GoPuff CEO Rafael Ilishayev: The Plan to Make GoPuff Profitable by 2024 | 20VC #944

1. 0:00 – 1:54

   Founding moment for GoPuff

   1. HSHarry Stebbings0:00

      Raph, this is such a joy to do. As we just said, if we were in the same city, we would be enjoying a tequila together. Sadly, we are not and so we're doing a podcast instead. Second best. But thank you so much for joining me today.

   2. RIRafael Ilishayev0:12

      Harry, uh, thanks for having me second time around. I guess I did something right the first time to get invited the second time.

   3. HSHarry Stebbings0:17

      Clearly did something brilliantly right the first time. I want to start for those that maybe missed the first show, which is a little bit of context, you know, two to three minutes. How did you come to start goPuff and what was that founding moment?

   4. RIRafael Ilishayev0:29

      You know, Harry, it's kind of crazy. It's been almost 10 years, right? We've been at this for a decade. Uh, (laughs) which is- which is a little- a little crazy. But goPuff started by solving our own use case, right? Ikira and I were college students who, you know, realized there's a pretty big need in the market, right? Everyone was going to the convenience store or the drug store to pick up everything they needed. And that experience, uh, as a student wasn't always very safe and it wasn't always great and everyone was always busy. So we said, you know, "Why doesn't anyone stock and deliver all these goods, uh, to students kind of across the country?" Right? We could start this in Philadelphia. And, you know, we had a little bit of an unorthodox start- start. As you know, Harry, we didn't raise money for our first three years. Uh, we were kind of profitable from day one. Uh, used the profits from Philadelphia, right? Back then, goPuff was a different service, right? You know, today, we're 5,000 items. Back then, we were 100 to 200 items, snacks, drinks. Uh, and we used the profits that we had from that kind of early goPuff 1.0 to expand to five cities until we raised their first round. And then goPuff really started changing, right? Alcohol, ice cream, over-the-counter medication, baby, pets, this kitchens business that we have. All these new verticals to now where we are today, you know, uh, over 1,000 cities on a global scale, you know, 12,000, uh, employees globally, you know, and much, much more

2. 1:54 – 6:42

   Why has capital dried up for instant delivery?

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev1:54

      drivers, obviously.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings1:55

      So, there's so many ways I want to take this. Um, you know, when we spoke last time, bluntly, capital was cheap, money was pouring into the space, you know, faster than it was Adam Neumann's new company (laughs) . Just kidding. Um, uh, still amazed by that. Uh, but anyway, uh, flowing into the space. And it's a very different landscape today. Capital's dried up across the board, but especially in this space. Um, we've seen businesses go bust in this space. Uh, many. Um, I wanted to watch you start with a little bit of why. Why do you think that capital has dried up specifically for this space, and what are the core drivers?

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev2:29

      You know, I think, uh, Harry, capital markets have not been friendly for any growth companies (laughs) over the last, uh, I would say two to three quarters. But if we're talking about instant needs specifically, you know, we say this all the time, uh, Ikira and I, when you're starting a business as complicated as our business, right, where you have so much technological needs, supply chain needs, logistical needs, where you really need to nail it before you scale it, you have to really focus on the inner crux of your business, the infrastructure of your business before really expanding in a very big way. And that's what we did for a first couple of years. We spent a lot of time building the- the technology inside of the four walls of the building, building operational excellence, and then really scaling the business by, you know, proving that we can deliver really strong unit economics. Pretty much everyone else in the instant need space from across the globe had the opposite strategy. You know, "All we need to do is open up a whole host of buildings. We'll figure out the tech later. We'll figure out the operational excellence later. We don't have a supply chain set up, it's fine, we'll figure it out later." So, it was scale it then nail it strategy. And, you know, when the capital markets started getting more constricted, they realized their underlying business just isn't all that strong, right? They're not producing really strong unit economics. And as a byproduct, a lot of people started really struggling. And I think really, it's just the beginning, right? I think it's going to continue. Uh, that trend is going to continue to accelerate because the initial strategy was grow at all cost, not really nail our business, really nail our unit economics and then scale the business.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings4:13

      So, my take was, you know, obviously I invested in Airlift. Um, my take was bluntly that as the cost of capital went up, uh, capital-intensive, low margin, uh, businesses became more and more of a challenge for investors to finance. Would you agree with that summarization or would you say that's not- not fair to categorize our- our space as capital-intense and low margin?

   5. RIRafael Ilishayev4:38

      If this business is done right, it's actually not a low margin business, right? So if you- if you set up your- your structure correctly and you're buying correctly and your ads business is working correctly, right? Now we're launching a whole new host of businesses that, you know, I think they're going to improve our margin structure more. Our gross margin structure is actually among the best in, you know, if you categorize like our retail peers instead of our tech peers, right? It's among the best, right? We have gross margin in the high 30s, low 40s depending on the region that you're in. And it's actually really, really healthy margins to operate a- a- a profitable business, especially on a unit level. Uh, what I'll say, though, is a lot of people, you know, I don't want to- I don't want to beat a dead horse here, but a lot of people when they were expanding to city to city, they- they just weren't focused on, you know, how do we build really, really strong margin profile in the business, right? There's no question, right? Infrastructure is expensive, right? You have to- you have to build buildings, you have to set up racks, you need equipment, the whole nine yards. But the return on capital on this business and how fast these markets pay back is really, really incredible once you start humming correctly, right? In the beginning, right, it took maybe a year, a year and a half for a building to recoup, uh, its investment. Now some buildings, you open up and three months later-... where you recouped all, all your fa- fixed costs. Right? The business really starts humming in a much better way. So, it really just boils down to, did you set the right amount of time, energy, and focus on nailing the fiscal responsibility portion of this business, being really strong on the fiscal side, and then scale the business? Or you said, "Hey, I want to grow at all costs. I want to expand to as many cities as I can, and we'll figure out our distributors later. We'll figure out our vendor relations later. We'll figure out our technology inside of the four walls and routing, binning, and batching later"? If that was your strategy, you know, the capital markets are gonna crush you the next two,

3. 6:42 – 8:54

   How do margins compare between old and new markets?

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev6:42

      three quarters.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings6:43

      You mentioned the margin element there. Tell us, how do the margin, uh, levels vary when comparing, you know, your most mature markets, your Philadelphias, your strongest markets in the US, to your incredibly new markets, say, in Europe or any that you expand to? What does that margin ... You said thir- high 30s, low 40s. Is it, like, negative on the margin side in new? What does that variance look like? Just help me understand that.

