0:00
the stock has grown in the last year from a $7 billion company to now a $44 billion company. 44 billion. Okay. You know what I mean?
Search this video
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That's That's what Elon bought X for.
0:11
This people This guy selling Labubus. It's insane. It's crazy. All right.
0:21
Dude, Sam, do you know what one of these are?
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Oh my gosh, Ramon will not quit talking to me about these things.
0:29
Okay, so those All right, so for the listener, Shawn's showing me holding up?
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They look like uh dolls, basically in the same vein as a troll.
0:37
But I have gotten texts from my friend our friend Ramon who says, "Have you heard of this thing?
0:41
It's worth" and he says the number and I'm like, "Oh, it must have been a typo."
0:47
So, what what's the deal with these things?
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Do you know what they're called? I don't Super something?
0:53
No, this this is a Labubu.
0:54
All right, Sam, get just get yourself educated.
0:57
This is a Labubu doll, okay?
0:59
Does it have a Prada sign on it?
1:03
Yeah, that's part of the part of the stick here.
1:04
Okay, so what's the what's the story with these things?
1:06
This is basically the most viral toy in the world. Yeah.
1:10
It's one of the biggest craziest since, you know, Beanie Babies and things like that.
1:15
And so, the story behind this thing is pretty crazy.
1:17
I just wanted to tell you some of the things that I know about it.
1:20
Of course, my wife put me on to this months ago and I just ignored it as the the stock of this company is up like 7x in a year because this thing is going crazy. Chinese company, right? Chinese company, yeah.
1:32
So, this is made by this these dolls are produced by a Chinese company called Pop Mart.
1:36
And the maker of this guy, Wang Ning, he is now the 10th richest man in China.
1:40
And like he's adding like a billion dollars to his net worth in the last, you know, few months. 30, right?
1:47
Or or like he's He's He's really young.
1:50
Like, dude, look at this picture of him.
1:53
Yeah, but Chinese guys always look really young until they don't. Until they don't.
1:56
Yeah, haven't you ever heard like all of my Asian friends?
1:59
They're like we always like young and then we fall off a cliff. All right. Do you see this guy?
2:04
Yeah, yeah, I mean he could be 12 or 50. I don't know.
2:10
Yeah, so this guy is behind this company Popmart, but it's kind of fascinating what's going on with this craze, right?
2:17
Like it's it's really taken over.
2:17
So somebody gave these to my kids as like a gift and I didn't really understand the significance of it.
2:24
I was like, "Oh cool, thanks."
2:27
I didn't realize that we were just gifted like a really important thing.
2:30
This is like one of the more valuable items in my house right now.
2:34
Like these things sell for thousands of dollars.
2:36
The top ones can sell for six figures.
2:38
That's how crazy they the craze is for this.
2:41
Okay, so tell me the story because this is this sounds like a good good stock to short because that's typically how these like collectibles kind of tend to go. Yes, I I agree with you. We'll get to that.
2:51
All right, so the story of the Labubu dolls is there's a guy who's an artist around 2015.
2:56
He's He's in the Netherlands.
2:56
He gets inspired for to create like a kind of like a a toy world.
3:02
So like a a character world based on where he's at in the Netherlands and he designs these dolls.
3:08
These kind of like like look at their teeth, like the little like Gremlin looking doll.
3:12
Yeah, that's fairly hopeful.
3:14
There's hope for us, okay?
3:15
Because the experts are describing this as ugly cute and it's succeeded because it's ugly cute.
3:22
And I just thought like our podcast I just feel like that just gave us like some wind in our sails for what we can do as well on YouTube.
3:28
It's worse for us because we're not particularly ugly, but we're not particularly good looking. Is there like a cute? What the kids call mid.
3:39
All right, so he creates these in 2015.
3:40
Not a lot happens from there, but in 2019, so four years later, he partners with this company Popmart.
3:48
And Popmart was started about a decade ago because this guy Wang Ning had this insight which is he thought that this kidult trend we talked about this before because you're into Legos.
3:58
So he's like this kidult trend this like kids toys for adults.
4:01
It's going to be a thing.
4:05
And so he creates this store and the store to really takes advantage of this like style this business mechanic called blind boxes which I don't know if you've seen LOL dolls or mini brands where you buy the box but you don't know what's inside.
4:20
Similar like Pokémon card packs.
4:22
You buy the pack you don't know what cards are inside.
4:23
And so this mechanic which I think they call like the gotcha mechanic creates a lot more spending right?
4:29
People will will keep buying cuz it's a little bit like a treasure hunt and you want to see what you can find what you can get.
4:34
Will you get the big rare to be a scam.
4:36
Like I remember Logan Paul or Jake Paul was sponsored or did business with a company called mystery box and that was like a rage like a very trendy thing for like 3 months. Do you remember that? Like 10 years ago?
4:48
these loot boxes are in games and people know that okay this is kind of not it's not a scam per se but it's basically manipulative right?
4:54
It gets people to buy a lot more people get addicted to this thing and especially when you're targeting kids which is why Logan Paul and those guys got in trouble was hey this is targeting kids.
5:02
The beauty of this is it's not targeting kids.
5:04
So the way these blew up is through celebrities.
5:07
Wait can I ask a question about the company Pop Mart? So he had a Pop Mart.
5:12
He had just a it was a toy company for a long time or what was the the origin?
5:16
So the story is 2010 he opens up a small designer store in Beijing and he's trying to build it off this kidult collectibles brand.
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He starts selling blind boxes.
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This Labubu's not in play at this point.
5:28
There's other blind boxes that he's trying to sell.
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And in 10 years they grow from one store to you know 300 plus stores, 2000 vending machines where you could just like it's just you know you just buy one of these boxes right right out of a machine.
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It ends up going public in 2020.
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Stock doubles on on first day.
5:45
The stock has grown in the last year from a $7 billion company to now a $44 billion company. 44 billion. That's insane. I mean?
5:53
That's what That's what Elon bought X for. So, that's so insane.
5:54
So, the before it became when it was just a four or seven, I think you said, billion-dollar company, they just sold like dolls that people liked.
6:03
And it so which which a $7 billion toy company is is that's already a mega success.
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So, they sold other people's stuff. That was over 4 years.
6:11
But yeah, yeah, they're they're they're selling collectibles of different brands, different IP.
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And this is one of the IP that they have.
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And this doll alone, like these these Labubus did like 700 million last year.
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So, they're like now like almost It's it's it's it's getting close to about half of the revenue of the company overall because the trend has exploded.
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And then they connect with this with this artist.
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And so, that's brings us to where we are now.
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Yeah, so the question is how did this explode?
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Where does a the thing that fascinated me is like where does a trend like this even come from? How does this happen?
6:42
Because it's totally irrational, right? Like why this doll? Why not another doll? Who Is it the teeth? Is it the outfit?
6:48
Is it what What is it behind it?
6:49
So, there's some I guess learnings to have from this about like the psychology of a winning product.
6:56
So, I just want to tell you a little story about how this happens. So, check this out. Uh exhibit A, 2023.
7:04
Okay, so this is a photo that you clearly can tell it's just Rihanna like getting coffee or leaving a hotel.
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She's going to an airport.
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And she just looks like she's it's not sponsored. She's just being a lady.
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And she has one of the toy Beebops or Booboos or whatever they're called hanging off of her book bag. Book bag? Is that what it is? I can't purse.
7:25
It's a Louis Vuitton purse.
7:25
Okay, I It looks like a book I'm looking from far away.
7:28
It looks like a book bag.
7:30
Okay, so she's spotted with it. Hmm, interesting.
7:33
At the same time, another trend is happening in Thailand.
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In Thailand, people are starting to see these Labubus, for whatever reason, as possible good luck charms.
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And in Thailand, people are quite religious and they started to view these as like almost like a spiritual, like a little guardian that they could have with them.
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And so, that's that rumor starts to spread.
7:51
And then, what happens is do you know the black the band Blackpink?
7:55
Do you have you ever heard of this band? No, I think.
7:57
It's like a Korean pop band.
7:59
Faces are one of the most popular pop bands in the in the world. So, Yeah.
8:03
it's a girl band, like Spice Girls. Oh, I know it.
