How Dave Ramsey Built His $300M Empire, Trademarkia, And MFM Rip-Offs - Transcripts

That sounds like that sounds like this is like, you know, those things where it's like we're auctioning off a date with Laird Hamilton Yeah a hug. Why don't you buy this? Yeah, you just bought yourself a nine million dollar hug

We're live what are you talking about today? I've got a bunch of good topics Let me bring up one juicy one last year or two years ago. You asked me a question. You're like, who do you admire? I think you asked me that and I said this guy named Laird. Hamilton Laird. Hamilton is this like beautiful surfer, dude He's like in his 50s now. Basically, he's beautiful like we get it. We get it acknowledge that he's got like Beautiful wavy blonde hair and like a nice skin and he's pretty ripped for his age and he always was ripped He's like this tough guy that surfs a big waves and whatever

He launched this thing called where you make fun of me because I'm I don't even need to make a joke. You've done it all yourself here

Like this is like this is like objective like I'm just stating facts here. He's a human kendall He launched this thing called layered super foods. Have you heard of that? It's like a coffee creamer. That's made out of like Coconut I think right anyway, they took the company public I don't know why they did that but they took it public at a 300 or 400 million dollar market cap at the time They were doing 50 million in revenue Look up the company now. Let me find it. Oh, wow nine million dollars nine million dollars So this company they sell like a fair amount of like coffee creamer. So yesterday, I think it was 8.8 million, dude So listen, they have 20 million in cash. No debt at all. Their revenue is decreasing So it like in q3, it was 8.8 million In q3 of last year was 10.9 million. So what's that like a 50 million dollar a year business? But it's declining their group.

To hang out with layered Hamilton sounds like this is like, you know those things where it's like we're auctioning off a date with layered Hamilton is a hug. Why don't you buy this? Yeah, you just bought yourself a nine million dollar hug Dude why is this why is this company you haven't looked at this but why is this company so cheap? No, I don't know

I mean, I don't know how much debt they have but none none. I said that so I read their report

They had their q3 report 21 million dollars in cash zero debt zero debt So I never understand when when companies trade this far below their just cash value Cuz you know the obvious question then is why do you not buy this thing for 15 million and just wind it down and distribute the 20 million to yourself and make 5 million dollars, you know

Like in the or sell or sell the inventory they have like 13 million or something in inventory

Interesting. So yeah, so I mean I haven't looked at this because you just mentioned it But yeah, there's a bunch of these right now that are like this There was one the other day that I that I saw that was kind of in the same same bucket But there's a bunch of stocks that are down like 95 percent right now that seem like, you know, interesting takeover targets and we have a friend who Was interested in doing this and so I made a list of like 10 I was like here's 10 that I think you could buy is this friend aggressive It's an aggressive friend.

Got it. I know. Is this friend?

Got it. I know which friend it is. How tight is that, by the way, just to be able to say, this is an aggressive friend and

you're like, I know who it is. Would this friend say to a, a, a, a bottling entrepreneur, your business is one Google away from me ruining you?

Well, I don't think so, but maybe they usually don't say things to their, to their faces like that. They're more just like, can I do like, you know, those sharks that swim only under the water. They don't put the fin out. He's more like that. Got it. Okay. But like wish.com was the, it was the other example that, that had recently seen that was like this, which is wish, you know, pretty big brand name because they spent billions of dollars marketing this thing, $10 billion market cap at one point now, 360 million. So 10 billion to 360 million has seven, 700 million in cash with no liabilities. You know, I don't, I don't know exactly how you can buy these things. I think that's the, the challenge is like to actually acquire the majority in doing so you would push the price up because people would know what you're doing. So I think you'd have to make like a tender offer at a specific price. That's like, you know, what, whatever something above, but you know, the board will just reject it.

is not helping work in the real world.

So, you know, this like idea of public company takeovers is not something- Is that like a trucking conversation you've had,

which is can Shaq win the a hundred meter dash? You know, the one thing about this podcast is the number of on the fly analogies you have to create. It just really brings, That's a different skill, that's a different muscle, and yeah, that muscle's not so strong yet.

Still working on it. So anyway, Laird Superfood. Interesting company that I was eyeing. Laird, maybe a little less hot in my book now, because his company is worth only $8 million, it's a budget $300. Now he's just a really hot fit guy

before he was hot fit and rich, so. He lost the third leg of the stool.

Yeah, he's still a famous and famous Trump's wealth in most cases, in most people's eyes,

but anyway. All right, well let me tell you about somebody who is rich and somebody who is famous, but he's not hot. Can I tell you who this is?

Okay, are you familiar with Dave Ramsey? Can I tell you who this is?

Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, very. Tell me what you know about Dave Ramsey and I'm gonna fill in some gaps for you.