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev7:08

      So, it's, margin is not the only element to profitability, right? You, you need a healthy basket size, right? Because i- if you have, y- you take dollars to the bank, right? Not percentage points. Right? So like, as an example, alcohol is our lowest gross margin percentage category, but our highest gross margin dollar category. Those baskets are much higher with, with alcohol baskets than non-alcohol baskets. So, you'd rather lose a few percentage points on, on the gross margin percentage side and gain, you know, $10 or $15 on the, on the basket size. Overall, you know, the dollars that you bring, the dollars you bring home are much higher. So, across the US today, right? I'm gonna exclude Europe. All the new markets that we expand into generally look very similar, right? They start with a, a slightly slower basket size 'cause there's kind of direct correlation between 10 year and AOV. The longer you stay on the platform, the more you start ordering on, on Gopuff. In Europe, um, they're gonna kind of focus on the UK for a second. Basket has grown a lot over the last two quarters, but it's still kind of double digits lower than what we see in the US when we were starting the market. So, it's grown fast, um, I think the number one focus we have in, in the UK specifically today, is continuing to drive a higher basket. And I'll give all the credit, uh, to our teams over there. They've done a really, really great job, right? Now, now we're in the, in the, in the 20s from a, from a basket size perspective. I think that, that business is continually gonna grow and, uh, you know, I think it's possible in the next couple quarters we're in the high 20s, low 30s from an AOV perspective.

4. 8:54 – 13:07

   The race to profitability

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev8:54

   2. HSHarry Stebbings8:55

      Can I ask, you know, given what we said about kind of the capital availability for the space itself, um, is this a race to profitability now for everyone surviving in this space?

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev9:07

      I think any company in any space that's not thinking about profitability right now and is not focused on profitability, there's a higher chance than not that th- these companies will probably not exist in the next year or year and a half. No matter how strong your balance sheet is. Because, you know, no one know, no one has a crystal ball. No one knows how long this is gonna last. No one knows how, how long the capital markets are gonna continue to stay depressed. And the reality is, I can speak for us, uh, you know, we built, uh, a new financial model that's completely self-funded, right? One that doesn't require any more outside capital, one that only looks at our, our balance sheet. And by the way, it's not one where we said, "Hey, we're gonna cut all costs completely. We're gonna stop innovation completely." We could be profitable a bit faster, but, you know, you want still somewhat of a balance of being able to continue to grow, continue to innovate, right? Like our kitchens business, for example, is crushing. Every week is a record from the week prior, right? We want to continue to invest into that business because it's doing well, but we're not gonna invest in it like how we used to invest, right? We're not gonna be opening up, you know, two or three dozen buildings a month, right, that have kitchens. So, it's a balance between, um, you know, driving really strong EBITDA and still innovating for the customer. So, that balance, for us at least, meant that we're profitable in 2024. Right? And-

   4. HSHarry Stebbings10:41

      What, what's the core differences between the old financial plan and the new financial plan you mentioned? What are the big changes?

   5. RIRafael Ilishayev10:48

      It's less buildings. Um, so what, what drives, you know, on a unit level, you could be really pro- So if you look at like on a, on, on a metro basis, all of our existing metros are producing, you know, cash flow. So, you have your, your, we call 'em your cash cows, right? Your Philadelphias, Chicagos, uh, Bostons, now Miamis, uh, all of our Texas markets of the world that are, are producing cash flow. Uh, but you have a lot of new markets that need time to get first to unit economic profitability, then EBITDA profitability. So, if you continue to open up markets, you're gonna continue to have, you know, an existing business that produces free cash flow, but, uh, a new business, right? This emerging business that's still, uh, requiring investment and causing the overall picture to be negative. Right? I'm talking about the, the overall, uh, uh, EBITDA picture. So for us, that meant, you know, opening up significantly less buildings. So, you know, less, less kind of fixed costs out the door. Not focusing on initiatives, um, that are, you know, might be good for tomorrow, but, you know, not so good for today. Like I'll, I'll give you one that hits kind of close to home. We launched a pharmacy business, uh, in Philadelphia.... were actually delivering prescription drugs to folks. And, uh, I love that business, and it's one that I think we'll come back to one day. But we just said, "Hey, man, you know, it's a great idea. Just not for 2022." So it's, it's sometimes saying no to these really shiny objects that customers might really love, but it just, like, you know, given the, the environment of today, you know, we can't afford to invest eight figures into this net new business that's gonna take, you know, multiple years to pay back, right? Because it takes a while for these businesses to incubate and then, you know, reach a terminal velocity and everything else. So, it's, it's real- being really, really strict from a prioritization perspective. And then also, you know, m- controlling your fixed costs, right? So, you know, we're not gonna add a, you know, fleet of hundreds of more buildings in the next 18 months, right?

   6. HSHarry Stebbings13:00

      Okay.

   7. RIRafael Ilishayev13:00

      We'll strategically open buildings where it makes sense, but we're, we're not gonna be opening up buildings like we were opening up buildings in the

5. 13:07 – 15:40

   How do you prioritize which products to persue?

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev13:07

      last 18 months.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings13:08

      From a prioritization perspective, I spoke to Emil Michael before the show. Um, wonderful, uh (laughs) , wonderful conversation I had with him. But he told me about all the different avenues and products that you can build. Uh, and I- I'm fascinated. When you think about that and the question that we just had there, in this new more capital constrained, newer financial m- like, plan world, how do you fundamentally prioritize between the initiatives you do do versus those that you don't do?

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev13:33

      A lot of products that you build in the product roadmap, uh, are things that are good for you or things that are good for the customer. And sometimes there's an overlap on things that are good for you. You meaning the team or the company, uh, and the customer meaning the customer. So sometimes there's an overlap. So being relentlessly focused, uh, I'm talking about like the consumer product team as an example, being relentlessly focused on things that are only gonna drive kind of better consumer behavior. So whether it's better discovery or better basket building. I'll tell you, like a feature that we're launching, you know, that we, we've talked to a lot of customers and the feedback they get is, uh, place, place an order on Gopuff, and right after I place an order I'm like, "God, I forgot toothpaste," or a light bulb or batteries, right, immediately after I click the place order button. So, we'll give people a chance, right, two minutes post their order to continue to build their basket for anything that they want, and remind people, "Hey, these are the items that you most frequently, most people most frequently forget, uh, after, after placing an order." So, a lot of those kind of features where we're really listening to the customers, and like, I'm talking about the now just from consumer product roadmap perspective, uh, that we're really doubling and tripling down on. On the driver side, you know, the first week of October we're having, uh, a global rollout, uh, of a new routing software, right? So we, we've integrated almost entirely the RideOS business, right? And that's improved routing, binning, and batching tremendously, right? It's all under, uh, the, the Gopuff umbrella now. The first week of October we have, uh, you know, kind of V2 of that launching, uh, which I think will keep P90 delivery time stable but will improve our ability to bin and batch by, I think, uh, you know, pretty close to double digits.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings15:25

      Yeah.