8:05
Yeah, I like I like those guys.
8:07
I see their music videos, they're very eye-catching.
8:08
Yeah, I know what you're talking about.
8:10
Uh well, it's just like a it's a sensation.
8:11
You'll go on YouTube and you're like, what is this thing with a billion views on YouTube?
8:17
It's sort of like the sensation of like the BTS thing. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
8:21
Okay, so okay, so this is right here.
8:23
This is Now, we're talking about Blackpink.
8:27
So, Lisa from Blackpink goes to Thailand to visit her friend.
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Her friend says, "Hey, what do you want to do today?"
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They decide, "Let's go shopping."
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She thinks, "Okay, we're going to go shopping.
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Clothes, bags, what are we going to go buy?"
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But no, she wants to go to Pop Mart.
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And she says, "What the Pop I don't know what Pop Mart is."
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But they go to a Pop Mart store.
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At the Pop Mart store, the friend really wants a Labubu.
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And Lisa says, "Honestly, not into it. Don't I don't get it.
8:54
Don't don't care about it. Blah blah blah."
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But the friend gets super disappointed because they're all sold out.
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And the lady at the store is like, "Listen, it's impossible.
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You're not going to get one."
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And that little memetic monster inside Lisa starts to roar. The one in her stomach.
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And she's like, "You know what?
9:10
If I can't have it, I must have it."
9:10
And she decides, "Actually, I think I do like Labubus.
9:16
And I think I do want to go get Labubus."
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And she starts to collect these.
9:19
Now, she starts getting obsessed with Pop Mart.
9:21
She goes, she buys blind boxes, and she starts collecting these.
9:24
This becomes her de-stress type of thing she does from the the stressful life of being a world-famous pop star. Yeah.
9:32
Now, she gets caught having a Labubu. Why?
9:36
Cuz she posted it on her Instagram.
9:36
So now we're fast forward 2024.
9:37
This is the photo that created the craze.
9:40
It went from just like, you know, how a hurricane starts and there's like some some sweeping winds, maybe a a casual storm a casual rainstorm, and then then comes the hurricane.
9:52
And this this Instagram story started the hurricane.
9:56
And it's her hugging her Labubu. Can I say something? I kind of get it. That looks pretty cool.
10:03
It looks pretty for you, too? You like this photo?
10:04
Yeah, it's uh it's like an old white guy in overalls.
10:08
It's kind of what it looks like. It looks like a farmer.
10:11
does look like a Midwest farmer, actually.
10:13
This I kind of like I I and it's big. It's about 2 ft tall.
10:16
I kind of think that's neat. I understand that. one, yeah.
10:20
So they they come in different sizes.
10:21
The The one that sold for over 100,000, that was like a a human-size one. Okay.
10:26
Okay, so this is the stock since that photo was taken.
10:28
And you can see the stock is up 7x since then. It's just been crushing.
10:34
And so the Labubu craze starts.
10:34
And what you know, what's interesting about this is why Okay, so celebrities started posting about it. That's Okay, I get that. But what else?
10:42
So here are some of the other things that I found kind of interesting from a I don't know, behavioral psychology point of view.
10:50
The first is the lipstick effect.
10:50
Have you ever heard of the lipstick effect? I don't think so.
10:55
So there's an economic theory that basically says that whenever people are under financial pressure.
10:59
So maybe the economy's a little bit choppy, maybe there's you know, there's inflation, there's what there's wage pressure, whatever it is.
11:09
People will opt People think that you'll stop spending.
11:11
But what actually happens is you shift the spending.
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And so instead of buying a new bag, you'll just buy some lipstick.
11:17
You'll buy a new lipstick.
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And so lipstick sales will explode at a time during economic pressure cuz you take away from bigger luxury purchases and they go into smaller luxury purchases.
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So instead of a $200 outfit or a you're going to buy a $20 item instead.
11:33
And so, people think that this is part of what's behind Labubu, which is that this thing, uh you know, initially started where these are like, you know, a $20, $25 box that you buy and you get a Labubu.
11:43
But the thing with these, the smart thing of these is I showed you the doll.
11:50
This is the most important part.
11:50
This little ring, because most stuffed animals, you just keep them at home.
11:54
So, there's no virality to it, right?
11:56
You just have it at the comfort of your own home, nobody sees it.
11:59
Uh you don't get to show it off, it's not a status symbol.
12:03
But just having the bag clip attached to these things, they suddenly became like luxury accessories.
12:07
And so, that's why Rihanna had it attached to her bag, and this Blackpink lady had hit hers, and then David Beckham is posting that, and Kim Kardashian posts that she has 10 of them, and she starts clipping them to her bags.
12:18
It becomes this add-on to your luxury bag, this cute little add-on that you could put on your bag.
12:25
And then, each one of these has an outfit.
12:27
So, I can take this off and I can buy new clothes for this, and I can upgrade my Labubu.
12:31
So, now you have Can you spell Labubu?
12:34
L A B U B U Oh, okay, I see.
12:39
By the way, Labubu is actually only one of the characters, but that's just what it became called.
12:42
The The characters are actually called the monsters, but uh nobody that didn't stick.
12:47
Oh my gosh, I'm on their website.
12:50
I think it's kind of cool. Yeah, it's very I'm in.
12:53
And so, and so, what what I think is interesting here is that you have this kind of what Charlie Munger calls the lollapalooza effect.
13:00
So, maybe you have the lipstick effect causing people to look for for little luxuries.
13:04
Then you have the kidult effect where you have adults looking for uh you know, maybe comfort and pleasure uh because when they're That's the another economic theory here, which is that when adults face stress uh from work and global events like wars and whatnot, they find emotional relief in collecting toys and things that connect with their childhood.
13:23
So, you have that effect here kicking in.
13:25
You have the lipstick effect kicking in.
13:26
You have the status symbol effect of this where you can attach this to your bag.
13:30
You have the ugly cute effect which we are just explo- we're just crushing with right now.
13:36
And so all these come together to create the phenomenon that is Le Boo Boo. Great great great job. Uh good find.
13:42
I I've been hearing about this but I didn't exactly dive deep so that's cool that you did this.
13:48
This is not sustainable and this is definitely going to go away in the next 5 years.
13:54
But let's get it while the getting's good. All right.
13:57
So I've built a few companies that have made a few million dollars a year and I've built two companies that have made tens of millions of dollars a year.
14:05
And so I have a little bit of experience launching, building, creating new things.
14:09
And I actually don't come up with a lot of original ideas.
14:13
Instead, what I'm really really good at, what my skill set is, is researching different ideas, different gaps in the market, and reverse engineering companies.
14:22
And I didn't invent this by the We have this guy Brad Jacobs.
14:25
We talked about him on the podcast.
14:26
He started like four or five different publicly traded companies worth tens of billions of dollars each.
14:31
He actually is the one who I learned how to do this from.
14:32
And so with the team at HubSpot, we put together all of my research tactics, frameworks, techniques on spotting different opportunities in the market, reverse engineering companies, and figuring out exactly where opportunities are versus just coming up with a random silly idea and throwing it against the wall and hoping that it sticks.
14:50
And so if you want to see my framework, you can check it out.
14:53
The link is below in the YouTube description.
14:57
So I started thinking, how do I make money on this? All right.
14:59
So the first way I should have made money on this was when my wife started telling me about this, which was I don't know, 6 to 8 months ago.
15:04
I should have either bought the stock I should have looked I didn't even think it was going to be a stock.
15:08
I just thought it was like a stuffed animal.
15:10
I didn't even think it was a a public company.
15:11
Should have bought the stock or you know, you could have could have tried to collect and flip.
15:14
Okay, that's too much effort. So what's the play here? So I went and looked up. I asked AI.
15:19
I said, "Tell me the last five crazy toy crazes as crazy as Labubu over the last 50 years and compare them.
15:26
What were some of the other ones?
15:28
So it would have been Cabbage Patch was Uh the baby Beanie Babies Beanie Babies was the second.
15:34
I think Trolls were popular for a minute, but I don't know if they were a craze.
15:37
Then it gave me Pokémon, Pokémon cards, which had two two bumps.
15:43
There was the one when we were kids where buying and collecting packs reached about about the same revenue, about $2 billion a year.
