$10M+ Business Ideas: Tractors, Toastmasters & Franchisees (#450)

Shaan Puri 0:00 At the beginning of the show, we do this thing where we're like, "Put your h- like raise your hand if you're an entrepreneur." And most of the hands go, go up. I say, "Okay, keep your hand up if you've launched your business." All right, like 15% of the hands go down. "Okay, keep your hands up if you have more than $100,000 in revenue." Okay, so hands go down. "A million dollars in revenue, 10 million in revenue, 30 million in revenue." We just keep going up to see kind of like who is, who, who, who wins the No Small Boys Stuff competition of that, of the crowd. 'Cause we're like there's m- the people who are there, they already kinda know our story and they know our bits. We don't know them, and so that might be actually more interesting. And there was a guy who was one of the people who's got, like he was at the kinda like 30, 40, 50 million level. He's like, um, "Yeah, I, uh, I sell gear to fire departments around the country." And he's like, "You know, like we're like, like hoses?" He's like, "Like hoses and uniforms and, you know, nozzles and [laughs] and like, you know, just stuff for the fire department." And he-

Sam Parr 1:01 Did he say that he did 57 million in revenue of that?

Shaan Puri 1:05 Something-

Sam Parr 1:05 Is that what he said?

Shaan Puri 1:05 Something like that. I don't remember the exact number, but it was something like that. [upbeat music]

Sam Parr 1:17 All right. We're live. What's going on?

Shaan Puri 1:19 I'm back home. The live pod is over. The show, the show is over.

Sam Parr 1:24 Let's talk about your time in Austin. The live pod, we should talk about a little bit.

Shaan Puri 1:28 Yeah.

Sam Parr 1:28 We might be airing that, that episode. We, we gotta go back and listen to it to make sure that there was nothing that we had to bleep out, but what did you think about Austin? Seemed like you had a great time.

Shaan Puri 1:37 Had a great time. Dude, I know more people in Austin than in San Francisco somehow, so [laughs] I, I think, uh, I don't know if that's about Austin or that's about me. I think it's more about me not leaving the house here in San Francisco, but when I left my house and went to Austin, I saw tons of old friends, you, and a bunch of the crew. Um, had a great time. Stayed, uh, started off in a haunted hotel and then moved to a better hotel, and then, uh, yeah, it was a good time.

Sam Parr 2:02 You, uh, came in on something like a Wednesday. You left on a Sunday, or a Thursday and Sunday, or something like that.

Shaan Puri 2:07 Tuesday, five days.

Sam Parr 2:09 Tuesday. Tuesday to Sunday. You had, you s- you spoke at two conferences. You were on the Chris Williamson Show, which was, uh, that guy's interesting.

Shaan Puri 2:18 Yeah.

Sam Parr 2:18 But what, what was cool having you here was I felt, I felt, um, I missed our times in San Francisco, the 2012 to 2000 like 18 era where it was like it felt like all of us were at, doing the same stuff. Then when you came in town, we ha- everyone, we, we, we had like three or four dinners of like eight friends, and it felt like, oh wow, this is, it feels like it's happening again. And actually it feels like it's not happening to the extent of what we experienced then, but there are a lot of really special people here, and it felt really cool like to, to appreciate that.

Shaan Puri 2:55 Yeah, you're right. Uh, I think people should do whatever we did in our kind of like 20s, which was move to the city where there's a bunch of other people that are, um, chasing the same dream as you. I think that's like a, that's an amazing... Like you could pick a city based on weather, based on location. You could pick it based on cost. Those are some factors, but if you're in your 20s and you're the type of person who listens to this podcast, you're sort of entrepreneurial, you're ambitious, I think the move is move to a city where, move to a place, I even, not even gonna say city, move to a place, this could just be a house in the town you're in, where you will be around other people who are chasing the same dream as you. It is massively underrated. Like you will not only get smarter faster, but also, uh, you bond with people and it's like those bonds don't go away. Uh, you, you will always kinda remember when you were all at the very upstart phase of what you were doing.

Sam Parr 3:52 And we did this live pod, and this live podcast, and the con- so it was me, Shaan, and Andrew. The content was fine enough, whatever, but what, when, we'll talk about that later or we'll just air the episode. But what was cool was I met people, I think we had 550 or 600 people. It was sold out. And I met, and so we stayed out, Shaan and I and Andrew stayed afterwards and like did like a meet and greet with everyone. And you always talk to these people, and I'm amazed that these people would fly in from all over the place. I met a guy from Malaysia. Um, I met people from all over Mexico, America, North America, uh, who came and they were like, "I came here because in my town I'm a weirdo, and it feels nice to be around non-weirdos." And I was like, "What do you mean?" And I looked at Twitter afterwards and I saw pictures of like... So like basically we didn't let people into the venue until right before it started, and in the line, I don't know if you saw this, there was people interviewing each other like for their own content channels.

Shaan Puri 4:46 [laughs]

Sam Parr 4:46 There's like, people are like, "Oh, I met this person who's doing this. I met this person who did this." I met this lady. Did you meet this Mexican lady who moved to, from like Mexico City to Ann Arbor, and she flew down from Michigan. It was her and her 12-year-old daughter. Did you meet those people?

Shaan Puri 5:03 I did. Uh, loved that. That w- they were, she was like, "Hey, love the pod. This is my daughter. She listens as well. We listen together." And I was like, "Oh, amazing," you know, "what do you..." I asked the daughter, I was like, "What do you, what do you like about the show?" Uh, 'cause she was, she was quite shy, uh, in the moment. And she was like, "Ah, just, you know, I like that it's fun. Uh, it just gets me laughing and then, uh, you know, I just learn different things and it makes me wanna go do, like it makes me wanna go do stuff." [laughs] And I was like, you know, that's the [laughs] that is the actual sales pitch, right? You'll laugh, uh, you'll learn something, and it'll, it'll get you excited to go do stuff. Um, and the mom was like, you know, "Thank you, uh, for the pod because it's the only, like it's the only podcast we can listen to together, that we can both, that we both enjoy, so it's like become a thing we do." And, um, you know, that's probably not that common, but, uh, that was one of my like golden nugget kinda moment takeaways from the whole thing.

Sam Parr 5:59 Yeah, that, she was my favorite person that I met, but I, but anyway, my point is, is that it was cool that like- Um, and what you were saying is what we saw a very micro version of that with 500 people was like, go to the place where there's other weirdos like you and like cool stuff happens. And, and that's always really fun. I met a lady who was like, "Uh, yeah, you talked about me on the pod, and I recently sold that thing for $30 million."

Shaan Puri 6:21 [laughs]

Sam Parr 6:21 And she was like waiting in line for like 30 minutes to talk to me, and I was like, "What? Can I wait in your line? Like, I wanna [laughs] I wanna, I wanna learn about you." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 6:29 Can I wait in your line? Exactly.

Shaan Puri 6:30 [laughs] Let me, yeah, let's do some of the interesting people that we met. So there was a guy, um... At the beginning of the show, we do this thing where we're like, "Put your hand... Like raise your hand if you're an entrepreneur." Now most of the hands go, go up. I say, "Okay, keep your hand up if you've launched your business." All right, like 15% of the hands go down. "Okay, keep your hands up if you have more than $100,000 in revenue." Okay, so hands go down. "A million dollars in revenue. 10 million in revenue. 30 million in revenue." We just keep going up to see kind of like who is, who, who, who wins the No Small Stuff competition of that, of the crowd. 'Cause we're like, there's m- the people who are there, they already kinda know our story and they know our bits. We don't know them, and so that might be actually more interesting. And there was a guy who was one of the people who's got, like he was at the kinda like 30, 40, 50 million level. He's like, um, "Yeah, I, uh, I sell gear to fire departments around the country." And he's like, "You know, like, where like, like hoses?" He's like, "Like hoses and uniforms and, you know, nozzles and [laughs] and like, you know, just stuff for the fire department." And he-

Sam Parr 7:36 Did he say that he did 57 million in revenue of that?

Shaan Puri 7:39 Something-

Sam Parr 7:39 Is that what he said?

Shaan Puri 7:40 Something like that. I don't remember the exact number, but it was something like that. It was in the, it was either 30 or 50 million, something, somewhere there. He said he had an exclusive right to sell in nine states. So like, you know, beautiful business, right? 'Cause he's got a, basically a monopoly on selling in these, in these certain states. He's like won the contract or whatever. And really profitable business that, uh, that like, you know, who even thinks of that? Like who even thinks about who's the, who's the B2B e-commerce for fire departments? And it just gets you thinking, "Wow, how many niche businesses are there?" 'Cause you just kept meeting one after another. Uh, do you have any others that stood out? I got a couple more.

Sam Parr 8:15 Uh, we went to dinner, so we had a dinner the night before. One business that I really like that, uh, I'm eager to see if it's gonna work out or not, is called Boom and Bucket. And what Boom and Bucket does is I, I don't know if it's rental or if it's for selling equipment.

Shaan Puri 8:28 I think it's selling.

Sam Parr 8:29 But I, I think... Is it selling?

Shaan Puri 8:30 Yeah.

