From understanding the value of pain in the growth process to embracing her competitive and intuitive edge, Xaviera’s narrative is a remarkable testimony to the entrepreneurial spirit. So, listeners, buckle up as we dive into the high-stakes game of business acquisitions, uncovering the strategies, the emotional rollercoaster, and the wisdom that comes with selling your life’s work. This is Selling The Wonder Weeks with Xaviera Plooij.
The key topics that we discussed during our talk were:
- Leverage Market Innovations to Your Advantage
- Articulate Your Business’s Value Confidently
- Prioritize Self-Reflection Post-Transition
- Reflect and Grow After Major Milestones
As always – hosted by Peak’s very own co-founder and managing partner Johan van Mil and Anke Huiskes founder & managing partner of NP-Hard Ventures 🕺🏻🕺🏼
You can find the episode on your favourite podcast platform, linked below. And, if you are really interested in listening to the big exit of specific founders – reach out to us so we can invite them for the next episode!
You can find the transcribed version of the episode below:
Starting a company is easy. Keep on growing a company, that’s harder. But selling your company, that’s a whole different story. In the Big Exit Show, we lift the curtains of secrecy around selling business by learning to ambitious and successful founders who’ve been in this roller coaster. Our host, venture capitalist Johan van Mil, is the founding partner of Peak, and I’m Anke Huiskes and the founder of NP Hard Ventures.
And today in the hot seat, we have Xaviera Plooij and she’s the founder and director of the Wonder Weeks. Her parents, a researcher couple, Frans and Hetty, published a book about The Wonder Weeks in 1992, stating that a baby develops in 10 predictable steps. And Xaviera took that book to a whole different level and drew it internationally.
The book is available in 29 languages and is one of the best-selling apps in the world. She recently rewrote the book with her father. And last September she published the Wonder Weeks, a pregnancy handbook. And then the next phase is that she ended up selling the company last year, which is the reason we asked her to join us today to tell her incredible story. So welcome to the show, Xaviera!
The Beginning
Johan van Mil: Can you maybe tell us a little bit about the beginning?
Xaviera: “As a good teenager, I always said I would never, ever, ever follow in my father and mother’s footsteps. And of course, it ended up that way. So after I graduated, I started a company in concept development and strategic thinking and specialized in retail. My father kept asking me for more advice about marketing because marketing and publishing houses don’t go together. They’re not doing that well in marketing, to put it kindly.
So I took over more and more. At one point it was just too much because it started to grow so much and I couldn’t handle my own company, advising him, and doing more for the Wonder Weeks. So I decided it was a gradual process and I took over the company at one point. And that’s when I thought for the first time, I should rename everything. Because I started with books and every book had a different title. So I didn’t have one brand. Word jokes were tricky in other countries. And that was such an obstacle at one point. So I decided to see the content we were selling as a product and not the individual books. And if you take the content and view the book just as a means to get that content across, that changes everything. And I think that was the first step in going global actually. If your content is pure and when it’s available in all kinds of ways, not only as a book, you can reach many more people.
Rebranding The Original Book Into One Worldwide Brand
So that was the biggest step I took. Rebranding everything into one worldwide brand, and centralizing the content. Then I was inspired by a TED talk about the different ways that people learn and the different forms of intelligence we have. And I thought: if I could have my knowledge available to everyone within the broad spectrum of all these intelligence types and facilitate the way people learn. Then I can reach everybody. And then Apple came with this device for the lucky few and people waited for four days outside a store for a smartphone.
And I thought: who would ever need a smartphone, right? But I thought, you know, I’m 30 years old. My book is old, so we should do something new, something for the lucky few too. So I decided to make a brochure online, an app store, which I think I was one of the first ones to get in that app store. And that was, I think it was 15 years ago.
Launcing The Wonder Weeks App
That took on really well because if you’re the first one to adopt something, it’s very easy to become number one, right? And if you then try to do your best, it’s very easy to just stay number one, which I did all these years. So the app actually turned out to be much more than just a brochure to get my book sold. At the end, it was 80-90 % of my revenue and it was the best sold app in countries I didn’t even know existed.
