My First Million: Shaan Challenges Sam to Ignore His Limits, Michael Rubin is the Billy of the Week, and More

People people DM us a lot of interesting ideas my reply to all of them. They go, what do you think about this?

I always reply with two things. I always say it's an amazing idea

And then I say when are you launching?

All right, let's start the episode here

All right, what I've got actually two interesting things to tell you the first this company reached out

It's a famous publication that you know of and I don't want to say it out loud yet

But they want us to go to Baja, Mexico to ride motorcycles and film a series on like a weekend adventures

Are you interested in that?

What for like they yeah, what's what's the catch you want me to come out here and surf and ride motorcycles?

What's in it for you? They just had I

I guess I could talk about it. I haven't asked if I could talk about it

It's just like it's a that without giving too much weight

They have a just a web series that goes in like on TV it gets for web and TV

They have a TV channel and they have this whole series where they it's all about like nine to five workers like normal

Yuppie jobs and you have adventures Friday to Sunday. So like what all can you do on a weekend?

Okay, all right. That seems super

Up your alley and kind of a well alley too, but you know

That's that's their suggestion. Do you have a better idea on like a weekend adventure? It's an adventure publication

Yeah, I don't do motorcycles. That's my only thing. I don't do motorcycles and after Kobe

I also don't do helicopters, but I love surfing surfing is a cool thing. I suck at it

But it's fun. So I would do that

Well, if you come up with a better idea then then pitch it but they like it's all paid for and everything

Oh, okay, great. Yeah, let's do that. Why not? Ah, look at your fitness influencer life is already coming in handy

So you the what I wanted to talk about was you're getting really fit to do you and I think it's pretty inspiring

Are you enjoying this coming from an influencer like you the fitness world that means a lot to me?

Hardly, but do you so do you think it's do you have you has your body or I know your body has changed as your brain

Change, do you think and your attitude? Of course that changes first, right? Yeah, the attitude changes first the brain changes first

The body changes, you know slowly over time, but yeah for sure

But I like okay if people if I took off my shirt, you know, nobody's gonna be super impressed with me just yet

But I'm pretty impressed with me and that's kind of my own opinion. I hold in higher regard than anyone else's so

Yeah, I basically I went from like

kind of like I

Don't know. I was I would you be like he's fat would fat if it was a fat. I might have been fat. I

Didn't think about

I'll be like what the hell I look fat here that I'm like every photo. I look fat. Maybe I'm just fat

That's kind of what I reached the conclusion of at that time

You were getting overweight. I think that like I think that you know

There's like a like a like a definition of obese like, you know, it's a body fat percentage and I guess if we use obese and fat

Yeah, I would say you're overweight, but I don't think you're overweight now

Yeah, so and so now I've been training hard for like a year

I started off doing two days a week three days a week and I just cranked it up to five days a week now with the trainer

It was always supposed to be five days a week, but the days I was supposed to be doing on my own

I was you know, really half-assing it or no assing it

So so I would say on average I was doing like three or four days a week before and now I'm doing five or six days a week

Pretty intense and I gotta say

I don't know why you're bringing it up. So I don't know where you're going with this

But it's amazing and I could talk about it all day because it's like the best thing I've done all year

So, you know, if you're if you're if you're listening to this and you whatever investment you're making right now under health

I guarantee you that if you upped that investment you would only thank yourself and that's kind of where I'm coming from here

Is like, yeah, I'm I'm super happy with making this shift and it's totally great

I have this the reason I was bringing this up is I had this friend who is incredibly wealthy

like I would have to imagine like 30 million dollars wealthy and

He he was like, I want to get in shape

What routine are you using and I'm like, that's a bad question who cares about the routine if I was you

I would just hire a coach

It'll be like $400 a month and he was like, wow, that's expensive and I'm like dude

You've got one body in one life

Like I for me my fear is when I see someone who's my age or 40 50 60 and their body hurts

So they can't walk and they can they like struggle to sit down on the floor or something like that

I'm like, that's hell, right? Like you're just you're in this you're in this shitty home

That's falling apart and you can't get out and I was like what you know, you just bought this fancy house

Why not also buy a fancy body and that's a like look good naked

But all but like feel good and so I was just thinking about it and I and I think we talk about investing and I'm like

I think that's that's got to be the best investment for sure

We have a we have a mutual friend. I can't say the name on here because what they said is funny

But I'll share what they said. So they're wealthy. They're probably like I think they have like, you know a hundred million dollars, you know in the bank and

And they said this thing they were they're like always doing kind of like fitness see stuff

They're not like it wouldn't look at them and say, oh, yeah, this person's clearly like, you know ripped out of their mind

Or they're not just like super jagged. It's not that but they live a very healthy lifestyle and whatever wherever they go

Like in their day their workout is like a key part of their day and they don't sacrifice it

They don't get they don't get too busy for it. And so I asked them about that and I said, you know

Man, it seems like you're really taking this seriously. He goes

Yeah, you know the way I look at it is if you're rich you have no excuse to be fat

Go what he goes look if you don't have the money and you're all your you're just you're trying to support your family

You got to work two jobs. You got to shop at certain stores, you know McDonald's, you know, you got to eat what you can afford sometimes

Okay, fine

Like still that you're not great and you know, I want you to not be in that situation

But like I definitely understand he goes if you're rich and you're fat, that's on you, bro

And and that's how I feel now is like when he said it I was like, you know, that's actually so true

Which is if you had all the resources, but you didn't make the investment that matters

That's sort of silly, right? And so that kind of trick that kind of was one little seed

They got playing in my head. I'll tell you something else. That's been funny. My trainer recently

So you're at you're absolutely right on what you said, which is it's not the workout routine

It's not the it's not what you do. It's not the workout program, right? It's not like somebody has some secret formula

For most people it really doesn't matter like for most people even if you just walked 15,000 steps a day and you ate only maybe

2300 calories, you're gonna like look pretty good

If you're not working out five days a week, that's your problem. It has nothing to do with the routine

It doesn't matter what you did in the routine like just start with doing any workout and then make it better over time

And like yeah, when you're when you're Sam status, then the actual routine does matter because

You know, you're you're already at the kind of 99th percentile

You're just trying to optimize at the end and try to get certain details to pop

So yeah, then your routine matters, but for most people it doesn't matter

But I'll tell you something my trainer told me that was counterintuitive. He goes

We were talking about like my body has really changed my arms have changed my chest has changed

But my stomach still looks like the stomach of a guy who's not super in shape like I'm not I don't have like a six-pack

That's not even kitchen bro. It's a so that's what I said

I was telling him I was like, oh, yeah, but that's all diet, right?

And he goes he goes, you know, everybody says that he goes

They say you can't I'll train your diet all the stuff. He goes and I get what they mean

He goes, but I'll tell you what

Intensity over diet all day. I go what he goes intensity over diet watch

He goes don't even touch your diet right now. Don't worry about your diet

Don't be feel guilty when you eat something. Don't like count every calorie. Don't go weigh out your chicken breast

Like don't do any of that shit

All I want you to do is commit to cranking up the intensity when we're here in this this part of the gym

So he's like if you're like let's say zero to ten

What's the intensity of your workout today like on average? I say, oh, you know, it's like a eight

He's like great. All we're gonna do is we're gonna take that to a nine

We're just gonna make every workout at least a nine on the intensity level and some days

We're gonna be hitting nine and a half and some days we're gonna even hit a ten

But right now I just want you to focus on a nine and he goes watch what happens and he's been so right

Which is that it was really hard to just change my diet

But it was that much easier to just crank up the intensity in working out and it's not that the intensity will all of a sudden

Shed my fat. It's that when I put the intensity in here diet becomes a much easier decision

because I really like laid it all out during the workout part and so the desire to like throw it all away for you know

This like pleasure these chips or this whatever like it's just not there and now and at first

I thought he's full of shit. I did not believe him, but now that now that I'm actually trying it

I just said hey, let me let me follow what you say. You're my coach. I

Understand what he's saying and this is now applied to many other things in my life. So now even in business

We were I was talking to Ben about one of our business plans

And it's like, oh, should we do this or this or this it was all about the plan the how the route, you know

What is the strategy and I basically said fuck the strategy. Let's just take our intensity up

You say what I said, whatever strategy we're doing. Let's just agree that like right now

We're probably executing any of our strategies at a seven or eight

Let's just execute any of these bullshit strategies out of nine and a half

Let's just see what happens and this is just working in all areas of my life now because now when you put a nine

Nine or nine and a half intensity you kind of like want to figure out the right plan, right?

