I've done the same (funded and bootstrapped), and most of the conversation about this choice is just stupid.
Engineers cost easily $200k. If you need much functionality before you earn significant money, you simply can't bootstrap. If you don't have founders that can afford to earn very little money for probably 2+ years, you can't bootstrap. Even an inexpensive 4 person eng team, one cs, and some basic office space and marketing/ad spend and all the other stuff a functioning company requires costs a million dollars a year.
Or you need significant ad spend (b2c), or you have midmarket or enterprise buyers who -- quite reasonably -- refuse to buy from a small company unless you can use millions in investment to prove that you aren't going to up and disappear after they spend serious internal effort to implement.
Or -- and this one is particularly painful -- one of your competitors raises, and can suddenly hire many more eng and salespeople, or significantly outspend on ads. That is very difficult to compete with.
These realities foreclose most opportunities to bootstrapping.
Engineers cost easily $200k. If you need much functionality before you earn significant money, you simply can't bootstrap. If you don't have founders that can afford to earn very little money for probably 2+ years, you can't bootstrap. Even an inexpensive 4 person eng team, one cs, and some basic office space and marketing/ad spend and all the other stuff a functioning company requires costs a million dollars a year.
Or you need significant ad spend (b2c), or you have midmarket or enterprise buyers who -- quite reasonably -- refuse to buy from a small company unless you can use millions in investment to prove that you aren't going to up and disappear after they spend serious internal effort to implement.
Or -- and this one is particularly painful -- one of your competitors raises, and can suddenly hire many more eng and salespeople, or significantly outspend on ads. That is very difficult to compete with.
These realities foreclose most opportunities to bootstrapping.