How A 28 Year Old MISFIT Built A $30.7M Business From His Laptop (And You Can Too!) | Rob The Bank

Rob The Bank 0:00 If you have a TikTok, you can put out three videos and the third video gets two million views, and you just made $20,000 off your product launch. So if you can learn that content style, I don't know how you can fail. It- it's painfully simple. Everything comes full circle when you're who you're supposed to be. Like, I just, I focused on me. I didn't... It, it's so cliche, but I didn't spend time, you know, obsessing over girls or chasing these things. Like, I was focused on my individual glow up, and it just showed how easy all of the other things tend to fall into place.

Calum Johnson 0:28 Let's say that I found the, the winning product.

Rob The Bank 0:30 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 0:31 I've then developed, like, a unique product which is 3%. Let's even say it's 5%, 7% better.

Rob The Bank 0:37 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 0:37 What are the actual practical steps of me now promoting that product on TikTok?

Rob The Bank 0:42 I'll break down the step-by-step for building a multimillion dollar company in this era.

Calum Johnson 0:47 Okay. So six months ago I shared on this channel that I had this crazy goal of hitting 100,000 subscribers. Well, it's not as crazy as I thought. At the time when I said that, we had 3,000 subscribers, and we're so close right now to hitting 100,000. So please help us out with this goal, this crazy dream that I had. Hit that subscribe button. Here's where I wanted

Calum Johnson 1:09 to start, 'cause Rob Oliver, people might know you as Rob The Bank.

Rob The Bank 1:12 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:13 Um, and I wanted to read this tweet that you wrote. You said, "In the last 10 years, I've nearly lost my business, sold it later for $30 million, dodged cancer, became a father of two, found God during dark times." You then go on to say that, "These past 10 years have been a crazy ride, and it all started with my dad." And so that's where I wanted to begin, that last part. When you reflect on the story, and it's a crazy story. It could be a movie, right?

Rob The Bank 1:43 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:45 Why do you say that it starts with your dad? Why is that the starting place?

Rob The Bank 1:48 Well, I think that was my inspiration. Like, b- biologically you're, you're born from your father, but to see the platform that my dad kind of gave me. You know, he started with, he was born in a tent in Tennessee, and first father or first child of five kids. Mom was 14 when he had him, and that was kind of my baseline for seeing work ethic every single day.

Calum Johnson 2:14 Mm.

Rob The Bank 2:14 Like, that was a guy that just blue collar, put in the time, 30, 40 years, you know, as long as I saw him growing up, that was just self-made and self-built. And he, he's not, like, crazy, crazy, you know, multimillionaire or anything like that, but just to see someone take kind of this idea of, like, the American dream and make that shit happen while everyone around him is, like, addicted to meth and falling apart.

Calum Johnson 2:37 Mm.

Rob The Bank 2:38 And so that was always kind of my springboard, and really my competition in life too in a lot of ways, which sounds uncomfortable to say about your father, but it's like, you know, if, if someone took it from zero to one, I need to take it from, from one to two. Um, and that, that's really where my, my story starts.

Calum Johnson 2:54 Mm. I'm curious, that is an interesting thing to say, right?

Rob The Bank 2:56 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 2:57 That your, your dad is almost your competition.

Rob The Bank 2:59 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 2:59 But I think, I think there's something in that, in the, in the father and son, and you wanna take kind of the legacy that they've built and then take it forward. I'm curious where that, where did that thought first start? Like, is there an experience? Is there a moment where you were like, "I'll-"

Rob The Bank 3:12 Yeah, it's, it's, it's become reality. I, I take pride in saying things that I think a lot of people maybe think or it's, like, deep down in there, but it's so uncomfortable to say you'd never, you'd never actually say it. And then one of those examples is when I sold my business, the Genius Brand, you know, multiple eight-figure thing, he had a distribution company which was, like, totally different that he had built over 30 years, and was much smaller than Genius, and we sold our businesses right around the same time.

Calum Johnson 3:38 Mm.

Rob The Bank 3:38 I sold mine first for, for more, more money. And, like, believe it or not, he's proud of me, but there was also a level of like, "Whoa, what the fuck?" You know?

Calum Johnson 3:48 Mm.

Rob The Bank 3:48 Like, like, um... And so I, I just, I've been through a lot of different father moments, if you will, that, um, there's, like, this duality in it that anyone out there that has a, a relationship, like, with their dad, it can be confrontational, it can be out- Like, he's been my worst enemy and my best friend, and my biggest supporter and, like, the person I've hated the most. And I don't think enough people talk about that.

Calum Johnson 4:10 Mm.

Rob The Bank 4:10 But I think it's one of the defining things in so many of our lives. Like, if you look back, I share a lot of those traits that he has that I probably can't stand. And the fact I have those traits is also probably why he butts heads with me, right? And so we just have these different worldviews that have shaped with, like, a fundamental underlying personality, and, um, u- it's, it's made me.

Calum Johnson 4:31 Mm. You know, I'm curious. I'm curious to get into kind of the, the early years. Um, and it's interesting, right? Like, when we think about school or we think about high school-

Rob The Bank 4:39 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 4:39 ... you almost have, like, these different archetypes

Calum Johnson 4:41 of what the kids are like, right?

Rob The Bank 4:42 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 4:42 You have, like, the jock, like, the cool kids, you have the nerd, the loser, the loner.

Rob The Bank 4:47 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 4:47 Um, the ones that, like, struggle getting girls. I'm, I'm curious for you, what kind of kid were you? Like, if I'd gone back to your school and observed, like, what would I have seen?

Rob The Bank 4:58 I mean, I was a misfit in every way. I didn't fit in. So picture sophomore year, I'm fi- and now I'm 6'4", like, good athlete, like, do all these things, but sophomore year I'm 5'3". I grew up, basketball was my life, so I'm naturally in just kind of that, that culture. And so I'm this 5'3" kid who doesn't necessarily get in with, like, any of the white kids, but then on the, [laughs] like, on the Black side, like, I'm not, like, super accepted there. And so I was just this little misfit. I mean, 5, 5'3". And then junior year I'm still, like, 5'7". And I mean, girls was, like, the biggest struggle of my life. I- that's the age you start crushing on everyone, and I used to have this confidence about me. I still do. I, like, I've tried to brainwash myself in a way that, like, I think it's important. We can talk about that later. But even back then, you know, like, I, I didn't mind shooting a shot. Basketball court, I'd shoot the shot. Girl I like, I'd shoot the shot. I've told this story a couple times, but, like, one of the hardest moments for me my sophomore year, I'd just moved to the new public school in my area and there was this, the one girl I really liked and I'd, you know, had math class with her and we kind of built, like, a little relationship. In her eyes in hindsight it's obviously just, like, this is my little- ... cute, dorky friend, in my mind I'm like, "Yeah, I can, you know, I can, like, pull this," right? And, uh, there was a song I like. I love music, and, uh, the lyrics, like, really resonated with me for her, you know? And I'm like, "Oh, this is perfect." And I remember writing her a little love note, and going and handing it to her. And, um, like, but kind of running off. Like, I didn't stand there and wait, but I could s- I still had visibility of her, and she was with her friends. And I remember she looked and, like, read it to the group and they all laughed. And she kinda like crinkled it. Like, didn't fully tear it, but just kinda crinkled it, and it was like-

Calum Johnson 6:41 Mm

Rob The Bank 6:41 ... oh. And that shit made my heart, like, sink. Like, I felt this sick, disgusting, whatever feeling. And pretty much from there until later senior year, I, I had very little success with women.

Calum Johnson 6:55 Mm. You know what's interesting, actually, you mentioned that you were, like, you were a misfit.

Rob The Bank 6:59 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 6:59 And I think when you were younger, it's difficult to be a misfit because you wanna be, you kind of, you're, you're feeding into all of these things. Like, you wanna be liked, you wanna be popular, you want other kids to like you, you want the girls to like you. And so when an experience like that happens, what is the effect of Rob Olive- on Rob Oliver in sophomore year? Like, what does that do to your confidence?

Rob The Bank 7:23 Here's the truth. I think we're all inherently individuals and misfits in some capacity. Society is engineered in a young way, 'cause you said in high school, right?

Calum Johnson 7:32 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 7:32 That you just desire to fit in. Bro, that h- that, that shit's more relevant as you get out of high school, you're trying to find your entrepreneur group or you're trying to find your coworkers. Like, we seek to be a part of a group, and so we often compromise our personality and who we are, and more importantly, what we have to bring to the world the more we fall into that. And there's reasons for it. There's social expectations. Like, if you walk around, like a, like a goth with, you know, like, heavy clothes, what's the chance you're gonna get a tech job?

Calum Johnson 7:58 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 7:58 Like, zero, right? So we're, we're forced to conform to this new world that isn't necessarily us, and in the process we lose ourselves. And we're not living for who we wanna be, and we lose that independence. And so that's kinda my, my personal brand nowadays, the whole Rob The Bank thing, it's been like I have this luxury of having made enough money in my mid-20s where I can kinda stand up and, and be who I wanna be, but most importantly, hopefully be a symbol for anyone else out there who wants to be them. Because, I mean, hate is abundant. It, it comes nonstop. But the more in tune you are with who you're supposed to be, the better off your life tends to, tends to get. Like, and that's, that's me saying that firsthand. And so I guess that's kinda ... [laughs] That was a long answer there, but that's my general message to people, is, like, embrace that natural misfit tendency. Don't fall into the crowd, no matter what. And it's really hard in high school. Like, like-

Calum Johnson 8:53 Mm

Rob The Bank 8:53 ... that's, that's where the pain is. But if you felt that pain, just know that's gonna be a blessing later on. 'Cause if I didn't go through all those experiences and get ostracized or outcast, like, I wouldn't have had the, um, awareness or vision to create my own company. 'Cause it happened again when I'm s- started building my business. You know, this is the cliche entrepreneur story, but the second you go all in on something with passion, y- you, you lose people, you lose friends, and they talk shit at first. Like, all those little gimmicky entrepreneurial quotes about, like, first they laugh, then they ask you how you did it, like, that's all for real. I'm sure you're, you know, you're running this up.

Calum Johnson 9:27 100%.

Rob The Bank 9:27 I'm sure you've got friends back home like, "Good luck with the little podcast," or whatever, right? Like, it's cute. And now you're gonna break 100,000 subs, and they're kinda like, "Oh, you know, he's for real."

Calum Johnson 9:36 Mm.

Rob The Bank 9:36 But that, that's kinda my message. I hope just to embrace that misfit nature.

Calum Johnson 9:40 Yeah. No, I love that. That is so true. Um, you know what? I wanna get, I wanna get into the Rob The Bank stuff and the entrepreneurial rise. Before we do, though, I'm curious, like, so you go through this experience. Uh, it's soul-crushing, right? And you talk about the fact that you're, you're a misfit. You grew up a misfit. And the point that you are now, I can tell even in the way you dress, the way you present yourself, your brand, you've fully leaned into it. Like-

Rob The Bank 10:08 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 10:08 ... you've embraced it. But it doesn't always start like that, and I, and I felt that firsthand, right? Like, there's certain moments where you almost kind of lean into trying to be like everyone else, trying to please the crowd.

Rob The Bank 10:20 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 10:21 And so I'm curious, when you reflect on, on your early story, is there a moment where, in your mind, it's kinda the time where it's almost like you lost yourself a bit, like you started trying to play into the crowds or, like, trying to lean into being like everyone else? Like, what, what comes to mind?

Rob The Bank 10:39 Yeah, I mean, I'd say, I'd say throughout life, yeah, I mean, for, for sure. You think back, like, even, you know, early college I'm looking back at how I dressed, or even, even those years. You know, I mean, I think that's where I got criticized half the time. Like, basketball was my life, bro. Like, I'm trying to make that varsity team. I played on good AU teams growing up. And so I'm dressing like basketball players [laughs] like, for, for lack of a better ... You know, like, it's more, it's more street. And, like, that was where I was leaned into, and then any of my white friends, I was, like, kinda friends with those groups, they're, like, they're not treating me the same. And so I remember one day I went to, like, fucking Abercrombie and I'm like, "Maybe this is how I need to be dressing," you know? And I'm like, "God, why does this store smell so bad? What's going wrong? You know, what's wrong in here?"

Calum Johnson 11:18 Mm.

Rob The Bank 11:18 Um, but it's been a constant accumulation of e- events where I'd say I haven't stuck to me until, like, when I was building that first company, I let go of all that stuff. And that was one of my first times where I got tunnel vision, and it wasn't, like, on style or anything like that. I looked like a dork, but I was living for me. I knew I was living for me. I knew I w- I was living for what I need to do. And kind of as I've rounded into this phase of my career, like, I'm doing the same, but it's a little more ... It's in a, it's in a different way. It's public. Like, I, I buy the things I like. I'm interested in fashion, I'm interested in design, and I have no problem standing behind those things because they're, they're me. Um, and, and I think the more you kinda iterate down to that, we're all one of one at the end of the day. We really are one of one, and the more you iterate to find that individualism, the more fulfilled you're gonna be.

Calum Johnson 12:05 Mm. No, I love that, and it's so true. You know what? I think, I think it's interesting even when I look back at my own life, there's certain moments, I almost call them, like, trigger moments-

Rob The Bank 12:13 Mm

Calum Johnson 12:13 ... where it was just a sign to me of, like, you have to bet on yourself.

Rob The Bank 12:17 Mm.

Calum Johnson 12:18 Like, you have to go all in on you.

Calum Johnson 12:21 And so I'm curious, when you think back to that and you talk about even the experience of being in, like, in the Abercrombie store trying to dress like these other kids, what was kind of that first moment where you were like, "Fuck that, I'm just going all in on me"? Like, what was the trigger point?

