Surviving the WORST Airbnb EVER - Early Pod Episode 10 with Chan Park
Big things start small. The Early Podcast. Stories and insights from early employees and innovators who’ve shaped the future.
With this episode... we’re going deep into the trenches — a little dog pee, thousands of drivers protesting in Asia, and a $30-a-night Airbnb in Detroit… plus all the shenanigans that came with it.
Episode 10 is live!!!
Chan Park joined Uber in 2012 with a limited playbook for expansion and one goal: launch cities as FAST AS POSSIBLE.
On day one, he was told, “Why aren’t you in Sacramento?”—and things only got wilder from there. He launched Uber in Detroit from the sketchiest Airbnb on Eight Mile, then got sent across the world to open up Asia.
From navigating protests in Jakarta to pitching Travis on a $1.5B car fleet in Singapore, Chan shares the insane scrappiness it took to help make Uber global.
In this episode, we cover:
• The details of being born in Korea and immigrating to the U.S. at a young age
• What it was like to launch Uber from a $30 Airbnb in Detroit
• Why 10,000 people protested Uber... when they had just 12 cars on the road
• The actual Uber interview process (“They asked what I do on weekends…”)
• Travis’s response to a billion-dollar car fleet idea
• What it takes to build global scale in the middle of chaos
This one’s packed with raw stories, working your ass off, and what it actually took to scale Uber worldwide. If you've ever wondered what extreme ownership really looks like — this is it.
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New episodes (at least) every Tuesday, and I’d love your feedback on who we should interview next. Email me: max@earlypod.com
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