So Dave, he's like a personal finance guru. He's based out of Franklin, Tennessee. He's in his 70s probably now. We started as a radio host where it was just like Dave Ramsey like show, and then he parlayed that into like the Dave Ramsey network. So now he has like four or 500 employees based out of Franklin, Tennessee, and they do like 400 or 500 million a year in revenue where they sell like personal finance stuff. I think he's pretty controversial because a lot of his like rules, his lot of his personal finance rules are based in like biblical, like rules. He also believes in like zero debt and he's pretty conservative, so that people who are conservative aren't into him.

Okay, well you do a lot more that I would have guessed. So, I guess the segment's over.

I guess the segment's over. Like Franklin, Tennessee, how do you know this stuff? What's going on here?

He also bought all of his buildings without any debt. So he owns like a campus in Franklin, Tennessee.

Yeah, yeah. So I didn't know all of this. Sorry, but did I, I don't know.

You know, well, so I didn't know all of this.

Did I, I don't know. You know, well, you spit in my food, but all right. I'm still hungry, so let's go. So Dave, he's 62 years old. He was a realtor turned radio host. And yeah, he's from Tennessee. So basically what happened is by his mid-20s, so this is like back in the 80s.

So back in his 80s, I'm still hungry, so let's go.

So Dave, he's 62. But you didn't know who Dolly Parton was. And she's also a Tennessee person. So like.

Yeah, I guess. Lesson learned. I'm not coming at you with any Tennessee trivia anymore. You're a ringer of that stuff. So by his mid-20s, he's got like a $4 million property portfolio, real estate portfolio, and it's kicking off some cash, maybe like 5% a year cash or cash return. So he's making 250K a year off his real estate portfolio at that stage. At this time, 1988, so the, you know, the year I'm born, his bank basically revokes his line of credit and demands that he pays it back. And he couldn't sell fast enough. So he gets foreclosed on and declares bankruptcy. This is like the trauma of why he's like, don't use debt. No debt. And he's like, debt bad, debt bad.

I believe.

You're a ringer of that stuff. Which is absurd. You don't know any people that go to that? What's that? No, I mean, I don't know anybody that goes. Dude, in the South, it's a thing. So I had Texas employees. And like, if you're just like a normal couple where each employee makes, or each wife and husband makes like 60 or 70 grand a year, you'll like pay to go to like a Dave Ramsey. Like he trains these financial advisors and they host seminars. And you'll go to this like five day weeknights thing where it's like, instead of Bible study, it's like, we teach you how to like save and like invest.

Like, you know, people. Anybody, anybody that goes. Yeah, it's like Jesus on the front and a P and L on the back. It's like this new remix Bible. I love it. And so his company Ramsey solutions is absolute juggernaut. It's insane. So, so, okay, let's break down now the media side. So he launches this thing in 1992. And basically he's done content for 30 years about the same seven steps. It's like this guy's just been talking about the same thing. I don't know how he feels like hours.

Like, you know, that's not gonna lie, that's an absolute bar! Bar. You know, like, I was like, hey, YouTube editor.

Play that clip of, like Jay-Z the first time he hears the intro to like, with Timberland. Timberland's playing him a beat,

and he's like, ooh, that's nice!

With Timberland. That's nice!

That's how I feel when I hear biblically based common sense financial education media company. So that's amazing. Then he's got, you said you talked about this like a Nat, his Tennessee like empire. He's got, he's got a thousand employees working there. He owns all the real estate. So he's got, he owns, I don't know if this is correct. Dude, he owns a lot. He owns a lot. He owns two office towers. He's got basically like, you know, a 50,000 square foot event center. He's got 60 acres of just like property land that he bought for $10 million. So owes a bunch of land, uses that land to run his common sense biblical financial empire out in Tennessee.

but then he has and this is good the debt free scream. Have you seen this before?

Well I used to think that it was like the equivalent of ringing a bell. Like yeah he had like a he had a thing where people would call him like I finally paid off my debt and they like

celebrate it. They celebrate it with the debt free scream. I think there's things we could learn from this guy. I think we should steal some of this guy's shtick and so he's really got something going here. Anyway, so you've never heard of him? No, I've heard of him. I didn't realize how rich

he was. I just thought he was like someone's dad that gives basic financial advice because he's got the dad vibe. He's got the vibe of someone who calls diabetes diabetes. Like that's what you know what I mean? Like the thing above your head is definitely a rough to him, not a roof.

He's got that type of... 100% on the diabetes thing, dude. So good, and the podcast, too good.

I need to now laugh for 30 minutes. I don't want to... So good, and the podcast, too good.

Do the rest of the podcast. That's his vibe. He's a little judgmental too and he's like,

this is the only way. Yeah, he's opinionated. I mean, he's Dr. Phil for money. Exactly.

He's got his thing, which is like, this is how you do things. Exactly. He's like a guy with the big belly who wears suspenders vibes. You know what I'm talking about? Like that type of vibe. So he's not wrong. It's just sometimes his energy, I think, is a little bit judgmental. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly.

Like that type of vibe. So he's not wrong.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Okay. I was going to make a bunch of jokes about his look, but I decided to turn the other cheek or whatever he would want me to do. So his show is nationally syndicated on radio, which I think is the hack. So 20 million people a week, apparently, listen to this. I don't know how they...