Sam Parr 8:30 So basically if you are, if you own a, um, or if you need to buy a, um, tractor or like a, one of the, like anything Caterpillar, so like dump trucks I guess, uh, Boom and Bucket, whatever, you know, whatever has a bucket and carries heavy stuff.

Shaan Puri 8:45 Dude, what a great name.

Sam Parr 8:45 There's a marketplace. Yeah, it's a really good name. It's Boom and Bucket, and it's a really cool website. And so they, I think, uh, the founder, his name's Adam Lawrence. He previously was the COO of Bolt. Bolt was like this like high-flying startup, one-click checkout startup. To be determined if it's gonna work out, but they raised something like hundreds of millions of dollars at multiple billions valuation. He left there after being there for a while, then he went and started Boom and Bucket. And he's telling me all about it. I think it's only a year old or two years old. Still new, so they're still figuring out if it's gonna like take off or not, I think. But really cool business that I actually think will work once they can kinda get s- uh, uh, uh, to, to, to... You know with marketplaces, you need supply and demand. It's really challenging. But if y- if they-

Shaan Puri 9:28 I'm on, I'm on their site right now. So Boom and Bucket, which also sounds like an amazing name for a bar in Austin. Like, you know, [laughs] a bar with like, you know, dollar Jell-O shots-

Sam Parr 9:39 A sports bar

Shaan Puri 9:39 ... and like, uh, you know, the ax throwing in the back. I feel like that's actually i- in Austin, people just have that in their backyard, the ax throwing thing. That's like, that's what it seemed like. So-

Sam Parr 9:48 No, bro. We all have cold plunges and saunas.

Shaan Puri 9:50 [laughs] Yeah.

Sam Parr 9:52 That's the thing in Austin. Everyone, uh-

Shaan Puri 9:54 None of us do feel like Toast. So the first thing on here is a tw- a 2012 Caterpillar 420F. For somebody out there, they're like, "Oh, my favorite model. Uh, [laughs] been dreaming about that one." [laughs]

Sam Parr 10:06 Yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 10:07 $77,000. Ships nationwide. You click it, and it's basically like, "Here's the thing. It was priorly used in construction for concrete. Uh, you know, here's the specs. Uh, we inspected it. Here's what we found that was great about it. Here's what needs work. It's got a residual oil buildup on the engine valve cover. No active leak seen." So they're adding value by doing inspections and doing close-up and detailed photos of the equipment. And then they say, "Great, you can buy through us. We will finance it to you, and we will take care of the shipping to get this to you." Um, this seems like a great idea. I don't know anything about this niche, so, you know, take that with a grain of salt. But, um, love the name, love the idea. And I love that this guy went from, like the most Silicon Valley VC thing you can do, like a network effects, VC-funded, multi-billion, like, you know, unicorn that's either gonna become $100 billion or go to zero, and he's like, "I'ma move to Austin, grow a mustache, and start selling tractors online." [laughs]

Sam Parr 11:04 Dude, he had a, he had a thick beautiful mustache, and he was wearing cowboy boots, and he looked exactly... He looks like you want him to look.

Shaan Puri 11:11 He looked like it was a disguise. [laughs]

Sam Parr 11:14 Yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:15 Looked like he was trying to blend in in Austin. [laughs]

Sam Parr 11:18 So this guy's awesome. His name's Adam Lawrence. I love Adam. I've, I've, I've gotten to know him over the past year, so he was cool. Who else was, was

Sam Parr 11:24 interesting?

Shaan Puri 11:24 Um, another one that I thought was cool, these guys were in the meet and greet line. They come up and they're like, "Hey, love the pod," blah, blah, blah. "No questions, just want a picture." Um, or actually they had one question. They were like, "You know, we do franchise marketing." And I was like, "Franchise marketing? What? Uh, say more." And they were like, "Basically 5% of McDonald's stores use us as their digital marketing agency and social media marketing agency." And I was like, "Wow, 5% of McDonald's franchises? That's like, that seems really significant." They're like, "Yeah, it's going great." And this is actually the second time I heard about it, and this is kinda my rule of two, which is if I hear about the same thing from two completely separate people, it's like, well- Roll up the sleeves. Time to go down a rabbit hole. We'll, [laughs] like, you know, plug the nose-

Sam Parr 12:11 Wait, but-

Shaan Puri 12:11 ... and take the plunge

Sam Parr 12:11 ... you heard someone talk about the same business or the sa- like, literally the, or the same style of business-

Shaan Puri 12:16 Same, same style-

Sam Parr 12:17 ... or the same person

Shaan Puri 12:17 ... of business. So our buddy, Sieva, had told me about this, these businesses. So there's a two businesses called, one's called Scorpion Marketing and the other one's called Ferocious Marketing. Uh-

Sam Parr 12:26 Okay, I see a trend

Shaan Puri 12:27 ... normally seems like a little bit of an overcompensation, but they actually sound like badass businesses.

Sam Parr 12:32 Yeah, I need like a, I need like a, like a, like a Rabies LLC.

Shaan Puri 12:35 [laughs]

Sam Parr 12:35 You know what I mean? [laughs] Where it's like you, [laughs] like-

Shaan Puri 12:40 [laughs]

Sam Parr 12:40 ... Typhoid Fever, [laughs] uh, Marketing or something. [laughs] I need something like that.

Shaan Puri 12:45 Yeah.

Sam Parr 12:46 I love that.

Shaan Puri 12:46 Hey, we're from Dengue. Um, yeah.

Sam Parr 12:48 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 12:48 We're the boys over at Dengue Fever. We're happy to help.

Sam Parr 12:51 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 12:52 We make it hot-

Sam Parr 12:52 Yeah [laughs]

Shaan Puri 12:52 ... you know what I mean?

Sam Parr 12:53 [laughs] Genghis Khan Incorporated.

Shaan Puri 12:55 Yeah.

Sam Parr 12:56 I love it.

Shaan Puri 12:56 We kill the competition. [laughs]

Sam Parr 12:59 [laughs] Yeah.

Shaan Puri 13:01 So he had told me that one of those two, I don't remember if it was Scorpion or Ferocious, does over $100 million as just a kinda like Google pay per click plus, um, you know, basically Google ad agency plus maybe, um, maybe Facebook ads as well for franchises. Like, they go to every, you know, Goodyear tires in America, and they're like, "Yo, you need to have a good presence online. This is what we do. We help Goodyear Tires franchisees make more money in your location. You pay us, whatever, 10 grand a month, and we take care of your website, your marketing. We'll make sure you're t- visible on Yelp and on Google when people are searching for tires," blah, blah, blah. And that's what they do. And then they go do the same thing they did in tires, and then they'll do it in Jamba Juice, and then they'll do it in, you know, one franchise after another. And so I kind of love this model. I think that this, like, this idea of gener- like generic agency, meh, but agency that is tailored towards franchisees, I think is great. Why? Franchisees all are gonna have the same problem set. You're gonna have a cookie cutter customer. I love that. Typically, if something is a franchise, it's got scale already. So you know that niche is sort of validated. Third, it's the easiest marketing pitch in the world once you get started, which is that, yeah, we do, uh, you know, over, you know, if 5% of Mc- McDonald's franchisees use us, or we're the largest agency for McDonald's fra- franchisees. We are the number one. We serve over 150 store, uh, fr- franchisees. Guess what? The 151st is way easier to sell to once you got to the 150, right? It's like it, it becomes a snowball in terms of your marketing. Um, your operations can get streamlined 'cause they all, again, cookie cutter customer, they all need the same thing. And then lastly, that type of customer, a franchisee, they've basically put, like, their net worth on the line to own these franchises. They typically are not... Like, these brick-and-mortar franchisees, they're doing that because they're not super tech-savvy or online savvy. And so I think it's the perfect kinda customer, and you could just provide clear ROI from month one. And I think you could do this in a lot of niches. Like, I think you could do this in, like, senior living. Like, my father-in-law has a senior living facility, and, um, he is, like, he basically, like, the, the entire business is just, "How's our occupancy?" And, uh, uh, you know, if occupancy's at 55% versus 65% versus 75% versus 85%, that's like the s- that's a swing of, like, $10 million just in that, that question right there.

Sam Parr 15:31 Oh, wow.

Shaan Puri 15:31 Um, and so I'm like, "Great. Hey, Dad, what are we doing for Mar- well, how are we filling that occupancy," right? Like, you know, "What are we doing?" And he's like, "Well, I don't really know how to do online marketing," 'cause most people who own senior living facilities are not the most tech-savvy. He's like-

Sam Parr 15:48 So we need, like, a, like, a come die with us marketing, uh-

Shaan Puri 15:51 He's, he's like, "We host a coffee and donuts, like, brunch for the local hospital nurses," 'cause that's, like, their number one source of deal flow right now. And then there's these search engines like f- like placeformom.com or something like that, and, you know, you tr- you try, you tell them, "Hey, I'll pay you for leads," but they just don't bring you that many leads. And so somebody who can basically solve the search query for, like, you know, senior living Austin or memory care Austin or whatever, the person who can rank you at the top for that search is gonna be the difference between 55% occupancy and 75% occupancy, I think. And so I think if you found a niche or a franchise like that, doing the, the sort of digital marketing for it, I think, becomes very appealing.