   5. RIRafael Ilishayev15:25

      So not only, uh, you know, it ... That, that, that's not a really huge effect on the consumer side. Consumers actually won't see a massive difference from, uh, from a delivery time perspective. But it'll save us a good bit of money on, uh, on our CPO

6. 15:40 – 19:28

   Challenges to the instant delivery market

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev15:40

      side.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings15:41

      It's interesting, 'cause what worries me is, um, and what I've seen as a consumer, um, I- I will never lie to you, dear Raf. Um, I- I have a, a propensity to switch between different providers. And what I've seen with certain providers is with the cutting of costs you see two things really happen. Well, three things. One is customer service is the first to go. Live chat goes, and that sucks. Two, you see increased delivery times. Like, lo- it was 10 minutes. Now it's 40, 45, or not at all in some cases. And then three is inventory is just depleted to shit and unavailable. So unlike SaaS businesses where if you cut cost, the core NetSuite product or Salesforce stays the same, you might not have the same cadence of innovation of product, but when you cut cost here in our businesses, you really feel it. And then it creates this negative flywheel effect where, in most of those other services, I don't use them anymore because it's so shit across those three dimensions. Do you see what I mean and does that concern you?

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev16:46

      Yep. So, it absolutely, uh, concerns us and, uh, but probably not in the way that you're, you're thinking about it. And so I think, you know, looking back and being a little critical on ourselves, right, Gopuff was never built to be a 10 or 15 minute delivery service. And I think because the consumer on a global scale, right, and I'm, I'm, I'm talking about outside the US, right? We're focused on the UK for a second. In the UK, the consumer was almost taught that 10 or 15 minute delivery is a norm.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings17:22

      Yeah. Yeah.

   5. RIRafael Ilishayev17:22

      Right? And maybe in somewhat, in New York that was the case too. And that's not a sustainable business model, right, any stretch of the imagination. The reason why it's not sustainable, predominantly, is 'cause you can't batch orders, right? What makes, uh, uh, you know, a, a group of orders really, really profitable is if a driver can leave with two, three, four orders at once and still deliver it quickly. So what we learned from, on the consumer side, uh, I'm talking about the, the US business, and I think it translates really well, uh, on a global scale too, is people don't necessarily want a really fast delivery, they want a really consistent delivery. So they'd rather really have like a 30-minute average with, you know, a seven, eight-minute deviation than like a 20-minute average with a 15-minute deviation, right? Where, you know, there's an inconsistency in delivery.And that's, uh, kind of been our go-to for, you know, five, six, seven years. And I think we got a little carried away in the UK, uh, with kind of trying to, to match what the, uh, the, the local, uh, players were doing, instead of going back to our roots, which is like, hey, this is w- what consumers generally want, is a consistent delivery, delivery over delivery. And two, by the way, that's the profitable business, right? Because you could bin and batch a lot better, right? Your, your tech can predict orders coming in a lot better, and then in turn, you could deliver a really great experience. I think on the, on the CS side, uh, it's a massive mistake to cut CS. Uh, it's one of the areas that we're, we're trying not to affect in a, in a really big way. As you know, we did, uh, we did a reorg. Um, I think, again, just being, uh, very, very blunt, it's just folks that are not thinking about, you know, how to control their cost in a way that doesn't affect consumers, or th- the, the players just won't be here the next 12 to 18 months, right? I don't want to repeat myself, but that, that's, uh, the hard

7. 19:28 – 22:14

   How does batching change the economics?

   1. RIRafael Ilishayev19:28

      reality of what we're living in right now.

   2. HSHarry Stebbings19:30

      How does batching actually change the economics? To me, listening from the outside, I go, I, I, I see it. That makes sense, maybe a 5%, 10% difference, but it doesn't, like, make a inherently unsustainable business suddenly sustainable. How does batching actually change the economics? Just to help me understand that.

   3. RIRafael Ilishayev19:50

      So, you need a lot less drivers when you batch to fulfill a lot more deliveries. So, your cost on a per order basis, it's actually not a 10% or 15% swing. You know, in a market that has a high ODH, the amount of orders a driver could fulfill in an hour, versus a market that has a weak ODH, the cost difference on the variable cost side could be as high as 50%.

   4. HSHarry Stebbings20:13

      Wow.

   5. RIRafael Ilishayev20:13

      Right? So, it's a, it's a massive difference of like, you know, a metro that looked good or a metro that doesn't look good. And generally speaking, in our business, a metro that doesn't look good is a new metro, right? Because it doesn't have enough orders yet on a per day basis where you can effectively batch, 'cause batching only works well is if enough orders are coming in, or the system could predict enough orders are gonna about to come in, in the same two or three square block radius of a given city or neighborhood or wherever that MFC is placed. So, if you're gonna able to pro- you know, with a high degree of confidence predict that, hey, an order came in, the next two to three minutes, wait to send that order out, next two to three minutes another order is gonna come in within that same block, or, you know, in a really good city, orders are just flying in, right? Right? They're doing, uh, you know, five, six, seven, 800 orders a day, where you don't even have that problem anymore, right? The system is just kind of working in the back end, batching orders together and sending it out. And the key to that, right, the, on, on, uh, on the, on the end side, why, why it's a lot cheaper is you just need a lot less driver partners. Right? You, you have fewer driver partners doing a lot more deliveries. And by the way, your driver partners love this, right? Because they're making a lot more money. So, uh, you know, they're getting paid on a per delivery side. So, they're making a lot more money, you need less driver partners to fulfill the same amount of orders. Uh, as a byproduct, your CPO starts decreasing tremendously.

   6. HSHarry Stebbings21:41

      Sorry, what's CPO?

   7. RIRafael Ilishayev21:43

      Uh, cost per order.

