Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to a new episode of Building the Dream. In this podcast, I explore the personal stories of twelve Dutch tech Titans. My name is Leopold, and I am the host of this podcast. Today, I am proud and happy that Ruben Meiland has found the time to share his impressive story with us.
Ruben started programming as a young teenager and also produced several house records. To promote his own records, he built the dance platform Beatfreaks in the late nineties, featuring music news, a party agenda, a community, and later also online ticket sales. Together with his former business partner Frans, he then started Ticket Script, which they scaled in no time to over a hundred million in revenue, before selling it to the American Eventbrite. After the exit, Ruben moved with his family to San Francisco, where he joined Eventbrite as the Director of Product. He has now joined Leading Courses, where he is currently the CEO.
With Leading Courses, he aims to create the global booking platform for golf courses. Meanwhile, he also finds time for his family with two young children, his hobbies music, golf, and dream flying. Today, he shares all his highlights, low points, and lessons with us. Welcome, Ruben. How are you on this dreary morning here in Utrecht?
Well, good, because I love being in Utrecht. I lived nearby here. So, it's super nice to be in this beautiful city again.
Before we start, we'll do a few dilemmas. So listeners can get a good picture of you. Playing eighteen holes with Tiger Woods or spending a day producing music in the studio with Richie Horton. Jemina. I think this will be easy, but no, I guess Tiger Woods, I think. Yes, Yes. Would you rather sell green fees or tickets for a festival? Gosh, Leopold. A ticket for a festival, I think. Yes, yes. Successful musician or successful entrepreneur? Success in entrepreneurship. Starting a business alone or together with a partner? Together with a partner. Well-funded or lean bootstrapped? Lean bootstrapped. Entrepreneurship or investing? Entrepreneurship. Living in Zeist or in San Francisco? We live just outside San Francisco, but I would say Zeist now. Okay. Would you rather be at Burning Man or in the clubhouse of St. Andrews? Burning Man. Clear, thank you.
Yes, Ruben, let's start at the beginning. How did you grow up and where?
Well, actually, right near Utrecht here. I'm originally from Harmelen, a small village outside Utrecht. And I was mainly raised by my mother. From about my sixth year. My parents divorced. And I had a really good childhood. We never really lacked anything. We didn't have much money. So my mother always had to work really hard.
How did you come into contact with programming so early?
I once got or borrowed a computer, I'm trying to remember. I was about ten a ZX Spectrum, Sinclair. From the neighbors. Or that boy was also programming, who was then older than me. And I found that super interesting. So I then also got such a computer from my parents, I think. I'm trying to go back, because I was then ten or nine. And then I started borrowing books from the library. There wasn't really internet yet where you could look things up. Because I thought it's really special to create something from nothing. So with a computer was already a special thing at the time. We always had a computer at home. My father had an XT early on... and a three hundred eighty-six four hundred eighty-six. You know the old computers, where I also played games. I thought I can probably make those games myself. So when I was about eleven twelve, I started borrowing books from the library. Basic programming. And I taught myself with those books. And then I started programming games and also music.
How did you come into contact with house music so early?
Well, I had a group of friends who also went to a lot of house parties. And I first listened to Dozen like the Groove. That was a radio program by Robin Albers. I listened to that a lot. Just in my bed secretly, late at night, you know. I believe it was on Saturday that it was on the radio. And I loved that music. Because it was actually a combination of music and computers. So the fact that you could get sounds out of a computer... I found that incredibly interesting. And then when I was fourteen in nineteen ninety-two... I went to a house party for the first time. That was then unknown. I told my mother, I'm going out to a dance party for an evening. Well, that was fine. They didn't know any better. I had older friends, so I went to... It was Ghost Town, I believe. Here in the Ve banen in Utrecht I went. There was a mellow room and a hardcore room. And I loved that mellow room, hardcore too. I found it impressive to stand in that room. But that mellow room really attracted me. It was very cheerful, amiable, nice people, it was cozy.
And at what point did you start Beatfix?
Actually, as a school project, when I studied here in Utrecht... we had to build a website. This is of course ninety-seven. The internet was just coming up. And I thought Well, then I'll just make a website to promote my records. And that slowly grew into reviewing other records... to placing photos that I took at parties. But that was not yet digital then. So I took pictures and they had to be scanned... and then put on the site again. And that slowly grew into a community platform.
Was that already really a business, or was it still an unregistered?
Yes, well, maybe I eventually did register it... but it was really a hobby project. So I started it alone. But of course, I did attract some people. I also had a lot of friends. Everyone in my friend group went out. Or I made new friends in the scene. So eventually it did grow into more. And Beatfreaks became. Really a platform for a niche of techno enthusiasts in the Netherlands and even Europe eventually. We even at one point attached a booking agency to it. A travel organization. Then we went with buses to Germany, to parties. Organized events. That became more and more. But it was difficult to make money from it. So at that hobby project became at one point a forty fifty sixty hour project, so to speak. Yes, where I didn't really earn anything.
And at what age was that?
Yes, so this was the beginning of two thousand I think so. So with that, I was twenty-one. Yes, twenty somewhere beginning of twenty. So you had to find a job on the side. Yes, so I also just started building websites for clients, for parties. Because I had such a large network in the dance world... I made the website for Awakenings with a partner then. And Dance for Life. So and just other clients, publishers, small- and medium-sized enterprises... all kinds of things. So I could earn a bit of money with that. So that was already a bit of entrepreneurship then.
And at a certain point did you really see the opportunity to start selling tickets via Beatfreaks?
Yes. Where did that come from? I was approached by Frans. Frans Jonker. We grew up on the same street once. And so we still had a bit of contact via via. And he understood that I had a platform where quite a bit of traffic came. Where we had twenty-five thousand registered members. That was quite a lot then. But I, yes, we got to talking. I say It's quite difficult to make money from it. MP3's we were selling. Well, this is the time when you had to sell MP3's. It was just after Napster, so to speak. Yes. And Soul Seek. And that didn't really take off, didn't really get off the ground. Bannering, you earned a bit from it, but also not very much from advertisements. So it was a And that was difficult. And he had more of a commercial background, also online. So he says Can't we look together if we can monetize it in some way... to use a hip word.
And how did you start then?
Was it really just two guys in an attic... or did you have some sort of start-up capital organized? No, we really started in our own attic room with Skype basically open all day and then discussing. The nice thing was, is that I could make everything. So if they had an idea... and then we had that also live within a day, so to speak. And we actually did a bit of research, also among the audience... of Yes, what do you spend money on, you know. Where are. Where are the opportunities we started looking. then we quickly came to the conclusion that a hundred percent of our visitors... spent money on tickets for events. Yes. And if you then look at that time. we had Ticketmaster, Ticketbox... that was about it... and they charged six seven guilders slash euros for service fees per ticket. thought Yes, that can be done differently. Plus, we already saw then that buying tickets in stores was just quite a hassle.
What did you need that money for?
To maintain yourself? Yes, that mainly in the beginning. So Yes, we really literally sat next to each other. What are our fixed costs? Yes, let's be transparent about it. Yes. And the fixed costs plus a very small bit that we give ourselves. Because that was really no fat cat. But we just wanted. They didn't need to make money. It was more We need to cover the costs... and then we just have to go for it. But I was indeed the first person to hire... who earned twice as much as we did, you know. It was really a difficult decision. It was really difficult who are you going to hire? Is he worth it, you know. Is he going to bring in money.
... more in the podcast ...