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Like everybody here, we can all consume whatever we want.
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So we can fly in whatever planes we want like you know you can fly private, you can stay in the nicest hotels, get the nicest Airbnbs, go out to dinner every single night of the week at the five-star restaurant at the Michelin star.
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And you can do that for the rest of your life.
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Like you your personal needs as a human being are satisfied.
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But I can't buy that skyscraper right there.
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And I can't buy that this huge company.
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And so what happens is like the things that you want to buy change.
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And so you create a new deficit for the amount of wealth that you want.
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Again, this is just assuming you like the game.
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And so like I like the game and so I just want to keep playing it.
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Where should we Where should we start?
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Cuz you do a lot of these interviews.
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What What's the fun version of this for you?
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Because I feel like if somebody actually wants to know an answer to something, it's been published.
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You got a book, you got a Twitter, you got you got a thousand YouTube videos.
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Like if you're motivated, you can go find the answer.
1:02
Like I tweeted out, "Yo, Alex's coming on the pod today.
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What would you like to know?"
1:05
They're like, "I'd like to know his thoughts on offers." Making a killer offer.
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Like that's literally his book.
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It And I think the book is like free or 99 cents.
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So like that's just a lazy lazy question at this point.
1:16
Um But I know whenever I do interviews, there's some version of the conversation that are more fun or I'm like, yeah, when when we talk about that stuff, it's more interesting to me and that kind of lights me up in a different way.
1:24
What What is that for you?
1:25
Well, I'll say there's two things that I've been probably focused a lot on.
1:28
One is obviously acquisition.
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com and so like what we're doing and and kind of clarifying the mission between all the stuff that we're actually doing every day.
1:41
And then the other side of it is just that the Leads book is coming out.
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And so it's tough cuz I'm sure you guys have had stuff that you've worked on and it's like been on its way coming out and all of your energy is going into writing it or building it or recording stuff about it and then you can't talk about it because I don't want to I don't want to I don't want to talk about all the time until it's like ready to to go off.
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And so the six weeks beforehand is when it's like we have all this pre-recorded stuff.
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I've got like full courses, like I've got all this [ __ ] that's going to that's going to drop when the next book comes out, but I haven't talked about anything Leads related for like two years because I've known cuz I've been working on it for two years for the next launch.
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So those are the two things that are like top of mind for me like what we're doing on the Mosey Media side and acquisition.
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com and then and then the Leads stuff.
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What's the split between those two?
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So you got media, you got acquisition. com. Give me the time split.
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So given on a given month, you know, what percent if there's a pie chart, what do you spend it on the on the content versus acquisitions?
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And then also on the money side like are you making more off the media or you making more off acquisitions?
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What's the What's the relative difference between the two?
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Yeah, we we lose money on media.
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So no, we we don't make money.
2:57
I think I think between like AdSense and if you consider book sales a part of that, but I give the book away for 99 cents.
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Actually Amazon updated it cuz we re-uploaded it with like some fix hits and they wouldn't let us go below 190, which now makes all the times I said 99 cents like people are going to be like, "He's trying to get us." It's six. Anyways.
3:17
Um But no, I think the book does um The book does about a million bucks a year in profit in terms of like what it what it makes.
3:25
Um And then and then AdSense is probably like five grand a year.
3:29
So it's like one and a half million and that that that barely covers the media team.
3:35
And so that's kind of the team right now?
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We've got 10 and then we've got vendors. Are you enjoying it? Yeah, I dig it. It's fun.
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Right now we do I record what I said to answer your question Sean about time split.
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We do one recording day every 14 days.
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That's like the direct to camera stuff.
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And then you know, if I do a podcast like I got one of my guys here Trevor who's recording you know, our our side of it so that they can clip this stuff later.
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So Are you enjoying like the celebrity that comes with this?
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You know, getting noticed and things like that.
4:05
Um enjoy is probably like cuz I feel like there's some people who love attention and there's some people who hate attention.
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I'm like right in the middle. You know what I mean?
4:13
Like I was I was purposely deliberately not public because I wanted to be rich and anonymous and that was kind of like the mission for a long time for me.
4:20
Um and then now that we are on there, I would say that there are pros and there are cons of increasing, you know, fame or what do you want to call it? Recognition.
4:29
Um I think the pros outweigh the cons, but there are cons. Like what? Uh you get weirdos. You know what I mean?
4:37
Like we're we have we have security. You know what I mean?
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Like we go to like I can't I can't attend any event.
4:44
Like I can't attend event.
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Like I can't go to somebody's like small group meet up.
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Like I can't Like it's it's very hard.
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Uh because I can't enjoy anything.
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Uh because I'll have a line of people or you know, asking for advice or signatures or pictures or whatever.
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And like again, I am grateful to [ __ ] to everybody to do that.
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It's just like it's a different experience.
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So I just have to I have to if I'm going to go to something, I go into it knowing that's what my experience is going to be, not whatever or whoever's on stage.
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Yeah, it makes the online experience dope, but it makes the real life experience less It's different.
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That's what you fundamentally just changes what the in-person experience is.
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Like if I walk out So like what's interesting is that I was able to or I have been able to to to mark how social media and like the the audience has grown by the number of real world interventions I had per unit of time.
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And so like I remember the first time I got recognized public.
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And then it was once a month and then it was once a week and then it was once a day and then it was every time I'd walk outside the door and now it's about five times or six times every time I walk outside.
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Um I get I get recognized.
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Um and so like I just imagine that that just continues to compound, you know, with time and with distribution.
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So it's just it's different. But here's the pros.
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We get the best talent for our portfolio companies and for acquisition.
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com because so many people want to come here.
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Um we get them for at market rate or or below because of all the learnings that they want and the other people who are also pro players on the team.
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Uh we get the best deal flow that's all proprietary, companies that want to work specifically with us.
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They're not trying to exit to anyone or sell to anyone.
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They want to work with us deliberately to scale the company.
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So like I continue to do it because I'm more rewarded for doing it than I am punished for doing it.
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But there are definitely, you know, you get weird letters and you get you know, weird attacks and things like that.
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Like it's just you know, it's it comes with the territory and it's to be expected and so um for us the pros outweigh the cons, but there are cons.
6:35
I remember talking to Tim Ferriss and you could just tell from the outside, but he I don't know if he's mainstream famous or not or if I'm in a bubble, but he's popular enough that he has all these people listening to him and all that stuff.
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But he What the cool thing about him was he had high profile people and people who like a lot of people who listen to you, you're like I'm thankful that you listen, but I don't exactly want to go hang out with you.
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But he would actually have a ton of listeners who would reach out to him who were like, you know, like the Matthew McConaugheys of the world or or some like football coach or Ryan Holiday has that too where it's like someone who's like a big deal who you're like "Oh my god, you listen to me. That's amazing.
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I would I would be honored to go and hang out with you."
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And he had he had stories like that and Sean and I have had that a little bit where like some like business person who we both admire will be like, "Yeah, I heard your pod on this thing."
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And I'm like, "Oh wow, you listened to that?"
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Has that Have you crossed that threshold where you have people who you admire who are messaging you and being like, "Man, what you said was really cool.
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What's your you know, I have a question about X, Y, and Z."
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And you're like, "Oh man, that's amazing.
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My heroes want to talk to me now." Yeah. Um what I mean, yes.
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I don't want to put anyone on blast, but like there have been some mega mega influencers who like followed me and like hit me and they were like, "Dude, this is awesome."
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And I'm like "Well now I think less of you because you follow my content."
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So I think like flag there.
8:00
You know, I was I told Leila the biggest red flag I had with her was that she was in a band.
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Um and so Um no, I'm kidding.
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But um but yeah, like some NFL players that I used to like, you know, really look up to like huge MLB stars like and like huge huge podcasters that that, you know, followed me and and yeah, it's been go to like see I'm like, "Oh yeah, how is so-and-so celebrity?"
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And I click and it says like follow back. And I'm like "Oh shit."
8:30
Uh but no, it's it's cool.
8:30
I mean, it's it's it's surreal.
8:32
I'm sure you guys have had it's surreal.
8:34
It's very um Well, I grew up like admiring Lance Armstrong.
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I'm I'm big into endurance sports and one time I got an email and it was like "Hey, just want to let you know, I love The Hustle."
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Uh and he signed it with Lance and the you could tell it was Lance Armstrong by his Gmail.
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And I was like, "I don't believe this is really Lance Armstrong.
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If it is, here's my phone number. Call me right now."
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And he he he called me within like three minutes and I was like he called me.
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He goes, "Sam, what's going on?"
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And I was like "Lance, is this really you?" Father and then yeah.
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And I and then I I had a couple other athletes holler at us and I remember thinking like growing up playing sports, I would have killed to have athletes like this recognize me and I could never achieve the athletic greatness enough for them to acknowledge you know, my talents.
9:22
And then now you just take this total like outside path and you get to it.
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Or like one time we had like this was really weird, but like the lead singer of Linkin Park, Mike, he like tweeted out that he likes our pod and The Hustle whatever.
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And I was like, "Oh, that's sick.
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Like I never know I would have wanted to have met you, but there's no way I could have gone down this normal path.
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But if we went this weird way, we finally kind of met."
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And I found that to be very strange and awesome.
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Yeah, it's sort of that be so good they can't ignore you as a general advice for life.
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Like what whatever you want is on the other side of you being so good that you can't be ignored. At anything.
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At anything and also like it doesn't have to be I think that's kind of what you're saying Sammy.
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It doesn't have to be the thing you expect. Right.
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Like oh you want you know you want to meet Warren Buffett someday?
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You don't have to be a stock picker.
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That's not that's probably actually the least likely way that Warren Buffett's going to want to going to want to know you and in general you shouldn't really pick based on what they want.
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You should just pick based on the thing you can actually get so good at that you can't be ignored. And it's hard to do.
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Obviously that's hard to do but it's like more of the it's more of the right guidance than than many other bits of advice you could take as far as like a North Star for how you're going to like you know what you're going to go for. Right. Exactly.
