How Fathom Analytics Built a Profitable Privacy-First Alternative to Google Analytics

Paul Jarvis was a well-known author and designer with a large audience from his book "Company of One" and his newsletter. He co-founded Fathom with developer Danny Van Kooten in April 2018, driven by a shared conviction: Google Analytics was a privacy nightmare, and the world needed an alternative. Danny later stepped down, and Jack Ellis, a software developer who'd been working with Paul on an unrelated side project, joined as the new co-founder around late 2018.

The Privacy Opportunity

Jack and Paul built Fathom before they had a deep understanding of GDPR, CCPA or the UK's PECR. Paul's original validating tweet, from April 16, 2018, predates GDPR's May 25, 2018 enforcement date entirely. They built it because they wanted simpler software that put user privacy ahead of everything, not as a reaction to compliance pressure. Once GDPR did take effect, it became a powerful growth tailwind: many website owners started asking "Do I really need all this tracking? My Google Analytics dashboard is overwhelming and I only check pageviews anyway."

Paul had built a minimal, open-source analytics tool with Danny and was looking to turn it into a real product. Jack, fresh from building his own analytics projects, was the perfect new partner.

The Fathom Approach

• **No cookies** — No consent banners needed (GDPR/CCPA compliant by design)
• **No personal data** — Doesn't track individuals, only aggregate pageviews
• **One-page dashboard** — Everything you need on a single screen
• **Fast script** — Under 2KB (vs Google Analytics at 45KB+)

The product deliberately did less than Google Analytics — and that was the selling point. Most website owners were drowning in data they never used.

Building in Public

• Monthly revenue numbers on Twitter
• Technical decisions and architecture changes
• Privacy policy analysis and GDPR/CCPA guidance
• Why they chose to stay bootstrapped

Paul's existing audience (from "Company of One" and his newsletter with 30K+ subscribers) provided the initial distribution. Jack's technical transparency attracted developers who cared about performance and privacy.

The V2 Rewrite

In 2019, Jack rewrote Fathom from scratch (V1 was Go; V2 became Laravel/PHP with a custom analytics engine after Jack joined). The rewrite was necessary to handle scale; by then, Fathom was processing billions of pageviews monthly.

The technical blog posts about the rewrite became some of Fathom's most popular content, attracting developers who appreciated the engineering depth.

Growing Against Free

Each Google Analytics controversy (data sharing with advertisers, GA4 migration chaos, EU regulatory actions) drove a wave of Fathom signups.

Staying Bootstrapped

• The business was profitable from early on
• Privacy analytics doesn't need blitzscaling
• VC pressure to grow might compromise privacy values
• They wanted to build a "Company of One" (Paul literally wrote the book)

• ARR: $100K+ (specific milestone date not documented in founder sources)
• Customers: Thousands of paying customers globally
• Script size: <2KB (vs Google Analytics 45KB+)
• Cookie consent: Not required (no cookies, no personal data)
• Infrastructure: Laravel/PHP with a custom analytics engine, processes billions of pageviews
• Pricing: From $14/month (100K pageviews) to custom enterprise plans
• Team: 2 co-founders + small team (Company of One philosophy)