Brainstorming +$1M Weird Business Ideas With Morning Brew’s CEO Austin Rief (#543)

Shaan Puri 0:00 Dude, this is a great idea. This is why we started this podcast, for somebody to come on and say, "Yeah, I just built a $100 million media company, but guys, smokin' meats is where it's at." [laughs]

Sam Parr 0:12 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 0:13 [upbeat music] What's up? We got the three amigos of newsletters. The short story of Austin is, out of college, create Morning Brew, sold it for, I think I read 75 million, so don't... You'd have to correct me if I'm wrong, but 75 million bucks. You still run it, hundreds of employees. Amazing. You have a doc here of a bunch of topics.

Austin Rief 0:37 Yeah. Someone sent me this deck, like, last week, and I, I was, like, gonna text Sam about this. I was like, "You know what? Let me wait for the pod to talk to you guys about this." This is a, a, I feel like a My First Million special. So, I've been super excited about a bunch of these post-COVID, get out of your house, do exciting things that's not go to a bar and just drink. I think that's pretty boring, and there are a bunch of these in New York. I don't know how... If they have where you guys live. But

Austin Rief 1:00 they have, uh, ping pong bars and pool bars, and they get more and more, uh, out there. And I was tweeting about this, and some guy sent me a deck. He goes, "I got something interesting for you." So if, if you have your computer out, look up, uh, Bingo Loco. Right?

Sam Parr 1:15 [laughs]

Austin Rief 1:15 This guy sends me this, this deck for bingo. I'm like, "Well, what the hell is this?" Right? Bingo Loco. Uh, it's basically a club-meets-bingo, right? So boozy bingo, performers, confetti showers, the, the whole thing.

Shaan Puri 1:32 This looks like a Tiesto concert or something [laughs] going on. What is this?

Austin Rief 1:36 I didn't know people played bingo off of cruise ships. Like, I thought bingo was either for old people or cruise ships. He sends me his deck. I don't wanna disclose their numbers, but he goes, "Check out one of our competitors, uh, Bongo Bingo USA."

Shaan Puri 1:49 [laughs]

Austin Rief 1:50 And I'm like, "There's no way" [laughs] I'm like, "There's no way there's a whole industry for, for bingo raves, for bingo parties."

Sam Parr 1:56 Dude, the websites are exactly the same. Dude, they, they just copied each other.

Austin Rief 1:59 [laughs] It looks like they're the same. I, I, I... Again, he just sent me a deck. Apparently, people in the industry, so these Bongo Bingo guys apparently, uh, pre-COVID, were doing 20 million a year in revenue.

Sam Parr 2:10 No way.

Shaan Puri 2:11 [laughs] Explain this model. Do they own the place, or they're just going and, like, doing a pop-up bingo night at some place?

Austin Rief 2:18 No, I think they go all... I... It's actually really smart, right, because what they do is, I believe, they go for pretty off nights for certain places, right? So, you know, so nights where a club or whatever, wherever they have these, wouldn't be that popular, but they still bring that environment, right? So they still use a lot of the infrastructure that these, these venues have. And they bring, it seems like, the whole show, the confetti showers, the performers, everything. And what I think is interesting is they keep you there with the bingo, right? So there's a, there's a shuffleboarding place in Brooklyn, right? They keep you there because you play shuffleboard for, you know, hours and hours, and you're just buying drinks, and that that's, like, the, the shtick. That's the hook to get you in. And it's the same thing, game of bingo. I'm sure they have performers mid-game. They keep you there for seven hours. You just buy a bunch of drinks. So I, I thought this one was awesome.

Sam Parr 3:01 Tickets are $53 right now.

Shaan Puri 3:05 Wow.

Sam Parr 3:06 And they sell these out?

Austin Rief 3:08 I, I guess. So they, they must be making money off the booze, right? I was, I was trying to do more research into this. There's not that much informa- I'd never even heard of it, but they must be making their money off of the booze.

Shaan Puri 3:16 Well, look at this ad. So I went to their ad library. People of Minneapolis, a bingo rave is coming to Granada Theater March 15th, which, uh, is a couple months out. It says, "After a string of sold-out shows across, uh, America, Bingo Loco i- has Minneapolis in its sights." And then it's got, like, this TikTok video which literally looks like you're at, like, a rave, and you go there, and then that's the, you know, $30 ticket. And then there's, like, a, you know... What, what is this, basically? There's a host. There's music. There's confetti. There's, um, you know, dance-offs, links- lip sync battles. There's a... You know, there's drinks, basically. There's alcohol.

Sam Parr 3:53 It... This is, like, uh, the sound. [sings] It's like that on a website. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 3:58 [laughs] That's the business plan?

Sam Parr 4:00 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 4:00 You open up a, open up a deck, and it just plays that sound. [laughs]

Sam Parr 4:04 I've got four words for you investors. [sings] [laughs]

Austin Rief 4:11 [laughs] I'm, I'm sure the margins on this are crazy. Their costs are some, some random performers and, and, and bingo. Again, I, I, I, I played bingo one time on a cruise ship, and these guys are making what seems like 20 million bucks a year off, off bingo. I gotta... We gotta figure out what we can do this next for.