10:40
And so anyway it's cool that we're all kind of like seeing that in reality and it come true. Alex are you Alex? Sorry. Go ahead Sam.
10:51
I was going to say are you enjoying acquisitions.
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com because I know when we first talked to you I think you were maybe only a year or two years in. You were relatively new.
10:58
I think you had just sold um Gym Launch.
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Are you happy with like is it what you thought it was going to be and do you actually like doing it?
11:09
And by the way explain what acquisitions what that is.
11:11
Yeah and so it's acquisition. com.
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The reason I I emphasize that is because there's somebody bought acquisitions plural.
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com and it's just not it's not me. It's different than me. But acquisition.
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com is our portfolio of companies and uh So I'll give you the the the TLDR 90 seconds.
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So I uh had a chain of gyms, took that, licensed the IP to 5,000 locations, started a software company software distribution base and then started a software company.
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We exited all three of those companies in 2021.
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We took in about 40 million in distributions prior to the exit and we sold for 46. 2 million.
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And the software company I did separately or sold separately in a strategic deal that was all stock.
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Um and I I said that because you guys would probably laugh because like I I people were like I Googled Alex Hormozi net worth and it says 15 million.
11:56
It's like well I sold the company for 46 and all cash.
11:56
So like I don't know where you got that and the only reason you do that and get that money is because it was making money.
12:01
So So anyways that was pretty much 2021 so we closed December 20 fifth or sixth. I can't remember.
12:10
It was it was one of those days.
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It was right around Christmas. 24th Christmas Eve. That's twice.
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Christmas Eve we is we closed.
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Um and then we started acquisitions. com the next day.
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And so that was when we like we made our kind of declaration.
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At that point they'd already made three uh minority investments that had done really really well and that's why I wanted to make that kind of my next big thing.
12:30
If you started it the next day that means you kind of had this idea cooking.
12:33
So what was the what was the genesis?
12:35
Why did you why did what made you realize oh this is what I should do next?
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I should buy these minority stakes in in companies like the one I just built and I should get this domain name which I assume you had to buy.
12:45
So how were you so ready to do that?
12:47
What was the thought process?
12:51
So um during COVID guys obviously gyms were affected by COVID. You know we took a hit.
12:58
Like we took a major hit.
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We were still profitable but it was a it was a big you know it was hard.
13:01
Um and so to kind of get some space cuz there wasn't a lot like I couldn't do more. You know what I mean?
13:09
Like obviously we you know we we pushed things harder but like I was above the business enough that there was nothing I I wasn't I wasn't going to do anything, right?
13:17
And so I kind of just needed to take my my mind off things.
13:19
And so by by happenstance a guy who owned a photography a single photography studio um made his way on my calendar.
13:28
And in the first and this is not how you do this everyone. Like do not do this.
13:32
But I was actually still taking some calls for Alan because I wanted to do some like testing and this is before I had a big brand.
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So I was just kind of like founder talking to customers to get an idea of what was going on.
13:42
But he knew me enough from just like I'd written a small book in the gym space called Gym Launch Secrets that he had read that book like loved it applied it to his photography business and she took a sales call through my software company because he knew I was taking the calls.
13:56
And so he hopped on and was like I have no interest in your software.
14:00
He's like but could you please give me 20 minutes? And I was like sure man. All right. I just liked his vibe.
14:05
And so anyways we ended up doing a deal and so we took a minority percentage of the business and that business I think had done 1. 6 They were doing 1.
14:13
6 million a year at a single single location which is pretty awesome for a tiny like photography studio.
14:18
And he had I think he had taken and this isn't all the book clearly cuz there's a million things.
14:23
But he had taken some of the concepts from the Gym Launch Secrets book applied them and it had grown the business a lot.
14:26
And he had an agency for photographers to kind of like do the same model for them, right?
14:32
And so we were having conversation um and he was like I did exactly what you said and all the photography studios add 400,000 a year here to top line when they use our thing.
14:43
And I was like they add 400,000 a year?
14:45
He's like yeah on average. And I was like okay.
14:50
How much are we selling this thing for? And I he's like pennies. And I was like okay.
14:54
So um let's not do that and let's own them all.
15:00
And so that kind of pitch so he actually and this is where like the the trust factor of what like the inbound deal flow which is what I love about acquisitions.
15:05
com is that we have a lot of trust.
15:07
And so he actually shut down a business that was making him I think 500,000 a year in profit that agency side and shut it down to zero um because he like believed that he believed me enough to to go all in on this other direction of private ownership of all the locations.
15:21
And so um as of today and that was 2020 as of today we have 36 locations.
15:31
Uh in that business you know just 30 plus million a year.
15:33
Uh and it continues to grow by one or two locations every month.
15:36
And so what's that business do? Enchanted Fairies.
15:40
And so it's children photography. Right. Dude that's insane.
15:43
And you so when when we last had you on I saw I went to the website and I was like okay cool what what are acquisitions? Great.
15:49
What are the what do they acquire?
15:50
And I saw basically like uh Enchanted Fairies and I was like okay cool they're doing like kind of the Gym Launch playbook on this other space that makes a lot of sense.
15:58
And if I go there today they're still those same companies.
16:02
So how come you're not putting new acquisitions up there?
16:05
I assume you've made a bunch of acquisitions like you know in the last 24 months or whatever.
16:10
Why not put new companies up there?
16:12
You're pretty open about other stuff but in this case you're not putting them up there.
16:14
And then also I let's start with that. Yeah.
16:19
Main reason So there's two big reasons why we're not public the acquisitions.
16:23
Number one is that it's my brand has grown to such a degree that like if I say hey this business is awesome and it and it has a national like Enchanted Fairies is less of a you know like unless you're in one of those 30 markets then also my audience isn't like moms with kids.
16:40
So like it's it's it's you know it's it's arms length enough that it doesn't affect the business.
16:44
But as you can imagine a lot of the businesses come to me are business services.
16:48
And they're you know they're national they're international whatever companies.
16:52
And so like me endorsing a company would 5 10x the company overnight.
16:57
And so that comes with a couple things.
16:59
One is that I haven't negotiated those deals with a brand endorsement included.
17:02
If I include a brand endorsement then I own majority.
17:05
I'm not going to like I'm not going to risk my face on something I can't control.
17:12
And so these are most of them most of the investments we have are minority.
17:14
We do have a majority investment as well.
17:18
Um but that was one that came in as minority and then I just bought more of it sold off the business.
17:23
Um and it was our wheelhouse.
17:24
Um The second thing is that if we were to exit those businesses and I had done an endorsement in a minority position then guess who has to go with the deal? Me. Right?
17:36
Like I would as an acquirer if there's some massive influencer that's associated with the brand like he's not getting out in a deal.
17:43
And so our goal is to build value in the in the business so that the business is sellable and more viable.
17:50
And we use my face to bring deals in.
17:51
And so that's why I've been really really tight-lipped about um the businesses.
17:56
How many deals have you done so far?
17:59
We've done Right now we have 11 portfolio companies.
18:01
Is it all your own money or you raised a fund? No it's all private. It's all mine. Damn dude.
18:06
So you're you're going all in on this.
18:08
And so I asked you originally are you happy with how this is working out? Is it was?
18:14
What's he going to say no?
18:16
Well yeah he could be like well he's like well I didn't I didn't I didn't realize like this is actually just some mostly a due diligence game and I don't know if I love it.
18:23
I mean what's the worst part about it?
18:25
What's something you didn't kind of what's a downside you didn't fully respect up front?
18:30
So I think there's like knowing something and then experiencing it are two kind of separate things.
18:37
And so like I know that in a minority position we have to use soft influence to to to try and move things forward.
18:43
Um I know that but I would say the most difficult part is is is half listening to advice.
18:54
And so I'll give you an example.
18:55
So if I say hey we think that this operator in your business blows and we need a new operator. Person says okay.
19:02
And then we find them a new operator.
19:04
And then they hire the new operator.
19:04
But then they don't fire the old operator.
19:09
Like what the [ __ ] Like Right.
19:10
Like I mean very hard to win at that point, right?
19:13
And it's like well I listen So like it's kind of like listening to half of someone's diet advice.
19:18
It's like yeah yeah I'm doing the cheat days.
19:20
For rushing the cheat days.
19:22
It's like yeah but there's other days that you're in a deficit.
19:26
Yeah yeah but you said cheat days raise your metabolism.
19:27
Like yeah but you also need a deficit. You know what I mean?
19:30
And so it's it's it's listening in completeness and so I don't know.
19:34
We may move to like cuz like the business that I I would say transparently that I enjoy the most is the one that we have complete control of.
19:42
And so we bought majority of that business and we were growing that one like gangbusters.
19:46
And the speed to action is so much faster.
19:49
Um that being said you know we've you know I'd say like the biggest win we have would be a company that came to us that did 16 million the year before that you know, did 50 last year.
19:59
Um, 20 million in EBITDA.
20:01
Uh, so that's the biggest company that we have in the portfolio.
20:02
Um, We've had you know, the the Enchanted Fairies is obviously one that we you know, we were doing that at two-ish with you know, combining the two things though.
20:10
They're pacing two and a half million a month right now or 2. 7 something like that.
20:13
Um, so we have some pretty ridiculous deal, right?
20:15
Like I had a friend message me that was like, dude, Hormozi's playbook is uh, obviously amazing, but he's like, this deal that they offered us he's like, I don't know who would take this.
20:27
And uh, you know, he's like, there's he I don't know if this is actually the deal or not, but he was like, basically it was like, no money, we'll give you no money, but we get ownership above if we grow it above X.
20:36
So it's kind of like uh, I think I think sounded like more of a risk risk-free strategy in a way, but um, is that is there a standard deal structure and is that it where you're not putting capital in?
20:49
You're basically saying, give us the equity, we guarantee we grow it by this much and if we don't some I don't know, some some clawback.