   8. HSHarry Stebbings21:44

      Oh, right, cost per order. Uh, k- can I ask-

   9. RIRafael Ilishayev21:45

      Yeah, sorry. You, you get used to these acronyms internally, and then you forget that, you know, it's not part of common vernacular.

   10. HSHarry Stebbings21:52

       No, no. Listen, this is, uh, totally fine. I will just clarify. Uh, in the old days I would be like, "Oh, yeah, CPO." Now I'm like, "What the fuck is that?"

   11. RIRafael Ilishayev22:00

       Yeah. (laughs)

   12. HSHarry Stebbings22:01

       Um, uh, tell me- k- is ODH, which is the orders per driver per hour, yeah?

   13. RIRafael Ilishayev22:05

       Yeah. It's the amount of orders a driver fulfills per hour.

   14. HSHarry Stebbings22:08

       Is that the governing metric of success in your business, do you think? Or is it AOV or

8. 22:14 – 24:37

   What is the north-star metric of instant delivery?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings22:14

      is it... W- what is the governing metric of success in your mind? And I know it's difficult to say, but if you were to pinpoint one...

   2. RIRafael Ilishayev22:23

      So, the first thing is, like, none of it matters if you're not producing positive unit economics. So, a market is not producing, you know, sh- if you're not making, if you're making less, if, if your unit economics are negative, right, it do- it really doesn't matter, right? (laughs) On the, on what, what, what you want to do, what you don't want to... Like, today, our focus is a little different than, you know, maybe the way that you want me to answer that question. Like, when you're growing, right, you wanna, you wanna do everything, right? You wanna increase basket or you wanna reduce cost. That's really the only way to, to, (laughs) to, to deliver, you know, positive unit economics. Once the, a market has achieved, right, its target unit economics where there's $4 positive on a per order basis, or we have markets that are doing 8 or $9 positive on a per order basis, after that, the only thing that matters is volume, right? Because, like, you need to produce enough volume then in that city to cover your fixed cost. Right? So, you're not positive on a gross margin basis, you're positive on an EBITDA basis. So, the fir- first step, right, in this business is, you know, deliver positive unit economics, right? And that's through, you know, starting with a healthy gross margin, right? So, that means, uh, you have an underlying, you know, right built business, right? You have good vendor relations, you have the, the right distribution centers, you have the right, m- you know, contracts or... There's a, there's a whole, there's a whole host of things that, that lead to, you know, building the right assortment and having the right gross margin associated with it. And then, uh, two, you know, after you've, uh, you've built your, your target AOV, because, like, our AOV has improved, you know, hundreds of percentages since we've launched the business, right? And we had an AOV in the teens, then in the 20s, now in the 30s, right? On a, on an average basis, right? As the basket size continue to improve and as we continue to build more technology to be able to bin and batch better, uh, you know, the next layer of that is just more orders.... right? Because now every order that's leaving the door is very profitable. So to get profitable on an aggregate basis, right, on, on a totally EBITDA basis, you just need enough orders. Does that make sense?

   3. HSHarry Stebbings24:36

      I totally

9. 24:37 – 30:15

   How do you know when you have a retained user?

   1. HSHarry Stebbings24:37

      get you, in terms... It, it totally makes sense in terms of the orders. The thing that I think to straightaway is actually Facebook, which sounds terribly weird, but I'm gonna explain. Um, Facebook obviously had the metric that once you added, I think it was five friends, you were, like, a retained or an engaged user. Thinking about kind of order frequency and cohorts, how do you determine a retained GoPuff user? Is it three orders in a month? Five in a, uh, a w- a week? What is the frequency which shows you that you have a retained user with a behavioral change towards GoPuff?

   2. RIRafael Ilishayev25:11

      Yep. There are actually two ways to look at it, right? Um, a customer that orders across three categories in their first order will spend $600 more than, that year, than a customer that orders from one or two categories. So it's not just-

   3. HSHarry Stebbings25:27

      Wow.

   4. RIRafael Ilishayev25:28

      ... how fre- it's not just how frequent they order. It's what is, the first time, the very first time they get into GoPuff, what is their shopping behavior? So are they coming into the, with the intent of, "Hey," like, you know, "I heard this place has really great ice cream. I'm gonna buy a pint of ice cream." That customer on this, this, their first year will spend less money than a customer that comes and buys their ice cream and also buys a snack and also buys some, some household items and maybe some medicine. Right? Three or more categories means significantly more spend that first year. So what we try to do, um, is, uh, breed better discovery on the first experience, right? Give a broader, uh, uh, broader kind of category, uh, discovery, right, when we, when you launch GoPuff, especially on a new time customer. And also, we try to drive behavior to get to two orders in the first 14 days. That's really, really important. So, like, what you're seeing is that you have your biggest drop-off from order one to order two. Then you have a smaller drop-off from order two to order three. And once they get to the third order, uh, they're, they're our customer. Right? They're not, they're not leaving GoPuff, right? If you look at, you know, order three, get, customers that made it over three, and you look at the retention cohorts over the next 12 months, we're losing like low double di- low, low, I'm sorry, low single digit percent of our customers, like 2%, 3%. So once they get to order three, right, they're, they're ours. The, the, the struggle is not just getting them to order three, but getting them to order q- three quickly. So, like, if you're getting to, from order one-

   5. HSHarry Stebbings27:05

      I, I-

   6. RIRafael Ilishayev27:05

      ... to order two in-

   7. HSHarry Stebbings27:07

      So-

   8. RIRafael Ilishayev27:07

      Go ahead. In, like, 60 days, uh-

   9. HSHarry Stebbings27:10

      What can you do to drive that up?

   10. RIRafael Ilishayev27:12

       You-

   11. HSHarry Stebbings27:12

       Yeah, what, what can you do to drive that into order three?

   12. RIRafael Ilishayev27:15

       You, you, you do ins- in- instead of, instead of doing an incentive, right, you know, us, like many other e-commerce players used to do an incentive only off, off one order, right? All of our incentives now are, uh, value over time, right? We built gamification into our, into our platform where daily, you could come in. You could spin the wheel, uh, get, uh, Free Puff points, uh, which can be then used for, for prizes. You can win things in the Spin the Wheel, like, uh, you know, White Claw sponsored a Tesla. So one customer is gonna, is gonna get a free Tesla, uh, or Live Nation tickets, uh, on a global scale to see their favorite artist. So, like, we give people a reason to keep coming back, even not to purchase, to just keep coming back in the app and utilize it. We've built challenges within the map, so missions. Uh, if you start, you order three times in a row, you get increased amount of, uh, of, uh, of points, which then can be redeemed for prizes. And one of the single largest driving factors is we improved FAM tremendously. So we started the year with 11% of our subscribers being FAM customers. So FAM is our subscription program. Uh, two quarters later, 11% has now become 30%. So 30% now of our, of our order in customers are FAM customers, and their behavior, especially if we get them on their first order, is wildly different than customers that don't sign up to FAM, right, whether it's a first, second, or third order. So we believe we're just getting started there. We believe the, you know, steady state number is, you know, north of 55% or 60%. On the, on the-

   13. HSHarry Stebbings28:50

       Can I, sorry, can I just dive in and interrupt?

