Book snapshot

Built Without a Budget lands at a moment when many Gen Zs are chasing the entrepreneurial dream—but most books only tell the stories that end in glory. This one doesn’t. As a finance student at the University of Toronto, Tejas Trikha launched CouBon. This two-sided, dynamic pricing marketplace connected restaurants during their slow hours with students seeking deals. Armed with limited resources and plenty of persistence, CouBon grew from a dorm-room idea into a live platform used daily by students and partnered with dozens of restaurants—generating real revenue before closing due to scalability limits and macro headwinds. Written while the journey was still fresh, this candid account goes beyond highlight reels to share the real grind: pitching investors cold, solving the two-sided marketplace paradox, managing churn, and knowing when to walk away. It’s a survival guide for student founders—and a reminder that even when the outcome isn’t what you planned, the lessons can be life-changing.