20:57
We've iterated it honestly a bunch of times.
20:58
So one of the one of the So this is a to answer your question Sam, like probably even more pointedly now that we're getting into it.
21:03
One of the hardest things about like the investment cycle is that when you're making a product, right?
21:08
You're or you're trying to sell a service, you can ideate it, create an MVP, pitch it, see how it goes within like 60 days.
21:16
Like the whole like the whole thing soup to nuts you can you can do that whole cycle in 60 days.
21:21
For deals, it's like you can think of an you know, an idea for a deal structure.
21:26
It takes 90 days to 6 months to close the deal.
21:28
And then it might take a year to see even just like some preliminaries of like, how do we like the structure? How does it work? Etcetera.
21:34
And so like I still feel like we are most in our infancy in the deal structures that we have.
21:41
So like uh, in terms of no money in, there are deals we put money in, there are deals that we don't put money in. It depends on the deal.
21:47
Um, like the big one for money is it depends on what the need of the business is.
21:51
So like if we're opening up a lot of brick and mortar locations, like we're about to I think we might have actually closed today or tomorrow on a a 28 location chain.
21:58
Um, that one requires capital to open more locations.
22:04
So that one I'm like, I know where the capital's going, I see what the returns on capital are, let's get that, right?
22:08
If it's a national-based service business, so let's say it's uh, you know, mortgage sales.
22:14
Like they don't need there's no cap ex.
22:15
Like they just need recruiting new guys, right?
22:17
And that's how that's how sales can increase.
22:18
And so like that's where that's where where does the money like where's the money going and what is it used for?
22:24
Like cuz what I don't want to do is just like someone got to go buys a mansion after I write a check.
22:28
Like that's not the goal here.
22:30
Like the goal is that we're both together wanting to grow this massive thing.
22:33
Um, and so it just really depends on on what the what the nature of the deal is. So that's number one.
22:38
Um, in terms of of uh, how we structure them, uh, originally I had more of a grand slam offer type thing.
22:45
Now it's just much more straightforward of like we're at you know, we're equity holders in the business.
22:50
It's it's interesting cuz it's actually gotten less cute and less clever as time has gone on.
22:54
Like it's just much more like this is our deal.
22:58
Like we own a big chunk of the business um, and we're going to grow it.
23:03
And I mean the thing is is that for us based on my holdco costs, like I put 500,000 a year in labor into the businesses.
23:12
And like that's if I wanted to like not mark up labor. Like that's hard cost.
23:17
And so if a company for example, you know, is doing whatever, 5 million a year in EBITDA and I'm and I'm buying a you know, a 1/3 stake or a 40% stake in the business, like how like what am I valuing it at and how much of that value is going to come in the form in the form of of just work that we're going to do do?
23:37
And so that's where that's where the valuation and how much cash in etc.
23:41
kind of becomes more like per deal uh, basis.
23:44
But yeah, so the long story short is one is soft influence has been something that I've been learning.
23:49
We may in the future just do more majority deals.
23:52
Um, where the founder stays on because like what I want to do is show how much more we grew this I mean we do have obviously some minority ones that have crushed too, but like I I want to murder this majority deal and be like, wouldn't you like to have 49% of something 10 times bigger or 100 times bigger?
24:10
Uh, and so that's kind of the the the angle.
24:13
But yeah, we're we're learning every day.
24:15
We talked to uh, our good friend is Andrew Wilkins and he's done a similarish thing as you and then um, we've got a handful of other friends that have done something and they're like, well, I got really inspired when I read uh, this Warren Buffett book and that like taught me a little bit about compounding growth.
24:29
Uh, and other people have cited other books or things that they learned where they're like, oh no, this is the way to go and that's what I that's why I got into this. What about you?
24:37
What what transitioned you from going to this like almost PE model versus just one brand model?
24:43
Yeah, and I definitely if I were to if I were to give us a a name, it would be like a merger of a family office and a conglomerate.
24:49
Uh, because family office in that it's literally just family money.
24:51
Like I don't I don't have any outside investors and then conglomerate in terms of like our business model.
24:56
Like I'm not trying to exit anything.
24:58
I would like to continue to compound investments we have.
25:01
If a founder absolutely like needs to or wants to or you know, gets divorced and has to liquidate the asset then like we will go down that that that route, but long-term we're long-term holders.
25:12
Um, but in terms of the inspiration, um, it was actually because Jim Launch has there's only 50,000 micro gyms like in the US at least.
25:22
And we had already gotten on the phone with 20,000 of them.
25:26
So like if you're a micro gym owner, you know who we are, probably.
25:31
And I realized I went to this um, this little meet up of entrepreneurs and it was like six or seven people and the whole room was doing in aggregate like 500 million a year in revenue.
25:43
And I was all you know, I I think I were doing like mid-30s at the time and uh, I was like I I was really excited to go cuz I was like, what do these guys have that I don't have?
25:51
Like I wanted to you know, like what am what am I missing, right?
25:54
And we had been there for like 3 years.
25:56
We'd been mid-30s for 3 years and I felt like I was like something was wrong.
26:00
And the big takeaway I had was not that they had better systems or they had better marketing or better sales or better product.
26:04
They just were going after a bigger market.
26:07
Like every single one of them to a man had a market that was 10 to 100 times the size.
26:12
And so I said that whatever I wanted to do next was going to be was going to go after a much bigger market.
26:16
And there are significantly more businesses than there are gyms.
26:20
Uh, and so that was kind of the big thing.
26:22
I was like, okay, what's something that can compound forever and that has a huge TAM.
26:27
And so we kind of like walked backwards from there.
26:29
And then in terms of like the the doing this model, like we believe that people like build the people and the people build the business.
26:36
And so like Leila, you know, when we're it was like 18 months of ideation.
26:40
I know we're we're going full circle, but like how did we start the next day?
26:45
Well, these are the things that we're thinking through.
26:46
Um, and I said, Leila, if I were to die tomorrow, what what business would you start?
26:50
And she's like, I would try to recruit a firm.
26:51
You know, I was like, I don't want to start a recruiting firm.
26:54
I was like, huh, I want like is there a way that we could combine what you like and what I like into something cool?
26:59
And so for us like the most hands-on valuable thing that you can do for a business is find A players.
27:04
Because if you find A players, you put them in the business and they grow the business.
27:08
And then that value stays inside the enterprise of the business, not holdco, like not the goose but the egg, right?
27:14
And so for us, we just recruit Hormozi talent because we like our competitive mode is that we have more influence than they do.
27:22
And so we have a whole culture community of Hormozi talent where our head of people like continues to bring like we have tons of people every single day that are applying for portfolio positions and then we can screen them, vet them and then because we know the company and because we're long-term incentivized, we don't just want to like put a body in a seat.
27:42
We want to find the killer that we know that if we that we we we want we want to fill the role once, right?
27:45
We want to fill it with somebody who matches the culture and matches the skill set of the business at this level.
27:51
So lots of times like first-time entrepreneurs, they're at whatever, a million a month and they're like, okay, do I hire a bookkeeper?
27:56
Do I hire a staff accountant? Do I hire a controller? Do I hire a CFO?
28:00
Do I hire a director of finance?
28:01
Like where like who am I hiring right now?
28:04
And what does that person look like?
28:08
And so like we've done this enough times to be like, okay, at this level you probably need a controller who has experience going from a million a month to 3 million a month and right, and like at that point they and we'll tell them up front that we will bring a CFO who has transaction experience in the future so they're not jostled when that happens, right?
28:23
Same thing they're scaling out the sales team.
28:25
They're like, okay, well, I've got three good guys.
28:28
It's like, cool, we need 20.
28:28
So like you can't just take your best closer and make him manager cuz he's never done this before.
28:33
So we want somebody who's built at least one or two sales teams specific to let's say it's inbound or might be outbound.
28:38
It depends on like the sales process of the business and they've built these types of teams and like, cool, we'll bring that guy in.
28:43
We have our playbooks and we say, hey, on our interview process we're like, this is how we do things. Do you align with that?
28:48
And if we do feel like there's alignment and they can they they have the chops cuz we do skill tests, then we can say, hey, I think that you'll match.
28:55
And obviously the founder still has final say because they have to like the person otherwise it's not going to work.
28:59
Um, but we do a lot of that heavy lifting cuz you know, we might take 100 interviews at holdco to find one one guy for one specific role for one company.
29:08
And that's where that labor cost comes in for us.
29:09
But mostly put like the reason we took majority and I took majority, bought majority of the of that business was we had built the entire executive team.
29:21
We built the entire executive team and we're like, okay, cool.
29:22
And the founder was like, you know what?
29:24
I kind of want to do other things with the business.
29:26
Like I know it's in good hands. I trust you guys.
29:28
And so it was like a very friendly deal and now he just gets checks every month and like likes his life a lot and we just continue to run the business, which we're cool with.
29:38
There's this really cool video where you're with Grant Cardone and I think you were like in the process or pre uh, process for selling Jim Launch and you're like and he said something like rich people sell their companies, wealthy people never sell.
29:52
And cool is that I've sold a company before, Sean has sold some companies before, you've sold a company.
29:59
What's so funny is a lot of first-time founders and second, third time, maybe a lot of people their whole business is selling, but after they sell, they go through this period and they're like, [ __ ] I shouldn't sell ever again actually.
30:11
And you said you sold the business for 47 million.
30:15
You said you had taken 40 million in distributions.
30:16
So in my head I'm like, that's a pretty [ __ ] sale then.
30:20
Do you wish that you would have just held onto it and and and never sold that that company? No.
30:29
Because the person I was then wouldn't be able to do what I can do today.
30:33
Could I do that Could I say today would I hold onto it? Yes.
30:38
But I don't think I could have done it then.
30:41
And so a lot of the reason like transparently if I had I got more credibility from selling Jim Launch at 46 and it was valued at 150 before COVID.
30:48
So to your point it was a [ __ ] sale. Um but I was done.
30:51
I was emotionally done with the business.
