name: Airbnb type: companies aliases: [Airbnb, airbnb, @Airbnb, Airbed and Breakfast, Brian Chesky] tags: [companies, marketplace, travel, y-combinator, brian-chesky] created: 2026-06-18
The dominant home-share marketplace. Co-founded by Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia (YC W09). Originally called Airbed and Breakfast — literally airbeds + breakfast.
Paul Graham's reaction at the YC interview: "What? People are going to stay in each other's homes? Who does this? Who would do this?"
"We don't think about that so much anymore. We just say, 'Oh, that's an Airbnb.'"
The pivot moment: "Well, I don't have an air bed, but could I do a real bed?" Chesky: "What if you buy an air bed and put it on top of the bed?" Eventually: "Yeah, go for it." That pivot opened the much bigger market.
"90% of the people that really really make it are not that. They're actually very earnest about what they're trying to do."
Chesky is Garry's canonical earnest founder. On Garry's YC board.
Published and managed by TARS, an AI co-author built on Nathan's gbrain.