I had to look up where this or that country was based. Gee, I’m getting sold there. I didn’t even know that country existed. So that was a big breakthrough. And then the whole marketing shift in social media came along and my app was big and the app made people read books. That was also very nice to see because there are so many people who don’t read books.
But due to the app, they were so interested, they wanted more, so they bought their first book. That was good too. So a lot of things changed with the app and well, like I said, it was a bit of a coincidence because I thought I was just doing something for the lucky few. And yeah, and there it ended up being,
Growth Phase
I remember the first time we had this Android award. And it blew up. I was nominated and I was thinking, you know, I’m this girl sitting at our kitchen table in Arnhem. Am I really getting nominated for something? Is this a small prize? And then I found out there was a vote from people. So there were actually people voting for my app. What? And then I saw I was competing against Nike. And I thought: okay, you know, forget it, you’re just being nominated.
But then we were the number one! So I got t-shirts made like: we’ve got the app. And I thought that would be my high moment there. But then it just grew, grew, grew. And it turned out to be so valuable to people that we were seen as the most valuable product, most valuable advisors to young parents globally. So that made me come into the advisory board of Pampers.
That opened up so many doors. Although my book and my app, they’re just commercial products. I never thought about it as a commercial product. I had a passion for helping parents around the globe. And I think that passion was seen in the app and in the book because that’s how I always got validated by my consumers, the parents. And, well, that gave me a special entrance into households, into the minds and the hearts of families, I think. And that’s also how my validation came because if you want to have a product and get it global, you need someone to help you or something to carry you, get there globally. And I was there globally. That was the biggest strategic move I made, although I just wanted to help parents wherever they were.
Finding Your Place In a Family Business
Johan van Mil: Xaviera, taking a step back, because as a parent and a father of two kids, I also bought the book in Dutch: Oei, Ik groei. I still remember it, especially in that phase, as a parent, it was very helpful to understand the phases your kid is going through, right? And especially the growth steps, and growth phases that they go through. You worked with your parents, and they had a scientific background. How did you convince your parents or how did they convince you to take this piece of content forward? To the gigantic success that you made of it? How did you both first decide? Can you elaborate a little bit on that?
Xaviera: That was very easy. My parents are the dream parents every child wants. And they just always said: if you put your mind to something, you always succeed, we can see that in your eyes. And they knew our passion was the same. We all wanted to reach parents and help them. So it was very much aligned. There’s not so much to say actually. They just said you can see it in your eyes so go ahead. Of course, we had discussions, because I was making it global. They were doing their science. There’s this gray area where I would say: we should bring it like this because parents want to hear it like this.
For example, when we changed from moms doing everything to moms and dads joining teams, that’s not something that happens overnight, right? That’s a process. While I think one of my best talents is to spot where things are going. Where my parents are researchers, so they first want to see that it’s already there before they say it’s there. So that was a gray area, for example.
So we had some really big discussions about that topic. It’s stated in the book: you read mom, but if it’s a dad, that’s okay too. And my dad, for example, never figured out the problem. Because he said, I took care of you for two years when your mom did her PhD in Cambridge. He was a full-time dad, which was quite something back then.
But he said, you know, it’s stated in the book. You can also read Mommy as Daddy. I was a stay-at-home dad. I’m not offended. People want to hear things differently now. But those were minor discussions. Yeah, they always gave me the freedom to do whatever I wanted, as long as I could say why I wanted it and if my eyes showed that I really needed to do this.
Johan: When you look back, what was really great to hear about your parents and seeing the enthusiasm in your eyes and then going for it. I can also understand with a scientific background and also the fact that you brought it from, let’s say, one book to, let’s say, an international company with apps, content, et cetera, with a brand above it. It’s a huge step for them as well. What was the biggest discussion that you had with your parents, where you really had to convince them to do it differently than they did before? Also to understand, because I would never work with my parents. I never did. And I think a lot of people struggle with that idea.
