Urban Company, The pivot that changed the marketplace and saved the company

Every iconic company has a version of itself that had to die first.

Most founders spend their early years chasing revenue. Abhiraj Bhal spent one board meeting in January 2018 giving half of it away. He told his investors that Urban Company, then still called UrbanClap, would shut down the open marketplace that generated fifty percent of its sales and commit fully to a model that was harder, slower, and far more operationally intense.

In this episode of Legendary Pivots, Abhiraj Bhal, co-founder and CEO of Urban Company, sits down to revisit the pivot and the crucible moments that led to it, which made the company what it is today.


Urban Company had raised multiple rounds as a tech-enabled marketplace, but the founding team could see what the growth numbers were hiding. Cohorts weren't retaining. Supply kept churning. The model that had gotten them funded was quietly working against them.


By then, the company was effectively running two organisations with two cultures and a fifty-fifty revenue split. Abhiraj knew he could no longer keep his feet in two boats. What he chose to let go of, and why, is the heart of this episode.