Career
After graduating from RISD,Gebbia moved to San Francisco to work as a designer for Chronicle Books. [9] There,he was the only industrial designer in a company of 200 people who focused on graphic design. [10] He also founded Ecolect,a green-design website. [11] [12] In 2007,Brian Chesky,his classmate at RISD,moved in with him,and they both quit their jobs to start a company together. That same week,their landlord raised rent by 20%,to an amount they could not afford. Knowing that the Industrial Design Society of America conference was to be hosted in San Francisco and many hotels were fully booked,Gebbia came up with the idea of renting out airbeds in their apartment to conference-goers. They marketed the beds by creating a website called "AirBed &Breakfast”and emailed design blogs to garner interest. They received three bookings and were able to pay their rent to stay in the apartment. [13] [14] [15] [16] [17]
In 2008,another of Gebbia's roommates,Harvard graduate and technical architect Nathan Blecharczyk,became the third cofounder. He said he was inspired to co-found Airbnb due to a landlord increasing the rent on the San Francisco apartment he shared with a roommate,believing that there should be competition to this practice. [18] While struggling to find initial angel investors,Gebbia and Chesky created two boxes of cereals,Obama O's and Cap’n McCain's,to sell online before the 2008 election. [19] [20] [21] [22]
They found a small manufacturer in Berkeley who agreed to fabricate 1,000 cartons in exchange for a cut of the royalties. The team bought generic Cheerios and Chex,and placed the cereal into their boxes. The boxes,which cost $40 each,received coverage from CNN and Good Morning America;Katy Perry auctioned off an autographed box to her fans. [23] [24] The promotion netted Airbnb $30,000;sales were strong at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. Impressed by the cereal boxes,computer programmer Paul Graham invited the founders to the January 2009 winter training session of his startup incubator,Y Combinator,which provided them with training and $20,000 in funding in exchange for a 6% interest in the company. [24] [25]
Gebbia helped early hosts present their listings. [26] When the company was struggling to gain traction in New York City,Gebbia and Chesky booked with two-dozen hosts and discovered that many hosts were taking low-quality photos that did a poor job of presenting the listing. Leveraging Gebbia's background in design,they rented a camera and took high-resolution photos of the listings. Gebbia offered complimentary professional photography services sourced from a community of over 2,000 freelancers. As a result,Airbnb's revenue in the city doubled and the Airbnb Photography Program was created. [27] In March 2009,the name of the company was shortened to Airbnb.com,and the site's content had expanded from air beds and shared spaces to properties including entire homes,apartments,and private rooms. [28]
In May 2017,Gebbia launched Neighborhood,a modular designed office furniture business. The furniture was created for Bernhardt Design,a furniture company that has worked with emerging designers. [29] It was launched at the ICFF furniture fair as a part of New York City's design week. [29] The LEGO-like collection earned featured recognition in publications like Designboom ,the first and most popular digital magazine for architecture and design culture,Quartz, Dezeen ,and Interior Design. [30] Gebbia supported the newly formed Eames Institute for Infinite Curiosity,aimed at broadening the influence of Ray and Charles Eames through exhibitions from the Eames Collection. [31]
On December 10,2020,Airbnb became a public company via an initial public offering,raising $3.5 billion. [32] In January 2022,Gebbia acquired a minority ownership stake in the San Antonio Spurs,joining billionaire Michael Dell and San Francisco-based global investment firm Sixth Street Partners as fellow investors. [33] In July 2022,Gebbia stepped down from his full-time operating role at Airbnb,while remaining on the board of directors in an advisory role. [34] In September 2022,Gebbia was appointed by Tesla,Inc. to its board of directors. [35] [36] Samara,formerly a research and development unit of Airbnb established in 2016,became an independent accessory dwelling unit (ADU) startup in 2022. Gebbia announced the launch of its first product in November 2022,a net-zero tiny house called Backyard. [37]
Investments
Gebbia has invested in:
Work for DOGE
In 2025,Gebbia joined the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) as head of its National Design Studio (NDS). The studio's job is to improve the design of government websites. [43] [44] Gebbia said government websites,especially on mobile,are "horribly out of date" and he wants to create an "Apple Store-like experience." [45] [44] Gebbia told the Katie Miller Podcast he had a "pretty unpleasant" experience when he first joined DOGE." The hate mail text messages that I got were disheartening to say the least," he said. [46]
Personal life
Gebbia lives in Austin,Texas. [47] [48] He is married to Brazilian model and influencer Isabelle Boemeke with whom he has a son. [49]
Philanthropy
Gebbia is among the youngest members to join The Giving Pledge committing to give more than half his wealth to philanthropic causes. [58] Gebbia has made donations to service-led companies and projects,including Thorn and Educate Girls. [59] A former scholarship recipient,in 2014,Gebbia donated $300,000 to his alma mater,RISD,to create an endowed fund that will make the school accessible for students in need of financial assistance. [60] [61] In 2017,Gebbia brought Yeonmi Park,a North Korean refugee as his guest to the Met Gala to bring attention to the issue of global-refugee security. Park was featured on the front page of the style section of The New York Times following the event. [62]
In 2019,Gebbia donated to the Kevin Durant Charity Foundation which was used to redevelop basketball and tennis courts at playgrounds in Hayes Valley,San Francisco. [63] In 2020,he and his team launched Airbnb.org,a non-profit that enables hosts on Airbnb to house people in times of crisis. [64] [65] In December 2020,during the COVID-19 pandemic,Gebbia made a $25 million donation to benefit two San Francisco charities working to end homelessness in the San Francisco Bay Area:Rising Up—Larkin Street Youth Services and All Home. [66] [67] In 2021,Gebbia was included on the list of America's 50 Biggest Charity Donors by The Chronicle of Philanthropy . [68] In May 2022,while Gebbia was the graduation speaker at his alma mater,Brookwood High School,he pledged 22 shares of Airbnb stock to each of the 890 graduates,a gift worth a total of $2.1 million. [69]
In February 2023,Gebbia made a $25 million gift to The Ocean Cleanup,the organization's largest private donation to date. The gift expands climate health and ocean sustainability operations across oceans,rivers,recycling,and research. Funds particularly support deployment of the organization's System 03 cleaning technology in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. [70] In February 2023,Gebbia committed to donating $25 million to Malala Fund over a period of five years. [71] [72]