Xaviera: That’s what I said too. The biggest discussion we had was when I was completely rewriting Oei, ik groei or The Wonder Weeks, our basic book. That was their goal. They wrote every word like they wanted to write it. A complicating factor was that my mum died in that period, so everything I rewrote, her legacy, was not there in these exact words anymore. So I think those were the biggest discussions. But that was good too, you get a diamond not by rubbing it, you have to polish it.
As long as we were able to look each other in the eyes, we could fight over it for a couple of hours. But that only sharpened our minds. That’s also the basics of every baby leap we’re talking about. Pain is where the growth starts. If there’s no pain, there’s no growth. And the way I’m raised, is that I don’t think about pain or problems or the way that others think. I think about it as huge opportunities, as feelings I want to feel because that’s where the magic starts.
Anke: And when you’re saying this, is it in hindsight that you think these were indeed the uncomfortable moments where the company and you as the founder had to leave?
Needing Friction To Grow
Xaviera: I honestly believe that with people, with organizations, with cultures, with every kind of system, the same steps apply to all kinds of systems. Even for companies, you grow the brain of the organization, culture, or person. You need friction to get it moving, to see where you’re going. And I really like growth. So the pain is the start of the growth. In that form, I really like pain because I don’t feel it like pain. I feel it like a great opportunity just presenting itself to me via my heart, my belly, and my head.
Anke: And it seems like you’re very competitive as well because you just mentioned something like if you’re not number one, you’re no one. That’s like pretty masculine or it’s very competitive.
Xaviera: Yeah, there is only one number and there is only one color and that’s gold.
Anke: Because in the beginning, you made it sound pretty easily: oh we were the first, and then something happened by accident. But these things don’t happen by accident, not at this scale. And I think you’re very intuitive that you knew: we’re gonna go on a mobile app store because it’s gonna be important and Android’s gonna be important. How did you stay ahead of the curve? Because there are so many others trying. It is still a very competitive space.
Xaviera: That’s one thing, don’t wear the crown, be the crown. That’s something I honestly embody. And the thing is, I am very intuitive and I think I’m very good at spotting chances. I just feel where things need to go. That’s the phase I’m very comfortable with, the growth path.
My books were about leaps and growth. My first career was as a ballet dancer. Look, my favorite pose is this leap. So leaps and poses are just my territory. And I always knew from the moment I was born, I was born at dawn and that’s actually what I do precisely. At dawn, I bring out the light.
I think for me, I never felt it as being that hard because I just know where to go. Because I know myself very well. And I know very well what I like and what I want. And I know even better what I do not know, what I can’t do. And that’s also good talent.
Knowing Who You Are Provides Strenght
Johan van Mil: Xaviera, I read in an early interview of you, what you experienced at school, right? I think it was in the fourth or fifth grade with a teacher who didn’t treat you well. And then you realized a big thing. Are you referring to that moment when your personality became who you currently are? Is that what you’re referring to?
Xaviera: That’s a good question actually, a really good question. I think at that point, I was 10 or 9. And I’m born with quite a brain and that teacher didn’t really like that fact. And I didn’t know when to shut up. So I helped her, I thought. But I was actually correcting her, which is not the thing you want to do as a child, I now realize. But I honestly thought that I was helping. And so that was a very bad experience. I’ve been locked in closets, been thrown from staircases, and everybody had to laugh. With my glasses, they thought: who was this nerd? And because I was named Xaviera Femke when I was born, I decided that they would call me Femke, not Xaviera. And I decided at one point: Femke was the nerdy part. The girl who was locked in the closet, she’s dead. I’m going to rebuild Xaviera. She’s got 10 iron spines and she’s going to rule the world. So that was at that one point. But that made me adapt to a very masculine energy. And I think only after my exit, I got this revival of going back to my feminine energy. And finding the Femke in me.