Rob The Bank 12:38 So I've got a couple. Let me, let me tell you a couple good ones. I have one story that I saved, saved for this, 'cause I've told the story about the girl breaking my heart when I was 14 or 15 or whatever. What I don't tell is what happened when I was, like, 23. And I'd been with my, my wife for a, a long time, and there was a breakup where we were not together for six months. And so this girl from my high school, in college, one of the first times I went all in was when I decided that I wanted to play basketball again. So I walked onto that team and it became my life, and I transformed physically. Like, I got jacked. I was a practice player, but, like, my whole life changed. That was, like, my first glow up, right? And I get back after college that, that last year, and I'm working out at my local gym, and that girl's there. And we had, like, a decent relationship. And I remember she comes up to me and my friend and she, like, puts her hand on my shoulder and she says, "Oh my God, Rob, you're like - you've gained, like, 50 pounds of muscle," like something like that. And long story short, I slayed that demon, for lack of a better term, um, [laughs] while I was on a break with my wife. And, um, it just kind of - that was one of the moments, though, where I realized everything comes full circle when you're who you're supposed to be. Like, I just - I focused on me. I didn't - it, it's so cliche, but I didn't spend time, you know, obsessing over girls or chasing these things. Like, I was focused on my individual glow up, and it just showed how easy all of the other things tend to fall into place. And so that was one of the moments. And then I'd say more recently, too, there hasn't been, like, an aha, but it's been the more that I double down on who I'm supposed to be, the better life keeps getting. And that's operating from a place of, like, very natural abundance, that's investing in others around me, that's giving back, that's not being afraid to buy the pants I want or whatever, and things just keep getting better. Like, in, in general, business keeps going better. Like, I've made more money, at least on paper, with some of the brand growth and stuff in the last two years than I did my entire career prior. And it's not like I wasn't successful before that, but that was me going in on me, on, like, you know, truly.

Calum Johnson 14:40 Mm.

Rob The Bank 14:40 And the results speak for it- the, the results speak for themselves.

Calum Johnson 14:43 Mm. I think it's actually the self-improvement is, like, an addictive angle because you, you start doing it and you start seeing the results and what happens, and it just, each win spurs you onto the next win. And you know what? I wanted to share a quote that you put on your Twitter. You said, "Nietzsche was right on the money when he said that the modern man has to literally relearn how to believe in himself. You need to teach yourself to be confident. You do this by taking bets and surpassing your own expectations. Eventually, you build a big enough portfolio of wins to rest your laurels on. Start stacking confidence points now."

Rob The Bank 15:22 Yeah. I think modern society in general, again, it forces conformity. That's why there's, like, this obsessive idea of, like, the Matrix or whatever, which, which I totally reject 'cause I never think it's, uh - it's never been easier to create your own life and design your own life and make money however you want and, and all that stuff. We can talk about that more later. But in today's world, they don't, like, accept someone who stands up and, and wants to claim Ws. You know? That's, that's pushed away. And again, there's so many reasons, like, societally why you shouldn't shoot the shot, why you shouldn't start the business, right? But in reality, this is the greatest place in the world, greatest time in history to be building anything. And it's like, what's the worst case if you fail? Like, I mean, even, even we have bankruptcy law. Like, there, there's literally no downside to starting to stack wins, and we're just - we've gotten so far out of that game it's not even, it's not even funny. And so again, I hope to lean into messages like that because I'm only one person, but if some of these messages become more mainstream ... Have you heard the idea of life maxing which I've been pushing?

Calum Johnson 16:25 Mm. Explain it.

Rob The Bank 16:26 I mean, li- life maxing is just this idea that you need to take your scorecard and you have your different main traits, and then you max all of those out. So it can be business. There's often something physical like, you know, for me it's, it's martial arts. I love to box. Like, I do that several times a week. Um, experiences. And basically you reject this idea of balance in exchange for an obsessive foot on the gas everything in life. Like, even when you're finding peace it's in, like, recovery through, you know, a trip or whatever, but you're constantly investing in all the components of life that are gonna max out your life. And that inherently fuels each thing. Like, every new time I go do an experience like this, you know, flying to New York to do this podcast. I, I, I told you, like, I just, I wanted to come to New York. I wanted to spend some time here. That was a, an investment in an experience. It was an investment in a relationship, but that's gonna come back. And I'm not worried about work-life balance or anything. I'm trying to set up a life where I'm constantly working. And the more that people can align that way in a young age, the better off they're gonna do. The TikTok shop kids are a phenomenal example of this, so we can talk about that later.

Calum Johnson 17:30 Mm. You know what I've realized? The, the default kind of mood or mindset I feel like when I observe a lot of people, and we all fall into this in different stages of our life, is kind of indifference.

Rob The Bank 17:43 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 17:43 It's, like, almost like apathy. It's, like, just, uh-

Rob The Bank 17:46 But in the wrong way.

Calum Johnson 17:47 Mm.

Rob The Bank 17:47 We numb ourselves to the fact we're dying. Like, you go walk the streets of Wall Street right now and even the intern doing the private banking thing, like, he is so focused on that day and getting back to, you know, working his 14-hour day and getting on the couch and just working to be 30 to get that promotion to be the millionaire, to be the ... Like, it's, it's soul-numbing versus crafting out a life where you're indifferent to people, people's opinion of you, right? We're, we're indifferent to the, to the reality that we're gonna die, and you need to be indifferent to the reality that other people's opinions don't matter.

Calum Johnson 18:22 Mm. And I feel like the, the reason I even mention that is that the energy that you bring, it's like you're, you're going after it.

Rob The Bank 18:30 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 18:30 And I can tell even the way that you speak, there's like, it's personal for you.

Rob The Bank 18:34 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 18:35 And I, and I find that interesting. Whenever someone sits in that chair and they're speaking about something, and I can tell it's personal, to me what that signals is that there's some sort of experience. There's some, there's something that's happened in their life that they're like, "I'm not doing this at 50%. I'm gonna do this like my life depends on it," because it does. It's personal. And so that's, I'm kinda curious for that. Like, why, why is, why is it so personal for you, this, this kind of relentless drive to, to self-improve, to get better? Why is that such a strong thing?

Rob The Bank 19:09 I think the biggest question is: what do you want in life? And then when you realize that anything in life requires a certain level of effort and focus if you want it in a meaningful amount of time, then there's truly no other way to behave. I mean, if you wanna build a business, like go through Silicon Valley and you're not gonna see any guys that half-assed it, that did it part-time. If you wanna build a monster podcast, you fucking, you know, you... I know you live and breathe this thing. I, I know. I've seen the growth in a short amount of time. You're a perfect example. But that's just what it takes, and, and it's not, it's not meant to be like the dry Hormozi, like you just need to work a million hours. It's like no, you need to find your passion and your flow, and in that it doesn't even feel like you're working. But if you're not taking that approach, then I don't think there's any point in doing it. Like, I think people spin their wheels a- I know people spin their wheels and waste their time quarter-assing something when in, when they're 80 years old, that will have mattered zero. Whereas building a huge show or building a brand that's gonna live beyond me, those are impactful things, and I would rather put all my time and effort into those. And so I guess I do talk about them very obsessively, but it starts to become second nature when it becomes your life.

Calum Johnson 20:18 Mm. You know what, you mention the point about quarter-assing, like just not, not putting your all into it, and I wanted to, I wanted to read this, um, 'cause you had a moment of that. And you said, "Life was great during college, but then I graduated and I had no idea what to do next. I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur, but at that time I was lost."

Rob The Bank 20:41 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 20:41 "I went through a dark period of my life. I was smoking weed daily, constantly having depressive thoughts. There was no clear path for me to make it." Can, can you just talk about that period?

Rob The Bank 20:52 Yeah, for sure. So I graduated a little bit early. I had like running start credits, and I finished college, and I was like, "You know, I'm gonna take this,

Rob The Bank 21:00 this time off." And that was one of the first times I'd just end up on the couch every day playing Call of Duty, smoking, and it's like the best thing in the world for a week. And then two weeks you're like, "What am I doing with my life?" And by the end of a month you're like, "What's the point of this existence?" Like period, I just spent this time in college. My basketball years are done. What am I gonna do next? And I think this is a point where maybe a lot of people tune it out and just like start to numb themselves, start to become indifferent. They train themselves. I think a lot of people have like a mild depression, and rather than address it and be in tune with it and ask themselves why, they just, it becomes part of their life.

Calum Johnson 21:36 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 21:36 It becomes their normal. And so that's what eventually prompted me to just like, hey, I have to figure this out. That's when I went and shadowed my uncle, like I spent some more time with my dad, and I was like, I just have to find out how to make it in some capacity. This is before early social media too, so I don't have like Tai Lopez telling me I need to make money online or Tim Ferriss 4-Hour Workweek or anything. This is just a kid becoming in tune with his emotions and becoming in tune with the reality that this isn't a forever thing. This life isn't a forever thing, and you have to start figuring it out, and you have to carve something out.

Calum Johnson 22:07 Mm.

Rob The Bank 22:07 So.

Calum Johnson 22:08 I remember Chris Williamson says this thing. He says, uh, "Most people live lives of quiet desperation."

Rob The Bank 22:13 Yeah. It's, it's exactly that, right? That, that depression kinda starts, and few people are brave enough to address it. They say, "You know what? If I just, if I get that corporate job, then I'm doing what I'm supposed to."

Calum Johnson 22:24 Mm.

Rob The Bank 22:24 And then they start that corporate job, and then it's like it becomes worse, but it's like, you know, if I get that promotion or get a vacation to, to kinda break you out of it briefly. But you zoom out 30, 40 years, and I think millennials as a whole like have, have really, really fucked up. Like the, the dream of the millennials has been a little social media and a tech job and a, you know, Starbucks to go. And the end result is like [laughs] less, less kids, less fulfillment, all this stuff. But I, I think we're seeing it right-sized with the younger generation that's becoming more self-aware, if you will.

Calum Johnson 22:59 Mm.

Rob The Bank 22:59 Um, but yeah, Chris hit that one on the head.

Calum Johnson 23:01 Mm. No, 100%. 100%. Do you remember the day it kinda changed? Like, if the default is that most people live lives of quiet desperation and you're going through these days where day after day it's like smoking weed, playing video games-

Rob The Bank 23:14 Yeah

Calum Johnson 23:14 ... do you remember the day where you were like, "No, this is different"?

Rob The Bank 23:17 Uh, so th- so that, that moment was another gradual shift, and eventually I fed A- found Amazon. And when I found Amazon I started to make some money, and that was like a, you know, a bit of a cure, right? Like life started to feel a little bit better. I still lived my normal life. Like I'd go to the gym, I'd eat Chipotle, but I, I was still kinda on autopilot. Everything really changed when I got a phone call from my mom. I was sitting in my little desk, like just starting my day, and she's like, "Hey, I, I need you to know that your dad took your grandma in for an operation this morning, and she didn't wake up." And I'm like, "What do you mean she didn't wake up?" Like my nana is what we call her, she was the center of our family, 70, super young, uh, had lived a crazy life. You know, I told you she had my dad when she was 14. And all of a sudden, um, she's not waking up. And, and I don't, I'm like, "What does that mean?" And basically she went in, she had a oper- operation on her leg, freak deal, and her heart stopped, and they did revive her. And so this I think is what made it worse and more surreal. They revived her, but she was totally brain dead. And so, you know, immediately we go to the emergency room. My whole family spent the entire week there. And she's a vegetable, and we're just praying for that .01% miracle all week. And I see my dad cry for the first time in his life. I see, you know, my grandpa beg her to wake up, and it never happened. And o- on Easter of all days, I'll, I'll never... This was like the moment. On Easter, after she'd been out for a week, we all go in that room, and there's the decision made to pull the plug, and everyone circles around her, and we hold hands. My dad couldn't be in there. My grandpa couldn't be in there. It was, like, me, my mom, and a c- c- mostly, mostly women, and play this song she loved, Rocket, Rocket Man by Elton John, and they pulled the plug. And, you know, she takes a gasp, and you just see the flat line, and that was after, like, a week of hell. And I remember going to the window and kinda looking out. It's in Seattle, and feeling like, like, almost spirits. It was like this surreal, like, energy where, where I don't know if it's her leaving the room or what, but you're like, "What, what the fuck?" And pretty much f- like the day after that, we're, we're all sitting at dinner, and it's like life goes on. And you have to find this kinda new normal, but most importantly, you remember that, like, yo, that's gonna happen to my dad. That's gonna happen to me. And that kickstarted this fever. Like, that was when I like, "Hold on. I have this Amazon thing. I'm making 20 grand a month. I'm seeing, you know, guys build these bigger brands. Why not me? Why not do something she'd be proud of? Why not do something I'd be proud of?" And that was pretty much the moment where I abandoned my old life, like, dramatically. Like, I stopped going to the gym. I realized this, this internet thing was here. I can create something that changes my life at least in the... Change my life forever. And I poured in that shit like fucking crazy. But it was that prompt with death or experience with death that tends to kinda be a recurring theme in my life that it focuses you. You get one shot, and you're only gonna live for you. And so that was one of the more... That was the first moment where, like, a light bulb really came on.

Calum Johnson 26:29 Yeah. Damn, that is, that is something. And you know what, you know where my mind goes is, um, I think, like, with our parents and grandparents, we kinda look at them as, like, superheroes.

Rob The Bank 26:40 We do.

Calum Johnson 26:40 Like, we don't even look at them as, like, real-

Rob The Bank 26:41 We do

Calum Johnson 26:42 ... humans.

Rob The Bank 26:42 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 26:42 Like, if they get sick, like when my mom gets sick, it's like, wait, she's like ill?

Rob The Bank 26:47 Where's she been?

Calum Johnson 26:47 She has a cold?

Rob The Bank 26:48 That's not supposed to happen.

Calum Johnson 26:48 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 26:49 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 26:49 Like, that never happens. 'Cause we always look at them as like they have the answers.

