Taco Bytes: 10 Lessons for 10 Years of Building HeyTaco

Send us Fan MailTo celebrate HeyTaco’s 10th birthday, Una sits down with HeyTaco founder Doug Dosberg for a heartfelt and hilarious trip down memory lane. In this special Taco Bytes episode, Doug shares 10 powerful lessons from a decade of building a gratitude-powered business—complete with taco costumes, customer stories, and Beyoncé GIFs.If you’re a startup founder, team builder, or taco enthusiast, this one’s for you.Highlights from the EpisodeThe Big 1-0: Doug reflects on what it feels like to hit the 10-year mark and why it doesn’t feel like it’s been that long.Behind the List: How he went from “I don’t have any lessons” to “I have too many lessons.”Lesson Threads: The top 10 takeaways cover everything from building a bootstrapped SaaS to designing human-centered recognition.Doug’s 10 Lessons for 10 YearsBuilding a business is hard — It takes time, patience, and the courage not to quit when things get tough.Don’t do it for the money — Solving a real problem beats chasing revenue any day.Work on a problem you actually feel — Doug built HeyTaco because he knew what it felt like to do meaningful work and feel invisible.Your customers are the best investors you’ll ever have — He bootstrapped HeyTaco from day one, and never took outside funding.Tools don’t create culture. People do. — A moving story about a team using tacos to lift up a teammate shows that culture lives in moments, not mechanics.Customer service is the product — Doug still checks the support inbox. Listening to users fuels innovation.Recognition works best when it’s imperfect — Typos, emojis, and awkward phrasing are features, not bugs.Recognition is a leading indicator — Tacos often spike before major milestones (like a little ChatGPT launch 👀).Recognition reveals what actually matters — Teams can reverse-engineer their real values by looking at what teammates thank each other for.HeyTaco is just a vehicle — The mission is bigger: help people treat each other better and feel appreciated at work.Also in This EpisodeDoug’s taco costume makes a triumphant returnUna compares the HeyTaco dashboard to a football stadium noise meter (she’s not wrong)A spicy debate about AI vs. human supportFavorite Quote“HeyTaco is just a vehicle. The real work is helping people treat each other better and feel appreciated.”