Sam Parr 16:35 Yeah, you just have to run it, which can be challenging. Running those companies are, is very hard, but getting customers, I think, is actually easier than-

Shaan Puri 16:43 But what's the one thing that-

Sam Parr 16:44 ... servicing the customer

Shaan Puri 16:44 ... makes running a company easier? If you had good, [laughs] a good way to get new customers. It is, like-

Sam Parr 16:49 For sure

Shaan Puri 16:50 ... the number one, like, you know, Advil for all aches and pains when it comes to running a business is, well, at least we're getting a bunch of customers, like, you know, easily. We have a reliable way to do that. Uh, every other complaint from there is, like, you know, just a, a little, little bump

Shaan Puri 17:04 and bruise.

Sam Parr 17:04 Another interesting person who you met for the first time was Nick Gray. So Nick Gray was, like, the... We, we asked him to, like, emcee our event, and then he ended up just attending every other, like, dinner that we had.

Shaan Puri 17:16 [laughs]

Sam Parr 17:16 And he, like, emceed it hardcore. And what's interesting about Nick Gray is, you guys should look him up, is he's in, like, real time, you can watch him, like, become an authority on this very strange topic of, like, hosting small gatherings.

Shaan Puri 17:29 Right.

Sam Parr 17:30 And he might be able to turn this into something substantial. And just to give you a, an example of what happened, we had this, like, fancy restaurant booked for this one dinner. It got rained out because it was like the table was partially outdoors, so we went to this kinda crappy bar. And then we moved to another bar next door that was also somewhat outdoors but had a roof. And Andrew, one of our guests, was like, "Oh, man, is it gonna be cold?" And An- and Nick was like, "Yeah, it might be cold. Hold on." And he ran to a shopping mall across the street and bought, like, $100 long-sleeve T-shirt-

Shaan Puri 18:00 [laughs]

Sam Parr 18:00 ... and goes, "I got you." And how impressive was that?

Shaan Puri 18:04 He, he was-

Sam Parr 18:05 I mean, that was, that was-

Shaan Puri 18:05 ... the ultimate party host, which is no surprise because that's what he does. So his... I don't know him. You know him very well. Uh, I, I just met him and I'm, I'm just, I'm just got my first dose of Nick Gray, and I can't wait for my second dose. So basically, it sounds like he ran a company called Museum Hack, which was basically A kind of like a night adventure company. So you would go to a museum, the tour would be hosted by a local stand-up comedian or magician or somebody who's got some sh- showmanship. And, uh-

Sam Parr 18:35 Yeah

Shaan Puri 18:36 ... and basically he paired showmanship with something that needed showmanship, museum tours. And it was a good company. I think it was making a couple million do- like maybe one, two million dollars a year profit. He sells the business, takes the proceeds, invests it into, I think... Did you say all of it into Tesla or like just a lot of it?

Sam Parr 18:54 So previously he had made money because he, he, his, him and his family started an aviation parts business. So they made like the screens that go in like private jets, like, uh, like the, uh, navigation screens. With the earnings that he had from that business he invested [laughs] it all in Tesla and there's these funny pictures of him during the New York Marathon years ago, and he would hold up signs that says, "Buy Tesla," 'cause he was like trying to like-

Shaan Puri 19:17 He would just show up everywhere-

Sam Parr 19:17 ... promote this [laughs]

Shaan Puri 19:18 ... and just Tesla bomb.

Sam Parr 19:20 Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then he, uh, killed it on that and then he started this, uh, museum company. With his proceeds he put it into Cloudflare, which has not done well.

Shaan Puri 19:29 [laughs]

Sam Parr 19:29 But you'll see him all the time, it's really funny, you'll see him, like someone will be like, "What's the best service for this?" And he'll just reply on Twitter, "I hear Cloud- Cloudflare is really good."

Shaan Puri 19:38 [laughs]

Sam Parr 19:38 "You should check out Cloudflare." Like, he's like promoting it. And with his book he does the same thing. He's got this book called Two-Hour Cocktail Party. If you go on Google Photos and look at the reviews of any bar in Austin, he's been there and he's reviewed it. And when he reviews it he takes a picture of his book in front of the sign or the food of that restaurant as like guerrilla marketing. That's all he does.

Shaan Puri 19:58 So-

Sam Parr 19:58 He does little things like that constantly

Shaan Puri 19:59 ... so you had, you had told me about this guy as this kinda like s- super social guy w- that's in Austin that's like now doing this thing called the Two-Hour Cocktail Party. And, um, and he sold like, I don't know, 10,000 plus units of, of that book. And he was like, um, and I, I couldn't tell at first. I was like, "Well, is he a idiot or a genius?" And I think this is a common game I play [laughs] where I meet somebody and I, I'm playing the idiot or genius game. And, and the case for idiot was like, wait, so he like sold his company and now is all in on this like just perfecting this c- like owning this little sub-brand, this con- this content brand around hosting a two-hour cocktail party. I, I can't tell you the last cocktail party I hosted. So, so I was like-

Sam Parr 20:45 He spent three years writing that book.

Shaan Puri 20:46 He's, and, and he was all in-

Sam Parr 20:48 Like years writing it

Shaan Puri 20:48 ... and then, uh, all the things you told me about the way he was promoting the book, and books in general are not a great business model, so I was like, "What is this guy getting at?" And that was my like, "Is he an idiot?" But very quickly I've shifted into, "No, this guy's a genius," [laughs] and here's why. So first of all, it's a real problem. Hosting a, hosting a party, or hosting a, hosting any kind of party, forget like a specifically a two-hour cocktail party, but hosting a dinner party is something that is valuable if you do it, kinda stressful when you do it, and there's a difference between bad, good, and great that comes into a bunch of details. And the details are things like when you invite people, how do you prep them for it? What is the email you send beforehand that reminds people even that this is happening, what it's gonna be about, and how they should show up? Uh, and that when they show up, like how do people have to introduce themselves? Oh, he's a big, uh, yeah, gotta have name tags. Name tags help because whether you-

Sam Parr 21:45 Name tag Nick

Shaan Puri 21:46 ... name tag Nick.

Sam Parr 21:46 You call him name tag Nick.

Shaan Puri 21:47 You gotta, you gotta have name tags. Okay, what, what else do you have to have? He's like, well, you kinda want the event to flow versus just having it be like, well, whatever happens. If we break out into, to random cliques of people that already know each other ver- or a giant group where it's kind of awkward, uh, you know, what's gonna happen? And so he's like has his little system. He's like, "I'm gonna have some unstructured time and some structured conversations, and then back to unstructured after the structured 'cause the structured gave us all something to talk about in the unstructured time." He's got his thing. And, and it goes into little things like, hey, you know if you host something at your house, like peop- nobody knows where the trash is and so they're opening all your cupboards of your house trying to find shit. Now they're just going through all your shit. And then they just leave it on the counter and now your house is get- now the party's looking like a, a college frat party. Just put a label where the trash is. Let's just do that. And he's got all the little reminders and tips and tricks for a host. Okay, so solves a real problem that's kinda stressful and kinda valuable if you do it right. Like, we've both been to parties where the magic happens. The conversation just gets really interesting. You meet three or four people that you're like become really good friends with. You did this, actually. Like, this is how we met was, uh, you hosted a dinner party at my office. And so like, y- you know, the, the right dinner party can lead to some really great things and the wrong one is just forgettable. Okay. So now why do I think it's actually genius? I think he's got a win-win scenario, and what I mean by a win-win scenario is that whether this becomes a big deal or not, he wins. Ha- the first part is by doing this he is building like the ultimate friend group network. [laughs] Like-

Sam Parr 23:19 I think, uh, Andrew called him, Andrew Wilkinson called him a friend billionaire. He goes, "Nick's a friend billionaire."

Shaan Puri 23:24 Yeah.

Sam Parr 23:24 And he'll, and Nick, Nick, Nick won't brag about it but I'll be like, "What'd you do this weekend?" He's like, "Oh, I was out at a friend's house." I was like, "Who?" He was like, "Oh, uh, Matt Mullenweg, the guy who started, uh, WordPress."

Shaan Puri 23:32 Yeah.

Sam Parr 23:33 "We were just, I was just at his house all weekend." And I was like, "What? How do you know Matt?" He's like, "Oh, I met him at a dinner this," and he like has so many stories like that.