So that’s a weird process but I think that’s the best thing the exit gave me. The opportunity to really find out who you are. I always was who I am and I knew myself very well. But there’s always hidden parts that come up. I’m still going through that process. And that’s the biggest thing I got from the exit. Being so much aligned with yourself, finding yourself so much, seeing things that you already knew before about yourself, but then now being able to put it into words and understand them.
Anke: We have more questions about that phase for sure. But before the exit: can you take us through what happened? What pieces came together for this to happen exactly the way you envisioned it as a little girl? Can you take us through that process?
Xaviera: I think as a little girl, I saw the struggles my parents went through, the struggles with money, from time to time. Researchers don’t get paid very well. I realized from an early stage on that if I wanted to go to La Rochelle, where I did some French studies, they would not go on holidays.
And I realized that early on. I always said, you know, I will never have the life where I work so much and have so little. And I started just to envision, I had this magical number which I will not say, but that was something I dreamt of. Even when I was a little girl. I would be riding a Porsche 911 with an open-air roof, open top, and… I have a lot of things I wanted and I think, you know, they call it manifestation. If I truly believe in manifestation, I think it’s just, you know, coordinating our thoughts. But actually, yeah, it’s all check in the box.
Anke: What can you tell us about the details, we do love to get more into the nitty-gritty details of how that process went.
Acquisition Phase
Johan van Mil: Of the other company knocking on your door, basically asking to acquire the business.
Xaviera: I was going through a very bad time on a personal level. So that made it easier to sell, which sounds ridiculous, but it is.
There was someone who just sent me an email via LinkedIn and he said: we want to collaborate. Which basically means you have to do everything for free in my experience. And I won’t do anything in return for you. But someone made a mistake in my company and they said: we’re doing this together. And I really believe in fair split, but also, you know, input-output. And I had to explain to him, if they don’t do the input for one-third, you don’t share one-third.
So I was just getting this guy from LinkedIn to my office, explaining to the other one: no, this is why we don’t do collaboration. Because we have to do everything. So I was in the mood of, you know, well, I’ll just give you my brochures and whatever, you know, you go, because that’s not a collaboration. So that was my mindset. And then it was on the table and he started.
He said at one point, okay, those are all lovely ideas. However, I’m the international director of that company. Looking back, that could have been something to take into account that he wasn’t there to talk about brochures. And that we actually want to take over your company or get a majority share. And I was like, okay, okay, let me go grab some coffee. Change my mind. So I came back with the coffee and said: okay, my mind shifted and I’m there and you know it took me three seconds making that coffee to actually realize this is something I need to do.
You know, my company didn’t sound like a sellable company because it was a family business. Although I really tried tying the books to the Wonder Weeks brand and not to me personally as an author, you’ll always be the one giving interviews. Your name is there, you’re the author. So it was tricky but I knew it was the best thing to do for my company and that I could do really well too without my company.
Johan van Mil: And what was the size of the business? Also what you can disclose, of course, but also in terms of people, how big you were?
Xaviera: I had an ideal company. I just had eight people. Yeah, that’s ideal because I’m not a manager. I’m not a good manager. I don’t like Excel sheets. I don’t like budgeting. I don’t like paperwork. You know, we just had one big room. We were one big family and almost everything was outsourced. And I love that. I’m not that kind of person with, you know, if someone tells me I’ve got 1500 people working for you, I’m like, okay, come on. I don’t like that kind of company.
I’m just a normal regular girl from Arnhem and I wanted to have a good company. So I had eight people and that was it. And I had almost all work-at-home moms because they know how to really combine stuff. And of course at the end they were getting into the office, but we were very flexible in our hours and everything. And I love that.
It was only during the due diligence that they made a calculation that 500 people were actually working for the One Weeks director, Inrik. Where the One Weeks provided their income. So that was the point where I realized, dude, if I make a mistake, there’s 500 families depending on me. But I never realized that before. That was only during the due diligence.
Anke: Because you outsourced the printing of the book, the whole publishing was outsourced, the app you founded in the end.
