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We hit a 100 million annual revenue run rate at 11 months.
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Groom did it in 22 months, right?
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And they were acquired for 1. 2 billion.
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A1 took them 10 years to hit 100 million.
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We hit 200 million run rate in 18 months.
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>> All right, Danny, welcome to the show, man. Why don't we start off?
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Why don't you give a little little intro to yourself? So, who are you? What do you do? >> Hey, Sean. Thanks for having me. Quick background myself.
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Always been an entrepreneur.
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Started working at a very young age at 15. I was a telemarketer.
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So that's how I got started working.
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Age 24 had my first business was a restaurant.
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Did that for three four years.
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Then ventured in hotel furniture business, import export from China into the US.
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Eventually work on some big projects like the MGM city center in Vegas.
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Did that also for the three four years.
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Then in 2010, I took a leap of faith and moved to Hong Kong um to launch a e-commerce company that was doing group buying.
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And then when Groupon went international, they acquired 51% of my company. Yeah.
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We became the largest e-commerce company in the region. I left in 2014.
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We're doing about 200 million annual revenues. I had a good exit.
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That's where, you know, I made my first million. Yeah. Per seion.
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Um but and then after e-commerce I was like hey you know what do I do next?
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Had a lot of options at my disposal and I didn't just want to go back into e-commerce even though that was the easy route for me.
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Um I ventured then I actually you know got started in diagnostics and DNA testing.
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So founded Prenetics which was a life sciences DNA testing company.
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And again this was 2014 right?
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So very early no one was really talking about this stuff.
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And I think you'll see that in my entrepreneur career, it wasn't the obvious choice, but everyone's like now looking back is obvious choice, right?
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I mean, think about in 2010, no one was using e-commerce in Hong Kong. Yeah.
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Everyone in fact told me to go back to US.
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They're like, Danny, just go back to US.
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This model is not going to work in Hong Kong.
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We we made it the number one e-commerce company at the time.
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But going back to Prenetics, you know, started as a life sciences company.
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when COVID hit, you know, we were prime position to take advantage of it. We worked very fast.
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In two weeks, we got our CO testing kit.
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We then became Hong Kong's number one co PCR provider as well as in the UK.
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So, those yeah, three years we Yeah, I would say we were like printing money, I would say. Right. Um, >> they exploded.
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>> At one point, we're doing 40,000 PCR tests a day, right? We total did 28 million.
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This is laboratory PCR test those three years.
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We did 700 million plus revenue.
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Um in three years time we listed on the NASDAQ in 2022 where household name everyone that arrived in Hong Kong at one point had a mandatory prenetics PCR test.
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prenetics PCR test. And then of course that led goes into you know IM8 which is kind of you know what happened after COVID you know we had a billion dollar valuation during co in 2022 because co was still going on 18 months later our market cap hit I think was like 50
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million right went from billion plus to 50 million y'all like right you really know who your friends are at that point right because at a billion >> you got a lot of f got a lot of friends at a billion you and a lot of friends that are billing >> when you're down 95%. Uh, okay. The Uh, okay. The stock's down 95%.
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Were the friends also down 95% or it wasn't so bad?
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>> No, I mean the friends wasn't down 95%.
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But when you're when you're going up, everyone wants to be involved, which is natural to be fair, right?
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Everyone wants to be surrounded by winners, but very few >> want to be surrounded and associated when you're going down, right?
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Because I think the path >> to recover is significantly much harder.
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I mean we had a few options like you know what why don't we just close the business because you have think about the the background right we I think in 2022 yeah we did you know 272 million revenue right and basically 40 tests turned to
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nothing right so basically you know our revenue dropped by 95% and and to be fair I think the market you know realized that and was rightfully valued so we thought okay what do do you know do we close up shop just return capital
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to our shareholders um you know do I do something else I mean of course you I've been successful as a operator as well as investor right so a lot of options still but you know I knew that you know I still wanted to create something out of
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this and also wanted to be very responsible to the shareholders from before coincidentally at the same time as we were thinking what to do you know I had the opportunity community to meet with David Beckham. And this was right
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And this was right at the same time where I was thinking about getting into the supplement category.
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And when I met David, you know, it wasn't to like pitch him on, hey, let's get to the supplement category.
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We were just having a conversation about his background, what he's doing, and he was very intrigued about my consumer background as well as my life sciences background.
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And he was telling me, you know, about his problem, him and Victoria's problem about how even for where they are as individuals and of course, you know, they have all these resources available to them, right?
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They even found the supplement category very overwhelming, especially that when they're traveling, you know, they just can't maintain that routine of taking 12, 13, 14, 15 pills and these capsules and etc.
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capsules and etc. they just yeah don't do it right and then yeah me as an entrepreneur like hey I'm sure there's a better way for that and yeah after you know three to four months countless conversations as I'm I'm sure you can imagine and someone with David's pedigree and background if something
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went wrong it's not no one cares about Danny it's always going to be hey David something blew up right so he had to take >> significant precautions And I told David from day one, hey David, I know you know for the last 30 years there's been so many people wanting you to do this category and you reject it. And I told David something
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And I told David something that was surprising to him.
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I was like David if we do this together. Yeah.
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I don't want you just as ambassador.
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I want you as a co-founder but this brand has to live beyond you.
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I don't want this to be another celebrity brand. >> Yeah.
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So let's explain what IM8 is, right?
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Because that's the current business.
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So I am if I go to the website I see Beckham, I see Giannis, I see Lily Collins, I see a bunch of famous people and they're drinking a little red drink and you know so if you've seen it most >> most of the supplement category is green, you guys are red and um it's a it's some sort of supplement drink, longevity drink.
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You got the Beckham stack on here and can you explain just in short like you know just real quick like what what actually is the product that you sell?
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>> Yeah, so we've made the business model very simple.
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We came out with our daily ultimate essentials and it's very simple, right?
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It has 90 ingredients, replaces 16 different supplements in a powder shet.
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You mix it with 12 ounces of water.