Sam Parr 4:27 All right, everyone. A quick break to tell you about HubSpot, and this one's really easy for me to talk about because I'm gonna show you a real-life example. So I've got this company called Hampton, joinhampton.com. It's a community for founders doing between 2 million all the way up to, like, $250 million a year in revenue. And one of the ways that we've grown is we've created these cool surveys. And so we have a lot of founders who have high net worths, and we'll ask them all types of questions that people typically are embarrassed to ask but provide a lot of value. So things like how much the founders pay themselves each month, how much money they're spending each month, what their payroll looks like, if they're optimistic about the next year in their business. All these questions that people are afraid to ask, but, well, we ask them anyway, and they tell us in this anonymous survey. And so what we do is we've created a landing page using HubSpot's landing page tool, and it basically has a landing page that says, "Here's all the questions we asked. Give us your email if you wanna access it." And then I shared this page on Twitter, and we were able to get thousands of people who gave us their email and told us they want this survey. And I could see, did they come from social media? I can see, did they come from Twitter, from LinkedIn? Basically everywhere [laughs] else that they could possibly come from. I'm able to track all of that. And then I'm able to see over the next handful of weeks how many of those people actually signed up and became a member of Hampton. In other words, I can see how much revenue came from this survey, how much revenue came from each traffic source, things like that. But the best part is I can see how much revenue came from it. And a lot of times it takes a ton of work to make that happen. HubSpot made that super, super easy. If you're interested in doing this, you can check it out, hubspot.com. The link's in the description. And I'll also put the link to the survey that I did so you can actually see the landing page and how it works and everything like that. [beep] I'm just gonna do that call to action then. And it's free. [beep] Check it out in the description.

Sam Parr 6:00 All right, now back to MFM. So you make a lot of money at Morning Brew doing digital stuff and you just hit send on a little email. It's easy. Kind of. Kind of easy. Uh, why on earth do you care about physical stuff? That seems way more challenging.

Austin Rief 6:15 Yeah, I don't know if I would ever start something in this space, but it's just so fun to go see, to go see the way people... You know, I would never think this would work. In a million years, I would never think bingo, uh, on steroids, bingo, uh, performers would work. But I think it's so interesting, and I love going to these things around the city to try to see how people get people hooked on these things. It's so easy to hook people on a newsletter, right? It's, it's content every day. It's very different for people to come back to, to play shuffleboard or bingo. So I, I, I love these.

Shaan Puri 6:45 I have an idea for one. Can I pitch you guys one? All right. So I'm tr- You know, as soon as you said this bingo thing, my brain starts, the wheels start turning. And Sam, you'll appreciate this. You like the UFC. So y- I don't know if you remember when Conor McGregor was on his come up, uh, he was knocking people out. He was knocking people out. He was the best, and this guy... And everyone's like, "What can't this guy do?" 'Cause everybody thought whoever the next guy he's fighting, that guy's gonna neutralize him with this, this, and this. Knocks him out. And I remember watching, uh, one, you know, a, a ex-UFC fighter. He was doing, like, an analysis, and he's like, "I'm watching Conor. He does all this spinning shit and he does this, he does this." He's like, "I think it's all smoke and mirrors." He goes, "I think everything is just a distraction 'cause he's trying to land the left hand." And he's like, "You know, that's, every, all this stuff he's throwing, he doesn't care what happens with it. He's just trying to hit you with the left hand." To me, this is the same business model. Like, the bingo, it's, it's like, "Oh, did you hear about that bingo business?" No, no, no. You hear about that alcohol business that uses bingo to get you to the bar? So similarly, we gotta figure out what's gonna get people to the bar and get them drinking. And so here's my idea. I've always wanted to enter one of those eating contests. I don't know if you guys have ever done one. I've never actually done it, but, like, those places where it's like, "If you can eat this pizza, it's free." And, like, I've always wanted to actually go do it, but there's always, like, this problem where it's like, it's like you have to pay $75 to, like, buy the huge pizza. It might be free, but you, you know, whatever. I would love if somebody turned this into, like... You know, if I was in college, I would've been all over this. If it was like, it's, it's the contest is who can eat the biggest, you know, who can eat the most hot dogs or the biggest pizza, who can finish it the fastest. And you can go enter, and you have to bring friends to be kinda your cheering section. They're all rowdy and drinking and cheering you on. It's free to play 'cause the pizza's not that expensive. But you're gonna fill up the bar with, like, you know, whatever, hundreds of people who are in the mood to kind of, like, binge and go extreme, 'cause that's kind of the theme of the night in a way. It's like sports meets binge-eating. Well, what's the best thing that goes with both those things? Binge-drinking. Who's with me?

Austin Rief 8:44 The only thing you could add is a little bit of gambling. You need to have people gamble.

Shaan Puri 8:48 Oh.

Austin Rief 8:48 This is, this is like gamble. It's like gambling, right? It's, it's, it's, it's Vegas meets a party.

Shaan Puri 8:52 Beautiful-

Austin Rief 8:52 So just add some, add some betting

Shaan Puri 8:54 ... beautiful yes and there, Austin. I don't know if you've been doing some improv, but that was a beautiful yes and. I really appreciate that one. Good riff.

Sam Parr 9:02 I follow this guy on YouTube. He's called Beard Meats Food, and looks like he has, uh, 3.6 million subscribers. Have you guys seen this guy? He just goes to small restaurants in England that they have, like, you know, uh, you get this free if you eat it. He eats roughly 10,000 calories in each of the challenges, and he nails all of them. Like, one time he ate, like, I think it was five pounds of chocolate. Have you seen this, Shaan?