15:50
And then it died down for about 20 years.
15:52
And then recently with like kind of Logan Paul started collecting them again, they had another peak. It had $1.
15:57
6 billion in its sales on the cards recently.
16:02
So Pokémon And then the last one it gave me which was I thought kind of interesting as AI, but actually is a good point cuz I was thinking maybe Furby's or Tamagotchis.
16:09
I didn't I didn't know what it was going to give me. Um those were smaller.
16:15
It gave me Stanley Cups, which actually makes total sense cuz it's the same thing.
16:20
It's the exact same thing. And so it gave me those.
16:22
And the funny thing about these is on a on the scale Labubu is actually still small.
16:27
So this doll did about $700 million.
16:31
Uh those all at their peak were kind of like $1.
16:33
6 to $2 billion in sales.
16:33
So I actually expect that over the next year this thing goes even the star kind of goes viral nova.
16:40
It burns out and it hits a $2 billion or $3 billion in in revenue.
16:44
Um and then it's going to crash cuz the funny thing with all of these is they all had about a two to three-year peak tops.
16:52
And so I think the actual play if you want to make money on this thing is to short PopMart stock starting around you know, end of 2026 and you know, maybe maybe through 2027.
17:03
Uh now shorting is dangerous cuz you can lose your shirt cuz shorting has sort of asymmetric downside.
17:11
Uh but if you I think if you were a betting man, the odds are that you know, by 2027 this thing is not a $44 billion company anymore.
17:18
What was the name Okay, so you had a friend, uh Michael, Michael Smith, Michael Acton Smith.
17:23
He had a the guy who created calm. com. Before he created calm.
17:29
com, the the meditation app, he actually had a toy a stuffed animal toy company called like Minno Monsters or something like Yeah, that's right.
17:38
Um what was the name of the thing?
17:39
And the So his company was called Mind Candy and it was Moshi Monsters.
17:41
Was it Minno Minno Monsters was a a mobile game.
17:45
Minno Moshi Monsters was his.
17:45
If I remember correctly, um this is all 15 years ago.
17:48
It's so hard to remember everything, but he raised lots of money as a technology company almost or at least from tech VCs.
17:54
And he was like, "I'm going to build a massive toy business."
17:58
And I remember reading at the time, this is insane. You're stupid.
17:59
But now that I think about it, there's been many examples of where that is not stupid.
18:06
And this is yet another one of them where you could actually build a really cool IP toy company.
18:08
And he was sounds like he was on the right track.
18:13
It didn't work out, but It was big in the UK.
18:14
So in the UK, it was like, I don't know, one out of every three kids is playing Moshi Monsters. It was like insane.
18:21
It was like 90 million users globally.
18:25
And I remember meeting him, I think it was still during the kind of like It was kind of like the tail end of the peak. So it it was big.
18:34
But it was it it it it had stopped exploding.
18:36
And he was like, "That's okay.
18:38
We're going to like try to turn this into a thing."
18:40
And he was telling me they're making Moshi shampoo and body wash.
18:44
And like, you know, it's going into every category.
18:46
But unfortunately, that one didn't work out.
18:48
We have to get Michael on, by the way. I was going to say that.
18:50
We have to get Michael on the pod because Have you met him?
18:53
He is one of the coolest guys uh I've met.
18:55
He's such a nice guy, first of all, like total genuine good dude. Super creative. Really creative genius.
19:01
And then also like a rock star kind of.
19:04
Like when you meet him, you're like, "Oh, I'm talking to Russell Brand's like, you know, cooler cooler brother."
19:10
You should Everyone should Google him.
19:12
His name is Michael Acton Smith and I remember back in '14 or '13 or '12 where I mean I'm still interested in this, but I was like I want to be like I was like looking for a person I wanted to be like and it was like him. He would be one Yeah.
19:25
There was like photos of him like holding hands with like Paris Hilton or like he was like if you Google like Michael Acton Smith like he was even dating. That's the best part. Just holding hands.
19:36
She was like he had like paparazzi photos of him because he would have this like tech angle even though it wasn't exactly in tech, but he If you guys Google him and see what he looks like, you'll understand.
19:45
He looks like a Telegraph described him as a rockstar version of Willy Wonka.
19:49
That's his Wikipedia page. It's great.
19:52
This guy was so cool and now he has since started Calm which I have no idea how big it is, but it's hundreds or hundreds of millions or billions.
19:59
A multi-billion dollar company. He's the man.
20:02
This guy is absolutely the man and he's been the man for 20 years. He has. He has. He He is He's amazing.
20:09
Okay, I'm going to call him after this and be like I will fly to you.
20:10
Let's do an episode because Where does he even live now?
20:14
I think he was in the UK.
20:14
He was kind of back and forth between like, you know, US and UK.
20:17
I think he's in the UK now.
20:19
He's just like a rich guy now.
20:19
He just like does what he wants. Well, I don't know.
20:23
I think he always did what he wants.
20:24
That's why he was That's why he was our hero.
20:26
That's the difference between a guy who is very rich.
20:29
That's the difference between guys like me and guys like him, I guess. Like he Exactly.
20:36
He chased money and money chased him. Yeah. He didn't run very fast. Uh this guy is the man. Yeah. No, that's hilarious.
20:44
Okay, I have another one for you.
20:46
Can I give you another one? So we did kids toys. I have another one.
20:47
You might know the story of this one.
20:51
Have you ever had one of these before? Okay, what's this? Oh.
20:56
I'm holding up No, it looks like Buzz Lightyear bubble gum.
20:58
a box of Tony's Chocolonely. Hell yeah, brother.
21:01
I love Tony's Chocolonely.
21:03
Do they have some that have Pop Rocks in them?
21:06
By the way, I've been saying it wrong for a long time.
21:08
It's not Tony's Chocolonely. It's Tony's Chocolonely. Do you know that? I just call it Tony's. I love Tony's.
21:13
I learned to I I have always bought them and then when we hung out with uh Mr.
21:18
Beast, I kind of he told us the backstory.
21:20
I didn't realize how amazing they were. I love Tony's. Yeah, yeah.
21:25
They're and their backstory is even better than I thought.
21:26
Cuz when we were hanging out with Jimmy, he was like, "Oh, yeah.
21:29
I um you know, he for for Feastables really wanted to get Feastables to have a supply chain that had no child labor.
21:36
He's like, "You know, most of the cocoa farms in Africa have child labor.
21:39
All the big uh chocolate brands, you know, Hershey's, etc.
21:43
, they all buy from them.
21:45
When I learned that, that was effed up.
21:47
I went over there and we try and we've basically spent spending, you know, a couple years now trying to fix the supply chain so that that doesn't have to be the case."
21:54
He was like, "Every company, I don't like this this or that thing about them, but there's one company that I really admire that seems to be doing something well."
22:01
And I think that's how he like phrased it and he said, "Tony's is the one. They do things right."
22:05
Is basically what he said. Exactly.
22:06
And he actually called the founders of this and learned from them of like, "Okay, what do I need to do?"
22:10
Which is cool because they were the ones who were who initially made the push.
22:15
But do you know the the backstory of why they made the push into doing this?
22:18
Wasn't it started by an actor or a famous person in Holland or something like that? A journalist.
22:23
Okay, it was like a non-business person who started it and they started it with It's one of these cool stories where they didn't so much care about chocolate, they cared about like helping the earth or human rights or something.
22:33
And we just so happened to be doing it via chocolate.
22:34
Like it was some like story like that, wasn't it?
22:36
So, the story is uh these I think there was two uh Dutch journalists, but these two Dutch journalists, they're covering the chocolate industry on their TV show.
22:46
And um they hear about, you know, that the chocolate companies are all all the chocolate all the cocoa comes from West Africa and that there's a lot of child yeah, slavery and child labor.
22:59
So, two separate things, right?
23:00
Slavery and then child labor, happening happening on the farms there.
23:02
So, they want to go and investigate. So, they go down there. They investigate.
23:08
They find that it's true.
23:11
And they put you know, they put out a story to try to help and I think their store the exact story is that at one point all the big chocolate companies signed like a treaty.
23:21
They signed like a pact to say we're going to stop this.