Xaviera: I had a hybrid model and for everyone who wants to go international, there is not one model. If you look at it and you say, I’m doing it this way. You’re so not allowing culture to be there. But culture is a real fact. And the moment you embrace a culture in a different country, that’s the moment they take you in. If you want to do it your way, just stay out. Either go in or don’t go in. So sometimes I had a publishing house with a joint venture, because I would never just publish. Although in minor territories, I would just publish, because it would be Slovakia or something. You know, it sounds really diva, but if your book gets published in Slovakia, you know, it was just for me, okay, another title, just put it in the show. I shouldn’t think about it like that, but it was so big at that moment.
I had this hybrid model, so sometimes I would use a joint venture, sometimes I would publish myself, and sometimes I would have e -books, audiobooks and everything that was available via the Play Store or the Apple Store. I would do it myself and then only have the print with the publisher. Sometimes I would have print-on-demand, sometimes I would have my own warehousing and my own printing. It just depended on how much could I get my tentacles in that country.
And I firmly believe that if you do it yourself, you do it better. That’s, you know, it’s classical, but I do. So I would always do as much as I could do myself. Only if proven that others were better at it, I would have a partner in that form.
Johan van Mil: And you were probably approached by a lot of people, right? Who saw the success of Wonder Weeks in different countries and said, I want to do this in my country. Can I co-publish the book or can I co-write or can I do a joint venture, et cetera? Right? I assume that’s the way how your business grew internationally, right?
Xaviera: eah, but actually I always thought the moment people are interested is the moment when you hold back. The moment they can’t live without you. That’s the moment you ask for cooperation because at that point everybody’s going to say yes. So for example, everyone who has a book wants to go to the States. That’s like a huge thing. Actually, a breakthrough in the States, it’s not that hard. You know, it’s not the hardest breakthrough I had. It’s the biggest territory. It got me the biggest amount of money. Yeah, but it’s not that hard because we’re very close. So everyone wants to go there and you try selling your author rights to someone.
But they would see you as a Dutch girl or a European girl. They don’t even know where Holland is. You’re just a European girl. That doesn’t work in our states, etc. So everybody keeps on fighting to get this position and asking these publishers to get printed. Because the weird thing is, if you have a product, if you have a normal product, your product is sold in the States. If you have a product that is a book, it’s not your product, but then you are a published author. And that somehow gives everybody the feeling of feathers between their butt. There is no reason because it’s just a product.
Becoming No.1 In Print-On-Demand
Xaviera: So everybody wants to be in the States and want their name on something. And that’s where you lose the game. That’s where the ego enters and the ego should always be exit. So I just waited. I just created my own mask. I went into print on demand, which at that point was for losers. Because if you go to print on demand, no publisher, once you write, you’re doing it yourself. You’re the biggest loser.
That’s how people thought. I thought. let them think like this. I don’t care. Let them think I’m a loser, but I’ll be number one. I can’t be number one with a publisher, but I’ll be number one in print-on-demand and I’ll change print-on-demand. And I did. So I went from 10 books, 200 books, 500 books, getting an email from Amazon for the first time. Look, it’s so much, we can’t print it on demand anymore. Can we make a batch? So I went to 1000, went to 1500. I was thinking, okay.
Okay, I’m the really, really good company. And at that point, it happened that print-on-demand was seen differently because of a bestseller that did way more than publishing houses would sell in print-on-demand. So I had Amazon on my side because, you know, I changed the game from them.
Anke: Hahaha.
Xaviera: But then I was so big, then I thought that this is my point where I just go. At first, I did a hybrid model. So I did a bit of distribution externally, but in warehousing, there was a lot of shit. You know, you don’t want to be in Mallorca on holiday and then hear that your book is printed very badly. And there are containers of books everywhere. Never want to go there again. You know, being in your bikini next to a director making all these calls all the time. I don’t want to go there again.
So I thought, okay, I’m too big for the number one loser position at the gainer’s position because we changed the whole ball game of print-on-demand. And I went to publishing houses. But if you go to publishing houses, it’s not a matter of: do you want to print my book? It’s a matter of who am I allowing to print my book? Now you pitch for me. That’s what I did.