It's like if I'm going to put in this intensity, it better be on the right thing and your brain will solve the

Which path should I choose problem in a different way because of the intensity? I don't know if that makes sense

But it's a little no it does my back

All right quick break to tell you about another podcast that we're interested in right now

Hope spot just launched a shark tank rewatch podcast called another bite every week

The host relived the latest and greatest pitches from shark tank from squatty potty to the mansion a bench to ring doorbell

And they break down why these pitches were winners or losers and each company's go to market strategy branding pricing valuation

Everything basically all the things you want to know about how to survive the tank and scale your company on your own

If you want to give it a listen, you can find another bite on whatever podcast app you listen to like Apple or Spotify

Or whatever you're using right now. All right back to the show

This weekend I went to f1 formula one racing in Austin

It was like the hot thing to do and I went with this guy. Have you heard of?

What's it called jungle scout, you know jungle scout? Yeah, yeah, we've talked about it

It's the tool that basically if you go on Amazon and you want to see what products are selling

How much how much of this Instapot gets sold every week jungle scouts this little extension you can click on it

It'll tell you what how much sales the products on Amazon have it's kind of expensive, but it's a cool product

So it's a big business like you know, if you just Google it like I you'd have to if you could put the pieces together

That they're not far from a hundred million in recurring revenue

Big business. Yeah, and started as a Google Chrome plugin, which is interesting this guy Greg

I he's Neville's good buddy. My buddy's Neville. So that's why I got brought into this thing

I went with him and he's very nice very kind easy to talk to but

Incredibly intense and here's just a tiny example of what I see this and I'm like I like I always see like whatever I'm around

Certain people I always notice this when intense people do things like this. So for example the race that just ended

Some people I don't know how they got onto it, but they got onto the track

I guess they just went on it took photos and he's like, let's go and he just starts walking over and I'm like

Well, there's no like gate and like every and imagine like huge stands and then you walk down the stands and there's like a fence

That's quite tall and he goes. He's like, well, let's go. I'm like, there's no there's no gate and he goes

No, no, no, we're just gonna jump the fence. Everyone was staring at us

He just walks up without hesitation puts his hands up there climbs up on this fence and just hops

He goes, come on, let's go and I wouldn't I'm I'm I don't like confrontation that much

I don't like doing a lot of things that like people stare at me and I was like, what you just did it

Like you didn't even think twice and I've been with people who are like really successful entrepreneurs

And they'll be like a line and of course this is like jackass

This is like a jackass move and they're like, no, no, no, we're not waiting in line

We're just gonna we're gonna walk in and we're just gonna we're gonna do this and

That's like an example of that intensity. Have you ever noticed like you probably have friends that do like dude

You're like this. You're an intense dude

I've noticed this from you and the line example is perfect when we were going to do our live show remember in Miami and

The airport was just packed. I don't know why I was like six in the morning. The airport was so packed

We got there early and we were still gonna miss our flight like the security line was like two miles long and we waited

We waited we waited and then you were like you just like some switch flipped inside you that was just like

Okay, we have all the reasons to like do do like just to miss this flight. Basically. It's like, all right

We got here early. Look, it's just a long line. There's nothing we could do

You know the airport is packed to cove it just it's all that circumstance and then I literally we didn't even you didn't even say anything

You were just like, okay, I'm gonna go and then you just left the line

So you gave up your spot, which was like a risk because we had waited for like an hour and a half

Yeah, we snuck into the the pre you go to TSA pre check

You're not TSA pre check and you just hand the guy your ticket and he's like bro

There's no pre-check on this and you were like, oh, yeah, my my wife pre-check

It was she we it didn't print or you're like, you're like, I'm pretty check

He's like looking at he's like, there's no pre-check. You're like, I'm pre-check. It just didn't print right and

Then he's like your will just dominated his and then you just got through the line

If I go and say the exact same thing that may work and so I I was like I need to crank my intensity up

So I went and I bought clear at that moment

I just I went and spent 200 bucks buying clear and then I like clear

Well, they'll escort you to the front of the line and like take you through TSA

And then it was like you called me and you're like dude

You got a sprint because you were at the gate. You're like you got a sprint

So I didn't have my shoes on because the security line or whatever so I'm holding my shoes

Didn't have time to put it back on I'm in my socks and I sprinted to the gate like I've never spent it before and I hate running

So I hate I hate ran my way all the way there, but it was your contagious intensity another example

We wanted to build our podcast studio and I was like we had kind of been talking about it

And it got to that dangerous point that happens where you have an idea a thing you want to do and then you've talked about it

But you're not closing you're just somewhere in the middle and this is where dreams go to die

And I think most people it would just sort of like it would either fade and you just don't do it

Or you kind of half-ass it and I remember like in a 24-hour period you just blew up my phone

You were like DMing me like pictures of every other podcaster

You're like how about this this this just tell me of these three which one do you want?

I like number two number two and I'm like, yeah sure number two you're like great number two

Okay, I found the chair on Amazon actually let's drive to these three places and like let's go pick it up today

What time are you free? Are you free in 10 minutes? I'll be at your house and you came you picked me up

We drove to Ikea that we drove to another furniture spot that we drove to this bootleg spot in Oakland

And then while we're at the bootleg spot in Oakland

it was like not really happening and then

We went to another spot and then literally the sales lady recognized your intensity. She came up to us

It was a big furniture store. She comes up. She goes and you guys look like you're you guys look like you're ready to buy

I don't know what she said

She said something like you guys look like you know what you want and you were like

Yes, I'm looking for this red chair because I have a show and I wanted to pop in the thumbnail

And it's got to look like this and she like ran into the back and tried to find this one

And then you like got the whole thing done and somebody meanwhile somebody was painting the whole wall

You're like we need to paint the wall

so you like hired some guy to go paint the wall over the weekend and by Monday it was a Friday by Monday the studio was done and

I share this because

That's a level of intensity that you die. I know you have that I've observed in all of my successful friends

They have this at this trait or not all I shouldn't say some people are doing style

but very common that people who are success have this level of intensity when they do something massive action and

It is contagious. It's contagious to the people around you and like the lady in the store

There's a there's this principle that's kind of like this. So I'm reading this book

Sorry to go on a tangent here, but I'm reading this book. You every everybody's heard of it

You've heard of it think and grow rich by Napoleon Hill. Have you read that? Have you actually read the book?

Years ago, but it's one of those books that you should reread every five years probably I should probably

I've had the book for like ten years

I never even opened it because I was kind of like I think I get the idea

And so I actually started reading it two nights ago and he tells a story of this guy who

Wanted to work with Thomas Edison. He's like this guy had a clear idea

He's like I want to work with Thomas Edison. He goes to notice two things. He said

He knew exactly what he wanted not just like I want a job in the lab

It's like no, I want to work with Thomas Edison. This guy is an amazing inventor

Because the second thing is I don't want to work for him

I want to work with him as a business partner

And so he's like, you know problem is I have no qualifications and I'm literally not even the same city

I've never met the guy. I have no access to him. I don't know anyone who knows him

But he didn't let any of those limitations. Those limitations were sort of irrelevant to the guy

So sure enough, he buys a train ticket. He goes to where Thomas Edison is. He barges through the door and he says

You know, mr. Edison, uh, I'm here to work with you. Like I think you're great

And I think, uh, you know, we'll do great work together. I'm here to work with you

And Edison's like what the fuck like, you know, we're not even hiring but uh, like and he said something Edison has a quote in the book

Which is like

Even though this man had no qualifications and I had never seen this person. He's a complete stranger

There was something about the intensity of his presence that told me this person has their mind set on something and they're gonna make it happen

And that sort of reminded me of this like common thing that I've I've seen in a lot of people and in myself in situations, which is

Once you get to that level of absolute certainty

And you carry yourself people will literally just start to respond to you differently because they just see

This person is like on a mission

They are a man on a mission and like I mean, I either need to get out of the way or I need to get behind them and help them

Do this. Um, and that has like served me. I have one crazy story that served me well

But is that ever happened to you or have you ever seen that in yourself for others?

Yeah, I call it being an animal and like Paul Graham. I oh, he's the one who he goes

Basically, he's like a lot of people talk about who you should hire in your early stage startups

He goes basically the one word you want to use to describe them is are they an animal?