It's huge. It's huge, but when I used to drive, I would listen to it all the time.

Yeah, of course you did. Of course you're his target market. So he's basically carried by 600 radio affiliates. I think that's amazing. So he's got his books. He's got 23 best-selling books. I don't know what that even means. What do you think that means? That's their personality. So he's got his daughter does it now, and he's got these other people like Ken and Dr. John and all these other people that he's created as other personalities or brands. They're called the Ramsey Personalities. So he's got them in.

is if you're working there. Yeah. Hallelujah. I'll give you that.

Half-hearted hallelujah. That's fine. If you come to work late and they're paying you, you're stealing. Don't steal and expect to be promoted. Hallelujah. I'm a capitalist pig. There's nothing socialist about me. I'd put my

receptionist on straight commission if I could figure out a way. 100% hallelujah.

I love that one. All right, Dave. Now you're talking about my style. All right, here we go. If somebody calls in and they got more debt than their annual income, he'll say, that's a small shovel in a big hole. I love that. Love that. Dave. Okay. Then he also says, he quotes the Proverbs 22 seven and states, the rich rule over the poor

and the borrower is a slave to the lender. No, I think that that's wrong. I think that you can use

debt effectively to help you. Carries a gun. Guy's awesome. Guy's awesome. And I did not- He carries a gun?

Carries a gun. He carries a 45 with hollow point bullets, according to himself. You know what a 45 is? That's a pretty big round. Yeah. That's the biggest round I know of. Biggest round I know of. That's a big round.

Yeah. So anyways, fascinating guy in his 60s that I could not believe his empire generates this much cash. 300 million a year is a pretty absurd number for this. Dude, and he's been doing that for decades. It just shows you how big the Tony Robbins empire must be. Tony Robbins says this thing during his things. He goes, my business is bringing over $500 million a year. But I didn't know what that means because it's like when a ad agency guy's like, oh, I've spent over a hundred million dollars. I've generated over a hundred million dollars in revenue. It's like, no, dude. The company gave you a budget. You push spend at the average normal rate and you've done this for 10 years and you added up their total revenue number.

Dude, and he's just shows you how big I could also see by the way. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's not full of shit. It's definitely not full of shit. I don't have any way to verify it, but like, I know his reach and I know that that is like very attainable to God. Did you just read a book on the words Christian say?

No, dude, it's the flooding. It's flooding. I just have a little special something in me today. Either I'm going to get canceled or I'm going to get a good laugh out of you. And that is worth

the risk. Have you been south of the Mason Dixon line, man? Have you like been in the Midwest? Apparently not. You went to Duke, but Duke's not really the south.

My skin colors allowed south of the Mason Dixon line. I don't know what that is.

Have you hung out in like Tennessee, Missouri, Kansas, Alabama? You've never hung out in these places, have you?

Plug out? Is there something to do there?

Have you ever even been? I drove through, but I came to California. I had to step through the mud of the Midwest to get here.

You got to go, man. You're so out of touch.

You're so out of touch. I was born in Tuscalo, Oklahoma. All jokes aside. So, you know, I got my Southern street cred.

Dude. I got my southern street cred.

Dude, that's like southern. My southern burden certificate. Just because you've been to the airport don't mean you've been there. That's like it with this other thing. You got to get out, man. Even just go to like, this sounds very absolute.

Get out is right. If you're in Tennessee, you do got to get out.

Dude, just go. I thought exactly. You're... Go drive an hour and a half north and go to a Walmart and just chill and just watch what people purchase and monitor the pot. You got to get out of your little San Francisco bubble, my man. You got to get out and see like, there's 350 million people in America.

Dude, I can tell you a funny story. Yesterday, I went to go, I left my house for a meeting. So I go meet somebody very interesting. I might tell you about this later in the pod. So I go meet somebody very interesting. And I'm deciding if I want to save it to do a bigger thing, or he's going to come on as a guest. Or maybe I'll tell you about it. I haven't decided yet. So do I know them? No, I don't think because they're not in your world, right? Like you know about Dolly Parton. You don't know about like, the NBA.

Yeah, not a big baseball guy. Because you're after the checkout. Or you have the self checkout to...

No, they're, well, there's like self checkouts, like to the left on the right. Then there's like the cashier in the front. Then there's some people just waiting for their order. You don't know if they're in line or not. Like you don't know what's going on. And so there's a guy in front of me and the cashier is just like waiting. And I was like, I was like, oh, you can go. She's ready. And then the cashier just goes, he doesn't have money. I like peed my head in front of like, Oh,

I'm like, oh yeah, sure! In front of like, sure enough I'm getting the money. And I thought it was such a funny thing for the lady to say, now he doesn't have money.

Like so funny to be getting the money! So outrageous of a comment. I like why did she have to say it like that? But it was like the most direct line for the answer. Like, not like, no, you can go ahead.

He's not ready or he's not ordering.

It was like the most direct line.

Just, he doesn't have money.