   14. RIRafael Ilishayev28:52

       Of course.

   15. HSHarry Stebbings28:53

       C- couple of things I just wanna touch on. I, I, I use GoPuff a lot. Uh, (laughs) I'm not gonna say how much. (laughs) Um, but, uh, uh, I use GoPuff a lot, and I've never seen the points. And I, obviously I have them. Is that a product mistake of GoPuff's, respectfully, that I didn't know there was a point system and I didn't see the incentives, respectfully?

   16. RIRafael Ilishayev29:15

       Uh, I'll, I'll tell you, we, we don't do as good of a job, uh, I'm assuming, Harry, you order most of your orders in the UK. Uh, we don't do as good of a job on the product side in the EU, uh, on the point side, uh, from a priority perspective. They've been prioritizing, rightfully so, discovery and new categories rather than loyalty. Um, we're gonna have a more... Th- there's some things that, from a copy and paste standpoint, didn't work from the US to Europe. Um, so we said, you know, we're gonna have a very, very local approach, uh, assortment building, right? Like (laughs) you got, you, you had to build a very local assortment, uh, in-market, uh, and I think we learned that the hard way when we just launched, uh, in, uh, in Europe for the first time. But there's some things that work really well on the global scale, and, uh, I think we should prioritize loyalty in, uh, in Europe in a bigger way, uh, the same way we do in the US. That's gonna change over the next, uh, throughout

10. 30:15 – 32:15

    Pricing of GoPuff membership

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev30:15

       the end of the year. Uh, we're gonna make that a lot more evident in our, specifically in our UK markets.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings30:20

       Can I push you on the FAM side too? And I'm sorry. I didn't mean to push you, but, like, have you done testing and wha- how much does it cost to be a FAM member? I, I am in the UK, but I can't remember how much it costs-

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev30:31

       Uh, 500, I think.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings30:31

       ... which isn't part of my point, but how much is it?

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev30:34

       ... $6 a month.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings30:35

       Have you done price elasticity testing on that $6 a month? Because if you increase-

    7. RIRafael Ilishayev30:40

       We, we literally have a test running right now.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings30:41

       ... to 10, I wouldn't know.

    9. RIRafael Ilishayev30:43

       A- a- a- a- as we speak, we have a test running right now.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings30:45

        Yeah.

    11. RIRafael Ilishayev30:46

        So it's, it's out, it's out in the wild.

    12. HSHarry Stebbings30:48

        'Cause I think on that-

    13. RIRafael Ilishayev30:50

        Yeah, uh-

    14. HSHarry Stebbings30:51

        It's one of those ones where you could unbelievably increase revenues without changing a thing beautifully.

    15. RIRafael Ilishayev30:58

        Yep. So we actually, we haven't seen a big drop on conversion on price. The question is, is what the behavior looks like two, three, four months out. Does that customer continue staying a customer at a higher price point where we think consumer spending is gonna get affected over the next couple of quarters? So, you know, where I believe the world is gonna head is in the next two or three quarters, the customer's gonna get more price-conscious. You know, they're gonna have less disposable income, and they're gonna start making decisions on what are the most important things in their life. And the way that we've structured Gopuff is it, like, a- and FAM specifically, it's, like, a no-brainer to be a part of FAM. It's very, very affordable. You get a lot of value for it as, as a byproduct. But in general, Gopuff is very, very affordable, right? It's in line to what people see in traditional retail from a pricing perspective. And, you know, the last thing that we wanted to do in a r- you know, is start increasing fees and pricing in a way where, you know, today it doesn't matter, but two or three quarters where consumer spending starts getting affected, they're like, "Well, Gopuff is too expensive for me to, to continue to be, you know, either a subscription customer or, you know, such an active customer."

11. 32:15 – 34:22

    Consumer behavior in a downturn

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev32:16

    2. HSHarry Stebbings32:16

       Does it change your inventory? Do you think about, hey, how do we introduce more... Uh, you know, we have Poundland in the UK. I guess it would be Dollar General in the US. But, like, very much, like, very dollar-centric products which shine on that, it's a dollar each. Do you think about changing inventory in that way or not?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev32:37

       Yeah, I've been studying a lot, uh, the past two recessions that have been happening in the US, and, you know, what are the industries that grew through recessions. Um, alcohol is particularly resistant to, uh, any effects of an economic downturn. I think people... You know, it's funny, we were joking. People, I think, drink when they're happier, they drink when they're sad. Uh, I think the, the type of alcohol that's purchased, uh, during a recession is different, right? People are not gonna be buying your $200, $300 price tag item, but they're gonna be buying more of your $15, $20 price point items. So, I actually don't think baskets are gonna change from a, from a dollar amount perspective, but the assortment inside of the basket is gonna change, right? More of the kind of budget, uh, budget bottles, uh, but more quantity, versus one kind of high-ticket, high-end item. So, we've been leaning into alcohol, uh, in a really big way. Convenience also grew, um, during the last recession, uh, you know, especially a few categories within convenience. Vices do very well. So we've been focused on, you know, studying the trends of the two pre- uh, previous recessions. The best data we have. I've never lived through a recession. The closest thing I've had, uh, to e- economic downturn was on a micro basis, you know, because we didn't raise any money, uh, in the beginning, so we had to behave like we were in a recession, uh, Yagir and I, because we had no money. Uh, but we actually never lived as, as CEOs through, through a recession. So we've been studying, you know, the last, the last two times it happened, you know, how did people behave? And we've been building, uh, continuing to build an assortment that

12. 34:22 – 38:35

    Why did you pull out of Spain?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev34:22

       kind of matches those kind of behaviors.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings34:24