23:26
And I guess like years later they had gone back they had gone to investigate and it was like the exact same situation.
23:32
They saw that it kind of nothing had really changed.
23:33
And so, these guys are pretty disheartened by it.
23:36
So, they decide like this is where the story gets crazy because a normal person, even a normal a great journalist would just report the story, maybe use some some some choice language when they when they talk about it and then they would shake their finger at them and move on.
23:51
But these journalists went and did like you know, took the exit off of High Agency Avenue and were like no, no, no, watch this.
23:59
It's So, the guys they come back and they do the they decide to do a publicity stunt.
24:03
So, he eats the chocolate and he calls the police.
24:08
And the police come and they're like, "What are you doing?"
24:10
And he goes, "I'm eating chocolate that was made with slave labor and child labor."
24:15
And they're like, "That's what?
24:15
That's not a crime you're eating chocolate. That's not a crime."
24:19
He goes, "No, no, no, actually according to statute blah, blah, blah, knowingly consuming this product, knowing what I know that this is the product of child labor and slave labor, that's actually illegal. Arrest me, boys."
24:31
And so, they lock him up, they take him to jail and that becomes this viral sort of news stunt that brings even more attention to this.
24:39
Now, prosecutors end up dismissing the case cuz they're like, "We're not going to prosecute this."
24:42
But they decide to go in and create their own ethically made chocolate brand.
24:45
And they decide to call it Tony's Chocolonely because they're like the guys the guy's name is Tune and but in the that's his Dutch name but they're like Americanized Westernized version of of of Tone, I guess is his name, would be Tony.
24:59
So, they goes Tony's and instead of and he said it's going to be very lonely to build a chocolate company that's actually trying to be like ethically sourced.
25:08
So, he called it Tony's Chocolonely. Okay. Great.
25:10
And that's how they felt in their fight against the cocoa, you know, industry.
25:16
And it becomes a hit pretty much right away.
25:18
They they sell 20,000 bars in two days because of the public like resonance with their story.
25:24
And it becomes the best-selling chocolate brand in their market, which is the Netherlands.
25:27
They get like 20% share in the in the Netherlands.
25:29
It passes up Mars and Nestle and other other competitors there.
25:34
And then they start expanding and they keep expanding and then they start finding like-minded brands.
25:38
So, there you know, I don't know if you know about Ben and Jerry's but Ben and Jerry's is also one of these like very sort of like strong ethical, moral They they stick to what they want to do.
25:49
Good people corporations.
25:49
I actually saw Ben or Jerry, I forgot which one, talk at an event I was at like 15 years ago.
25:56
And I've never been pretty blown away by the like how genuine it was for them and how the extent that they had gone, right?
26:02
So, for example, I don't know if you know, it's like they have this one flavor that's like their brownie flavor.
26:07
I forgot it like you know.
26:09
I'm so [ __ ] fit now, I can't even remember the name, dude. It's insane.
26:12
It's chocolate fudge brownie.
26:12
Something something fat people eat. So.
26:20
That's so my past, I just can't even You're like I I barely remember how that felt last week.
26:25
By the way, meanwhile, I'm holding up this Tony's Chocolonely, three bars are missing from this pack. Blame it on the kids.
26:32
My wife gets pissed off at me because whenever we bring like a treat to like a friend's house, we bring dessert, they cook dinner and like it's like already open and she's like she's like, "What the hell?
26:41
You can't like give like a pack of ice cream when there's like one." I'm like, "Why not?
26:45
We're going to open it anyway, like half an hour.
26:46
Why can't I open it now?"
26:48
That's sort of what That's sort of what happened. Exactly.
26:57
She's like I'm a She's She's like I'm a She always compares me to like a bear looking in the cabinets for honey and I get my finger stuck in the jar. this.
27:05
My brother-in-law Aaron, he's he's one of these people that like, you know, doesn't you know, doesn't eat a ton in general like food's not a big He's not a big foodie. Yeah.
27:11
But if you leave like a snack he's like a bear.
27:13
Like if you leave a treat in their house, it's gone by the morning and you're like, "Did you wake up?"
27:20
And and so like he'll eat the whole bag, right? Of anything.
27:22
And so my sister calls it like with Oreos and like like we got a pack of Oreos, right?
27:29
And she's like, "Oh my god, Aaron's doing a line right now."
27:30
And I was like, And doing a line to her meant you eat the entire row of Oreos like you did a whole line and I just thought that was so funny. Aaron likes to party. Exactly.
27:43
We got to have him back on.
27:43
Brother Aaron, the OGs, the real OGs now.
27:44
He He had two guest cameo experiences like way back in the first 30 episodes. It's hilarious.
27:51
Anyways, chocolate company.
27:51
So Tony's Chocolonely, what did they do?
27:55
Um All right, I'll do Ben & Jerry's.
27:56
Finish the Ben & Jerry's thing.
27:56
They opened up a factory, I think somewhere like in upstate New York or something like this.
28:02
And they they It was after they met um What's it called when you get out of jail and like you're in a program but you like don't want to go recidivism?
28:10
Like they they wanted to reduce recidivism like people who go back end up back in jail.
28:14
Which is traditionally incredibly high.
28:17
It's really high and one of the big drivers of why do people who after a long sentence get out and go back?
28:20
It's not cuz they're like kind of morally corrupt at their core.
28:24
It's like they couldn't get a job and then they didn't have any money and then they didn't have a social life and Previous friends were losers or they left prison without knowing anyone but only had $50. Exactly.
28:34
And so a big a one way to decrease recidivism is that if people can get a job.
28:38
But nobody wants to give them jobs so they created a whole factory.
28:40
Their brownie factory is all brownies made by ex-cons basically.
28:44
They're the the Ben & Jerry's flavor.
28:46
They like wanted to They they they met some guys who had a good good recipe and they like built a factory around them essentially.
28:51
So, they're they're do-gooders.
28:52
Um so, Tony Tony's Chocolonely to break into the US starts partnering with Ben & Jerry's.
28:56
Um and the revenue has just grown and grown and grown.
29:01
And so, like last year, I think they did 200 million in revenue and they made this like a legit chocolate company that started with two journalists just basically trying to make a stand against the man. And how cool is that? This is awesome. This is so cool.
29:13
I uh I Do they run the company now? No, so they're out now.
29:18
Um there's like a CEO that they like, you know, it's just kind of run by like, you know, normal suits basically at this point.
29:27
And they get some flak because like um their supply chain is still not perfect.
29:32
And but they're very transparent about it.
29:34
So, the the crazy thing is like they'll report that they had like, you know, 11 issues this year of like child labor discovered in their supply chain.
29:40
And people are like, "See, you're not totally free." And they're like, "What?
29:44
We're trying to like we're trying to be transparent and say what, you know, we we're way less than anybody else.
29:49
We're And we're also honest about this and we're reporting it so that we can keep improving this."
29:52
But they get some flak as like, you know, I guess like skeptics say that maybe they're just greenwashing at this point now and since the founders left.
29:59
And even I think the founder has sort of alluded to like, "It's not the same since we left."
30:04
I don't know the exact story.
30:05
It's like I'm trying to read these like Dutch translations of articles and decided that like I'd rather just eat the chocolate and chill.
30:11
Um so, I'm not sure the exact story, but I think there's maybe a little controversy around that.
30:14
Yeah, I I've known about this brand for a while and this and I didn't know the I only knew what what Jimmy had said, which wasn't in this depth, but that makes me like them way more. The product's awesome.
30:26
I mean, I love the brand.
30:28
They also said and I I eat the [ __ ] out of them.
30:29
I mean, it's it messes me up, but that's cool.
30:35
Maybe you could be the influencer that blows them up even more. Same bar.
30:38
I eat the [ __ ] out of them.
30:42
It's just like you most of my like guilty evening start with a bar of Tony's like and the problem with that jar of honey Let's not even how much time we got.
30:53
The the issue is they would sell their candy like it used to come in like the extra case size. It was like a huge bar. They only sell in bulk.
31:00
By the way, did I ever tell you about the time we were talking about recidivism?
31:04
This is not entirely related to business but I think you'll get a kick out of this.
31:07
Did I tell you about the time Do you know that I've been to like I think we've talked about this.