Shaan Puri 9:24 No.

Sam Parr 9:24 This guy's channel? It's the craziest channel I've ever seen, and I watch all of his videos. It's one of the few YouTube channels I subscribe to. This guy needs to la- launch your food challenge gambling business.

Shaan Puri 9:35 And there's actually a bunch of these Instagrammers that you could do this with. So, uh, you know, there's that guy who eats the raw meat. I, I think he's called Raw Meat Experiment.

Sam Parr 9:43 Read his bio. Read his bio, Shaan. His bio is great.

Shaan Puri 9:45 Okay, let's just... I, [laughs] So 142,000 followers. He goes, "Eating raw meat every day until I die from bacteria" [laughs]

Sam Parr 9:53 [laughs]

Austin Rief 9:54 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 9:55 Then it says, "Line two: Seeing if I live for five days or 500 years" [laughs]

Sam Parr 10:01 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 10:02 And literally he'll just-

Sam Parr 10:02 It is disgusting

Shaan Puri 10:03 ... take, like, a chunk of ground beef, and he just sits outside of a Whole Foods. He buys the ground beef, and he just eats it raw. Or he'll just get-

Sam Parr 10:09 Ugh

Shaan Puri 10:09 ... a chicken breast uncooked, and he'll just chew it like it's a, you know, uh, I don't know, like a Slim Jim or something like that. And, uh, I feel like these, there's so many Instagram food mukbang, like, different variations of this. Like, there's a lot of YouTubers that, that do this where they order just an insane amount of food, watch me eat, and it is entertaining to do. I could feel like you could get them to host, be, like, kinda guest host promotional to, to do these pop-ups.

Sam Parr 10:33 I used to, um, when I worked, uh, b- when I moved to San Francisco, I didn't have a lot, and I would part-time... I had, like, a part-time job, and I worked for this guy, Joe Garvey. He had a company called Clash. It stood for California League of Adventure Scavenger Hunt or something like that. It was called Clash SF. And he was making seven figures a year, and we would host these citywide, uh, scavenger hunts, and they were the best. It was so fun, and I got to see some of the, like, economics of, like, some of these in-person stuff, and I was actually pretty shocked at how great some of these could be. It was a lot of work. Um, and then we have another friend, Nick Gray. Did you know, Shaan, that Nick Gray had a business called Museum Hack, and he eventually sold it, and it was doing many, many millions in revenue? And the way the business worked, where it was, he eventually, i- or at first, it was just, like, guerrilla, where he was, he would, like, go to, I think it was Met, the, the Met, uh, in, um, New York. It's a free museum. And people would pay $50, and he would give them a tour of the museum, and he would explain the, the art. And then eventually he hired lots of theater kids to lead these tours, and he had them set up in a variety of museums throughout the country, and eventually he had a partnership after they, like, kicked him out a bunch of times. And, uh, he said that business was awesome.

Shaan Puri 11:44 Dude, I, I love the way he described it, too. He uses the phrase renegade museum tours. I just thought that was just a great way to pitch it. He was like, "Yeah, I, my first business, I hosted renegade museum tours." And he doesn't really explain what it is, but you try to put it all together. And the word renegade, I feel like is, uh,

Shaan Puri 12:00 underutilized, u- u- under-hyped word. I think I'm gonna try to, try to bring that back into my, my everyday, uh, vocabulary.

Austin Rief 12:06 I think they made him, I think Time Out made him the number one, uh, thing to do in New York, and I think that's what blew him up, right? He blew up. And then, and then of course he went B2B, 'cause that's where the money in all this stuff is, right? Selling...

Shaan Puri 12:16 [laughs]

Austin Rief 12:16 You sell it to a consumer for 50 bucks, you sell to Morning Brew for 20 grand, and our HR team just signs off and approves it.

Shaan Puri 12:22 [laughs]

Sam Parr 12:23 Austin, last time you were here, I think we, we talked about, like, the creator economy, and I'm almost certain all three of us were like, "This is gonna fizzle out." And has your opinion changed? And I know, like, some things have happened in, like, the news or the media world that has, uh, got you excited. W- tell me about that.

Austin Rief 12:44 Yeah. I think, uh, last time we spoke, I remember we were all talking and we're like, "What, what's the next Milk Road for?" Right? Milk Road for X. We were all talking about that. Uh, and we're like, oh, AI's popping off. Let's, let's... Someone should launch the Milk Road for AI.

Sam Parr 12:56 Milk Road for X. That just got Shaan all, all-

Shaan Puri 12:59 [laughs]

Sam Parr 12:59 He's all hot, man. Y- you're, you're, you're, you're speaking to him perfectly.

Shaan Puri 13:03 Austin got on the call, called me skinny, and now he said Milk Road for hex, X instead of Morning Brew or Hustle for X, and I am... This guy is a charmer. I love it.