30:54
I just didn't want to do it anymore.
30:55
I still own a third of the business.
30:56
So like when they crush the exit the next exit at 250 million, I'll still get my $100 million check from that.
31:03
Um but I was I was emotionally I'd moved on.
31:06
And my big thing is like all my friends, all my close people were like, dude, you sound depressed as [ __ ] Like you're not interested I was like, dude, I want to do this new thing.
31:16
They're like, dude, you light up when you talk about this new thing.
31:17
And so um I actually walked away from the deal during the deal process and then came back.
31:24
Uh and so like yeah, it was not like it's funny cuz people give me a lot of I I'm glad you brought it up cuz a lot of people give me praise for that, but they don't have the context.
31:30
Like get what like, you know, we had done we'd done 30 million in EBITDA the two the 24 months prior to do the deal.
31:40
So like, you know, selling at 46.
31:40
2 is not like like I I told them I needed to be public about the number because I do know that the vast majority people don't get it.
31:49
Um and then that's that is enough to give me credibility for [ __ ] Tik Tok.
31:52
Um but it's not like the transaction itself is not necessarily one that I'm like proud of.
31:58
I'm proud of what we built and that the continue the company's grown 40% since we sold it.
32:04
Um I said they're going to kill on that deal.
32:05
But now that I also understand how debt works, which I didn't understand that like again this is like knowing versus experiencing, like I understood that they were going to get debt, but when I realized that 80 or 90% of the money that they put in they then just immediately would write back out leveraging the company's books.
32:23
I was like, well, [ __ ] I could have kept the whole [ __ ] thing and gotten 90% of the money not personally guaranteed and de-risk myself.
32:33
But would that have created the same story of something that is sellable from a personal brand perspective?
32:37
And I think the answer is no.
32:38
And so um I don't regret the sale.
32:41
I think the sale was required for that step in my journey.
32:45
I think that now because we have the credibility like no one cared that I'd taken 40 million in distributions.
32:52
No one gave a [ __ ] Like it didn't matter.
32:53
Like the day I sold my neighbors were like, oh, I saw you on Forbes. Like congratulations.
32:57
I was like, I was richer before I did the transaction.
33:02
Like I was wealthier before that point.
33:04
Um but like it allowed us to do acquisition.
33:07
com cuz I don't think I could have cuz my my brand was still so I was still the CEO as far as people were concerned of that company and I needed to have that space so that I could create Acquisition. com.
33:21
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33:21
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33:23
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33:29
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33:32
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33:36
Sean, would you have done What do you think?
33:38
Would you have done that?
33:39
I I think he explained it beautifully.
33:39
I think he explained it exactly beautifully and honestly, which was that two two things he just said that I resonate deeply with me.
33:47
One is the last thing you just said, which is to have what you want, sometimes you just need to make space.
33:53
And so this is like I learned this through relationships.
33:55
Uh you're dating somebody, you kind of they're not exactly what you want. They're not bad.
34:00
There's nothing wrong There's nothing terrible about it.
34:01
So most people just stick with it for years and years and years and then they're kind of like, well, if there was like a much better option, then yeah, like I would feel more comfortable just like going being single.
34:13
But I've always been very quick to just If I know this isn't it, I'll break up.
34:17
I don't need to have another great option ready or or like shown to me to make it real.
34:23
I know that if I make space, then great things can appear.
34:26
And then sometimes you just got to do that like I've taken like when we sold Bebo, it was the same thing.
34:31
I had I'd been doing this thing for six or seven years and the business was doing okay at that point.
34:38
It thought like, you know, but in my heart of hearts I knew this is never going to be massive.
34:41
And we'd all gone into that business with a basically like, yo, let's do something massive.
34:45
So by other people's standards it might have been a good business.
34:48
By our our own mission, it was going to be a failure. I knew that.
34:51
And so it was when I was out with a friend and he was like, I don't get what you're doing.
34:55
You And he's like, you just need to shake things up.
34:58
And um you know, I was shook. I couldn't sleep. I was like, he's right.
35:01
Like I've been doing this for too long.
35:04
I need to shake things up.
35:04
And so I went into our our investor the next day and I just said um I think it's time we change things up.
35:10
I said, I need to change things up.
35:12
I said, you you know, if you want to keep going, uh I will help you hire a CEO and you can take have somebody else take this over.
35:20
I'll give you back my shares.
35:22
I don't need a thing from this.
35:22
Like I I I will do whatever I can. Or give me 30 days.
35:27
I'm going to see if I can sell. Or I'm out.
35:30
Like those are the This is Either way in 30 days this is going to change for me.
35:34
I've I've just decided to make space basically to for something.
35:38
He's like, well, what do you want to do next?
35:38
And uh I was like, I've no idea.
35:41
Like he's like, well, no, really.
35:41
Like, you know, usually people when they're you know, they they come to me, it's cuz they already kind of lined up something else.
35:47
I was like, no, honestly, I have no idea.
35:48
I just know that I need to make some space.
35:51
And so that part resonates with me and also the idea of like you like when I look back now and I'm like, oh, like before I sold our company, if I didn't if my company wasn't going to be the next big thing, I would just shut it down.
36:03
Literally just turn it off, take a zero on it.
36:07
And then I just start looking around and I learned this word acquire in Silicon Valley.
36:10
I was like, oh, people just sell failing companies?
36:12
And then I learned like, you know, they asset sale.
36:13
Oh, you could just sell the code and the assets?
36:17
Like wait, people Who are these buyers?
36:19
And I didn't even really understand what my options were.
36:23
And so when you talked about basically I could have refinanced I could have just refinanced based on the business assets, took 90% of the value.
36:28
I felt that same like stupidity later. But like that's life.
36:31
Life is basically looking back and being like, I was such an idiot.
36:35
And that's how I mark years of time, not by like the calendar days, but by number of times I look back and say, God, I was so dumb.
36:40
I didn't even understand this.
36:42
I was sitting on something I didn't even really I didn't really know what I should I Now knowing what I know now, I know exactly what I should have done.
36:48
And at that time I didn't even I wasn't even aware that I was making a mistake.
36:51
Well, the difference is like I think that we all us three actually have done were we are tacticians.
36:57
So like I understand how to grow [ __ ] and I understand like you build this page, you do this thing, you write these words, here's the customer, you talk to them, whatever.
37:07
I think the the the gap you have to bridge is becoming a from tactics to strategy.
37:11
And I used to like make fun of all my buddies who were in finance.
37:15
I'm like, dude, you're just like an Excel monkey. You don't know anything.
37:18
Like you just this stupid [ __ ] head trying to maybe makes money, but you don't know [ __ ] And then I realized like when they talk about debt and stuff, I was like, I'm not going to pay attention to any of that cuz I think that's stupid.
37:26
And then I realized how it starts working and I'm like, oh my god, that's how the strategy.
37:31
So it's like that's the strategy and that and I was like, oh, I used to think I'm I've got good vision.
37:37
I understand how this [ __ ] works.
37:37
And then I realized how money worked a little bit more with debt and borrowing other people's money to do this and like taking money off the table and all of these like terms that I kind of heard about, but I didn't exactly understand.
37:48
I realized, If I'm going to be like really good at my job, I I got to be good I got to understand the tactics, you really also have to understand the strategy, which Alex, it seems like you're actually now now you get the strategy of how money and business works, not just the tactics, which the whole $100 million offer book, which I wrote I think it's awesome. That's mostly tactical.
38:06
But the strategic [ __ ] is what you're saying of like, oh, you can borrow other people's money and to do this.
38:12
That That's some big picture [ __ ] Yeah, without a personal guarantee.
38:16
So cuz a lot of people are like, why don't I have debt on the business?
38:18
Cuz I don't want to risk that.
38:19
I was like, you are not risking it.
38:21
Like the business is risking it.
38:23
And if you're willing to do a sale for X, it's like, well, are you willing to do like cuz the business is going to take the risk on either way.
38:29
I mean, depending on the acquirer, but if you're selling to private equity like I know you have a lot of a bigger tech audience, but I probably have a bigger like uh like certain like I would say everyday business audience, you know, guys who have massive roofing businesses or, you know, a huge chain of, you know, teeth whitening studios.
38:44
You hear me like just just those types of businesses are the ones that tend to to follow more of my stuff.
38:48
And like that's usually going to be a roll-up or a private equity acquirer for the most part, right?
38:53
Maybe a strategic if you like have another big teeth whitening chain that wants to buy you, but like that's about it.
38:57
Um and I I think I I resonate with what you said, Sam.
39:02
I always thought those guys like I was like, you don't even understand business.
39:04
And I to a degree I actually don't think they understand business, but they understand the macro level of business.
39:09
And I think where you get really dangerous is when you know both. Totally. play both games.
39:13
Like you can because what they do, they own almost purely inorganic growth.
39:17
They try and staple [ __ ] together that, okay, we bought four companies that do, you know, 3 million in EBITDA and so now we have 12 million in EBITDA and we're going to have some equity arbitrage and we're going to be able to sell this thing for whatever.
39:30
Yeah, saddle them up with debt.
39:30
And then it's just then it's just a math equation.
39:32
Like it doesn't even matter about growing the businesses.
39:33
But it's like, what if do that and you could also triple all the businesses.
39:38
And then it's like that's when you create these like breathtaking home runs.
39:40
And that's kind of what I mean that's what we're trying to do with that acquisition and I don't I don't have I don't have a I don't have a a huge need for more money unless it's a an enormous like there's nothing I can do I'm I'm Have you ever heard Have you ever heard Felix Dennis's like how to be rich?
39:58
I think that's the name of the book. Yeah. We love it.
40:02
We talk about that table a lot like the comfortably poor, you know, comfortably rich then you get to like rich rich.
40:06
It super resonated with me.
40:08
It's like I'm the I'm the the comfortably rich.
40:12
But like not the super rich, not the like so like everybody here we can all consume whatever we want.