31:12
I've been to San Quentin a few times and Indiana State Prison.
31:15
You've mentioned that you did but I don't know the exact story. What's what's the story? the background of this.
31:18
So I've gone to I have a friend who I'm going to this is the story it's going to be about him.
31:23
But I've been to Indiana State Prison a couple times or once I went to San Quentin a few times.
31:27
One time we went to Indiana State Prison so we go because my friend has this charity called The Last Mile.
31:33
And the idea is like when you commit a crime particularly murder you're not always sentenced to life.
31:40
You're inevitably going to get out and it's better for that person if if they get out and have a job.
31:44
It's better for society if they get out and get a job and it's better for the taxpayer if they get out and get a job because you don't want them to go back to prison because that's that's bad for everyone.
31:53
And so it's we are all incentivized it's totally bipartisan to get this person to be trained and to get a job.
31:58
And so this company The Last Mile started by my friend Chris they help you learn I think when I went I think they were learning WordPress.
32:06
I don't know what they learn now but this was a while ago.
32:08
They were learning WordPress or they were learning like some front end development so you can get a job at like an eBay or like a They're coding now?
32:14
Yeah, I don't know what they do now.
32:18
Yeah, they have like some like weird like like hot or not apps They're just minting NFTs.
32:23
Yeah, I don't know what these guys are doing but my friend Chris started it and he was a prominent venture capitalist.
32:31
He helped he was the first investor in Wish.
32:34
He was an early investor in Snap. He did uh Boom.
32:35
He did all these other like cool startups and for some reason one day he went and volunteered at San Quentin at a prison and he was like, "I think this is my life's mission to like help reduce recidivism."
32:48
Meaning when you get out of prison and uh you don't go back.
32:51
And so he created this thing called The Last Mile.
32:55
They now have hundreds of employees.
32:57
They've had thousands of people who have gone through their program and uh I up until recently I I he told me the stat a couple years ago so I don't I don't want to like jinx them. I don't know the update.
33:06
But of the thousand or two thousand people who graduated, not one had ever been back to prison.
33:12
And that's like a huge thing.
33:15
And uh and so it's really interesting that this tech person has uh like he quit.
33:20
So he doesn't invest anymore. This is all he does.
33:21
And I talked to another guy, Mike Novogratz.
33:24
Uh he was on the pod uh two weeks ago and that's his thing now, too, is uh reducing recidivism.
33:31
So reducing the rate that you go back to prison.
33:32
But I know a bunch of people who have given up their careers to go pursue this.
33:38
I'm on their website right now. Pretty crazy stats.
33:40
It says since the 70s the prison population in the US has increased by 700%.
33:46
Which is not what you would expect.
33:46
Uh you know, that's not just like, "Oh, that makes sense.
33:51
It should grow every year." It's like, "No, no, no.
33:52
The prison population should not necessarily grow at that rate."
33:54
It says that every prison every person in prison has an annual cost to the American taxpayer of $70,000, which means we pay about 50 billion dollars a year is spent on state and federal prisons. Um isn't that crazy?
34:10
It's It's It's amazing, right?
34:12
the the last mile's participants in the last mile who who go through their I guess it's like an education program as they get out have a 75% employment rate when they come out, which is good.
34:20
I wonder what the non I know I wonder what the baseline is.
34:23
It's got to be half that or something.
34:26
basically what happens and I and I talked to some of these guys when they were in there.
34:29
They were like, "Look, when I got out I had been in for 10 or 15 years. I was a thug.
34:32
Like I didn't want to associate with my old people and like my family had either died or wasn't around and they basically gave me a bus ticket and 50 bucks and I was like, "Sir, where do I go?
34:42
I'm not sure where I go to right now. What do I do?"
34:44
And so they're like, "That's why I came back here."
34:47
So I just started going back to how I used to behave.
34:50
By the way, why does he have a um This guy Chris looks awesome, Chris Redlitz.
34:54
Why does he have a Sirius radio show?
34:56
What does it does that get broadcasted into in the prisons in some way or like is that just an external thing? Both.
35:01
So he had So Chris is interesting.
35:04
So we had Michael Harris on the pod.
35:06
Michael Harriot is his nickname.
35:07
Harriot is the founder of Death Row Records.
35:09
Chris is kind of he I joke, he's an OG.
35:12
He's an he's an original gangster.
35:14
So he knows all of these guys. So he's friends with Dr.
35:18
Dre, Snoop, the founders of Death Row, all these cool guys and they all have this like blend of like hip-hop but also like crime like interests and so he decided to have a show with Sirius where he would get some get some of these cool guys on the radio show and they would talk about what his issue is but also it was like wrapped up in like kind of cool stories cuz it's kind of like like hip-hop and like celebrity.
35:41
And so he had a show for Sirius where he would talk about it.
35:45
This guy's living the dream. Got rich.
35:48
Decided to do good in the world. Has a great podcast. The triple threat. I love it.
35:53
He's cool and so he actually So I became really close with him.
35:56
He invested in my company when I was a 25-year-old or 26-year-old in San Francisco.
36:00
Very coincidentally, we both moved to this small town in Westport, Connecticut together and we hang out all the time and his wife her name is Beverly.
36:08
She's a 95-lb woman and I've been to San Quentin and we we were walking on the yard with these guys doing like bench press and sit-ups and all that whatever and I walked with this little lady through the yard and the red sea parted.
36:23
And she just walked through it.
36:23
She's like, "Tyrone, how are you?"
36:24
And she would go, "Miss Bev, nice to see you."
36:29
It was the craziest thing that I've ever seen.
36:32
It was like I'm telling you if she like ran this prison yard.
36:34
She was the only woman there and it was the craziest thing I've ever seen.
36:38
And they have a joke that says, "If it glow, you may go."
36:42
When you walk in to San Quentin, they stamp your hand.
36:44
And so when you leave, you have to show them your stamp underneath underneath a black light in order to get out.
36:51
And they would do jokes where she would wink at the guy when I'm walking in and he didn't actually stamp me. He just pretended.
36:57
And I would go to stamp my hand to leave and my hand didn't glow.
36:59
And they're like, "Sir, you cannot leave."
37:00
"We have to get this figured out."
37:02
And I was like, "I'm not staying here."
37:05
So like they would pull like tricks on you like when you go and see this place. It was wild.
37:09
But Chris and Bev are two people when I think of how to live life, it's them. That is the way to go. That's dope.
37:16
Can I tell you a related story?
37:18
So, my buddy Trevor was writing a book and he did this great very smart move which I I never really heard anybody else do, but I thought it was a good idea.
37:28
He goes, "Hey man, check your email."
37:28
I check my email and there's like a plane ticket and it's a plane ticket to go see him.
37:34
And he's like, um "I'm going to do I want to write this book and I want it to be great.
37:40
And I could sit here and brainstorm this on my own, but I really want to do something that I'm calling a book storm."
37:47
And he basically decided to fly out the five kind of smartest, most interesting people he knew to hang out with him for a day and just help him flesh out and brainstorm the book together.
37:55
And he's like, "I will owe you one for life, but I just really respect you, trust you, and I really want your help with this cuz I'm trying to make this great."
38:03
I go and in the room is basically my buddy Trevor, his brother, and then there's the head of like the women's volleyball the US women's volleyball team which is like way out performed in the Olympics and won like a bunch of gold.
38:18
And there was one other person and then there was this guy, Larry.
38:22
I'm like, "Oh, I'm a professional brainstormer.
38:23
This is literally what I do.
38:25
I'm like just ready to rock and roll.
38:28
But I'm just blown away by this guy, Larry.
38:29
Every time this guy, Larry, opens his mouth, he says something that's super wise, super smart, on the nose.
38:35
Just a few words, but he's always on point.
38:37
And so, after about an hour of the brainstorm around the book, I was like, "Dude, I got to ask Larry, I missed the intro what's your story, dude? Cuz you're incredible."
38:47
And Larry tells the story where Larry's like, you know, I am My name's Larry, blah blah blah.
38:51
And he goes, "I was incarcerated for the past 22 years." Wow.
38:57
And I think he had just gotten out.
38:57
I don't I don't know how long it had been, maybe a year or two, something like that.