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You just drink it every single morning and it takes care of your foundational nutritional needs. So, what does that mean?
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All of your multivitamins, um, your CoQ10, MSM, probiotics, prebiotics, postbiotics, and because normally you would have to take the equivalent of 16 different supplements, that will easily cost you $250 to $300 on a monthly basis. Yeah.
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And for us, we're selling at $90 on monthly basis, this combination, which also tastes great and you can carry around with you everywhere. >> Right.
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And you guys have been I mean you're a public company so you're public about your numbers but you've talked about your numbers before. Yes.
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>> Um this you're only about a year into this to this product line right?
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>> We're only 20 months in.
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We only launched December of 24. Right.
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And you know now we've been the fastest growing supplement brand you ever recorded. >> What does that mean?
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How how fast are you growing?
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>> We hit 100 million annual revenue run rate at 11 months.
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um in this category wise I mean Kruans did it in 22 months right and they were acquired for 1.
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2 2 billion after 3 years.
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Ag1 took them 10 years to hit 100 million.
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We hit 200 million run rate in 18 months.
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>> So you're at 200 million a year.
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So there's two two angles to this, right?
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I have my ecom nerd hat cuz that's been in e-commerce and I can ask you about the funnel and the kac and all that.
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Then there's just like highlevel, you know, product market fit.
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when you hit a pro when a product hits a nerve and you've you've nailed the positioning, the branding.
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You've nailed something in category and positioning.
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Can you talk to me about category and positioning?
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Because I think those are highly underrated and most people are terrible at that and it's very hard to recover if you have category and positioning wrong.
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You can be the best at just trying to crank the grind the funnel, but it just doesn't matter if you haven't gotten those that the first first key decision right.
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Can you talk to me about category and positioning? >> Oh, do you see that?
9:32
I just stepped over a million-dollar problem, a million-dollar business idea.
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And that's the thing, most people walk by these million-dollar ideas all the time and they don't even notice.
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And so our friends at Starter Story, they put together a list of 90 business idea. Each one is vetted.
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They're all real problems, real gaps in the market because they talk to hundreds of entrepreneurs and they put together this amazing stuff that's incredibly well researched.
9:56
And so if you want to find a bunch of amazing business opportunities, you can get it for free.
10:00
just scan the QR code or click the link in the description.
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>> Even before, you know, we got into this category, everyone told me not to do this.
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They're like, "Hey, supplement category, highly competitive, so many bad eggs."
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And and to be fair, I mean, I can tell this story now is that, you know, my whole board disagreed with me, right?
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They're like, "You you don't know anything about supplements, Danny." I It's true, too, right?
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I haven't got I I I didn't do anything in this category before, right? Yeah.
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It was e-commerce, selling coupons, DNA testing, running the lab, all that stuff. Yeah.
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But also to be fair, you before any of that, I never had a background as well too. [laughter] Right. Yeah.
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So, but of course still, you know, the board was like, you know what?
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And then we have to make a of course a commitment with David Beckham. There was Yeah.
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It was not a small commitment. Correct.
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And then so they disagreed with me, but you know, I knew that if we made a great product and we've nailed the positioning and the brand, right?
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And with the support of DB, you know, this would be a home run.
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So I had to really fight you and educate my board.
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And again, it's like, hey, you know what?
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If I'm wrong, I'm going to resign.
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I'm going to, you know, quit, right?
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That was that was what that was my position because it really I needed to be convinced myself that was this was the right move.
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But but what made you think that this would be the right move? Because it it is true.
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Sub category is crowded, right?
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Like a lot of people have a celebrity. Who cares, right? Like >> correct.
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And a lot of celebrity brands fail, right?
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They're like my board tell me there's so many there's actually more failures of celebrity brands if you think about than actually success cases, >> right? So what was your take?
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>> So my my take wasn't number one, everything starts with the product, right?
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Everything starts with a better product than what's available in the market.
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market. And I can yeah honestly say yeah we have the best product in the market but like you fairly pointed out consumers may not recognize that right and then so this is where you from day one we spend a more time also on the taste profile because a lot of times
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people have the great product blah blah blah etc but if it doesn't taste good no one's going to drink it right so I spend a week at the factories that's every single day testing like you know 20 30 different flavors until we got that taste like ah you know But this taste is good, >> right? And that wants to drink again.
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And that wants to drink again.
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But those two things, those two also doesn't, you know, relate to success, right?
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So you mentioned the color, the brand.
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We wanted this to stand out.
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We didn't want to just create another greens powder, right?
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Then no one created a reds powder, right?
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And then so I think by default >> that was interesting to people.
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>> Is it red because it's like made of beets or it's red because you made it red?
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Like you know what I mean?
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Like did it need to be red or you chose to be red?
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It was a natural coincidence that when we created the formulation, there was like beats inside. Yeah.
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The formulation and this was a natural red color and then like let's just let's just go hard on this color. Right. >> Right. Which then made sense.
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And then our packaging, if you look at is a very big red box, right?
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It's very premium the positioning.
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So I didn't want just to be another supplement brand.
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I wanted to yeah have a really great unboxing experience. It's bold.
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the name, you know, easy to remember, the fonts, the colors.
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>> How'd you come up with the name?
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Because, you know, I whenever I brainstorm company names, you get 500 names.
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Each one you look at, you're like, that could be it.
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And then, you know, so like if I had written down on my list of supplement names, I am and then the number eight.
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I might have maybe it would be like, oh, that kind of flows, but I would have the courage it takes to pick such a weird name. Where's that come from? Why? Why? Why that name? How'd you know?
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How'd you know? very good in names right I would say I'm like really good in names I mean my my e-commerce company is called you buy I buy right group buying right with that just the number you then prinetics was have prevention and genetics so you have prrenetics
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>> right and then of course IM8 it came I wanted something simple and easy to remember um and then I am means I am and then eight if you flip it around means infinity infinite possibilities right and I knew at one A will enter China and the number eight will also work in China. Right? So there's definitely Right?