Rob The Bank 26:52 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 26:53 They know what's gonna happen.

Rob The Bank 26:54 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 26:54 They know. They can almost predict the future.

Rob The Bank 26:57 And that's what I meant, bro. My dad has been, like, the strongest person I've known my entire life. Like, he, he raised that family. And I still remember, you know, one of his friends came up to the emergency room, and it'd been, like, a day or two, and I still, I hadn't seen him cry. I knew he'd been crying previously. But the friend came, and, and, and he just exploded into tears and hugged the guy. And I was like, that was one of the, like, sickest feelings of my, of my life. You know, like, it made me cry, and I'm just like, "What the fuck?" Um, it's like these surreal but real. I mean, that, that's, like, this is real life. Like, this, this is gonna happen. This will happen. You don't know what day the reaper's gonna call. You know, all of our lives are stories written by authors that we don't, we can't even see it. You know, we can get in tune with it and influence it, but we need to appreciate all of it and actually do stuff that matters.

Calum Johnson 27:46 Mm. It sounds like that moment kinda lit a fire. Like, you, you already had success. Like, things were already-

Rob The Bank 27:54 A, a little success

Calum Johnson 27:54 ... going well to a certain degree.

Rob The Bank 27:56 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 27:57 But then it seems like from that moment, you just took it to another level. And I think so much when we, we hear stories, we kinda... People talk about that in, like, the abstract of like, "Oh, I just doubled down. I started doing something." I wanna get specific, and what, and what I mean by that is if someone had, like, observed your life, what you were doing on a day-to-day basis maybe a month before that event happened, and then they'd seen the way that you were working, I don't know, maybe three months afterwards-

Rob The Bank 28:24 Yeah

Calum Johnson 28:24 ... like, what was the shift? Like, on the day to day, like, what was the shift?

Rob The Bank 28:28 Oh, you wouldn't recognize the person. My, my life prior to that was, like, gym bro split. Like, I was happy enough to be able to work five, six hours, less than most people, get to LA Fitness by 3:00, and lift for two and a half hours, and then go to Chipotle and shoot the shit with the buddy I always lifted with. And I was just always super proud of my, my lifts, my useless fucking lifts. You know, like, everyone should lift to a certain point, and then, like, all right, bro, you're 230 pounds. No one cares if you can bench 315. Um,

Rob The Bank 28:54 and then when that happened, you fast-forward three months later, and I didn't leave a, a cage. Like, I locked myself in my home office and, like, I mean, straight up, like, it's kinda embarrassing, but, like, I didn't really shower that much. [laughs] Like, like, I was like... There's old pictures of me, for real, where you're like, "Who, who is this guy?" But I just saw this Amazon thing growing, and I, I saw this actual opportunity in front of me. And I was like, "If I don't master this trait, then I will have left generational opportunity on the table for whatever I wanna pass down in this world." And so that was the shift. And if you, you looked at me then and maybe six months after, right? But, like, I literally had this thought in my head. I... Maybe it's crazy, maybe it's not, but a haircut is a waste of, a waste of time. Not money. It was just a waste of time. Like, me going in and getting my hair cut is an hour that I could be putting towards this thing, and that's how I thought in terms of everything I did. And I was wildly infi- uh, inefficient business-wise. Like, I'm this kid figuring it out. I wasted all this time trying to figure out different components of the business, but my fundamental thought process was anything not going to this is a waste of potential millions down the road. And boy, my hair got wild, bro.

Calum Johnson 30:03 [laughs] You know what? Gi- give people, give people the context. You, you spoke about it as, like, Amazon at that time was, like, a generational opportunity.

Rob The Bank 30:12 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 30:12 Like, when you say that, like, what was it that you were building?

Rob The Bank 30:15 I built a supplement company. That was my first thing. I bu- I built a portfolio of supplement companies. The Genius brand is the main one that's still up there, leader in nootropics. But when I was on that platform, it was like a reseller platform. And, like, I used to go to other top brands that are selling in GNC and Vitamin Shoppe, and, like, I was like, "Hey, I can help you sell on Amazon." They're like, "Oh, Amazon, not that serious." Like, whatever. I was like, "No, just give me a shot," you know? And I'd get them listed. And this is how I started and they would be making some sales. Like all of a sudden it's like 20% of their business, 30% of their business, these massive conglomerates. I'm like, "Guys, this is the new platform and it's already doing that kind of revenue. You should really focus here." And they'd be like, "Ah, yeah, whatever." Like, they'd, they'd like me, but they didn't pay me that much mind or take it that seriously.

Calum Johnson 30:57 Mm.

Rob The Bank 30:58 And it was eventually where I realized like, okay, this is, this is my time. Like, if they're not gonna pour into this and they're doing, you know, 25 million with all these other channels and I can do 25 million just here with better margins, like this is, this is my time. And so it was so wide open back then. There's no one bidding on keywords. It's r- very easy to rank at the top of SEO. Like when you hear people talk about Amazon being saturated today, it's not saturated. There's more customers than ever, but the easy days of like just you could throw a pre-workout up there and literally be at the top of pre-workout and be making 20 sales a day without spending any money.

Calum Johnson 31:33 Mm.

Rob The Bank 31:33 Like it was that, you know, wide open. And so that, I mean, that's how I got my start. I saw this vehicle.

Calum Johnson 31:40 Yeah. You know, I wanna, I wanna take one of the quotes. You, you spoke about risk. You said, "I took $5,000 I had in savings and invested into developing my own supplements brand."

Rob The Bank 31:50 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 31:50 "That's when my first brand was born." Talk about that and just taking everything, going all in.

Rob The Bank 31:55 Yeah. Because I mean, for me it was, it was clear at the time. I lived at home. I didn't, like I said, I didn't have this like, crazy lifestyle and I'm seeing all this stuff happen. I'm like, "I have to figure out how to launch my own brand." This is where people stress out today. They're like, "How do you get a product made? How do you find a manufacturer?" All that stuff. That's the easiest part. The hard part is figuring out how to sell it at scale, right? So when you have a Amazon or you have a TikTok shop like that, that's where most brands struggle. Getting the brand made was as simple as like, I called this manufacturer who I'd met at a trade show. They knew I kind of did Amazon. I was like, "Hey, can you ... If I give you a deposit, can you front me on the rest of this? Like, I'll turn it to profit." And they, like I said, they knew me at the time. I'd helped other brands. They're like, "Yeah, whatever, kid. Like, we'll give, we'll give you a shot." And I just, I mean, I had to go for it. It's like if I lost that five grand ... And I knew I'd won it. Like when you get to a certain point with your skills and you see like a very clear opportunity you're just like, "How much money can I make? How big can I scale?" I, I never felt the risk of losing that because the deck starts to get stacked in your favor. You know what I mean? Like, if, if you have the skills, if you put in the time, then it becomes exponentially easier to succeed. What do they say? It's like, what is it? Eight out of 10 businesses fail, or nine out of 10 businesses fail. Those are the nine people that didn't have like an, an edge or a clear cut path to scaling the thing.

Calum Johnson 33:11 Mm.

Rob The Bank 33:12 Um, I had that piece and so, you know, I threw that in there and, and we turned that to a much bigger number very fast.

Calum Johnson 33:19 Mm. It also sounds like your mindset at that point was just at a different level. Like it was almost like a refusal that you would lo- like that you wouldn't succeed.

Rob The Bank 33:26 No, it was. I mean, you tie it back to that, uh, Nietzschevich quote about stacking wins and stacking confidence. Like that's what I had done. I had, I had got on the sales calls and sold the big brands on how to succeed on there, and I had spent time with those teams and, you know, I had done sales on Amazon with other people's products. Like, I'm like this is, this is clear. You know, I have the confidence to, to launch this. I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. Like, let's go. Now's the time. But it came back to all those years prior of putting in the time and learning the stuff and yeah, I mean that's kinda what made it go.

Calum Johnson 33:56 Yeah. You know, we- we- we're gonna get into the TikTok shop stuff because the same way that you said that in 2012 or 2013 when you started Genius Brands, Amazon FBA was like a generational opportunity.

Rob The Bank 34:08 Mm.

Calum Johnson 34:08 I've heard you speak about TikTok shop in that same way. So, so we'll get to that. But I wanna, I wanna start by kind of what was kind of the early period of Genius Brands like, right? Because you take this $5,000 in savings, which to most people and to most people listening, if you told them to take their savings and put it into a new platform, it would be insane to them.

Rob The Bank 34:30 Mm.

Calum Johnson 34:30 Like, it would feel like stepping off a ledge, right? Like it would-

Rob The Bank 34:33 Which is actually insane to me. I'm trying so hard to get back into touch with ... I'm 32 now and I forget those, I forget those days. But to me it's insane to do that Wall Street thing I just said or the, or the tech job or the ... Even worse, you know what I mean?

Calum Johnson 34:45 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 34:45 Like I don't ... That's the insane part to me 'cause it's like what's the outcome? You lose $5,000 and you have to start again eventually, or you commit your life to something that's like damn near modern prison.

Calum Johnson 34:57 Mm.

Rob The Bank 34:58 I mean, in a lot of ways, like you said, it's, it's a quiet ... What, what's the Williamson quote?

Calum Johnson 35:01 Quiet despe- most people live lives of quiet desperation.

Rob The Bank 35:03 Quiet desperation. That sounds horrible.

Calum Johnson 35:06 Mm.

Rob The Bank 35:07 So I don't know. I think through, through that lens. I think we gotta try to change that narrative too because there's, again, as we talk about TikTok and some of these opportunities to start with nothing, like it's there.

Calum Johnson 35:17 Mm.

Rob The Bank 35:17 Did you put, did you put a lot of money into starting the show?

Calum Johnson 35:20 Uh, I was working when I started the show.

Rob The Bank 35:22 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 35:22 And I was doing it on the side.

Rob The Bank 35:24 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 35:24 But when I left, I left my job to do this full time maybe 15, 16 months ago. This was making no money when I left.

Rob The Bank 35:31 But did you have the platform started?

Calum Johnson 35:32 But I-

Rob The Bank 35:32 Like was it started yet?

Calum Johnson 35:32 Yeah. I, I was already doing it for a year.

Rob The Bank 35:34 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 35:34 But like the audience wasn't anywhere close to what it is now. I kinda just saw ... I go off instinct, so I see an opportunity-

Rob The Bank 35:42 Yeah

Calum Johnson 35:42 ... and then I'm like, "I'm just gonna do it." Like-

Rob The Bank 35:44 And you felt like you had the skills at that point and like-

Calum Johnson 35:46 Yeah

Rob The Bank 35:46 ... you know.

Calum Johnson 35:46 I knew it was my thing.

Rob The Bank 35:47 Yeah. I mean, you're, you're, you're good at it.

Calum Johnson 35:49 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 35:49 And, and after a year of doing it, like you know you're stacking the deck in your favor.

Calum Johnson 35:53 Mm.

Rob The Bank 35:53 That's how I feel.

Calum Johnson 35:54 And, and you, and you know what it is? It's like I understand how you get to that mindset where it's, uh, why won't people take the risk? I also understand the other side of it which is like you at this point have like stacked the wins. Like you have so many proof points of the risk working-

Rob The Bank 36:11 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 36:11 ... that it's like why wouldn't you do it?

Rob The Bank 36:13 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 36:13 And so get into like when you

Calum Johnson 36:16 were doing, when you were building Genius Brands, what was that initial period like? Because, and I, I'm feeling this firsthand, like business is fucking hard.

Rob The Bank 36:25 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 36:26 Like it is tough to build a business.

Rob The Bank 36:28 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 36:28 And sometimes it takes years to actually get good at what you're doing. But it sounds like for you it was actually you had some success out of the gate with Genius Brands. So like what were those initial periods like?

Rob The Bank 36:41 Well, I had some positive cashflow, right? So I was in the green. I was making some money. But in terms of building an actual business, like the complexity that goes into that, it's insane when you start hiring people and ... Like I'm doing all this from scratch. I don't have a mentor. I don't watch much YouTube. Like, I'm having to figure out, like, okay, now I have three employees. Should we use this Slack thing, you know, to communicate?

Calum Johnson 37:02 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 37:02 Like, how do we orga- organize the Slack channel? How do we Dropbox or Google Drive? And how do you ... Like, all these different pieces I'm having to learn from scratch. But I'll tell you what, because I found the outlet I liked and something I was, like, super interested in, I liked it every day. Like, I was super excited to go answer those questions. There was that flow-esque state, and that ties back to the life maxing thing. The more you can align with that flow-esque state, the more you're gonna get out of your life because none of that ... Like, now I look back and all this stuff that I take is second nature. And I'm trying to, like, get to a point where I can re-communicate that to people in the early stages, but all of that was self-learned because I'm flowing. Like, period. I probably learned more ... I know for a fact I learned more in those first two years than I did at any point ever in my modern education. You know, like, college, useless. High school, useless. You don't learn marketing, you don't learn management until you're doing that shit.

Calum Johnson 37:54 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 37:54 Like, I, I remember having this surreal reflection moment where I was like ... I was a horrible student, but there was this management class, uh, 404, it's like your peak management class in, in college, and there's this, uh, woman teaching it that was like the superstar professor, and she had never done anything her entire life other than teach that class. And so ... I apologize. It was negotiation. Negotiation. She had never done anything other than teach negotiation. And I remember when I was selling my business to private equity, thinking back to that class, going like, "She would've died in this world."

Calum Johnson 38:25 [laughs]

Rob The Bank 38:26 Like, died.

Calum Johnson 38:27 Mm.

Rob The Bank 38:27 And yet she was the one that was, had every single opinion ever on what you are and aren't doing right in negotiation. And so you learn from doing it, and then you max out your learning when you're doing something you actually enjoy, because none of us are gonna ... Like, the information is not gonna stick if it's shit we don't like.