And do they just get shit done and I remember like

I remember talking to my friend Jake who went and worked at this company called teespring which grew very very quickly

And I was like, what's it like to work for Walker the guy who runs it and he goes

He's an animal like for example

We wanted to do this partnership and we had been working for weeks and weeks

I'm getting in touch with these folks and he just googled like their customer service number and then just right there in the meeting

He goes guys watch this and he just calls them and goes. Hey, can I talk to this one person?

Hey, this is Walker. I want to make this happen. What do we got to do? And he like

Like and that's a that's a very easy example

Dude, I have almost the same story when I was in college. I had

I've talked a little bit about this before but my very first business idea was was to create the chipotle for sushi

So the same kind of fast casual model, but for sushi

He done it for sandwiches for burritos for chinese food, but nobody had ever done it for sushi

So that was the idea problem was I know nothing about sushi. I know nothing about the food industry

I had in fact only tried sushi for the first time like a week before that and that's why I even had this idea

I was like, oh sushi's fucking amazing. How do I do more sushi in my life?

and um

And so one day I skipped class and me and my buddy trevor

We were sitting around at our apartment and I was like, you know

And trevor loves to watch food shows like chopped iron chef. He just loved watching this food shit

I never understood it because again, I'm not a foodie. I was like, why do you want to watch other people eat food?

That seems like crazy to me

But you know, I got hooked because the shows are great, obviously and we're watching a throwdown with bobby flay

And there's this sushi chef that comes on and he's like he know obviously he knows his shit about sushi

Otherwise, he wouldn't be on the food network. He says his qualifications were like, you know, I'm in LA

I got my restaurant

But I also run the largest sushi academy for training chefs

So we were like, oh this guy runs the largest chef training thing for sushi chefs

And he had like this swag to him but and we had interviewed three chefs locally

And they were all like, you know, think about like a traditional Japanese sushi chef like zero kind of outward personality

Very traditional conservative and they just looked at us like you are like kind of like besmirching the name of sushi

Sushi like how dare you even suggest this fast sushi. No, no, thank you

And so we I saw this guy and he had he had a big personality, which is why he was on tv

And I said, we need a guy like this. I go and he's like and trevor's like, yeah, where are we going to find him?

I go, he's right in front of us. We need this guy and he's like, okay

And so he's quiet for a second and trevor just googles his number. He's like turns his laptop and he goes

here's his number

And that's like, you know, challenge accepted like if your friend shows you that it's like or you know, it's like

Hey, that girl over there. You got to go now. Now you got to go approach that girl

So I pick up the phone and I call and I don't know why I said this. I didn't I didn't have this planned

But it's exactly what you just said the guy walker said

I

He picks somebody picks up the phone and I'm so used to getting the run around that I didn't expect it to be him

So I go

I need to talk to philip yee. How do I make that happen?

And then he he goes

So I didn't say may I please speak to the which by the way, that's the right way to ask which is how do I make this happen?

It just because there's always an answer came out and it came out because I had already worked myself into a state of

Intensity and I was kind of nervous and so like I was just in this heightened state. And so that's just what came out

And he goes is philip talk to me and I hadn't planned what the fuck I would say after that and I was like, oh

I said philip

You've never met me, but I'd like to start a business with you and I know that sounds crazy, but if you give me 10 minutes

To hear me out hear out my plans. I think you'll find it really interesting

It might be something that will will extend what you're doing in LA. It seems like you have a great thing going

I think this will really take that and and really blow it up

And he goes he goes. What's the plan?

How old am I at this time?

Yeah, I was a senior in college so 20 21

Wow

And he goes, what's the plan and now I didn't have a plan so I go I go, you know what it's going to be easier for me

To email this to you. What's your email address and I bought myself two days to like create a plan and send it to him

And later on, you know, so he a bunch of stuff happens. He flies out to meet us

Uh, we're going to school in North Carolina. He flies to our college dorm basically and meets us

We fly to his I live on his couch in LA. He's he like vets us but he basically puts us through the grinder to see

Are we the type of you want to work with?

Which I don't know how the story's gonna end but at that point to me, that's a success

Already, it's a success already. We turn this joke of an idea

Into like well, it might be a funny idea to you when I say I'm starting a sushi restaurant, but uh,

You know this food network chef's on board or he's like kind of on board. He's talking to me at least

He's flying out here next week. So we're gotta prepare for that. I'm not going to class right now

I gotta prepare for my chef and so

Later months later when we we finally struck a deal with him. We closed this deal

And he's like, dude, you don't know how many people is it because celebrities eat at my restaurant

He's like, you don't know how many rich celebrities come to me. They say, oh, this restaurant's so small

You don't even have a liquor license

You need you need to expand I'll put up the money you need to expand

He goes and I never did business with any of them and here I am with three dipshits in college

And I decided to go into business with you and everyone thinks I'm crazy

But you know why I go why he goes you remember what you first said to me and I was like no and he goes he goes

You called and you said I need to talk to Philippi. How do I make that happen?

He goes that he's like there was something in the way you said it that just told me

This guy's gonna do something

This guy's gonna make something happen and he goes he goes if you literally had not said that phrase

I don't think I would have even ever heard you out because this is just another one of these people who say

I want to start a restaurant with you. I'd like to partner with you blah blah blah

And I was like wow I didn't realize these things make that big of a difference and I don't think it's the words

I think it's the intensity that will bring you to do the right thing and say the right thing at the right time

That's great. I like that. How did it end?

We partner with him. We go live on his couch. We train in his restaurant in LA

and

So, you know first first day I go there

He shows me the process for making sushi. So I don't know if have you ever seen how a sushi chef rolls a roll of sushi

just like the

Yeah, I guess so like they use that like a piece of wood

Yeah, a little bamboo. There's a bamboo roller basically but before you do any of that, right?

So the seaweed lays down and you got to put the rice on it. Now the rice is sticky rice

Uh, if you've ever had asian food pain, yeah sticky rice. So how do you use your hands?

How do you grab the sticky rice? How do you say this little problem?

I didn't even realize there's a problem, right? I'm said they're watching him for an hour

First he says just shadow me sit here and watch me. I said, okay. I'm watching him and he's just making sushi

And I'm kind of getting it but I don't even know what I'm looking for right like any amateur

When you look at something you don't even know what you're looking for

You don't know what the details are that matter until you try something and this is why he was a genius teacher

One hour in he goes the next customer walked in and I'll tell you who it was in a second

He goes he goes all right, Sean you're up

And he moves out of the way and I get to go stand in that spot

Wearing my stupid chef coat and I don't know anything about anything. I've just been watching this guy

I thought it would be a long time because traditionally in sushi if you've ever watched like

What's that zero dreams of zero? Yeah, it's like a five decades

The tradition is like you spend five years just mopping the floor

Then you get to touch the veggies

Then you get to touch the fish and the last thing you ever touch is the rice because actually sushi means

Vinegar rice it's sushi is really about the rice not about the fish

so um

So I didn't expect to be doing it and so one hour and he throws me the fire

And not only does he throw me in the fire? He throws me the fire with this guy who sits down and I look up

And it's Daryl from the office if you ever watch the office is Daryl

And Daryl's a regular there. So he kind of knew like wait wait wait Daryl Daryl from the office is he's the warehouse guy

He's the black warehouse guy. Oh black dude. Uh, Ben Robinson. I think his name is

Uh, I don't know that's his name. Maybe that's his name. It's just something like that, but Daryl

I know Daryl, of course. So so it's Daryl. So I'm like, oh, fuck. I gotta make sushi and I make it for Daryl

And sushi it's like the guy's staring at you. You're two feet away from each other. Like there's no hiding in the back

Of the kitchen to make it. I'm making it in this guy's face

And uh, and so he Daryl Philbin. Sorry, Daryl Philbin

And so I so I first I just freeze. I'm just standing there. I'm looking down at the fucking bamboo

I have seaweed bamboo and rice

And I'm like, okay, how did he do this and then I'm freezing and then he walks away and I'm like, shit

Okay, I gotta figure this out before he comes back. He comes back up to me

He hands me a shot of uh of sake and he goes drink the fucking shot and roll the fucking roll Sean and I

So I take a shot and then I'm like, okay

I grab the rice because I'm like, I gotta spread the rice on the on the seaweed

I grab the rice and immediately I know I've done something wrong because the rice is so fucking sticky in my hand

That as I try to rub it on to the seaweed to place it on the seaweed

It's like not gonna leave my hand. I just rip the seaweed and my hand is like a rice glove

And he goes he's laughing and he said he goes, you know every time before I roll the roll

I dip my hand in this water and I clap he goes that clap is not for show

That clap is you wet your hand and you clap and that removes all the moisture that like kind of like splashes the moisture off your hand

So you just just enough so that when you touch the rice is not going to stick to your hand

And so I was like, oh shit and then he kind of showed me how to do the first one or whatever

And so that was kind of like my first experience was feeding him and like that same day

If you've ever watched lost the guy hugo from lost

Uh came in and he ordered food or whatever. It's crazy. Anyway, so that's that's part of how that story ended

Have you heard of um, I want to talk about intensity and and billy of the week because I came across this guy

That is incredibly fascinating and one of the most intense people I've ever read about. Have you ever heard of michael rubin?

michael rubin is that the fanatics guy?

