Six founders.
One table.
Every month.
Founder Dinners matches you with five highly relevant founders — same growth stage, same business model, same burning questions — at a great restaurant in your city. No subscription. No catch. Ever.
From application to dinner table in days.
Apply in 3 Minutes
Tell us about your company, growth stage, industry, and goals. No pitch deck required — just a quick profile.
Get Matched Monthly
Every month we invite you to opt in. If you do, our algorithm matches you with five founders who share your growth stage, business model, and industry.
Sit Down to Dinner
We book the table at a great restaurant in your city. You show up, order what you like, and meet five people who actually get what you're building.
Stay Connected
We create a private Slack channel for your table. Introductions, follow-ups, and friendships continue long after the check is paid.
"The best conversations I've had about my business happened at a dinner table, not a conference."
Six reasons to pull up a chair.
Real Answers, Not LinkedIn Advice
Ask the founder next to you how they closed their Series A, killed churn, or fired their first bad hire. Real talk, no filters.
Find Your Co-Founder
Some of the best founding teams started at a dinner table. Meet operators, engineers, and designers at the same stage as you.
Investor Access
Founder Dinners is powered by Astronomic, an active investor. Impress the table, and you might just impress us.
Expand Your Network
Six curated introductions per month. That's 72 high-signal founders per year — people you'd never cold-email your way to.
Combat Founder Loneliness
Building a company is isolating. These dinners are a reminder that you're not alone — and that everyone at the table is figuring it out too.
Competitive Intelligence
Sit across from someone in your space. Learn what's working for them. Share what's working for you. Everybody wins.
Dinners happening in your city this month.
We currently host dinners in 50+ cities and are expanding every month. If your city isn't listed yet, apply anyway — you'll be first in line when we launch there.
What founders say after the check is paid.
"I went in skeptical. I left with a potential co-founder, two warm intros to investors, and a standing monthly dinner with three of the people at my table."
"The matching is genuinely impressive. Everyone at my table was at the same revenue stage and had the same burning questions I did. It felt like a mastermind, not a networking event."
"I've been to a lot of founder events. This is the only one where I actually remember the people I met six months later — because we're still in a Slack channel together."
"Free, curated, and no pitch decks. I don't know why every city doesn't have this."
Six seats. One of them is yours.
Everything you want to know before you show up.
Still on the fence? These are the questions founders ask most before their first dinner.
Free. Always. Not ‘free for now.’ Not ‘free until we hit scale.’ Free, full stop. There is no membership fee, no cover charge, no subscription waiting around the corner. The only thing you pay for is whatever you order off the menu — same as any dinner out. Founder Dinners is free because it’s powered by Astronomic, a venture studio that invests in founders. We find other ways to create value together — no subscription required.
That's the whole point. You're matched with five founders you've never met — but who are highly relevant to where you are in your journey. Before the dinner, you'll receive a calendar invite with every guest's name and LinkedIn profile so you can do a quick scan. Most founders tell us the conversation starts within the first two minutes.
We currently host dinners in 50+ cities including Austin, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Seattle, Denver, Boston, Atlanta, Dallas, Nashville, Portland, Phoenix, and Washington D.C., among others. We're expanding every month. If your city isn't listed, apply anyway — you'll be first in line when we launch there and we'll notify you the moment a dinner is scheduled.
When you apply, you tell us your business model, industry, revenue stage, and nearest-term growth goal. Our matching algorithm uses all four dimensions to group you with five founders who are at a compatible stage and can offer each other genuine value — not just people who happen to live nearby. We prioritize product founders (SaaS, marketplace, e-commerce) and match service providers separately.
Once a month. At the start of each month, we email all members and ask if you want to attend that month's dinner. It's fully opt-in — if you're traveling, swamped, or just not feeling it, you skip that month with no penalty. There's no commitment beyond showing up when you say you will.
We create a private Slack channel for your table that stays active for 30 days post-dinner. Use it to share resources, make introductions, follow up on conversations, or just stay in touch. Many tables keep talking well beyond that window. You're also added to the broader Astronomic Slack community, where you can connect with the wider founder network.
We'll be straight with you: yes, Founder Dinners is also how we meet founders we might want to work with or invest in. Astronomic is a venture studio, accelerator, and full-stack founder services company. But the dinner itself is genuinely free and genuinely valuable — no sales pitch at the table, no follow-up pressure. If we think there's a fit, we'll reach out. If not, you still had a great dinner.
Each seat is individual — the matching is based on your specific profile, and bringing a plus-one would change the table dynamic. That said, your co-founder is welcome to apply separately and will be matched to their own table based on their profile. If you both attend the same month, we'll place you at different tables so you each get the full experience.
Your next breakthrough
is at dinner.
Founder Dinners is free because it’s powered by Astronomic, a venture studio that invests in founders. We find other ways to create value together — no subscription required.
The only cost is whatever you order off the menu. We handle the matching, the reservation, the calendar invite, and the Slack channel. You just show up.
Request Your Seat
Takes about 3 minutes. Free. Always.