Calum Johnson 38:43 Mm. You know, you know what's interesting? Um, and maybe you'll remember this. When

Calum Johnson 38:47 you're, when you're running a business, and especially when it's, like, the first real business that you've done-

Rob The Bank 38:50 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 38:50 ... and this is what I'm experiencing right now, is even when things are working, every new stage is something new, and you haven't done it before. You have no reference, especially for people that are like ... You don't come from some wealthy family where, like, your dad had a successful business and can, like, coach you through-

Rob The Bank 39:08 Mm

Calum Johnson 39:08 ... the whole thing. And so there's sometimes this anxiety even when things are going well, 'cause you're now like, "Okay, I need to now hire, like, a manager for, like-

Rob The Bank 39:18 Oh

Calum Johnson 39:18 ... my bi-" And then, like, there's these new things that you haven't done. You have no reference for it, and it's actually, like ... It can make you anxious.

Rob The Bank 39:25 My God. It arguably gets more anxiety-ridden and more stressful because the stakes just keep getting higher and higher.

Calum Johnson 39:31 Mm.

Rob The Bank 39:32 Like, one of our portfolio companies that I, I don't talk about and I just keep kinda private, but, you know, we're breaking that off entirely and hiring a CEO and going for retail and doing all of these things, like hiring a, a true C-suite team, and that's the, the makeup of being a multiple nine-figure business. And it's not something I've done. And, and luckily on that side I have a partner who has had an exit like that, and so there's some familiarity there. But you talk about anxiety and stress on, like, hey, I can make the marketing machine go. I can get this TikTok thing working. I can make Amazon work. But now we're talking HR departments and CEO and this whole different thing. It's about as stressful as can be because if you shoot the wrong shot there, it sets you back.

Calum Johnson 40:13 Mm.

Rob The Bank 40:13 You know, maybe we have a window of three to five years to build a generational, you know, half a billion dollar brand, but if you misstep on any of these, you s- the stakes are higher, right?

Calum Johnson 40:23 Mm.

Rob The Bank 40:23 And I think you have to remind yourself of how far you've come this whole time. Like, if I would've told myself two years ago as I kinda re-embarked on the whole, whole thing I'd be where I'm at right now, I'd be like, "Oh, that's incredible." But I still wake up and have days where I'm like, "This isn't going fast enough," or, "This is stressful," or whatever. And so again, that's that mental framing of entrepreneurship that isn't talked about enough. Like, the higher you go, you have to kinda make it a superpower to catch yourself mentally and never let those negative or dominant thoughts become reality, because thoughts do tend to become reality. And if you keep playing that story in your head over and over again, like, "Hey, you know, I'm supposed to be so-and-so and I'm supposed to have these guests on my podcast by now," or whatever, eventually that can manifest in the wrong way, whereas if you come at it from a more abundant place and you're curious and you ask the right questions to people that have done it and have brought in a podcast manager, whatever, right?

Calum Johnson 41:15 Mm.

Rob The Bank 41:15 Then you're gonna get so much further. And, and so I, I'm a big fucking believer of what goes on up here regardless of where you're at.

Calum Johnson 41:22 Mm.

Rob The Bank 41:22 Like, the bigger you get.

Calum Johnson 41:23 Yeah. I remember we had, we had a guest come on here. Name is Hunter Hammons, and he said, um, the best entrepreneurs tend to just be the best, like, s- stress managers.

Rob The Bank 41:33 Well, think about it like this. I had, like, this breakthrough the other day. The difference between a billionaire and the average person is their ability to handle stress. Like, you think about a Bezos, and no, he has Amazon, Blue Origin. How many personal investments does he have? How many different properties does he have? Like, as I've gotten, learned to be wealthy over the last five, six years, you know, I got real estate, I got liquid assets, I got crypto, I have personal employees that, you know, manage the house. There all these different avenues of, of stress. Like, whereas, you know, some people are like, man, they get upset if their, like ... I don't know. What is it? Like, people get up- like, stressed about all sorts of stuff.

Calum Johnson 42:08 Mm.

Rob The Bank 42:08 And unless you learn to shake all of that off, then you're not gonna grow into that next tier. So as soon as I started thinking about it through the lens of like, you know, how much do billionaires actually handle, and I'm just preparing myself to be hopefully in that league, the easier it got, right? Like, it, it's kind of a badge of honor to be able to shrug off, like, oh, I just lost a million bucks in crypto. Like, whatever. I'm not gonna let that ruin my, I'm not gonna let that ruin this interview. I'm not gonna let that ruin my business. I'm gonna keep trudging forward.

Calum Johnson 42:34 Mm. You know what? It's like when you're, when you're in those early moments, I think just because you're not as experienced, those, the losses or, like, when the stress does rise, it, it feels more impactful 'cause you don't have that framework of, like, how to handle it. And so I'm curious. Like, you're going through this period as you're building Genius Brands and you're continuing to scale, and at every ... It's like new level, new devil, right? Like, that's the, that's the quote. As every level, it's, like, these new things that you're dealing with. Is there like a peak moment of stress, like a peak moment an- anxiety, like a story that you remember where it was like, that almost overcame me even. Like, that was just, that was it?

Rob The Bank 43:15 From overnight, I went from thinking I was gonna be a multimillionaire, like liquid on paper. I was gonna go tell everyone, "Fuck you, I did it," to, "Oh my God, I'm gonna have to lay off my friends and go get a 9:00 to 5:00." And what happened, basically there was this Amazon algorithm change, and overnight they more or less wiped half of our products of reviews. And they did this to a lot of, a lot of brands. This was like a pivotal Amazon moment, I think late 2018. I mix up all my years. But we woke up and half of the business was gone. To make it worse, you know, I told you how obsessive I was. This was the first year, uh, the first time in years that I took away from the business. I got married in Ireland, and the night of my wedding ceremony all this shit started to happen. So I'm on time change, I'm communicating with my guys back home, like, "What's going on?" I'm already kinda anxious 'cause I hate being away from the business. And in the course of, like, 48 hours, Amazon decided that these products were whatever, and they smashed us. And so all of a sudden our business is cut in half, and I think they're gonna keep doing it to more products. 'Cause they, for, for a month every Tuesday, they would hit new products and more or less kill these products. And so it was in that moment, I had like a literal anxiety attack. Like I remember, you know, hyperventilating and shit. Went and grabbed some, like, CBD in Ireland, thought that would help. It didn't. It made it worse. I'm, uh, freaking out over there, and when I got back, like I sat down with my key guys. These are my two best friends and, you know, one of them has a kid. Like his life's dependent on this business, like his whole salary. He's got, like I'm taking care of him on the equity, but he's all in. And we're all sitting there like, you know, there's, I don't know, there's maybe like a million bucks in the bank or something at this point. And we go, "You know, I guess we could take this and like run or what," you know, like kinda at least say we did something. And we looked around and we go, "You know, this is happening to other people. Why don't we launch into those new categories? Why don't we take that money, triple down on this thing, understand that we didn't, we, we didn't do anything wrong." We kinda got caught up in like a bad mix. You know, big tech is, is big tech, and they always run systems and algorithms. And so we doubled down and we went after like three main categories that the leaders had been smashed, and maybe rightfully so. Like a lotta, lot of black hat guys got hit then too. And so basically we end up creating three of our best products in this time period. Our business almost roars back to like exactly where it was. Six months later, Amazon restores the reviews on the existing products, and that was like this rocket fuel. And that was one of the most pivotal moments in entrepreneurship for me because it br- it comes back to sports. It's like under pressure. Like when you're under pressure, how are you responding? Are you gonna turtle up and, and, you know, be a little bitch, or are you gonna like stand up and own it and make good decisions? And the best entrepreneurs I've seen, like one of the private equity guys I met down the line, they are just famous for when the house is on fire, being that voice of reason and that steady hand that is gonna guide you through whatever that situation might be. It still might not be good on the other side.

Calum Johnson 46:11 Mm.

Rob The Bank 46:11 But they're like a calm, collected mind, and I think my sports instincts kicked in at that moment. But since then it's reinforced such this pivot- this like pivotal belief that that's what makes the great ones.

Calum Johnson 46:22 Hm. You know, um, there's this, there's this line, there's this line that Drake says in a song. He says, uh, "Imagination running wild with the speculation."

Rob The Bank 46:33 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 46:34 And it, and it reminds me of what you mentioned earlier, which is like we all have these fears and like these insecurities. I call it like the quiet voice in your head, that when things start to kinda not go your way a little bit, it's like this little voice that's like, "You were never able to do that thing," or like-

Rob The Bank 46:50 Bro, we're narrative machines.

Calum Johnson 46:51 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 46:51 And we have all sorts of beliefs that have been ingrained into us through the years, and that's why I said where thoughts tend to create reality. You need to be able to flush out those thoughts, because they're often ridiculous.

Calum Johnson 47:01 Mm.

Rob The Bank 47:01 Re- like truly ridiculous. Like you can ... I'm famous for this. I can tell this story in my head of how I'm gonna lose everything, like with the perfect cataclysmic whatever, and if you succumb to those, a lot of the time you'll make your life exponentially worse. Like do those wild, wild thoughts ever come true? Like probably not. But on the flip side of that, if you can create a positive narrative, a positive internal talk track, you start to become unstoppable. I mean, truly. It's, again, stacking that confidence, but more importantly training your mind to become who you need to be, like being there mentally already. And I, I, that's that whole law of attraction. That's that whole gravitational pull to becoming who you're supposed to be. It's not foo-foo. It's not like super magic. It's very rational.

Calum Johnson 47:44 Mm.

Rob The Bank 47:44 And I mean, you, you said it best.

Calum Johnson 47:46 Mm. I'm curious though, because your nightmare was kinda happening. Like you wake up that morning in Ireland and you see that like your business is going down in the way that it is. I'm just ... Like what is your, what is your mindset? Like what is happening in your mind? What are the fears? Like-

Rob The Bank 48:02 I mean, for 48 hours, bro, I mean, you know, I'm 24, 25-year-old kid. The world is ending, for sure. [laughs] And I, I am succumbing to speculation, and I am worst case scenario, and I'm freaking out my guys. And I mean, all, all that stuff's real. I mean, it was like a truly horrible moment. But again, there was a solution in it, and how many people in that same instance ... I know plenty of brands. I know one guy that like fire sold his shit. You know, he had a business that was worth $20 million. He sold it for a million bucks. Um, so it's in those moments where you need to be sound. Because even, like, hey, worst case, we had a good team. We had the skills. Like if that business went to zero, we could've started something again. We could've figured it out. Someone would've funded it. There's often always an answer, but you can compound it negatively and make your life dramatically worse. It's like the idiot who, you know, sells at the bottom of the stock market 'cause the world's ending.

Calum Johnson 48:53 Mm.

Rob The Bank 48:53 You know, has the world ended yet? Like, no. Did, did it crash 50% in COVID? Yeah. Did we then go on to have the greatest bull market ever? Like, yeah.

Calum Johnson 49:01 Mm.

Rob The Bank 49:02 You know? And so it's being more in tune with the nature of reality while- Attracting a level of positivity and, like, true iron mindset.

Calum Johnson 49:08 Yeah. You know what it, it reminds me of? It's like the, it's the panic that gets you. Like, often when things go, like, cataclysmically wrong-

Rob The Bank 49:15 It's emotional, yeah

Calum Johnson 49:16 ... it's not the initial thing that happened, it's the knee-jerk reaction.

Rob The Bank 49:20 It's everything you do after, 100%.

Calum Johnson 49:22 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 49:22 And so, I mean, now, like, I've had horrible shit happen now, but I don't even talk about it because it's been more like, you know, "This is who I'm trained to be. This is another day in the office." Like, it's not always good, and when it's good, I appreciate the fuck out of it. When it's bad, I learn to handle it.

Calum Johnson 49:36 Mm. You remember the moment when you kind of, like, you had composure around the situation? You spoke about that first 48 hours, you were, like, all over the place.

Rob The Bank 49:45 It, it was when I got back. It w- I got back, we all met up, we sat down, we had coffee. It was like everyone sat round table and we kinda laid out the options. And I remember, I go, "Am I crazy for wanting to just double down?" And they all kinda looked at me like, "Eh, what's the worst that can happen, you know? Like, maybe a little bit, but fuck it." And we all just kinda like went all in and called the manufacturer, worked on some new formulas. And I mean, we, we blitzed that. It was, like, the hardest we all had worked. Everyone's extra locked in. That's the good part about dangerous times too, right? It brings out the best in people if you're focused. Like, that fight or flight instinct kicks, the, the house is on fire, you're figuring out, "How can I go save the baby?" You know [laughs] ? Like, you'll, you'll do superhero things. And so I've almost come to appreciate those times in a lot of ways.

Calum Johnson 50:28 Yeah. And it makes for such a legendary story as well.

Rob The Bank 50:30 Makes for way better stories.

Calum Johnson 50:32 Um, so anyway, you know what? You, you go on to,

Calum Johnson 50:36 uh, you build Genius Brands, you sell it for 30 million to, to private equity. I wanna get into the TikTok stuff and kind of like what you're doing now.

Rob The Bank 50:45 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 50:45 Because, um, you spoke about TikTok shop in 2024 is what Amazon was in, like, 2012, 2013.

Rob The Bank 50:54 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 50:55 It's that scale of opportunity. And so just to begin, let, let's kinda level set. Like, why, why do you say that? Like, what is it that you're seeing with TikTok shop that it's like, "This is where the opportunity is"?