40:17
So we can fly on whatever planes we would like you know, you can fly private, you can stay in the nicest hotels, get the nicest Airbnbs, go out to dinner every single night of the week at the five-star restaurant, at the Michelin star.
40:28
And you can do that for the rest of your life.
40:29
Like you your personal needs as a human being are satisfied.
40:33
But I can't go buy that skyscraper right there.
40:38
And I can't buy that this huge company.
40:40
And so what happens is like the things that you want to buy change.
40:42
And so you create a new deficit for the amount of wealth that you want.
40:46
Again, this is just assuming you like the game.
40:47
And so like I like the game and so I just want to keep playing it.
40:50
The the funny thing is that what you actually like is just playing the game and if you just said, well, I'm rich enough then you'd have to stop playing the game you really love.
40:59
And so instead you start to come up with like things you want that in actuality sound a little bit silly.
41:03
It's like I actually I don't even think you want that skyscraper or to buy that I don't even think that's actually what motivates you.
41:08
It's just that I'm actually peaked loving the game right now and the game only works if you care about the score.
41:17
And so you know, it it is impossible to put to enjoy that you can't play the game if you've said I've already scored the maximum number of points.
41:22
Then the game becomes kind of silly.
41:24
And so it's funny like this is with all of our friends.
41:27
It's like well, why are you doing this?
41:29
Don't you you kind of got enough money, man.
41:30
And it's like yeah, but I don't have enough enjoyment.
41:34
The enjoyment of the game is infinite and the thing I enjoy the most is playing this game.
41:37
And you know, I'm so I'm going to continue playing but in order to do so I have to like construct these silly like dreams that that I'm not even sure I really care as much about as far as just playing the game.
41:49
Dude, that was huge and as a side note it's like if you think of there's there's kind of like I feel like two ways you can create a deficit, right?
41:55
So one is like you can create a financial deficit by saying like I want this thing.
41:58
It's cost a billion dollars and so I need to go make a billion dollars.
42:01
There's my deficit to where I am where I want to go.
42:04
The other side is what I was saying like when you asked like what are you like excited about cuz I already said like what are the worst parts but like I'll tell you what's what's good right now.
42:10
Is that we have finally separated Mosey Media, which is basically like my my Layla personal brand and like the the content we put out.
42:17
I would say the books kind of fall under that like the courses, the books, all the materials we give out to to Mosey Media.
42:22
And so what we originally were saying when we started acquisition.
42:25
com is that the mission was to make real business knowledge accessible to everyone.
42:28
Like that was the that was the mission of the company.
42:32
And that is still very much the mission of Mosey Media.
42:34
What we realized is that Holdco team.
42:36
So like our ex-consultants are our people who who recruit talent, our heads of sales who build out sales teams, our heads of marketing who build out marketing departments and marketing functions, our head of customer success who build out product and the client experience etc.
42:47
Like those people didn't really resonate with making business education accessible to everyone.
42:52
Like that wasn't actually like what their mission was.
42:55
And so we got really clear on what the mission of acquisition.
42:58
com is, which is and this kind of came organically.
43:02
So it's like really exciting for me.
43:04
But one of the things I've always envied about Elon is that like every company he gets involved in basically saves the world.
43:10
They're like what He finds a way to tie the mission of what he's doing to saving the world.
43:14
So even Twitter he was like free civilization needs free speech and then it's like boom.
43:20
I was like man, how did he take a meme platform with tweets of arrogant dudes, you know what I mean?
43:27
And turn it into you know, free speech for civilization.
43:29
Like that's where I think a lot of his genius is.
43:32
Um And so for us I was like what's that thing?
43:34
And so we have the external gap of like yeah, I want to hit the billion or whatever.
43:39
Um but I think the internal one is that we want to build a company off of praise and not punishment.
43:44
And so we have this huge thing in terms of how we try to build things is like you can punish people or you can praise them and we believe that you get more performance out of praise.
43:52
Now you look at Goldman Sachs, look at JP Morgan, look at McKinsey, look at Bain, look at these massive companies, even some of these like huge ones and it's a lot of people are like man, it's a toxic toxic work environment.
44:01
It's really hard blah blah blah.
44:02
And so these are usually punishment driven cultures.
44:04
And so we want to And so what's what's happened is like by doing that that has aligned all of our Holdco team in terms of how we want to build these companies and the billion dollar Alex mark is basically irrelevant because like to really win by their standards we need to build something that's 10 or 50 or 100 billion. You know what I mean?
44:26
And that might take the rest of my lifetime and it'll probably happen after I die.
44:28
But if we can do that then we can prove one thesis, which is like people want to work and most environments are set up to punish people.
44:36
And all you do is you raise the bar of what it takes to not get punished.
44:40
But what happens is people churn out of work, they burn out, they hate their jobs, they hate their lives and I think that there's a better way and Layla and I are are going to try and dedicate the rest of our lives to trying to prove that.
44:49
And so that is the mission of acquisition.
44:51
com and what we do with the companies and we can show that that it's not just like fluffy stuff.
44:57
And I think if it were just Layla it'd be a woman driven thing.
44:59
People would be like oh, it's a girl who's saying you should be nice to people.
45:01
But I think I given how I look, how I talk, I can probably deliver that message.
45:06
And it may take the rest of my life to do it but like I haven't felt like [ __ ] amped about anything in a long time.
45:12
The last time I was this pumped was when the mission of Gym Launch was to take the gym industry from its knees to its feet because the average gym owner takes home $36,000 a year in personal income.
45:23
And has like maxed out credit cards and has like 18 days of cash on hand and I was like I want to fix this.
45:27
And what ended up happening is like I cuz I wasn't emotionally mature enough.
45:33
Um I took enough licks from people really close to me, both clients and employees.
45:37
Um that I just like I just needed to put distance.
45:40
Like I had 17 different people work for me try to start their version of my business. You know what I mean?
45:46
I had clients trying to you know, like start their like because it was a it was a business based on consulting, right?
45:52
It was a consulting business.
45:53
So like once you had kind of like models you could in theory try and compete with us.
45:56
Now no one has succeeded.
45:58
Um but it was enough that I was like dude, you were bankrupt.
46:04
And like and like on the brink of divorce and used all of my stuff and then like you scaled to three locations and sold them and now your family's financially set up and like now you want to attack me?
46:13
Like it happened enough times and then you kick me?
46:15
This is how I get repaid for this? That's how it felt. That's how it felt.
46:20
And so I wasn't I like I think now I can handle it a lot better.
46:23
But at the time I just like I felt so disenfranchised.
46:25
I just felt honestly cuz I really poured my soul into trying to fix the gym industry.
46:31
And so when I felt that way we created space and then it just became an asset we owned and that's why I was open to selling it.
46:37
Um but like I haven't felt like that until now.
46:40
It's so funny you mentioned the Elon big mission thing.
46:42
Like this guy he did it with Twitter too, which was really funny and then while he was doing that deal news came out it's like oh, Elon Musk impregnates like this woman who worked for him and he's like and he was like he's like overpopulation underpopulation and we we're at risk of population collapse.
47:00
It's actually the biggest risk of all.
47:02
And he's like I'm just doing my part. This guy is Teflon Don.
47:04
Like how did he get away with this?
47:07
He spun that [ __ ] like like he did a like a 540 on that thing spinning that to be like actually actually I was also saving the planet with that one too. You're welcome. I was like this man.
47:23
Like what's that thing they call it where it's like just like the male male [ __ ] Like the abilities for some some men to just absolutely [ __ ] their way out of everything and Elon's got that.
47:34
Like he is the world he is the world leader in that.
47:36
I think there's wisdom in it though.
47:38
Like in terms of like cuz even thinking if I wanted to create a stronger narrative cuz like I'm already amped about this narrative but like again it's I think there's there's power in reframing what you do to be something that aligns with humanity.
47:50
Cuz to be fair, doesn't matter what you do.
47:53
If like you if you if you chunk up enough like people need food. Right?
47:58
You want to feed humanity.
47:58
Like people like a lot like a lot of these things that are necessary for civilization all like chunked up enough like are pillars of society.
48:04
Yeah, it's all what story you're telling yourself because then you'll tell that story to others.
48:10
And if that story serves you then then great.
48:11
I mean I think I personally I think this is the Silicon Valley like uh what like PTSD or whatever where it's like anytime I hear a mission statement I'm like just shut the [ __ ] up. Like tell the truth. You want to make money. Great.
48:25
You want your own life value to increase and you realized that in order for you to get that value you had to create more value in the world.
48:30
And so you identified some people that needed something.
48:35
You provided that value in spades.
48:38
Whether that was dentists need better software or that's you know, the world needs a social network or we want to send disappearing photos back and forth to each other's phones.
48:46
Like you know, you hear Evan Spiegel like you go look at the original landing page it of Snapchat or the emails that he sent to the sororities and fraternities where he's just like the landing page is like two chicks in a white bikini like kind of like do like taking like a naughty selfie basically and then there there's a giant timer where like the the the the photo's going to disappear.
49:07
And same thing when he's emailing the the frats and sororities telling me he's not saying I'm trying to you know, reinvent the way that humans communicate.
49:15
Actually, you know, 75% of our brains is wired for images, not text.
49:18
And so I wanted to make a messaging app that was image based and that you know, and and then you hear him do the the pitch and he's like um you know, for too long images have only been used for memories.