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So there's definitely >> lucky number of China, right?
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>> Number eight me and it's like I am is like I am healthy, I am strong, I am powerful, right?
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>> So there's a great meaning behind that. >> Okay.
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And so you go into this category now you get your formulation done. What's the zero to one?
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So what did that what did that look like?
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You just fire up Facebook ads, Shopify store.
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Did you do anything else?
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Like what what does zero to one look like?
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zero to one look like? uh 0 to1 again the formulation part you know I would say was a result of also getting an amazing scientific advisory board yeah on again when I looked into this was like okay what are all the different
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challenges someone can you yeah go at us and it's like hey just because we have David Beckham it's not enough and everyone knows David is not a scientist right I'm not a scientist right so we then the next step was recruiting a world-class scientific advisory board the likes of Dr. Don Musum from Mayo
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Don Musum from Mayo Clinic.
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Um you James Green the former chief science of NASA, Suzanne Decoda the director of microbiome at Cedar Saii.
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So these individuals we brought along they all took part in creating this formulation and that wasn't enough.
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And how did you do that by the way?
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That's um what you're cold emailing.
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Is there a I I actually know there's like a there's like an agency there's like a brokerage service.
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I don't know if you know this one.
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There's a brokerage service >> between doctors and supplement brands that literally it's like get a doctor on your brand.
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I don't know if you've seen this.
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I haven't seen like a very niche agency some guy has. But what did you do?
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You you cold called these people.
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You go fly out, meet them, you expect me. What's happening?
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>> I I knew the former chief of science of NASA prior. Yeah. Yeah.
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Basically, he was at NASA for two years.
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So that was easy because he knew me, right?
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And again, a lot of this relationships is is built bound trust. And you know for Dr.
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Don Mu Salem you I contacted her on LinkedIn we got on a call and again the first time we had it she was very skeptical cuz so many supplement brands you know reach out to them and again for especially as if you're a practicing physician yeah it's also quite rare to
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work with a supplement brand especially if you're let's say with male clinic really rare >> right because they have a lot of restrictions etc etc right so >> but I think from day one you even I told Don Yeah, we're we're still working today very closely is that we need to prove the science and evidence. Yeah. So Yeah.
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So that's why we embarked on a clinical trial before we launched the brand.
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We embarked on third party testing by not just one organization but by two by Euroins and NSF certification for sport.
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So that means if you're a professional athlete, you know it's free from 280 banned substances.
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So, I have a lot of friends who are in the supplement game and [clears throat] in in general when you're in e-commerce, it's easy to become very skeptical and very jaded, of course.
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Um, not because anybody means poorly, but just because it's very easy to get something up and running and put the make put all your effort into the packaging, maybe even some into the taste, but ultimately, >> you know, you're not in the factory and and you know, and also it's very easy to have something that might help, but is is not scientifically proven, right?
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Scientifically proven is a very high bar.
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And so, I would say there's almost two two parts of the ledger.
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There's the first part which is like are these clean ingredients and is it made in a clean factory?
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That's kind of like trust test number one.
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Trust test number two is what the hell is a postbiotic? What's a prebiotic?
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Does any of this stuff actually matter if I drink this?
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Does anything really change in my body?
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And I know obviously I'm asking you know the priest if religion is real.
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But I I guess like if I'm a highly logical rational person, what would be your most convincing thing you could tell me that would make me actually believe in supplements?
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supplements? A lot of supplements out there don't work and that's the reality right and I think the best validation of our product is that doesn't matter who we have Beckham blah blah blah etc our business won't be in 20 months can't be
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a 20 million 200 million plus business without recurring subscriptions and that means the product works as advertised all right and the best >> how does someone know that the product work how does the customer work you'll feel it and they get and the best way to energy. What What are you feeling?
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What What are you feeling?
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>> Better energy recovery. Yeah.
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Um you sleep better, your gut. Yeah.
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Everything is working better. Yeah.
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And of course, a lot of these individuals, these are CEOs, athletes.
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I think the best case I can show you.
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I mean, I I was surprised by this email, right?
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Around last April or May of 2025, right?
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I got an email from Arena Sabalinka's team, right?
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co- email into me, right?
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They're like, "Hey, you know, Arena's been on your product for about three months now via a recommendation from her nutrition coach.
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When you're the world number one tennis player, every single thing they're measuring your recovery, how you're feeling three to four times on a daily basis."
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And they don't need a right?
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I mean, she has so many options and resources.
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And she's like, "Hey, she's been feeling amazing from a recovery perspective and she hasn't gotten sick while on the product.
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given that they're traveling, you know, different time zones every single week, can we partner together, right?
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And then so that was a great validation of the product working at the highest level of sports.
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And the reality is also every single ambassador that came after that was inbound to me.
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>> Hey, let me ask you a question.
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Is the market in China or India for that matter like two big population places?
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Is the is the supplement market the same?
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Is it just the same but 10 years ago?
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Um is it different or what's going on over there?
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>> Um India to be honest with you, I don't know.
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Um I do know is a much lower price point and category.
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Um in China they do have AG1 but it's not like Yeah, from what I understand it's not doing well.
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>> Why do you think that is?
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Is it is it all just price point or is there another factor?
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factor? I mean again it goes back you know to price point education branding positioning you know there's like so much right I think to be fair 99% of American companies go into China and think they can just succeed with the
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same business model um and for China to operate it successfully you need a completely different business model completely different team like for example my team can't do China 100% there's like no hell they no way they can do China, right? So, for me to enter
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So, for me to enter China, I would need to get a completely new team of every single individual, >> right?
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Tell me about some of the operational excellence.
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So, I want to know what are some things that you're doing that I could look at that um I could be inspired by.
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Oh, that that you know, the way they do that, that's really good.
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So, now I'll give you a couple examples.
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So, we had Chad from Grun's on the podcast and he was showing us their funnels, their Facebook ads.
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were looking at his ad library together and they were showing like he's got like you know there's eight different sort of reasons to buy, right?