39:01
And he goes, "Yeah, from the age 18, he's now 40.
39:03
He's like at age 18, I was arrested and I was I was in for, you know, whatever, 22 plus years.
39:09
And I was like, "Larry, no offense, but you just got out a couple years ago. How are you so smart?
39:14
How do you know all this stuff?
39:15
Cuz he would He would have these amazing pulls where whatever we're talking about, he would reference this thing in this book and this quote he could just recite by memory.
39:22
So, Larry, I'm like, "Larry, how do you know all this?"
39:27
And he goes, "I was incarcerated at age 18.
39:31
They lock you up and throw away the key, right?
39:32
Like you're basically like the lowest man on the totem pole for society.
39:35
They don't Nobody invests in you at that point.
39:36
You're You're a sunk cost.
39:39
And so, he's like, I was, you know, getting in trouble and it was a rough place and it was not a good time.
39:44
And he's like, "I made a decision.
39:47
I'm no longer in prison, I'm in university." Huh.
39:48
And he's like, "So, every day I just studied.
39:50
I just decided to go to university for the past 20 years."
39:54
He's like, "I decided to read all the books and learn and write and better myself."
39:59
And he's like, "I would literally change what I saw.
40:01
I would walk in the prison yard and I wouldn't see the barbed wire."
40:04
He's like, "I saw roses."
40:06
He's like, "I literally just re-brainwashed myself that I am not in prison. I am in university."
40:10
And I carried myself like that and I acted like that.
40:15
He made the most of what was, you know, otherwise a very bad situation.
40:18
I just remember being so blown away and inspired by this guy Larry when I heard that heard that story cuz I was like, you know, if Larry can do that at a life sentence in prison, and this sounds stupid, but like then I can be bored in a line at Starbucks for an hour you know, whatever like I you can change where you are.
40:34
You don't have to be in the situation that you it looks like you're in.
40:38
Like you can literally just decide, "No, no, I'm in university right now.
40:41
No, no, I'm in a spa right now.
40:43
No, I'm in I'm in the brainstorming session right now.
40:46
Yeah, I mean I am where I want to be." I thought that. That's so cool.
40:48
Yeah, it's really challenging cuz on one hand for some reason you start you feel like sad for someone like cuz you meet someone like I a lot of the guys I met they I think they kind of had a tone for their sins a little bit where like they change, but you're like, "Oh, I feel so bad for you. Like that sucks. You don't deserve this."
41:05
And then you like learn about what they did and you're like, "Oh, actually no.
41:09
Like consequences exist for a reason.
41:10
Like that sounds fair to me."
41:12
And it creates like a you get Whenever I've done these things with these guys, I get so many mixed emotions.
41:17
It's a very challenging thing.
41:18
It's a very hard thing to be part of, too.
41:20
But it is a no-brainer, right?
41:22
You want someone to like Yeah. not go back.
41:24
Did I tell you my embarrassing prison story?
41:28
No, but that sounds so awesome. It's very embarrassing.
41:32
This could go so many ways.
41:34
So I go I I go with this Were you making dad jokes on your first day in?
41:38
So I moved to Silicon Valley and I'm working with this guy Michael Birch.
41:42
And Michael Birch is this wonderful guy.
41:47
Michael's built a successful career in Silicon Valley.
41:48
He's basically like a billionaire.
41:49
So one day he messages me like, "Pack it like pack a bag with enough clothes for a day I got two days and meet me like at like whatever. Meet me at like 8:00 a. m. at this spot.
42:02
You're not going to work today."
42:02
I'm like, "All right, I don't know what's going to happen."
42:04
So I go and we start driving.
42:07
idea where you were going?
42:08
I think he tells me on the drive that we're going to he's a part of this group called the inside circle.
42:14
And inside circle was a where they take guys from the outside to go meet guys on the inside and it was at the prison a Folsom was was it called Folsom prison? Yeah, Folsom.
42:24
And so we go drive there.
42:28
It's a maximum security prison and I'm basically just a huge wuss, right?
42:30
So I don't know what I don't know what I'm getting into.
42:32
I don't know what I didn't actually sign up for this.
42:34
Michael says kind of like trust me you'll you'll like this this is good. You should do this.
42:38
I still don't really understand what we're doing.
42:39
I did I think it's like a you know like dare where they like scare you they like take you in the scare straight like you're like I thought it was scare straight.
42:47
I thought we were just going to observe from like behind this like really thick glass.
42:53
I'm like oh cool we're going to be like watch and I'm going to be like wow, I learned so much today from observing. Tapping on the glass.
42:59
And then they open the door and they're like all right guys come on in. I'm like what?
43:03
And so we go in and they're like all right you know pick a buddy pick a pick a partner and so I'm like and I like pick this guy and and the the program starts and basically it's like a men's group so you sit in a circle you talk about your feelings.
43:21
Oh and by the way, when I walk in immediately my eyes are drawn to one person cuz it was so obvious to me like this was the hardest guy in the prison.
43:28
Somehow this guy had sunglasses and I don't know why he was allowed to have sunglasses.
43:34
He had a walking he had a cane which I thought like you're not allowed to have like a like a something that could be like a weapon.
43:40
He's but he's got a cane and he's got sunglasses but he's not blind by the way. What?
43:45
sunglasses like up on his head sometimes and he's got black guy? Black guy.
43:47
And he had like an entourage.
43:49
Like he had like two guys with him who were really big and like but they deferred to him and he was kind of older and I was just like I don't know who this guy is but I've seen enough shows and movies to know that this guy is somebody here.
44:01
And maybe somebody on the outside I don't know but he's somebody in here.
44:03
Anyway so he's in my group.
44:05
And his two like entourage guys.
44:09
So we get in the circle and I'm like, okay, I don't know what I'm supposed to do. Am I giving advice?
44:11
Is this a mentorship session? What is this?
44:13
And it's like, no, no, no, you're here to talk about, you know, it's a this is a safe space, unpack your feelings. I'm like, oh god.
44:18
And so first guy starts and he starts talking about how he's feeling pissed off.
44:25
And he's feeling pissed off cuz like I mean, crazy story, but like he's locked up in here and his sister outside is having she's being abused by her boyfriend.
44:34
He just wants to kill this guy, but he's on the inside, he can't get to this guy. So he feels powerless.
44:39
And he's sharing this heavy emotional real life problem. Yeah.
44:44
a grade A real life problem.
44:47
And I'm I of course cuz I'm horrible I stop listening.
44:51
I'm just like panicked thinking of what am I going to say?
44:53
You know when you're like supposed to be listening, but you just actually just planning what you're supposed to say?
45:00
I start doing that cuz I'm like I'm going to like retell a fake movie so you sound hard.
45:03
Like Yeah, so I'm like Like my my startup doesn't have product market fit.
45:06
This is really grinding my gears.
45:08
What the hell am I going to say?
45:10
I don't have real world problems, right?
45:11
Like my life's pretty good.
45:13
And the circle we're going around the circle and it's just one crazy like real problem after another.
45:20
And then um and then it's getting to me and I'm just like, what am I going to say?
45:24
And so I'm like, all right.
45:27
I guess I go deep in the bag.
45:27
I'm like all right, I do have you know, there is something that's like pretty heavy.
45:32
I don't really talk about this normally, but like I guess it Thank god I have this cuz this is the time and place to unpack this story.
45:38
And so I start unpacking this story and in my mind I'm and also I'm like I'm talking kind of slower and dramatically cuz I'm like let me really ham this up a little bit.
45:48
Like let me not let me not be me and laugh during this.
45:52
Let me uh you know, try to be serious here.
45:56
And I think I'm doing a great job.
45:56
And the guy with the glasses just midway through is like, man I don't believe none of that shit."
46:05
And I'm like I'm like, "No."
46:05
And I immediately I'm like, "No, it's true."
46:08
He goes, "I know it's true. Hey." And I'm like, "So what?
46:10
Just to clarify, you said it's true. Are we cool? What's going on?"
46:15
And he was like And he was like, "Man, that ain't your truth though."
46:19
It's like he's like, "It's true, but that ain't your truth."
46:22
And I'm like, "What is this puzzle? What is this riddle?
46:24
I don't know what this means."