Yes, so he's interesting because he's a young guy. He's probably not yet 50

But if he is 50, he's early 50s and his name is michael rubin. He's been a baller for years and years and years

And so this guy is incredibly fascinating, but not a lot of people know who he is

I think he's worth like 10 billion dollars. Like, you know, he's worth a ton of money

You know, like jack Dorsey money and yet he's like pretty under talked about and so this guy listened to his story

So I was reading reading about him. So basically he's in the news now, but I'm going to explain his background

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So at the age of 12, he started a ski tuning bit shop in his in his parents' basement

And then two years later at 14, he got uh, $2,500 in bar mitzvah gifts and he leased a

An office or a shop near his parents' house and by age 16

He was already in $120,000 in debt and had to settle with creditors and his dad had a

Pay him a give him bail him out for $37,000 and he was basically said like I'll bail you out

But you have to go to college and you got to stop this nonsense

So he goes to college

But then after a couple of semester he drops out and he already has five new ski shops

And it kind of kicks ass and he eventually sells it and then at the age of 21

He starts his business called kpr sports is an equipment an equipment closeout company by age 21

It has a million dollars in sales two years later age 23 50 million dollars in sales at the age of 20

at 23

1995 he purchased it purchased 40 percent of the

Women's shoe company rica. Have you heard of rica? No, it was around in like the the 90s and early 2000s

And then eventually he started this company called gsi commerce

He kind of pivoted into this thing where it was called gsa

Gsi commerce and they would buy brands and they would kind of be the logistics and back end that make these brands amazing

And he sold that at age like 28 for 2.4 billion dollars netting him 150 million dollars personally

Then a few years later he bought the business back and he formed three different companies

The first was shoprunner. Have you heard of shoprunner? No

Shoprunner basically was kind of like amazon prime, but for all non amazon stores

So you could spend a hundred dollars and get free shipping on loads of different stores

He started rula la which you probably wouldn't have heard of but i bet your wife has

And then he has and then he started fanatics

He sold shoprunner recently for 228 million dollars fanatics ends up becoming this massive business

And so basically if you buy like a rams jersey

It's made by fanatics and they basically work with the nfl and they get they're like the official merchandiser basically of like all major sports

But here's where shit gets really really wild. So fanatics turns it now at this point

I believe it's three different large businesses

So there's the main fanatics business, which is they basically have licenses with an nfl mba mlb

They make shirts and stuff like that and and just normal merchandise

I think I believe if it's not publicly traded

It's nearly publicly traded and worth 18 billion dollars

The second thing that he did was he spun out this trading card division. Have you seen that? They're just no news because this

What is it? What is it called?

He raised it's called fanatics trading cards

And so basically he raised 350 million dollars at a 10.4 billion billion dollar valuation

And so basically there's companies like tops. Everyone knows tops. They make cards

I think they also make a bunch of other stuff like gum and random things

But tops plus the other three big dogs in the space. I forget what they are

But I'm if you're listening in in a baseball card, you totally know

huge

So collectively those make like two billion dollars a year in evita like so it's a fairly big business

So you're like 10 billion dollar trading card company. It is pretty frothy, but like it could you know

It can be a billion dollar a year in profit business totally

And so he raised money for that and then he has the second thing called candy digital

Which is making NFTs for sports and they just raised 100 million dollars at 1.5 billion dollar valuation

And so he spun all of these off and now he's also the owner of the 76ers and the new jersey devils

So the sports team pretty freaking wild and if you follow him on instagram, which I just started following him

He's homies with meek mill

Uh, and he like helped get him out of prison and he's uh, spent a lot of his time Michael Rubin spends a lot of his time with prison reform

Incredibly incredibly prolific very very very confident very fast moving very intense

Incredibly interesting guy seems like a good guy. Um

And the door is open for for him to come on the pod this guy this guy's cool

I've seen a lot of his interviews and uh, and I like him a lot and I think what he did with fanatics is like

I always view doing things in sports. It's like if you want to do sports and music

It's like actually so hard to win because it's like, oh, yeah, I'm passionate about sports great

You and you know two one two billion other people

And so it's really really hard to do what I'll call obvious ideas in sports like

Yeah, selling the merch selling jerseys selling shirts

So for him to build such a large business in what would be such a competitive

Space is really impressive to me

It's very impressive and what I when I was watching interviews with them

So gary v is a partner on this um on a couple of his things like I don't know if he's an investor or if he gets a

Small stake. I don't know what how the how the thing is but he's he's mentioned in a lot of the articles

That's like either a co-founder or a founding team member something like that

And basically I've hung out with gary maybe only three or four times including the time we had him on the podcast

I've hung out with him in person and he has the same energy that I've noticed michael rubin has where

There's basically like this thing that I have and I think every human being even these guys

They just don't have a lot of it where it's like a self-limiting belief where it's like well, you know

I can't do this because of this this and this and I've noticed with gary. He's talked like one time he told me

He's like I want to my next thing

He's like I'm going to create all these restaurants and they're actually going to be completely free

And the way they're going to make money is mx or whoever's going to sponsor it

Um like he was just brainstorming. He's like, but I'm going to do that and in my head. I'm like, well, that's really dumb

I mean a free restaurant. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of

um

But I feel like nine out of ten things he does. I would say that's a really dumb idea and they work

You know, he said he's going to come out with these. What's his nft thing? It's uh v friends

v friends

Like if he told me I'm like gary, this is really dumb or uh, you know, like this is not going to work and it's been incredibly lucrative

And very successful and they don't have this limiting belief where it's like this won't work for this reason or this reason

It was just like well, why not like it it logically it makes sense. I think this can work

Anyway, this is very timely. So let me tell you why

By the way, I've noticed a lot of these coincidences happening in my life where

I'm thinking about something or I'm doing something and then somebody who's like

Uh like minded they're almost experiencing the same thing just in a different way. We trade these stories. So

Same exact thing. All right. So I told you I'm reading think and grow rich

There's a section in there that I uh remember. You know, it's just like stuck in my head and he goes

He goes to be successful. One needs to be success conscious and I was like, I don't even know what that means

I don't think most people know what that means, but the interesting part is the second line

It's what he says after that. He goes he goes and people who fail all fail for the same reason

They take their current limitations as real limitations

Right there. They take the perceived limitations that are that they're perceived they're feeling now

And they treat them as real and what you're saying is exactly that which is that everybody

You know, oh, I need to do this, but I don't have the time, but I don't have the money

But I don't have the experience

But this person said they were get back to me and they haven't got back to me yet

Uh, but this but you know, the port is closed right now. And so the shipment's gonna be delayed

It's like there's always these limitations that

Feel very real in the moment and then what what successful people do really really well is they sort of just ignore all those limitations

They ignore all the limitations about themselves and even the thing when somebody says no to them

They're like, okay, cool. But like what does your boss think about that? How about I talk to them?

Let me see what they have to say. How about I go to your competitor

Let me see what they have to say. How about I ask you again?