Anke: Incredible. There’s so much else I think to unravel, but I’m also aware of the time. So let’s go back to the acquisition table where you went in, you went to get some coffee, you switched the button, I think to walk in realizing this might be like a life-changing opportunity from that conversation.
Choosing What’s Best For Your Company
Xaviera: No, I never thought about it like that. I thought it was the best thing to do for my company because I wasn’t the best manager at that point. I’m a starter, I’m a creator and it got so big and I heard myself saying no to quite good ideas for my team. But the only thing I was thinking is why do we need to go bigger? Why do we need to go bigger? I was done. And you know, that’s the point where you have to be honest. If it’s your child, you can’t treat it the best way ever. You have to give it to someone who does, who has this passion to make it bigger, bigger, bigger. I’m not that person. So that was my…
Johan van Mil: Surprising! Oh, sorry, sorry, but surprising because you lean so forward, right? So you’re active, you’re really creating your own destiny in every way, right? How you build a company, how you convince your parents, how you indeed make Amazon realize that they should keep your book on the store, right? Keep your book in stock. So I think you really created your own culture. But in this respect, you say, I was done more or less, and this guy at the kitchen table suddenly made you realize.
But it’s a little bit because you’re leaning so forward and so active and taking your own destiny. And in this way, you are also, if I understand you correctly, a little bit surprised by the fact that that happened, right?
Xaviera: I was surprised, but surprises… I don’t believe in time. Time is a stupid concept and it only makes us aware that for example I had to log in at whatever time today.
But you know, a surprise just means that there’s new information. You’ve got to process it to find your outcome. Right. And yeah, I know for a lot of people that takes months, but for me, that’s two seconds. Yeah, I’m sorry, but that’s the way my brain works. And you know, that’s how I accepted. And so, no, the thing is I always thought about my company first, you know, as a leader, I think that’s the biggest thing that I realized from the exit.
When you’re active in a company, there is no place for your ego. You are just a part of your machine. You are a very important part, but it’s not you. And you can be replaceable. Every part is replaceable. And like I said, my machine was getting so big, although I might be like the motor or something. I wasn’t strong enough. I was built for a smaller car. My car got bigger. You need a new motor block, right? And so I realized that, everything you leave in your life, it opens up room for something else. So I wasn’t afraid of that. It was better for my company. If it’s better for my company, I honestly believe it’s better for me. So.
And there was a time where I thought, you know, I’ll just dive in, you know, no is an answer too. I want it my way or the highway. If they do it my way, I’m lucky girl, I’m free. If they don’t do it, you know, the highway, I have a good company, I don’t need to sell. You know, everything is doing really well. I still like it. So why, you know, there’s no problem. And I went in it like that. Yeah, not, not, not.
Anke: And how long was that period of that first conversation to you signing the paperwork on behalf of the company?
Xaviera: That was only a couple of months. That went quickly. Yeah. So it was just the first talk with the coffee that was just before the summer holidays. And I told them directly, you know, I had to shift my mind, but I’m in for it. And I knew directly, I’m not selling a minority because that would just mean that they would be investing in my company. I didn’t have any problem with money. So, you know, there was no reason for me to actually even think about accepting money for whatever reason.
I’m never ever having someone have a majority over my company because that would mean they would tell me what to do. Well, to be honest, you know I did serve some so you know I did do a lot of jobs when I was a student. But I’m not the type someone needs to tell what to do, that won’t work either.
Anke: That’s not your fight, yeah.
Xaviera: So the only option is, you know, get out, just sell everything. And I don’t know what happened at that coffee machine, but I just came back and I’m doing it. But I’m doing it my way. And I told them directly, I have no experience with this. I have no one to talk to because my friends, we aren’t into business. I have a magical number, which is going to pay not one year or more, not one year or less, because this is what I want and it doesn’t make sense. And I know you won’t get it. But that’s the number I’ve always dreamt of and that’s what the number is going to be.
