The crowdfunding phenomenon has grown exponentially over the years; however this type of financing mechanism does not only include successful initiatives, but there are also numerous cases of failed campaigns in which the proponents do not receive any funding. While most of the studies focused on the post-campaign phases of successful initiatives, a very limited number of scholars have explored the case of unsuccessful initiatives. This study is one of the first to focus on the latter and try to shed some light on the dynamics of the initiatives that have faced such a failure. We conducted qualitative and inductive research based on interviews with proponents of failed CF campaigns in the Italian context and secondary data (in particular from websites, social media, updates). The preliminary findings highlight that significant differences exist between the initiatives failed in the reward-based CF context and the equity-based CF context, as well as the stage of development of the business. Most of the interviewees highlighted the significant learning opportunity for them and the importance of creating collaborations with different stakeholders; at the same time, they faced different emotional challenges in such a scenario. This study could have useful implications for theory and practice. Among the main stakeholders involved are entrepreneurs, CF platforms, investors, policy-makers, governments, incubators/accelerators.