But this time I'm gonna ask more playfully and later on at night out over a glass of wine

Now you're gonna have a different answer and like they don't take no for an answer on any front

You know on their own limitations from there

They don't take no from themselves and they also don't take no from the world and

So I noticed that and so I yesterday we were finishing up our workout

And uh, and we have a kind of like, you know, like

We train the body but we train the mind at the same at the same time

And so we were talking about this. I said, man, I read this great thing

And I know I could share it with him because he's he's the type to that like to eat the stuff up

And he goes, oh, that's great

And I go, but you know what? I don't want to just sit here and say that's great

Because what what really means when I say this and we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that that's true

Is we kind of do this thing where we're like, yeah, that's true

Uh, other people fucked that up, but you know, not me. Um, there's like this inherent like, yeah

Other people really need to get this but they don't get it. I get it

So I said, no, no, no, screw that. Just like we just did reps in the gym on our, you know, shoulders and and lats and whatever else

I said, let's get a rep right here. I say, what's a let's get a rep right now

What's something that you want that you just have some random limitation that you it's not even like you haven't been able to overcome it

Honestly, you're just not even aware of it. You're not even like saying it out loud

Once you say it out loud, you probably find a solution to it

But you don't really do it. I said, I'll go first

I said, man, I ever since I went worked out at sam's gym. I want my garage gym to feel like that

I already had the weights. I'm already doing the workout, but it doesn't feel the same

His gym feels amazing to be in. He's got the floor finished properly. He's got this

He's got the fan on the wall. He's got the music system. It just feels great

I want my gym to feel like that and I said, I want that and then what's my limitation?

I hired this one contractor. He's been really slow getting back to me with a quote

It's like, well, I could think of 10 ways to solve that problem right now

But like I just kind of hadn't put my awareness on what was

What was a random limitation that was standing in the way of me and something I wanted?

And I told my trainer, so you got to do one now. What's what's something you want that you have a limitation?

I said, let's get a rep and this is a very powerful way of thinking which is when you get advice

Don't just be like, yeah advice. Let me write that quote down. Let me tweet that quote out. It's like, no, no, no

Apply it in the moment get a get a rep doing the thing

And so, uh, so let me ask you let's do it live

What's the thing you want in your life and then what's the thing you want that you're not kind of like

It's not being realized fully right now. It could be anything could be something relationship work wise money wise fitness wise whatever

Something small something in your house. Whatever. Um, what's the thing you want?

and then try to shine that light on

What's the limiting? What's something you've just let limit you for no reason that gary v wouldn't that michael rubin wouldn't

Um, okay. This sounds silly

It should sound silly. It's perfect. It's usually the silly things. I've had a fear of camping for a long time

And I want to spend more time in the wilderness because I like the idea of it

But like I'm kind of afraid of like being out at nighttime in the woods by myself or with like a small group

Okay, great. So you you want to camp and then you're afraid and then so if you shine the light

What's the what's the limited? What's the thought that goes in your head?

Is it I don't have x or I'm afraid of y. What is it? I've just not I've just I've not bought

Like a camping equipment. I've not looked at where to go

I've not told the buddy or two that I want to go do it and that and I've not take I've just not planned anything

Make it more personal. Why haven't you planned anything?

Uh, what's old fear fear of what fear of being out at night in the wilderness by myself

And that's the perfect stopping point because whenever you say the fear out loud, it sounds really fucking stupid

It's like I'm afraid of being outside at night by myself. Like first of all, I'm not scared. I'm not gonna be by myself

I'm gonna be with somebody because more fun with friends. Secondly, like

Whatever, it's not that scary. I could do it

Uh, right. So like that's the best part of like when you finally find the thing and you say it out loud

It just sort of dissolves because it's like well, that sounds silly like yeah

It doesn't have it's it doesn't have as much power once I say it out loud once I shine the light on it

It's like scurries away

Well, you got to get your gym set up and it's not that hard. I sent you the link

I know yeah, I have everything the the limiting thing was I don't know how to do home improvement projects

Like I'm not handy dude. Do you know how to cut like a slice of bread? That's all you have to do when you lay down floor

You're just gonna be able to even easier than that. I was like I could pay this guy to do it. Okay. That'll solve my problem

Oh, the guy's not responding. Okay

And I just let it fizzle there. It's like what no, I want this look

Why I want this? Why would I why would I just let this wait?

And we we all agree that that one common denominator in most of the things you want is you've come up with an excuse to wait

I'm like, I'll give you another example. I hope he doesn't mind me saying this

But I had this guy who kind of was like an apprentice for me for a few months

And I basically was like he was like, hey, I want to learn about content and stuff like that

I said, cool. You come help me research and write stuff and I'll teach you some things

and after a few months, uh, he went on his way and I was like

Cool go out there in the world and since then

I think I could say his name. So it's this guy. It's this guy. Chris. I don't even know how to say his last name

Chris has a look. I don't know. It's crazy. Last name redhead guy who works at Goldman redhead guy exactly

So he was a college student at the time. So when I was talking to be a student at Yale and uh

Nice guy. I've talked to him super nice guy after I did the apprenticeship

He grew his twitter following from I think like 2000 followers. He just hit 100,000 followers yesterday or two days ago

He texted me. He's like, dude, I hit 100,000 like thank you. You know, I learned a bunch of stuff

You showed me kind of like what good writing looks like and I was like, dude, that's honestly

It's fucking amazing. Like you're a college kid and you did that like that's that's super impressive

Um, and he's like, you know, but I'm thinking about like where do I go from here?

I said, well, it's real simple like

What do you want? Like I'm not I'm not going to tell you what to do next like what do you want to do next and then go

Do that thing. It's really that simple

And he's like, oh, you know, I want to start a company

And I said, okay, cool. So did you take that banking job that I was telling you not to take? He's like, yeah

You know, I've been here for a little bit. I don't think that might that might be the long thing long-term thing for me

I think I want to start a company someday

I said, oh, you're waiting. He's okay. I've just you know, like I said, okay

Why don't you just quit your job and go do that?

He's like, well, you know, and he gave me another reason for waiting

I said, okay, so why don't you just go do it and he goes

Well, I you know, if I did do it, I'd want to do it with my friend. He's really really smart

Super smart guy, but he has to wait a year because he's graduating. He's not graduated yet

So, you know, I thought I'd just wait, you know a year

I said wait a year, huh 10% of your 20s. You're just gonna give away

Wow

What's precious asset just pissing it away, huh?

Uh, just waiting, huh wait

Wow, I was just like and he's like, yeah, you know, and then also, you know, I want to

I'm making good money right now. I want to save up so I have enough runway, you know money

Money's always like, you know, it it does matter at the end of the day

I said, how about this?

How about instead of telling me a bunch of reasons why you're not going to do the thing you want to do

You just start telling me some reasons you are going to do the thing you're going to you want to do

Try that it works much better. Trust me

And I was like kind of a dick about it

But it's really that fucking simple and I notice and it's not just him. I know this because I do this

I'm guilty of waiting for bullshit or coming up with reasons to wait

And so whoever's listening to this that needs to hear this

Don't wait

My trainer says wait is a wait wait is a wait on your back and stop waiting

So, uh, I had a friend who and and we can move on after this

But I don't know if people I think people will like this, but I had a friend who on

I do this all the time. So if I have friends or people who I care about

In on April 5th

I'm at the point where I've saved enough money to move forward with the prototyping process

I feel like I found the right engineer to partner with it's a decent amount of money

But I think I could do it. I want to know what your thoughts are on how to launch this

I text it back. I go, uh, if I was you, I would do this this and this right this morning

I I texted him. This was April 5th. I texted him today. How'd the idea turn out?

He said too expensive for me to commit my life savings the cost and manufacturing and marketing of a physical product

Way big and much bigger compared to starting a software or internet company

Oh, wow. So you started a software company lol. No, I love it

I was about to say I'm figuring out what to do and what I'm going to stop being a worker be and then I'll probably um

I can't say I'll probably quit after blank IPOs don't even know what city I'll be in next year and

It's never gonna happen. It will never happen. Oh, no, it will never let's imagine lovingly for this guy

It is gonna happen. It's gonna happen once he stops thinking that way right once he stops being that way

Once he changes that'll change and so I don't know. I don't know what it is, but basically there's a

There's a funny thing with that and you know, I I always wonder like

Do you be a dick or do you kind of like empathize if you care you be a dick?

And why is that?

If you care, well like look, it's like look

Do you want this or not and and oftentimes I say to people I'm like, do you really want this?

I don't know if you actually want this and I think that you just think it's cool to want this and I don't think it's cool

To want this you want to either do or you don't right you want to talk about if you just want to talk about it

Just tell me you just want to brainstorm right or you just want to shoot the shit

But if you're telling me that you want this then I'll I'll hold you accountable actually I'll I'll say why haven't you done this?

