Lessons From the Newest Unicorn Startup: Be Frugal, and Drink Costco Coffee

In some ways, Vanta Inc. looks like a startup from a frothier era. It’s run by a 35-year-old entrepreneur in San Francisco and sells software primarily to other startups. On Wednesday, Vanta became a unicorn, with a valuation of $1.6 billion, less than a year after raising its first institutional capital, a rare achievement even in boom times.

But Christina Cacioppo, the founder and chief executive officer, wants everyone to know she’s not running a typical, cash-burning technology startup. She bootstrapped the company for years after founding it in 2016. She refuses to serve gourmet coffee in the office. (Vanta buys beans in bulk from Costco.) The company used to pay for employees to access multiple workplace chat tools with overlapping functions. (Now they use only Slack.)