AlphaGo beat Lee Sedol in March and suddenly everybody had an opinion about AI. Chatbots and VR headsets everywhere else.
+21
Ninety minutes. Four steps.
01
Get a coffee (or breakfast)
Come a little early, grab whatever you like, and take a chair at the table.
02
Share what you're working on
A few minutes each: you, your project, and one ask to the cosmos (or two).
03
Help out
Everyone helps at least one other person: an intro, some experience, a resource, a second opinion.
04
Stay a while
The format ends at 10:30. The conversation does not. Stay and network as long as you like.
Come back. No membership, no obligation: just an open chair next Thursday. Some come once. Others come back for months, until what started here has grown into startups, practices, whole markets.
Founders talking to founders. Selling services is not really what this table is for.
12 common asks
What people bring here
01
Pressure-test an idea
02
Find a co-founder
03
Build a go-to-market
04
Meet first customers or partners
05
Get in front of investors
06
Bask in the company of world-class entrepreneurs
07
Figure out pricing
08
Raise a round
09
Enter Silicon Valley
10
Hear how others did it
11
Share a war story
12
Go global
…and about a trillion other things.
We make friends, not contacts.
And let's try to give before we take.
Voices from the table
“
I came once, meaning to just have a look. That was two years ago, and the person who was sitting opposite me that morning is now my co-founder.
Anna V.
at the table since 2017
“
Everything was on fire that year and I came very close to folding. What kept me going was this table, and honestly a plain “how are you doing” did more for me than most of the advice.
Dmitry K.
at the table since 2024
“
I finally said out loud that I was stuck, which I had been putting off for months. My first investor was sitting two chairs down.
Elena S.
at the table since 2019
“
I turned up with a question about hiring. It got answered in about five minutes. The man who answered it became my partner a year later, so I got rather more than I came for.
Marat B.
at the table since 2022
“
That spring we were all scattered into our flats. Thursday was the one thing that did not move.
Sergey I.
at the table since 2020
“
We rewrote our positioning on a napkin. A month later it was on our homepage.
Olga T.
at the table since 2023
“
A tough year. We stand shoulder to shoulder, and we're sticking around. Because it's the right thing to do, because we love this country and this whole part of the world. And, actually, because of REAL first principles.
The Yellow Door
2022
“
I had a whole list of questions about the US and MENA. I got through maybe half of them, and still walked out with two introductions and somebody's spare conference ticket.
Timur A.
at the table since 2025
Archive · since 2016
History gets made around our table
Scroll the years, tag yourself and the people who were there, add your own photos, or write what a Thursday gave you.
ICOs, blockchain and voice assistants. Crypto moved from the fringe to the evening news.
+10
“I came once, meaning to just have a look. That was two years ago, and the person who was sitting opposite me that morning is now my co-founder. - Anna V.
Kubernetes ate the infrastructure, the first GAN faces appeared, and BERT quietly changed how machines read.
+26
The last normal year, though nobody knew that at the time. Superapps, no-code, computer vision.
+35
“I finally said out loud that I was stuck, which I had been putting off for months. My first investor was sitting two chairs down. - Elena S.
The planet went online in a single spring. Remote-first, dark stores, e-grocery, and a great deal of very bad video.
“That spring we were all scattered into our flats. Thursday was the one thing that did not move. - Sergey I.
NFTs, Web3 and the creator economy. Money was cheap and ideas were loud.
Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and the first conversations with ChatGPT. Our world changed again.
“I turned up with a question about hiring. It got answered in about five minutes. The man who answered it became my partner a year later, so I got rather more than I came for. - Marat B.
“A tough year. We stand shoulder to shoulder, and we're sticking around. Because it's the right thing to do. - The Yellow Door
GPT-4, and LLMs in everything. “Have you tried it yet?” became the only question anyone asked.
“We rewrote our positioning on a napkin. A month later it was on our homepage. - Olga T.
Agents, copilots, RAG. A generation of founders grew up on these.
“Everything was on fire that year and I came very close to folding. What kept me going was this table, and honestly a plain “how are you doing” did more for me than most of the advice. - Dmitry K.
On-device models, and robots that actually did things. Software started moving objects around in the physical world.
“I had a whole list of questions about the US and MENA. I got through maybe half of them, and still walked out with two introductions and somebody's spare conference ticket. - Timur A.
Code, rounds, market share sustain life. But the idea that wouldn't let you sleep, and the morning it finally worked: these are what we stay alive for. “O me! O life!… What will your verse be?” What will you build?
after John Keating, Dead Poets Society (1989), and Walt Whitman, whom he was quoting
Add to the archive
Add a photo or a memory
A photograph, a few words, or both. What this table changed for you: "found my co-founder here", "stopped being afraid to pitch", whatever it was.
The conversation continues
Not a feed for its own sake: what you build, what you need, how you can help.
Telegram chat
The conversation continues here between Thursdays: questions, finds, introductions.
JoinHouse rules+
- /A few words about you and your project, not a three-screen CV.
