New York, New York, United States
Pavilion is a membership community and events organization for go-to-market executives and rising leaders, founded in 2019 by Sam Jacobs in Austin, Texas. The company began as a dinner club for chief revenue officers and VPs of sales in New York City and grew organically through word-of-mouth and social media into a global organization with chapters across the United States and internationally, reaching more than 10,000 members.
In 2021, Pavilion raised $25 million from Elephant Ventures at a post-money valuation of approximately $100 million to $105 million, having grown ARR from $1 million to $4 million in a single year. The capital infusion prompted a significant expansion into product and engineering, a large B2B sales organization, and Pavilion University, a learning platform. Those bets proved oversized relative to the business, and Pavilion moved from 30 percent EBITDA margins in 2020 and 2021 to burning capital through 2022 and 2023.
By early 2024, Jacobs had restructured the business, cutting headcount from 62 full-time employees to 27, shutting down an internal software build in favor of the third-party Hivebrite platform, and returning the company to cash-flow positive operations. Pavilion entered 2024 with a stated 15 percent growth rate, a 4-to-1 LTV-to-CAC ratio on both its corporate and individual membership lines, and a strategic focus on member onboarding and retention rather than aggressive new-member acquisition.