I was in the bathroom at the airport recently and there was like, there's like a line for the urinal, but there was also like a line for the stalls and the guy walks up to me and he looks at the stall and he looks at me and he goes, you wait to poop.

He was like... I was laughing. He almost said the weirdest shit.

He was like, you have to answer, too, right? You can't not answer at that point.

You're like, why am I playing into this? It was just to look at it. He went to poop. I was like a 12 year old. I don't know why I thought that was so funny. Oh my god, I have another business. Do you want to talk about business or no? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, of course

We're idiots. By the way this whole if you're not watching on YouTube you're missing half of it cuz Sam's wearing a Harvard sweatshirt

While we tell these stories

We just signed about someone illegal whiskey waiting to poop You made a bunch of jokes about the South this is so stupid. Oh my god, by the way, if you're listening in Austin We're doing an event. Well, actually we're doing two events I think the second one is not confirmed the second one is Shawn and I doing a live pod late April

We're gonna have more on that, right? Oh, that's it's confirmed we're doing it. We just don't know the venue yet We don't have a venue Yeah, we need to know is it gonna be 300 people a thousand people or 3,000 people That's that's kind of the only thing that that we're missing here Is how many of you will show up? To this live show in Austin where we can we're gonna we're gonna put on a little show We're gonna meet and greet have some fun. Maybe do a little private dinner with some people afterwards

So I think we should, we're gonna do that end of April.

We don't know the venue yet. Where do they go to like sign up for that? We'll put the link in the description here.

Yeah, and then go to, what's our website called? MFMpod.com. MFMpod.com, which is like my first million, pod.com. And then we're doing another one. This one is not a we, this is a me. Sean's not coming to this one. It's just a casual hangout session. We're doing that Wednesday, March 15th, it's free. You can just show up and we're just gonna hang out. And you can find that also on MFMpod.com or by the time this episode airs, I will have tweeted it.

So you can go to my Twitter handle, thus and part and see it. Sam, I'm in a great mood. Can I tell you why? Yes. I did something that I forgot is an amazing tactic and technique. So I'm gonna say it out loud here. So other people could do it, but also it's a reminder to myself to do it.

Have you ever heard of something called flooding? No, is that when you text someone a lot of, no, I have no idea.

Give me a lot of things. Don't urban dictionary. It's probably something weird, but here's, here's how I learned about it. Tony Robbins talked about this thing. So he goes, somebody asked him, they go, what's a marriage advice or a thing you do in your marriage that makes it better? And he basically had two stories that I really loved. I'll skip the first one for now. I've told it. I teach it in my course, but I'll skip that one for now. The second one that he had said was, he goes about once a month, we'll do something called flooding, which is basically us, we sit down on the couch, like we're about to watch Netflix or something else. But instead of just mindlessly vegging out to some TV, we watch videos or photos. So we go of some part of our past, some era of our past.

but have you ever seen this video, you know, 12 year old- Like old blog posts or something? Or go to old- I will pull up and-

Bombs world. E-bombs world. E-bombs world.

This is in this video of this cop pulling over this guy, he's got his hands above his head. It's like this.

Yeah, yeah, yep. Yeah, yeah.

And he goes, he's patting him down. He goes, he goes, all right, let me just check the pockets. Hold on, here we go. What's this? And the guy goes, that's my penis. And he goes, that's your penis.

And then he continues, that's-

And this video cracks me up just the way- He video cracks me up just the way you go, that's what penis and the guy goes,

that's your penis, that's your penis. And so there's that-

I have to see that one. And so there's that one. but then there was just a whole bunch of these that were like, just goofy videos. Yeah, a lot of them were like, you know, the news anchors, interviewing some like that kid who was like, I like turtles kid, or like the grape stomp video or like whatever. This was a whole bunch of these. And I watched like six of them, and they just cracked me up in this, like, way. It's like a simpler time went, an evolution of good wife in a mortgage. I didn't have it. You know, it's just literally that was like those videos where just took me back. They They just teleported me. And so how they recommend this, this idea of flooding, you probably have done some version of this on accident, but like make it a practice. It's pretty awesome.

And it just puts you in an amazing mood.

But I didn't have the evolution of dance. So I did it recently. So I'm going to tell a story that I, we, you and I were texting about, and I can't reveal what I was selling because it was kind of against the law and I didn't know it at the time,

but I tweeted out recently. I tweeted out recently. What's that thing, statute of limitations. You're way past that. It's been more than 10 years. Is that a real law?

Or is that just something that's a law?

It's just something that you could say.

Is it a figure of speech? That's definitely a legal speech. Here's what we'll do. We can mention, I'll say it was alcohol. That's all I will say. It was legal alcohol that I was selling. That's all I'm going to say. I was like-

anytime you have to specify it was legal, probably not a good thing.