Shaan Puri 23:39 And wh- when you are a friend billionaire, what does that mean? That means you, you know a lot of cool people, so you're constantly inspired by the people you're around. You got a lot of people who, you know, got your back and who love you, and you, you have a bunch of, of like real connections and like real, a real social life. Which I think is like, I think is kind of like one of these like silent like, uh, you know, epidemics that's going on right now is that most people I know have like a really weak and feeble friend group. Maybe I'm just in that-

Sam Parr 24:09 Mm-hmm

Shaan Puri 24:09 ... that world, I, I don't know, but like a lot of people have this feeling of like, great, I work from home, [laughs] I live at home, I eat at home, I order food on DoorDash. And like I don't see another human being for like, you know, I can go seven days without seeing another, another like person with a pulse. Or even if you are seeing people, it's all transitional and transactional. It's like great, I live in SF or LA and I go to Barry's Bootcamp and everybody rushes in and does the thing and then rushes out. And like- This, like, what hap- like, where am I supposed to make new friends? Uh, you know, that's not really, like, that easy for most people. So anyways, I think that what Nick has is, is actually quite rare. So whether the... all this is, is he makes a bunch of friends, has a bunch of fun experiences. Um, e- and, you know, he was showing me this video on his phone. He's like, "Check this out." He's like, "Last night after we hung out, I was on my way back, and my friend texted me and said, 'You gotta check this out. It's flooding in my area, but it's created, like, this almost, like, fake surfing thing.'" Like, it was, like, flooding on some street, and the water was running really fast, but there was, like, a lip in the, in the road. And so he c- you could go on a boogie board and basically feel like you're surfing, and they just did that for, like, hours.

Sam Parr 25:19 Right.

Shaan Puri 25:19 And he had these fun videos. And I was like, "Cool. I was just, like, on my phone scrolling [laughs] while you were doing that." Right? [laughs] Like, this guy's not only a f-

Sam Parr 25:27 Yeah, I was watching it in videos

Shaan Puri 25:27 ... a friend billionaire.

Sam Parr 25:28 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 25:28 He's gonna ha- he's, like, an experience billionaire. So I think that's the, that's the bottom of the win of if nothing else, he gets that. But at the top I'm like, "Dude, I kinda think this should be a local franchise." Like, I think that he should basically turn this into, like, the modern day Toastmasters. Like, I think if he wanted to, this could be an enormous business, and it could help a lot of people because he could basically say, "Look, j- open up a local chapter," like Toastmasters, "and, um, it's just dedicated to hosting awesome get-togethers of awesome people. I'll train you how to host them, right? You fly out to me, you, you attend one of these as part of your training, and, um, and then go wherever you live and start hosting these things. And, uh, you know, pay your membership dues to, to be a part of this."

Sam Parr 26:15 Mm.

Shaan Puri 26:16 "And l- let's, let's create an international wave of people who wanna get better at hosting things and having an awesome social life." I think he could create the next Toastmasters. What do you think?

Sam Parr 26:27 So Toastmasters, uh, so for those of you who don't know Toastmasters, I don't know entirely how they describe themselves, but I, I knew it as, like, a public speaking club. So you spend 50 or a, a $100 a year, something like that, and you get to go to a local chapter where you, like, everyone practices public speaking. But I think they weave in some type of leadership component where you can, like, learn how to lead, but it's all related to public speaking. They're a non-profit, so you can look them up. So Toastmasters has $63 million in assets, of which tw- it looks like about 35 million of that is just cash. And then they did last year something like 18 million, 19 million in membership dues. Uh, sorry, 25 million in membership dues and about 30 million in aggregate in total revenue. So, like, n- a nice sub- that, that's very nice. Uh, so it definitely worked.

Shaan Puri 27:14 Yeah, exactly. And I think that, like, you know, there's a lot more people who wanna be able to host a party and build an awesome kinda, like, social life for themselves than there are people who wanna get better at public speaking. And, uh, so I think this actually has a lot more legs. And it, it reminds me of The Game. So I haven't read his book, but, uh, but Neil, the way Neil Strauss wrote The Game and was like, "Hey, d- do you wanna get better at, you know, like, meeting women? Uh, if so, you know, this is a book that's gonna tell you a bunch of sto- awesome s- you know, sort of war stories plus techniques that, that can help you do that." And I think that this reminds me a little bit of The Game. It's got the benefits of The Game without the sleaze factor of, of The Game. And so for that reason, I'm in. And I just gave 'em, I just gave 'em-

Sam Parr 28:02 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 28:03 I just gave 'em the thought leader triangle with my hands for those who are listening. I-

Sam Parr 28:06 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 28:06 It's where you start with the, the pyramid of hands going upwards, and then on the, on the inflection point of the sentence you gotta flip it down.

Speaker 28:13 [upbeat music] This data is wrong every freaking time. Have you heard of HubSpot? HubSpot is a CRM platform where everything is fully integrated. Whoa, I can see the client's whole history, calls, support tickets, emails, and here's a task from three days ago I totally missed. HubSpot. Grow better.

Sam Parr 28:35 Did you meet anyone else that was interesting or have any other, uh, thoughts about, uh, people you met or experiences you had?

Shaan Puri 28:41 I got a couple high-level thoughts. So about c- couple high-level thoughts. The most, so we did the meet and greet for, like, I don't know, it was almost, like, two hours or something after the show, um, just, like, people

Sam Parr 28:51 Were you tired after that?

Shaan Puri 28:53 Um, I have this thing where relief gives me a lot of energy, so I was so relieved that the show was over, that I felt like people had a good time, um, and that I didn't... Like, my, my trip was over. I was gonna go home and get to just, like, be in my bed and not have to be... I was traveling with my two little kids, which is, you know, it has its own challenges.

Sam Parr 29:08 I had no less than 10 people reference the size of the cotton candy that your children had.

Shaan Puri 29:15 [laughs]

Sam Parr 29:15 They were like-

Shaan Puri 29:16 My wife wanted to see the show, so she brought my kids, who are two and three years old, to the show. And that's like, you know, that's like, you know, opening up a, a, a lighter inside of a natural gas factory. Like, you, you kind of know this thing could combust at any second. And she just had a, a backpack of bribes, which I think actually should be its own product from traveling moms. It's just a pre-made backpack full of, like, little dollar store toys that you can give out every 15 minutes to be like, "All right, be occupied. Don't scream and cry and think about anything." And just unbelievable amounts of crazy candy that they never get to eat.

Sam Parr 29:49 Like, a bathtub size container of cotton candy is, is-

Shaan Puri 29:53 They had a seven-layer lollipop. It looked like, you know those, like-

Sam Parr 29:56 Dude, someone told me, they were like, "We saw Shaan's eating, Shaan's kids eating a kebab or, like, a hot dog or something except it was, like-

Shaan Puri 30:03 [laughs] It was a skewer of lollipops

Sam Parr 30:04 ... Sour Patch Kids.

Shaan Puri 30:05 [laughs] Yeah. It was like a, you know when the sheikh builds, like, a, a 95-story, like, apartment for himself in, uh, in Dubai? It was the s- the sheikh Dubai tower of lollipops. It was incredible.

Sam Parr 30:16 Yeah, I had a bunch of people t- uh, telling me about that. But anyway, what were

Sam Parr 30:19 you saying?

Shaan Puri 30:19 So I would say in the meet and greet line, the most common que- I would say the most common questions, I, and I don't know what you experienced 'cause you had your own line and I had my own line, so maybe your- yours was different. I got a lot of people being like, "Hey," whatever. "Love the show. Can I take a selfie?" And then, "Got one question for you." And the question, I was like, "Oh, well this is, this is gonna be a- It's probably gonna be a doozy, right? That they're, they, they want, you know, they're gonna- they're using their one shot on this question. And it would... The most common questions had the most obvious answers. It would be like, "You know, I'm trying to decide between this or this. You know, what, what do you think I should do?" "Well, what do you wanna do?" "I really wanna do this." "All right, well then you should probably do that one." [laughs] Or like, "I don't know."

Sam Parr 31:01 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 31:01 It's like, "Well, if you like... I mean, do you want, do you like w- do you like one more than the other? Like, do, you know, do you want one more... If you knew, if you did know what you wanted, what would you say? Yeah, I know you don't know what you want, but if you did know, what would you say?" And they're like, "B." I'm like, "Cool. Do B then." Right? Or it'd be like-

Sam Parr 31:18 Yeah, and I, and I hate giving that answer because it's like, uh, you know, not that we're someone's hero, but don't meet your heroes because, like, yeah, we just give you the most obvious-

Shaan Puri 31:26 Right

Sam Parr 31:26 ... obvious answer.

Shaan Puri 31:28 But, but, but-

Sam Parr 31:28 The, or the second one is, like, I'm doing this, this, and this, and I go, "Oh, cool. What are the results?" They'll tell me. I'm like, "What were the results last year? Okay. Well, just, yeah, keep going."

Shaan Puri 31:36 Yeah. [laughs]

Sam Parr 31:36 Sounds like it's working.

Shaan Puri 31:37 Exactly.

