Make Sunsets Monthly: Sales Tests
[We originally sent the following to our mailing list subscribers 6/1/26. Added to website 6/5/26.]
Revenue: $9,566
Burn: $40,798
Cash: $637,615
Runway: ~16 months
Some new sales traction: 91 new customers this month! Both our targeted Meta ads and on-ground presences at music fests produced sales. Here's one of our tables in France, selling sunscreen + promoting Cooling Credits:
And, I'm not running either of these: a friend's startup has (started to) crack Meta Ads. Ben has stepped up from being a long-term cooler to run in-person sales experiments in Europe, with help from his friend Maya-Jeanne. Dollar amounts are tiny, but number of new customers is real. Now, we'll grow these one-off, 1-Euro sunscreen purchases into monthly subscribers who brag about their cooling to friends.
I got a prop spinning, slowly, on a quadcopter that should, eventually, be able to lift me. Barely worth this footnote in comparison to sales finally hitting "put $ in, get something out!"
This month, we will:
-continue euro fest experiments with the goal of one hitting marginal profitability
-expand or kill targeted ads
-find or start making a *big* balloon machine. Eventual goal: > 550kg per balloon so we can see deployment via satellite!
Starting Scaling Sales,
Luke (+1,173 Coolers)
P.S.: 2 press things, neither of which seems to matter for immediate sales. NPR's marketplace launched balloons with us. We sound less crazy with (almost) every interview... and every record climate event. And, Stardust finally shared some details about what they plan to someday maybe release into the stratosphere. Is a fancy amorphous silica sphere "better" than sulfur dioxide? I have no idea! I hope so, and if peer-reviewed, open science shows this (or any other substance) is safer + more cost-effective we'll switch. And, we're happy to provide test launches for anyone wanting to test novel molecules. Until then, we'll keep copying volcanoes... and won't be waiting for badges of approval from any random governments;)