Right. Um, I think he goes he goes, you know, I treat people the way they told me they want to be

So you want to be fit right?

So then if you're gonna complain about doing this sets well the guy who's fit does this

So I'm gonna treat you from the place you told me you want to be and hey you at any given time

You could come and say I don't want it anymore. I changed my mind. I want this instead cool

I'm happy to change my treat. I'm happy to treat you differently when you tell me that you have changed your mind

That you don't want to you don't want this anymore that you want something else

You are totally right to that but

Let's be clear. I'm always going to ask you. Did you change what you wanted?

Because if you still want that thing then I'm going to keep treating you like the person who gets that thing

And that person doesn't do or say these things and so I'm not going to entertain it

I'm not going to be the shoulder to cry on I'm not going to be the one who sympathizes and pats you on the head and says

I understand why it's tough for you. Why it's so hard because it's not so hard for that guy

And so be that guy people uh people DM us a lot of interesting ideas my reply to all of them

They go, what do you think about this? I always reply with two things. I think that's an amazing idea

And I always say it's an amazing idea

And then I say when are you launching?

It's always amazing like you're just asking for permit. You're just asking for permission

So I'm going to give you permission amazing. There's no reason why this can't work oftentimes. There's a lot of reasons

But it doesn't matter when are you launching right and uh, I do a simple mind says

Sounds cool, right? They say

I have this idea. What do you think? I would love to hear your feedback your thoughts happen to jump on a call

I don't even reply to any of that. I just say sounds cool

Let me know when you launch it so I could check it out

Yeah, I always say the same thing and sometimes I I'll reply months later

Like I'll save certain conversations and I reply. Do you want to talk about one more interesting thing on the list?

I have one thing from this De Beers thing that I've just yeah, I've been dying to hear it

Okay, so okay, so let me tell you this story. This kind of blew my mind

I got to open up my notes for this because I I did you know proper proper research for this

um

So why don't you put your notes in this document so I can see them. Oh, it's just really long

It's like two pages at note. So I didn't want to blow it up for this, but uh, let me just tell you this story

I got your full and undivided attention. You can't even read the thing. You got to listen to me say it

all right, so somebody in my family is

Was thinking about getting engaged soon

And so the whole like engagement ring process was going on and

They were asking like, you know all the questions you have because you don't usually you don't most people don't buy a ton of diamond rings

Or something's like that. So they're kind of like, you know, what's the budget?

You know, I see there's these four C's cut clarity, you know, which one should I care more about?

blah blah blah so

And and then they did this thing they went to a jewelry shop and they tried some I said just go try some on see what you see

What you what you like

And I said, you know, you're not gonna buy it from there, but go to a nice shop to try things on

So you can see what shape you like what color you like what different prices will get you that sort of thing

And they go and they came back and they said hey, you ever heard about this lab grown diamond thing

And uh, had you heard of this?

Uh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, basically there. I mean, that's all it is it's

Diamonds grown in the lab. So just the way that like now you have

Um, you know

For for many different types of products for meat. They're trying lab grown meat

So what if instead of farming animals and killing them and you know

Contributing to a lot of you know, global warming

You could just take a stem cell from a cow's shoulder and grow a filet mignon, right?

That's the promise and there's a company called Memphis meats that's doing it

And it tastes it looks identical to the meat to a steak

It tastes identical because it is identical

Cellularly molecularly it is identical to a normal steak

Now the problem right now for meat is that it costs like $10,000 a pound or something crazy

So, you know, it's not economically feasible yet

And um, and then there's this company I was looking at potentially investing in it's called vitro labs and they're doing this with leather

They're saying hey instead of killing animals for leather. Um, what if we could have a cruelty-free leather?

Let's just grow the skin in a lab and they're signing deals with you know, that's pretty cool big name luxury brands

You know the the sort of uh, who's who luxury brands that they want to offer a vegan product

But they don't want to sacrifice the quality of the material. So they said hey, let's get you an identical

Material molecularly matching material for that. Okay. So I've been interested in this lab grown trend and diamonds with the latest one

So I said, oh interesting diamonds. It's not the new it's not new. It's actually much more commercially forward

It's like out there and people buy this stuff. It's growing in popularity compared to meats and leather

Which are kind of like still in development. So

Um, so I started looking into it. I was like, I was like, is this kind of like bullshit or what's going on and here's what I found

The diamond industry itself is mostly bullshit and a lot of people know this but I dug into some of the history

And here's what here's what I found that kind of interests me

so

Before 1870 like diamonds

Uh, weren't even like there. They were not even a

Considered rare. So, uh, they're plentiful. Sorry before 1870. They were rare because we didn't know where to find them

So like, you know, the maharaja in india would would have it in his crown or you know

Some egyptian person would have it in their in their garment, but it was who's so rare that you didn't even see it around

It wasn't even a thing. It wasn't even businesses around it

but then in 1870 they find this huge deposit in um, I think south africa

And so now diamonds become this like they realize. Oh diamonds are actually not in short supply

There's tons of diamonds. They found this huge thing

And so all these miners go in like a gold rush basically and they start mine

They start establishing diamond mines in south africa and then like six months later a year later

They all realize like shit. There's now too much supply. We're flooding the market with this stuff

And it's we're all going out of business

Nobody can afford

um, nobody can afford

Uh, to to run the mine because we're we're flooding so much supply. So the miners

Um, but no so the miners like damn it if everybody else just stopped

I could make a bunch of money, but it's like the prisoner's dilemma

Nobody wants to be the one that stops so they all keep going and they all put each other out of business

And so there's this guy Cecil Rhodes who comes around and Cecil Rhodes starts buying up the mines

He's like, I need to aggregate all this supply in south africa. So he starts aggregating it all

And basically buys mines from one of the farms is called something something the brothers were called debirs

That was their last name

So it becomes the debirs like mining an exploration group or something like that some name like that

So that's where debirs the diamond company comes from and so debirs became this

Over the next hundred years debirs becomes this monopoly. They control 90 percent of the supply

And the reason diamonds are considered rare is because debirs owns all the supply and they just limit how much they produce from the mines

They could produce 10 times more, but instead they intentionally restrict supply at the mining level

Then they this is so monopolistic is crazy

So then they created this group of 200 people only 200 people were allowed to buy from them called site holders

And they said, oh, you were invited. So so we control all the supply

So we decide who we sell to and we only are gonna sell these 200 and then you can go sell to merchants

Now we're gonna I said they could kind of hold these 200 people accountable and say

Hey, why is this person over here selling at this low price cut them off and like just cut you off

And if a new mine popped up they would go like the mafia and they'll go and just sort of like through violence

Intimidation or like even just like market tactics. They would basically like put the mine out of business and take it over

So like let's say you discovered a mine that had a bunch of yellow diamonds

They would flood the market with yellow diamonds ply crush your economics

You'd go out of business and they take over your mind

And so they would just find whatever you produce and they would just flood you and so um, so

All the way up until about the year 2000. They owned 90 percent of this thing

But I was like, I was like, why is this so if it's not rare, where does the value come from?

and so the story is basically

Diamond mining wasn't big business right away. It was like an okay business. It's a good business

And then it started to like kind of like plateau and it wasn't really growing that fast in 1936

They say we got to do something we got all this diamond production

But there's not enough demand now for the diamond production

So they go down Madison avenue and they find this ad agency and they find this one guy

So everybody who loves diamonds today and every girl who's demanding a diamond engagement ring

It's because of this guy George Locke

Back in the day and they hire this guy and they say look we need you to create demand for diamonds

And at that time before 1936 people were not even giving diamonds as an engagement ring

It wasn't even like rings weren't even an engagement process

It was like very rare that people would do that most people just kind of uh, did an engagement as sort of a different sort of agreement

And so he does a big study and he says okay look

Um, what we need to do is this we need to get men to buy the diamonds for women

And we need the women to believe that diamonds are the way that your man could show you

So for women, it's like if you want the man to say he loves you we need diamond to represent love

Diamond equals love. That's like one side of the board. They said on the other side men

The bigger the better the more expensive the diamond the more of a man you are so it became

And they came out and it was it was like some like ridiculously obvious statement that they came out with right

so they they had a bunch so they've done like, uh

Diamonds are forever is was named. I think one of the most uh, I think it was named the marketing slogan of the century