Sam Parr 31:38 Like-

Shaan Puri 31:38 Either it's working, don't, don't mess it up, or sounds like it's not working. Do you wanna... It's like y- you're asking me for investment, and, uh, actually, you should be asking for advice, [laughs] right? Because it's not working. Uh, you know, the same thing was like, "I'm doing these, I got these two ideas. So I got, I got one company I do this, and another company I do this, and I'm really, it, it's really hard because blah, blah, blah." Cool, sounds like you're doing two, two companies. Uh, like, do you think, do you think the optimal strategy's gonna be to do two startups at once or one? Like, [laughs] and they're like, "Uh, yeah, one probably." Cool, so which is the better business? Like, which one do you wanna do? Which one is working better? And then they're like, "Well, no, but see, this one kind of feeds into this one." And I'm like, "No, it actually eats away at all of your time and mind share. It doesn't feed into anything." And they're like, "Hmm." And I'm like, you know, like, y- Elon Musk can, can run two companies at once. He might even be able to run three. But, um, un- until you have, you know, like [laughs] until your palm is like, you know, a physics textbook, like, you know, [laughs] until you can, until... Unless you're built the way he's built, like, it's probably not the optimal strategy for you. Like, if you're in this meet and greet line, I'm just gonna tell you right now, probably don't wanna be a CEO of three startups at once. And so, uh, the obvious answer for most of them is like, well, what if you just focused on the one that's, that you like more or is working better? Like, w- I think that would probably work better than trying to make both of these, these fledgling things work. And so I felt almost silly that that, that was the case.

Sam Parr 33:10 And what we're saying here about everyone was searching, 'cause we met, like, a bunch of successful people. For example, probably one of the more successful people we met was this guy named AJ Patel, who is, like, 32 or 35-

Shaan Puri 33:23 35

Sam Parr 33:23 ... or something like that. And he started a dog supplement company, which whenever I hear about that, I'm like, that's the greatest thing ever, because who knows if, like, the product works.

Shaan Puri 33:32 [laughs]

Sam Parr 33:32 But he originally sold a portion of the company at, like, $200 million valuation, and then a few years later sold it for $650 million in valuation. And he seemed pretty, like, zen-like. Like, he kind of had his act together. But still, there was some things where he was, like, trying to figure out what to do next and, like, he, he had normal questions that everyone else-

Shaan Puri 33:53 Right

Sam Parr 33:53 ... had. And on here you had every- everyone searching.

Shaan Puri 33:56 Yeah. Actually, k- I wanna say one last thing about that previous thing about most common, most of the common questions have the simplest answer. That's not a knock on those people. What I meant is, dude, this game is not as complicated as we make it. I have the same, I do make those same mistakes and, and all it takes is just a third party with, like, a fresh set of eyes to be like, "Well, sounds like you just pick the one you want to do." Right? Or like, "Instead of doing three things, try focusing on the one and it'll probably work better." Or like, you know, whatever. And so I think that it's useful to almost have that be your own coach in that way and save yourself a lot of heartache, because that, it wasn't a knock on those individuals. It's, that is the common problem, um-

Sam Parr 34:36 Mm-hmm

Shaan Puri 34:36 ... is that we, we, we don't have complex problems. We have simple problems, and a simple problem doesn't need a complex answer. It needs a simple answer. So that was my point there. All right, the, so the second thing, yeah. Everyone is searching. It didn't matter who we were hanging out with. Net worth zero, net worth 100K, net worth one million, 10 million, 100 million, and the, and, and the billionaire we had dinner with. Everybody was searching. Searching for meaning, searching for what's next, searching for what they should be doing with their, their time, searching for a better challenge, searching for a way to, to solve their problem. It just felt like everyone was searching, and specifically a lot of people were searching for, like, direction. And it really made me, like... It really highlighted to me the value of when you know you, when you have a clear direction, the value of that. To like, to be grateful for that and find people who are good at figuring that out, because I think if you stay in that searching state for too long, that shit's dangerous. It's like in Inception. It's like we can only be in the dream for an hour before we forget that it's a dream. Uh, you know, we gotta do that thing where we fucking cold plunge ourselves to get back out of it and wake back up. It's like there is, it's okay to be in a wandering mode or a searching mode or a kind of a thinking mode, like, "What do I wanna do?" But after six months, after 12 months, after 18 months, like, that shit becomes, you get lost in the sauce. And, uh, I felt like there were kind of a lot of people that were lost, lost in the sauce. Uh, that, that, that their, their search was sort of like almost indefinite, and I think that's, that's dangerous.

Sam Parr 36:07 That's interesting, and that's actually really scary. That's a kind of a, because it's one of those things where if it goes on for too long, it gets even worse, and then, you know, you're like, you know, ass deep in it and you're like, "Oh, no."

Shaan Puri 36:18 Yeah, you forget-

Sam Parr 36:18 "How do I get out of this?"

Shaan Puri 36:18 ... how to even start the engine. It's like this car hasn't been on for a long time. [laughs] Does the engine start? And I think you're good at this. I think the way, I think you're really good at this. The way you are very structured helps you, 'cause I think you're very, like, regimented. You're like, "For the next three months, I'm gonna only talk to people and figure out what I want. And after three months, I'm gonna have a conversation with myself and shift into the next gear." And because you're, uh, this is my read of it at least. I, I don't know what goes on in your head. But my read of it is-

Sam Parr 36:46 No, that's,

Sam Parr 36:47 that's exactly how I do it

Shaan Puri 36:47 ... you time box things, and- You know, there's, there's an argument to be had for, like, just wandering around and letting, you know, d- you can't control everything. But I think having these cr- creative constraints, these, like, time box constraints, helps keep you honest. Like, am I really... Am I even learning from my wandering at this point, or am I just... Have I forgotten, like, my, my head from my feet? Do I even remember what the hell I'm supposed to be doing right now? And so I think, you know, you had a period post-Hustle and pre-Hampton that was, like, your searching period. But it was like, I think you knew you were gonna search, you knew you were gonna wander and explore, which meant don't jump into something really fast, but also don't let that last forever. Is that right?

Sam Parr 37:28 Yeah. Well, I'm obsessed with time. So, like, even when I was 20 years old, I had this document. I think if you Google, like, my name and then CEO doc, you'll be able to find this spreadsheet. And I would map out, I, I think I had thousands of them, of all these biographies of people I read, and I would type in, uh, like, when they started their apprenticeship, when they got successful, and the time it took to do that. I was obsessed with time. And the reason time's important is I think that the constraint is incredibly n- necessary. I read this book by Robert Greene, and he talked about urgency, and that was the first time that I learned about the importance of urgency, and so that's why I'm obsessed with time. And so usually what I do is I have this thing called worry time, which is very similar to, like, searching time. But worry time is like, here's the period that I can worry about this, these following things. So, like, it could be like, you know, I'm not sure th- here... I'll make a list of all the things, uh, going on in my life that, that are happening right now that I'm not sure about. Like, it could be, like, this podcast. It could be, um, my relationship. It could be anything, and it's like, all right, on Sunday from 3:00 to 8:00, I'm gonna worry about it.

Shaan Puri 38:29 Right.

Sam Parr 38:29 And I'm not g- and then I'll, like, set time aside to worry about it, and then I'll set it aside and, like-

Shaan Puri 38:32 Versus just letting it bleed into every moment of every day and be this underlying worry or anxiety that just sort of, like, plagues you.

Sam Parr 38:40 Yeah. So it's just like, uh, you know, like, have you ever used Headspace, the meditation app? There's this, like-

Shaan Puri 38:45 I'm a Calm guy myself-

Sam Parr 38:45 ... cool thing-

Shaan Puri 38:46 But go ahead. [laughs]

Sam Parr 38:47 Yeah, I like Calm, too. But Andy, the guy who would narrate it, would be like, "All right. Today we're gonna, uh, we're gonna do the meditation," whatever. "Now, the cloud is above you. Let's put all of our thoughts and feelings and worries in that cloud above us. Now, let's just walk a few feet away. Now we're away from the cloud. We can acknowledge that, like, our worries are up in that cloud-"

Shaan Puri 39:06 [laughs]

Sam Parr 39:06 "... but we're no longer o- under it, and we can go back under it when we're ready and worry about it." And so that's kinda where I came up with, like, worry time. And so I have worry time, and I also do the same with, like, searching time. So it's like, all right, I'm gonna search for this, and then in three months I'm gonna say, "Did I find it or not? No? Okay, fine, we'll give it another three months." And then once I find it, it goes, "Searching's done. We are no longer searching." So I actually, uh, turned off... Like, this is just a very small example. I turned off the Twitter DMs of my Twitter handle 'cause I would get all these interesting opportunities. But I said, "Nope, we are done with opportunities. I have the opportunity. We are going to pursue that, and then at a later date we'll open back up to pursue new opportunities maybe, but right now there's no- nothing new."

Shaan Puri 39:46 Right.

Sam Parr 39:46 And, uh, I... Like, we, my wife and I were joking, but it's not really joking, is like my rule right now is no new friends. I don't need new friends. I have the friends that I want. That is perfect. I'm not gonna go out and hang out with new people. No new friends because, uh, you know, like, the searching time is done for now, and we'll open it up at a later date.

Shaan Puri 40:04 Right.

Sam Parr 40:04 Auditions will come at a later date-

Shaan Puri 40:05 [laughs]

Sam Parr 40:05 ... for new ideas and new friends.