Rob The Bank 51:09 So first I want people to appreciate how fundamentally the earth has shifted, the, the nature of commerce, the nature of everything because of short form content and discovery. The big deal for me that I, like ... And I'm saying this for all the 22, 25-year-old, like, anyone under 25 that hasn't had life experience on the internet. The big moment in Amazon was when they surpassed Google for where people were searching for products. Prior to, like, I don't know, 2015, 70% of people started their search on Google. Amazon comes around and within a couple years Amazon was becoming the SEO platform for products. And that was, like, this moment where all of a sudden people are fundamentally shopping different, right? Like, e-commerce is now gaining this level of scale, like, this true pivotable, pivotable force. It, it, it killed GNC, it killed Vitamin Shoppe, it killed a lot of categories that weren't primed for e-com. And it wa- it's so obvious in hindsight, right? Could you imagine a world without Amazon where you can one-click order? But back then it was, it was less obvious. Although, if you're really in tune with it you're like, "Oh, yeah, no, this is pretty clear." Now fast-forward, the whole impact of the TikTok thing hit me about two years ago. Now, you've seen all the influencers come up through this world, like, it's just a new wave. You've, you've got the Hormozis. Hormozi's basically like Gary Vee of this generation because of short form, right?

Calum Johnson 52:27 Mm.

Rob The Bank 52:27 And streamers and all that stuff. But that's been because of their adaption to this new pla- like, this new way of communication and this new way of discovery. And then I'm planning a Tokyo trip with my wife, and all of a sudden she is not using Yelp, she's not using Google, she's not using any of these things to plan our activities or our dinners. She's going on TikTok and seeing the shit real time, like, "Oh, that looks good." Like, "Okay, we're, we're gonna go here." And all of a sudden I go, "Oh, wow, this is, like, way bigger than simply, like, a dance app or, or whatever," right? Or a means to be an influencer. Like, this is fundamentally gonna rewrite the way everyone organizes everything. And kudos to TikTok, they've done a phenomenal job of forcing it down everyone's throats and making it addictive and getting this mass scale. And then TikTok wakes up one day and they go, "Well, we're not gonna fall into the mistake Twitter made. Like, we're gonna be a platform where people make money." And then you look over into Asia, and that's how everyone shops. They shop live streaming, they shop video discovery. Like, there's not fancy Shopify websites, it's a whole different way of commerce. And TikTok goes, "That's gonna work here, and we're gonna spend every dollar we have to to make it happen." And so at first, you know, I'm still hesitant as they roll out the shop platform. They're burning, like, a billion dollars a day, they're doing their own fulfillment, they're not making money on the brands. And then I see the level of scale that starts happening. Like, there's a brand that was relatively obscure on Amazon a couple years ago, they do maybe, like, 10 million a year. And all of a sudden they're doing 15 million a month on TikTok shop, like, third month in.

Calum Johnson 53:55 Mm.

Rob The Bank 53:55 And it's just creating this, like, broadcast system where even if you're not buying it on TikTok shop, you're like, you'd know that brand in retail. Like, you, you, you see it. And when that light bulb came on, I go, "Yeah, this is, like, clear." Like, we've just gone, we've undergone a fundamental way that people communicate and shop just like we did with Amazon.

Calum Johnson 54:14 Mm.

Rob The Bank 54:15 It's the exact same thing happening again, and it's presenting itself different, right? You have to learn different skills and all that, but it's as good as it comes. You have a billion shoppers and you can reach them without spending any money.

Calum Johnson 54:27 Mm.

Rob The Bank 54:27 That's the beauty of all of it. Like, the fact that I could reach so many shoppers back with Amazon without spending a dime, now you can do that in TikTok if you can master virality. If you can master, like, different means of communication, you can build something that exponentially scales without having to go raise a bunch of money and all that stuff.

Calum Johnson 54:43 Mm. You know what I was thinking about as you were speaking? It's, it's actually interesting that evolution that you describe.

Rob The Bank 54:48 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 54:49 Um, 'cause it's really about, like, where does the customer journey start?

Rob The Bank 54:53 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 54:53 Like, where do people start with when they're looking to buy something? And I remember growing up, right, like, say that you wanted, I don't know, kitchen towel-

Rob The Bank 55:01 Yeah

Calum Johnson 55:01 ... or, like, a new sofa or whatever.

Rob The Bank 55:03 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 55:03 You would just go on Google and type that in-

Rob The Bank 55:05 Yep

Calum Johnson 55:05 ... and, like, see on the shopping results. And then to your point, there was a certain- Uh, there was a certain point in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 where you don't start on Google anymore. You go straight to Amazon-

Rob The Bank 55:18 Yep

Calum Johnson 55:18 ... and you type for that pr- you type that product and you don't even know if Amazon have it, you just assume that they do. They're the platform, like, they're the place you go. And now to your point, people's first discovery of a product is now starting on TikTok or on social media platforms.

Rob The Bank 55:35 On short-form, on short-form content, and I, I do think TikTok will win out. I don't think they get banned, but every time I talk about TikTok I get someone in the comments, "Good thing it's gonna be banned." Like, if you put TikTok in the header of this, that'll be the first comment you get without anyone watching it. I don't think TikTok's going away, personally. Um, but even if they do, it's IG shop, it's YouTube shop. Like, this fundamental shift has happened, and I really want the audience to understand that nuance because these skills, the ability to communicate in this era are s- invaluable.

Calum Johnson 56:03 Mm. Okay, you know what? I'm, I'm curious to get into, and this will be so valuable for the audience. You start Genius Brands in 2012, 2013.

Rob The Bank 56:10 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 56:10 You

Calum Johnson 56:11 start with t- $5,000 and you obviously end up selling it for $30 million. And so if you almost wanted to build the equivalent of what you did, like if we took, um, Rob Oliver, maybe you have all the resources that you did in 2012 when you started, but you have all the learnings, the knowledge, the experience, uh, that you have now and it's like you're seeing the opportunity on TikTok shop and you almost wanna build, like, an equivalent business. Like, you wanna build a business in a similar way to how you did Genius Brands but on TikTok. What is kind of step one in your mind? Like, where are you even starting that out?

Rob The Bank 56:48 Let, let me break ... Like, I'll, I'll break down the step-by-step for building a multimillion dollar company in this era, but I wanna highlight something really quick. I, I've gotten more into this social media world. I told you I wasn't with Genius, right? And when I started my latest brand, Top Shelf, it was Amazon only and I have posted results and strategies and playbooks of that since we were doing, like, $2,500 a day. If you go back and look at my stories, you see ... Like, they're, they're saved there. Top Shelf, $2,500 a day. This is cool. We made $200. Like, $200 a day, that's life-changing. And then you fast-forward to the Amazon growth was all there, like we got it to a couple hundred thousand, but then you see the exponential spike when TikTok rolls out, and I'm transparent in talking about all of it. Like, you see those numbers go from, you know, 3,000, then 10,000, and then TikTok shops roll out and I'm posting $100,000 days. And this is, like, as real and clear as can get. And so that, that's one of the things that throws me off with this whole social world. You have a lot of people who talk about some of these things and it's like, well, yeah, but okay, if it's so good, if the getting's so good, where's your business? Where's your brand? Or where's your, you know, like, where's your money? I don't wanna see Shopify screenshots, I wanna see, like, what are you doing? And so Top Shelf is the, the brand I've been building publicly. Like I said, we have a couple different ones, but this was not a resource intensive business when it starts. I'm not a guy that's gonna put millions of dollars into something. Like, I'm always gonna be that guy that wants to find that avenue where I can start with five grand because that's profitable, it's scalable. Like, I don't want investors and I don't wanna burn millions of dollars trying to find out if something works. And so in today's world you have that opportunity, and we've pivoted Top Shelf since we, since TikTok shop rolled out. You need a product, so this is, this is step number one. And I always recommend people do something they're interested in. It's the internet. Like, there's that whole idea of fuck your passions, do what makes money, but we have the luxury of doing stuff we're interested in because it's so broad. Everyone's buying everything e-com. And so you need to find a niche you're interested in. There's a lot of different ways to kinda go about this. Like, I loved Genius, I love nootropics, I love biohacking in that phase of my life. In today's world, you know, if, like, fitness is your thing or, or whatever, there's a couple means of nailing down that actual winning product. You can ... The simplest way, you can open a brand new TikTok account, completely blank. You can go like products that you use, like period, in niches you're interested in. And what do you think is gonna happen when you go back to that super genius AI algorithm? They're gonna start feeding you the winning products. Like, you are gonna see like, oh shit, shilajit's becoming a huge thing and like, oh, this is kind of interesting.

Calum Johnson 59:18 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 59:18 And so you're fed countless ideas of a flagship hero product. So that's, that's one method. You can use ... There's, like, exploding topics which shows all the budding search data, like broad in your category. Like, oh, all of a sudden, you know, looks maxing is becoming a thing and so so-and-so u- is using, like, a jaw trainer. Like, you, you're fed these ideas and then you can cross-reference that on Amazon. Like, are people already moving into this world? Like, what is it saturated? What's it look like? So you can kinda nail down your winning product there. Uh, fastmos.com is another one that, like, not a lot of people know about that shows all of the data from TikTok shop. Like, you can see who's doing what. So that's your starting point. The second point, this is a Virgil Abloh rule, and all you need to do is improve that product by 3%. He's like, "Most of humanity was built on simply improving ideas by 3%." And so TikTok so early you see a lot of these ideas ripping, they are garbage. The branding is garbage. Like, you could on accident improve something by 10%, you know? And, and you don't need money for that if you figure out some of these, like ... We use AI tools, bro, to, like, do half of our branding and graphics now, like DALL-E 2. And, like, it's such this crazy time that if you just skill stack you can do this from zero. So you improve the brand 3%, and then if you're younger and you're, like, native to TikTok you can learn how to make the content yourself because people misunderstand TikTok as Instagram. Instagram follower count matters. Like, if you have a big Instagram count it's valuable. If you have a TikTok you can put out three videos and the third video gets two million views and you just made $20,000 off your product launch. So if you can learn that content style I don't know how you can fail. Like, if you make the product, improve it, and then learn the content yourself on TikTok shop you can be in the green without spending a dime. Now me, I don't make the content, right? I'm 32 years old and it's, it's a, it's a young man's game.

Calum Johnson 1:01:10 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:01:12 But this is where the exponential scale comes in. You make a product that's designed for these affiliates to push and all of a sudden there's this huge network of young kids who are masterful at making shit go viral for our product, right? They've figured out the hooks, they've figured out how to captivate attention, and they get that algorithm. You pay them a commission. Like, you take care of them. And that is the infinite scale game. Like, we did, we did a million dollars on TikTok shop our third month with TikTok or with Top Shelf because of those pieces. And does that, does it all make sense?

Calum Johnson 1:01:42 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:01:42 Like, it's like it, it's painfully simple actually. And I think so many people are like ... I don't know. It's usually not painfully simple to build like a multi-million dollar business, but the blocking and tackling of this one is like so straightforward.

Calum Johnson 1:01:54 Yeah. You know, I wanna, I wanna go deeper into each step. 'Cause you said step one is you wanna find the winning product.

Rob The Bank 1:01:59 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:01:59 And so you start that TikTok account and you start looking at different products. You're liking videos and the algorithm's feeding it back to you and you're starting to see, okay, these are some of the industries. I'm curious for you, like, because when I look at what you did with Genius Brands and I see your content and even the way that you speak about it in interviews and in conversation, it feels like you were very intentional about going after something in the supplement industry.

Rob The Bank 1:02:24 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:02:24 And then it also seems like you were pretty clear about how you were gonna improve it.

Rob The Bank 1:02:29 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:02:29 And so for a lot of people that are watching, I can imagine like they don't have that level of clarity, right? Like, they don't have the ... They're like, "Okay, what ... Are there certain industries that are like better than others?"

Rob The Bank 1:02:41 No, of course.

Calum Johnson 1:02:42 And then you also mention, um, it's almost like certain products are easier for these affiliates to make go viral.

Rob The Bank 1:02:50 Yep.

Calum Johnson 1:02:50 Um, I saw s- I've seen people, they're doing like ... This was, this was like a few months ago, maybe even a year ago. They were doing like the whole sex chocolate thing.

Rob The Bank 1:02:58 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:02:59 And it's like that's easier to make it go viral because it's a bit s- like it's naturally kinda controversial.

Rob The Bank 1:03:06 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:03:07 Um, and so how do you think about that like in terms of are there certain industries, are there certain product types that you're specifically targeting?

Rob The Bank 1:03:16 Yeah, of c- yeah, yeah. So, so the Tabs found- uh, Tabs Chocolate-

Calum Johnson 1:03:20 Yeah

Rob The Bank 1:03:21 ... his roommate is my partner on a lot of this stuff, 22-year-old kid, and we invented this whole shit. Like, like for real. That's why when I see people nowadays popping up talking TikTok shop, I'm like, "You guys don't know. Sounds good, but you guys don't know."

Calum Johnson 1:03:31 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:03:32 Um, we invented this game. And so from a product standpoint, like that's where I said we started iterating with Top Shelf. You need to be under- You need to be able to understand the product in three seconds and buy it within 10. So that's the frame of reference you have to look through with this era. But that's still very broad. I'll use an example of one of my students in Million Dollar Brand Club, my guy Cole. I just invested in his business. Mouth tape is another one. He started for, for five grand. He's into the Huberman stuff, biohacking, and so he sees there's this brand out there, Hostage Tape, that did like 10 million last year or something, and he hates the product. Like he's uses it, but it's like shitty adhesive, doesn't like the branding. And so this dude calls up a manufacturer in China. He's like, "Hey, can you guys add a lavender scent to it? Like, can you, can you just add a lavender scent to the thing? And then can you do something about this adhesive?" And so fast-forward two months and a couple grand, he has this new mouth tape product to market. It's Hybr tape. Like check it out on TikTok shop. I'm super proud of this dude. I use it every night. And it's a dramatically better product. It cost him a c- like the minimum order in China was like 500 pieces at $2 a pop.

