$5.7M Pit Exit Sale

Marc Lore shares the story of how he sold his first company, The Pit, during the 2000 tech crash.

"The Pit was basically a sports stock market. We used baseball cards as a proxy for athletes, where you could buy and sell players like stock.

Right after the NASDAQ crashed in 2000 - it went down about 80% - there was no way to raise any venture money. We had only started the company maybe 10 months earlier and had raised $5 million. We ended up selling it for $5.7 million. Everyone said 'Yeah do it, this is a great exit' and we thought 'Okay, we'll sell this and get to the next idea.'

Topps was interested in the people we'd hired - we had a great team and a vision for what we wanted. They were there to provide some capital, and that's how we got the deal done."