Shaan Puri 40:07 Dude, that's great. Uh, I love the way you said that. I do a similar thing, but without... Uh, I, I, I hate the word time. I'm the opposite of you. I, I wanna get off the concept of time altogether. Um, but my, but in reality the result is actually very, very similar what I do, which is I, I focus on the word constraint. So how can I use a constraint to my advantage? I love this because naturally I'm always constrained, right? Like, I don't always have every resource at my disposal to do what I wanna do, right? Let's say I'm traveling and I don't maybe have the time or the equipment to get to the gym to do the same workout that I was doing before. Then, uh, how do I get excited about the constraint? Okay, I got this wall. I have the floor. I've got my suitcase. Ah, interesting. I can air squat the suitcase, and then I can, you know, do these like... I could do a pushup challenge where I'm gonna do 100 pushups in the next five minutes, and I'm gonna see, you know, if I, how far under that time I can get. And, you know, you do that, and you've used a constraint to your advantage to have a better experience. So I, I always have this thing which is I'm not going hour to hour. I think that's a really s- I think time creates a lot of stress in people's lives. So I wanna use constraints without the stress of time. So what I say is like, all right, I'm trying to have an experience right now. What kind of experience do I want? I want a sweaty workout experience. Okay. How can I now use an expe- uh, use a constraint to ratchet that up and make it even better? Um, right? Like, and, and that's how I wanna do things. So I, I'll do the same thing where I'll constrain myself. All right, I'm gonna turn off DMs, or I'm going to do no, do a no new friends season. And I'll, I'll use these words like season just to sorta time box them, but without the sort of urgency or stress of, like, the thing you did where you're like, how successful were these guys by 30? Dude, that would've just made me feel miserable. So I had to, like, tweak that a little bit for myself where I didn't wanna always feel perpetually behind in life. Um, and so my way of doing that was focus on, all right, I'm about to walk into this room. What kind of experience do I wanna have? And get good at choosing that, and then be like, how can I use a constraint to, to, like, level that up, to enhance that, rather than feeling constrained by lacking some resources that I otherwise would want to make this happen.

Sam Parr 42:23 I think the time thing is important because you do compare yourself to others, and comparing yourself to others everyone says is bad. I actually think in some ways it's really great because you see what's possible. Just like if you're, like, an athlete where you're like, "I wanna be like this athlete. I wanna be strong, but I wanna be stronger than them or faster or whatever." But whenever we do these events and I meet all these amazing people, like an AJ, like a Sully, like an Andrew Wilkinson, and I hang out with them and I think, "I'm behind."

Shaan Puri 42:48 [laughs]

Sam Parr 42:49 "I'm way behind."

Shaan Puri 42:50 Yeah, but that's-

Sam Parr 42:51 And-

Shaan Puri 42:51 That's the-

Sam Parr 42:51 And that's dangerous.

Shaan Puri 42:52 That-

Sam Parr 42:53 That's dangerous

Shaan Puri 42:53 ... that's the thing I referenced the other day when I said there's the, there's the, um, the science of success And there's the art of fulfillment. What, uh, the comparing yourself will help you in the science of success. It will motivate you. It will put a chip on your shoulder. It'll get light a fire under your ass, but it's not gonna help on the art of fulfillment side. And so what some people try to do in life is be like, "Let me solve the success thing first, and then I'll do the happy thing after that." And I think what you do, if you look at w- remember my back to my everyone is searching thing, what ends up happening is people solve the success thing. They try to throw a bunch of money at the happy thing. It works to an extent, but not all the way there. They're kind of disillusioned, and they just sort of fall back on, "Well, let me just go do more success shit. At least back then, when I was only focused on success, I felt better, and I know how to do that but more than I know how to be happy." And, uh, and so-

Sam Parr 43:41 Or, or it's like, "I thought this number would f- give me the answer. Turns out I was wrong."

Shaan Puri 43:45 It's just one more zero.

Sam Parr 43:46 "It's actually five times that."

Shaan Puri 43:47 Yeah. [laughs]

Sam Parr 43:48 Yeah, it's actually... It's not, it's not 50. It's actually 150.

Shaan Puri 43:51 And somebody said this the other day.

Sam Parr 43:51 Uh, I was just wrong.

Shaan Puri 43:52 They, they said, "It's always three times more than what you got." Uh, [laughs] like people always think, "If three times more then, then I'll, I'll chill out after that. I'll, I'll really move on to that next phase." And I think while I, I don't think that's a bad path-

Sam Parr 44:03 Well, we-

Shaan Puri 44:03 ... I don't think you end up in a bad spot. I do think there's probably a better version of it, which is like, "Can I do happy and successful at the same time? Is that possible?"

Sam Parr 44:11 Well, we were talking, and, and I'm gonna out him here, but it's nothing crazy. But we were ha- had dinner with Andrew. Andrew, you know, his company as of Friday, I don't know what it is today, was worth 850 million in Canadian. And I was like, we were talking about like what's next and, or like we were talking about like just personal like motivating factors. And he was like, "Oh, I was motivated because I wanted to feel secure financially because for some reason I always felt insecure as a kid, and, you know, everything comes from like issues you had as a child." And I was like, "Do you feel secure now?" And he was like, "You know what? Not really."

Shaan Puri 44:43 [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:43 And I'm like, "Wow, you don't, we, we're still not gonna feel secure at that number?"

Shaan Puri 44:46 [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:47 Uh, like you, it, you always need more. And I always... And I couldn't decide if I felt negative about that feeling or positive. But I have realized that that might be the learning is that like you don't feel secure. A lot of people don't feel secure regardless of what they have or what they don't have. Like it's the, it's the same feeling of it's not enough, like it can get taken away.

Shaan Puri 45:07 Well, I, I view it a little differently. It's more like the security doesn't come from the money. That feeling you want isn't gonna be, isn't gonna change when the money changes [laughs] in that, in that way, right? Like, uh, I feel secure now, and I have one, one billionth of whatever he's got, right? Like, it's like, you know, he... Why? Because I just view, I just view it differently. I have different insecurities than he's got, right? Like, uh, but on the, on the financial one, I'm like, "As long as I still got my wits about me and my two hands, I'm always gonna be fine. If I got my brains, I got my hands-

Sam Parr 45:39 That's-

Shaan Puri 45:39 ... I'll always be fine. So what do I care? I could lose all my money in crypto. I could lose all my money in this. This business could tank. Podcast, I could say the wrong joke and get canceled on the podcast tomorrow. Still got my hands and my, my brain? All right, I'll be o- I'll be, [laughs] I'll be all right." And so if you... It's like fitness, right? Like if I put you in any fitness test, I think you would feel pretty secure, right? Like-

Sam Parr 46:01 Yeah

Shaan Puri 46:01 ... I don't think I could be like, "Sam, we're gonna do a wor-" Like, I think if you invited me over and you're like, "Let's do a hard workout," you know, I'm not eating that morning. I'm, I'm like, I don't know, I gotta be light on my feet. I gotta, I gotta do... Like, "Hey, w- is creatine working one day? Let me take some of that." Like, you know, [laughs] I'd be stressing out-

Sam Parr 46:18 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 46:18 ... because I don't have the fitness security. Whereas I think if I invited you over for a hard workout, you'd be like, "Huh, we'll see." Right? Or even if somebody, e- even if David Goggins invited you for a hard workout, may- maybe at that stage you would feel, feel a little bit of the, the lack of security. But I think for most people in most situations-

Sam Parr 46:33 Yeah

Shaan Puri 46:33 ... you would feel, feel pretty secure. And so I, I think it's everybody's chasing a feeling. They think the feeling comes from a thing. The feeling doesn't come from the thing. The feeling comes from you, and it comes from practicing having that feeling. And I think until people grok that, they're just not gonna have the sh- the type of feelings they want of happiness and all this other shit.

Sam Parr 46:53 Speaking of which, we have a very sturdy audience. I was putting my hand around on people's backs-

Shaan Puri 46:59 Yeah

Sam Parr 46:59 ... to take a picture.

Shaan Puri 47:00 Had a bunch of broad backs.

Sam Parr 47:01 Oh my God.

Shaan Puri 47:01 [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:02 Yeah, we had a whole bunch of broad backs.

Shaan Puri 47:04 A bunch of deadlifters out there.

Sam Parr 47:05 There was a-

Shaan Puri 47:05 What's going on? [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:06 There was a, [laughs] there was a bunch of sturdy ass people. Maybe it's a, a, a Texas thing, but there was a bunch of big old boys that we were talking, and, and women. Like every- Like there were so many strong people. I, I probably said it at least 20 times. Uh, like, you know, it's like you're awkward. You, it... The meet and greets are weird. I don't know what to say to people. Uh, so it's usually like, "Oh, I like your shirt," or-

Shaan Puri 47:26 [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:27 ... "You look huge. You're yoked."

Shaan Puri 47:29 [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:29 But [laughs] I said that so many times. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 47:32 Yeah. Yeah, we got, we have a i- interesting, interesting demographic. There's like the people that look like you, the people that look like me, and the, [laughs] then there's the people that look like neither of us. [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:41 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 47:41 But it's kind of amazing how well distributed. It's like a bunch of Indian dudes, bunch of really strong white guys, [laughs] and then like, and then, and then the other group, which is a blend of, of normal people. [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:53 We had so many Indians, and so many Indians with a really thick accent, so I guess they had just moved here. Do you think that we are... Are we popular in India because of the topic or because of you?