Calum Johnson 1:04:36 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:04:37 He did better branding. Like he kinda poured into kinda my whole framework. I don't wanna bore everyone with ... Well, we could talk cult branding and like the obsessive nature of it, but he put all those pieces together. 3% is not a lot. His product's probably 25% better than the leading thing in that world. But he gets on TikTok shop, he runs this exact playbook, his brother starts making the content, and they're doing 100 grand a month in like their fourth or fifth month. And it's super profitable and it, it checks all of those boxes. And so and that was not complicated. I mean, it was as simple as going on Alibaba, typing in, um, mouth tape, and there's like 50 people that wanna make it for you.

Calum Johnson 1:05:10 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:05:10 Hits them all up, like does the work, starts getting samples. And he's gonna be the next million dollar brand in our community.

Calum Johnson 1:05:16 Mm. You know what's actually, um, interesting? And it goes back to something you mentioned earlier, which is it works a lot better if you're actually interested in the product personally.

Rob The Bank 1:05:26 100%.

Calum Johnson 1:05:26 Because I, I can imagine a lot of people listening, it's like especially if you're like a newer entrepreneur, this is the first business or one of the first businesses that you've started, it's like how do I even improve a product 3%? But if you're the user, it should be kind of obvious.

Rob The Bank 1:05:40 No, it comes second nature.

Calum Johnson 1:05:41 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:05:41 And, and that's the entrepreneurial thing. It's like y- And again, I try to simplify it to the point you don't need to reinvent the wheel. You don't need to come out with something totally new. You just find one of these categories and slightly iterate. Sometimes it really is as simple as better branding, which I, I don't really recommend that. I really like the entrepreneurial thing, like where we're solving a problem, but s- you can succeed with just better branding. Like you can be number two on TikTok shop to a shitty brand that doesn't really know what they're doing and you can win. Sa- Tabs Chocolate. Tabs was not the first sex chocolate. They were the first TikTok shop optimized sex chocolate, and he charged $30 for a three-piece of chocolate and printed like millions.

Calum Johnson 1:06:17 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:06:18 But again, pretty straightforward. It wasn't like reinventing the wheel.

Calum Johnson 1:06:20 Yeah. You know what? I wanna, I wanna get into the, the branding and marketing side 'cause I think that's hugely important piece to it. Before we do, I'm kinda curious: what is your process or thought process around like testing product? Because I can imagine it's like someone starts going through this process and maybe there's several industries they're personally interested in and you're like ... Then is there like a testing phase where you're like buying different stuff and you're like, "Nah, actually this won't work"? Or like you start kinda building a brand and then you like toss it aside. What is that process of you actually getting the thing which you're like, "If we turn the marketing onto this, it will go"?

Rob The Bank 1:07:01 Yeah. Ho- honestly, I, I've never done that. I know that's like a common talk track amongst e-com because-

Calum Johnson 1:07:05 Mm

Rob The Bank 1:07:05 ... like a lot of people like ... A lot of people frame how Amazon is supposed to be or how this is supposed to be, but to me, if you're paying zero for traffic, like if you can make the content and you know there's a market for it- You can't fail. Like too bad. Like I mean even Amazon was the, the early thing. I had some products that did unreal and made the business and I had others that would stall out at like 10, 20, 30,000. But they weren't losses because all of the pieces were there, the knowledge was there, the brand was there, the search data was there. And so I really, like I'm not a fan of like half-assing it.

Calum Johnson 1:07:35 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:07:35 Like I, I get the need to wanna test, but like I, I know a kid that yerba mate is like a hot category. It's probably too late by the time this airs. But he was onto this like a year ago and instead of going for it he tested a landing page where he wasn't even fulfilling the orders. He just wanted to see how many people would buy it and then he'd refund them. And he wasted like six, seven months doing that.

Calum Johnson 1:07:56 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:07:56 And now yerba mate is as big as they come. I have another student who launched a yerba mate like kinda combo and he did $7,000 yesterday on like his third week in business in a day. And so to me if the data's clear and the opportunity's there and you have confidence in what you're doing, like shoot the shot.

Calum Johnson 1:08:13 Mm. So it's basically if the, if the product quality is there and there's the traffic, like you can get eyeballs to it, that's enough.

Rob The Bank 1:08:20 Exactly.

Calum Johnson 1:08:21 Okay. I get you.

Rob The Bank 1:08:22 It's when you can't get the traffic. That's why I said the hard part isn't often making the product, the hard part is having a window to scale it without breaking the bank. Like-

Calum Johnson 1:08:30 Mm

Rob The Bank 1:08:30 ... as Amazon got more difficult that's where that na- narrative of Amazon saturated came from because all of a sudden it was a lot harder. Whereas like TikTok right now is like bro you can, if you have the skills you can sell literally whatever.

Calum Johnson 1:08:42 Mm. It's the speed. Okay. You know what? Let's, let's talk about, uh, the branding. I think you called it cult branding.

Rob The Bank 1:08:47 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:08:48 Ex- explain that. What, what does that mean?

Rob The Bank 1:08:49 So the best brands in the world mirror cults. Like actually there's an emotional connection and relationship with the brand at its fundamental heart and we're all susceptible to this. Like you, like these pants, these are Chrome Hearts. I am part of the Chrome Heart cult. I know I could buy these same pants from Carhartt with the same exact quality for a hundredth of the price [laughs] you know?

Calum Johnson 1:09:14 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:09:14 But, but that's the nature of strong brand. And so when you look at all the strongest brands out there there's a very clear intention on who they stand for and who they serve. My favorite story is the founder of Lululemon. When he started that business he did not make double XL because he did not want fat women wearing his, his product. And that's offensive and it's loud and it pisses all sorts of people off, but the end result is he's a billionaire. Okay? And like that, that's just objective. That's not me having like, "Oh, you should be supporting those people." Like I'm not here for any of that. I'm just telling you what made that work, what made that go. You look at like Harley. Harley caters to a ... That's another cult brand. Caters to a very specific market, a ver- very specific person. And so whenever you're setting out on this journey I think it's super important that you can summarize all of this with drawing a clear line in the sand of who is your business for, who is your brand for, and then rejecting everyone else. Like, like it, it's not for everyone. It's for X, Y, and Z. And there's enough of a customer base there to get you from zero to a million. I mean, I think too, you know, Lulu's public now, right? And they're trying to go bigger and like it's a whole different game. It's not actually not working for them. They've got away from their roots. But I'm speaking to startup people. Like that's what I know. I know zero to 10 million. And the harder you draw that line the more you're gonna connect and resonate with people.

Calum Johnson 1:10:36 Mm. You know what? I wanna read one of the ... I saw a tweet when you said this. You said, "Nike sells the same shirts as Reebok, yet people pay twice the price for a logo. You need to create a strong brand, one that has an emotional connection that speaks to the pains and beliefs of the customer. Strong branding plus unique differentiators equal premium product."

Rob The Bank 1:10:58 Yeah. All day. And, and I think it's especially important when you're starting out to have that better margin to play with, right? Like if you're, if you're trying to commoditize and be like everyone else, if you're selling the same generic shirt as Reebok and trying to ... or a Nike and trying to beat them on price what's gonna happen? They're Nike, right?

Calum Johnson 1:11:14 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 1:11:14 Like so how are you setting yourself apart? Chrome Hearts is a great story. They are not for everyone and they've built a billion-dollar business with like 26 stores by being extremely exclusive, extremely clear on who they serve. And the end result is again like success. Uh, you're a Drake fan?

Calum Johnson 1:11:31 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:11:32 Me, me as well. And there's Nike socks and then there's Nike socks with Nocta on them that I buy that are like $5 more.

Calum Johnson 1:11:40 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:11:40 It's the same sock, but I resonate with that brand. There's something about brand that forms identity in an individual and the more you tap into that and can make it a part of someone's life the better off you're gonna be as the brand owner. Like as much as I can talk objectively about all this stuff I can't stop the lure that is Gallery Department or Van Cleef or whatever, you know? Like Steve Jobs was the original one on this. Apple's the biggest cult there is. I mean you go try to tell any iPhone user that like an Android's better and you're, you know, maybe, maybe punches are being thrown, right?

Calum Johnson 1:12:11 Yeah. Hands being thrown.

Rob The Bank 1:12:12 And, and, and the sooner you take that on your own journey and the more you appreciate it the better off you're gonna be.

Calum Johnson 1:12:17 Yeah. You know what? I'm, I'm, I'm curious to get deeper into your, into your process. When you're building like one of these, um, like brands on TikTok like take me into the room because you're someone that when I watch your content and what you do you're very intentional about brand and messaging.

Rob The Bank 1:12:33 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:12:33 And so when you're almost doing like the brainstorming or the strategy-

Rob The Bank 1:12:37 Mm

Calum Johnson 1:12:37 ... or the brand meeting like what are some of those conversations that you're having? Because when entrepreneurs say you have to know your customer I know how it feels to the person that hasn't built the business yet. It's like just feels so vague. Like how do I know the customer? How do I know what's gonna resonate with them? Like w- where does your mind go? Like take me into those rooms.

Rob The Bank 1:12:58 No, this, this is a great one and I'll, I'll break this story down just objectively. Again, it's important here everyone remembers I'm relatively indifferent to a lot of this stuff and with- as a brand owner you can be very ... You don't have to explain yourself, right? You don't have to explain most of it. You can do whatever and let the art sort itself out. And so if you go on social media what 18 months ago before there was a wide ban who was the most seen person?

Calum Johnson 1:13:20 Tate probably, yeah

Rob The Bank 1:13:21 Tate, of course, right? Like, you couldn't go on that app without seeing Andrew Tate. And it created this wild wave of the red pill stuff. Like, then Belmar and like, like, then Iman Shehki, literally that's all there is. Our first home run product, it all coincided, right, with TikTok coming together. And Tate strategy is actually what we use on products, like multiple accounts. But I remember going, "Well, there's a huge audience here that is not being sold to directly." Our first hero product was called Alpha Grind, and it's black packaging and it's like gold. You know, it's, it's a great coffee alternative. It's coffee plus nootropic. But we b- just positioned that in a way that this whole platform is already wildly, like, red pilled out, right? Like, it was almost, it was almost like it's, it was comical, like how silly it was getting. And so [laughs] we positioned the rebrand of Top Shelf, this was like iteration two, 'cause before that we were like a, a coffee company and we positioned a lot of the branding just from an aesthetics, just from like all those components of something that would look like it sits on Tate's shelf on the war room. And then now as that's died out, like, the ... And that got us from zero to, to 10 million. And now as that's died out, we're again iterating. Like, we're not, we're not here to, like I said, I'm not marrying to any trend or idea. It's like who are the customers. At the center of it, I just want, this is a brand that's gonna help men level up. And so as that kind of lost steam, you know, we're going through another big rebrand and like I'm leaning so hard into the Chrome Hearts and I guess Drake's level of era of masculinity, where it's a more subdued, but like, I mean, who's gonna tell Drake he's not him, right?

Calum Johnson 1:14:53 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 1:14:53 And that's kind of the archetype. So as that, that has faded out, we've pivoted and that's what can take us from 10 to 100 million potentially. Um, Chrome Hearts, like it's that same kind of archetype. And so that, that was the room as that moment was going crazy. You can't open your phone and not see, you know, whatever he's yelling about, and we leveraged that to our advantage.

Calum Johnson 1:15:13 Hmm. That's interesting. So you're actually, you're actually observing like trends and culture and then understanding the people that are supporting-

Rob The Bank 1:15:22 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 1:15:22 ... those movements.

Rob The Bank 1:15:23 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:15:23 But understanding them on like a deep level and-

Rob The Bank 1:15:25 At the center of that it was just, it was a self-improvement thing, right?

Calum Johnson 1:15:27 Right.

Rob The Bank 1:15:27 However you dress it up, like, like, you know, we're not over here getting wildly political with it. Like at the center of that, that young man consuming that content wants to be tougher. He wants to go to the gym. He wants to start kickboxing. Like, so let's, let's make a product for that and let's align it-

Calum Johnson 1:15:42 Hmm

Rob The Bank 1:15:42 ... 'cause it's there. Another one like right now, we almost went all into this and I, I pulled back 'cause I don't think it's a fully fleshed out idea, but there's a subset of men that are leaning into looks maxing. Not sure if you've seen this, but it's like, you know, 16 to 20-year-old kids that are hyper-focused on their looks almost in like a feminine way. Like they're doing their facial routines and they're like all these different things. So we could probably make-

Calum Johnson 1:16:02 Like the nail polish stuff, I guess? Is it?

Rob The Bank 1:16:03 Uh, no, not full nail polish.

Calum Johnson 1:16:05 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:16:05 It's more just like, like literally like how you're getting your hair cut and like ... It's, it is very sassy. Like they're 16-

Calum Johnson 1:16:10 Yeah

Rob The Bank 1:16:10 ... like skinny, like they're not hitting the gym.

Calum Johnson 1:16:12 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:16:12 So like they get kind of pigeonholed as like, you know, they get, they get bashed a lot. But at the center of that, there's clearly a cry for something, right? And there, there's a movement that's getting tens of millions of views. Well, what kind of product could you sell that audience? Like we had a, like a moisture, a men's moisturizer in the works that I know would sell 'cause the data's there.

Calum Johnson 1:16:29 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:16:29 Like it's, it's serving that movement.

Calum Johnson 1:16:32 Hmm. That's actually really interesting. That's really interesting. And so I, I'm actually curious then, so what, what kind of ... 'Cause you mentioned with that specifically you kind of pulled back.

Rob The Bank 1:16:42 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:16:43 Um, so what is the differentiator of what makes you go all in on a movement and be like, "Okay, we're gonna build the product, we're gonna build the brand, we're gonna go all into this," versus it's not r- quite right? Like what are the key differentiators?