- /Please do not pass on someone else’s contacts without asking.
- /If you can help, tag the person and make the intro.
Addendum
We also follow the spirit of Startup Grind’s code of conduct: be respectful, no harassment, never share someone else’s details, no spam or unsolicited pitching.
Startup Grind Code
MK
Maria K.
B2B SaaS for retail · 2h ago
Looking for intros to procurement directors at large retailers. The pilot is ready, I need a first big customer. Grateful for any connection.
#intro
#clients
ES
Ekaterina S.
Telegram channel · 3h ago
via Telegram
Thanks to everyone who came this morning. I wrote down three things I am changing in the product this week.
AP
Anton P.
Fintech · 5h ago
After last Thursday I rebuilt onboarding on the advice from the table; activation is up 18%. It works.
#clients
OR
Olga R.
HR-tech, 8 yrs · yesterday
Happy to help with your first product and engineering hires. Ping me: I will share templates and recruiters I actually trust.
#hiring
PO
Pavel O.
Telegram channel · yesterday
via Telegram
Has anyone dealt with lawyers on international structuring? Looking for advice, not a service.
NG
Nikita G.
Deep-tech · yesterday
Expanding into the UAE and raising pre-seed. Anyone who has done it: what do you wish you'd known? Coffee is on me Thursday.
#global
#raise
Pay what you can
Entry is free. The contribution is optional: it keeps the table small and independent.
Pick a Thursday
Your contribution
500 ₽
How was your Thursday?
How likely are you to recommend Founders Coffee to another founder?
Not likelyVery likely
How was your Thursday?
How likely are you to recommend Founders Coffee to another founder?
Mind leaving a word or two?
A photo and a short line help other founders decide to come. Totally optional.
How was your Thursday?
How likely are you to recommend Founders Coffee to another founder?
The nicest thing you can do
Know a founder who'd love this?
Even better than a review: give them your chair at the table. We'll reach out to them ourselves on your behalf, with your note about Thursday attached, and show them how to sign up.
Their first Thursday is free: our gift, from you.
How was your Thursday?
How likely are you to recommend Founders Coffee to another founder?
What would have made it better?
Short and honest. The organiser reads these, not a robot.
How was your Thursday?
How likely are you to recommend Founders Coffee to another founder?
Thank you. See you Thursday.
Pay what you can
Entry is free. The contribution is optional: it keeps the table small and independent.
Pick a Thursday
Your contribution
500 ₽
The chair is yours
Details and the Telegram invite are on their way to your inbox. Come a little early: it makes it easier to ease into the conversation.
Add to calendar
The nicest thing you can do
Know a founder who'd love this?
Their first Thursday is free: our gift, from you.
Not another chat: a real circle of founders. Every Thursday we step out of Telegram, Zoom, and phone calls to share what actually works, face to face.
01
Thursday
The first handshake. Coffee, twelve chairs, a real conversation.
02
Intensive
Those who want to go deeper join our programs: product, metrics, go-to-market.
03
Global
Silicon Valley, BRICS, partner networks. We help founders outgrow a single market.
04
Investment
Sometimes our fund joins the round. By then we know exactly who we are backing.
05
Friends
And most often, we simply become friends. And that part is forever.
Short answers
What people usually ask
Who is this for? +
People building their own thing: founders, co-founders, early employees with equity. A founder-to-founder exchange, not a place to sell services.
What language is spoken? +
Each table runs mainly in its own city’s language: Russian in Moscow, Armenian in Yerevan, Bahasa in Bali, with plenty of English throughout. There is almost always someone from another country at the table, so nobody gets left out of the conversation.
Do I need a pitch or slides? +
No. A few minutes in plain words: what you build and what you are stuck on. Slides often get in the way.
Can I join online? +
Not today: the whole point is being at the same table. But the world evolves. If this changes, we will let you know. Why not?
It is my first time. Is it awkward? +
Almost every table has new faces (usually about a third). Many others keep coming back, again and again. Some have built entire startups, opened new markets, and put together their teams through this format alone.
9AM? I'm in I.T. I go to bed at 9. +
We like early starts, before the day gets loud. If it matters to you, set an alarm, or just don't sleep. (JK: sleep is important.) An early start is also what lets those of us with a day job get here at all. But if mornings are just not your thing (or you are far more into cocktails than coffee), come to our evening TGIFs instead.
TGIF at The Yellow DoorWho is behind this, and why? +
The Yellow Door and Innov8 Global Labs. Honestly, it is one of our favorite projects: a chance to hang out with real people, help real startups, mano a mano, tête-à-tête, shoulder-to-shoulder, no middlemen in between. We walk out inspired every single time, finger on the pulse. It is also the front door of our pipeline: plenty of founders we meet here go on to our Intensive Programs, go global, get invested in by our fund, and one way or another, we end up lifelong friends.
Can I run a Founders Coffee in my city? +
Yes, and we would be glad if you did. The format is not complicated: twelve chairs, one table, three minutes each. Write to us and we will share what we know and help you fill the table.