About Me
A native New Yorker and technologist. I have been interested in technology since my first beige computer tower in 2004. This interest has led me to exploring the digital space in many areas, including art, programming, music, and UI/UX studies. I would combine these newfound passions to create Trusov LLC, originally an art services business that employed 6 developers. Later, I transformed Trusov LLC into a consulting firm that allowed me to work with a diverse array of clients in both entertainment and media. Currently, I am a master’s student at Columbia University, Columbia Engineering in New York City. I love to play the guitar and piano, travel the world extensively, photograph wildlife, teaching others, and even racing at track events. Now, I am seeking internships in these related areas: product/project management, software engineering, machine learning, and data analytics. If you are interested, please check out my portfolio section and my resume; hope to hear from you soon!
How a 21-year-old made over $1 million in sales from Roblox last year
Roblox creator Arthur Trusov made his first digital item in July 2019. Arthur Trusov.
- Roblox creator Arthur Trusov designs digital goods that players can use in games for the platform.
- The prolific Roblox creator sells hundreds of thousands of digital goods a month.
- In 2020, Trusov made nearly $848,000 in sales, and almost $1.4 million in 2021.
Arthur Trusov is one of Roblox’s most prolific creators and has sold millions of digital items.
The Middle Tennessee State University graduate joined Roblox in April 2012, and since then, has designed thousands of user-generated content (UGC) items, from digital sunglasses and hats to weapons and pins. In the process, Trusov, who currently splits his time between Seattle and Tennessee, has become a multi-millionaire.
Trusov joined Roblox when he was 11 years old, after viewing a YouTube video of a Roblox game showing people in a house who must survive a huge flood destroying the home.
“I would look up Roblox on Google and discover that ‘it’s free,’ which was the marketing quip of Roblox at the time,” Trusov said. “That coaxed me into playing Roblox as a guest and eventually making a registered account.”
Roblox, which cofounders David Baszucki and Erik Cassel launched in September 2006, enables players to create their own games and play games made by other users, from pet and theme park simulators to tower defense games. By the time of its IPO in March 2021, the company said more than half of Americans under the age of 16 were users.
Roblox’s increase in popularity as a metaverse-type platform — the company saw users spending more time on the platform during the pandemic — coincides with the rise of interest in the metaverse generally. Companies like Meta (until recently called Facebook) are banking on designing entire interactive, virtual worlds. Creators like Trusov fall into a growing group of entrepreneurs who are designing clothes, accessories, and other digital goods players can use.
But Trusov didn’t start with digital goods. He first began building experiences on Roblox, including “Project Minigames,” a collaboration with his friend Andrew Wang that included a set of cooperative puzzles and go-kart racing. His work caught the eye of employees at Roblox, who hired him on as a game designer and associate program manager from 2018 to 2019.
It wasn’t until July 2019 when Trusov struck out on his own and designed his first item of user-generated content — a noir-themed 1940s-style bowler hat priced at 400 Robux, or $5 — that he realized he could make a viable business out of designing digital items.
When Trusov lowered the price of the bowler hat to $1 per item, sales skyrocketed. He sold roughly 2,780 items in all.
“I realized the perfect prices of my future UGC items,” Trusov said.
One of the thousands of items Trusov has helped create is this digital wearable, the “Kemono Grey Cat Head.” Arthur Trusov
Trusov has now made thousands of digital Roblox items based on his interests and user feedback. He said he spends between 10 to 12 hours a month collaborating with a team of three digital artists who design between 20 to 30 digital Roblox outfits and accessories a month, which are released during the first week of each month.
The team uses programs like Procreate to make sketches or drawings of digital items, creates a virtual model in Blender, and designs textures for the model in Substance Painter and Adobe Photoshop. Roblox’s own creation application, Roblox Studio, allows Trusov’s team to perform tasks like importing and exporting the item onto the platform, publishing the item, and testing out the item on the platform.
Although items designed by Trusov and his team are usually priced under $1.50 each, Trusov sells hundreds of thousands of items each month. In 2020, he made nearly $848,000 in sales and almost $1.4 million in 2021 from Roblox digital goods. Insider verified his earnings with documentation provided by Trusov. According to Trusov, last year 10% of those earnings went to staff wages, 1% to office space, and the rest to his own salary, taxes, and other business expenses.
Trusov’s bestselling UGC item? A pair of vintage-looking sunglasses that has sold over 2 million to date.
Producing Roblox UGC items has made Trusov a multi-millionaire, affording him wealth which he shares with his parents. In October 2020, he purchased a $250,000 home for them and paid down several thousand dollars’ worth of their credit card debt, he said.
“I just essentially gave them freedom, the same freedom they sought to seek when they came over to America,” Trusov said of his parents, who immigrated to the US from Eastern Europe.
If Trusov has any advice for other aspiring Roblox creators, it’s that persistence is key.
“When I started Roblox at 14, I didn’t make my first buck until 2018,” Trusov said. “Just four years, and I didn’t stop. All my friends and family thought what I was doing was stupid, that it was never going to take off, but look where I am today.”