And let me just tell you my company is not worth it, but this is what you’re going to pay. And I’m a very bad second captain at a ship. Don’t use me like that. You know, I will upset myself, I will make myself crazy. Everybody will turn crazy. What we’ll do is this, I’ll make you a big map where my ship is going. You’ll send another captain with a rubber boat and a big money pot on it, right? Like, you know, this was just a big bucket where you put the money in like the pirates.
A big bucket of money and you go with your rubber boat, you put your captain on it, you give me your rubber boat with your big bucket of money and I’ll pedal to the beach and whenever you need me, I’ll be on the beach, you can call me. And that’s exactly what we did at the end. So, you know, that was one of the biggest decisions and the best decision. Because that made me take charge again, because I was playing in a game where I had no experience, no knowledge, no one to talk to. So changing the rules and making it my game again was a good thing.
Valuation Of The Wonder Weeks
Johan van Mil: And did you get the extra? Shall I read what my colleague Tycho prepared?
Xaviera: Please do so.
Johan van Mil: Yeah, I’m reading what he printed and it will be displayed in the video also.
Congratulations on your exit, Xaviera. The transparency on how you build your global imperium from a book to a hit in the App Store is really impressive. Probably as impressive as the transparency of your exit. My approach to reaching evaluation was therefore to connect with some mutual connections and just dare to ask.
The conversation with one of your family members did not result in a lot. His feeling of pride affected my calculation at first. Therefore, thanks for getting in touch with me, Xaviera, and pointing me in a better direction. Typically, exit valuations consider a broad range of sources and market dynamics. However, with The Wonder Week’s varied product lineup and the limited data available, I focused on some basics.
One, mobile downloads. Since 2012, the estimated number of downloads is 4 million. Multiplying this by the purchasing price of 6 euros suggests a 24 million in revenue from app sales in 10 years. Other sources estimate the app’s monthly revenue at 200k MRR, monthly recurring revenue in 2022, or 2 .4 million annualized revenue. This confirms the calculation of the annual revenue.
For the digital business, the 2 .4 million is considered with a mobile application multiple of three times the revenue. Representing a fair multiple for 2022. The second part of the business is, of course, the books. Between 1992 and 2018, approximately 2.5 million books were sold, with a sales price of average 30 US dollar per book, making the total revenue in these 26 years a staggering 75 million euros. Or an average of 2.9 million annually.
Looking at the revenue multiples of publishing licensing revenue multiples ranging between 0.5 and 3, I would consider a one-time annual revenue of 2.9 million for the book license. So now the question to Xaviera: what’s the combined value of the total valuation of your company in 2022? 10.1 million US dollars.
Xaviera: No higher. He’s underestimating me.
Johan van Mil: Okay, that’s not good.
Anke: Never underestimate Xaviera.
Xaviera: Yeah, I pointed him in the right direction when he was sneaking up on my nephew.
Johan van Mil: That’s the way how we do research with a big exit show, right?
Anke: But yeah, now we do have a ballpark number. We know it’s higher. And I think with that, I want to conclude.
Xaviera: I would never sell my company for 10 million. Never, never. It would have been, you know, get out of my door and don’t even talk to me anymore. No.
Anke: Yeah, I told you, she knew what she wanted. Is there maybe one last piece of advice that you want to tell the listeners of the show before we wrap up?
Xaviera: Oh there is so much. But be sure if you want to sell your company. Take the time to really sit down and think about what you want. Don’t go into other projects too fast. Just really take the time to see who you are and what you want in life and make you a better person. Because somehow we all, we serial entrepreneurs, we think we can do it all and the thing is we can do it all, so we’re right. But there is a whole part of you that you forget while chasing and chasing and you take the time to find that part. I think I love that very much.
Anke: Amazing.
Johan van Mil: Great advice.
Anke: Thank you, Xaviera And we’ll soon talk again.
Xaviera: Thank you.
Johan van Mil: Thanks a lot, Xaviera. Great meeting you. Bye bye.