Shaan Puri 48:03 Well, I mean, there's a lot of, lot of business topics out there. They don't all have that. [laughs] I think, you know, like anything-

Sam Parr 48:10 Like is, is Ch- Where's Chamath from? What's he... He's, uh, in... Is he Indonesian? What is he?

Shaan Puri 48:14 No, he's Indian. B- he's from, uh, Sri Lanka.

Sam Parr 48:17 Sri Lanka. It, it, I mean, I don't know. Do they... They probably love him too, but like-

Shaan Puri 48:21 Hey, Sri Lanka is like-

Sam Parr 48:21 It was like the-

Shaan Puri 48:22 ... 6 million people underwater or something like that. It's like [laughs] very like... I don't know how many of them even have access to like, you know, know about Ma- know about him. But, but yeah, if, if he goes to India somewhere-

Sam Parr 48:31 But it's like the, um-

Shaan Puri 48:32 It's a cult phenomenon. Him, Naval, Balaji, like they really, really look up to, to, to those people. And the, like, it's like if you go to, i- in China, the most popular person was Kobe Bryant. It's like Kobe Bryant was the star of stars because of some combination of like he's got the thing that they want, like crazy like athleticism, plus they piped those Laker games into China and like only Laker games for like a period of time. And so he was just the coolest thing.

Sam Parr 48:54 And everyone in China wishes they're a Black man.

Shaan Puri 48:56 Yeah. [laughs] Exactly. And he was just like-

Sam Parr 48:58 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 48:58 ... looked like a god compared to them, right? And it's like, I think you, you like people who are They're like you, and so you feel like you could be them, and then there's people who are so unlike you that you're like, "You are so different, I just, I, I am in awe of what you are."

Sam Parr 49:14 It's like the, uh, Bjork effect. So Bjork, you know, is from Iceland, which only has like 5 million people, and like, Bjork's music sucks, but every once in a while she would be like number one on the charts just because like everyone in Iceland-

Shaan Puri 49:26 Really

Sam Parr 49:26 ... would like cheer for her because she was, like doing something interesting in America. Or like Bruno Mars. If you go to YouTube and look up Bruno Mars's videos on YouTube, they have like three and four and five billion-

Shaan Puri 49:37 [laughs]

Sam Parr 49:37 ... views on YouTube because everyone in the Philippines, 'cause he's like Filipino, is like, "That's our guy." You know what I mean?

Shaan Puri 49:43 [laughs]

Sam Parr 49:44 So I guess that's why we have a really nice Indian contingencies, 'cause you're their guy. Whereas with me it's just a bunch of like, uh, you know, like guys from Ohio.

Shaan Puri 49:52 [laughs]

Sam Parr 49:52 But whatever. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 49:54 Dude, can I tell you, speaking of

Shaan Puri 49:55 Ohio, can I, um, do a little bit here on Jerry Springer?

Sam Parr 50:00 What about him? RIP.

Shaan Puri 50:01 He died two days ago, I think. Um-

Sam Parr 50:04 Yeah

Shaan Puri 50:04 ... his story's kinda crazy. Do you know much about Jerry's backstory?

Sam Parr 50:10 Wasn't he the mayor of, of someone in, somewhere in Ohio?

Shaan Puri 50:13 Cincinnati.

Sam Parr 50:13 Dayton, Ohio or something?

Shaan Puri 50:14 Cincinnati.

Sam Parr 50:14 Since... Well, he was really the mayor of-

Shaan Puri 50:16 So-

Sam Parr 50:16 Was he was the mayor first and then talk show?

Shaan Puri 50:18 Before. Yes. So basically, his career is like, he, at 25 he's the ad- advisor to Robert Kennedy during his presidential campaign, who I think died or got assassinated-

Sam Parr 50:27 Wow

Shaan Puri 50:27 ... or something. Um-

Sam Parr 50:28 Yeah

Shaan Puri 50:28 ... then he's like, "Okay," goes on to do like kinda like local city politics, ends up becoming the mayor of Cincinnati for a brief period of time. Gets fired because he solicited a prostitute, I think, and got busted for it. And [laughs] so he's like, "Oh, sorry," like, "Yeah, shouldn't have paid for an escort or something." Um, l- so now he's like out of the political game and he's, you know, in his 30s I guess, and he's like, "What do I wanna do next?" And so he, he gets casted onto local TV to do a political show. It's like, "Oh, you could be like our political kinda like talk show type of guy." So he does that for, for a little bit, and then he gets his own show. So he's, I, I- I don't remember what year this is, like, I don't know, '91 or something like that, and he gets his own political... He's doing his own political talk show. Three years go by, kind of, uh, unspectacular, and then the moment happens. A new producer comes in, is like, "Hey, look, this political show, it's going nowhere. Let's switch it up." [laughs] And the, and the Jerry Springer Show is born. So the producer comes in, he's like, "Look, we're gonna shift it towards controversy, um, dirty laundry, and basically, like we'll captivate, we'll make captivating TV by putting scandal on air. And we'll have like-

Sam Parr 51:41 Was it fake though?

Shaan Puri 51:42 So con- uh, there's, there's different opinions on this. I read a bunch of, like Reddit posts of people who are producers on the show or went on the show. Here's, here's where I think it meted out, which is they would cast for scandal. People would say, "Yeah, that happened to me." The producers would intentionally not fact-check anything, and um, so you could e- it could have either been real for you or you could've just been like, "If I do this, I get to get on TV, I get a flight to New York, I get to go... Basically m- me and my, my whatever person get to go on vacation to New York, all, all expenses paid. We get to be on TV and, you know, that'll be that." And so for some, I think it was like truly real. For a lot, they were like kinda like make it up, or they would it embellish. So it'd be like, "Yeah, I cheated, but like actually they weren't best friends and I didn't steal. Like, we knew each other first" and blah, blah, blah, and he actually knew about it already. He's not finding out on air, but like whatever, we'll kind of recreate that.

Sam Parr 52:38 And was it daily or weekly?

Shaan Puri 52:39 So it was, I think it was a daily show. It, at its peak-

Sam Parr 52:42 Wow

Shaan Puri 52:42 ... it's higher rated than Oprah. So he becomes the number one daily show. And for the first time in people's... So, so here's some of the kind of amazing things. It goes 18 years on TV. Jerry knows it's stupid, but he's like, "This is what people want and I'm gonna give them what they want." And I, I had a few takeaways from this whole thing, right? So first of all, Jerry, Jerry. J- like, just the, that's iconic. It's just so iconic and I love it.

Sam Parr 53:08 Yeah, that was, it was, it was the pre-Worldstar.

Shaan Puri 53:10 Yeah. [laughs] Dude, W- Worldstar, Worldstar lives in the shadows of Jerry. So here's couple things that stood out to me. Number one, he gave people what they wanted, not what they, what he thought they should want. And in fact, he started with what he thought they should want. "Oh, here's the latest on the local political issues and where we stand and blah, blah, blah." And he pivoted, and he pivoted the right way. And I think as entrepreneurs, um, there's a great, like Gary Halbert quote where he says, "No mo- never has more money been lost than trying to market to somebody what they should do versus what they want to do." And, um-

Sam Parr 53:45 Mm

Shaan Puri 53:45 ... as a marketer, you gotta internalize that. Now, there are some people that are not in my cult that, that hate that phrase. They think that's terrible, that the world is terrible because of that. They say, "No, shouldn't we strive to be better? Shouldn't we strive to help the world be a better place and, and not that?" Like, these sugar-filled cereals and these like, you know, dopamine social networks and all this stuff. And so some people hate that that's true, and they're fighting against it. As an entrepreneur, I'm in the camp of you are here to serve customers. You're here to give them what they want. If you wanna win, you give them what they want. You get... If you wanna win really big, you give them what they want in a way that no one's el- no one else is giving it to them, or maybe even that they didn't even realize that they wanted. People didn't know they wanted this, and you're the first to provide it. But that's the game of business, and, uh, to me. So, so anyways, I think he's a great example of giving people what they want. Uh, two, he pioneered a new format. So his whole format of like putting this dirty laundry on air and the fights, the bouncers, the like, the, the, the s- the, the, the pregnancy test rev- the DNA test reveals, like this guy's a goddamn innovator. Uh, number three, he became number one. He be- [laughs] bigger than Oprah in, in his prime. And lastly, what I love was he, uh-

Sam Parr 54:59 Dude, he did 5,000 episodes

Shaan Puri 55:01 ... he got his friends to win, too. So his security guy, Steve, who became like a charady- a character on the show, like they're best friends. Steve says, you know, the most wonderful things about Jerry, and Steve gets his own spin-off show later after the Jer- after the Jerry Springer Show. So I love that he kinda brought- ... friends along the way, and then they, when he eats, they all eat. And, um, there was a few, few good examples of that. And the other f- funny thing about this-

Sam Parr 55:24 And people b- people liked working for Jerry?