       Can I ask, before we touch on kind of leadership through more ma- macro challenging times, um, we said we're friendlies and so we can do this, but I'm just, I was interested. Why did you pull out of Spain?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev34:36

       I don't think we should have ever launched Spain. This is, like, Hari, me being very, very honest with you. Uh, we got into Spain via the Deeja acquisition, and we probably should have pulled out immediately instead of waiting to pull out. I think as, as a founder, when you're in the midst of a bull market and everything is going great and your core US business is rocking and, you know, things are just piling on top of each other, good things, I'm talking about, piling on top of each other, and everyone is telling you to do more, right, because you've shown a, a massive track record of o- operational excellence, um, you kind of get, uh, this idea that you could take on more than you should take on. And we've always had a nail it then scale it mentality. And Spain was a scale it then nail it strategy. Right? We should have, what we really should have done in, in Europe is we should have owned the UK, right? We're now, like, I think 25% market share in the UK in instant needs. You know, that and the next two months will be in the low to mid-30s. Right? We're gonna continue to grow and kind of dominate, dominate there. We should have become the number one player in the UK, own the UK, then expand it to our next country. You know, that's what we did in the US as we continued to kind of expand throughout states, we used to own a market, entirely own a market, kill everybody in there, and then kind of continue to, to expand. And that strategy played out to be super fruitful because we opened up New York, for example, last. Right? And a lot of people thought that, like, you know, "You guys are way too late. There's so many players." Right? We own 70% of the instant needs market in New York right now. It's not, it's not, it's not even close to the number two player, even though we're the last player to come in, because we really, pardon my language, we had our shit together in a, in a, in a very, very deep way. And-... that's the way we should have handled Europe, right, in hindsight, right? But no one has a crystal ball, right? No one, a year ago, could have told you in the midst of a bull market that we'd be going through this kind of economic downturn, and maybe it wouldn't have mattered, right? If we continued to stay through a bull market and people continue to value, uh, kind of growth over consolidated EBITDA. Uh, but, you know, here we are.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings36:56

       Had you known that it was coming, is there anything else you would have d- wh- what else would you have done differently? Like, closing Spain straightaway would have been one. Is there anything else that you would have done differently?

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev37:07

       Probably wouldn't have tested as many things as we've tested, right? I, I mentioned pharmacy to you as one. It's like, i- it's not even the money aspect, the distraction factor for the team, um, like not focusing on the- the things that matter most. Like, I mentioned kitchens earlier. We probably opened up too many kitchens too fast. Like, right now, we're o- we're ready to open up a lot more kitchens, right, because the business is so well-oiled and Stortman is right, Emilia who's running that team, uh, she's done a really, really phenomenal job at continuing to scale that business. So like, i- in general, we were moving very, very fast because the market was rewarding us for moving fast, right, because we continued to deliver in a really big way. Yoqir and I continue to over-deliver in the things that we do. We had a really great team around us and the market's like, you know, "Why is..." It, it, it... We did everything that like, you know, even our investors every... We, we've been doing even more, right? We were saying no so much. They're like, "You should," y- you know, "What about Southeast Asia? What about Japan? What about, you know, the rest of Europe?" (laughs) We said no so much to things, but in hindsight, we probably should have said no even more and just really focused on the things that we're exceptional at instead of, you know, continuing to l- Innovation is good, but innovation just for the sake of innovation is not good. You know what I mean? Innovate where it's important for the customer and where the customer really wants and, uh, it's a, it's a funny

13. 38:35 – 40:58

    Could this recession be good for you?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev38:35

       thing, right? You get rewarded as a byproduct.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings38:39

       My one question though, actually, when I look at it is, is this time... And, you know, listen, a recession is always horrible, people lose jobs, it's not a nice thing, obviously. But is this time actually secretly good for you? And what I mean by that, and I say this as your friend, but if I analyze the last two years, bluntly, the competition I don't think served you well. I think, you know, the likes of local players in the UK made you go to the 10-minute delivery when... Or try and do the 10-minute delivery when it wasn't optimal. It obviously increased counts for everyone. E- Do you actually think that this period will cause a lot of people to not be in business anymore and only the strong survive?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev39:19

       I think any business across any industry that's not focused on profitability is cooked. And Instant Needs is no, um, is no exception. So, I think, I'll touch on your earlier point, right? It is, uh, an incredibly sad moment, uh, as a founder to have to say goodbye to people that you personally hired. That's gonna happen kind of on a macro basis across the board, uh, in a lot of companies.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings39:50

       Sure.

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev39:51

       And, yeah, for sure, right? It's like on a, on a human level, it's, uh, pretty sad that a lot of folks are gonna lose their jobs and, um, you know, hopefully will, will rebound in a big way. As it relates to Instant Needs, I think a lot more people are gonna find it really hard to stay in business, especially the people that are today, which is, you know, a, a good majority that are thinking that this is not so bad, right? You know, "We're gonna, we're gonna come out the other side of this, uh, really strong or this is gonna be over in a quarter or two." And Harry, who knows? Very much i- i- in- You know, again, no one has a crystal ball, no one knows, uh, you know, what's gonna happen in the future. But, you know, my experience, I've seen that paranoid found- founders are usually the founders that win, right? The ultra-paranoid, right, that are prepared for anything, right, the, uh, are usually the ones that win. And, you know, that's how we're tr- treating it, where we're, we're ready for anything that, uh, uh, the macro throws at us. And we're building, uh, towards

14. 40:58 – 43:18

    Is this an acquisition opportunity for you?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev40:58

       a business that's completely self-funded.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings41:01

       Is this an acquisition opportunity for you? With many of these players really looking for exits, we've seen them looking for exits. We- we- we're both in the business. (laughs) We've seen them shopping around and their brokers shopping around. Is this one where you're like, "Actually, we have real opportunity to buy something at a good price here that wouldn't be around without us buying them?"

