The Inspirational Story of Alex Tew and His Million Dollar Homepage

This kid made $1M+ in just 4 months by selling pixels on a website.

7 years later he built a $2B meditation company.

The guy you probably know, the story you don't 👇 pic.twitter.com/FAZ71uVXEo

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Meet Alex Tew built 'The Million Dollar Homepage' - a static website with 1M pixels of advertising space.

Within just 30 days of launch, Alex had pocketed $250k and was getting 65k visits a day.

By October 2005, the website had over 1.4k advertisers. pic.twitter.com/19Hq1tIx4t

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

It became such a sensation that it was picked up by the BBC, the Guardian, and the Wall Street Journal.

Alex made $1.04M from the homepage at 21.

CRAZY!!

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

But this wasn't his first attempt at business.

Alex was always an entrepreneur↓ pic.twitter.com/OSmiaCgTef

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

When he was just 8, he sold his hand-drawn comics in the schoolyard for $5 each.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

In 2002, when he finished high school, Alex made a bold decision.

He said "later" to college and chased an unconventional dream: Beatboxing

Under the alias “A-Plus" he toured around the UK and launched the world’s first beatboxing forum https://t.co/CO5yGRODfR pic.twitter.com/pGtAgrlLsQ

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

The forum united beatboxers worldwide.

It became "the place" for beatboxers around the world to bond.

They even gathered a 200 people convention where they swapped tips on everything from snare drum replication to nose humming. pic.twitter.com/cc0bvGuEzB

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

But after a few years of stagnant growth, he sold the site to a friend.

“I was living at home, and I was fed up with being broke,” he said.

So he asked himself a simple question: "How can I make a million dollars?”

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

You see, Alex was worried about student loans because he had freshly enrolled at Nottingham's biz school

So, one August night in 2005, he whipped out a notepad and dreamed up cheap products he could sell a million of.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Most ideas were bad: “Gum Slinger” (a small pouch for used chewing gum).

But this one idea was fucking great:

"A webpage featuring 1 MILLION PIXELS up for grabs at $1 EACH." pic.twitter.com/Q1yXdSHFp8

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

In 2 days, he whipped up the website.

August 26, 2005 dawned and the site was live.

It cost him $50 in domain fees, but that was a small investment for what he was going to make—$1M.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

The business model was really simple:

"For $100 or more, advertisers could purchase a 100-pixel block (a 10x10 grid) and plaster it with their logo or image, complete with a hyperlink.

The only rule: It shouldn't be porn."

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Within 14 days, Alex got his friends and family to buy up to 4.7k pixels = $4.7k.

Using the profits, he hired a PR firm to draft a release. pic.twitter.com/jpD2TwYlhu

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Crazily, it got picked up by the BBC, The Guardian, and the Wall Street Journal.

That day the site made $3000!

It was a huge win for Alex! pic.twitter.com/AB9PdxOKDw

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Within 30 days, Alex made $250k and was getting 65k visits a day.

By October end, the website had over 1.4k advertisers.

And Alex was $500k richer.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

By New Year's Eve 2005, only 1000 pixels remained.

Instead of selling them directly, Alex auctioned them off for $38k.

Alex made - $1.04M from the MillionDollarHomePage. pic.twitter.com/Amnn4xdU7R

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

4 months earlier, Alex was a broke 21-year-old.

Now he was a MILLIONAIRE.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

With $700k in in-hand cash, Alex dropped out of college after just one term.

But his success came at a cost.

He became fixated on ideas that would grab attention rather than deliver actual value.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

From 2006 - 2010, Alex launched a series of similar projects -

• Pixelotto (lottery side; made $200k+ from it)
• PopJam (social media humor site)
• OneMillionPeople (similar to MillionDollarHomepage, just instead of pixel ads, it was photos of people) pic.twitter.com/kRStaFC6IY

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

All these ideas were unoriginal and did not have any real value.

Alex realized that he couldn't replicate the same magic.

So he left for Silicon Valley and joined a friend's incubator.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

During this period, Alex's mental health suffered.

He struggled with depression as he neglected his sleep, diet, and meditation practice.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

To solve his problems, Alex decided to build simple tools.

One of them was https://t.co/pt5d8le8de, a 2-minute timer that prompts the user to take a break and "do nothing". pic.twitter.com/ODHNzzOpHF

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

People were becoming more aware of the negative effects of technology on mental health and seeking ways to disconnect.

The timing was perfect!

So, in 2012, Alex decided to launch a meditation app that would cater to these needs - Calm. pic.twitter.com/H6IROHf2Oi

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Calm exploded in popularity as soon as it launched in 2012.

In its first year, the app made $100k.

By 2015, revenue had skyrocketed to $2M.

In 2016, with the political turmoil and unrest in the world, revenue jumped to $7M.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

In 2017, it was named Apple's App of the Year, which helped bring in ~$37M in revenue.

Calm's success can be attributed to 3 things:

• User-friendly platform
• A great product with a focus on mental wellness
• Partnerships with major brands pic.twitter.com/rRtHxznOJq

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

Today, Calm has 4 million paying subscribers, and 100 million downloads and is valued at a strong $2 billion.

Alex Tew, now 39, is the executive chairman and continues to advocate a simple and calm life.

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023

“Living in busy cities, going a million miles per hour, always being plugged in and slammed with information — that’s not a life we evolved to live.”

He's right about that! pic.twitter.com/9Xhb3KiAXR

— Joe Speiser ⚡️ (@jspeiser) March 27, 2023