Enrique
New member
Brendan Brader, CEO - HostRocket.com
Company Web Site: http://www.hostrocket.com
What did you do before you ventured into web hosting business direction?
Before and during the time I started HostRocket, I was a student at the University At Albany.
When was the idea of going into web hosting industry born? What were the factors that influenced your decision to go into this industry?
I was a student studying business & computer science at the University At Albany, and decided that the industry looked like it had a lot of potential growth and a low startup cost.
Briefly introduce your company's history and role in the industry?
HostRocket.Com, Inc. was founded in mid 2000 as a partnership and an Alabanza reseller. We quickly realized that at our rate of growth the alabanza cost structure would not allow us to offer to our customers the features and service that we desired, so we moved to colocated servers in the VDI datacenter. In August of 2001, costruction of our 10,000 sq. ft. private datacenter located in Clifton Park, NY was completed and all of our servers were moved in house which is where they have remained since. HostRocket has since its inception been at the cutting edge of the webhosting industry when it comes to offering feature packed accounts at a economical price. To insure stability long into the future, HostRocket which has been profitable every month since its inception, operates fully within its own budget to assure a proper growth rate, and that no debt is accured that can be forclosed upon in the future.
There are thousands of other companies. In your opinion, what makes your company stand out? What would be the business philosophy behind it?
Our company has always been about providing the absolute best in feature packed accounts for a price that any average consumer can afford. Instead of buying expensive advertising we buy more bandwidth for our customers, and let our growth come not from expensive banner ads but word of mouth sales via happy customers. With us the customer gets more bang for their buck than with other hosts, and they appreciate that.
Please briefly describe the service(s) that your company offers.
We offer managed shared and semi-dedicated hosting solutions through our main company HostRocket.Com, as well as managed dedicated and advanced hosting solutions through our sister company RackFast.Com.
Have you ever taken a bigger risk in terms of presenting innovative solutions or implementing something no else dared even to try?
We have always offered more bandwidth and more storage then any of our direct competitors. By moving into our own private datacenter, we have set ourselves up to be able to grow with industry trends and maintain this well into the future.
How do you help your customers grow their business? Do you offer special tools/assistance that helps them succeed on the web?
Many of our customer come to us because they have had problems with other webhosts not offering enough bandwidth or storage for them to grow their site the way they want to. They come to us because we offer more, and because we have through our semi-dedicated and rackfast managed servers the ability to grow our hosting solution to meet their needs no matter how great they become.
Do your customers help perfecting and innovating your business? If yes, what is the level of their role in that?
Through the use of our customer forums located at
http://forums.hostrocket.com, we have a constant feedback loop in place with more than 5000 of our shared hosting customers. This allows us to keep in tune with their growing wants and needs and adapt to them quicker than most hosts.
Your company's short-term goals?
To improve our customer service and server uptime, to make customers happier and to help the company grow.
Your company's long-term goals?
Again, to improve our customer service and server uptime, to make customers happier and to help the company grow.
The best advice you have for someone who is just starting a hosting company?
Make sure that when you are working out your pricing structure, you keep in mind that should your business grow to a certain point you will need to be able to afford health insurance and other benefits for employees, office space rent, insurance, utilities, around the clock monitoring and support, and several other expenses above and beyond the cost of the dedicated server you start out with.
Is there a fun part in your business? If yes, what would that be?
Having gaming servers on a 200+ mbit connection to the internet.
The moment in your company's history that you're especially proud of?
The opening of our private datacenter in 2001.
How did you come to choose your company name?
Our name was originally suggested to me by a friend who I believe got the idea from nameboy.com. We choose it because it was different enough that we would be able to develop a brand with it, but it also implied that our service was fast.
When you were a kid, who did you want to become?
That would probably have to depend on how old I was, it could range from Wayne Gretzky to Bill Gates to Danny Carey.
Other than being in web hosting industry, what is the other profession(s) that you would want to attend?
Running a mini-golf course would be a nice relaxing job.