Or something like that again of last hundred years

It was voted that diamonds are forever was the best marketing hook

Created because it created this like demand for diamonds. So why is that so so there's a bunch of like aspects to this

So first, how did they build demand? Well, it was basically in old school influencer marketing

So they decided all right, we're gonna make diamonds look like the gift of love

And so they went to hollywood and they went to all the producers and they said we will give you producers

Here's a beautiful diamond for you to give your wife. Here's a diamond for you for you for you on your bracelet

Or your necklace your earrings or whatever and they basically said hey

um

We will give you these diamonds for free producer

But you need to have a scene in your movie the climax of your movie where the man professes his love for the woman

He needs to open up a box with a diamond ring inside

And then she needs to have an amazing reaction like she needs to be won over because the guy did that

And so they went to all these movie producers and the movies now all have these scenes and you could go back and watch this montage of

Before this nobody was doing this in movies all of a sudden every movie

This was the key scene the guy pronounces his love for his what for the woman and gives her a diamond and she says

Oh my god, I love you too. It kisses him back

And so they like used that kind of inception then they went to fashion designers and I said hey

would it be a shame if um

if if if you didn't say that the trend next year the big trend is that diamonds are in what the

Let's call it the trend to diamonds

So they created this thing called the trend to diamonds and they just got all these fashion designers to ambiguously say

There's a trend to diamonds

So now you have the the the high art people saying this and then you have hollywood showing it

And that was like the main sort of brainwashing mechanism of of the world at the time. There's no social media. No nothing

And so then they said so then you know the ad agency starts getting uh, you know clever. They're like all right

Um, how do we make the diamond proportionate to the man's success?

What if it was you have to spend one month's salary on this and they went with one month's salary

And then they upped it to two months salary and then they had an advertising campaign that said

um

How do you make two months of salary last forever?

Buy a diamond. Oh man amazing, right?

And then and then they were like, okay, look, but hey, we all know that diamonds are actually not that rare, right?

So we can't have people reselling these so they said oh

Uh, first of all if you make it the the the the ultimate gift of love

The woman won't want to sell it the guy won't want to sell it and then even if they do here's what we'll do

Dealers the you the the merchants who sell this you cannot take diamonds back

Because diamonds even though they are like seen in the world is like a store of value. It's like oh

Just jewelry. It's like, you know jewelry is kind of like a safe way to store your wealth

It's like a car if you take a diamond out of the shop

It's lost 50 percent of its resale value and the dealer doesn't want you to know that

So they won't even make you an offer to buy it back. So they banned merchants from like making offers to buy it back

Because they didn't want the merchant to tell the customer. Hey once you buy this thing. It's worth half

and so they said don't even make an offer and um

And so they they kind of like killed the resale market and then they created this diamonds are forever campaign

so that you would not want to sell your diamond

And they did this country by country

So like you can look in any country you can see this chart

So it's like the u.s. goes through this curve where no one's buying diamonds to like 75 percent of engagements are all through diamonds

and then

90 percent it gets to like 90 for something percent are our engagements are done through diamonds

In japan they they're like oh we have no market share in japan they go

They do do the same marketing playbook there it goes from five percent of brides have a ring to 60 percent in 20 year in a 20 year period

And to beer's own 70 percent of that market share, right?

And then they started creating other marketing gimmicks like the right hand ring

It's like if you're an independent woman

You know you don't want this ring on your left hand that shows that you're kind of owned by this man

We're a right hand ring

You need a diamond on your right hand that says that's the right hand ring the 25th anniversary ring the upgrade ring

Like you know just show that you're doing better than you were before

And so they created all this like they literally fucking created the demand and they restricted the supply. It's kind of unbelievable

Um, so that's kind of like the they're amazing the core of it. There's some other stuff

Like, you know, there's like sort of the blood diamonds thing which is like the bad pr around it

Which is that these diamond mines were a kind of shitty conditions to be in

But b they were like

Basically using profits from the mine to fund like

War in the area like militia war in the area

So that's kind of like you're basically funding conflict in a way

And so the the diamond industry tried to like after that movie blood diamond came out

They tried to like clean up their image, but then lab grown diamonds started coming out

and um

And so the lab grow diamonds come out and it's like oh shit

So first they created a marketing campaign that says real is rare

And they basically were like if it's real, that's what makes it rare, which is what makes it valuable

So if it's a lab grown thing, uh, that's nothing and they refuse to acknowledge it

They refuse to sell it. They refuse to care about it

But customers were like dude this is it's indistinguishable from a diamond

Then they could I cannot tell what's a real diamond like mine from the earth or made in a lab because materially again

The composition is the same. It's not like a fake. It's not like a fake diamond. It's the same material

It was just grown in a lab rather than grown in the earth

And so I always get the the shanko commercials

Right and they say like you don't want to get them from a lab from a lab. It's it's it's just like every other one

Right, exactly. Exactly. It's not special

And so the problem is it's still growing in popularity because they sell for about 30 of the price

So you can get like a way bigger ring that looks identical to a diamond ring that is made of a diamond

Um, but it just happened to have been like it's like do I want my coffee sourced from

You know Canada or from Philippines or from Africa like it's kind of like where's it sourced?

So some people care, but it's growing in popularity

So then the beers and the diamond industry they like did the last kind of like stone cold killer move

For years. They were like lab grown is fake

It's bullshit. Don't buy it

And they but they but it was just growing in popularity anyways, so they were like, all right shit

We gotta do something else. So then they create a brand called lightbox

And they start producing lab grown diamonds. Everyone's like, oh my god, does this mean that lab is legit?

And they're like, no, no, no, no, no

Lab is for people who can't afford diamonds. So we're going to sell ours

So they undercut the price like crazy. So normally a lab grown diamond will cost like 30 or 40 percent the cost

so it's like a 50 60 discount and

But they started pricing the hairs at like a 90 discount

Of a real diamond just to ruin the market value of the brand perception of lab grown diamonds

And they said this is for they said they came out in a statement. They said this is for emotionally shallow events

Like a sweet 16 or like a quinceanero party by the by the lab grown for that

You know, so this is their latest tactic to try to like

Keep up this big myth this big lie

That diamonds are this rare valuable precious gem and it's like actually complete bullshit. This is amazing research

This is a good one. This is a very good story and

And what but here's the thing where we are maybe it will change is us in our 30s

We all do the same thing which is right before we get engaged. We say this is bullshit

I will not stand for this. I will not pay this amount of money right my budget. I'm going to set it really low

I'm going to get a fake one or I'm going to get a lab grown like I will not buy into this

And then you get into it and you say

Fuck it. It's gonna make her happy. She's gonna make her happy. Yeah

And we all refuse to buy into it

And well more and more people are starting to go the other way

but

But yeah, it's it's amazing that this is still the majority right given

Now that lab grown is visibly identical and you can get a way better better looking diamond

For for a cheaper price

It's amazing that that like the really utility doesn't overwhelm but like the branding is that embedded

It's that strong after so long and actually there's one other part which is that eventually, you know the diamonds do um

The the the the beers did lose their monopoly

I should say so like in the year 2000

They basically broke up the monopoly because they're getting a lot of public pressure as a monopoly the the buyers were kind of sick of

Being like constantly threatened

By the beers and then people found new minds in australia and all these other places where they couldn't like

You could kind of just in africa you can kind of like coerce people but in australia. It's a lot harder to like go

Coerce a minor in public to like just fucking give you their mind

And so um, and so they've changed their business strategy

So and the last factor by the way is there's this guy the family that kind of like created the real monopoly is the oppenheimer family

And they've run this thing for years first guy oppenheimer. He's the one are they?

They're they're very wealthy. So the the business I think is like a 10 billion dollar business

I think they sold half the stake for four or five billion recently

And I also think they own like 50% of louis Vuitton or something like that. They own some other stuff too, but

But anyways, they couldn't the in the family. There's no one to take it over anymore

No one wants to run the business that nobody another young generation. They don't want they don't want their business

There's nobody there's no air and so they're like shit. There's no air

Business is still good, but it's getting harder and we don't have somebody to fight it

And so they actually switched strategy. So they broke up the monopoly and now they shifted from like 90% market share to 30%

And then they started rolling out their own retail stores and profits have gone up

But they're kind of like

They're um, you know, their their control has gone down their power has gone down and I would have to if I had to bet

You know, I'm a I'm a very amateur historian and so I've read a lot of these stories

If I had to bet I would bet that

Once you break up a monopoly for a family owned business

I would argue that the odds that the odds are that the family are now actually going to get richer

It seems like what what do you mean?