Rob The Bank 1:16:55 W- with that, i- if I had a brand new brand, I, I would, I would build something to the looks maxing community. Like it was just at that phase of it. Whereas Top Shelf is, has gotten to a certain point and I don't think that existing market, 'cause we, we built it in a way that like, you know, you should be hitting the gym, you should be, you should be living more kind of how I try to design my life as kind of the customer. Whereas that was still too, like too sassy masculinity.

Calum Johnson 1:17:18 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:17:18 If that makes sense. Like it was still too ... It just didn't align. But the opportunity's there, it's just my brand at that point had, had graduated from that size of a market.

Calum Johnson 1:17:26 Yeah. I'm curious what you, what your life looks like on the day-to-day in terms of, um, how you're observing

Calum Johnson 1:17:32 trends. Because it sounds like you kind of have your finger on the button of like where everything is going and like where the movements are-

Rob The Bank 1:17:38 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 1:17:38 ... and what products. Like what is it that you're doing? Are you just on your iPhone and you're on TikTok or like are there tools that you're using?

Rob The Bank 1:17:44 Like I said, in, in this world we get to live for a living. Like we get to exist in this culture, you know? Like how we design our life ultimately becomes the same things we're fed, the same circles we run in, the same algorithms. Like if you keep living a particular way you, you drift more into these, these worlds. And the important part with it is to be an, an observer. Like we're all on TikTok, 99% are as consumers. Who's actually observing it like objectively as like, "Oh, this is an interesting idea," or, "Oh, this is bubbling up"? And so I think I've just gradually learned to take more of like a neutral approach with all of it, right? And, and not get swept away. And like I, I try not to have opinions on many things. I try to just view it as like, yeah, this is the movement that's happening. Like you see Drake paint his nails, you see Yachty paint his nails, and then I'm like, you know, I test it. I'm like, "Yeah, I'm gonna paint my nails."

Calum Johnson 1:18:33 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 1:18:33 I paint. Like who's gonna say anything to me? I box or whatever.

Calum Johnson 1:18:35 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:18:35 And I did that, you know? Triple sevens, like I thought they were fly. Um, but just existing within that culture and then being able to kind of play off it is, it's fun as long as you're observing.

Calum Johnson 1:18:44 Yeah. And you know what, you know what's interesting and it's smart is that, um, because you're an objective observer you can actually go like a layer deeper and start to see like, well, what are like the desires and like what is the-

Rob The Bank 1:18:56 Yes

Calum Johnson 1:18:56 ... what are the needs that people are trying to get with-

Rob The Bank 1:18:58 Yes

Calum Johnson 1:18:58 ... this behavior?

Rob The Bank 1:18:59 What's the fundamental thing they're trying to achieve and then how can you influence it? 'Cause both looks maxing and the red pill thing were just unique cries for help.

Calum Johnson 1:19:07 Mm-hmm.

Rob The Bank 1:19:07 An underserved audience that was trying to better themselves. However that manifests in the end result, like, you know, that's where people start getting strong opinions and it's right or it's wrong. But what's the center thing going on there?

Calum Johnson 1:19:19 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:19:19 And the more you can tap into that the m- the more money you can make as bad as that sounds. But like-

Calum Johnson 1:19:23 Yeah

Rob The Bank 1:19:23 ... that's how I, that's how I approach it.

Calum Johnson 1:19:25 Yeah. You know what? Okay. Let, let, let's take it- Let's take it deeper. So let's say that I found the, the winning product.

Rob The Bank 1:19:31 Mm.

Calum Johnson 1:19:32 I've then developed like a unique product which is 3%, let's even say it's 5%, 7% better.

Rob The Bank 1:19:39 Mm.

Calum Johnson 1:19:40 Um, I'm very clear on like who the customer is, what the brand story, all of this. How- what are the actual practical steps of me now promoting that product on TikTok? Like what does that look like?

Rob The Bank 1:19:52 Yeah, I mean do you wanna talk manufacturing? I, I get asked all the time too, where do we get it made. Like where do you get the product made? I don't wanna gloss over that because that's one of those things to me that's second nature. There's manufacturers that want to make your shit. Like if you Google mouth tape manufacturer, you're gonna find five pages of people that do that.

Calum Johnson 1:20:09 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:20:09 Um, so seriously, Google and then bang on the phones. 'Cause that's where I think a lot of people get hung up. They don't know where the product gets made. Am I making it in my kitchen? Am I like... But no, you're working with a contract manufacturer. There's all sorts of them. Um-

Calum Johnson 1:20:19 Just quickly, when you say bang the phone, so like you'd find a manufacturer on Google-

Rob The Bank 1:20:24 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 1:20:24 ... and then what, you're calling the factory and like-

Rob The Bank 1:20:26 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 1:20:26 ... what is even happening in that call?

Rob The Bank 1:20:27 You're finding the salesperson and telling them you got a product and these are your, you know, this is your budget, these are your minimums. Like I wanna bring this to market, can you help?

Calum Johnson 1:20:35 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:20:35 And a lot of them, like maybe it won't be a good fit. Maybe they only work with huge brands.

Calum Johnson 1:20:39 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:20:39 And but eventually you're gonna find that boutique manufacturer, like I did with Genius, that'll scale with you. You know, those guys didn't, I didn't pay them for the whole run. I gave them a deposit, they took a little risk on me, and they grew with me over the years. But their business is to make those products, right? Like they don't keep the lights on unless they're making X amount of bottles per year. So there's a whole ecosystem out there that wants to support you as a brand owner.

Calum Johnson 1:21:00 Mm. Are there mistakes that people make when it comes to the manufacturing point of like, I'm assuming, I'm assuming you get sent prototypes or-

Rob The Bank 1:21:07 Mm, you get samples and stuff like that. Yeah. Manufacturing, it can be a tricky world. Again, if you're starting out, like work the phones and all those, those things tend to sort themselves out. Like you're, it's a relationship game.

Calum Johnson 1:21:18 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:21:18 Um, some manufacturers are can be shady. Some don't hold their lead times right. But that's why you're... I recommend calling 10 to 15, just to get your feet wet, right? And figuring out what works. Um, but yeah, I mean, that's, like generally a pretty complex topic. But to bring something to market is not, not that complex. It gets way harder when you're trying to do like, you know, I'm trying to do a million bottles or whatever and you lockdown supply chain, but at that point, you, you have the skills and the confidence, right?

Calum Johnson 1:21:43 Yeah. Yeah, you've built it up. Okay. So let's, let's assume then that we also, we have the manufacturing sorted out.

Rob The Bank 1:21:48 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:21:49 Like we, we can fulfill orders, and now we're just like how do we get the traffic-

Rob The Bank 1:21:54 Mm-hmm

Calum Johnson 1:21:54 ... on top of it? Um, explain that game to me of like actually marketing the product on TikTok.

Rob The Bank 1:22:01 Yeah. So TikTok shop the platform is like super straightforward. You go, you know, like LLC or something like that. Um, you know, make sure you're doing it under a new business. But then you open up a TikTok shop account, you put all your info in, you list your product. It's like, you know, you need a picture of it. You get it up there, and now all of a sudden you're in the game. You choose your sale price, like you're, you are officially listed on TikTok shop. You have zero eyeballs and zero sales, but that's where if you learn that skill of making... Most of it's faceless, bro. Like people think it's like, oh, are you an influencer talking? No, a lot of it's like the kid holding the phone and the product whips in and it's like, "This legendary herb has been around for like..." You know, it's a very specific content style. And if you master that by either studying the others or, you know, there's YouTube channels that are starting to break it down. I told you that Tab's roommate, um, he runs a whole program now. Like that's where I get all my creators. He has a program training 18, you know, 15 to 24-year-old kids how to make, you know, it's like $10,000 a month doing this.

Calum Johnson 1:22:59 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:22:59 But I'm the one writing the checks. Like it's for real. I want as many creators as possible. So if you're young watching this, like that is the side hustle in my opinion that can get you started. And so if you learn to make that, all of a sudden you're, you're in the game. And then it's just how many videos are you putting out per day? Oh, fulfillment, right? You, you need to have somewhere to fulfill the product. Everyone uses a 3PL. Um, TikTok shop is partnered with ShipBob. So basically you get that run off the manufacturer, you send that inventory to ShipBob, you plug in with them, and they'll fulfill every single order off of TikTok shop for you.

Calum Johnson 1:23:29 Wow.

Rob The Bank 1:23:29 Money starts going up.

Calum Johnson 1:23:30 Yeah. That's super easy. I'm curious because you, you work with so many creators. Can you even see someone, and maybe they haven't even really made that many videos, but you can just see the way they are and like the way that they create and you're like, "Okay, they're gonna be, they're gonna make like viral content"? Like-

Rob The Bank 1:23:47 Oh, yeah. Yeah. And, and I mean, and the good ones often aren't, aren't for sale, right? Like you're trying to... The, the best case is you're taking a bet on like, it's like venture capital. You take, you pay 10 of them a retainer-

Calum Johnson 1:23:58 Mm

Rob The Bank 1:23:58 ... and nine of them go bust, and then one of them gets you five million views and it just paid for the whole thing, your whole product run, and you're like, "Shit, I need more inventory."

Calum Johnson 1:24:06 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:24:06 Um, but that's generally kinda the game. The more you kinda pour into that world and, and learn it, there's new talent popping up every day.

Calum Johnson 1:24:12 Mm. So, so, so the one out of the 10 that is like the star, that is the outlier, what is it that they're doing? Like when you, when you think about it, like what is, what is so special about their content? Like what do those common features tend to be?

Rob The Bank 1:24:25 They, they almost always like, they don't, like this almost sounds bad, but there's almost like a little autistic component sometimes that they just get the algorithm. Like the ones that invent the new strategies. There's this one that everyone does now and it came from our group, but it's this like deep AI voice. You've probably seen it on like the motivational stuff, but it's like it's Adam on ElevenLabs. And it's like, "If you took Alpha Grind for 21 days, this is what would happen to your body." And a lot of the time it's just like a very unique creator who's been like living and breathing that since they were, you know, young. Like how old are you?

Calum Johnson 1:24:57 I'm 26.

Rob The Bank 1:24:57 26. So like when, when did you have a phone for like, uh-

Calum Johnson 1:25:01 Ooh, probably 13, 14.

Rob The Bank 1:25:03 13, 14. So you, you largely grew up with a phone.

Calum Johnson 1:25:06 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:25:06 The 18-year-olds, like that's been their, screens have been their world, right? They don't even have a computer. Like you pr- you're probably on a laptop more than, or just as much as a phone.

Calum Johnson 1:25:14 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:25:14 I was phone in high school, right? So like I'm, I'm native to it, but not like them. When you have some of these kids that were making TikToks in high school, they just get it. They know it's like hook, keep them watching, repeat. Some sort of engagement. And that's the equation. Like I can tell you the equation all day. I still don't have the same natural gift that- Sydney, who is a girl here in, in Brooklyn that she was, like, one of the star creators. She made, like, 120,000 her third month doing it because she just- she's just in tune with it. Like, she was working at Chipotle, finds this whole Creator's Corner thing. She's like, "Well, this is what people wanna hear." Starts getting the reps up. Um, that's the other thing, it's like, it's a rep game. You're not gonna go viral your first five videos.

Calum Johnson 1:25:54 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:25:54 Um, but the more you do it, like, the more swings at bat, and that, like, eventually it's gonna happen.

Calum Johnson 1:25:59 Mm. I'm curious then, so because there's people that can go viral.

Rob The Bank 1:26:03 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:26:04 I don't, I don't know this for TikTok, but I've seen it in other forms of social media. There's people that get a ton of attention but can't sell product.

Rob The Bank 1:26:10 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:26:11 So is it the same with TikTok, where, like, there's certain creators that they can make viral creative, but it doesn't necessarily lead to sales?

Rob The Bank 1:26:18 Yeah. I, I think the beauty of this world is these are all sales driven videos.

Calum Johnson 1:26:23 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:26:23 So, like, they're not showing their face. It's almost always optimized to be about the product with some claim or some story. Um, that's why I think influencers are dying. Like, there's a lot of influencers that have mad reach, but people don't take them seriously or, or whatever, right? And you pay that person a couple thousand for a post 'cause they have a big audience, and the end result is zero sales, whereas this is, like, hyper-focused, sales-driven content.

Calum Johnson 1:26:44 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:26:44 And there's still a scale. Like, you know, some videos will get way more reach and still not sell that much, and some will only do a couple hundred thousand views, but it's such a targeted video, it sells. But, um, in general, like the way this is approached is sales first.

Calum Johnson 1:26:57 Mm. I'm curious, I'm curious, like, you mentioned that this is, like, a, a similar magnitude of opportunity to what Amazon was.

Rob The Bank 1:27:04 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:27:05 What are some of the craziest things that you're seeing with, like, people that are doubling down on it, like the, what are some of the results that they're even getting?

Rob The Bank 1:27:14 There's this brand Guru Nanda, who's another Amazon friendly brand, who's doing a couple million a year. They've done $38M now since they've started on TikTok shop, and it's, like, a mouth rinse that ... Have you seen

Rob The Bank 1:27:25 it? Like, it's all over a lot of people's explore pages, but again, they just kinda figured if we go viral, we make sales. Let's figure out how to go as viral as possible. Um, you're familiar with the Tate strategy, like, just how he had all these different accounts going from affiliates?

Calum Johnson 1:27:38 Ex- explain it to people.