21:29
Maybe you're on OMIC and you want Ompic support.
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Maybe you're looking for mood and here's a mood thing.
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Maybe you're a woman and your hair and your your hair's falling out postpart whatever.
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I don't know what they're I don't remember the exact angles.
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He's like I've got like the ad that goes to the landing page for that persona for that problem for that sales pitch and I'm running all eight simultaneously.
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Whereas most entrepreneurs are, you know, usually just get fixated on one and they don't get they don't get as much of the market.
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He would tell us that or um Eric Ryan from Method Soap and Ali Gummies came on and he was he's a master of packaging and positioning and he said I was looking in the vitamin aisle and >> you know first thing I knew was that every container was round and so we would be a rectangle and he's like it's as simple as that.
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I look for a sea of sameness and everywhere in the aisle that I see a sea of sameness I know there's an opportunity to come in and do something different.
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That's what they did in Band-Aids. and soap and vitamins.
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>> Yeah, I would I would say even right now, you know, to be fair wise, you know, the ads and landing pages, personas, that's quite standard operating procedure right now, right?
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If you're a DTC brand doing$100 to $200 million, I mean, you have to be doing that, Greg.
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Um, I think for us wise, I think one thing that we've done really well was scaling on meta ads.
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You know, right now we have anywhere from, you know, two to three,000 ads live at any given time.
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We're testing out you know 500 to 800 creators on a weekly basis.
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So it's that constant testing um that is really really important right and you have and right now the reality is even with ad buying I mean you know app buying is like a commodity right now.
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Yeah, before a few years ago, you have to be really really good at ad buying.
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But now Meta does all of that for you already, right?
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You don't need to do the targeting.
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You don't need to do all this stuff, right?
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All you need to really figure out is how do you get really good creatives and really good creative diversity on the different personas because now you need a creative to do the targeting.
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And >> so tell me about that creative machine. So you said two things.
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You said you have a couple thousand ads running at a time.
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So are those like statics or those videos?
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videos? statics and videos I would say is about you know 55 60% statics and then the rest videos >> and you're doing that with what a studio you're doing that with AI what is the machine that's building all that >> uh combination of everything so we have
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our own ambassadors yeah again we have of course we have like top 10 very famous ambassadors then we have another thousand or more or so ambassadors affiliates that are creating lots of content for us on a daily basis right And that feeds the engine depending on whichever personas that we're going to. And a lot of times you have your proven
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And a lot of times you have your proven winners and then it's like how do we recreate all these proven winners because you know there's also create a fatigue that happens right.
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So we've have our own create a fatigue score that we identify.
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we identify. So we know okay when a ad is potentially going to get in fatigue which then ultimately will drop that row right again 300,000 above on a daily basis on meta you know which is quite high given that we're only 20 months in
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right and we've been able to >> yeah scale that and I think one key thing again public information given we're public companies that if you look at what happened in Q2 versus Q1 Q1 our CAC was 305 right our average order value is about $230, right? So, um, and
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So, um, and we we doubled our marketing spend in Q2, right?
24:56
We doubled it from about 17 to $33 million in a quarter, right?
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Our CAC actually went down by $4, right?
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From 305, 301 because you would imagine if you're doubling spend, your CAT's always going to go up. Yeah. >> Right.
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And then so I think we reached a point where again we got the engine running.
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The brand is also doing very well from a brand position and we've ran now 200 plus offline events.
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I think this is something that I haven't seen any other supplement brand do.
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>> And why are you doing that?
25:28
Because that creates content or because that creates loyalty or both?
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What's the what's the main reason to do 200 offline events?
25:32
main reason to do 200 offline events? I mean it's very important from us from day one you a this is about a authentic [snorts] product science and you know when we have these events we have our scientific advisory board members there they're talking about the product right
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and again this is not just a marketing aspect is you know we have real science behind the brand they get to meet our formulators and our scientists and doctors last week in New York we did like yeah seven events in seven days right um as part of [clears throat] US
26:04
been I always say these the events are very difficult to scale right >> but I think that's very very important especially in the age of AI you don't know what's real you don't know what's what's fake or whatever right >> and then so I think having that offline presence is really important for us
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>> yeah and I think that's pretty counter to where most brands are right now I think it's so easy to sit sit at your laptop fire up ads let you know tweak your landing page and Clearly, you get the scale, you get to measure it, you get every you get the feedback loop right away. You don't have to like go
26:37
You don't have to like go get face rejection out in the real world.
26:41
And it almost means that like offline has this disproportionate premium because it's simply like less contested.
26:47
And once you've had an in-person touch point and then you go see an ad, right?
26:50
It's going to be a completely different experience than if you've never it's just a >> brand and I tribute you that CAC lowering when we double our spend.
26:58
We're not talking about like a lot of double a lot of spend doubling, right?
27:03
And even July our cap fell to $239, right? Yeah.
27:09
You know, which is, you know, we're spending more than $10 million a month on marketing, right?
27:12
And then so it was continue lower, but I do believe again I don't have quantifiable data to say this is all offline, but I'm going to continue to double down on offline events um because that's a really important to the brand side of things.
27:27
Tell me about some of the kind of early days of entrepreneurship where maybe your entrepreneurial philosophy got got formed or the core skills that are helping you today, but where were they first kind of originated?
27:39
Where where'd you cut your teeth doing it?
27:42
>> I mean, so I dropped out of high school, right?
27:45
So I was, you know, basically a bad kid.
27:48
Got kicked out of high school for fighting.
27:50
So I had to really learn everything, you know, on the streets, I would say, right?
27:55
as as an entrepreneur, you you're always faced with making decisions with very limited information.
28:02
And I think, you know, for everyone that knows me, they know me.
28:04
I'm like very street smart, right?
28:06
I can figure things out by myself with very little information.
28:10
>> Where where were you going to high school? >> In San Francisco.
28:13
>> Oh, you were in San Francisco. So, you get kicked out. So, why telemarketing?
