Today IKEA has bought the pioneer of the ‘gig economy', TaskRabbit. It’s the next chapter in a story that began with a dog called Kobe.

In 2008, on her way to dinner, 28 year old Leah Busque and her husband were getting ready for dinner. She remembers: “We were living in Boston and had called a cab to pick us up for dinner when we realized we were out of dog food.”

“We had this 100 pound yellow lab named Kobe who had to eat.”

That’s when Leah asked herself the question “"Wouldn't it be nice to go somewhere online and say, 'We need dog food,' name a price we'd be willing to pay, and find someone in our neighborhood, maybe at the store that very moment, who could help us?” 

"Before the cab arrived at our door I purchased the domain name runmyerrand.com.”

Leah and her husband, Kevin, spent dinner talking about the idea and she says “I spent the first four months talking to anyone who would listen to me.” She then quit her job at IBM, renamed her idea ‘TaskRabbit’ and says “I locked myself in a room for 10 weeks straight to code the first version of the site.”

That first step led to TaskRabbit becoming a pioneer in the ‘Gig Economy’, and over the next nine years it has attracted over 60,000 ‘taskers’ in 40 US cities, raised $37 million in funding and grown to a valuation of over $100 million. 

This year the company was named one of Fortune’s “Most innovative companies of 2017” and today it has been bought by IKEA. 

This doesn’t mark the end of TaskRabbit, but the beginning.

IKEA has 357 stores in 29 countries and says they have “started a successful pilot with TaskRabbit and the IKEA stores in London to enable furniture-assembly services by Taskers to IKEA customers.” This can now be rolled out globally so you can now have your IKEA furniture with Taskers assembling it for you.

From a hungry dog to a $100m company, here’s 3 tips from Leah on building your business:

TIP #1 - AVOID SELF-ASSEMBLY

Leah says “There was a huge learning curve from building a product to building a company. When I first started, I was just building the technology and platform. Quickly I needed to get a grasp on fundraising, marketing, financing and operations. I’d never even taken a business or economics class, so early on everything felt like a black fog”

So Leah turned to mentors, first by joining an incubator, then attracting advisors like Tim Ferriss, and finally by getting on board the right team to help her grow. If you’re still trying to do it on your own, stop. Unlikely IKEA furniture, companies don’t come with self-assembly instructions.

TIP #2 - CO-CREATE WITH YOUR CUSTOMERS

Leah knew TaskRabbit had taken off when she heard of an unusual task on TaskRabbit “A woman lost her keys in a lake and went on to find someone who could help get them back. A scuba diver saw it and dove into the lake. It's not even a category of task we have.”

By making TaskRabbit a co-creation with her customers, it has led to brand new opportunities - including the IKEA acquisition: “Don’t be afraid someone will steal your idea; the reward is exponential versus the risk.”

TIP #3 - MAKE SUCCESS A DAILY TASK

While many new startups see their success in the future, Leah sees her success in how she approached each day, saying “I wake up every morning and think to myself, “How far can I push the company forward in the next 24 hours?”

If you’re struggling to take big steps while holding yourself from thinking big, Leah recommends the opposite: “You have to keep setting yourself big hairy audacious goals - the kind of goals you’re almost too ashamed to share with anyone because they’ll think you’re nuts - and then set yourself baby steps on how to get there.”