How Do I get my Co-Founder to Leave?
Hi there,

I developed my business myself & spent ~$3k of my own funds. When my website was 95% complete, I got one of my friends, Zake* to create my logos about a month before we went live. We agreed that I’d pay Zake $300 for the logos. Zake changed their mind & said I should rather give them 5% of my business, co-founder title & a “seat at the table”. This was 1.5 years ago & it was their initial offer, I didn’t negotiate with them.

We didn’t sign any type of contract at all (bad idea, I know). We verbally agreed that Zake would a) post on social media 5 days a week b) do our SEO c) update the website images once a month, minor things like changing the website banner d) make any misc documents look good (no content just aesthetics) ie our pitch deck e) attend our weekly team meetings. I pay for everything, which I think is fair.

On our website Zake is listed as a co-founder, but we have no signed contract/ paperwork whatsoever, their shares are sweat shares & they haven’t invested any money into the business.

We’ve had a lot of “almosts” but as of today we have don’t have any investors & the company is not worth much. YTD, we make about $2k - $5k in monthly revenue. Last year, we were making $0 - $1k a month. We live in a developing country, cost of living is a lot lower here.

Zake does close to nothing & I have proof of me repeatedly asking them to do their tasks. For the past 1.5 years this has been an ongoing issue with us. I have emails of Zake admitting that they don’t pull their weight & they’ll change, but they haven’t.

I want Zake to leave my business. About a week ago I sent Zake a kind email stating that it may be “best for both of us” if they leave the business. I offered Zake $750 as a severance package of sorts. They have not responded. I texted & dm’d too & no response either.

Honestly, I don’t mind negotiating with them & giving them a bit more money, I just want them gone. They don’t even attend our team meetings anymore. This whole year they’ve worked on the business for max 2 hours (team meetings included), it’s almost May.

Although they were supposed to do the SEO in September 2020, they still haven’t done it. I paid a freelancer to do the SEO instead. Other than the SEO, I’m doing all of Zake’s tasks. Literally 100%. It’s honestly not that tough. I spend max 2 hours a week doing it & I know that Zake just doesn’t care about the business, which is okay but they should just leave then.

Since I’ve been gaining popularity on my personal social media (my followers are in the 6 figures, last year it was 5 figures) our sales have been rapidly increasing & I sense that Zake is keeping one foot in the door in case we blow up, but they aren’t willing to do any of the work to help us get there. I also have a great opportunity that will make my business more money & I want to be sure that Zake is no longer part of the business before that happens, or least we should have a signed contract. This opportunity is time sensitive & I haven’t told anyone about it.

I’m thinking about sending Zake a Founder’s agreement, with cliff vesting + termination info. But I doubt they’ll respond to it, never mind sign it.

Do you all have any advice on how I can get Zake out completely & quickly? Or any general proposed next steps, especially because we don’t have a contract & they do not respond to any of my messages.

They are also one of my oldest & closet friends & I think they think I’ll never get rid of them because of that. I will though.

Thanks in advance!