49:28
been used for memories. But I wanted to use images for communication the way we originally did with hieroglyphics and [ __ ] It's like bro, it's okay that you thought this app was fun and cool and like that it might be a hit and it took off in like you know these like schools and because people wanted to get around you know their teachers or parents being able to see photos in their camera roll
49:48
like that's okay and but they always do this they always tie it back to some kind of now it's the D word it's democratized oh yeah we're going to democratize access to private limos really it was really like and then of course what does it become right as the marketing teams get in there and the consultants get in there they're like we're we're our mission at Uber is to make transportation as readily available
50:12
as running water that's because that became their mission statement it sounds [ __ ] awesome but it was amazing but it must be really you didn't start and literally the early stories of anybody who knew Travis and Garrett at Uber was like they'd be like dude check this out push a button while they're at the at their like Michelin star dinner and be like watch this car shows up and they're like yeah that's really baller right I
50:35
could see where he's at on the map like this is amazing this is my private driver you know I summon him through my app and it's like there's a there's always to me like the disconnect between what I think the truth is which is a little bit skeptical and jaded and then like the revisionist history story that like sounds really admirable and noble and like I personally have just come down and I've landed on like
50:57
I'm okay with the truth I get that human nature we're kind of just primal animals and it's okay you seek pleasure you avoid pain you like status and you you know you don't want to be low status like it's okay but Alex is Alex is like mission so like you know Alex maybe it started like the mission of our company is to get your money and to put it in our bank accounts you know what I mean like we're changing our bank account one
51:24
dollar at a time and we're starting with your dollar by the time you get our dollar like I cuz inevitably or I imagine it started with I just want to get rich and do dope [ __ ] and then it changed to you know this pretty grand thing of changing work through instead of using praise and when did that change I think it's a yes and so Sean I'm like like the bullshitometer etc like I full-heartedly hear you on that and I
51:54
think that one is that the truth can change and what I mean by that is because it's not like we're not talking about a fact we're talking about truth of of why someone does something and so like why someone does something can change so like when I started gym launch I've said this like the mission of gym launch was to not be broke like that was the mission of gym launch but what happened is after I saw the lives that
52:17
got transformed from it and I was no longer broke the mission had to change because I had accomplished that mission so the mission had to get bigger in order to continue to expand that because I had families who relied on me employees etc customers and so it did truly become to take its knees knees to from its knees to its gym industry from its knees to its feet right and so like acquisition.com started with the thing
52:34
acquisition.com started with the thing that I was passionate about because the only thing I was passionate about was just spreading like good business like I love to talk about business it's like my favorite thing in the whole world I don't think about business I write books about business I make courses about business I make content about business
52:45
like and then I do business in the meantime like I [ __ ] love business and so that was the only thing that I felt passionate about and so that's what I made the mission about but as we've walked the path realizing that like the reason the businesses have done really well for us is because of the cultures that we create and we believe that those cultures
53:02
create better businesses and honestly also better working environment like generate really good bottom line but also really great experiences for the people who who work there and so like I haven't been amped about it and so like the truth of why I want to go there now and now I see that a much bigger picture than I did when we started it two or three years ago
53:20
I think that I think your reasons evolve and so I think that it makes sense that I think it's both honestly like every speaker's personal goals he was like he had transferred money from that person's account to his to the degree that he could buy whatever he wanted and so I think you just think more about it and you're like why do I want to do this cuz you have to have a
53:39
reason otherwise you just you go into a ball of nothingness and so yeah well look I mean in the I think the best way to actually learn that we were talking about the last episode we talked about what's the restaurant John Panda Express guy yeah yeah and then and we were like you know he he just sells like orange chicken like that's not exactly inspiring but like
54:01
he he he employs like 20,000 people and he like gives these guys I think he we were talking about I have my notes here he gives them all like he pays a little bit for them to go to Tony Robbins he gives them like the thinking grow rich books and like all these books and he's like yeah like the whole chicken [ __ ] like that's kind of cool and all but
54:17
like I'm actually like taking an hourly wage worker and we're trying to like elevate them and so I'm like oh I can get behind that I'm I'm in on that and if you look at like a lot non-tech or non-Silicon Valley companies who employ like 30,000 people and they're like yeah you know we sell tires and that's cool but I'm really just trying to like we we we create jobs and that's very
54:35
fascinating and that's really exciting and that's cool and it's better for the economy or like you know some of these like really boring brick and mortar brick and mortar businesses I think that's actually where you see a lot of really cool missions or like if you have read the have you ever read about the Koch brothers they got oh you mean Koch like Koch Industries
54:52
yeah yeah yeah yeah Koch Industries so basically started with the dad he was like an oil guy and then they used the byproduct of creating oil to create all types of plastics and whatever and so now it's arguably it goes back and forth of the biggest privately owned company in America and he was like no like my whole thing is like freedom for people you know and I want to like teach
55:12
them that they have autonomy and like through working here he's got a whole book on his management systems and he's like more so what I'm inspired about is like is like giving empowering people and so anyway when I read about those like older companies I actually think that that's a bit more inspiring than like some dork saying that he's changing the
55:30
world one like computer chip at time when it's like I don't know like that's not exactly inspiring you know what I mean maybe it hasn't played out yet like if Bill Gates said he like when he started was like I want to have a computer and everyone's like okay and then he did it and so I think I think part of it is also like what snapshot on the timeline are we looking at but dude
55:48
I 100% agree with you said like I love I like because basically it shifts from internal to external like in the beginning you do it for you obviously you do it cuz you get you get praise instead of punished like you have good thing more good [ __ ] than bad [ __ ] so you keep doing it but once the thing that was good no longer like the diminishing return of the pleasure of
56:07
more money isn't there anymore then you have to find a new you find a new goal like you said and then and if also coincides with other people being motivated by not making Alex rich but by proving a point that we can create companies that reward instead of punish and actually have better returns like I'm juiced and like we haven't proved it yet that's fine we haven't proved it yet we will
56:29
I want to ask you two two questions the first is around people you admire so we talked about the Panda Express guy on our on just our own last episode cuz we were featuring it was like crazy rich Asians basically was the theme of the episode and then it turns out he lives near you or whatever like you know you're both in Vegas who are some people that you admire so
56:51
I always find this interesting to hear who kind of like stands out and why for for for different folks so who are some people that you admire either past or present you know people that you've met cuz I know that this kind of like getting famous on YouTube thing opens up a bunch of doors you meet a bunch of cool people that like you otherwise you
57:08
expand your circle of people you you get to know through this stuff so who are some people that you admire well I definitely admire Andrew Cherng from Panda Express cuz they're a married couple that built this whole thing and they didn't they never took out outside money and they've owned the whole thing privately they have 2600 locations they do 3.7 billion a year with 27% net
57:24
do 3.7 billion a year with 27% net margins and they take 935 million dollars a year in personal income and I think that's only possible because they have created a new vision for what they wanted the company to be about which is
57:34
about their employees I am inspired by Warren Buffett you know what I mean I mean I I I am because of the long-term mentality he has and he built Berkshire Hathaway and in some ways I feel like he he built it he's like a beautiful life story of like
57:47
just believing in the power of compounding and patience and like that's what I feel like his virtues are that he's demonstrated in rational decision-making I I would say that for us it's like if we can build something like that but just with our own our own spin our own zest which is around praise and punishment and building companies that like we can win by their scoreboard but we do it our way so that's that the Warren angle and I mean I
58:09
admire Elon a lot a ton you know just like what we're talking about earlier like his ability to see vision and connect to a larger mission he's seen he's been able to masterfully do that every single company he's been a part of
58:19
and his track record's incredibly [ __ ] impressive and he just continues to like defy the laws of like what seems to be like normal or possible over and over and over again and so I think just like how he just like stares into the abyss and
58:31
says like let's do it I think that's something that I really really admire yeah obviously has flaws like all of us do but I think he also has been really good about like owning his flaws and being public about that he's just a human and I think he may create a new
58:44
model for how big public CEOs run and maybe that you know maybe we're in the beginning of of that world and and I think on the totally other side of the coin I think I admire what like Mr. Beast has done from a personal branding
58:57
Beast has done from a personal branding perspective I've been able to to get to know him really well and uh and Jim's Jim thinks really big and has a tremendous work ethic and I think seeing the merge like seeing where all these things are like Elon has been able to build a personal brand and you know in a lot of ways like if you're a fan of Elon you want to buy all of the things
59:19
but he just happens to have enormous monetization vehicles and to your point Sam about like how they use like yeah sure we make tires yeah sure we sell orange chicken I guess in a lot of ways I see like all the companies that we have in acquisition that comes to give, of course we transact, we build businesses, but like the reason we do it is this and I think that's um really dope. And so
59:36
And so that's that's like those are probably that like if you were to if you're to mix like what are the things that I'm drawing inspiration from at Earn, it's a and if you look at what we're doing it probably would make sense to see all three of those as the three biggest kind of influencers. You got like Mr.
59:49
Beast on personal brand side here, you've got Warren Buffett on the investment side and then Elon from like the big vision and I feel like those three things are probably where I draw the most inspiration from in terms of like our day-to-day and what we're trying to do.
1:00:01
What's interesting about you is that you're pretty good at you're very catchy.
1:00:05
So like the whole knees to feet thing is is pretty awesome.
1:00:10
Um and then uh what was the line for your current company?
1:00:12
It was uh reward versus punish. Yep.
1:00:14
Uh you're pretty Yeah, we would have beat them we would have beat them at their game and we would do it our way.
1:00:21
Well, you said we want to beat them on we want to use their scoreboard but do it our way.
1:00:25
So you've got your quite lyrical.
1:00:26
Um you've also done a few there's like actually a handful of things that you've talked about very uh like casually that I've caught on to that I really like.
1:00:35
So for example, you say you say dessert what do you say dessert every day or something? Never skip dessert.
1:00:40
Never skip dessert and then you also because your whole like dieting thing is you eat all of your protein earlier on and then you're like all right, now I have uh I fat and carbs I we can go big on those.
1:00:52
Uh and like you've done like a few things outside of business that I find like almost more impressive or actually use on my daily life more so than your business stuff which I actually found is pretty funny.
1:01:05
Uh you also have I don't know if you've seen this Sean but if you Google like there's this like 23-year-old Alex who does a thing where he's like I'm going to do a bulk over the next like eight weeks and he has like before during and after photos and like that stuff I look at significantly more than a lot of your business stuff.
1:01:22
I find that some of your fitness uh and diet stuff like more interesting and applicable in my day-to-day life than the business stuff.
1:01:30
Um I'm shocked that like a living.