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev41:22

       You know, yes and no, um, and the reason being is like it's such a massive distraction to integrate a shitty business.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings41:31

       (laughs)

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev41:33

       Uh, and, uh, you know, s- some, some of these businesses have a decent amount of customers and it just makes sense to, to think about acquiring them for the user base, right? Which is very different than, you know, in our business, a logistical, tech logistical business. Um, to acquire a business that, uh, you know, doesn't have really good infrastructure, doesn't have really good tech, you have to scrap everything, you have to integrate your systems, you go into their buildings, their buildings are, you know, they're trash, right? They're not big enough or they have the wrong equipment and they're set up all incorrect. Like, the, the distraction of, of having to do this, it, the juice is just not worth the squeeze s- you know, nine out of ten times. But at one out of ten, right, where you had a really strong founder or a group of founders and are very hungry, that are really focused on building the right kind of business, that's worth looking at. We saw that in Deja, we saw that in Fancy where, uh, you know, not even necessarily the businesses were very big or strong, but the founders were so good and they matched our values so well, that it just made sense to integrate. Now, today, uh, in today's environment, we're, we're being very, very picky, right? Bring on businesses that j- just...... have not set up that same correct infrastructure that we want them to. And two, frankly, like, you know, we don't want to inherit, you know, the losses that this business has. Right? And sometimes those losses are massive, right? We're a very small business, from, from a revenue perspective, with very, very large losses. So, you know, it, it's gotta be right is, is the, uh, long and short way

15. 43:18 – 45:13

    What does Instant Delivery look like in 2-3 years?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev43:18

       of answering that.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings43:20

       Two to three years out, what does the, the space look like?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev43:27

       You know, I think, you know, I'm obviously biased. (laughs) But-

    4. HSHarry Stebbings43:31

       Really? No. (laughs)

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev43:33

       I'm, uh, I've, I obviously, I obviously have a bias, but i-... you know, try- trying to be as, uh, as unbiased as I can, is the instant needs world is very, very complicated. And I think, you know, at least from my standpoint, right, uh, on, on the Gopuff side, uh, you know, we all kind of have a chip on our shoulder. Right? Uh, a lot of people say, you know, this business can't be profitable. You know, two decades ago, Webvan! and Cosmo, uh, you know, couldn't make it, so today, two decades later, all these players, uh, plus Gopuff who sh- who started this thing, you know, it's, it's, it remains to be seen whether this could be an even a profitable business. And I think that puts a massive chip on our shoulder, on Nikir and I's. First of all, 'cause we built a profitable business. We were profitable for three years. And second of all, I have, you know, a near 100% degree of confidence that we're gonna do it again in the next 18 months. So, we have a massive chip on our shoulder, right, on, uh, kind of delivering that and proving, uh, to, to everyone that this is not just a, an amazing consumer business, not just something that consumers really love, but a very profitable business and sustainable business. So, I think, to answer your question, the folks that are thinking that way, you know, will be here to stay. Right? I think on top of all of that, we're gonna continue to be the number one, uh, global player, um, but, you know, anyone else that, uh, positions themselves to build really strong economics and profitability,

16. 45:13 – 46:40

    Amazon is the competition we admire

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev45:13

       uh, will have a right to compete in this space.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings45:16

       Final, final one before I quick-fire, and it's incredibly fair, so don't worry. Um, if you were to choose one competitor that you most admire, who would it be?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev45:26

       You know, I think for us, since day one, when we, when we launched Gopuff, we have looked a... uh, you know, almost in awe at Amazon, obviously. Like, I'm talking about not, not from, from the in- instant needs space, but from a global e-commerce perspective. Everything that, that we saw from Amazon and Bezos, why we hired so many people from Amazon, is 'cause we have an immense amount of respect for what they've built, right? Uh, specifically in the US, getting into any industry they see fit, and then, uh, for many years dominating that industry, uh, was something that we drew a lot of inspiration from. So, I think, you know, not even in our industry, I think it's probably the, the most complicated and amazing business in the world. Right? And I think what they've built from, uh, a logistical perspective and then, uh, expanding to new business units, right, whether it's, uh, FBA or AWS, uh, is something that we take a lot of inspiration from as we launch our new businesses, right, whether it's Gopuff Ads or some of the new businesses

17. 46:40 – 51:35

    What new GoPuff verticle will perform best in next 2-3 years?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev46:40

       we have brewing that are, that are launching in the next two quarters or so.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings46:44

       If you were to place a bet on new business growth for your new business lines, it could be ads, it could be kitchens, it could be any of the others, what in the next two to three years do you think will be the biggest from where it is today?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev46:55

       I have one that I can't mention that I think will be the biggest, because we haven't launched it yet, and we haven't talked about it.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings46:59

       Oh, you teaser, you. (laughs)

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev47:02

       And I think, I think that business, uh, one day could be as large as our retail business, or as large as, uh, uh, as large as, you know, Gopuff as it exists today, right? The Gopuff app. Um, I think if we're talking about existing business units that exist today, I think our ads business has done tremendously well, uh, and has, uh, and has grown under, um, under the last couple of quarters. Um, personally, uh, the kitchens business is my favorite business. I order our cauliflower pizza every day. Uh, my wife thinks I'm insane. But, uh, (laughs) I, I enjoy it and I really do think that we built a, an amazing consumer product. And what I love about the kitchens business even more is that, on a standalone, the kitchens business doesn't make sense. So we just launched, you know, kind of Gopuff Kitchens as a standalone business without core Gopuff, right? All of our general merchandise, alcohol, everything else is a byproduct. You just don't have enough basket size to deliver a profitable business. But Gopuff Kitchens married with the core Gopuff assortment together, y- you know, it's, it, it really is something special. Right? You're seeing, in markets where we have Gopuff Kitchens, attachment rates of 20%. So 20% of a- of consolidated orders adding a Kitchens item in there, something that we cook in- inside one of the... So I think that business shows a lot of promise, right? And a lot of growth, and something that consumers obviously really love. So I'm gonna continue to place a really massive bet on that business, even though it is capital-intensive, right? You have to physically build and open up kitchens. But the ROI on those kitchens is becoming better and better, kind of month over month, as we're, we're continuing to refine the assortment and the quality.And then two, it's, it's something that just a net add- net positive additive to, to the overall business, right? It increases retent-... It's very rare that you introduce a category that improves retention, improves frequency, and improves basket. Alcohols was one of those, uh, one of those categories. The goPuff Kitchens business is another one of those categories that improves all and moves all three KPIs in the right direction.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings49:20

       Listen, I totally get you. Uh, final, final one, I promise. Has there been, uh, o- one investment have you disagreed with the board on making? And it doesn't mean there's, like, a board disagreement but, like, you know, board members have, "I think we should focus on ads. I think we should focus on kitchens. I think we should focus on..." Has there been one where you've disagreed?