46:27
And then um It's a crazy It's like really intense moment where I had to stand up.
46:33
And he's like And they're they're like, "All right, it's time to do the work." I'm like, "What?"
46:37
And I stand up and I'm like, "Am I going to get beat up?" And so he's like right?
46:44
He's like, "What's your truth?" And I'm like, "What?
46:45
I just feel uh And I'm like I'm like I'm like, "No, but that is a real situation that has happened to me."
46:53
And they were like, "No, what's your truth?"
46:55
And I was like, "All right, the truth is I'm just trying to say what I think you guys want me to say cuz I just want you to like me."
47:02
And I pointed at the guy.
47:04
I'm like, "I just want you to not hate me."
47:07
And he looks at me, he just stares at me.
47:08
He stands up, he gets in my face, he goes, "That's your truth." He gives me a big hug. And then we sat down.
47:15
And then for the next hour I was like, "I don't know what the hell just happened, but I think I'm in a prison gang and this is awesome.
47:20
I think I think I've accepted this. It felt amazing."
47:25
That's called a breakthrough.
47:25
Yeah, I had a breakthrough.
47:26
So that was my first prison story. That's great. Did you How did it end?
47:32
Did you guys like exchange information? What did you do?
47:36
Dude, have you ever taken ecstasy?
47:37
I haven't, but I assume that's what it felt like cuz for the rest of the time I was just like the weight of the world was off my shoulders and I just enjoyed myself.
47:43
And I And I realized like, "Oh, I could just be my insecure, neurotic self and that's fine here. Okay, cool. I don't have to pretend. Great."
47:53
And then they were like, "Cool, he ain't pretending anymore. We like this guy.
47:57
Whatever you say Whatever you say now, we don't really care, but we just know that you're not pandering to us.
47:59
What value do these guys get? What a lesson learned.
48:03
What value do these guys get?
48:07
Well, I think, you know, they live a pretty hard life.
48:10
No, I think it's just in general they live a pretty hard life and they go to this meeting every week.
48:13
So, they have this kind of like 2 hours a week where they get to go and kind of like as they would say like take the mask off, put the armor down.
48:21
In fact, like it would be a mix of like the Hispanic guys, the white guys, and the black guys in this session, but then they would like openly say like yeah, but like he his friend like shanked my friend.
48:32
And so, it's on, but here it's not on, but as soon as we get out it's on again.
48:36
And I was like this is like a pretty bizarre dynamic, but they all agreed like all right, when we're here, it's whatever, but when it when we're out there, it is what it is.
48:42
That's just the the way it That's just the way things are.
48:44
I remember being like that's insane.
48:47
Um but you know, understandable in a way.
48:49
So, they have this as a space where they can like de-load kind of emotionally and mentally, which is important and feel like a human being and be able to like express themselves.
48:57
I think it's a pretty dehumanizing feeling, right?
48:58
When you're again locked up, throw away the key, and you know, anybody who comes in, they just see you as your label, right?
49:05
But like in that environment for those 3 hours that we were there, it you know, nobody was There was no status.
49:10
Nobody was better than anybody else.
49:11
Or like yeah, there was that, but I was worse than everybody else.
49:13
I guess it's probably more accurate way of saying it, but like there was no They got to like be treated well and be helped and be just talked to one man to another man.
49:21
Um At least again, these are mine This is like my interpretation of it.
49:25
I'm sure that people who do this more have like a more sophisticated way and a better way of saying it.
49:29
By the way, now that we're talking about this I'm going to wrap up, but Jack Smith, I forgot.
49:32
This is his big philanthropic cause as well.
49:34
So, Jack Smith, if you ask him what he's doing on a regular basis for a long time, I would say what are you doing?
49:39
He's like, "Oh, I'm I'm pen pals uh with like people who are locked up and they I have a system where they can order any book and I'll get it for them." Isn't he giving books? Isn't it a book program?
49:52
Yeah, where he created a website.
49:52
I forget how he did it, but where they can order a book and he'll buy them any single book that they want.
50:00
Dude, most generic name Jack Smith.
50:00
You can't find anything when you Google for Jack Smith. Like Yeah.
50:04
Okay, well, maybe we do this.
50:07
So, there's the last mile, which you could donate to. So, go to lastmile. org. You can donate there.
50:12
There's Inside Circle Foundation, where you can donate there.
50:17
So, maybe we do a little good.
50:17
So, if there's anybody who's listening to this and is inspired either to to start your own thing or to attend one of these or to donate, go do it, man, cuz it's uh seen it firsthand, does a lot of good, and I think doesn't get the type of attention that it would ever want.
50:31
By the way, the Inside Circle guys, they also made like a movie, a documentary about the program.
50:35
And Chris Redlitz is the guy who um who I who's kind of my mentor, and someone I look up to, and you can find him on Twitter.
50:44
He's um he's super low-key, but he's been the seed investor of like probably five to 10 different unicorns.
50:50
Hugely successful, and now he has dedicated his life to this.
50:54
So, just DM him if you're want to do whatever.
50:56
He's he's pretty open-minded.
50:58
to do something like this, by the way?
51:00
Yeah, I haven't found my cause for a long Do you have like a a career arc in mind where you're like, "Cool, I achieve I climb success mountain, and then I you know, parachute over to like you know, save the world?"
51:12
I told Sarah that at the age of 40, I'm going to stop the getting of money.
51:18
So, I said, "By By 40, I will no longer pursue any money, and we will have a cause, and that's what we will dedicate ourselves to."
51:27
That's what I That's That's the Wow.
51:29
You've also told me that you're going to disappear off the internet.
51:30
I think this is badass, and you should talk more about this.
51:33
I said, "At the age of 40, yeah, I want to get off the internet, and I want to not pursue any money-making things ever again.
51:39
I don't want it to like ruin my perspective, and just be a shallow capitalist, and only care about that and just delete the internet and just focus on like doing something good.
51:52
That's That's what That's the current That's the current plan. How old are you now? I turned 36 a month ago. So, I'm uh 36. 4 years away, dude.
52:03
Do you think that's a crazy plan?
52:05
Of course, it's a crazy plan, but it's a pretty cool plan.
52:07
I think it sounds pretty cool.
52:08
I said by the I said by 40. 40.
52:10
Are you I mean, what's your level of seriousness about this?
52:11
Is this like that's what's happening or like I'm just testing this out.
52:16
Seeing how these words sound in my mouth.
52:18
No, I I just think that I think that I think if you only pursue making money, I think that you become a very shallow person.
52:25
I think that there's more to life.
52:27
I think that there's been so many times where I've seen something inspiring and beautiful and in my head I think, "Oh, and then we could do this and turn it into this and then like optimize by doing this."
52:35
As opposed to saying, "This is beautiful. This is wonderful. I want to experience. Let's keep it small."
52:39
Uh and so, I want to like force myself to appreciate that.
52:43
One of my heroes is this guy named Felix Dennis.
52:45
He wrote the book How to Get Rich.
52:46
Felix Dennis was a publisher in England where he founded a bunch of companies, a bunch of publishing companies.
52:52
Eventually was worth six or 700 million dollars and he wrote that he was diagnosed with cancer something like at the age of 60.
52:58
And then at the age of like 61 while he was like learning about his cancer or something, he got into poetry.
53:04
And he was like, "I'm obsessed with writing poetry.
53:06
Why on earth did I not discover this sooner?"
53:10
And he quit business partially because he was dying and because he fell in love with poetry and he wrote in his book that if I could do it all over again, I would have quit at the age of 40 because I had enough and I would have pursued poetry because that was my calling.
53:21
poetry because that was my calling. And I always found that to be amazing because I think that often times when we're doing what we're doing every single day, we get caught into the make more, do more, optimize more when it's like kind of I want to be in the present
53:34
and I want to enjoy the things that I want to enjoy regardless if they make money because how many hobbies have you had where you're like, "Well, I would only do it if I could like make like oh I want to like buy these toys and like maybe I could buy like 10 of them and turn it into a money making thing. Now what you're doing is actually
53:47
Now what you're doing is actually pretty cool.
53:49
You but you still have a capitalistic mindset to it.
53:51
You are playing the piano and you are live streaming it which I think is amazing.