Austin Rief 13:11 Just trying to hype you up, Shaan. Uh, I, I mean, look, but there was 10,000... I mean, there's beehives growing off the backs of, of Milk Road for AI. And I think the, the problem with these businesses are, they, their content's not very good. They've all grown with these, these crazy growth hacks, which is great for the, you know, newsletter ecosystem as a whole, but it's not sustainable. I think there's... There's no more alpha in the, the newsletter game. Everyone talks about everything. And I think Beehive did for newsletters what Shopify did for e-commerce, right? E-commerce stores started and people got super pumped. They're like, you know, investors invested in Away and in all these businesses 'cause they're like, oh, Shopify makes it so easy to start an e-com store, and that's awesome. The problem was they made it too easy to start an e-com store, where everyone started e-com stores, where you have to be

Austin Rief 14:00 either the absolute best or you just can't raise a bunch of money and have to be okay with it being, like, a fine business. But everyone's just pouring in. Again, not a ton of money, but a ton of people just think, "Oh, if I can just create the, the Milk Road for marketing, the Milk Road for, uh, AI, I'm gonna have a, a Milk Road-like exit." I just... I don't know what you guys think, but I just don't think these newsletters have a ton of value.

Shaan Puri 14:23 Let me ask you a different question. Uh, you spent a bunch of time in media now. How long you been doing this? Like, seven, eight years, something like that?

Austin Rief 14:30 Coming up on 10.

Shaan Puri 14:32 Oh my God. Uh, wow. Incred- a third of your life you've spent in the media business. I hope you don't spend the next two-thirds of your life on m- the media business too. If you were gonna do something different, where would you go? Let's say media was off the table. Um, what would you do next?

Austin Rief 14:47 Yeah, so I think there are two types of businesses I love. I think one is, uh, you know, B2B. I think, you know, we've all built businesses where the LTVs are, like, 15 bucks. That's pretty tough.

Shaan Puri 14:58 [laughs]

Austin Rief 14:58 Uh, I love, you know, selling significant enterprise products. The other one is building the passion audiences. That's, I think, where I'd actually go. So, you know, we went to Camp My First Million last year, and we met that guy, I think, I think it was Al, who was building for, uh, quilters.

Sam Parr 15:13 Al Doan.

Austin Rief 15:14 Yeah. Um, I think, you know, he does hundreds of millions of revenue. So I think I'd wanna, wanna find a, a niche there. Figure out, you know, what is a weird niche? And so the one I've been spending a lot of time researching, I almost did something here, I ended up not doing it, is meat smoking.

Sam Parr 15:28 [laughs]

Austin Rief 15:30 I am obsessed with my Traeger, right? I-

Sam Parr 15:32 Dude, how do you use a Traeger? You live in an apartment in New York. Like, on your balcony?

Austin Rief 15:37 Yeah, on the... I, I live on the first floor, so I, I, I have access to the common space.

Shaan Puri 15:41 Uh, so I don't, I don't meat smoke. What, what even is meat smoking? Can you just give me that b- first before we talk about this?

Sam Parr 15:45 Dude, it's such a pain in the ass. It is such a pain in the ass.

Shaan Puri 15:47 Is this called grilling or it's different than grilling?

Austin Rief 15:49 You, you cook, you cook meat at, like, 200 degrees for, like, 10, 12 hours.

Sam Parr 15:53 It's like barbecuing, but 10 hours and no fire, and they use smoke instead. But I, all, all of my Jewish friends are into this 'cause you guys grew up eating brisket.

Shaan Puri 16:01 You gotta wait 10 hours to eat?

Sam Parr 16:03 And you've gotta buy, like, special, like, wood chips for it. It's a fucking pain in the ass. I've got friends that will wake up at 4:00 in the morning to, like, get their brisket started.

Shaan Puri 16:11 Okay, but I'm a believer. Anything that's a huge pain in the ass that people do, there's, like, a shit ton of money there.

Austin Rief 16:16 Exactly, right. And so there's a couple big brands in smoking. There's Traeger, right? Traeger's the one I have. And the thing is, to Sam's point, you don't just, like... It's not electricity. You don't just, like, turn it on and it goes. You have to, uh... It's, it's wood pellets, right? You literally smoke wood pellets. And these pellets, Traeger gets you to buy the $1,000, $1,500 smoker, but then also you're spending $50 every time you smoke meat because you're just burning these pellets. And there's a lot of meat smokers, uh, influencers out there.

Shaan Puri 16:46 [laughs]

Austin Rief 16:46 These guys in Nashville, these guys in Texas. And literally it's like, how to smoke a rib eye, how to smoke a brisket, and they have tens of millions of views. And they're all, like, kinda sophisticated. They have these rubs that you put on your meats, but none of them are taking big swings, right? None of them are build, are building the Traeger competitor. I wanna build the Traeger or the Green Egg competitor. Sell the $1,500 product, sell the $50 a month, $100 a month pellets, and build the next Traeger, which I think is a multi, you know, billion-dollar brand.

Shaan Puri 17:17 Dude, I'm, I'm fired up. I, I'm smoked up right now. That was a good pitch. I, and you, you seem pretty lit up about that. Uh, why did you not do this? This sounds awesome.

Austin Rief 17:26 I've been talking to some, some meat smoking influencers.

Shaan Puri 17:30 [laughs]

Austin Rief 17:31 Uh, I'm, I'm working on it.

Sam Parr 17:32 The, the, the, the meat smoking boys. That's what we'll call them.

Austin Rief 17:36 Yeah. What I like about these guys are they're just so much more down to earth than these New York City influencers. You know, it's not like the, the, the TikTok 22-year-olds. These are people who just love life. They just wanna smoke meats, and if they can sell a grill, even better. There's, there's this guy.