    7. RIRafael Ilishayev49:38

       I don't think... Disagreement probably is the wrong word, but, you know, I think midpoint last year, there was a lot of conversations, not just with our board but investors, on how fast we should be moving in Europe. And a lot of folks were really pushing us to expand to Germany faster, uh, expand to other areas in Europe faster, and I'm really glad that we didn't. So it wasn't, it wasn't very much a d- it was more of a conversation than anything else on, like, you know, y- how fast should we be moving in Europe and how many countries can we open up. Because, like, it's, it's like, uh... Yeah, it's funny, right? Th- th- the, you, you do well, right, and you start producing results. You know, people are just like, you know, "Just keep replicating that," right? You get, get some pattern recognition, "Just keep replicating what you've been doing." Uh, but it's not always that simple, right, on just (laughs) you know, kinda continuing to layer... Again, it, it doesn't match our, our core ke- tenet of nail it and scale it. So, I think that's probably been the only one in the last year where, you know, we've had conversations about how fast we should be moving in Europe, how much we're expanding. I think obviously today everyone's looking back and saying, uh, good that we didn't (laughs) and good that we're, we're, we stayed focused. Again, in hindsight, probably should've been, had it a l- a little bit more focused if we knew this was gonna happen on a bull market basis.

    8. HSHarry Stebbings51:08

       No, I totally get you. Ra- Raf, I could talk to you all day, as you know. Um, we really should do this with a... Every question I ask, you have to do a Don Julio 42, and every question I answer, I can do-

    9. RIRafael Ilishayev51:20

       Oh, man.

    10. HSHarry Stebbings51:21

        So, there we go. This will be a much more open interview (laughs) . Your team are gonna be going, "Oh, no (laughs) . Oh, no."

    11. RIRafael Ilishayev51:26

        W- yeah, a, a big 15 minutes in we're gonna have a hard time talking to one another.

    12. HSHarry Stebbings51:30

        Uh, listen, I'm gonna do a quick fire round, which means you're screwed if we do a tequila shot. But, um,

18. 51:35 – 52:25

    What gets harder and what gets easier with scale?

    1. HSHarry Stebbings51:35

       uh, a- and so I say a short statement and you give me your immediate thoughts. What gets harder and what gets easier with scale?

    2. RIRafael Ilishayev51:41

       What gets harder i- i- y- you know, is managing people and culture, right? You have to be even more transparent and you have to spend, uh, an even bigger time with your team to make sure that everyone has the same vision and understanding of what you're going through. What gets easier, right, at least for us, we don't have to live in warehouses anymore.

    3. HSHarry Stebbings52:01

       (laughs)

    4. RIRafael Ilishayev52:02

       So, uh, so I think just living accommodations got easier for, for Ikir and I. I think all jokes aside, right, um, it's a different kind of hard work. You know, Ikir and I still spend a day and a week inside of the MFC every single week. All right? We travel to a new MFC and we visit it. So, I think it's a core and important part of who we are. Uh, but, you

19. 52:25 – 53:30

    What do you know now that you wish you knew at the start?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev52:25

       know, the physical labor gets easier. The mental labor gets a lot harder.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings52:28

       Tell me, what do you know now that you wish you'd known at the start of goPuff?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev52:32

       You gotta, uh, hire taller, faster. And taller doesn't mean, like, a person that comes from a pedigree of a background, but a person that has deep subject matter expertise in a, in a given topic. So, uh, you know, all the advancements that we made on the routing side, for example, we hired subject matter expertise, routing started with hiring expertise, you know, seven years ago instead of five years ago or four years ago, we'd probably be even more advanced today. So, you know, I think, you know, kinda given the state we were in our first three years of being bootstrapped, we had to be very, very careful on the, the talent we bring on board because of how much it costs. If we hired some of that talent earlier, especially on the engineering and product side, we woulda been even further... I mean, like, you know, we're, we're the furthest ahead out of any instant needs player by a massive margin, uh, but that w- margin would be even wider

20. 53:30 – 54:38

    Who is your closest mentor?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev53:30

       if, uh, if we were able to hire them earlier.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings53:33

       Uh, penultimate one. Who's your closest mentor and what have you learnt from them?

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev53:37

       So, Ikir and I, uh, have been really, really fortunate, uh... You know, we're cognizant of the fact that we're 29 and, uh, the way that we've gotten to the place where we got into is by surrounding ourselves by the best people. And I don't wanna upset anyone because we have a lot of people that we're very close, but I'm gonna mention someone because you spoke to them, was, which is Emile. Uh, Emile Michael has been a close friend and advisor to Ikir and I for five years, six years now. And he's probably the best deal maker in the world. Uh, you know, I think some people would wanna argue about that, but, you know, I firmly believe that. And he's been nothing, besides being an ally and a close advisor and everything, he's been an amazing friend to, to Ikir and I. So-

    4. HSHarry Stebbings54:24

       I have to-

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev54:24

       ... I don't want to say it anywhere else, but he's been, he's been really, really awesome.

    6. HSHarry Stebbings54:28

       I have to thank you. After our chat I said, "Hey, would you, uh, would you like to come on the show? You, you're very brilliant." And he said, "I would love to." Uh, and so, uh, I'm pleased that we're gonna make that one happen thanks to you.

    7. RIRafael Ilishayev54:36

       Yeah, Emile's great. I can't wait till this

21. 54:38 – 55:51

    Where will GoPuff be in 5 years?

    1. RIRafael Ilishayev54:38

       air episode.

    2. HSHarry Stebbings54:39

       Um, it'll be good. Uh, final one for you, my friend. Where is goPuff in five years time? Very simple.

    3. RIRafael Ilishayev54:46

       Well, in the US, uh, I think, uh, we are the undisputed leader in instant needs, right? We cover a third of the US. Hopefully that number is much higher in, uh, in five years. And we've broken into and becoming the dominant player in a lot more categories, right? Again, I have never thought that I'd be an authority in the baby and pet category. I think I'm gonna be seeing, in five years, you know, a lot more categories than I ever thought that I'd be an authority in. Uh, but we're an authority in, uh, the, five years from now. I think on a global scale we're continuing to, to dominate expansion. But I think this time around, we're gonna own a market entirely and then open up other markets that we're then gonna own entirely before expanding to new markets. So, I don't know how many markets that includes, but, uh, you know, we're excited to see. Excited to see this thing unfold.

    4. HSHarry Stebbings55:41

       Raf, I could chat to you all day. Next time, third time lucky it comes with tequila. But thank you so much, and this has been fantastic.

    5. RIRafael Ilishayev55:48

       Harry, you're the best, man.

Episode duration: 55:52