1:01:30
For like I Like I I joked about it in the comments once.
1:01:35
I was like people like admire our like who my way of thinking about things in business and I was like for a decade I did that with fitness.
1:01:42
I just don't talk about it because everyone feels entitled to opinion because they have a body.
1:01:48
And I just and I hate I hate getting into the they're like well what about salt?
1:01:52
I'm like dude just [ __ ] off.
1:01:52
Like just you know what I mean?
1:01:54
Like I have I have so little patience for it cuz I'm like look at you and like if you were more in shape and by the way no one who's been more in shape than me has ever criticized any of the content I ever made.
1:02:06
It's just like people who are wealthier than you never say [ __ ] about business advice.
1:02:09
Like about you know what I mean?
1:02:10
Like no one ahead of you ever shits on Well, the cool thing about it is like I I use the fitness analogy a ton in business because I'm like well, it's hard but it's simple and that if you lift this much weight and eat like this
1:02:22
for a year, you're not necessarily going to look like Arnold or be lean or whatever but you're going to be pretty good or better than where you are now and you just got to do it for like two years and you got to like be fairly strict about it. Um so like that's why
1:02:34
Um so like that's why the carryover is quite fun watching you do both of those things. Yeah, I appreciate it.
1:02:40
Yeah, I mean simple not easy I feel like it's the it's a [ __ ] theme of of so many things.
1:02:46
Like fitness, nutrition, marriage, business like simple to do or simple simple to understand conceptually, very hard to do.
1:02:52
What's the simple not easy for marriage?
1:02:54
I mean I think it's it's it's reward more than you punish.
1:03:00
I mean it it actually comes down to that.
1:03:01
So like okay, if I want my wife to scratch my back more, I have to wait until she scratches my back of her own volition and then I have to reward her immediately and then she will want reward more and so she will do it again.
1:03:13
Uh and then and I reward again and reward again. Very Pavlovian of you.
1:03:18
Well, yeah, I mean I think we're all that. You know what I mean?
1:03:19
I think fun fundamentally there's three things you can do when anyone does anything around you is that you can punish them for doing it, you can ignore that they did it or you can praise them for doing it.
1:03:28
I've never heard um the Tony Robbins like I forget what he calls it but it's like the four uh the four styles of being in a relationship.
1:03:37
He is there something like this?
1:03:38
I don't know have you heard this thing?
1:03:39
It's like um the first one uh let me see if I can remember it off the top of my head.
1:03:43
So basically he goes uh you know first first one's like a baby.
1:03:45
It's like I need love and I don't have to give anything to you.
1:03:48
So it's just like I cry, you give and that's it.
1:03:49
Like uh you better be happy with that arrangement.
1:03:53
So that's like one relationship you can have one style of relationship you can have and that obviously like doesn't work out very well once you're an adult.
1:03:59
Um you can't just cry, expect to be given everything you want and then not have to do anything in return.
1:04:05
Because that's the baby love. So that's baby love.
1:04:09
Then he has uh the next one which is basically tit for tat.
1:04:11
So it's this where almost everybody falls into.
1:04:14
So this is probably going to sound familiar to at least to like to an extent and it is probably the root of all problems in relationships is tit for tat which is you measure what you get and then you give based on that.
1:04:24
When you're when you're giving a lot, you give a lot but then as soon as somebody breaks the cycle and they short you consciously or unconsciously they they don't do what you what you wanted, um you also withdraw or pull back some amount of giving and then they reciprocate give they they also measure and pull back and both sides do that and you end up with a sort of a a race to the bottom.
1:04:43
And so that's tit for tat and that's where most people stand and they they just a cycle that resets over and over again.
1:04:49
Um the next one is unconditional love which is basically I give regardless of what you give back.
1:04:56
I give cuz that's who I am.
1:04:59
I give cuz that's how I that's how I want to roll in my relationship and I control what I control.
1:05:02
And obviously that's way better and like to me that's the simple not easy in of of being a relationship is just go go unconditional mode rather than tit for tat.
1:05:10
Um and then he has like some higher one which is monk monk love or something like that he calls it where it's like spiritual love.
1:05:16
It's like I love you even though you hate me.
1:05:18
Like a monk can be like I I I pray for and love even my enemies and those trying to hurt me.
1:05:23
And he's like you know nobody gets there but like that's aspirationally what you could what you could get to as well.
1:05:28
It is like you know the love like a monk who who loves even their enemies and those who would try to cause harm.
1:05:35
And so those that those are the the four levels of love I remembered.
1:05:39
Alex, do you ever So like I saw this video of you the other day and now everyone's like giving you a hard time or they're just teasing you in a good way about like your outfit cuz you wear the same clothing all the time.
1:05:47
So you made a funny video about it and you go instead of just saying oh comfortable, you go dude, I'm just more Darwinian than them.
1:05:56
These shorts, you want to go work out? I can go work out.
1:05:58
You want to go to a restaurant?
1:06:01
Yeah, that's that's what he said.
1:06:01
He goes you want to go swimming? These are waterproof.
1:06:04
You want to go out to a restaurant?
1:06:06
These look just good enough that I can go and do that. I can do anything. I can do anything.
1:06:09
I'm Darwinian, you're not. I win, you lose.
1:06:13
the shoes you had mentioned cuz you you were like these sandals these are the perfect sandal for working out, running through you know like walking through rain, climbing a hill or they like being at the office.
1:06:22
And in the comments everyone was like yo what's the sandal? What's the sandal?
1:06:25
Where's the affiliate link?
1:06:26
We can't find it and then some dude like 50 comments down was like dude, that's what the it's this brand uh the the the nightshade color of this thing.
1:06:35
I was like all right, respect to this guy for finding it.
1:06:37
I'm going to go buy this thing.
1:06:40
Do but do do you ever like did your mom and dad ever like hey, quit being such a douche and just wear what we bought you because the be nice.
1:06:46
Like at what point do you like are you like this makes sense for me and also like it's good the brand um versus like live a little and like let's just [ __ ] around. Do you know what I mean?
1:06:59
Um yeah, like good for the brand is is actually not like really a thought when it comes to it.
1:07:03
Like I believe that it like brand comes as a result of rather than like conscious. You know what I mean?
1:07:08
Like like people were like so when did you think of never skip dessert?
1:07:11
I was like I was making fun of fitness people cuz my original audience was fitness people who obsessed about like not eating cookies and I was like [ __ ] off. You know what I mean?
1:07:18
Like eat dessert, you know what I mean?
1:07:20
But do it in a way that you have some six-pack all the time.
1:07:23
So that was why never skip dessert.
1:07:24
It was always like never skip leg day, never skip Monday.
1:07:25
I was like never skip dessert.
1:07:27
Um like the calves thing is because like I genuinely have started training I started I started every training session since since a girl told me that she thought that my calves weren't big uh since like 12 years, 14 years that I've I start every session with calves.
1:07:44
Um and so like my calves have grown a lot.
1:07:46
And so everyone's like uh Janet like my calves were sticks and I'd train the [ __ ] out.
1:07:51
So like is it part of my brand?
1:07:52
Yeah, because it's in some ways like it's true.
1:07:55
Yeah, thank you basically Lindsay.
1:07:55
14 years of fuel you gave me.
1:07:59
And it's the the outfit thing is actually because my it's my content team that wanted to make content about it because they're like dude, you're a [ __ ] maniac with this.
1:08:07
Like I feel like people should know this cuz everyone who knows you like in person knows that like like when they walked in for like almost a year and a half, there was a stacks of shoe boxes and I would wear different shoes for a day, an hour a day, a week and they kind of graduated to like if they're good enough I can walk around the apartment, then I'll walk around for their day.
1:08:28
If I can walk around with them for a week and I still like them and most of them never got there.
1:08:32
So I have a few finalists that got to that point but like I think I just like obsessed about making things better.
1:08:37
Same things like if I do end up doing a you know if if there is a good enough company that does no strips, like I'm going to iterate the product a bunch of times until I think it's absolutely untouchable.
1:08:45
And then I'll say this is the one I use and I can say that I say that with confidence because I I did the the work on it.
1:08:51
For me, I hate I just hate having to change.
1:08:53
Like I don't know what it is.
1:08:55
It's like it means that I started my day like not thinking about what I was going to do.
1:08:58
So I was like okay, well, if I can create it a setup or a uniform for myself that I can be in the most environments.
1:09:04
So for me I'm really never in less than 40 degree weather like ever cuz I usually tend to be in warmer spots of the country in general.
1:09:13
And so like this this outfit goes 40 to 120 degrees.
1:09:16
And so and I can go to the gym, I can go to the pool, I can walk for hours, I can walk all day, I can go to a nice restaurant.
1:09:24
I can do all these things so cuz if they need But that's crazy because your wife, who I've seen, she dresses lovely.
1:09:29
She like it's it's fashionable.
1:09:32
So, her hair always looks nice. You know what I mean?
1:09:35
Like You just said it goes 40 to 120 like a like a car goes zero to 60 and then you said Like this flannel this jacket right here in this thing goes 40 to 120.
1:09:46
Once once it's once it's below 40, I get cold. So, I have to put pants.
1:09:49
Um but like up until then I'm pretty much good within that range.
1:09:51
And so like I can I can button see like this thing can go full full sleeves and like I'm like that's what I'm in like mask cold mode.
1:09:59
Or if I go to a restaurant there are fire snakes, I can have that, right?
1:10:03
But otherwise, um you know, like I'm in beater mode.
1:10:06
Like we go to the gym, you know what I mean?
1:10:07
We go to the pool, we go to the beach, we go wherever, I'm going to be in beater mode. You know what I mean?
1:10:13
And This is the weirdest thing.
1:10:14
I tried his name Like you can put it in sport mode like a car.
1:10:20
Yeah, well my whole outfit has sports mode.
1:10:23
People are like proxy sport like my whole outfit has sports mode and comfort mode and weather mode and I can I can do that.