So well, so here's a story. I tweeted out that I think it always bothers me when people collect domain names. That's a pet peeve, because I'm saying, if you're doing that, you're doing the wrong stuff, because people will say, but I got this great idea, I'm gonna buy a domain name, or even worse, they'll say, I've got this amazing domain name, I should build something for it. I'm like dude, don't build something just because you have a domain name, so anyway I take it out, just make money first and just use store name dot SquareSpace dot com for the initial $100 in sales, and then go and get the domain name. And someone's like you can't do that. I was like oh no, I've done it a bunch of times. You're doing it because you have a name. I was like, no, I didn't actually in college tons and tons of times. In fact, I found this old website that I had and it was alcoholname.wordpress.com. Right. And I went and looked at the old stats and it's getting 5,000 views a month still on a WordPress.com free website. It's a store, it's a quote, a store that is a blog post and a click to PayPal.

in my living room and it was working out well. So I was like. I was building motorcycles in my

living room, sleeping on the floor, and selling collectors whiskey illegally on the Internet.

It was a simpler time The American dream the American dream I was one of those kids that had you probably had this too I didn't have beer like you remember those college kids that would have like beer cases the cardboard on their wall Yeah, I wasn't that bad but I did have an American flag. I definitely had the American flag So I was pretty trashy But yeah I was so I was looking at my old like

Blog that I used to do and I couldn't even remember the password and so I flooded myself a little cases the cardboard on

Their wall. Yeah, I'm just flooding my pants today. It's great

Alright, I have something for you. So there's this company that's for sale that I came across. So check it out and go to chambers calm Chambers. Okay. Yeah, like that Harry Potter stuff chambers chambers and partners. Is that it? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah

Okay. Okay, dude check this out. Well, I'll describe what I see It says discover the best law firms and lawyers and then there's like a search a search bar where you can type in a firm

A lawyer or a legal network. So this yeah, so I'll explain what they do So basically what they do is I think they're mostly in Europe But they are in America as well is they put out these rankings once a month or once a quarter something like that And they go and they interview lots of I think they have 200 employees who do this 200 employees who go out and interview different Lawyers they talk to your past clients And they try to like see which cases you're winning and it's all done manually. Like there's not like a lot of like tech behind it and then they create these rankings for like best legal firm or whatever like that or like You know a good firm for this good firm for that like different niches and then they put out these rankings and if you're a lawyer you can pay money and and get like a plaque they'll send you A plaque and then also they'll allow you to use their like thing in the in the like when you send an email It could be like voted a top lawyer by chambers and you could do and you could do all that dude this company they do 44 million euros or yes or sorry 44 million pounds so what's that in real real money that's like 60 million in revenue and then 18 million in profit and they're selling right now for close to 500 million dollars it's a crazy company for sale somewhere just like on a trade magazine for media companies that I follow it's like a small thing called flash and flames because this cut that website they cover like B2B media stuff because I'm like been obsessed with B2B data business the name of the B2B media thing flash and flames calm I love it it's like my favorite site I don't even want to tell

people about it cuz I like how you tried to just mutter it that's when you know

it's a good one it's a good one like I'm a paying subscriber to it which is like ridiculous but dude these lawyers pay like 1,500 to 4,000 dollars a year and they said they have like no churn they're like we have we no insurance from our from us because these lawyers wanted it for so much this these lawyers when for so much and I am interested in this and I found like eight or nine other businesses they call him like data businesses or databases or intelligence businesses and they're not really much tech but right now a lot of them are selling for eight to ten times revenue and I found ten examples of companies that have sold in the eight to ten times revenue range for one of these data businesses. It's ridiculous. It's crazy. And this sounds like a scheme because what they do is they rank you and then they go, hey, if you want like to make like a special profile on our website, we'll do that and it's $4,500 a year. And what we'll do is like once ranked, you could purchase this one pager where you get a profile on our site. It's almost like a Wikipedia page where they like one of the journalists just writes like two paragraphs and it says like, this legal firm is known for X, Y and Z. And then you could put that if you're a lawyer, you could put that in your email signature, and you're allowed to do that and then people can click and see whatever. It's crazy, man. This is a caper. They're pulling it off. And

I love stuff like this. You know, it's like JD power. We talked about like JD power. We talked about, you know, that they're smart because their logo is like, it looks like a medallion, like a, like it looks like a special emblem or a ward. Like it's a see with this. Like, w I don't know what you call these, but the pedals going around it. Put this on the YouTube channel so people could see it, but. A reef. It's like a reef around it that just looks like what the Olympics in Athens would award the top performers. So they're really playing into the whole thing with their brand. So I think that's pretty cool. I have a business that's sort of like this.

I have a business that's sort of like this. And their name is Partners. I'm gonna create something like this. It just, do you know. Far and Partners Mannay's some partners. We'll just do something for the people. We rank best condiments, mayonnaise and partners. I gotta figure this out. We can put this on the logo. But I love these rating businesses. What's the one you have that's similar?

So I was, have you ever done like trademark search yourself? No, what's that? Like when you start a business and you wanna look up, is this a good name? What do you do? Do you pay a lawyer and say, hey, could you just tell me if this trademark's available? Do you do that later once you get going?

I do that later once I get going. Is there an importance to having a trademark?