Shaan Puri 17:52 [laughs]

Austin Rief 17:52 Have you heard of this guy, um, Jonathan Moses Katz?

Sam Parr 17:56 No. Who's that?

Austin Rief 17:57 So he's a, he's a woodworking creator, right? And he's done kind of what I'm saying but in the woodworking niche. So what this guy has done, he was a big wor- woodworking creator, and he built some tools for... And it's cool 'cause obviously he's a woodworker, so he can build them himself for his audience.

Sam Parr 18:13 Oh, dude, his site, his site gets so much traffic This guy kills it, I bet

Austin Rief 18:17 ... crushes it, right? And so I've spoken to this guy one time, so I don't, I don't have, you know, any insider information, but he crushed it. And what he started to do is he started to partner with every other woodworking creator and said, "Hey, look, I'm doing... You know, crushing it for myself, selling a bunch of whatever widgets to my audience. Let me make you your own custom little thing your, in your woodworking niche, and I'm gonna help you all sell them as well. And then we can build a collective store of all our, all our products. And, and Shaan, if you sell one on behalf of Sam, you'll kick him an affiliate." This is a big business.

Sam Parr 18:53 I bet you he does 50 million a year on... So it's called KM Tools I think, right? K- yeah, KM Tools. I bet you this does in the 50 million range.

Austin Rief 19:02 Yeah. I, I wouldn't be surprised if it does more.

Shaan Puri 19:04 Dude, this is a great idea. This is why we started this podcast, for somebody to come on and say, "Yeah, I just built $100 million media company, but guys, smoking meats is where it's at. This is a niche you're never really thinking about. There's an opportunity here. Here's the, here's the distribution model we're gonna use. I'm gonna partner with these influencers and then do this kind of affiliate network and build this competitor." This is awesome. So-

Sam Parr 19:26 We're gonna call it The Meat Smoking Jerky Boys.

Shaan Puri 19:29 [laughs]

Sam Parr 19:29 And we're gonna... Th- this, this wa- this, this way it allows us a little bit of a lateral expansion into, uh, the beef jerky space, but we're gonna call it The Meat Smoking Jerky Boys. That's-

Shaan Puri 19:39 No, dude, you know that, you know that, um, that cigarette brand that we, we love the branding and the packaging of, Oklahoma Smokes?

Sam Parr 19:46 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 19:46 I feel like you kinda gotta do a Oklahoma Smokes or like a, a Nashville, Nashville Smokes Club, uh, or something like that, brought to you by The Jerky Boys. And, uh, you know, I think it's all needs to come together-

Sam Parr 19:59 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 19:59 ... into one mega brand.

Austin Rief 20:00 [laughs] I have not seen this branding. This is awesome. Oklahoma Smokes, we're stealing this. We're buying the company just to steal the branding.

Shaan Puri 20:08 [laughs] Dude, they're, they're so good.

Sam Parr 20:10 Google, like, some of the most popular towns in Louisiana and just pick one name that, like, stands out.

Shaan Puri 20:14 [laughs]

Sam Parr 20:14 You know, like Tupelo Meats or something.

Shaan Puri 20:16 [laughs]

Austin Rief 20:17 [laughs] I'm, I'm just, I'm just hoping a big meat smoking influencer, creator listens to this podcast and DMs me on Twitter and goes, "I'm ready to ride."

Shaan Puri 20:27 The Baton Rouge Smoke Company.

Shaan Puri 20:30 God, there's just so many possibilities here. Um, Austin, I know when we started this conversation, I didn't even know what smoking meats was, but I'm in. And hold a little check space for me on this company, 'cause I would love to be a part of this. You know, I'm the opposite of an e- expert advisor here. I'm actually gonna be your, your in-house beginner, and, uh, that's how I'm gonna add some value to you.

Sam Parr 20:50 Dude, even Zuck's into it. Remember, remember the whole, the, the Zuck, uh, meme about s- uh, smoking meats?

Shaan Puri 20:55 With Baby Ray or whatever. [laughs]

Sam Parr 20:56 Yeah. He, he loves smoking meats. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 20:58 [laughs]

Austin Rief 20:59 [laughs]

Sam Parr 21:00 And you're, you're into this. I know that for a minute, Austin, you were talking about how you're like, "I wanna partner with creators," 'cause I, 'cause, like, once you can attach with some of these folks, you just, you kill it. Is that what you would do?

Austin Rief 21:12 I mean, for, for this, yeah. I think that is still, uh... It, it, ever... It's very popular these days to partner with creators. I still think that's the future. I still think we're, we're scratching the surface. You know, there's Feastables and Prime and, and everyone talks about those, and it's definitely been played out in terms of talking about. But I still think ultimately you're gonna walk into a liquor store, you're gonna walk into Target, and every brand is gonna have a face, an association, 'cause why wouldn't it, right? I- if there's a brand that could have nobody attached to it or a brand that could have someone attached to it, why wouldn't that brand have the built-in distribution of you guys or someone, you know, more, more widely well-known or, or just someone? Like, I just don't see h- how that doesn't play out. And so, you know, it's do- it's been done with the, the biggest creators. I think the real opportunity is in the niches.

Sam Parr 21:59 Shaan, how big do you think... First of all, we don't really have that many, like, cool interests that you could have, like, an MFM product in Target. Like, what, what are we gonna fucking sell, Red Solo cups?