1:10:28
And so anyway, I mean like I I enjoy I enjoyed finding each of these things almost as much as I enjoy wearing them.
1:10:35
And I and I every morning, and this is true like every morning when I put this on, I get like a little a little boost where I'm like I know that I've picked every single one of these pieces out and I have no doubt that this is the best thing for me like for my day.
1:10:49
And so like I know that the brand of white beater that I have on right now, I tried 40 or 50 other brands on.
1:10:56
And I want I knew this one sat where I wanted to sit.
1:10:59
It wasn't too thick on the shoulder or too thin.
1:11:00
It didn't drop into some string on the back.
1:11:02
Some people like that, I didn't want that.
1:11:04
Um like beaters themselves are thinner than tank tops.
1:11:09
They're ribbed so that they fit right.
1:11:11
I think even like if you've ever seen those Under Armour tank tops or there's like shrink wrap ones like they don't look good.
1:11:16
Like I think they look synthetic and for me I think they look like kind of synthetic-y. Like I don't like it. I like cotton better.
1:11:22
Um and so like there's just a number of iterations.
1:11:24
Like if I talked about this shirt, I could tell you a zillion things that I looked at.
1:11:27
Like I mean I just I I have like an Excel sheet that like I was I was like the breaking I I thought you would have.
1:11:34
I have a few things like that.
1:11:35
I'm not as extreme, but I like buying and testing like a ton of stuff.
1:11:38
I think Sean did Sean wears ordered like 20 of the same shirts.
1:11:41
What products This is actually interesting.
1:11:44
This is I don't think this is like too inside baseball, but what products and brands do you obsess with and love like in your daily life?
1:11:53
Well, um I won't say them because I'm in talks with like Hassam. Pregnant.
1:11:58
Um to try and figure something out.
1:11:58
Um but I I will I will caveat that with I think that in general for people like my life might be different than theirs.
1:12:06
And I think just being delivered like so many people just like sleepwalking through life that like they're always sitting there with their pants that just don't fit just right or always don't have this thing.
1:12:16
Like a lot of stuff I modify.
1:12:18
So like I mod like my gym bag, like there was a video about my gym bag.
1:12:22
Like I tried out a bunch of different bags and I finally found a bag that I liked and then I modified the [ __ ] out of it.
1:12:27
And like that bag now every time I go to the gym people are like, "Dude, that bag's awesome."
1:12:31
I was like, "I know because I made it for this function and it's great and I love it. It's really good." You know what I mean?
1:12:36
So, I think it's more just like finding the like whatever your 40 to 120 is cuz maybe you live in Michigan and it's always cold.
1:12:43
Then it's like well you're going to have a different standard standard wear.
1:12:47
What shorts are are there?
1:12:47
I thought you used to wear just jorts.
1:12:48
I used to make fun of you for wearing them.
1:12:51
to wear jorts, but jorts the So, I'll I'll tell you I used to wear jorts cuz they were more comfortable um and I could do more casual settings with them, right?
1:12:58
They're like always showing up in like athletic shorts. You know what I mean?
1:13:01
Just like it just it looks it looked like almost too casual, I think.
1:13:03
Um and so a lot of restaurants are like no athletic wear.
1:13:07
And so I was like, "Okay, well, that's annoying."
1:13:09
And so then it went through this whole thing where I had to find like the best short.
1:13:13
And then while I was doing that like the ones that I have have back hooks on them so that if I can hang them to dry, I've got an iPhone pocket in there that's built in so like cuz I hate having to sit and then take it out of your pocket.
1:13:26
Every time you like it's such a pain like there should be a pocket for this. Everyone has one, right?
1:13:28
And there's like a a little place that I can plug an iPad iPad pencil in my shorts cuz I use my iPad a lot.
1:13:36
Um like I've got cargo on the other side and these are stretchy but not too stretchy, but they're stretchy enough that I What freight you hauling in there, buddy? What do you got?
1:13:44
What type of What do you need the cargo for?
1:13:47
Are you packing gummy bears?
1:13:47
No, a lot of times it's mic packs.
1:13:49
So, a lot of times it's mic packs cuz we're getting like right now my mic pack is in my cargo pocket.
1:13:53
Um but like I can fit a water bottle in here if I need it. Um or a or a hotel key.
1:13:58
Like hotel keys there whenever we're traveling or I use my Nicorette cuz I actually Nicorette.
1:14:05
So, I'll have Nicorette in my pocket if I go on a podcast.
1:14:06
So, I just I like always have the stuff that I I need there, you know?
1:14:10
Well, it's just about the best the best way possible, man.
1:14:14
This is my These are my favorite kinds of pods when you you find out, you know, it's like I want to see your weird.
1:14:20
Uh that's when I know you.
1:14:20
Until I see your weird, I don't actually know you, I feel.
1:14:24
This is my This is my personal my personal thing and uh I'm glad we went down this rabbit hole cuz I got to see your weird.
1:14:33
It's funny cuz when we lay out [ __ ] right now my I'm shaking.
1:14:36
I'm not going to show you the brand, but I've got this backpack here, right?
1:14:39
And this backpack I wore um I can wear it like when we travel, I can wear it everywhere and it has everything that I used to travel and I can travel for for four weeks with it.
1:14:55
Because all I have to pack is three pairs of shorts that are identical that are multi everything.
1:15:02
And then I just have an amount of tanks that is whatever the laundry cycle of the trip is. And that's it.
1:15:07
And I can put one flannel on top and I'm I'm good like and I don't even have to use the expansion part of that backpack, which I have options if I need it.
1:15:14
Uh and so like and it has a cool front thing for all my wires that's flat so it doesn't take up space.
1:15:18
Like there's just a lot of like and I went through a zillion different bags to find that.
1:15:23
I went through a zillion different bags to find the gym bag, but like now when whenever I pick it up, I'm like this is the best backpack job.
1:15:30
What the best way you spend money for you personally like not like a business investment that you know, you're you think it's a great ROI or you get a bunch of joy out of it or it's like dope for you that is let's say not your content team and not like something that's directly in the business.
1:15:50
Yeah, I mean I would say JSX is is wonderful.
1:15:52
Since it's in the Southwest, so it's a it's like semi-private flying. Yeah, I fly with them. It's pretty good. Oh, it's great.
1:15:59
I mean it gives you So, like I The only reason we fly private is because it saves It's the only reason we do it.
1:16:05
Like and you a lot less hassle.
1:16:09
But JSX allows you all the benefits of private flying.
1:16:11
This is like a [ __ ] JSX plug, but it's really good.
1:16:15
Um and a ticket's like 300 bucks when it would normally be like 50.
1:16:17
So, if you want to fly JSX from Vegas to Salt Lake or Vegas to Scottsdale or Vegas to to LA, um it's 300 bucks. It's nothing, right?
1:16:26
And you really you walk up to the plane, you get on the plane, and then you walk off the plane. Like that's it. You know what I mean?
1:16:34
Like it's it's just like private.
1:16:35
There's just a few other people there.
1:16:36
And private flying in my opinion has the most benefit for the shortest travels and the least benefit for the long travels.
1:16:43
Because like long travels, you want to fly as high as possible as fast as possible.
1:16:46
The bigger you know, the bigger the plane the better.
1:16:48
And um and by percentage of the trip you know, the the going through security and dealing with the hassle.
1:16:55
If you have a five and a half hour flight five and a half hours versus like seven hours of of transit does it you like the day's through.
1:17:03
Like it's kind of like it doesn't materially change a lot.
1:17:06
But on a short travel where you're going like sub I would say sub two hours like you can you can double the length of the trip or triple the length of the trip by going in reverse, cut it in half or by a third by flying private.
1:17:19
And so that's where I feel like you get the the highest marginal benefit.
1:17:22
It's also the cheapest uh private flights are the shortest ones cuz it's by hour.
1:17:25
So, that's kind of like when we when we when we go back and forth and uh usually the only times we'll fly private is if we can't get a direct uh JSX flight.
1:17:34
Well, we'll wrap up in a second here, but last time you were here, Sean asked a question about your portfolio.
1:17:39
Um and I want to follow up on it.
1:17:41
What's your portfolio looking like in terms of like your um both your private investments as well as like we doing with your money?
1:17:48
Are you keeping it in equities, bonds, cash?
1:17:50
I think last time you were super heavy cash if I remember correctly.
1:17:54
Or Or maybe it was Yeah, that's what it was. It was treasuries.
1:17:58
You're like I'm almost entirely treasuries.
1:17:59
What's it What's it looking right now in terms of like a if you could do like a pie chart in percentages?
1:18:05
Probably still half treasuries.
1:18:09
Except now they're a lot better than before. Yeah.
1:18:12
So, we're probably half treasuries, probably a quarter in just like indexes.
1:18:16
Um and the other quarter is in private companies. So, pretty simple. Yeah. Probably not by value.
1:18:22
Over time that that treasury part is going to continue to decline as we do more and more deals.
1:18:27
Um but yeah, I I still think that like I mean I don't know what the future looks like.
1:18:31
So, I like I I tend to like having lots of cash.
1:18:33
Like I feel good I don't I never want to not be able to do a deal that's going to 10x because I don't have cash.
1:18:38
Like that like the the cost of missing the 10x is well worth the quote inflation that I'm suffering for the difference between the treasury yield and the inflation cost.
1:18:49
Well, thank you for coming on again.
1:18:50
You if you go to our YouTube page my first million, you're actually like the I don't know what they call that video, but you're like our main page video. for a while.
1:18:59
Yeah, and it's like a quote of like I've come to the conclusion that I just like to work and I don't like when people ask me why am I working all the time or something like that.
1:19:05
But thanks for doing this again and we really appreciate it.
1:19:08
No, I mean thank you guys for having me on and thanks to the audience for maybe making requests to have me back on.
1:19:14
So, I I I appreciate it and it it means a lot to me.
1:19:17
So, I thank you guys for just being awesome hosts in general. Awesome. Well, that's the pod.