28:17
How did you stumble into telemarketing?
28:19
>> Um I I mean I think I didn't stumble.
28:19
I think it was like what do I do?
28:22
You know, I'm not going to school, right?
28:25
So, and then as a telemarketer, you know, I was 15. I was good at it.
28:28
I was good in, you know, kind of like co- calling people.
28:32
>> What were you selling?
28:33
>> I was selling time shares. >> Time shares. >> Yeah. Yeah.
28:36
Remember time shares is like again this is about 30 years ago, right?
28:40
So those few years where I would say I was a very bad kid actually formed a lot of my thinking as an entrepreneur because I always had to reinvent myself.
28:50
always had to go to a new school, make new friends, um, and get very comfortable.
28:55
And yeah, I I I believe I can survive anywhere.
28:58
You put me into Nigeria, Africa, whatever it is, I will figure it out. >> Yeah.
29:03
[laughter] The Yeah, the sort of more adversity you face, the more confidence you get um when you survive.
29:09
You know, there's there's another guy um Craig Craig Clemens who came on the podcast, good friend, great guy.
29:14
He's also an e-commerce sponsor.
29:16
So his company Golden Hippo does hundreds of millions a year in sales.
29:19
Bootstrapped him and his brothers.
29:21
He also was in telemarketing.
29:23
He was selling dating products when he was younger.
29:26
>> And um you know he he was sharing for him one of the ways he got better at sales was he was going to these seminars and he was reading books and he was just looking for like anything he could pull out one line one one copyrighting thing one psychological um sort of hook that he could pull on to.
29:39
Did you do any of that or were you just brute force numbers game?
29:43
numbers game? I mean you have to like communicate you know properly right I think you always have to be direct and I think I've always kept that right so very transparent in terms of hey especially with be let's say trying to meet someone for the first time always telling teams don't don't you know don't
29:58
talk about bo right I think you just have to be direct and transparent >> what's in it for them what's in it for us and again for me I've always for each of my businesses I'm always trying to deliver greater value first I think that's very important I never try to look at what's in it for me. I was like,
30:15
I was like, what can I help this person with?
30:17
How can I help my partner?
30:18
How can I help their business?
30:20
And that's been my philosophy from day one.
30:22
I think if you have that type of philosophy going in, it doesn't matter if the other partner doesn't reciprocate.
30:28
You move and you learn and move on. >> Mhm.
30:32
So, you're telemarketing.
30:32
You learn about the numbers game.
30:34
You learn that you got to sort of figure it out.
30:36
You get street smart to figure out things to survive.
30:39
>> And you and you you learn it doesn't matter who you talk to, right?
30:41
You can I can go up to anyone.
30:42
And it's just basically you the worst thing that happens is they reject me, right?
30:47
>> How many people would you call in a day?
30:49
>> It was like night shift at the time when I was working.
30:51
So it's like you know 6:30 then I would say 100 200 people.
30:56
>> And of that what's the rejection rate still going to be like 90 90 95%. Right.
31:03
[laughter] And and so was that something did you have to sort of what did you tell yourself to be able to like kind of quickly bounce back from that?
31:13
>> No, you just I mean again it's a it's a numbers game.
31:15
You just fail, you know, but basically you just tell yourself, hey, you know, the next one is going to be more likely to be positive, right?
31:19
So you have just get through it.
31:21
And I think you know to be fair, telemarketing taught me a lot. Yeah.
31:24
You have to have a thick skin.
31:25
Even when you talk to investors, same thing, right?
31:27
when you're early on they getting investment.
31:30
I mean you talk to 100 investors you only five may invest in you.
31:32
So there's nothing different about that.
31:35
It's just you're not getting rejected like hanging up on you but you you're still faced with that. Right?
31:41
I mean give you an example um of how that came to use right furniture business.
31:47
furniture business. I was co- calling basically MGM then I got a meeting and then I was able to get a meeting that was able to you know deliver the value I was able to get but without my co- calling days I probably wouldn't have done that right even when I did my e-commerce business you buy I buy which was group buying I remember I went to
32:07
Hong Kong and I had to co- call all the merchants myself right because again this is not like you know >> starts off with nobody >> yeah it starts with nobody right so I remember one time I was calling a big restaurant group and then director of marketing He hung up on me and I was like he hung up on me really like he like was like hurt me. I was like, "Wow,
32:23
I was like, "Wow, this guy like he said some like very bad words and blah blah blah to me, right?"
32:28
And then normally I was like, "Oh you probably like, you know, I was thinking, wow, who's this guy's boss?" I was thinking, right?
32:33
And then I then I like found who this B guy's boss is.
32:36
He was director of marketing and I co- called the office and it was Sandeep and he owned like 30 plus restaurants, this Indian entrepreneur.
32:44
And I asked for Sandeep, called the front desk.
32:46
He picked up the phone and I'm like, "Hey, this is Danny.
32:51
I just moved to Hong Kong.
32:53
I moved here from the US. Yeah.
32:56
Can have five minutes of your time because I have this interesting e-commerce idea and would love to see if I can partner with you. Right.
33:01
And then he met with me the next day for 20 minutes and he told me, "Danny, hey, um, Danny, I don't think your business is going to work in Hong Kong because why would I give 50% off to customers and I only get 25% of the check, right?" But you know what?
33:21
because you know, you called me after my director of marketing hung up on you and we're still here.
33:26
I'm going to work with you and give you all of my dirty restaurants and sign you up.
33:32
Um, and he did that because he knew, you know, I didn't give up and just was persistent, resilient, and that changed the trajectory of the business because he gave me 30 restaurants and I needed one deal a day, right?
33:43
So, he gave me basically my whole next 30 days was filled by one guy saying yes.
33:48
filled by one guy saying yes. And of course then I can continue but he was a big restaurant group right it was a very and then I would then go to other restaurant groups because got him because he was so famous you know Sandep Donnie Khan was working with us yeah can you partner too then yeah and once you
34:04
once you get yeah some traction etc then more and more people work with you right but that's just reality someone has to give you a chance and you just always have to be on the hunt >> my my uncle Vinnie was a doortodoor when he came to the country he came to this country he was doortodoor salesman of like the Bible or I don't know what he was selling. And I asked him the same
34:21
And I asked him the same thing.
34:23
I'm like, "Man, you were walking around in the heat in Georgia in the summers.
34:27
You're walking house to house, knocking on door, like getting rejected even more than on the phone, like to your face, door slam."
34:34
>> And um same thing, 90 to 95% of people door slam us.
34:37
He was the top sales guy.
34:39
And he he had a thick Indian accent.
34:39
I was like, "How did you do that?"
34:40
And he goes, "Oh, I took rejection better than anyone else."
34:44
I said, "Well, how did you take rejection better?"
34:45
He goes, "I put a price on the word no."
34:47
So he said, "If a if a yes is worth $100 to me and it's going to take me, you know, for every 20 nos, I get one yes."
34:57
>> Then he's like, "Then every no is worth $5 to me, right?"
34:59
He's like, "I just" So when they would say no, I would hear in my head, "All right, that's five bucks in the bank. Let's keep going."
35:05
And so he's like, "I was adding up the nos.
35:06
I was putting a price on it cuz I knew really like it's a numbers game.
35:10
I have to keep knocking."
35:12
And so I have to like sort of see each knock as a success even though what I my ears hear is is a rejection.
35:19
I have to change what I'm hearing.
35:21
And that led him to be the number one sales guy in the country.
35:22
And he ended up training all the other sales guys.
35:25
And I think there's a I think there's something everybody should take from from that whether you're fundraising or whatever whatever you're doing that like you know e-commerce I think a good like I if I looked at our conversion rate right now I think it's like 2 point something percent. 2% 2 and a half% maybe. You know, 97.
35:41
5% of people come to our site and say, "Hell no."
35:48
>> Now, you don't feel it as much when it's e-commerce, but but you but but you feel it when it's over there, you know?
35:52
So, so it's all a numbers game. >> Mhm. >> Yes. >> What else? You mentioned MGM.
35:57
What's What's the story there?
35:59
I didn't understand that one.
36:01
>> When I started first working in the hotel furniture business, I was doing hotels that were like 50 rooms, you 100 room, small hotels, right?
36:07
how small hotel chains just doing all of their custom furniture.
36:12
>> Sorry, can you go back?
36:12
Why why do why does Danny start selling hotel furniture? How does that happen?
36:17
>> No, because I was doing my restaurant business at the time.
36:18
I had a good friend that was an interior designer and she was just telling me, hey, you know, she's a designer for these hotels and she was having difficulty sourcing furniture.
36:28
And I was like, why don't you look in China?
36:30
And she's like, she doesn't know how to.
36:32
And then I'm like, why don't I help you?
36:34
And then she's like, okay, why don't you help me, right?
36:36
And I just did it for her.
36:36
right? And I just did it for her. And then but after a few of the hotels I figured out you know it's the same process if I make 50 chairs or 50 tables as if I make two to 3,000 chairs right so I was like who is making 2,000 hotel
36:53
rooms right now and at that time was like Vegas right then I started co- calling the Vegas hotels and eventually I co- called MGM and she gave me a meeting and then I went into the meeting and you know one year later I got a you know $4 million contract with MGM. >> How did that feel that first kind of big
37:09
>> How did that feel that first kind of big contract?
37:12
>> I mean, it felt, you know, amazing.
37:12
But of course, ultimately, you know, I wanted to deliver and that's so that's why a lot of times even when we do an achievement or milestone, you know, I always tell the team, hey, you know, this is good, you know, but it's not the end, right?
37:27
We're just getting started, right?
37:29
And it's like, you know, even last month, we hit 20 million in monthly revenue, right?
37:32
But hey, this is good prog, great progress, I would say.
37:34
But we have so much care opportunity.
37:36
So, but you know, I was of course happy that we're able to get such a big customer.
37:43
>> When you were doing the COVID testing, you were kind of in the right place when COVID hit where you could provide testing.
37:50
You said a couple interesting things. One, the ramp was crazy.
37:52
You said you did like 700 million revenue in the couple of years, which is just a bonkers number.
37:58
I'm sure there was a lot of free cash flow in that, too, not just revenue.
38:03
Yeah, we made over $100 million net. >> Net. Yeah, exactly.
38:06
And and you The second thing was you said like in Hong Kong like everybody who entered the country had that sounds like maybe you had like a kind of a really valuable key contract that you won or some sort of like a you know pretty defensible position.
38:19
So can you tell the the story of that?
38:21
And also during that, did you did you think did you know well this the music's going to stop on this at some point and what happens after that or did you say I don't know let's just run and we'll figure it out when we when when that happens. >> Yeah.
38:35
So I can tell you the backstory on this. Right.
38:36
So um I think this is in April. Yeah. April of 2020.
38:40
So CO was getting very bad.
38:44
I had a meeting with the chief executive of Hong Kong.
38:46
I was like, hey, you know, we have a lab, you know, CO seems to be getting, you know, worse and worse, you know, by the day. Yeah.
38:56
Can we somehow provide support and make use of our laboratory? Yeah.
38:59
To basically provide COVID testing to the community, right?
39:04
Um and then, you know, the chief executive said the same at the time said, you know what, um you know, we have our own public health laboratory.
39:15
We can do it all of ourselves.
39:15
So that was that right and I'm like okay no no no worries stand because at the time wise it was very difficult to get a COVID test in Hong Kong.
39:24
you would have to go to the hospital and they were charging like $300 to $400 USD for a COVID test and then I knew the cost of a COVID test is a fraction of that, right?
39:35
And they were making so much money and at that time you don't want to go to a hospital to do a COVID test because it means that you may get infected too, right?
39:41
I was like, you know what, we'll just create our own at home PCR test.
39:47
And then so we launched that within about a little bit more than two weeks and every day we're just trying to help out the community.
39:52
were selling it for $100 US when everyone was selling it for $400.
39:56
And even the hospitals would call me like why are you guys selling it for so cheap, right?
40:01
I was like I was like I just want to help the community, right?
40:04
That was that was the core um reason for getting into here.
40:08
So every single day we'll be selling out.
40:09
And then July, yeah, the government actually then again called me and like can we meet again cuz it was getting out of control, right?
40:20
you know, three months later and they're like, "Daniel, we need your help.
40:22
Um, yeah, can you help us service COVID testing to the community?"
40:28
I'm like, "Yeah, we love to help."
40:29
Like, yeah, uh, what do you want us to do?
40:33
They're like, "We want you to test 300,000 restaurant workers across 18,000 restaurants in Hong Kong."
40:42
And I'm like, "How long of a time do you want this testing?"
40:47
They're like, "Yeah, we want you to do this in 3 weeks."
40:50
So, that was a crazy operations, right?
40:52
I don't know why I I even said yes to it.
40:55
Again, we went from 100,000 100 200 tests on a daily basis to now testing, you know, 300,000 people in about a month time, which basically meant that we had to scale up from 200 tests to 10,000 tests on a daily basis.
41:11
and myself, my executive team where we're were all in the whole we then we h you and there were so many people without jobs at that time, right?
41:21
And then basically we started mass hiring. Yeah.
41:22
At one point we had like two to three,000 people.
41:28
>> What was the bottleneck?
41:28
Was it the actual tests the supply chain for the test or was it the people in the lab to read the test?
41:34
Cuz you you get the result at home, right?
41:36
What you >> No, no, you get the result in the lab. >> Okay. So you would send it in.
41:41
>> You have to send it in.
41:41
Um this this was before antigen tests were rolled out, right?
41:45
Because very early on you had do the you had to do a laboratory test which is the PCR test and then the antigen test which is the quick ones which are less accurate only came into play you know maybe one year after. >> I see. I see. Okay.
42:00
So, so you said supply chain and hiring people, >> people, logistics, data, right?
42:03
And then we're the first company contracted by the Hong Kong government to do mass community testing.
42:12
And of course, you know, 6 months later, we there was like 14 15 different laboratories that were also doing COVID testing.
42:21
However, the thing that stood out from us is I think a lot of it has to do with my technology and e-commerce background and and data and all that stuff. Yeah.
42:30
was um we were the only testing provider that never had a upup when it came to false positives and false negatives.
42:37
And then so when all these other laboratories they messed up and then the government got a lot of yeah crap for it right obviously because if you get a positive during that time you have to go to detention for like seven to 14 days right and then so this is why at one point every single individual that landed Hong Kong airport was mandated a prenetics test because they wanted to be the most secure and most accurate test.
43:04
Did you have to do anything crazy to unlock the supply chain there >> on a daily basis?
43:08
You had to be fighting, you know, with so many different other, you know, laboratories around the world, right?
43:15
You to get all this supply chain.
43:17
So, it was a every single day we're fighting and again a lot of times, you just to outbid them and we had volumes, right?
43:22
So, again, but it was a constant battle.
43:24
Those were some crazy two, three years of craziness. >> Yeah.
43:29
When you So, I I my last question, you know, I had a few friends who were doing this.
43:33
I had one friend who was doing mobile testing.
43:35
He had like vans that were testing.
43:36
I had another friend that was doing PPE when when you couldn't get masks and and other PPE to hospitals and whatnot.
43:44
>> And people were making money handover fist and doing this cuz there's so much I mean it was the strongest demand I've ever seen for anything ever, right?
43:49
Like life or death at global scale.
43:51
But you know some of those people they kind of stashed away enough cash that it was still a success and some people had overbuilt and then suddenly the music stopped and now it's like a lot of work for nothing.
44:04
for nothing. So every so give me an example right on on that exact thing is that it was it was right when we knew CO was over I let go of 2,000 people very very fast and that turned out to be a really you know good decision you know because again during that time wise and
44:21
you had Q health uh you had you know Lucera and these were at the time they were listed companies at one point Q health was $3 billion market cap they had a billion dollars in revenue in the US right Luca they had another like I think they $2 billion market cap. Yeah. Yeah.
44:36
They went bankrupt, you know, 18 months after COVID because they overbuilt.
44:38
They built their own manufacturing places.
44:44
They bought into the athome testing which never panned out postco.
44:49
But I knew that for both sides, for a company to survive after this, we needed to make a drastic cut.
44:54
And also for the individuals, right?
44:57
Because what what are we gonna do?
44:58
Why am I have 2,000 people if there's no testing?
45:00
I'm just gonna like right you stand around which is not good for them.
45:03
Everyone has to move on you know with their life and and livelihood and you know that was very difficult decision of course but ultimately it was the right decision for both sides.
45:15
>> If you were I don't know if you know you meet a lot of entrepreneurs or you know there's a lot of people that will come up to you that are you excited about what you've done and they're trying to do something and they're pitching you an idea.
45:25
What do you think most entrepreneurs just don't get?
45:26
What's the one thing if you feel like you could just shake them and and say, "Look, Ben, you just really don't get it."
45:32
It's the gap between where you are and where you want to be is this.
45:35
What do you think that gap looks like for most people?
45:39
>> I think I mean, again, about going back to number one, right?
45:41
You know, I always believe that if you build the best product in the market, it just makes everything so much easier, right?
45:48
And [clears throat] I think if you look at again, even you when the co testing, I I we had the best product in the market.
45:56
So if you have the best product in the market, it's much easier to build foundation, branding, positioning, premium pricing over any of your competitors, right?
46:06
And I also believe, you know, as entrepreneurs, etc.
46:09
, you have to get into the weed of everything.
46:13
I think some entrepreneurs, they don't like to, you know, get involved in every part of the business, but at least from my perspective, you know, what's worked very well for me is I'm involved in every part of the business.
46:24
Doesn't matter if we're a hundred million company, 200 million, we'll be in a billion dollars, whatever.
46:29
I guarantee I'll be involved in a lot of the key all the key decisions.
46:34
Um because I think that's what separates a founder from a higher CEO, right?
46:40
I think the founder and that's why a lot of times these founders blah blah blah etc.
46:45
they grow their business to 400, they hire CEO.
46:49
Often times the founder always comes back, right?
46:51
Because the CEO perspective, they're always much more conservative and they're looking at this from a paycheck where the founders were able to take risks that a CEO wouldn't be able to take.
47:02
So for example, even when I started IM8, if it was a CEO, there was no way he would have been able to take that risk, right?
47:07
But because I'm the founder, you have so much at stake here.
47:12
There's no one in the organization that to take a risk as much as me, >> right?
47:17
To be able to make that move.
47:19
Let's get into the supplement category, right?
47:20
Yeah, it's I don't know if you've read Have you read founder mode the sort of Paul Graham blog post?
47:26
>> Yeah, I mean I've read the Yes, correct.
47:28
I think founder mode is very different correct is like yeah we we see things very very uniquely different.
47:32
I think entrepreneurs you know really have to dive into that. >> Yeah.
47:37
And you know the first thing you said about product you know build the best product in the market.
47:41
I mean on one hand that sounds obvious um of like oh well okay yeah and I would say most people everyone thinks they have a good product.
47:49
Yeah, but you have the realistic, right?
47:50
It's like it's like a big difference.
47:52
I I tell people, how do you know? I like don't trust me. Just put it into cloud. Put in attach. What's better?
47:57
I know AG1 Doran Grun, right?
48:01
Let's see what it says on the similar product. >> Right.
48:03
[laughter] >> What does it say? Let's try it. >> Yeah.
48:07
>> Says if I had to choose one today, I'd buy IM8 over AG1. So you there you go.
48:11
It says it's not just 90 ingredients versus 75 cuz that's ingredient count is mostly marketing. >> Okay.
48:16
I think that it's currently doing a better job putting useful ingredients at disclosed non-trivial doses in the same daily drink.
48:22
And then it goes through the formula and it gives gives a little bit of an answer.
48:26
So at least according to to Chad GPD right now that that is that is correct which I think is >> okay I'm cut I'm going to cut that segment out and use it as an ad. Okay, that's perfect. [laughter] >> Yeah. Yeah.
48:39
Give me my kickback and then you can do whatever you want. >> Yeah. Give me 10% back.
48:42
>> I'll be one of your TikTok affiliates. >> Yeah, exactly. Affiliates. Yeah.
48:44
You know, I sold my company to this guy, Mike, um, Mike Whitmire, and he was telling he had built the number one ranked result for buying or selling gold online.
48:54
So, anybody wants to buy gold?
48:56
His company was was the the premier leader.
48:58
And I was excited when we sold cuz I was like, "Oh, you know, so much about SEO.
49:03
What are all the SEO hacks that we we're not doing?
49:05
I'm I I'm terrible at SEO.
49:06
I've never even tried that as a growth strategy."
49:08
So, I was like, "Tell me tell me like, you know, what should we start doing?"
49:13
And after a few meetings, I was like, "Dude, when are you going to tell me like the hacks?"
49:16
And he's like, "Well, there's some best practices."
49:18
He's like, "There's not really hacks."
49:20
He's like, "So I was like, "What'd you do with the gold company?"
49:23
And he goes, "I printed out like the page, the web page for all of us."
49:29
And I asked myself honestly, "Is there a reason you should use us?
49:32
Why should Google put us number one? Are we better? Are we actually better? Is it easier to use?
49:38
Is it Is it easier to understand? Is it more friendly? Is it faster?
49:41
like, "Do we have are we better in any way?"
49:44
And he's like, we had a cold honest conversation with ourselves that no, we were not better.
49:47
And then we decided, well, we actually have to be better if Google's going to rank us higher.
49:52
And slowly but surely, we did, you know, one brick by brick, we just made the actual experience better until we felt we actually deserve to be number one. And guess what?
50:01
Like at that point, we didn't need any of the hacks.
50:03
We actually were number one.
50:04
And I just remember thinking like, oh, I feel like you just taught me like a very valuable um like, you know, a very valuable obvious lesson that I needed to hear from someone like you.
50:16
I needed to hear from the guy who could shatter this myth in my head that the guys who ran number one are always just doing these clever tricks.
50:25
And it's like there's no trick.
50:27
The trick is be the best.
50:27
And if you're not willing to be the best, like if you know there's no way around.
50:31
You just got to go through this.
50:32
And uh I I needed to hear that at the time.
50:36
>> Again, that's that it starts with the product and I think entrepreneurs that have to be realistic, right?
50:40
>> Well, isn't it right that as a founder, you basically have to alternate between delusion and realism >> in a way that doesn't make any sense.
50:47
One in one moment you're going to have to be delusional.
50:49
You're going to have no evidence, but you're going to have to have the faith. Yes.
50:52
And you're going to have to believe even though you have no experience in this.
50:55
The market tells you one thing, smart people tell you one thing, but you believe another. That's delusion.
50:59
And you got to be a little dulu.
51:01
But then exactly >> then you have to switch gears to be hyper realistic.
51:04
And the guys, you know, somebody who's never delusional, they end up being an employee.
51:09
>> And somebody who's only delusional ends up being a failed founder.
51:13
>> It's the person who's able to shift gears between the two and know when you're when you need to be in each mode.
51:19
That's sort of the art of the whole thing. >> Yeah.
51:21
And and like again I had to be very like you said I had to be very delusional because I knew in my head if we put all these pieces together we would have a big success right but again going back I didn't have any experience in this so you had to build this with the limited information I knew at the time. >> Yeah.
51:38
Um well Danny I appreciate you coming on man.
51:40
This is a you have a fun story from telemarketing to now uh running one of the fastest growing supplement brands in the world and uh thanks for coming on. >> Thank you.