53:57
But in my head I'm like I want to do that too.
53:58
It's like well I only want to do that because I want people to see me learning a hobby. Do you know what I mean?
54:03
And I like that's like tainting the thing. streamed it once.
54:07
No I'm not criticizing you.
54:07
I'm criticizing I I was inspired to do it because I want glory. Do you know what I mean? yeah.
54:13
And Well I I learned pretty quickly when I started playing the piano that um nobody gives a [ __ ] if you can play the piano by the way. It's not like a thing.
54:22
Like uh if somebody plays the piano well it's like oh cool you can play the piano well.
54:28
They don't want to listen to even one song.
54:29
Nobody wants to listen to somebody play a five minute song on the piano.
54:33
That's a very like clear thing to me since learning to play piano but it doesn't matter because playing the playing a five minute song is incredibly fun.
54:39
In fact I was I sent Ben a text message cuz I think it's very relevant to what we're talking about.
54:44
So Pomp did a a SPAC recently. Did you see this?
54:48
Yeah I I I saw it but I don't entirely know what it that means but yeah.
54:50
So our friend uh Pomp Anthony they SPAC'd a company and the company's goal was to do the kind of Michael Saylor playbook which is it's a Bitcoin acquisition and finance company.
55:00
And so what they're doing is they they raised I think $750 million.
55:05
They SPAC'd it um it's now public you know it's going to be a public company and they basically bought $750 million worth of Bitcoin and they're going to raise debt and buy more Bitcoin and they're going to Because companies can companies or pension funds can own Pomp's stock but they can't own Bitcoin.
55:20
So this is how they get exposure to it. Is that right?
55:23
Uh that's one one aspect to it.
55:23
There's others which is like it's levered so like you know you can for every dollar you put in let's say let's say you buy Bitcoin directly you can buy $1 of Bitcoin but like their thing might they're They're to borrow and buy more than a dollar of Bitcoin for every dollar of equity, you know, for example.
55:38
Uh Um, they also want to eventually turn it into like a full financial services thing.
55:43
So, like essentially like a Bitcoin-backed bank.
55:46
Um, I think that's like part of the vision.
55:47
Anyways, I don't know exactly what they're doing.
55:48
There's, you know, they're only allowed to say certain things, but point is uh, it's like Pomp, this guy who's very much like us.
55:55
I think he's the same age, similarly I hang out with Anthony all the time.
55:58
Creator on the internet, good dude, and he's, you know, he's not like some uber uber uber genius that's like, you know, but he's like relatable is what I'm saying.
56:06
So, he's like he's like one of us.
56:09
And it's clear that, you know, this didn't just happen.
56:10
He's been working on this for, you know, some period of time, maybe 6 months, maybe a year, maybe 2 years, you don't know.
56:16
Uh, so he he it's like, oh wow, Pomp raised $750 million as as this public company now.
56:21
I think he owns 8% of it I saw from the filing.
56:23
So, like, you know, theoretically Pomp has like $80 million of value from this, right?
56:30
Some creators make courses.
56:32
Pomp's going to make like, you know, probably hundreds of millions of dollars from this thing if it goes well, okay?
56:37
And uh, that's clearly what he put a lot of energy and focus on and did a great job fundraising for.
56:40
And I was texting Ben and I was like, wow, wow, that's incredible.
56:44
I was like, meanwhile, I've logged 120 hours on the piano in the last 6 months.
56:50
And I go, honestly, no regrets though. [ __ ] love the piano.
56:51
Dude, so listen, you tweeted out, you said, I used to think jealousy was a bad thing, like a sin, and I try to avoid avoid it.
56:56
But jealousy is a wedding crash or it shows up uninvited.
57:00
And recently I started using jealousy to my advantage advantage.
57:04
Jealousy is an incredible signal.
57:05
It tells me at a very primal no logic level what my subconscious wants.
57:10
It's a heat signal for taste.
57:10
I don't obey the signal, but I do observe it and it helps me now.
57:14
And so, this sounds very strange, but when I saw what Pomp was doing, I was like, that's so badass, congrats to him.
57:21
But then very weirdly, when I saw you streaming you play the piano, for some reason I thought that was oddly one of the cooler things you've done in the last year or two.
57:29
And I felt stronger and I'm like, well, why do I feel that Why do I think that that is cooler?
57:34
I don't know why exactly, but it relates to that tweet where I'm like, what's the signal there that that's sending?
57:40
So, anyway, I thought that was really cool.
57:41
I thought that was significantly cooler.
57:42
And I said this as well, when you were contemplating making a play or or starting a business or something like that.
57:48
It's like, I don't know, for some reason the play is so much cooler.
57:52
So, I think I would pursue those like artistic things over the money thing.
57:55
And this sounds like a very trite, you know, like not everyone has the privilege to be able to do that, but I do think that like it's better for your soul that way. Yeah, exactly.
58:04
I mean, you can already, you know, hear the comments.
58:05
Oh, must be nice for you. You don't have to work.
58:08
Another verse of it is, tech bros discover hobbies.
58:12
There's more to life than money.
58:13
Also, by the way, both true.
58:13
Both Both Both very valid points of view.
58:16
I don't think it's the important point of view, but I do think they're valid points of view.
58:20
I think the important point of view is like trying to figure out what you actually want to do and then pursue it like in a relentless sort of un unashamed way.
58:29
And I think it's very cool.
58:31
When you said that thing, I think you had told me you're like, in 5-7 years I plan to delete my social media, disappear from the internet.
58:40
And and now you're talking about like, you know, and you know, stop the stop pursuing the getting of money. Yeah.
58:43
I really hope you stick to that.
58:45
I don't know if you will, cuz I think it's a very hard thing to do.
58:48
It's like, hey, can you turn down Like it's like being like, I no longer eat sugar, right?
58:51
It's like it's like those people who like I'm going to stop I'm going to diet, right?
58:56
It's hard to stick to a diet.
58:56
But if you actually did that you would like shoot up in the rankings of like most badass people I know. You know what I mean?
59:05
You're already top 10, but you would shoot up.
59:07
I've got four years to go.
59:07
I better get all I better get all of it while I can.
59:12
But I do think that that It's also by the way a percentage.
59:14
How certain are you you're going to do that at the age of 40? I just need to know.
59:17
I'm going to hold you to this. 60 to 70%.
59:18
I mean, look, I feel this A lot of it has to do with family, too.
59:24
Like I feel uh like when my little kids start like talking and having personalities, I think I would fall in love with them even more and I just want to like be a good example that there's more to life than than just the getting of money. Yeah.
59:40
Yeah, I'm totally washed.
59:40
What What are kids are so cute. I'm just washed up now.
59:44
I can't do I can't do anything, dude.
59:45
I'm just Yeah, like the old the more personality she shows, the more we're I'm like, "Oh, nothing really matters except our health and being around each other." Right. Right.
59:52
I don't Does that Does that stay linear?
59:56
Like or does it like Like does it keep getting higher the more they talk to you? Yeah, it is.
1:00:01
But I I think I at least for me, like there's a there is a cap.
1:00:05
It's not one of these unbounded things.
1:00:07
It's not like I want to spend every waking moment with you.
1:00:07
I'm like, "No, you got like you're too annoying. I'm I'm too tired. This is too much."
1:00:10
But it does I do I do have like a It became my favorite thing for like 3 hours a day.
1:00:18
Like for 3 hours a day, my kids are my favorite thing in the world.
1:00:22
And that's 3 hours a day that my favorite thing used to be working.
1:00:23
It used to be, you know, reading.
1:00:26
There was other things that were in that spot of like that 3 hours a day of like voluntary time I could I could direct towards anything.
1:00:34
And now my kids are that, right?
1:00:35
Like like jumping in the pool with them and doing stuff or playing a game or whatever.
1:00:38
That's like It is super super fun.
1:00:39
But it is capped at like a 3 to 4 hours a day.
1:00:42
Beyond that, I'm like, "Like how dare my wife make me raise my own children. This is too much.
1:00:47
I need to be helped and saved.
1:00:49
Who's Who's here to save me?"
1:00:52
This is the softest episode we've ever had.
1:00:56
All right, we should get off before we start crying. All right, that's it. That's the pod.