Yeah, very hard to sell a company without a trademark. Did you sell the hustle without a trademark? I didn't have a trademark. Yeah, typically very hard to get acquired without owning your name because it's a giant liability. So for example, like if somebody else owns the trademark and you get six years in, you're gonna have to change your name because the more valuable you get the bigger your exposure is for them to say,

I owned the trademark this, you have to change your name. Yeah typically very hard to get- But maybe my name, I mean, it was called the hustle. Maybe it was too broad of a name. You know what I mean?

Well, I don't know. There's probably some troll out there who've listened

like, Hey, hang on. Let me go get this guy. So dude, I'm past the reps in warranty. Like

the escrow has been paid out. So there's a great, there's a great, there's a great story. I think the early episode where Moy's came on and told the native story. So it's like, I dunno, episode 10 of this podcast, Moyes tells a story about like when they tried to sell native, they, they got in trouble with it. So they go there, they have a deal to sell native and as they're doing the diligence or like, as they're prepping for their diligence, They're like, shit, we don't have the trademark for native, Native deodorants. And they're like, okay, well, let's just get it. And they're like, well, you can't get it because somebody else owns it. They're like, what? Who owns native deodorant? There's no other native deodorant. Look, I have the domain. They're like, well, no, there's this guy.

When did you sell? December 3rd. When is that? Two years ago? What would that be? 21? Yeah. Okay. Wow.

So they, yeah, I didn't own it. They also, it also looks like you abandoned one in 2020. So you know, somebody did this on your team, maybe tried and didn't get it or whatever. It tells you what class it's in, et cetera, et cetera. So it's a great, great little thing and you can search for like associated names or whatever. It's a great website. And so I reached out to the guy who owns it. I was like, dude, this is a, and so I, I said, trademark, he has a great, great idea. Brilliant interface, you know, props to you. So the guy lives in the Bay area actually, and he goes, yeah, it's really cool website. You know, we have 5 million in ARR and I can't, you know, we never raised VC 5 million in ARR. It was kind of declining from the peak, but I just came back to the company, removed the subscription.

It's called a, you know, who was it, a non from CBM sites was on and he was like, no, we just like taking public data. That's messy. And we just make it a little bit easier to, yeah, we just make it clean. By the way, my first million is owned by advanced magazine public publishers, which is a big company in New York. And it's a entertainment services, namely an online non downloadable video series featuring star athletes explaining their life as millionaires. I guess that's that GQ thing, which I search or where I see when I search on YouTube. Anyway. Badass.

I love this. In fact, you want to, I'm going to go trademark this before this episode comes out because

now somebody's going to go squat on this. And a funny story about native deodorant. I've always remembered this story. I never brought it up to you. So the hustle's office in Twitch's office was just a block or like 50 yards from each other. So if you know, there's, there was like Kearney or whatever you were and then you were the left. If you go to the right, there was a little cafe that was lovely that I, that I really liked. It was deodorant. They sell deodorant. It was sold for a hundred million dollars in cash and it probably does hundreds of millions now. And it has like a really cute branding. They make shampoo, they make everything.

And so I have a feeling that he was just thinking of like good branding, thinking of branding by this. And I was like, this is, I remember thinking, dude, boys, they're ripping off your brand or are you doing it exactly? And now it's realized the obvious. He was like, alright, I need a name.

Looked out the window, saw it and was like, that's my name in my logo now. Exactly. That's mine.

If you go this, go, if you look up a database Less spoon. It's mine. It's like I'm a nurse Basically, is exactly the same.

It's exactly the same. It's exactly the same. And it used to be blue and it looks like there's like no door visa blue. It was it was the white background with the same blue and now it's green. It looks like they closed in COVID and they moved to a new location, but that old location that we were at, it was the same logo and it was called NativeCo and I think NativeDeodorant was- The domain was also Native-

That was like during Covid-

That's the exact NativeCo for him. Yes, it was. It was the exact same thing. And so he must've been just walking down the street and he goes like, yeah, that's me. That's mine now. It's just like there's that meme on the internet of a stick figure handing an item to another stick figure saying, hey, I made this. And the second stick figure looks at it and goes I made this. That's basically what just happened. And I don't think I've ever said this to him, but I would love to hear what his rebuttal is. But he 100% stole the entire branding, the name, everything from this company. I don't know if stealing is the right word, but kind of.

I mean, that one looks like stealing. It looks like he actually went to, took a screwdriver, took their sign off their office, moved it across the street, and put it on his office. It's the exact logo. I remember seeing that for years and being like, huh? And I just never put two and two together. I didn't realize he worked there, but I was like, wow, they're really ripping off his branding.

No, that cafe has been there for years. I remember walking by it for years.

Shut down. I mean, this is like everything that's wrong in society. He sells his business for $100 million. Poor cafe shuts down sadly during COVID, during the pandemic. This is the way the world is going.

Dude, have you seen people ripping us off? I don't know if you've seen this, but- No, but that's cool.

