to take a startup from an idea all the way to an IPO.

GrubHub’s journey from Mike’s bedroom to Wall Street doesn’t fit into how business schools teach entrepreneurship. In Hangry, he details step-by-step the grind of building an innovative business, with each chapter including sharp lessons for entrepreneurs and startups that Mike learned on the fly as he piloted GrubHub by the seat of his pants. Hangry reveals a decade of eighty-hour work weeks, detailed steps of how Mike garnered his first customers, his hunt for financing dollars, cliffhanger acquisitions, the near collapse of his marriage, a brutally difficult merger, and a pair of tumultuous quit/unquit moments, all to steer the company to become one of the most successful startups in the world. With a razor-sharp wit, Mike reveals hard-won truths about how startups succeed—and even harder-won truths about how startups fail.

Shocking everyone, at the pinnacle of startup success, Mike leaves it all behind, quitting the company he started to bike across the United States in search of balance. But eventually, the grand vistas of America bring the lessons of the past into focus, driving the realization that for entrepreneurs a hunger for success doesn’t end, and he starts another company, even more ambitious than the first.

©2022 Mike Evans (P)2022 Legacy Lit

Critic reviews

"In one of the truest portrayals of startup life I've ever read, Hangry lays out the painful-but-true story of the founding of GrubHub. But unlike most self-aggrandizing and chest-pounding entrepreneurial memoirs, company founder Mike Evans is brutally honest about how it really went down; the uncertainty, the disappointments, and his continuous struggle to keep a growing company true to its original vision. But it is more than just a business book—it's a personal journey as well. Hangry is right up there with ShoeDog for being one of the most honest and vulnerable depictions of what really goes into building a business."—Marc Randolph, co-founder of Netflix and author of That Will Never Work

“Mike Evans changed the way we eat dinner, and in Hangry, he shows us that it’s possible to transform a passion into a massive success. Mike’s riveting story shares the exciting highs and brutal lows of building a company from scratch. This is one of the most enjoyable and informative business books I’ve ever read.”—Ryan Serhant, star of Bravo’s Million Dollar Listing New York and National Bestselling author of Sell It Like Serhant

A wonderful founders journey from idea to Wall Street

A great story from a great founder. Learn how the journey from an idea finds its way to Wall Street with all the bumps along the way.

FANTABULOUS!

Mike’s journey in words was as encaptivating as his startup to IPO. Listening to the story in his own voice added a great connection to the adventure. There were so many great moments, like how he let his hunger and anger guide him into a whole new world of pizza and millions and millions of dollars or when the dogs were chasing him at the beginning of his bike ride (I might’ve cheered for the dogs). My favorite part was at the very end when he met up with his British bike pals, Paul and Terry, I could feel the overwhelming emotions of the journey culminating into a moment of peace. Thank you for sharing your stories and looking forward to your next adventures!

A reminder of why I am a business owner

I worked for Grubhub from 2011-2014 and this was as much a walk down memory lane as it was a reminder of why I wanted to own my own business in the first place.

Thank you Mike for changing my life back in 2011 by letting me join you on the Grubhub journey.

Also I worked like a DOG in rain, heat and snow in Brooklyn to be better then Seamless back before the merger.

Good read

Informative and a good reminder about why I’m an entrepreneur. It was just the message I needed to hear.

Spectacular book

Outstandingly well written book with a shocking amount of transparency in the details. A must for any startup founder.

Great Book

Fantastic personal story, great narration, a real, down-to-earth account of building of one of the most iconic tech companies coming from Chicago.

Good story

Great startup story, as well as points of wisdom learned by the author along the way. Also many enjoyable tales from his post startup cross country bike trip.

Love the whole journey from the beginning till now!!

Amazing book! Leant a ton of strategies on how to build a business!! Also it’s amazing to hear how much an entrepreneur goes through to make it work!!

A journey unfinished

As a start up founder, not only I found some of his stories relatable, I also have found other parts insightful for my building my company.

Some of the previous comments criticized about the two tracks of Mike’s journeys interwoven together like a cinematic art. I think both segments of life are related and reader can’t appreciate the later aspect of his life without knowing the prior one. Cause-effects.

The Story of a Start-up

Evans tells his story in his pleasant voice. His tale of how Grub Hub came to be is interesting but it isn’t an explanation. It’s more Evan’s reflection upon how his desire to find more restaurants that delivered to his neighbourhood wound up making him the owner of a multibillion business. The book is engaging and Evan’s descriptions of the inevitable bumps along the road to growth are informative. It’s an easily digestible description of the process of starting and exiting a successful business by leveraging the power of the internet-but those wishing for specific details, such as how best to compare multiple investor offers and exit options will be disappointed. Evans succeeds in restraining a tendency to preach about saving the world that most young business founders seem to espouse, so his story feels unusually personal and genuine.