Skip to content
The Twenty Minute VCThe Twenty Minute VC

Cost Plus Drugs: EXPLAINED | Mark Cuban Full Interview

Mark Cuban is a serial entrepreneur, investor, and owner of the Dallas Mavericks. Today we are focused on Mark’s latest entrepreneurial endeavor, starting Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drug Company, the online pharmacy taking out the middlemen, meaning no price games and huge drug savings. As mentioned, Mark is also the proud owner of Dallas Mavericks, since his taking over they have competed in the NBA Finals for the first time in franchise history in 2006 – and became NBA World Champions in 2011. Before Dallas Mavericks, Mark co-founded Broadcast.com – streaming audio over the internet. In just four short years, Broadcast.com (then Audionet) was sold to Yahoo for $5.6 billion dollars. If that was not enough, Mark is also one of ABC’s “Sharks” on the hit show Shark Tank. ------------------------------------------- Timestamps: 0:00 What is CostPlusDrugs? 8:30 Hiring Tips 18:43 Brand + Capital + Business Strategy 24:41 AMA with Mark Cuban ------------------------------------------- In Today’s Episode with Mark Cuban You Will Learn: 1.) Cost Plus Drugs: Origin -Why Mark decided to build Cost Plus Drugs? -Why has no one done it before? -How does Mark think about resource and time allocation with Cost Plus? 2.) Building the Team: Hiring -How does Mark analyze his approach to hiring? Where is he weak? Where is he strong? -What one motto does Mark always use when it comes to hiring? -What is the most common mistake Mark sees founders make when it comes to team build? -How does Mark identify stress removers? What are the core signals? 3.) Brand + Capital + Business Strategy: -Why is the current cost structure of healthcare so damaged in the US? -How does Cost Plus change this? -How does Mark think about what it takes to build great brand today? Why will Cost Plus not be doing big TV and traditional media advertising? -What types of guerrilla marketing is Mark most excited by? Why will Mark never have a billboard in Times Square? 4.) AMA with Mark Cuban: -What 3 traits does Mark most want his children to adopt? -What worries Mark most today? -What are Mark’s biggest strengths? What are his biggest weaknesses? -What single purchase has brought Mark the greatest joy? ------------------------------------------- #MarkCuban #CostPlusDrugs #20VC #VentureCapital #HarryStebbings #HealthCare

Harry StebbingshostMark Cubanguest
Feb 7, 202230mWatch on YouTube ↗

At a glance

WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT

Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drugs Attacks Soaring Prescription Prices Head-On

  1. Mark Cuban discusses Cost Plus Drugs, his self-funded company aiming to radically lower the price of generic medications through transparent, fixed-margin pricing. The business avoids insurance and pharmacy benefit managers (PBMs), instead selling directly to consumers at cost plus a 15% markup, a $3 handling fee, and $5 shipping. Cuban details the regulatory and supply-chain complexities of building a new kind of pharmacy and why having no outside investors lets him prioritize impact over profit. He also shares broader views on healthcare system misalignments, his philosophy on hiring, management, and goal setting, and personal perspectives on parenting, climate risk, and life priorities.

IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING

5 ideas

Radical price transparency can undercut traditional drug pricing structures.

By openly publishing a simple formula—drug cost plus 15%, $3 handling, $5 shipping—and bypassing insurance and PBMs, Cost Plus often beats both cash prices and insurance copays on generics.

Self-funding enables mission-first decisions over profit maximization.

Because Cuban has no outside investors, he can tolerate revenue volatility and resist pressure to add high-margin features or marketing, keeping focus on being the lowest-cost generic provider.

Success hinges on hiring exceptional operators and then delegating deeply.

Cuban emphasizes working with ‘rock star’ partners like Dr. Alex Oshmyansky, trusting them with operational complexity while he focuses on marketing, relationships, and strategic nuance.

Hire slow, fire fast—and distinguish stress removers from stress creators.

He advocates careful hiring, rapid exits for poor fits, and categorizing people by whether they reduce or manufacture stress; the former should be protected, the latter removed quickly.

Define goals around core customer value, not just revenue targets.

For Cost Plus, key metrics are repeat customers, number of drugs offered, and continuous price reductions; revenue and profit are secondary to building trust as the lowest-cost provider.

WORDS WORTH SAVING

5 quotes

Our goal is to be the lowest cost provider of generic drugs, period, end of story.

— Mark Cuban

I’m financing it all myself… when you bring on investors, you’re gonna run it differently.

— Mark Cuban

I really divide people into stress creators and stress removers. The stress removers, you do everything you can to keep them.

— Mark Cuban

We’re not trying to optimize revenues, we’re not trying to optimize profits. We’re trying to optimize how many customers we have.

— Mark Cuban

Time is the most valuable asset you don’t own.

— Mark Cuban

Cost Plus Drugs’ business model and pricing structureRegulatory and structural problems in the US healthcare and pharma ecosystemBootstrapping, capital allocation, and scaling a mission-driven companyHiring philosophy, management style, and organizational cultureMarketing without heavy ad spend and leveraging customer trust/word-of-mouthMisaligned incentives in insurance and hospital systemsPersonal beliefs: parenting, climate change, reading, and life priorities

High quality AI-generated summary created from speaker-labeled transcript.

Get more out of YouTube videos.

High quality summaries for YouTube videos. Accurate transcripts to search & find moments. Powered by ChatGPT & Claude AI.

Add to Chrome