Alborz Fallah likes his foot on the accelerator - even if it means the occasional crash.
When Alborz Fallah started Caradvice.com, he had no intention of it turning into a business. Investing only $25 into the blog, he used it as a means to explore his passion for cars.
“I’ve always loved cars, I’ve always been into cars. Even as a kid, my parents would tell you that I could name all the cars they drove past,” he says.
From that $25 investment, the then 21-year-old grew it to a nationwide car advice, review and news site.
Ten years on, now at 31 years old, Fallah sold the business to Channel 9 for $35 million.
However, the journey hasn’t been easy.
Fallah's mantra is fail early, and fail often. He started his first business at 12, running a content site that earned him a decent amount of money from advertising. He then ran a number of tech and web-based businesses that he eventually sold or closed.
However, even after starting up Car Advice, many manufacturers were sceptical of the early 20’s entrepreneur.
Alborz says, “We needed to convince more manufacturers to give us their cars to test and that's quite challenging when you're in your 20s and asking for cars worth half a million dollars.”
However, he was persistent and believed that if he didn’t ask, he didn’t get. One of the most memorable cars he test-drove was the Bugatti Veyron – the world’s fastest and most expensive car. Since then, it’s been a part of his business’ calling card.
As an Iranian migrant who arrived in Australia at the age of nine, success also drew the wrong kind of attention.
“I had someone throw a bottle at my car and tell me to go back to Muslim. I had to laugh at that, it's quite funny because of the ignorance of it I suppose. I'm actually not a Muslim but an atheist by upbringing,” he says.
However, he doesn’t let that affect his entrepreneurial drive.
“It's hard to get into business. It doesn't matter if you're an immigrant, it's a mindset. It certainly never stopped me from starting a business because I was an immigrant.”
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