Policygenius: Jennifer Fitzgerald

Funding Struggles

Jennifer Fitzgerald faced significant challenges when seeking initial funding for Policygenius. Despite her and her co-founder Francois de Lame's impressive backgrounds, they encountered skepticism from venture capitalists who questioned the market need for an insurance marketplace. Jennifer recalls a particularly frustrating encounter with a young venture associate who doubted the demand for life insurance, prompting her to retort, "Well, you also probably don't use tampons either, and that's a big market" 1. This skepticism, coupled with doubts about their technical expertise, led to six months of rejections, leaving Jennifer and Francois questioning their path 2.

   

Angel Support

After facing repeated rejections from venture capitalists, Jennifer and Francois turned to angel investors for support. They raised $735,000 from friends, family, and McKinsey partners, which was short of their $1 million target but enough to launch their website 3. A lucky break came when they were featured in a New York Times article, which dramatically increased their website traffic and customer inquiries. Jennifer describes the overwhelming response, saying, "It was basically an assembly line for three straight weeks to get to everybody who requested quotes from us" 4.