Start-up resource: StartupLawyer.MN
Web site: startuplawyer.mn
If you asked any entrepreneur what his or her least favorite business responsibility is, most would say it’s the detail work—drafting contracts, managing the books, completing employee paperwork, legal filings, etc.
Very few entrepreneurs enjoy these tedious tasks. But they’re essential to the success of any business, so most bootstrapping entrepreneurs do it themselves. Not because they want to, but as a cost-saving measure. The problem is, by nature, entrepreneurs are big-picture people, which can leave a lot of room for error.
Sam Glover and Aaron Street understand this dilemma and have created a solution. The tech entrepreneurs/business lawyers have started an affordable and structured legal services company, StartupLawyer.MN, catering specifically to tech start-ups. In addition to their first-hand knowledge of running a start-up, they’ve created an attractive pricing structure based on a flat-rate monthly subscription fee. They provide entrepreneurs the choice of four monthly packages ranging from $199 to $1,999 per month, with no additional fees.
Cofounder Aaron Street shares more about his small business resource.
Please tell us what StartupLawyer.MN is all about and how you’re different from other law offices.
We represent Minnesota tech start-ups as business and legal advisors. (Our tagline is “business lawyers for geeks.”) Our main differentiation from most other lawyers is that we bill on a monthly subscription basis, not hourly. Our monthly subscriptions allow tech start-ups to budget for their legal needs ahead of time—and without hourly billing, our clients don’t hesitate to call or e-mail us with questions before problems arise.
With such a niche, you guys must have a background in the start-up world.
In addition to representing tech start-ups in our law practice, we are also entrepreneurs. Our primary venture outside the law practice is a publishing company we co-own, Lawyerist Media, the leading law practice blog on the Internet. Lawyerist provides daily content helping lawyers to grow their practices and become better businesspeople.
Start-ups are trained to bootstrap. How is your pricing structured to accommodate that?
Our subscription pricing, with membership rates starting at under $200 a month, offers new, small, or bootstrapped companies a rate they can afford and—just as importantly—one they can foresee. Whether they are on our basic subscription package or a larger package, all of our pricing is up front, with no surprise invoices at the end of the month.
What do you see as the most needed piece of legal advice for entrepreneurs?
Our clients value us not just because of our willingness to be innovative in our pricing, but also in our innovative approach to solving their needs. As tech entrepreneurs ourselves, we offer all the standard legal services a new company needs—business formation, contracts, independent contractor agreements, etc.—but we also provide strategic advice on starting and growing their businesses.
Without giving away the farm, do you have any overall legal advice that you’re willing to share with us?
A lot of tech entrepreneurs—especially bootstrappers—feel smart enough to figure everything out themselves. My biggest piece of advice is rather than trying to figure out the answers to legal questions yourself, and rather than going to a free online legal forms site, give us or another attorney representing tech start-ups a call. We’re always happy to get coffee with new entrepreneurs, and can—at a minimum—get you pointed in the right direction with much less risk than doing it all yourself.
How can people learn more about you and your services?
Call or e-mail us, or if you go to our Web site, we have a simple form you can fill out to schedule a free coffee with us.
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