Shaan Puri 22:10 [laughs]

Sam Parr 22:10 Like, I don't even know. Like, what, what, what is there, like Tupperware?

Shaan Puri 22:12 [laughs]

Sam Parr 22:12 Like, uh, I, I don't know, like, what we could possibly sell.

Shaan Puri 22:16 What would be the dumbest thing that would be associated [laughs] with, uh, smoking meats?

Sam Parr 22:18 Yeah. [laughs] Like, like a, a notebook? I don't... I have no idea. But-

Shaan Puri 22:23 MFM slings, baby, let's go. [laughs]

Sam Parr 22:25 How popular... Like, what's like... So Barstool has, like, the Barstool Razor. They're in, uh, uh, stores, so, and they're a way bigger brand than we are. How-

Shaan Puri 22:33 Well, they have a frozen pizza. They have, like, other things, right?

Sam Parr 22:35 They have a bunch of stuff.

Austin Rief 22:36 Yeah.

Sam Parr 22:36 How famous do we have to be, do you think, in order to make a dent into, like, getting sales at Target?

Austin Rief 22:42 So I don't think th- that famous if you pick the right product. I actually think we're past the point-

Sam Parr 22:48 Or do you become more famous? Do you get more famous because your shit's in Target? You're like, "Oh my God, they're actually in Target."

Austin Rief 22:53 I think we're past the point where just fame is gonna drive, right? I think that works for, for a few people, but I think you actually need to have a great product. I think you had them on the pod. You know Dani Austin and, uh, her husband Jordan?

Shaan Puri 23:05 Yeah.

Austin Rief 23:05 Dani's big, but Dani's not as big as some of these other creators, but her brand is worth way more than almost every brand out there because it's actually a product that has a need. It's not, "Hey, we're gonna rip off, you know, one of the biggest brands on the planet."

Shaan Puri 23:20 Right.

Austin Rief 23:20 It's, it's a truly, it's a great product.

Shaan Puri 23:22 Oh, Sam, we could've done Hims. [laughs]

Sam Parr 23:24 [laughs]

Austin Rief 23:24 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:25 Or, like, the TRT subscriptions or something.

Sam Parr 23:27 Yeah. We should've done Hims. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:29 That would've been our move. [laughs]

Austin Rief 23:31 [laughs]

Sam Parr 23:32 Have you ever taken it?

Shaan Puri 23:33 No. Is it good? [laughs]

Sam Parr 23:34 I've never taken it either. I, I've never tried it. Austin, have you? You're younger than we are. Have you done it?

Austin Rief 23:38 No, I have not.

Shaan Puri 23:39 All right, guys, we know what we're doing next time we hang out.

Sam Parr 23:41 [laughs] Yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:43 Buy Hims and doing a podcast.

Sam Parr 23:44 Yeah. [laughs] We're gonna be playing swords. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:49 So I think that this is gonna be, like, the new newsletter thing. I think that people looked at Feastables, they looked at Prime, and they looked at Skims, and they're like, "Creator brand." And every creator's like, "I need to do a creator brand." And every, like, former drop shipper's like, "I just need a creator, and then we win." And they're all gonna go do this, and then they're all gonna wash out. There's obviously gonna be a few winners because the difference, right? Like, what Logan Paul did with Prime is so different than what most creators do with their product. Like- That guy, A, had like actually like a humongous audience, took it everywhere, built the brand sorta like brick by brick. Oh, he's at WrestleMania? Guess what? He's gonna fucking hit the guy over the head with a giant bottle of Prime. Or like, you know, there's one... And it was him and KSI, right? So they got two huge creators, two big markets to pair together to go into this industry. You know, MrBeast is like, "I'm gonna do Feastables," but he's not just like, "Hey, go ahead guys, go buy my chocolate." He's like, "I rebuilt Willy Wonka's chocolate factory for $3 million, and that's how I'm gonna launch this thing. I'm gonna make the product the content. The content is the product. There's no line between the two." And, you know, so, you know, he, those worked because the creators really were like actual entrepreneurs and partnered with world-class operators to pull them off, right? Like the- we talked about the guys behind Prime. Those guys are monsters. Uh, right? Those guys are in their 20s and mega billionaires for a reason, have built multiple beverage brands for a reason. The guy who built Conor McGregor's whiskey brand was also the guy who did, like, whatever, two other alcohol brands that were multi-billion dollar, dollar brands. And they, they partnered with him to do Proper 12. So, and same thing, Conor is like mega, mega famous and went all the way with the promotion versus other people may not. I think the Dani Austin story's good 'cause it was like her real story was like, "Postpartum I was losing hair. I was ashamed of it. I bought wigs. For the last year I've been wearing wigs while I've been an influencer. But instead I really wanted to find a product that would work, and here's the product and here's my before and after." And it's like, that's like the perfect combination of things. You have high margin product, you have repeat purchase 'cause people are gonna have, they have to keep applying the thing. You have a visual before and after, and you have a true story around the creators, like actual need versus just like a, a nice-to-have. And, you know, that is like the, you know, that's the, the Yahtzee of, of c- putting these, these together. Most people are not gonna be able to do that.

Sam Parr 26:08 Yeah, but Austin, you could do it. You, you, you got that operator gene. You could be one of these nerds.

