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Jared Schutz
interviewed by Brian Hecht on October 6, 1995
"It's just like when television first came around."
Jared Shutz is the director of American Information Systems, an Internet access provider.
Tripod: Tell me what line of work you're in.
JS: There's a few things that I'm doing. I'm the director of a company based in Chicago, American Information Systems. We sell access to the Internet. We help companies use the Internet in an on-line advertising sense, designing comprehensive World Wide Web and Internet solutions. Including connectivity, such as lease-line connectivity, and we're also a dial-up provider in the Chicago area.
Tripod: So you design the sites or you just provide the access?
JS: We do both. We have a creative staff and an alliance with an advertising agency ... We handle the full on-line advertising part of advertising campaigns for companies. Which includes, at times, ordering interfaces, if they want to be able to accept orders over the Internet -- or just a straight advertising and promotional activity -- including helping them design something which we feel will attract a lot of visitors.
Tripod: Give me an example of a client who might come to you.
JS: One of our clients is L'Eggs pantyhose, owned by Sara Lee Corporation. And what we did for them is we designed on-line ordering interfaces. There's also a pantyhose sizer. It's at http://www.pantyhose.com -- we registered that site for them -- and if you put in your height and your weight, it will tell you what size pantyhose you need, and it will give you a selection of what's available in that size. And you can order it right on-line.
Tripod: Let's back up a step. Tell me how you started this.
JS: Well, we've been around almost two years. But it was born out of discussions that I had through the Internet with my two partners, Josh Schneider and Michael Hakimi. And we discussed for about a year -- primarily through e-mail -- about the fact that there were lots of opportunities out there and we saw this as an emerging market. And we thought the future was very bright for it. So we decided to start the company, and we actually became incorporated last June, so that was about a year and a half ago ...
Tripod: So this is while you were, what, a sophomore at Princeton?
JS: Yeah. We started discussing it when I was a sophomore and I guess we founded it between by sophomore and junior years. Luckily, the industry took off tremendously, and we're really one of the oldest companies in the business. Because two or three years ago, there was no industry.
"When we started it was far from a forgone conclusion that the Web would reach the high level of popularity that it's reached today."
Tripod: You always had the Web in mind?
JS: Yes. The Web was a very new development at the time, when we first started. It has caught on ... But when we started it was far from a forgone conclusion that the Web would reach the high level of popularity that it's reached today.
Tripod: And tell me about the size and scope of the operation you've got going now.
JS: We try to be pretty diversified. When we started out, we directed most of our marketing muscle towards dial-up customers. We now have about 1,500 dial-up customers through access nodes in three different area codes ... [People] pay $25 per month for unlimited access, as much as you would from regional providers or from a national provider like PSI or Netcom. We get about a third of our revenue from those sources.
And then we do a lot of large corporate projects, like we'll develop the chat system for Utilicorp that they use over the Web. We do a lot of consulting work for many companies. So we try to keep ourselves diversified, so that a downturn in any area won't hurt the company significantly.
Tripod: How many people do you have working for you?
JS: We have 13 now.
Tripod: And can you give me some idea of revenues?
JS: For the last quarter we're doing over a million dollars in sales per year. And we're growing at a tremendous rate. We have been growing at about 10 percent per month for the last 10 months.
Tripod: How are you managing to be a full-time student and run this business?
JS: My official title is executive director. I mostly participate on a strategic level, a planning level, and a business marketing level. And I do some sales work as well. I spend a good deal of time on it. But I find it a lot of fun.
Tripod: And once you graduate, I assume you'll launch into this full time?
JS: Probably. I'll probably be in business for a while and, ultimately, I want to go into politics.
Tripod: Really? Tell me about that.
JS: Probably in about 10 years or so, after I've been in business for a while, I'd like to go into public service.
Tripod: Are we talking Congress?
JS: Yes, maybe Congress or maybe state politics, probably in Colorado.
Tripod: You implied that this was only one of your operations. What else have you got going?
JS: I'm also participating in a company called Stardot. Their homepage is http://www.stardot.com. And it's on-line political consulting, basically. We're helping candidates and political professionals and political organizations use the Internet ... I noticed one of your things [on Tripod] was "write a letter to your congressman" [Tripod's Political Playbook] -- if you type in your zip code it will tell you who your congressman is. And we use it to help lobbyists ... They will pay money to have respondents write letters to Capitol Hill ... And we've developed an Internet-to-Western Union Mailgram gateway that works along with the zip code thing ... They pay us per response.
Tripod: Do you think there's a unique window of opportunity here? Where people with fairly low startup can start a business like this? Is that window going to close? Or will cyberspace always be open to that sort of opportunity?
JS: I think it will close. I think it's a tremendous window of opportunity now, just like when television first came around or when radio first came around. But the difference is that you don't need large amounts of capital to get started. You get people like the two fellows who started Yahoo! And it gets immensely popular with no capital investment at all. You have companies like Netscape ... And you have the possibility -- like me and my two partners -- of two, three, four people who just want to work hard and invest a small amount of money to start something up. And I think that window of opportunity is already closing to a certain extent. It's much harder now to create an Internet access provider now, because there's so much competition out there. And that will only increase. Especially in light of all these mergers and the large corporate behemoths who move slower, but have a lot of content. And once they get their act together, they will try to dominate this new medium and make it harder for people who aren't already established to become established.
You can view Jared's homepage at http://www.princeton.edu/~jpschutz
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