Watch what happens. In the next two weeks, you're going to see Twitter threads, LinkedIn's, short videos on TikTok, other podcasts, talking about the exact same stories that we tell here. There's like this group of 10 people that just take our content, and then they just say the exact same thing. And they just tell that exact same story. They're probably better than us too. Dave Ramsey. How Dave Ramsey built a $600 million empire, animation, this, that, and then they're just going to like literally steal our shtick. It's kind of annoying.

I get it. They're probably better than us too.

Michael from our future has done it a few times. Yeah, they do. Yeah. He's one of the 10 that does this all the time. Who are the other nine? I mean, I don't even really want to give them shine of dear to that. Literally, if you're one of those people, just have your own silent embarrassment. There's nothing wrong with sort of like taking ideas and remixing them, but what most people do is they just take the same idea. They just tell the same story the same way that we already told it in their own Twitter thread or their own LinkedIn and whatever else, which is fine. But like give credit at least. If you're going to say the same thing, be like, oh, I was listening to my first million and they told this great story. Check it out.

But this is why, so I have a new project. I'm actually going to announce it in about a month or three weeks. This is why I didn't announce it. I've been working on this for almost a year now. I didn't want to announce it. CopyCats. Everyone talks about building public. I hate building in public. Building in public is not cool when you're popular. Building in public is really cool when you want to get popular. But once you already have a following, I don't want to do it. Like the Milk Road.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, tons. There's tons of embarrassing ones that are out there. There's like people that literally just took the same exact newsletter and they would some people would translate it. So they're like, Oh, I'm, you know, leche, whatever. And it's like the Mexican milk road. And then they would translate it to Spanish and just like Google translate and then publish. There's one, I don't know if I want to put this guy on blast, but someone who tried to buy the milk road and failed. Yeah, I know you're talking about. Then just tried to copy it in his own like way. And you can just say the funny thing is they very rarely work. They don't.

that doesn't really work. I'm not sure. I'm not a hundred percent sure. I'll explain why. I know why. Do you want to know the, so basically if for people who have been raised on the internet, they have a very high bullshit detector and do you want to know the best way to circumvent someone's bullshit detector? Now don't bullshit. You don't bullshit. don't bullshit. That's how you recommend that bullshit detector you don't bullshit and people could sniff this out. And so if they read something and it's like, dude, you're like a not cool older guy trying to act like a cool, younger person. I know that this is not good.

I told you about the end. You need in China, not quite right. It's like, dude, Dude, it's the same menu. Like this is the spicy chicken sandwich. And it's like, that's not quite right. And people, it just doesn't taste right. The taste buds reject it. Now, I believe that when it comes to, if I use one product and then somebody tries to copy it, I'm like, why would I want the shitty copy? I'm just gonna keep going with the original. But in markets where you're reaching a new audience or people who haven't heard of the original, I'm surprised it doesn't work. And I think my theory of why it doesn't work in those cases, I think you're right when it's, when people have tasted the original,

they don't really want the shitty copy. Or when it's like a community brand, like personality driven. You know, it's that one moat that Peter Thiel doesn't understand, brand.

Yeah. The one, the Asperger proof defense, one Asperger proof weapon we have. So, you know, the one thing that I think is true, which is like this like iceberg theory, which is like, if you look at an iceberg, like the part you see at the top is like, you know, 5% of the total mass that's there. And so what I think people get wrong when they try to copy a business is that they only see the top, the 5%. And they're like, okay, I'm going to copy that, but they don't know what goes on underneath. They don't know that, basically the uncopyable thing is the people, the personalities, the engine underneath that's coming up with the creative ideas, that's coming up with the next marketing thing because this one starts to decline. And so I think that's the part That's typically hard to copy, but honestly, I'm surprised that more of them don't work because if you're sufficiently talented,

I think it sadly does work more often than it doesn't. We should do an episode where we talk about the things that people have copied and it's become better than the original. Like there's stories of the Sam Ware brothers. So it's these three brothers in Germany and they have a company called Rocket Internet and it was a clone factory. And they basically, it was publicly traded until recently, but the reason they started this company was they like cloned Amazon and all these other company Zappos, Uber, things like that. But before they start a company, started that company, they cloned other things and they sold it to the original. So they cloned eBay in Germany and they sold it back to eBay for $90 million in like three months. And then they were gonna do the same thing with Groupon, but they got bigger than Groupon and they realized, oh wow, once you get huge, this business sucks, we got to offload it. And then they try to do that with Zappos, the shoe company, but they got bigger than the original Zappos. So the bigger, the market cap was larger so they couldn't sell it. And they, like, this is their whole strategy. It's a very fascinating strategy.