Shaan Puri 26:13 Well, the, the thing is, we're, we're all doing it in the B2B space, right? So what we're doing is not, is like, okay, we have 1/100 the audience of a MrBeast or a Logan Paul. Cool. So we need to sell a product that's 100 times more expensive than a bottle of Prime, right? He sp- he sells his for four bucks or whatever. We're trying to sell products that cost 4,000 or 40,000 or $400,000 a year by doing B2B software, right? That's why HubSpot did it with us. And I think this is the other thing, like Austin, you did a thread that was like, "This is the new thing," but it's like, dude, people have been doing celebrity endorsements forever. The difference is that now the celebrities own equity.

Sam Parr 26:49 I'm like, "Oh yeah, people can do this. Wait a minute, we did it. That's us." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 26:54 Yeah. Exactly. That's good for their brand, right? Like to, to help them sell a product that's worth thousands of dollars, right?

Shaan Puri 27:00 It would be smart of us to do that, not the, uh, the MFM [laughs] whatever, like Target brand nail clippers.

Sam Parr 27:06 Lego set. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 27:07 Yeah, Lego, exactly. Adult Legos.

Sam Parr 27:09 [laughs] Yeah. Yeah.

Austin Rief 27:11 And Sam, I, I think really that, that is you and Hampton. Like, you really are, I mean, it's, it's a what? $8,000 product. Like, I think that is the perfect example. You may not be Tony Robbins, right? You may not be Gary Vee, right? Maybe they're the equivalent of like the Logan Paul in B2B, but you found a great product, and it makes a lot of sense for your brand and your audience, and so I, yeah, I think it's a, it's a home run.

Sam Parr 27:32 Yeah. Keep showing. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 27:33 Speaking of Tony Robbins, Austin, you know this episode's gonna come out right after the episode with Tony Robbins, so uh-

Austin Rief 27:39 Yeah

Sam Parr 27:39 Which is good for Austin, I think. That's good for Austin.

Shaan Puri 27:41 Good for you.

Austin Rief 27:42 No. I mean, maybe, but I, I meant to start with this actually, so maybe we'll cut this and put it at the beginning. But you know, when, when you start a, not to shill Hampton again, I hate to do this, but when you start a, a Hampton session with your, your group, you, you air grievances, right? Everyone says, "Can, can you be honest with everyone? Can you really have a good dialogue and discussion, or is there anything you need to get out in the open?" Well, clearly we could 'cause I didn't say this, but, but I, I do need to tell everyone that Monday you and I were supposed to talk, like 1:00 Sean's like, "I'm gonna ca- I'm gonna call you, Austin. I'm gonna give you a call." 1:00 comes by, no call. 2:00 comes by, no call.

Shaan Puri 28:18 [laughs]

Austin Rief 28:18 So I text him, like, "Sean, what's going on?" You're like, "Oh, I'm prepping for the big guest."

Shaan Puri 28:21 No, no. You texted me, "Thanks for the call." [laughs]

Austin Rief 28:24 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 28:25 Which is even better. [laughs]

Austin Rief 28:27 And so I'm like, "Sean, what the heck's going on?" You're like, "I'm, I'm prepping for the big guest." I'm like, "Oh, Sean's hyping me up."

Shaan Puri 28:33 [laughs]

Austin Rief 28:33 Like 10 minutes later, "By the way, that was actually Tony Robbins, not you." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 28:37 [laughs]

Sam Parr 28:39 Yeah. So basically, like he reached out or someone on his team reached out. I had a thing planned, and also Sean is like, uh, the biggest fan, so Sean, it was awesome that you got to like just hang out with the guy you admired. How was it?

Shaan Puri 28:52 It was intense, is the way I would explain it. I mean, when I tell you I prepared for this, not only did I basically spend every waking moment for two days just like pr- preparing for this thing, which I never do for podcasts, um, I've also kind of been preparing for 10 years 'cause I follow the guy and I'm a big fan of his. I've been to three of his seminars. Like I- I know a lot, and on- there's, there's kind of a curse of knowing too much going in.

Sam Parr 29:15 Right.

Shaan Puri 29:15 And so-

Sam Parr 29:16 Like meeting your heroes type of thing.

Shaan Puri 29:18 Yeah, it's like you want it to go well so bad, it's almost like you squeeze the s- like don't, don't squeeze the bar of soap too hard, it just squirts out. Like if you, if you want it to go so well, it's gonna fuck up. I'll tell you guys the, the funny part. So like-

Sam Parr 29:28 I- interesting analogy. Interesting analogy.

Austin Rief 29:30 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 29:31 It's not the bar of soap analogy you thought I was gonna do. Uh-

Sam Parr 29:33 No. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 29:35 [laughs] I took the road less traveled there.

Sam Parr 29:37 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 29:37 So, so we're getting ready for the pod. It's me and Ari, we're sitting there, and his team's like, you know, his team's like swarming the computer setup. They're like, "Tony will be here shortly. Uh, you know, just everything's okay." And I'm like, "All right, sweet." I never get here early. You know I'm like chronically late, but for this one, 20 minutes early. So I'm sitting there for like 10 minutes and I could just feel myself getting cold. I'm like, "Oh no, I can't just sit here." And I was like, "I gotta use the shit Tony teaches you. You gotta be in state. You wanna have a peak performance? You gotta be in a peak state." Of course, right? Athletes do that. Well, guess what? What's one step down from an athlete? A musician. What's 25 steps down from that? A podcaster. And so I got up and I start doing my like Tony Robbins power move where I'm like, I'm basically doing this like really dorky, like mid-back stretch to like, you know, unlock my fucking chakras or something like that, try to get some energy flowing. And then I just hear, "Hello?" And it's Tony Robbins. And I like rushed back to my desk. [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:32 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 30:32 I'm like, "Oh, hey. Um [laughs] ..."

