How A24 Borrowed From The Startup Playbook And Why Startups Should Now Borrow it Back

There are three ways to shake up an entrenched system:

• Fight it head-on and try to overthrow it.

• Evolve it from within, bending it into something better.

• Ignore it entirely and build a new system alongside it.

A24, the now-iconic independent film studio, chose to evolve the system.

Rather than storm Hollywood’s gates or retreat to the cultural fringes, A24 carefully adopted the parts of the traditional studio model that worked, ruthlessly discarded what didn’t, and rebuilt the architecture, borrowing heavily from the early-stage startup playbook.

Their story has become a case study in how small, unconventional teams can reshape calcified industries not by destroying them, but by reprogramming them.

Their method was radical but intentionally non-destructive:

• Run lean and fast, with small teams and minimal overhead.

• Go all-in on digital-first marketing, meeting audiences where they actually lived.

• Bet on outsiders, not just safe, proven names.

• Build a brand people could actually feel something about, not just crank out more movies.

• Treat finance like founders do, treating every dollar as fuel, not a trophy.

In short: A24 didn’t just build a studio. They ran a startup inside an old industry.
And now, as today’s startups drift into safer formulas and incrementalism, it’s time they take a page back from A24’s playbook.

From Roadtrip Dream to Rebellious Reality

The seed of A24 was planted on Italy’s A24 highway, a name that would later symbolize not just a place, but a philosophy.

Founders Daniel Katz, David Fenkel, and John Hodges brought wildly different strengths:

• Katz: financial strategy, honed at Guggenheim Partners.

• Fenkel: a deep sense for production and acquisitions from Big Beach Films and Focus Features.

• Hodges: independent distribution chops from Oscilloscope Laboratories.

Their frustration with Hollywood’s risk-aversion—and their complementary skillsets—created a rare, potent DNA.
They didn’t set out to demolish the system.
They sought to evolve it.

They quit their corporate roles, raised $12 million in seed funding, and opened a modest New York office.

"The office literally looked like a pump-and-dump stock operation. The fact that we were able to sign any movies out of that office is absurd."
— John Hodges, GQ

Their approach was deliberate: build small, stay agile, weaponize constraint.

What Startups Can Learn From A24

At a time when many startups are chasing safe formulas, optimizing themselves into mediocrity, A24 offers a blueprint for staying strange, scrappy, and culturally alive.

1. Stay Small and Scrappy

Operating with minimal infrastructure wasn’t a flaw. It was the strategy.

Small teams enabled:

• Faster decision-making.

• Greater ownership.

• Sharper, riskier creativity.

Amazon’s early "two-pizza team" model and Stripe’s founder-led product launches echo the same philosophy: scale dilutes urgency; smallness sharpens it.

Today, many startups overhire and overcomplicate before they’ve even achieved product-market fit, trading speed for a false sense of security.

Strategic takeaway:
Constraint isn’t a burden. It’s the furnace that forges stronger, faster, sharper teams.

2. Build Culture, Not Just Campaigns

From the outset, A24 didn’t simply market movies.
They marketed a worldview.

Films like Spring Breakers, The Bling Ring, and Ex Machina weren’t just projects they were cultural signals, aimed at tribes craving rebellion, authenticity, and emotional sharpness.

This principle is at the core of every modern brand success story:

• Patagonia builds loyalty by standing for environmental activism.

• Liquid Death markets water like it’s a punk rock movement.

• Glossier didn’t sell makeup; it sold the identity of modern beauty.

Meanwhile, startups obsessed with CAC, CTRs, and MQLs often miss the forest for the trees.
People aren’t loyal to what you sell.
They’re loyal to what you stand for.

Strategic takeaway:
Build a worldview people want to belong to.
Culture compounds. Campaigns expire.

3. Bet on the Weird and Brave

While Hollywood doubled down on formulaic franchises, A24 placed its bets elsewhere, on chaotic outsiders and genre-benders:

• Harmony Korine’s neon-lit nihilism in Spring Breakers.

• Barry Jenkins’ intimate storytelling in Moonlight.

• Ari Aster’s unsettling genre collision in Hereditary.

They backed distinctive voices, not safe résumés.

Startups today often gravitate toward consensus: safe founders, safe products, safe ideas.
But every breakout story - Airbnb, Figma, even early Uber began as a non-consensus bet.

Strategic takeaway:
The weird, the brave, and the outsiders aren’t distractions. They are the engine of new category creation.

4. Hack Attention, Not Budgets

A24 didn’t just buy attention, they hacked reality.

The Ex Machina Tinder stunt at SXSW, where festivalgoers matched with an AI bot was low-budget but devastatingly effective.

It blurred reality and fiction.
It wasn’t just marketing, it was an experience.In today’s crowded digital landscape, earned attention is exponentially more valuable than bought impressions.

Startups pouring millions into paid media often optimize themselves into oblivion, amplifying noise without creating any meaningful signal.

Strategic takeaway:
People don’t amplify ads.
They amplify stories, stunts, and emotions worth passing along.

5. Treat Every Dollar Like It Could Disappear

Even as buzz swelled around them, A24 operated with fierce financial discipline.

They secured smart partnerships with DirecTV, with Amazon Prime that expanded distribution without surrendering autonomy.

They invested surgically, not lavishly.

Meanwhile, too many startups mistake fundraising for success, spending venture capital like it’s permanent rather than a temporary fuel.

Strategic takeaway:
Capital is not a victory lap.
It’s fuel to survive long enough to matter.

Financial discipline doesn’t restrict creativity, it protects it.

Why It Matters Now

Today, the startup world faces a growing risk:
A drift into sameness. A comfort with incrementalism. A fear of true, strange risk.

But markets and cultures rarely reward the safe for long.

A24’s story is a living reminder:

• Constraint isn’t a curse; it’s a strategic weapon.

• Culture isn’t a vanity metric; it’s the strongest moat.

• Outsiders aren’t risky distractions; they are the architects of what’s next.

• Attention must be earned, not bought.

• Capital is oxygen, not champagne.

A24 didn’t win by out-fighting Hollywood.

They won by playing a smarter, stranger, sharper game.

The startups that shape the next decade will do the same, those that dare to build movements, not just products.