Shaan Puri 55:26 People, from what I could tell-

Sam Parr 55:27 Like, he was-

Shaan Puri 55:27 Yeah, like it was like the opposite of Ellen. Uh, like Ellen is seen as this like, you know, America's sweetheart, and then behind the scenes was like, you know, a menace. And apparently Jerry was the opposite. It's like he was seen as a menace to society, and actually he was kind of a sweetheart, um, from, from w- what people said. Now maybe it was just the guy dies and no one wants to trash him, but like that's what I found. The last thing though that I thought was interesting was that in a weird way, because this show was really popular like in the early '90s, his show was actually [laughs] the first show to expose people to like, to people being gay or trans or like all kinds of stuff that's like-

Sam Parr 56:02 Totally

Shaan Puri 56:02 ... LGBTQ. Like, and he was like, i- this was a f- for a lot of people in America, they had never met or heard of anybody who was in any of those categories. And so he kind of was like the Band-Aid rip off moment [laughs] for, for a lot of America on these things, which I think is also kind of amazing. The Real World was kinda like that too.

Sam Parr 56:23 I, I went to a, I went to an all boys high school. And, and like I remember being like 14 or 15, and for some reason the high school, it was like a good... The, the culture of the school, like young men felt fine coming out and saying they were gay. And I remember like meeting these kids, and it was like the first time I've ever done that and like met like someone who admitted to being gay. And at first I was like, uh, you know, back then you, you would make fun of people. And then you realize, oh, that, that's, that's horrible. You- obviously we shouldn't do that and it's, they're my buddies. Um, and then it goes back to, and therefore, because I love you, I'm gonna make fun of you-

Shaan Puri 56:58 [laughs]

Sam Parr 56:58 ... just like I make fun of all my other friends.

Shaan Puri 56:59 Full loop. Full loop, yeah.

Sam Parr 57:00 And that's like... Yeah.

Shaan Puri 57:01 [laughs]

Sam Parr 57:02 And, and because I love you, I'm not gonna treat you differently. We're all boys and we're just gonna tease each other over someone has braces, someone-

Shaan Puri 57:08 Right

Sam Parr 57:08 ... uh, you know, likes men, whatever.

Shaan Puri 57:09 [laughs]

Sam Parr 57:09 It doesn't matter. We're gonna make fun of ourselves. And, and that's just the way, that's the way that young boys show that-

Shaan Puri 57:13 Right

Sam Parr 57:13 ... we accept each other.

Shaan Puri 57:14 That's how we show love.

Sam Parr 57:15 It was just a mini-

Shaan Puri 57:16 Yeah. [laughs]

Sam Parr 57:16 It, it was a mini Jerry. You know?

Shaan Puri 57:18 [laughs]

Sam Parr 57:18 Jerry was first. You know? You're like, like well we're not not gonna make fun of this person because of, uh, this and that. We're actually going to do it because it shows that we're gonna... It's normal. We're gonna normalize it. So who knew Jerry was so progressive? You know what I mean?

Shaan Puri 57:31 I know. The guy was a... I mean, we got Rosa Parks, Mar- Martin Luther King, and we got Jerry Springer. These [laughs] he's like, he's just one of many in a lineage of pioneers [laughs] breaking down social barriers.

Sam Parr 57:42 Yeah, I saw he died. Dude, he seemed, he always seemed really likable. I remember watching him like, did, did you watch it like did, when your grandmom like babysat you or something? Like, that's like what I remember doing is like-

Shaan Puri 57:51 No, I was just home after school by myself. Yeah

Sam Parr 57:53 ... yeah, like at like, it was like 4:00 when you get home from school, you watched Jerry and Oprah.

Shaan Puri 57:57 Right.

Sam Parr 57:57 I remember watching all... Or when you stay home from school being sick.

Shaan Puri 58:00 Maury.

Sam Parr 58:01 You watch Maury.

Shaan Puri 58:01 Yeah, staying home from sick, watch Price is Right and shit. [laughs]

Sam Parr 58:03 Yeah. I loved Maury. Maury was the best too. He's gonna die soon too. I l- just looked him up while we were talking. He's 85, I think. Uh, so the legends. The legends. It's a, it's a, it's a passing generation. Salt of the earth type of, type of people.

Shaan Puri 58:15 [laughs] Who's doing this now? Is there like a thing now? Like where does this happen? Does this happen on TikTok or like Twitch or YouTube or something? I, I, I don't see-

Sam Parr 58:23 That's a good question

Shaan Puri 58:23 ... this style of content even though it's a good one. You know another great one like this? My sister still listens to this every day when she drives her kids to school, Cheaters on radio. This, the show where they-

Sam Parr 58:34 Really?

Shaan Puri 58:34 ... where they bust cheaters. Like the, like-

Sam Parr 58:36 That's still a thing?

Shaan Puri 58:37 Oh, it's a big th- it's a, it's a big thing in the, uh, FM morning radio space, [laughs] which is a very small thing in the world now.

Sam Parr 58:44 I think that is actually Mo- It was Joey Greco. You remember Joey Greco, the host?

Shaan Puri 58:48 W- is it just one?

Sam Parr 58:49 Uh, that was the guy from-

Shaan Puri 58:50 I feel like every city just borrowed this format.

Sam Parr 58:53 Joey Greco was like the more famous host, and at one point he got stabbed. Do you, you don't remember-

Shaan Puri 58:58 [laughs]

Sam Parr 58:58 ... that episode where he gets stabbed? Dude, he like gets stabbed. And like the thing about, the thing about that era of like the 2000s and '90s, the reason it was cool was we don't know if it's fake because there is no one-

Shaan Puri 59:11 Right

Sam Parr 59:11 ... tweeting. You know what I mean? You like think it's fake, but like no one has a platform to like expose like that they went on the show. And so that's kinda why it's hard to like recreate some of these things is like we didn't know. Like I, I wasn't sure wrestling was fake or not until like, you know, five years ago.

Shaan Puri 59:24 [laughs]

Sam Parr 59:25 I, I... Who, who knew? You know what I mean?

Shaan Puri 59:27 Held out hope.

Sam Parr 59:27 Uh-

Shaan Puri 59:28 It's like, oh.

Sam Parr 59:28 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 59:29 Tooth Fairy and, uh, Vince McMahon. [laughs] Maybe. Maybe there's a way.

Sam Parr 59:33 Yeah. No one kn- no one knew. But no, that's a good question. I'm looking it up now. Cheaters.

Shaan Puri 59:38 Yeah, so, so he did the TV show-

Sam Parr 59:39 It was hosted by Joey Greco

Shaan Puri 59:40 ... he did the TV show version.

Sam Parr 59:41 And then the later host was Peter Gunz.

Shaan Puri 59:43 Right. The radio version is basically they call, the wife calls in and is like, "I think my husband might be cheating." So then they call the husband as a woman. I don't know how, I don't know actually how they pull this off. I, I gotta ask my sister what the, what the actual format is, 'cause I don't know how the-

Sam Parr 59:58 Dude, it's all fake

Shaan Puri 59:58 ... I don't know how they trick 'em that, that easily. 'Cause like, I mean, you'd have to get a cold call from somebody and be like, "Yeah, I'm down." Uh, so I'm not sure exactly what they do. Or maybe they called... Oh, I think what it is is they're like, "He might be cheating with my friend Rebecca," and they fake call as Rebecca to try to like, to catch him in the act. And then they just do, they hit the button and three-way call, merge in the wife, and she just goes off on him on air. It's, it's incredible content. I mean, like anybody who's, who's a content creator out there, like if you're not studying Cheaters, you're not even trying.

Sam Parr 1:00:31 If... There's a subreddit called Public Freakout. You ever go to Public Freakout?

Shaan Puri 1:00:34 Yeah, I've seen, I've seen Public Freakout on, uh, on my recommended.

Sam Parr 1:00:37 That's my favorite subreddit. That's my-

Shaan Puri 1:00:38 Your favorite? [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:00:39 That's my version, that's my version of Jerry Springer. Public freak out and popping, where they just pop like zits and shit.

Shaan Puri 1:00:45 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:00:45 I love that. Big fan of that one, and Public Freakout. I was on the front page of, uh, popping one time. I had a picture get 60,000 views, so it's just whatever.

Shaan Puri 1:00:55 [laughs] Can I endorse you for, for that on LinkedIn? Where, where, how do I-

Sam Parr 1:00:58 Dude, I swear to God-

Shaan Puri 1:00:59 How do we make this more of a thing?

Sam Parr 1:01:00 ... I had to get, I had to get like a cyst removed from my like head. And I, right before I went under surgery, I was like, "Hey, Dr. Brian, can you do me a favor? Here's my cell phone number. Can you take some pics, uh, while we're in surgery and send them to me? I wanna post them on this subreddit." And he did, and I got 60,000 views.

Shaan Puri 1:01:17 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:01:19 I have a, I have a, a folder right here on my-

Shaan Puri 1:01:22 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:01:22 ... Safari or my Chrome, Sil- it's called Brain. And it's like I took like before, a- before, during, and after photos. I was the number one on popping, so no big deal. Um-

Shaan Puri 1:01:31 I think it's literally no big deal, actually. That's the cool part about it. [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:01:39 [laughs] I guess that's the episode. We did a recap and we talked about Jerry Springer.

Shaan Puri 1:01:43 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:01:44 All right, that's the episode. [upbeat music]