Sam Parr 30:34 Hey, man.

Shaan Puri 30:34 [laughs] Yeah, sorry. You were just staring at my chair there as I was doing, like, you know, Tony Robbins stretches in the corner trying to get hyped for this. [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:42 He just hears, like, off-screen Shaan saying like, "I'm the man. Who's the man? I'm the man."

Shaan Puri 30:46 [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:47 "I'm the man." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 30:48 Even better, I'm visualizing, "Thanks, Tony. I had a good time, too."

Sam Parr 30:51 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 30:53 "Oh, you want my number? Let me get it for you." [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:54 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 30:55 I'm go- I'm working backwards from the desired end state, [laughs] just like you did to me, but he hears it off, off, off camera.

Sam Parr 31:02 And, and it went well?

Shaan Puri 31:04 It w- I, I mean, I'm not gonna give away too much, but let me just say this: tears were shed and they weren't mine.

Sam Parr 31:09 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:10 And if there's one mark of a successful Tony, like, life accomplishment, I wouldn't say he cried, wouldn't say w- but he, you know, teared up.

Sam Parr 31:17 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:17 And so, you know, I thought that that was a, you know, a, a good thing. But it's really hard to interview somebody who is a stage performer. Like Sam, you must feel like this sometimes when I'm just monologuing, monologuing, monologuing, like-

Sam Parr 31:27 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:28 ... right now. He's on, he's like a next level at that, and it's all good stuff, but it's like, you know, it's like you poke the thing and an avalanche comes out.

Sam Parr 31:36 Were you ever like, "Uh, all right, Tony, shut the fuck up. Let me ask my next question." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:40 [laughs]

Sam Parr 31:40 So, uh... [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:45 [laughs]

Sam Parr 31:47 You're just kinda like alpha a little bit.

Shaan Puri 31:48 And we only had 45 minutes. They were like, um, "Look, you got 45 minutes with Tony." And I was like, "45 minutes? Geez, this guy does nine hour a day seminars for four days straight. Like, what am I gonna do in 45 minutes?" And then, [laughs] and then I'm like, "Hey, uh, you know, actually, it might be better if we do this in person. I'm, I will fly to you tomorrow and I'll be there." And his team was like, um, "No, thanks. Uh, we'll do... [laughs] We'll... You stay over there. We'll, we'll do it this way instead." [laughs]

Sam Parr 32:14 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 32:15 But it was, it was good. I enjoyed it. Uh, I do think... I'm gonna just make a prediction. Austin, sorry to, to big dog you with the Tony Robbins thing, but I'll give you this compliment. I think people are gonna like this episode more because the rapport and also just, like, the style of stuff we talk about

Shaan Puri 32:30 is so, like, you know, on point for, for what this podcast is. Can I ask you a different story, though, about a big name?

Sam Parr 32:36 Yeah, go ahead.

Shaan Puri 32:37 A couple years ago, you texted us that you were going to dinner with SBF. And at the time, SBF was the next Mark Zuckerberg. SBF was multibillionaire of the fastest growing private startup, um, boy genius from MIT who wore, like, cargo jorts, and, uh, we were like, "Dude, tell us more." And you were like, "G- I can't. Gotta put away my phone right now. Like, you know, you know, see you later, suckers. I'm gonna go have dinner with SBF." Can you now, two years later, can you tell us the story? What was it like going to dinner with SBF?

Sam Parr 33:07 Yeah, he's not gonna do anything now, right? [laughs]

Austin Rief 33:09 Uh, he's in jail for a long time, I think. So m- maybe one day he'll get out and he'll listen to this episode. I, I don't think I've told this story publicly. Uh, so I'll, I'll tell it. Um, but I have a friend, investor at a big VC, invested in FTX. And, you know, this is probably, I don't know, 2021, so S- SBF was SBF, right? This is pre him obviously getting caught as being a fraud. But he's at the height of his power. He was, whatever the stat was, the top richest per- you know, the richest person under 35 in the world.

Sam Parr 33:39 Oh, the one-liner for anyone who doesn't know who SBF is, Sam Bankman-Fried, he was like the Bernie Madoff of crypto, 31-year-old worth $20 billion, and it all came crashing down. Now he's in prison for fraud. Okay, go ahead.

Austin Rief 33:50 Great. Thanks for the background. Um, it's gonna make me look really good. [laughs] Um, so I, uh, didn't know that much about him, though. Like, I didn't do any research. Uh, I'd heard him talk a couple times, but I didn't know any of the stories. And so my friend's like, "Free trip to Bahamas." I'm like, "I'm in." It's for his birthday. So we show up, and I've been to nice places, right? I've stayed at the Ritz Carlton, I've stayed all these nice places, and so I thought I knew where the rich and famous live. I was wrong. This place, it's called The Albany in The Bahamas, this is where the rich and famous live. Like, this place was n- there were 250-foot yachts everywhere. I mean, this is... I, I think Tiger Woods owns it. Uh, Justin Bieber, who I actually met the next day, lives there. