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All right, what's happening everyone?
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Today's podcast is with Kevin Espiritu.
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So Kevin has this company called Epic Gardening.
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Epic Gardening started as a blog where Kevin would just blog about his hobby as a gardener. He started it in 2016.
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And in this podcast, he's going to tell us the revenue for every year that he's been doing it.
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But this year, they're going to do something like $45 million a year in revenue.
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And Kevin walks through how they got traffic, how he's built the company, how he bought other companies to make Epic Gardening a big business.
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It's incredibly fascinating.
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He's super transparent with all the numbers.
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So he goes through deal by deal all the companies that they bought, how much they paid for it, how they found the company, how they found other companies that they didn't end up buying and why they didn't buy it.
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It's a really fascinating story.
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This guy is really, really cool.
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I think in about 5 years, this guy is going to be a really, really big deal.
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He's already a pretty big deal, but I think in 5 years, he's going to be like Chip and Joanna.
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You guys have to listen to this podcast.
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He's a really fascinating guy.
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Let me know what you think. All right, check it out.
1:06
Dude, so it's finally nice to talk to you.
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You I didn't know who you were and then on the podcast, Shawn like told your story.
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And I'm like, oh, I recognize this guy from everywhere.
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And I didn't realize how big of a business that you'd built. So congratulations. That's insane, right? Yeah.
1:22
Yeah, I know it's been a it's been a crazy ride. It's been a crazy ride.
1:25
I just watched one of your YouTube videos where one of your videos had just gotten I I think he's had 70 million views and it's just like you kneeling on a like a little kneeling like device so you can garden on your knees more easily.
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And you're like, I've been getting noticed in the streets because of this silly kneeling video.
1:42
Yeah, that video might haunt me.
1:45
I I think it's the most viral thing I've ever made. It's a short-form video.
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So I'd seen this little kneeling device.
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It was like a Instagram reel of a German trade show.
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And it was just this little kneeling device where you can of pop down it.
1:58
I think it's made for bricklayers.
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So I saw it and I was like, you know what?
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I kind of want to try it out just to see.
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And so I I had my team grab one.
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There was like one in San Diego where I live.
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And I made that piece of content in like maybe maybe 10 minutes maximum.
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Uh and and then edited it up, tossed it out, put it on I think TikTok first and it just started ripping.
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So I I was like, okay, I know this thing it has some legs.
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So then I threw it on Instagram and Facebook and then I threw it on YouTube.
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I think it's at like 150 million views across the platform.
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And the whole logic of doing it was let me put this product in front of our gardening audience and see if they like it.
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So then we can either hit up the manufacturer and carry it on our store or we can maybe make some modifications to it that make it a little better suited for gardening.
2:41
And then that is basically just market validation, right?
2:45
By the time we went that viral, we hit up the manufacturer, which is a German company and they're like, we would love to sell you some, but our entire stock in America is gone.
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Uh so every distributor we already have has sold out.
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So we can't we can't get it to you.
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How much rev missed revenue was that? I have no idea. What's your guess?
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Over or under 10 million?
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Oh, it's got to I think it's under for sure.
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Cuz I think these things are like 50 bucks maybe.
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I don't know how many we would have sold.
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But I don't think there was some crazy supply in the US.
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Uh but yeah, it's kind of it was kind of a bummer.
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So the my only the only thing I've ever gotten out of it is just being memed to to death about it.
3:21
Dude, so you the reason you're sort of interesting to me is did you start with like an internet marketing background?
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Cuz I know that you're interested in search and SEO and stuff.
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Was it like to be an agency?
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And then I mean, were you even into gardening and plants and all that stuff?
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Or did you were you like, I'm the plant daddy now because I've got this website.
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And so like which came first?
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What came first was Yeah, I guess I guess designing websites did come first cuz I came out of college with an accounting degree, but I played online poker to pay for school.
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And so that kind of like put me off the path of wanting to be an accountant right out of the gate.
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And you were making money.
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Yeah, I made like 200, 250,000 dollars probably playing poker in college.
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So I I used that to pay for school and then I had some money to like sit on. Was it all online? Yeah, it was all online.
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I hated playing in person I because it's so slow.
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Cuz when you're playing online, you're playing faster, but you're also playing like more tables.
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What makes a good online poker player?
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Because I would think I don't play poker really.
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I've only played like 10 or 20 times.
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It's just like it seems like reading body language and things like that is part of the game, but what makes a good online player? Just straight math?
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Straight math is a big part of it.
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So like understanding probability theory and understanding the types of hands that someone could or couldn't have in a particular situation.
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Uh but you're you're kind of right.
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Like eventually, when you play enough online poker, it gets down to the point where you know the people's screen names you're playing with and you probably have played with these people like over days, weeks, or months depending on how often they play.
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And you can even get down to the point where you know in this particular position like I'm sitting on the button, they're sitting in this position, and they they wait 3 seconds longer than they normally do and it's this person's screen name.
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A lot of the times, you can develop some sort of weird sixth sense and you know you're like, I'm I'm like nearly sure that's a bluff and you'll call them.
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And you made $250,000 over 4 years doing that?
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Yeah, so something like that.
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I didn't track it super well.
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It was like 200, 250,000. That's insane. That is insane. Yeah. Yeah.
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So it threw me off the path of wanting to be an accountant for sure.
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Uh and then when I got out of school, I played poker for like 6 more months or something and then quit, but I had nothing to to do.
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So I started playing video games and then I was designing websites to just pay some bills.
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And then I got into the marketing thing because I was like, well, once you sell a website, it's sold.
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So you make your 1,500 bucks or 2 grand or whatever the hell I was charging at that time.
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Uh so then I got into SEO stuff and I built the gardening blog at the same time cuz I was getting into gardening.
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I was doing it with my brother over the summer.
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But I was like, I need a I need like a digital business card.
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Like I need a little calling card.
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So I built the gardening blog as a way to show the website design clients like, hey, look look what I can build. What year was that?
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That would have been 2013.
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Dude, I think in the same year, I did the same thing as you.
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Were you reading like Smart Passive Income? Yeah. Yeah. Mhm.
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Okay, so Pat for those young listeners, I think you and I were on the young side probably at the time of his blog.
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I I think you and I are the same age. I'm 34. Yeah, 36.
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And Smart Passive Income was like this guy Pat Flynn, he's still quite popular.
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He's one of the early bloggers of like making money on the internet.
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And he had a What did he do?
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He did like a he wrote like a blog and an ebook on how to like get your building like green or lead certified or something like that.
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And he was making money doing it.
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And he would display all of his income and revenue online, which at the time was like insane.
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And then he did like a food truck a food like a book on how to create a food truck or something like that.
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And he like was like, I'm going to rank high on search and I'm going to blog throughout the way so you guys can see how I did do it.
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I read that and I created a poiso poison ivy like how to treat poison ivy website at the same time and it was making like a thousand dollars a day and I was like copying everything he was doing.
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And I have a feeling that you were reading that same blog at the same time.
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I have a even more cringe story around that time.
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So I was reading Pat like crazy.
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You just called me cringe.
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I mean, we all that that first site that you make, it's always kind of weird.
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Like come on, poison ivy site? Yeah, it's so stupid.
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I have one worse than that for sure.
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So Pat to me was like a god back in the day cuz he's a half Filipino, half white guy living in San Diego building businesses. Are you half Filipino?
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I'm half Filipino, half white and we've become good friends now, which is awesome.
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Um but when I read it, I was like, okay, cool. I see the blueprint.
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Pat's got this like green certification thing.
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And so my choice was to I created a a website called cocobuttercreme. org.
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And so I go cocobuttercreme.
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org and I start reviewing every cocoa butter cream that's on Amazon.
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And I was using an alias and like come on, like I was like early 20s.
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I was doing some dumb stuff.
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And I I was Suzy Michaels, a mother of two who was like reviewing how all these different cocoa butters worked on me.
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And and then I you know, you hook into Amazon affiliates.
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And I remember it took me like a month.
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I made like two bucks on that site.
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And I was like, oh my god, I made money in a way that's not like someone just paying me, you know?
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And it kind of blew my mind.
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Like the whole saying like everyone remembers your first dollar in the internet.
8:28
I wish it wasn't coco butter cream, but And then and that's when you got into like internet marketing.
8:33
But didn't you do like a Kendrick Lamar website, too?
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Yeah, that was that was man, that was probably like a couple years later.
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So the story on that one is my cousin.
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I was living with my cousin at the time.
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He was like a biomechanical engineer and I'm over here doing all this weird stuff on the internet like building sites and stuff.
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And he's kind of getting intrigued by it.
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And a friend hits me up and he was like, hey, I have all these blogs that I need to sell. I just need some money.
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I have Kendrick Lamar, Rita Ora, Schoolboy Q, like all these sort of up-and-coming artists.
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And this would have been like 2014, I think.
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He goes, you want to buy one?
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And I go, I I'm kind of doing my own thing, but maybe I'll have my cousin buy it and we'll do it together.
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So my cousin Johnny actually puts up the money for it and I think I had like 10% equity in this Kendrick Lamar website.
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And we start like scouring the internet and we actually become like the biggest source of Kendrick Lamar news on the internet before he drops his first album, Good Kid, M. A. A. D City.
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And so no one really knows Kendrick.
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Like only super fans know him.
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And there was a point where like I think Kendrick's manager even called my cousin who was like, I like we really appreciate what you're doing for Kendrick.
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Like you're putting his name out there, da da da da da.
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And the way we monetize that is we were just selling shirts.
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Just like print-on-demand shirts.
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I think we probably made like 30 or 40 grand doing that.
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And then after the album dropped and he blew up, all of a sudden he like trademarked his name and we had to shut the site down and stuff, but that was another like weirdo internet thing that we did.
9:56
All right, look, the question that Shawn and I get asked constantly is what skillset did we develop early on in our careers that kind of changed our business career and that's an easy answer. It's copywriting.
10:05
We've talked about copywriting and how it's changed our life constantly on this podcast and we give a ton of tips, a ton of techniques, a ton of frameworks and throughout all the podcasts.
10:13
Well, we decided to aggregate all of that into one simple document so you can read all of it.
10:18
You can see how we've learned copywriting, but you can see the resources that we turn to on a daily basis.
10:22
You can see the frameworks, the techniques we use.
10:23
It's in a simple document.
10:25
You can check it out in the link below.
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All right, now back to the show.
10:28
What was the main thing though?
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Was it the gardening like gardening websites the whole time?
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No, the the gardening thing didn't really start until for real.
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Like it was a hobby that I love doing and I've I've done it every every year of my life since 2013.
10:41
Um, but it was just like a a hobby blog until 2016 uh when I went full-time on it.
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And hobby blog in that you were actually like into gardening and you're like I'm just going to I'm just going to create content around.
10:54
But did you see any numbers where you're like uh this could be a big company or was it straight joy? No.
11:03
No, I mean it was a mix, right?
11:03
Like I was gardening for fun and then I would just document whatever whatever I was doing and like make a YouTube video or make a blog post and I would try to monetize it.
11:12
Like I'd make some ad revenue or I'd make some affiliate revenue, but I never thought it could be huge.
11:19
Like I remember talking to friends that were all kind of doing the same thing at the time and I was like man, if this thing could just make two grand a month or if it could make five grand a month like that'd be amazing that I wouldn't have to go get a job.
11:27
Uh cuz I think my mind didn't understand the scale that any any business could really become at that point in time.
11:34
So yeah, it took a it took a while for me to realize the potential of it.
11:39
And then you you kind of like had this it's a it's a it's not like a cliche to most people, but for the media world it's like a cliche at this point, but at the time when you were doing it it was like content and commerce was actually like a pretty innovative idea which is
11:55
I'm going to build this huge blog and instead of just making money on advertising, I'm going to sell my own products which is like it sounds silly that that that I'm calling that innovative, but like when you were getting going that was a thing. I mean I had a blog and I was like I
12:09
I mean I had a blog and I was like I don't think that you can like sell your own products.
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I'd rather just stick to like what I know which is content and ads and I was like totally against selling stuff, but you made the right decision for sure.
12:20
It's a significantly better business.
12:22
It's a it's a way better business and yeah, the the brief story on that is 2016 I I go full-time on Epic Gardening.
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I was at Scribe Media or Book in a Box it was called before that.
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I was like second employee there.
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So I quit that, go full-time on Epic.
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It was just a blog and YouTube channel.
12:36
Did you have any revenue when you quit?
12:40
Yeah, I was making $450 a month.
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I have this whole spreadsheet of like what it was making at the time.
12:44
So at that time I actually thought I was going to farm like legit farm in people's front yards and uh like aggregate all their square footage and like sell that produce to restaurants and stuff like that. Right.
12:57
I mean that sounds like really hard.
13:00
Yeah, it's it's a really hard way to make a smallish amount of money which there's people that do it and I actually respect it a lot, but it's cool. It's cool.
13:08
Yeah, it's just not scale.
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Uh so so I go okay, how about I just make this blog make a couple grand a month cuz it was making 450.
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So if I could make 450, I could probably make two.
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If I could make two, I could make five.
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And so I started growing it and I think that year the blog made 17 grand total uh about six months of the year uh and then the next year it was 72,000 revenue and this is all media cuz I haven't done any product yet, right?
13:33
2018 it was 225 and then 2019 is where I had that realization that you mentioned where I was like wait, why am I just making money from ads and like brand sponsorships?
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Like what do the brands want from me when they do a brand deal?
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They want access to your audience.
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Well, I have complete access to my own audience.
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So why don't I just be the brand selling to my own my own audience?
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Uh and so what I did is I realized like well, every piece of content I put out is basically a search for validating demand for whatever's in that content.
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And so I in all these photos I'm putting out cuz I'm I'm at this point I'm gardening in Hillcrest, San Diego in like a very small front yard in in a pretty urban part of downtown, San Diego.
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And so I'm like filming my content there.
14:18
I have these little raised beds in the front yard which is just a way to grow plants and they're made out of metal and every time I took a photo these everyone's like what are those?
14:26
What what are those things in the photo?
14:27
Like where'd you get those?
14:27
So I was like I actually don't know.
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Like a brand just sent these to me and I put them in the front yard.
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And so I started emailing this company. They're from Australia.
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I emailed them like maybe once or twice a quarter for like a year saying like hey, can I get these?
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Can I just like somehow get these to America and sell them?
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And they're like no, no, we already we have someone we're working with like we don't need to do that.
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And then the beginning of 2019 they emailed back and said like hey, are you are you still interested in in our products?
14:57
We like a distributor just isn't working with us anymore. I'm like yeah, sure. Let's do it.
15:00
And I think I probably had like 70, 80 grand in the business bank account at that point in time.
15:06
All right, so it's like it's like promising.
15:08
You're not rolling in it yet, but it's media. So it's mostly profit.
15:12
Yeah, it's mostly profit and it's a small business with with nearly zero employees.
15:15
So to me I'm like I'm making like a like a mid-level doctor's salary out of this business now, you know? So I'm I'm chilling. I'm I'm gardening. I'm liking my life.
15:24
Um so I hit these guys up and they're like yeah, sure.
15:27
Like here's how it works and I'm like holy I don't know how buying product works.
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Cuz I'm I'm used to media and so much like like the sort of cringe early days, the way I tried to do it was sort of sort of noob.
15:39
Like I was like okay, how do I buy the product?
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And they're like well, you have to pay us, you know, here's all these different like shipping terms.
15:45
So I bought a 20-ft container of these raised beds for I think $35,000 which was like half the money that I had.
15:52
Uh and I go okay, well what what what happens when they get to America?
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Like what am I supposed to do?
15:58
Like well, you got to receive it at the port and then you that container has to like go somewhere and then you have to unpack it and then you have to ship it. And I'm like okay, cool.
16:07
Like thanks for that information.
16:08
So what I tried to do is I tried to rent a storage facility out of a Costco.
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And like just one of the ones that you like go to if you're going to move for a year, you know, and you put all your furniture in there.
16:19
So I tried to do that and I was like trying to figure out how to get it from the port to the storage facility and then I was trying to look up like well, how do you get internet in the storage facility so you can so I can print the labels.
16:29
Oh and you were going to literally mail these things out yourself.
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Cuz I didn't know anything about commerce.
16:35
So I didn't know you could like send it to a 3PL or you could send to a warehouse.
16:39
How many like units of stuff did you have?
16:41
I think it was 550 beds at that time.
16:46
Okay, so like that's that's a ton, but it's like all right, I'm just going to go to the post office four times a week and I'll just I'll figure it out.
16:53
I mean that's a lot of work, but I guess it's kind of reasonable.
16:56
I I thought it was reasonable and the reason why I was trying to do it like that is because when I when I ordered it and they packed the container in Australia, I was like okay, cool guys.
17:06
Like to my audience I was like hey, you guys asked where these things were from. I figured it out.
17:09
I put up a really crappy Shopify store and I was like here they are and then I sold them out in like four or five days Oh no.
17:18
while they were still getting to America.
17:19
So I knew I I knew it was working, right?
17:21
And so then what I did is I used that money to buy another container and then that was on the way and then that sold out and then I was like oh my god.
17:27
Like I think there's something really going on here.
17:30
So what was your revenue in 19 the year you started selling stuff?
17:32
So 19 was like 550 and half of it was the product.
17:38
So in year one like immediately half was was product. So I was like oh my god.
17:41
I think what I've been building this whole time is the top of a business and not the bottom of it.
17:48
Like I thought media was the whole thing.
17:49
I was like oh actually media is right here and it monetizes, but the bottom is actually where where um the business lies.
17:56
the weird innovative idea.
17:56
I remember uh so like uh my friend Nathan Berry has this awesome blog post called like billion-dollar blogs and it's like basically the story of a handful of people who started out blogging and then built companies around the blogs.
18:09
And the most famous example is probably Glossier I think that's what it's called Glossier.
18:16
It's the the women's makeup brand that started as Emily Weiss I think her name is.
18:21
She had like a fashion blog and then she was like oh, this selling stuff is way better than selling ads and it became a a billion-dollar company and he has a few more examples of that.
18:30
And that that's when I first read about that idea, but I still thought this is way too intimidating and like too challenging.
18:39
And particularly for me at the time I ran a business website and I was like I can't what am I going to possibly sell? Yeah, like what product?
18:45
Yeah, so like it didn't really make sense for me, but even still I was like this is too intimidating, but you were living it and doing it which is pretty cool.
18:51
Yeah, I mean frankly like it was quite intimidating to me, but I just was too either dumb or smart to like realize that and just went ahead and did it.
19:00
But anyways, like the to wrap that up like I ended up talking to a friend of mine who was in commerce and he's like what the hell are you doing, dude?
19:07
Just get like a 3PL and get a freight forwarder and send the container to there.
19:12
Hook the Shopify to there and then they'll ship it all out for you and that's what I ended up doing and so that that was kind of the genesis of selling products at Epic Gardening.
19:19
And didn't you grow that to like 7 million in revenue with like four people?
19:25
Yeah, so yeah, I mean I think 2020 would have been 2. 8 in revenue.
19:30
So almost a six-xing year on year. And then 2021 was 7. 3 7.
19:33
4 or so and most of it was product at that point in time and that would have been on a team of me my garden assistant, my actual assistant, a video editor and and a writer. And that was it. That's all we had. On 7.
19:47
3 in revenue, what could your profit be?
19:51
Oh man, it was probably like 50% or something like that.
19:57
So, you're rolling in it. Yeah, yeah.
19:59
Well, cuz cuz the thing about it is you if you run it like that and that was with $0 of paid spend, right?
20:05
And so, I have no acquisition cost.
20:07
My acquisition cost is equal to my media cuz that's the only way I was getting the word out, but my media is not a cost, it's a it's a profit driver.
20:16
And so, it's that term negative CAC.
20:18
Like I had negative CAC on the business. Why raise money then?
20:20
I know you raised I think $17 million.
20:22
Why cuz like if you the cool thing about bootstrapping a company is you could do whatever the hell you want. Yeah.
20:28
And there's like freedom in that and that's frankly my favorite part about business is like the freedom of like you're creating your own empire.
20:35
You could do whatever the hell you want.
20:36
If you want to grow it, you can.
20:38
If you don't want to grow it, you don't have to.
20:40
Um you get all the money.
20:40
You don't have to answer to anyone.
20:42
I assume at this point you own you still own 100% of the company.
20:46
At least if I'm you, I'm not giving equity to my employees because it's like uh I've been doing this by myself for a long time.
20:52
I'll I'll rather just pay you a high salary.
20:55
Why even take $17 million?
20:58
Yeah, I wrestled with it for a long time.
21:01
Like maybe that deal took like 6 months to close, I would say.
21:05
And at least for the Turner Group, that's not some massive deal for them.
21:09
Like that's not that's not a ton of money for them.
21:10
It's It was huge amount for me.
21:12
The The logic ended up being I was like do I know what I'm going to do in the next couple years?
21:18
Like do I understand the complexity of the business I I had built cuz it's a that was a really lean team to be at 7.
21:23
3 with like a commerce business shipping product Yeah, there's like a bunch of redundancy issues like at that around like anything north of $5 million, it's like all right, we've got something here.
21:33
We've got a seed of something working here.
21:34
It potentially could be huge.
21:37
potentially could be huge. Like I should have some I should actually like shift to being a proper CEO and like with being being a proper CEO is like hiring extra employees even if like you know, like at that point it's like with with the size that you were
21:51
everyone was working 110% and at that point it's you kind of like almost purposely become a slightly more inefficient because you're like if I get 70% of effort from 10 people, that's better than 110% effort of five people and I'll have some redundancy so people can like chill a little bit or someone gets sick or quits. Like there's actually like
22:08
Like there's actually like some proper CEO work you have to do at that stage, I would think. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, totally.
22:13
I mean and the operational side like the hiring etc.
22:17
side like I had no clue cuz I was on a team of me and and four contractors.
22:20
Like I didn't I didn't really have hiring experience.
22:24
And then on the commerce side it's not like we got to 7.
22:26
3 selling like an online course, which would be a lot simpler to fulfill.
22:29
Like there's there's inventory planning.
22:32
There's like sales tax nexus that you hit in all these different states that you have to file for.
22:37
So, there was a lot of complexity I was like staring down the barrel of that I I knew that I didn't know about.
22:41
I was at least smart enough to know I didn't know what was coming.
22:45
Uh and then frankly like that was just a crazy period in the market.
22:49
Like 2021 was probably still the last best time to do any kind of raising.
22:53
And um and then at the same time I was like, "Look, I'm already ahead in in my space.
22:57
Like no one no creator in gardening is is doing what I'm doing.
23:03
And so, why don't I just make sure that I stay ahead and partner with people who actually understand how these media to commerce businesses are built."
23:10
And that's what ended up making me do the deal.
23:13
Were you able to take any money off the table or did the 17 go straight to the balance sheet?
23:18
I was able to take some off, which was great.
23:20
Um Yeah, that's like life-changing, right?
23:21
Yeah, it was it was life-changing and then like I had bought a warehouse um to to start fulfilling cuz eventually like I moved off the 3PL.
23:28
I was like, "You know what?
23:30
I'm paying these guys like 30, 40k a month in fulfillment fees.
23:33
Why don't I just like start a separate company, buy a warehouse, and then become my own tenant and then build equity in the real estate side."
23:39
And so, when we raised, I I actually didn't that that warehouse didn't go with it.
23:44
And so, I I had the warehouse too.
23:44
So, like the way the whole personal financial math worked out, I was like the way I live I'm good now and I can just like fully focus on trying to win this space.
23:54
So, that was another part of it. Do you have family?
23:58
Uh yeah, I have a I have a girlfriend.
23:59
Yeah, and then a lot of my family lives in San Diego.
24:02
What's it feel like to uh be I don't know if you were single at the time or not, but what's it feel like to be a young guy uh and you're like, "I'm good.
24:10
I'm good for potentially forever."
24:10
Yeah, I mean it's kind of uh underwhelming, I guess. I don't know.
24:15
Was it like that for you? I don't know.
24:18
For For me, I had I'd already made quite a bit of money running up through 2021 just sort of solo.
24:23
And so, it was a huge change, but it wasn't it wasn't like, you know, $1 million to $200 million worth or something like that.
24:31
Like the the way I live, I just don't I just don't need it, I guess.
24:34
Um and so, all I did was eliminate worry about like I don't know what if something medical goes wrong or I couldn't even figure out if I wanted to buy anything for a while.
24:43
Like I didn't I didn't buy anything like fancy to celebrate or whatever.
24:48
Not having money is the the period of my life where I didn't have as uh money was more stressful than the period of my life where I did have breathing room.
24:58
That That I completely agree with.
24:58
That I I always think like it mitigates all your downsides, but it doesn't at least I haven't found that it makes you some massively happier person. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
25:10
But you remember that that study where it was like $70,000 a year? Right.
25:16
That's That is absolutely I agree is That I agree.
25:19
Why do you agree that that's Well, okay.
25:22
So, first of all, I think inflation adjusted isn't it like 160k now or something like that?
25:27
Yeah, even I think that number is might be too too.
25:29
160 grand in in in one of the top five cities uh shockingly doesn't go very far. Doesn't go far.
25:36
Yeah, I think I think that's because the things Let's say you're making like 200 a year.
25:42
You can get like you can have someone come and clean the house or you can have like meal support or these sorts of things that that help you free your time up from things you like genuinely don't like to do.
25:52
Uh there's things like I love to do that of course I could pay for.
25:55
Like I obviously I grow my own food and I like cook meals and and bake my own bread and stuff like that.
25:59
I I don't have to do that.
26:01
But like I I don't clean my house anymore, right?
26:03
Uh and so like things like that I think give me I don't know if like positive joy would be the way I would phrase it though.
26:10
It's just like I don't have to do an annoying thing is the way I think about it.
26:13
Yeah, it's like uh you remember that book like the five languages of love and it's like, "Oh, your girlfriend's like an acts of service woman."
26:19
So, like if I do something nice for her, she'll feel loved. Yeah.
26:22
There's like the five languages of love, but for money where it's like for me it's not nice things, but for some people it could be they love cars.
26:29
For me, it's the same thing where I've got a cleaner who comes often and I just like genuinely feel happier not having to do my laundry and clean. Yeah.
26:38
And so, in those like small things, which frankly aren't expensive, uh it it it it definitely makes you happier.
26:45
Like those little small things.
26:47
I learned that all from Ramit. Same.
26:49
I learned that all from Ramit is is just he has like a surgical team on every single part of his life that he hates uh to do and I was like, "You know what?
26:59
That's actually pretty smart."
26:59
And so And he spends big on stuff.
27:01
I was with Ramit on Saturday.
27:03
He He like always asks these like crazy questions where sometimes I'm I'm just wanting to chill and have fun and he's like, "Sam, let me ask you a question.
27:10
What What's What's your rich life?"
27:12
And I'm like "I don't know, man.
27:14
Uh like let's just drink our coffee." He's like, "No, no, no. Tell me your rich life." And I'm like, "Okay. Uh it's not stuff. It's services."
27:22
He goes, "What would happen if you 10x your spending on your services?"
27:26
And I was like same conversation.
27:30
With the exact same He goes he goes he goes "How How How big would your staff be if it could be as big as you wanted it to be for your house?"
27:38
And I was like, "I don't know.
27:38
Like I think I have like a cleaner and maybe like a cook every so often or something." He's like, "Oh, man. Like what kind of cook?"
27:45
You know, he gets into the details on that.
27:47
He gets into the details. He loves it. He loves it.
27:48
And when he asks those questions, frankly it does make me start thinking A like maybe I should do this and B like am I thinking too small?
27:54
Like if I love something, why don't I like get 10x more of of that thing.
28:01
And so, it is like cool to think about.
28:04
He He does do a good job with that of like make of like pressuring me to think beyond like how I'm thinking and and Ramit's stuff has actually been life-changing for me. Same.
28:13
How big's the business now? Can you say? Yeah, yeah.
28:17
We're We're about 90-ish people uh and we're hoping to hit somewhere around like 40, 45 million this year in revenue. That's insane, right?
28:24
Did you ever think that And are you doing it profit profitably still now that even though you raised money?
28:30
Yeah, we're we're profitable. We're profitable.
28:31
The first year after I think we were not because, you know, we hired quite a bit ahead of of growth cuz we were like way under hired with me and four contractors.
28:41
And then um this year this year we are.
28:45
You think how big how big do you think it's going to get in like 5 years?
28:49
I mean I think it's like a foregone conclusion to get above $100 million because we have we've made a couple acquisitions.
28:55
We made two small ones and one large one.
28:58
And even just sort of growing those, I think has a shot at at getting us past 100.
29:03
I don't know how much bigger than that.
29:05
Why acquire something instead of building it on your own?
29:09
It's really just speed and if you have the competency internally to do it.
29:13
Did you I mean you you you studied accounting, but did you know anything about acquiring a company or did Turn kind of hold your hand?
29:19
So, the big the big acquisition where we bought the seed company, that was Turn and led a lot of the diligence on that cuz it's like way too complex a 30-year-old business.
29:26
Like I there's no way I could do the the diligence on that.
29:30
But the two small acquisitions, I led those and they sort of just helped with the legalities of of getting it all done.
29:37
So, the very first one was a seed tray.
29:41
So, like when you when you're gardening, you usually start seeds in like a little tray.
29:44
And a lot of these trays are made out of pretty flimsy plastic and they're just like throwaway things.
29:49
And so a friend of mine who was in the space on the media side of gardening, he's like an educator, he he was developing these trays and he hit me up and he's like, "Hey, can I come down to the house and just show you this new tray that I made to start seeds in?"
30:02
And this was uh early 2021.
30:02
I was like, "Yeah, sure, come on down."
30:07
He comes down, he shows me this tray and it's like this very super sturdy durable tray to start seeds in, which solves like some of the problems of them being flimsy.
30:14
Then he had like cut all these little slits in it and there's like a big hole in the bottom, which if you're a gardener, you know, it's like it makes it easier to like pop the seed out and put it out in the garden.
30:23
So I hold the tray and the second I hold it, cuz I've been gardening for like 8 years now, I'm like, "Holy this is like the best seed starting tray I've ever seen in my life, like for sure."
30:32
And he's like, "You can stand on it if you want to."
30:34
So I like I'm like 220 lb, so I stand on it with one foot, it doesn't budge and I'm like, "Okay, like that thing's durable."
30:42
And so I go, "Well, what do you want to do?
30:43
Like I think this is a cool product.
30:45
Do you want to like I can put it on my Shopify store and like see if the audience wants it?"
30:48
And he's like, "Yeah, sure, what do you think?
30:50
Like we'll just split the profits 50/50.
30:52
You have You have the audience, I have the product and and let's go."
30:57
So I started teasing it in like Instagram or YouTube videos and it's an injection molded prod- product.
31:01
So you we can only make so many in a day.
31:03
You have to like press the mold and like accumulate inventory.
31:07
So we we built up like maybe a week or two of inventory or what we thought was and then I just put an Instagram reel out and I was like, "Hey, this is the coolest tray I've ever seen and there's a link in my bio to go grab it."
31:16
And we sold it out like Shopify has this live analytics you can look at. It's awesome.
31:21
It's like It's like It's like just the biggest dopamine rush when you start seeing that coming in.
31:26
So I remember I was screen recording at just to see just to like kind of flex and and record the live screen and we sold out like couple weeks inventory like 25 seconds.
31:36
How much revenue is that?
31:37
It was like 25 or 30 grand, I think.
31:37
So now that's a that's an entire line of products we own. It's on our shop.
31:42
It's called our our epic tray line.
31:46
So if you go to our shop and you go to seed starting supplies, you'll you'll see all the trays there.
31:50
So over the next like over the next like three, four weeks, we just like built up inventory, dropped it, sold it out, built up inventory, dropped it, sold it out and we were just splitting the profits and then I go to him and I was like, "Hey, look, not only is this working like really well, like better than I thought, but there's definitely more trays that we could make.
32:07
There's like different form factors and different ideas and like little domes you could put on top to keep humidity in or whatever."
32:14
And I was like, "But I can't make them cuz that's what you do and I'm like 95% of your sales.
32:20
So what if you just joined Epic, you know, we raised some money.
32:25
I was like, "You could be our product lead.
32:27
We'll we'll I can't really like buy the business based on revenue cuz that that is we are your revenue, right?
32:31
And so how do how do how do we structure a deal?"
32:35
And so the deal we came up with without getting into like crazy specifics is we basically paid him for all of the assets like the the the molds themselves and and and development time and a premium on that, um gave him some equity and hired him as our product lead and then we've built that line out to like I think like 12 or 15 SKUs going D2C and wholesale now.
32:58
Um and it's like I think I think we're like up 7x probably on the acquisition price as far as like revenue after the fact.
33:06
So and and that wasn't like a big acquisition. It was sub 500,000.
33:07
So to me I'm like that's why you would That's why you would buy because I Yeah, and that's a great That's a great deal for everyone involved. Yeah, exactly. It was a total win-win. What are the other two?
33:22
So the second biggest one we did was actually a media acquisition. So that was a blog.
33:26
So a friend of mine from from like the old SEO days had built a gardening blog and we were hiring for a director of editorial like just someone to run our blog.
33:36
And our blog was doing well like maybe like 8, 10 million sessions a year and that was monetizing off of display ads, but then hopefully like people will go through and like buy some stuff on our store, too.
33:47
All from search or mostly from search?
33:49
Yeah, it's like mostly search. I'd say like 80% search.
33:52
Um and so this guy emails me and he's like, "Hey, look, I saw that that head of editorial position.
33:57
I'm working in SEO right now, but I've also been building a gardening blog on the side.
34:02
It was called allaboutgardening.
34:04
com, which is now redirecting to Epic Gardening.
34:07
And he's like, "I'd like the job like I'd like to put my hat in the ring for the job, but I kind of have like a competing blog."
34:15
So to me I go, "Look, you've built that blog really fast, way faster than our we're currently building ours, but you kind of can't work for us and run that blog.
34:23
So what if we bought your blog and hired you to run our blog?" And he goes, "Okay."
34:30
And so what we did is we bought the blog and we migrated his blog into our blog, which was like calling both like 10 million sessions a year, something like that.
34:40
So you'd think like 10 plus 10 is 20, but our blog from an SEO perspective it was like super strong.
34:45
So by migrating his into ours, our blog went to like we probably got like a 20, 30% premium on the traffic.
34:53
So like 10 plus 10 equals 25, right?
34:54
Uh so then you're monetizing better off of the display ads there, but then we also just made more from the ads themselves.
35:04
And so effectively the acquisition financed itself by the increased revenue like month one.
35:11
Uh so that was another like sort of weird acquisition.
35:14
Can you say what was that more or less than 500?
35:15
It was Yeah, it was it was in between 500 and a million and the way we structured that one is we paid some up front and some over a period of time, job plus equity.
35:24
So this was post This was post Chernin? This is post Chernin. Yeah.
35:29
So the way that one has ended up working out is we have a awesome leader running our blog at a higher level than ours was before.
35:36
Our traffic has over doubled and we're monetizing at over double the rate on the traffic.
35:40
So you know like like YouTube RPMs, right?
35:42
It's the same with blogs.
35:45
Like our our blog RPM doubled after doing the acquisition.
35:50
And so basically we just created like a cash flow that that finances the thing that we bought that created the cash flow.
35:56
Did you read a book about the I mean, how did you learn about acquisitions like this?
35:59
I mean, that's a pretty good one.
36:00
I just thought I don't know. I just thought about it.
36:02
I was like, "If I do that, I feel like all these things will happen." And then they did. I don't know.
36:08
Like that My my old like You're like, "Look, I don't make up the rules.
36:12
I just think them up and write them down." Yeah, I I I don't know.
36:13
I just I I Well, you know how like people say like there needs to be one rea- one like core reason to do something, uh like a acquisition or a business move or whatever.
36:24
I I agree with that, but to me I the way I mentally underwrote both of those things is I was like, "Well, the core reason is pretty obvious.
36:31
Like I don't have a product, now I do."
36:33
Or like I don't have the traffic and a leader, now I do.
36:36
But then I just go, "How many other ways could this benefit us and how many other ways could it hurt us?"
36:43
And if the ways that could benefit us outweigh the ways it could hurt us, I go like, "I feel like it'll just feel like it'll just work then."
36:49
And this probably holds true for like acquisitions that are smaller where it's maybe a less efficient market or something like that.
36:55
I don't know how it would work if if you have some sort of big big deal. What was the third one?
37:01
Cuz you're two for two You're two for two now. That sounds pretty good.
37:04
Those Those ones work Those ones have worked out. Yeah, yeah.
37:05
So the the third one was almost like kind of a condition of doing the Chernin deal in the first place cuz they were like, "Look, like this is this is not a big amount of money for us, but we want to do some follow-on and see if we can like purchase a really awesome company in the space and help power up Epic Gardening."
37:23
I was like, "Okay, cool, that sounds good."
37:24
Which is I think what they did with like MeatEater and a few others where they buy like they buy the or they invest in the the media company and then immediately they're like, "Let's go acquire a company to sell to the audience." Yeah, yeah, exactly.
37:39
And so we were looking Man, we looked at so many different companies like maybe 150, 160 different companies in the space.
37:44
I was like out at a uh fruit tree farm in Missouri at one point in time.
37:50
When you say look at 150, does that mean just like put like ideas on paper or does that mean actually contacting 150 people?
37:58
Oh, it's It means contacting more than 150.
38:03
It means like talking or like looking at a deck or inspecting in some way somewhere around 150. Something like that.
38:10
I mean, that's a ton of work.
38:13
Yeah, this is why this is why having them has been helpful or having an investor on your side has been helpful cuz like I'm out here running the business and I I might mention a company and they'll they'll diligence and say like, "Yeah, this makes sense.
38:22
This doesn't make sense."
38:24
And then they'll they'll cold email them or cold call them and be like, "Hey, this is who we are.
38:28
I know this is out of the blue, but would this ever entertain you?"
38:31
And then if they say yes, and like, "Look, why don't you like put together some high-level numbers and then send something over and we could talk about it with our team."
38:39
And then you get some type of like docs in or PowerPoint or you get something and you're like, "Uh yay or nay, like it could go to the next step.
38:47
Let's actually have a real discussion about this."
38:49
Is that Is that how the due diligence looks like? Pretty much, yeah. Yeah, pretty much.
38:52
Like I I remember we we were looking at like the top 600 gardening apps at one point in time.
38:59
And so we I got like a sheet from uh one of the people on the investment team and they were like, "Yeah, here are like the seven we think make any sense whatsoever and here's like the 593 that don't make any sense at all."
39:10
So it's like guys are doing a lot of the work then. They're helping you. Oh, yeah.
39:13
They're pulling their weight. Uh I think so. Yeah, absolutely.
39:17
Um So so anyway, so the seed company.
39:19
This is like the big the big acquisition.
39:24
This was a company that without me knowing it, it was the first pack of seeds I had ever grown when I first started gardening.
39:29
So I went into some random nursery with my brother and just picked up like a beautiful packet of seeds, Swiss cucumber seeds, and lo and behold, turns out to be the seed company we end up buying in the story I'm about to share.
39:41
So we go out to Colorado.
39:41
It's this company called Botanical Interests, and they they're really well known for having high germination rate.
39:45
So, the seeds sprout really well when you buy them, but also the packet is just beautifully designed. What are they growing? You know, I'm a noob.
39:52
I'm a total noob when it comes to this stuff.
39:56
What do they What's the output?
39:56
There's six I think we we stock about 650 varieties of vegetables, flowers, and herbs.
40:02
So, pretty much anything under the sun.
40:04
Anything that you would like reasonably want to grow, we we have it.
40:07
And it's a it's a husband and wife They've been running it for like 28 years. They were married.
40:11
I think they had divorced like a few years prior to that.
40:14
And they were sort of ready to hand the business off to whoever wants to run it next.
40:20
But it you know, it's it's like one of those like quote boring businesses that people talk about all the time.
40:25
Who's who's actually going to be able to buy it?
40:26
And the seed business is actually fairly complex.
40:27
There's a lot that goes into it that you have to understand. And so, we go out there.
40:32
I meet I meet the guy, the husband, and he's like, "Hey, can I grab a selfie?"
40:35
Like Actually, I have a friend who's like a big fan of your YouTube.
40:38
It'd be amazing if if I could show her that we met.
40:40
And immediately, I'm like Okay, like maybe I've got a little edge in this in this process.
40:46
Like maybe I'm going to be able to get this company.
40:48
I mean, it could go either way.
40:49
It could be like you have an you have an edge, or they know that they're that we have money behind us or something like that. Could be that, too.
40:57
Yeah, could be that, too.
40:57
But we go through the whole like the diligence happens.
41:01
We go on a tour of the place where we're talking through pricing and all this sort of stuff.
41:03
And so, I told my investors.
41:05
I was like They gave me all this swag. They gave me like a hat.
41:08
So, I go I'm just going to wear this hat in every piece of content we make until we either win or don't win this deal.
41:14
Because I know the guy watches it, right?
41:16
And I know like probably his team watches it, too.
41:21
So, for the next like this was maybe May.
41:22
For the next 6 months, which is a great time.
41:25
Like May, that's spring through summer.
41:27
I'm cranking YouTube videos out.
41:27
I'm cranking Instagram reels out, short form, whatever.
41:33
Hat Hat's on 24/7 every single piece of content.
41:35
And we go through the bidding process. We win the deal.
41:37
We were not the highest bid by like quite a bit, I would say.
41:41
A a material amount for the sellers to like not have in their pocket if they went with us.
41:47
And we go out to celebrate.
41:49
And I go, "Hey, you know, I really appreciate you guys.
41:50
Like it's it's truly an honor to be able to carry on the legacy of this company.
41:54
Like this is the first seed packet I ever grew."
41:55
And I'm I'm just being very gracious cuz I I did feel that way.
41:59
And he goes, "You don't know how much wearing that hat helped." And I go, "I knew it." Uh so Yeah, got him.
42:08
Not in like a malicious way. Just Sure, sure, sure.
42:10
I'm using the angle that I have, which is my Everyone won. Everyone won. Everyone won.
42:15
Did you What were some of the red flags and and I guess green flags or whatever it is for that deal along with a few other deals when you're looking through the financials in the business?
42:26
So, the the seed company's red flags are that it basically that it is a seed company.
42:31
Like that's just a hard It's a difficult business.
42:33
Like there's a ton there's so many different SKUs? Tons of different SKUs.
42:38
There's You have to do like a non-GMO certification.
42:40
You have to do germination testing.
42:41
You have to do pesticide and herbicide testing.
42:43
You're You're physically purchasing or contracting a grower to to grow seeds that you then receive, test, repack, etc.
42:54
And so, there's just like a lot of It's not like you're you're selling like a rug or something like that.
42:58
And you can just buy rugs from China and then sell the rugs to other people in America. So, that was complex.
43:05
But the part that I think was really green about it is it was far and away one of the best brands in the space.
43:09
Like I I loved it for 10 years.
43:09
And on top of that, they were mostly a wholesale business.
43:15
And the online business they they sort of hadn't done a whole lot with.
43:19
And I was like, "Okay, well, we're we're definitely an online first company, media and product.
43:22
So, why don't we just plug plug those two together?"
43:24
And I think the first year after we we did the deal, the online part of the business for the seed company was up like 70 60 or 70% year over year without really doing much.
43:35
Like all we did was move it to Shopify and tell people we own the company now, and that's pretty much it.
43:40
What what what payback cycle are you looking for?
43:42
And what type of multiple do businesses like this sell for?
43:46
Man, I I don't remember offhand the multiple, but I want to say it was probably 6 to 8x. Somewhere like that. Uh income? Yeah, I think so.
43:54
And how long till you could pay back the acquisition? That's a good question. I don't know.
44:01
Maybe Hopefully like Hopefully like So, I mean, I I I think that's pretty fast.
44:08
Yeah, it's like five I would say like five, hopefully.
44:11
Yeah, I mean, or I mean, if you only if they only sell for five to seven times, I would think that you you'd actually grow it or get that money back significantly faster, I would think because of kind of like the audience that you have. Yeah.
44:23
The audience and then like just the opportunity cuz we're we're we're carried in I would say 4,500 stores around the country.
44:30
And so, to me, I'm like, "Well, it's just seeds that are carried."
44:31
Like just our seed brands there cuz they were a seed company.
44:35
But we're making these trays that I told you about.
44:37
We're making these other new products.
44:38
We Now we have a distribution network.
44:40
So, why don't we tell all those retailers, "Hey, look, we're like making better product that your customers will want.
44:45
Just stock our product in your store."
44:49
And so, that was that was another like big lever, I think.
44:50
We're still testing it out and trying to prove if if that's right or not, but we're like Yeah, why why wouldn't we just offer a ton of our products now to wholesale in a network that we couldn't have built?
45:01
Have you ever been to Chip and Joanna's like Waco?
45:04
Like They're like it's I did a show for them in 2020.
45:09
Like you were on their show?
45:11
I filmed a show for Magnolia back then.
45:15
They have It's basically like Disneyland for like 4-year-old white chicks.
45:20
It's like you can like buy anything in the world that you're like for your home or living room.
45:26
I went to it once and like my mother-in-law and her sisters like wanted to go and like take pictures of like They just wanted to like anything with Chip and Joanna's name on it.
45:33
They just wanted to see it.
45:35
And I was like doing math around like how much I mean, it's like that It's It's like a It's like a campus.
45:41
And so, they've got like food and many many different stores.
45:44
And I was doing math, and I'm like These guys are going to be billionaires.
45:48
Like this is going to be the This is going to be the greatest thing ever.
45:50
And that's going to happen to you because you've got the same stick where you're you're in a good niche of I imagine it's mostly women.
45:59
And they probably have They probably spend a lot or just for the hobby, they spend a lot.
46:06
But B you got the charisma. You got the look.
46:08
Like you like it's going to happen.
46:11
Do you get crazy like stalker messages or like fans who are obsessed with you?
46:16
Um it it's definitely happened.
46:19
Yeah, it's definitely happened.
46:22
fun of me on this podcast all the time.
46:23
They everyone thinks I'm gay cuz I like I comment on like men all the time. Yeah.
46:28
But you know, I'm not embarrassed to say you're a charismatic, good-looking dude.
46:32
I imagine you've got you've got a lot of fans. Back at you, dude.
46:33
We So, everyone thinks I'm gay, too, actually.
46:36
Just because I'm like Just cuz I'm a guy I think it's cuz I'm a a younger guy in gardening, and gardening is seen as a more feminine hobby.
46:44
Uh people just think I'm a gay guy.
46:48
Which is just it's just an interesting phenomenon to experience on the internet all the time. But um yeah, no.
46:53
I mean, I would say it it happens for sure.
46:57
I I've done the whole like delete all your info from the internet process.
46:59
But it's kind of hard when good enough. It's never good enough.
47:04
Well, especially when you film at your home, right?
47:06
Like my set is my outdoors.
47:09
And so, I can't like not show the street, etc.
47:11
cuz it's it's just in the shot.
47:13
There's nothing I can really do about it.
47:15
Dude, I've had times where like I took a picture of my house, and I didn't think you could see it.
47:18
And then like the next couple days, I'll get gifts sent to my home.
47:22
And like people will find it on like street view.
47:24
And I'm like, "Oh, shit."
47:26
And like I'm not a famous person.
47:28
I'm a mildly popular person in a small subset of the internet.
47:31
And so, I can't imagine if you're like real famous or if I'm like you and my videos get millions and millions and millions of views. Yeah.
47:38
Yeah, I mean, look, it's it's hasn't been as bad as I think like legitimate celebrity-type people, but I've definitely had like I had an experience earlier this year where this woman We're all in the backyard cuz that's where we film most of the time.
47:48
But there's a garden in the front yard, too.
47:52
And I have security cameras on now that record like locally to my house, so I can pull up footage of whatever I want.
47:58
And this woman like comes up the front door, knocks on it, says, "Yoo-hoo."
47:59
And then like looks in the house, and then goes out into the front gate, walks opens it, like kind of messes around with some plants, tries to walk around the backyard.
48:10
And my assistant was in the backyard.
48:12
She's like coming around the the back to the front.
48:13
So, they kind of like butted heads.
48:16
And my assistant just freaked out.
48:16
She's like, "Who is this woman?"
48:18
And this woman saw nothing wrong with what she was doing. She was like, "Oh, yeah.
48:21
I just wanted to see if you guys were filming.
48:23
Like wanted to come say hi."
48:25
And we're like, "We don't know who you are."
48:26
And she like there's nothing we could have said to her that would have made her understand her behavior was like completely out of the norm.
48:31
And so, every so often, it's like the law of large numbers, man.
48:35
Like if you have an audience of many millions, all you need is .
48:39
01%, and that's still like 14 people, you know, that'll come mess mess with you.
48:44
You were telling Ari before about something that I wanted to ask you about, and this is something that I've been crazy interested in.
48:52
It's a business I don't really know much about other than listening to like two or three podcasts and reading a couple articles.
48:57
But the like licensing of fruits or vegetables or different type of seeds.
49:02
So, like I was reading about the history of Honeycrisp apples. Yeah.
49:07
And I believe it was started in either I think it was Minnesota.
49:11
Like University of Minnesota.
49:13
What they did was I think they like took two plants, and they bred them, however that people even do that.
49:20
I don't even know how you do that.
49:21
But it took like many decades because I guess it takes a year to get a new plant.
49:24
Or I guess it takes like 10 years to get an apple tree in the first place or 5 years, something like that.
49:29
And then you screw up a bunch, and then it so it ultimately will take many years, sometimes decades, to get like a good apple.
49:34
And then they come up with a really cute name like Honeycrisp or like I think I had one the other day that was called like cotton a cotton candy apple.
49:42
Like you like brand it with some like cute name.
49:46
And then you license it out to other other farmers and you build this massive business that has this moat that will take 30 years to disrupt.
49:57
Is that how it work is am I do I have that right with that That's pretty much right.
50:00
That's pretty much right.
50:01
So we're going to go into like garden nerd territory for a sec just so I can explain how it works.
50:05
So when you're making a new tree it's it's really difficult like you mentioned.
50:11
Like actually when you're making new varieties of most plants it's it it's super painful to get the variety that you actually want.
50:18
Like I met a guy at a farm once he'd been working on a potato for like 20 years.
50:22
And what was his goal outcome for that potato?
50:24
So the goal outcome potatoes are are grown from what are called seed potatoes which is basically just just a potato that you throw in the ground.
50:32
So you don't plant like a little seed.
50:33
You just throw a potato in the ground.
50:35
So this guy was trying to make a potato that you could grow from an actual potato seed.
50:38
Cuz when a potato is in the ground it throws like leaves up and it actually makes a potato flower which produces a potato berry and that berry has seeds in it and if you plant those seeds the problem is that you don't get the potato that you planted.
50:53
And so his outcome was like a more efficient way for a farmer.
50:55
It wasn't necessarily a certain taste.
50:58
Yeah it was it wasn't it I mean it definitely was a taste but you're right.
51:01
Like the idea was instead of buying a ton of potatoes and planting them by hand you could just plant a bunch of seeds.
51:07
That took him that took him 20 years right?
51:11
Did he get his out did did it did he do it? He got it.
51:13
Yeah it's called the Clancy potato.
51:14
We actually saw it on our our store. It's an awesome potato.
51:16
Did he get wealthy from it? I hope so.
51:18
I didn't ask but I hope so.
51:18
I think he did it under a seed company so probably they got wealthy. I'm not sure.
51:25
But either way he's an interesting guy.
51:27
So with fruit trees though it's kind of the same thing where like you have to you have to keep developing tons and tons of trees and then figure out let's say okay this is the apple out of the hundreds that I grew out that I actually like.
51:41
It's that's my next Honeycrisp right?
51:44
And what you then do is you you have to graft.
51:47
You have to take a piece of that tree and put it on what's called the rootstock of of an apple.
51:51
So like the roots and below.
51:56
Cuz you can't use the seed of that cuz it'll be a different apple and it will take a long time.
51:59
So let's say you you get this magical new Honeycrisp.
52:03
Uh what you do is you take a bunch of those those little branches off and you put them on other apple rootstock and then grow those out and then those are genetic clones of that new Honeycrisp and then you do that again and then you do that again.
52:14
And so that's how And is each time one year or how long does it take to grow a tree?
52:20
Mhm it's probably like it it it would really depend on the type of fruit but it it it's probably I'll say this it'll shorten from growing from seed by like 70 80%.
52:27
It's like way faster than growing it from seed.
52:30
Not only that it you you have to do it that way cuz you won't get the same genetic apple.
52:36
And so what what guys like the Honeycrisp guy you mentioned or there's there's a guy named Floyd Zaiger who's who's sort of known as like the godfather of stone fruit which is like peaches nectarines all those types of of trees what they do is they have tens of thousands I think of trees that they're cross-pollinating growing out grafting tasting testing and then when maybe 0.
52:57
1% of those actually become a variety they now have a patent on that cuz they've developed that what's called a cultivar.
53:05
They have that cultivar and then they can license that out for other people that put into production.
53:10
They take like a licensing fee on all those.
53:11
So you're right like once they actually create the next Honeycrisp or the next like killer peach they can make a cash flow off of that thing for like who knows how long until the next one comes around.
53:21
I'm looking at this guy Floyd. So he's 94 years old.
53:25
It looks like he's he's still doing it.
53:28
I think I think he passed away like a couple years ago.
53:29
But he's like a total legend in the space. Oh yeah you're right.
53:32
He he passed away but it looked like based off the photos up until like when he passed away it looks like he was still Yeah. planting or or involved.
53:39
Did he build a big his name of his company was Zaiger's genetics is that right?
53:44
Yeah Zaiger genetics and then what what there's a nursery called Dave Wilson Nursery which I think they sell the most fruit trees in the US.
53:51
They use a lot of Zaiger's stuff.
53:54
Uh and so they'll they'll be the people who grow out a lot of Floyd Zaiger's actual trees.
54:02
So it's a it's a crazy model cuz you're right like good luck competing.
54:04
You you have to spend like 20 years to even get started.
54:07
Does it make does it make is it like a good business or is it something that looks awesome but day-to-day it's quite challenging.
54:14
I mean I don't think it's the easiest business.
54:16
You have to know a lot about plant botany and genetics and all that.
54:19
But like the people who like this type of stuff like there's nothing you could pay them to make them stop doing it.
54:24
So they might as well have a business based on it you know.
54:28
Yeah my parents are in the agriculture industry.
54:29
So my father his first business was a fruit stand.
54:32
He He started as a stock boy in like the produce section of a grocery store.
54:37
Then he opened up a fruit stand.
54:41
And then he created a produce brokerage which is like basically you have relationships with farmers in Idaho or Bakersfield California and you buy let's say $500,000 of onions and then you go and find a trucker to pick it up and then you sell that $500,000 of onions to Walmart for five five or something like that off organizing that that deal.
55:07
And you have to sell at this point he's sold over $100 million of of onions over the course of 20 years but the margins are like 3% or like like you know it'll be basically him by himself selling 20 million a year worth of produce and like you make I don't know what you make but like $300,000 a year.
55:27
So good living but like you've got to sell a ton of product in order because the the margins are so small.
55:36
Uh and so I've grown up talking to some of these farmers and it's it's it's it's more of a vocation than anything because it's just what they know.
55:44
It's you know they've been born and raised doing that.
55:46
And it's like I I am a farmer no matter what and it's not like maybe traditional businesses where it's like I see an opportunity I'm going to do this.
55:56
It's like no this is just what I was bred to be.
56:00
That's what I've noticed in our in our space cuz there's a lot of like smaller product companies or small seed companies etc.
56:05
Like no one's no one's trying to get super rich doing it.
56:10
Like even even me like back in the earlier days I was like I I just I'm very happy making that 250 that I made gross revenue and pulling out whatever I made.
56:19
It just so happened that I also like business and so they combined really well.
56:24
Can I well we'll wrap up here in a sec but I want to ask you a quick question about diet.
56:29
I'm I'm a little I'm recently moved to a new place just mostly because it was across the street from a farmers market.
56:37
And I've been obsessed with the idea of buying produce and meat that only comes within like a 20 or 50 mile radius of where I am.
56:44
Um because like even if you buy food at Whole Foods I still think like Whole Foods is supposed to be like some type of standard which I don't think it is a standard anymore but for a long time it was like that was the standard of healthy eating.
57:00
Um but I still feel crappy after I eat that because I don't you know like I don't even know what organic means and I don't actually buy into the hype necessarily that that makes that is the right way to do things.
57:13
Are you eating all of your own food and do you think that makes you feel different than grocery store food?
57:21
I think I think for sure it does because I don't know that I believe you know that book Blue Zones?
57:27
Remember that one that came out?
57:28
It's like a whole bunch of old that that that book is awesome but I think it's Like I think a good part of it is yeah.
57:35
You know why it's So here well I'll tell the audience.
57:37
I did a little research on it.
57:38
It's like what they all have in common is that like in Osaka Japan or like they lie about their age.
57:46
And so like they noticed that like wow this in this town there's a ton of people born on January 1st. Like what's going on?
57:53
And it turns out a lot of them lie about their age.
57:57
I guess so they get social security at a certain time or something like that.
58:00
And uh and so there was a lot like the the the the although maybe he there was some bit of truth in there the commonality between the five blue zones is that they have a huge amount of like age fraud.
58:11
I also saw something about like can you imagine like lying to be older?
58:17
Uh I saw something about like it also maps to when we started accurately tracking birth certificates.
58:21
Like a lot of these people are old enough that they're from before when we did that.
58:28
And so how can you really know how old they are?
58:29
The thing I do think that's the nicer way to put it what I maybe said. Yeah yeah yeah.
58:33
Well I think the thing that is somewhat true there is like it does seem to just make logical sense that the fresher food you eat the better off you'll be.
58:42
And so to me I go well it doesn't get fresher than out of my own backyard right?
58:46
Like we just had a amazing carrot salad we made yesterday.
58:50
I've even grown my own wheat to make my own sourdough bread which is definitely extreme.
58:53
Like I don't think that's practical.
58:56
But yeah I mean I think you do feel better and I think the best the next best thing to grow your own food would be going to like a farmers market as long as you know like the farmer is actually growing things the way that they say they are cuz now there's like farmers market fraud.
59:08
Cuz down here in San Diego people will drive up from Mexico with like monocropped food and just pretend like it's a farmers market.
59:17
What questions do I have to ask them?
59:19
You would have to ask like well where is your farm?
59:21
Which they could definitely lie about if they wanted Yeah yeah they they should have pictures of it and you could ask like you know do you spray pesticide herbicide fungicide? If so like which ones?
59:31
You don't even have to know what their answers mean, but if they can't fire the answers off quickly, that's your signal that they kind of don't know what they're talking about. What do you do for meat?
59:42
Meat, I tend to just buy at I'll I'll go to like a Whole Foods or there's like a local fish market uh called Point Loma Seafoods down here in San Diego I'll try to go to.
59:52
And sometimes I'm trying to get like some friends to do that like quarter cow thing with me.
59:56
But so far so far no one's down, so if you're out there holler at me.
1:00:01
I've been trying to do that as well.
1:00:03
Uh you need like a huge garage fridge, which is how you know you made it by having a garage fridge to like store all this meat.
1:00:09
Uh but I've been doing it, too.
1:00:11
Have you seen um uh it's called uh it's called Coope, but if you Google like Coope Oh, yeah.
1:00:18
Yeah, yeah, we just had him on our podcast. Like the Smart Farm. Yeah. Okay.
1:00:22
Yeah, AJ's a good buddy of mine. AJ's awesome. Um I What's his URL?
1:00:23
I want to give him a shout out. Uh coope. farm coope. farm.
1:00:27
So, Coope is like it's like they like the tagline that I saw in article was like it's like the Tesla for chicken coop. And it's a so coope.
1:00:38
farm, it's like a smart chicken coop.
1:00:40
Um and it looks pretty cool. I think I might get one.
1:00:44
Um I think it'd be awesome to have your own chickens uh cuz that's like a pretty low maintenance uh way to kind of get into the habit or get in the hobby.
1:00:52
The other thing that I've done for years is uh beekeeping.
1:00:54
Um so, I've raised my own bees um in order to get honey.
1:00:59
Uh which is like an awesome hobby.
1:01:01
And beekeeping's a cool thing because it requires like not much maintenance as uh at all.
1:01:06
And from a business perspective you remember that flow hive or whatever that went viral like Kickstarter and it raised like $20 million.
1:01:15
I do think that uh beekeeping like the the supplies could actually be a legitimately good business.
1:01:22
Um and you could create like you can create like a lifestyle brand around it because the content to around that is like inherently quite viral.
1:01:31
Like I used to create these like just videos of me like uh scraping off the honey or the uh what's it called?
1:01:39
The um honeycomb the comb yeah, like scraping the comb off of my uh uh my trays or whatever that's in the hive.
1:01:48
I don't actually know anything about it even though I've had bees for years.
1:01:50
But like that's how little you have to know about this in order to like successfully do it.
1:01:53
Like I would like scrape off the comb and like make these awesome videos and then just like give it to my friends and they loved it.
1:01:59
And it was it's like such a fun hobby.
1:02:01
Uh and so I'm really big on that.
1:02:03
Named I think her name was like Texas Beeworks.
1:02:07
I don't know if you've seen her stuff on the internet, but she has this like very soft, pleasing voice.
1:02:10
And she'll be like there'll be music and there'll be some crazy scenario where there's a hive and she's like called out and she goes, "I've I've been called out to take this hive out of a manhole." Dude, she has a 1.
1:02:23
6 million subs on YouTube. Oh, yeah. Yeah, she's huge.
1:02:25
And so I always look cuz I know what I did with Heppner and I look at all these other people and I go like, "Don't you realize like you could have a thriving beekeeping like goods company?"
1:02:35
But then, you know, the the sort of paradox of the whole creator world is that most creators just don't want to do that and that's why they don't do it.
1:02:43
Dude, she was on Joe Rogan. I'm looking at it now. Erika Thompson. She was on Joe Rogan.
1:02:47
She goes, "I did my first podcast and it's Joe Rogan." It's Joe Rogan.
1:02:52
She goes, "I did my first podcast. Link is in the bio.
1:02:54
Thank you so much, Joe Rogan and team.
1:02:56
This was such a wonderful experience for me and my bees."
1:02:59
Damn, that's a flex right there. That's a flex. Awesome.
1:03:03
This This is like this is a gem. This woman she's got it.
1:03:05
Um yeah, man, beekeeping's a good uh is an interesting hobby.
1:03:09
You you should try it out.
1:03:11
You like it requires no work and I'm pretty sure it makes your plants way better.
1:03:14
I noticed that whenever I get bee whenever I get bees, you start seeing like all different types of flowers uh in the backyard.
1:03:18
That's the last thing I haven't done.
1:03:21
Like I've got the chickens, I've got it all the pond, you know, I don't have bees yet, so I might have to get some bees.
1:03:27
Dude, it costs like $200 to start.
1:03:29
Like I I my hives are from Amazon for 200 bucks and then you go on Craigslist and you find like a bee delivery person.
1:03:35
Uh the lady that I used was this like beautiful like Eastern European woman.
1:03:41
She shows up in her Lexus.
1:03:43
She pops out with an hive.
1:03:45
She's not wearing any mask.
1:03:45
She's got like a fancy watch on and like beautiful blonde hair and nice clothes and she just goes like, "You know, I've got your bees."
1:03:53
And I was like, "Yes, ma'am, please come put them over here."
1:03:54
And I paid her $200 for the bees and then $200 for the hive that I got on Amazon and that's all you that's all I needed.
1:04:02
Do you still have them right now?
1:04:04
Uh I recently moved uh but up until recently, yeah, I had them on the I had them in San Francisco and I had them in Texas.
1:04:10
But in San Francisco, I had them at my small little house.
1:04:12
Uh I had a backyard and then I also had them on the roof of my office in downtown San Francisco.
1:04:18
And I had about 10,000 bees and you wouldn't even you could your hive could be like 30 ft away and you wouldn't even know that it's there. Yeah.
1:04:26
Uh it's like a pretty self-contained thing.
1:04:27
It's It's like an awesome hobby. a spot for my hive.
1:04:29
Then I have the perfect spot in my backyard for my hive.
1:04:32
Yeah, and like I think I like I don't even know what I'm talking about and I have them.
1:04:35
And like I got I got stung I've been stung like twice.
1:04:39
Like it's like not like that big of a deal.
1:04:40
Like like people think it's a very intimidating, unapproachable hobby, but I got into it because I like made a list of like I was like, "I need a hobby that doesn't require a ton of work.
1:04:50
Uh I it can't cost a ton of money because if it costs a ton of money, I'm going to break rule number three, which is I can't turn it into a business to make money.
1:04:57
And so like I like and I was like, "What's a good hobby?"
1:05:01
And then I saw a Burt's Bees documentary and I was like, "That's a good hobby. Let's do it."
1:05:04
So, that's and uh AJ's a buddy of mine and uh he got me into beekeeping as well. Yeah.
1:05:12
Yeah, I'm excited to see how that Coope that Smart Coope business does.
1:05:14
It's a really cool design.
1:05:17
Um well, thanks for doing this, dude. You're the man.
1:05:18
Uh you're you uh you're going to be fun to watch over the next like 5 years.
1:05:23
This is going to be a very exciting journey.
1:05:25
I am we take pride on having people on before they get like right the beginning of their like takeoff.
1:05:32
And even though you're you're already incredibly successful, I have a feeling that this is still going to be early in your journey.
1:05:37
And and we're going to brag about having you on early in your career. That's awesome, dude.
1:05:41
Well, thanks for having me. Appreciate it.
1:05:42
All right, that's the pod.