Many thanks to Brendan for taking the time to complete this interview.
Company Web Site: http://www.hostrocket.com
What did you do before you ventured into web hosting business direction?
Before and during the time I started HostRocket, I was a student at the University At Albany.
When was the idea of going into web hosting industry born? What were the factors that influenced your decision to go into this industry?
I was a student studying business & computer science at the University At Albany, and decided that the industry looked like it had a lot of potential growth and a low startup cost.
Briefly introduce your company's history and role in the industry?
HostRocket.Com, Inc. was founded in mid 2000 as a partnership and an Alabanza reseller. We quickly realized that at our rate of growth the alabanza cost structure would not allow us to offer to our customers the features and service that we desired, so we moved to colocated servers in the VDI datacenter. In August of 2001, costruction of our 10,000 sq. ft. private datacenter located in Clifton Park, NY was completed and all of our servers were moved in house which is where they have remained since. HostRocket has since its inception been at the cutting edge of the webhosting industry when it comes to offering feature packed accounts at a economical price. To insure stability long into the future, HostRocket which has been profitable every month since its inception, operates fully within its own budget to assure a proper growth rate, and that no debt is accured that can be forclosed upon in the future.
There are thousands of other companies. In your opinion, what makes your company stand out? What would be the business philosophy behind it?
Our company has always been about providing the absolute best in feature packed accounts for a price that any average consumer can afford. Instead of buying expensive advertising we buy more bandwidth for our customers, and let our growth come not from expensive banner ads but word of mouth sales via happy customers. With us the customer gets more bang for their buck than with other hosts, and they appreciate that.
Please briefly describe the service(s) that your company offers.
We offer managed shared and semi-dedicated hosting solutions through our main company HostRocket.Com, as well as managed dedicated and advanced hosting solutions through our sister company RackFast.Com.
Have you ever taken a bigger risk in terms of presenting innovative solutions or implementing something no else dared even to try?
We have always offered more bandwidth and more storage then any of our direct competitors. By moving into our own private datacenter, we have set ourselves up to be able to grow with industry trends and maintain this well into the future.
How do you help your customers grow their business? Do you offer special tools/assistance that helps them succeed on the web?
Many of our customer come to us because they have had problems with other webhosts not offering enough bandwidth or storage for them to grow their site the way they want to. They come to us because we offer more, and because we have through our semi-dedicated and rackfast managed servers the ability to grow our hosting solution to meet their needs no matter how great they become.
Do your customers help perfecting and innovating your business? If yes, what is the level of their role in that?
Through the use of our customer forums located at
http://forums.hostrocket.com, we have a constant feedback loop in place with more than 5000 of our shared hosting customers. This allows us to keep in tune with their growing wants and needs and adapt to them quicker than most hosts.
Your company's short-term goals?
To improve our customer service and server uptime, to make customers happier and to help the company grow.
Your company's long-term goals?
Again, to improve our customer service and server uptime, to make customers happier and to help the company grow.
The best advice you have for someone who is just starting a hosting company?
Make sure that when you are working out your pricing structure, you keep in mind that should your business grow to a certain point you will need to be able to afford health insurance and other benefits for employees, office space rent, insurance, utilities, around the clock monitoring and support, and several other expenses above and beyond the cost of the dedicated server you start out with.
Is there a fun part in your business? If yes, what would that be?
Having gaming servers on a 200+ mbit connection to the internet.
The moment in your company's history that you're especially proud of?
The opening of our private datacenter in 2001.
How did you come to choose your company name?
Our name was originally suggested to me by a friend who I believe got the idea from nameboy.com. We choose it because it was different enough that we would be able to develop a brand with it, but it also implied that our service was fast.
When you were a kid, who did you want to become?
That would probably have to depend on how old I was, it could range from Wayne Gretzky to Bill Gates to Danny Carey.
Other than being in web hosting industry, what is the other profession(s) that you would want to attend?
Running a mini-golf course would be a nice relaxing job.
Many thanks to Brendan for taking the time to complete this interview.