Rob The Bank 1:27:40 The, the Tate strategy, what, why everyone saw Andrew Tate every single day from however long to however long was because he had affiliates that were trained in repurposing Tate podcast interviews, and a lot of creators are using this style now. Like, I, I will. Like, you'll see clips of this on my secondary accounts, right? But the idea was the more swings at bat, the more likely you are to go viral. And so all of a sudden he has hundreds of affiliates putting out two to three Tate videos per day. Most of them never see the light of day, and then all of a sudden, one gets 10 million views, and then now this guy's on your algorithm more and more. And so it's really the same idea. It's how are we getting as many swings at bat as possible? And so Guru Nanda figured that out early on. They've done 38 million so far in six months. Um, there's a product, like, 15 Day Gut Cleanse.

Calum Johnson 1:28:27 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:28:27 I have no idea who they are or where they came from, and they, they did $10M last month. Um, so the, the numbers are as real as you could possibly, like, dream of. I mean, it's like those are sustainable, life-changing business numbers.

Calum Johnson 1:28:41 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:28:41 But yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:28:42 You know what? Here's, here's where I wanna end 'cause I started by reading,

Calum Johnson 1:28:45 um, this tweet. Um, "In the last 10 years, I've nearly lost my business. I sold it later for $30M. I dodged cancer. I became a father of two, and I found God during dark times." And so I wanna end with that final bullet point. "I found God during dark times."

Rob The Bank 1:29:06 Mm-hmm. So you-

Calum Johnson 1:29:07 What is that moment?

Rob The Bank 1:29:08 Have you ... You, you've heard me kinda hint at abundance and grow, like, all of that stuff throughout this interview, right? And my whole story, I'll kinda summarize it in a, in a shorter form, but after selling that company, there was, like, a, a window of emptiness, where you get this huge wire into your bank account and you feel like you made it, and then you refresh it 10 times that day, and then you go to sleep, and you wake up the next day, and literally nothing is different. And you kinda go, "What is my purpose? Like, what, what am I, what am I doing here?" And I had been a guy that always felt guided or in tune with this very spiritual energy as I was kinda coming up. Like, I always felt like the steps I was making were guided. I felt like I was making moves operating from my heart, and then that wire hit, and for whatever reason, it led to this emptiness and this progression down this, like, rational rabbit hole, like, trying to make sense of everything in a very non awe-inspiring matter. Like, everything is dictated by randomness and chance, and that's just how this universe shakes out, and those who make it are lucky, and so on and so forth. And I had two years of really not a good existence. Like, when I look back at those years, uh, they were very empty, and eventually this led to I had this, uh, melanoma cut off my ear, which is a, a form of skin cancer. I have no idea what this thing is, and I'm kinda going through life on autopilot. I'm trying to learn how to be wealthy. I'm trying to learn how to protect my money, right? I wanna, I wanna make sure that's, like, passed along. That's all I think about. There's no growth. There's just, like, I got this chunk. Let me invest it right. Let me make the right decisions. And then one day, I, like, have this kinda growth going on behind my ear, and my wife flags it for me, and I don't, I don't think anything of it. For those of you who aren't familiar with melanoma, it's, like, the, I think, I think the leading cancer that kills younger people, like, under, under 50. It's a skin cancer.

Calum Johnson 1:31:02 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:31:03 And, um, the basic idea with it is it starts on your skin, and if you cut it off within a certain amount of time before it grows to a certain point, you're good, but if it tunnels down and it starts to get in your body, you are in for a whole 'nother round, like, world of treatment, and your life, your life changes. Your life all of a sudden becomes the melanoma. And so I'm going on with life. I'm still kinda like Mister, like, I don't listen to anybody. My health's fine. Like, that's just how I am. And my wife flags this thing for me, and I, like, ignore it for a while. And, uh, I'm back in Seattle visiting my parents one summer, and the day before I'm supposed to leave, my mom goes, "You're going in. You, like, have a dermatologist appointment today. You're taking that. Like, you're going in." And, uh, I was like, "Yeah, whatever." And so I, I go in, I sit down. I still have no idea, like, the seriousness of any of this. And the doctor looks at it and he goes, "That is coming off today." And I'm like, "Um, okay." Like, I'm still not really... I'm like, "Whatever." And dude, like, numbs me up, does this whole surgery, like cuts out this big chunk behind my ear. Um, we leave the next day, headed back to Puerto Rico. We stop in Texas for a week, visiting some, some friends, family. And, uh, I get a call from that same doctor, and he goes, "Hey, uh, are you sitting down?" And I'm like, "No, I'm driving." Like, "What's up?" And, uh, he's like, "Well, you know, we got- we got the autopsy back, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You're gonna have to go, you know, find the, the nearest major cancer center, and you need to go schedule an appointment." He's like, "The good news is I think we got this, like, in plenty of time, and- and like, you know, you're, like... Like, I think we got it, but you need to go in for this, this, and this." And- and basically, like, that day, I still don't know what's going on. I'm still kinda not thinking anything of this. And like, I'm, bro, I'm invincible, right? I'm 28, 29. I have millions of dollars. I, like, am plugging along with my life. Like, stuff like this doesn't happen. I'm in great shape. Like, I'm not thinking of health stuff. And basically, I have to go into this cancer hospital. I go- I had no insurance. Like, you know, I was in Puerto Rico at the time, so no US insurance, and we're just passing through. And next thing I know, it's like this scramble to find an appointment at oncology in, you know, one of these major cancer centers. And I remember when we finally did, walking in to- to that place, you know, and seeing the devastation. 'Cause you're in there with... You know, I mean, you see people that are probably terminal and fighting tooth and nail, and it's, like, a really fucked up reality. And long s- you know, long story short, they go in and they have to do another surgery to clear the margin, like rip all this stuff out. And the basic takeaway was like, "Yo, if you had waited like a couple more weeks, like that shit was starting to tunnel down, and, like, you're- you're living a whole different life." And so from that point, again, it's that reoccurring presentation of- of death. That fucked with me so tough. I'd just had my second daughter, and I remember just, like, wrestling with the reality of life, and again, that it could be gone. And then I looked back to the abundant me that had built Genius, and then the rational me of the last two years that I hadn't done shit fun and was focused on, like, just trying to be the smartest guy in the room. And eventually, through like a series of events, it was like God slapping me. It was, like, all these different things, you know? Like, I kept seeing this Bible verse, Isaiah 43:10, uh, 41:10. You know, "Do not fear. I am with you." And I spent like a year, bro, like really contemplating existence. Like, "Oh my God, this could be taken away. I'm not gonna see my kids grow up. Like, what is the point of any of this?" And that's what kinda led me on the whole, eventually, on the other side of that, I was like, "Oh, no, this is almost like another second shot at this." And this is the- the life maxing movement. This is like, I wanna go travel. I wanna live for a living. I wanna design my life so that I leave my mark while still experiencing life to the fullest. And it was through those really dark times. Like I, you know, like it, again, the- the whole mental thing's real, right? And you talk about I had created this narrative that like, "Oh my God, I'm gonna die," or like, you know, "It's gonna come back," or this, that. And it, it took me a long time to get over that. But on the other side of it was this blessing that, wow, I'm 31, 32, and I get to create this however I want. And eventually, that's what led to Rob The Bank. That's what led to these new businesses. That's what led to all the new growth, where I'm operating from, like, a true place of being in tune with that, that voice, that person. That's all I answer to.

Calum Johnson 1:35:24 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:35:25 I don't answer to others' expectations for me. I know, like, I'm blessed and have the opportunity to create in this world and operate from a place of abundance. And once I doubled into that and let go of all the rationale, like randomness, luck, whatever, life has been so dramatically better, it's not even funny. And it just keeps getting better. And so I think there's importance in that message, and, uh, we're just getting started.

Calum Johnson 1:35:47 Yeah. You know what, you know what? You, one of the things you said, it was, you said it was almost like God was slapping you in the face.

Rob The Bank 1:35:52 Slapping me, bro.

Calum Johnson 1:35:53 And you know what? When I was, um, when I was just listening to you recount that story, it's almost eerie in a way because the same way that you describe that experience sounds oddly familiar with the, with what happened with your grandma.

Rob The Bank 1:36:07 Yeah.

Calum Johnson 1:36:08 Where it's like this kind of innocuous event. Like, you don't even really think it's something. Like the, the mole that's growing on the back of your ear.

Rob The Bank 1:36:15 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:36:15 Or, oh yeah, she was just going in to get, like, a treatment done.

Rob The Bank 1:36:18 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:36:18 And then it ends up being something so much more huge. And even when you were telling the story about, uh, the melanoma, it's like going into that center, and it's like just a world of devastation.

Rob The Bank 1:36:31 Mm-hmm.

Calum Johnson 1:36:32 And I'm curious for you, like, when you go back into that moment, was it, like, eerie for you? Was it almost like this is almost like a sick experience? The fact that the similarities between what I went through with your grandma and how div- devastating that was, and then being there yourself.

Rob The Bank 1:36:55 It was sickening. And like, bro, to this day, like, we talk about how strong our minds are, and our, our bodies, and thoughts can create stuff. I box. Like, right near that cancer hospital, there's a boxing gym I go to, and I have to drive by it. And when I drive by it, I was just there a couple weeks ago, and I'm well removed from this entire situation, but as I'm driving past that, there's like a chilling, you know, like your skin crawls, and I feel, like, a physical burning where they took it off. Like, I, I literally feel that. And my life was like that forever. I used to give in to those thoughts. It was like it would, like, melt you down, and I still feel it when I drive by that place, you know, after I have not been there for a while. And I still remember those memories of seeing, like, you know, the mom with her kid with the, you know, hat 'cause she doesn't have any hair. But- I frame it and I know it to be like a blessing at this point. You know? Like, like I, I move past it, and I drive past there, and I, I tuck it away, and I'm just like, "Man, like that happened to me and I'm really happy God brought me to this next point in my life." But I still feel it, you know, when I drive by there. And I guarantee you if I ever went back to University of Washington where my nana passed away in that emergency room, I would feel that same room.

Calum Johnson 1:38:06 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:38:06 Um, but that's life and we gotta roll with it.

Calum Johnson 1:38:09 Mm. You know what you said? You said life maxing. I guess the, the opposite of that is just it's over, like death. I-

Rob The Bank 1:38:17 The opposite is, is, is nihilism. It's that subtle depressive thing that Chris talks about. The opposite is going through life on autopilot with no purpose, no intention of purpose. A real numb to the reality is that we will eventually expire.

Calum Johnson 1:38:32 Mm. Would you say that's like kind of your biggest fear? Like what would you say is your biggest fear?

Rob The Bank 1:38:37 I, I try not to have fears at this point, you know, because we're not in control of a lot of it. I think you lean into the, the power of this universe, of this God, whatever it might be, and try to be in tune with that mission, and then live it to the fullest, you know? Because w- we, we are gonna die. Like I got to a point with all of it that I no longer had a fear of death, you know? Like I know my father passing away will be that next big painful thing, and I know I need to be a certain point in my life for that, right? And, and, and so all these are inevitable realities that you can't be scared of, but rather accept and then look at your own life through that lens because it's gonna mold you onto better things.

Calum Johnson 1:39:14 Mm. You know what? J- just finally, you spoke about kind of like this, this relationship with your dad, like right in the beginning. There's almost like this competitive streak to it. I'm curious, like where, where is that like right now? Like how do you reflect on that right now?

Rob The Bank 1:39:31 My dad is, uh, largely opposite of life maxing in the sense of he came from nothing. He's always been super frugal. He could like afford a, a first class ticket, but would rather fly in the back of the plane 'cause that's who he is. I'm just slowly breaking him down to the abundance of life. So like I'm taking my whole family to, to Jackson Hole in a couple weeks, and, and I chartered a jet, you know? It's, it's like 22 grand or something, and it's just so unnecessary, but I know that experience will stick with him. Like you have to live what you, what you believe at the end of the day. And if you're living in truth, like I know that's gonna make one of those experiences that's just indefinitely legendary to him. I, I took him to the... He used to take me to basketball games growing up. Like we'd always sit like, you know, decent seats, but whatever. I took him to a Mavs game courtside, you know, for the playoffs and it was the b- like he stops worrying about what it costs when he starts living life, you know? And so I, I'm gonna continue to just do what I've always done, which is live my truth and try to bring good experiences to other people. And I, I'm trying to bring that to my, to my home life now too with family and all that. 'Cause it, it's, it's fractured a lot of things. And again, when I look at through that lens that, hey, this guy maybe has 10 to 20 years left, like what, what kind of experiences do I wanna be having? Like will I really worry about spending, you know, 20 whatever thousand on a jet, or will I remember that time that we had a blast in Jackson Hole and it was my dad's first private jet experience? You know, the answer's pretty clear, right, at that point. So that's where I'm at with all of it.

Calum Johnson 1:40:55 Mm. Awesome. Thank you so much.

Rob The Bank 1:40:57 All right. Can I ask you a question real quick?

Calum Johnson 1:40:59 Go for it.

Rob The Bank 1:40:59 You, you love your mom to death, I can tell, yeah?

Calum Johnson 1:41:01 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:41:01 That, that's-

Calum Johnson 1:41:02 More than anything, yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:41:02 Yeah, yeah. She'd be proud of this, yeah?

Calum Johnson 1:41:04 Yeah.

Rob The Bank 1:41:05 And I think when you look at it through that lens, like you know, I know my nana would be proud of all this too. It's like if you live your life in that level of truth, like that shit shines through at the end. So thanks for having me, bro. For real. I think you're like destined for elite things with this. Like you're-

Calum Johnson 1:41:19 Mm.

Rob The Bank 1:41:19 I know you're about it, and uh, it was a pleasure. Thank you for having me on.

Calum Johnson 1:41:22 Thank you so much, man. It's a pleasure having you on. Thank you so much for watching this episode. I hope you enjoyed it. It's really a dream for me that I get to do this. It's surreal that this is what I do full time and every week. So if you enjoy the content, if you enjoyed the conversation, the stories, please hit that subscribe button. It helps us immeasurably with growing the channel, with getting guests, all of those things. So please hit that subscribe button and I'll see you next time.