Well, so for example, standard oil, this is the same thing in the 1920s

Teddy Roosevelt said nope standard oil. You are the beers of America. You own 80% of oil production

You can't do it anymore. So they broke it up into five or eight different companies and some of those companies are exxon

mobile

BP right

Conoco and like five or six other companies that you probably know of

And it made Rockefeller get

Significantly richer because he owned a small stake into each one

And they all competed with each other and they boost their revenue boost their profits

And they all made and he made significantly more money because of that and that was

The big source of his wealth is when they broke up the company and I would say that if facebook and instagram had to compete with each other

It would actually make Zuckerberg richer same with youtube and google if they had to compete

It would probably make them better and thus the owners a little bit more rich

Exactly. I I agree. That's why when people talk about breaking up facebook

It's like, well, you know what this is going to do, right?

Like they're all going to become more valuable and the services will become better

But it does open up more room for competition whereas when they have an absolute stranglehold then

You know, it may not be as as lucrative and it may not be as good of a product

But it's very hard to break break in. Um, yeah, that was great. That that was that you well

There's also like an opportunity here, right? Like as I learned this I was like, okay, I know this is not new

But if I just sample the population

It's like on one hand you do two surveys one survey. They did was hey, did you know about lab grown blah blah?

Here's here's like look you can't tell the difference look

It's made of it's actually the same material composite. It's the same material as diamond

It's just grown from lab rather than mine in the earth

And hey, you don't have to worry about the like ethics of the mining because it's not not mine from the earth

70% of like millennials are like, yeah, I'm totally open to that. That sounds great

But then at the same time the market share hasn't caught up yet

And so I think that even though this is not a brand new thing

I think that people could create

Really valuable brand like I'm curious if somebody listened to this it wants to go and basically take an education based approach

To selling this because I think the more you educate people the more they want to like the more

More willing they are to buy and if you're the one who educates them you get that first right of refusal to sell them

Sell them their first lab grown diamond. So and I think

I would bet that millennials won't do this, but what's the generation after that z

I believe they would and the 18 because you know, they're so

Politically correct and they're very they they they they have a high bullshit detector. I believe and

For me and my friends a lot of us were like this is not the battle. I'm going to choose

Right. I'm just gonna I'm just gonna you know, buy my way out of this and and we'll fight a different battle

Right with them. I don't I would argue that there's a good chance that something like that could happen

I don't think it will happen now, but I think in 10 years when the 18 year olds to get in their 20s and 30s

Uh, and I would bet money. I I would bet my money. I think that that could work as well

So I'm bullish on this too. Yeah, that's great. Um, all right. Do we want to do it? This is a good story that

Yeah, we um that that this has got to be our our youtube clip. That was a very well research and very good story

Good job much

So that's the episode we'll see let's see if this one's a hit. I think it was kind of interesting. What do you think ben?

You're on mute ben

I know, sorry. I was uh, I didn't want to be on camera with my glasses because they look nerdy. I uh, I thought it was great

um

The debir's stuff is super super interesting. Um, and uh, and the intensity stuff

Uh, the the sushi story was great. Loved it. Good episode. Speaking of intensity. You dunked on somebody this week. You said

Did you really can you dunk? How tall are you? He's mormon. Of course he can dunk

So i'm 64

Apparently it's like the basket isn't isn't it isn't it the basketball of uh, of the like whenever all my mormon friends

They it seems like they always are playing basketball on sunday. All of our churches have

Uh basketball courts in them and so uh, even like non-mormons play basketball in our churches

Now are we talking like i'm 64 you could do windmills or we're barely scraping the dunk through or what's going on?

So, you know like when I was younger when I was in high school

I could do like tomahawks and and 180s and like pretty good dunks

But you know over the pandemic I didn't I didn't play basketball for like almost a year and a half

so I didn't know if I still had it and

Last night I just drove I was going down the lanes

I actually a buddy of mine jumped with me and I wasn't planning on doing him like that

But I was just I was there and I had to do it. I dunked on him

Can you please send me a video of something like this and I would share it

I'll I believe it you you I don't think you're a guy that would lie at all, but I would love to see this

I don't think that your guy that would even exaggerate a little bit. Yeah, I would love to see this

I don't have the video of me dunking on the guy, but I sure I have video of me dunking so I can

Can can I send it to me? I would share that in a heartbeat. I would love to brag about that

I are you're 64. We've never seen Ben in real life. By the way, you're 64

Yeah, last company I worked for was all remote and we had an off-site

We all met each other for the first time and everyone was blown away. They were like, oh, I didn't know you

I asked people

Like if I weren't one person at the company told me she's like you have short energy. I can't believe you're tall

Wow, I know

Dude, I saw this really hilarious tiktok yesterday where this girl just goes

Oh, I'm I go around on live streams and I just give people compliments for I call it I go

So we love our short Kings and she goes to tall guys streams like normal height or taller guys streams

And she goes we yeah, we stand our short King

We love our short King with kissy face and the guys and she clipped together their reaction

And they're just they're all like we love our short King and they get excited. They're like wait, what?

I'm six I'm six and a quarter like I don't know who you call a short king and then like

Everybody gets like super butt hurt about it right away

It like really fucks with their brain and she goes. It's hilarious. Just call them like my short King

Ben, please send me a video of you ducking on fools. I would love that that would make that would make my day

I'll send it to you right now. Sean. Sam. How tall are both of you?

I'm six I'm six one

Yeah, we're we're both

We're both of similar height and weight. I think I mean

I like when when when people meet both of us

They say you guys are much bigger than we thought and I would say that when we're together we look

Big and tall and Sean you look taller than you are. I think too

Oh good. I don't know what that means, but I'll take it. It's better than being called a short king

Well, I think it's because he got big hair

That's right. That's right

You know what I don't get do you do you guys feel tall at six foot and six foot one?

No, I don't you feel average height right like to me that's like six foot six

But like if you look at global averages or even American average like the American male height is like

Only five seven right or some five. Yeah. Yeah, it's like it's short. You guys are super tall

Which I don't know there's a disconnect. Well, then you're a giant. I guess so yeah by that logic. Um, no, I don't I don't feel tall

I feel uh, I feel thicker than the average person. That's for sure

And you are so Ben, uh, when you dunked on the guy, did you like scream?

What did it feel like? I mean, I've never dunked on anyone. I've only

I've dunked a volleyball once that's the closest I ever got it was like actually not even a volleyball

Like it's something smaller than a volleyball. I mean, that's pretty good. That's that is pretty good

That was like a high so

wasn't great

The guy was a friend of mine

I had we we'd been playing some pickup at a Mormon church actually and I just won like four games in a row

And I think people like morale is pretty low. So I just played it cool. I didn't say anything

I just kind of randomly

By the way, I'm not being prejudiced. It's a thing that Mormons like

It's like I've always known that there was basketball courts at the church

And it's like your church is like a community event, right? You hang out there after church

Yeah, we have weekday events there sometimes

Especially for like youth and like, yeah, people play basketball there. Yeah

Yep

Yeah, so it's a thing it is a thing

Sam such a Mormon thing to go dunk on someone politely as you did like it's such a Mormon

politely done

And then like to drink a coke

I don't too, right?

Uh, a lot many Latter-day Saints many many members of the church do drink a lot of soda because you don't drink coffee or tea

Um, but I don't

Yeah, whenever I go to Utah like I'll go to the drive-thru at these like soda places

And they've got the best sodas like the weirdest combinations. I love it

I'm I'm team Mormon, man. I'm an honorary member. I hope sam are you a coke or Pepsi guy?

Coke I coke zero all the way all day band coke or Pepsi

I've I've actually never had either in my entire life. What? Oh amazing. That's amazing. Okay, great

I saw this great reddit thread that was like brands if their slogans were true

Like it's like a truthful brand slogans and the Pepsi one was um, is Pepsi okay?

I thought it was so fucking clever

It's like the thing at the restaurant you order a coke and then they hit you with the is Pepsi. Okay

Um, all right, that's the episode. Let's see. Uh, we gotta cut those into clips. We had a bunch of good ones. See you

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.