Built Without a Budget: What I Learnt From My Startup That Didn't Scale

Built Without a Budget lands at a moment when many Gen Zs are chasing the entrepreneurial dream-but most books only tell the stories that end in glory. This one doesn't.As a finance student at the University of Toronto, Tejas Trikha launched CouBon. This two-sided, dynamic pricing marketplace connected restaurants during their slow hours with students seeking deals. Armed with limited resources and plenty of persistence, CouBon grew from a dorm-room idea into a live platform used daily by students and partnered with dozens of restaurants-generating real revenue before closing due to scalability limits and macro headwinds.Written while the journey was still fresh, this candid account goes beyond highlight reels to share the real grind: pitching investors cold, solving the two-sided marketplace paradox, managing churn, and knowing when to walk away. It's a survival guide for student founders-and a reminder that even when the outcome isn't what you planned, the lessons can be life-changing.The startup story you don't see on Instagram.