Right. Yeah, I think there's an art to copying, and I think we could do a whole podcast about like, if you're gonna copy, here's how to do it. here's going to do it in a way that feels good to your sole, feels good to customers, actually works and is not just going to result in a massive waste of time. I think there's a bunch of different little factors there. I think one thing the Sam Moore brothers did, one of the factors for example is they did the same business in a different country and so I think a geographic differentiation is important. I think that's one that you can copy and make things work when you do a geographic difference, but then there's some traps with that too that we could talk about, but all right, where do you wanna finish up? I think we should... Well, there is one thing that we should do, and- Yeah, I forgot about that thing. That you're aware of it, I think I'm aware of it. I can't seem to find my pen, but I did that-

That's a pig. Yeah, I forgot about that thing. Yeah, I did hear, I did- That's a pig. You don't need a pen, so basically- But I thought I have to sign something. Some sort of thing. You do, but, you sign it, but just with a click of a button. So basically, at this podcast, My First Million, our content unlike every other content on YouTube, it's actually not for free. let my sign something so you do not a free podcast it's not a free podcast because what you have to do if you seem more more than one episode this thing called the Gentleman's agreement which is it's called that because we're not there I'm not behind you to stare at your screen honor code it's an honor code you have to basically go and click subscribe on YouTube because we'll get more subscribers that helps the algorithm we get more views and we'll do more dumb stuff for you so it's called the Gentleman's agreement if you've watched more than one video you have to do this everyone's doing it by the way

everyone's doing it. By the way, I have a addendum to the gentleman's agreement came from a, from a listener. She pointed it out. She goes, not only have I signed the gentleman's agreement,

I have signed the ladies understanding. What's the ladies understanding?

Yeah, there's not many phrases that will stop me in my tracks, but I stopped in my tracks.

The ladies understanding I thought that was... The ladies understanding that's actually when you also click subscribe on the itune or the I would call itunes on the podcast app and the Spotify app, you go that extra mile. Go that extra mile and give us the ladies' understanding along with the gentleman's agreement.

So you go that extra mile. This lady's understanding, he's understanding. Since we started doing this, so two things about gentleman's. Number one, it's funny because we were talking about copying, you stole the shtick from somebody.

Did I stole it? And he called me, by the way, and he was like, isn't that awesome? It works so good. And he invited me to go to a UFC fight with him.

And you did it right because you gave credit to him. You put your own spin on it. And yeah, you credit him most importantly as being like, this guy did this awesome thing. And I was like, wow, I gotta try doing this. So, you know, you credit him and that's cool that you guys are going to see a fight together. That's amazing. Now, the second thing is, we have grown a lot since we did this. So we started doing this, we were at 100, the first time you did it, I believe we had 145,000 subscribers on YouTube. That's like a month ago. We have, yeah, that was like, yeah, maybe 45 days ago, something like that. And now we're at 180,000. And the people who watch the YouTube videos, they know this.

He goes, watching on YouTube is better than Spotify. So we started doing this, we were like, yeah, no shit,

I told you this, it is way better to watch the show on YouTube. And in fact, what I think we should do to really like juice the agreement, to even add more, you know, see appendix A of the gentleman's agreement, I think we should do a piece of content that is only good when you watch it. So here's my proposal to you, Sam. shirtless? Yeah, Sam is gonna be shirtless, and I'm going to screen share.

Yes.

But I think we should screen share us, but I think we should screen share us going through like a pitch deck and taking one from average to awesome or like good to great and just show how we would tweak the copy, how we would make it look better and we'll use a real one. And so I think we should do that and put that only on the YouTube channel because it would only make sense to see it.

No, I think that-

No, I think that on YouTube you should log in to chase.com and Show show your checking account. Okay, and it will react but we won't say the number that's genius

You know, this is why you complete me, bro

You know, this is why you complete me, bro

We're gonna go to chase.com or whatever Bank of America Whatever you use and you're gonna just we're gonna watch you log in and we're just gonna react and that's it

By the way, did you have yes, and is the corniest thing that the startup world tried to take from from like the cool like You know people who are actually funny world because actually it's a

no, but

You just did there no, but we should do this instead is a better people which is what you just did there And Improv people are are one step below a cappella people in terms of the nerds So like there's no way we're cool and it brought people you ever been around a dip and then proper since like being around someone Who does CrossFit, you know, like just stop talking about it. I can't stand in prop people. They're exhausting. It's like a It's crazy for people without muscle Dude, I'm on said it's like it's like a blind Jack Russell, you know, those are it's like that dog That's yapping everywhere and when it's blind you just can't stop it's going all over the place

That's why I feel about an improv person. It's crazy without muscle. Yeah, I think you're right. I did improv so I can confirm This is correct And you're correct that it's below a cappella

Which is below anything that's actually cool. I could tell is the worst of the worst I remember hanging out people from New England and they like were pranking about a cappella and it's like dude, shut up Why are you talking about that? You know what people would know and

And they're like ordering or they're like waiting for their food at the table and then one guy's like and then it's like

Harmonizing is like dude, you gotta stop like, you know

If I hear the Lion King song one more time, I'm gonna put a bullet my neck That's why I feel what I'm with these people

If I've ever trapped on a subway and like they do a flash mob around me start singing

Above my people are above the a cappella people. I'm gonna do something. I'm gonna start I'm gonna do something

I'm gonna start vomiting just to out outrageous. That's the pod

I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to I put my all in it like no days off on the road less travel never looking back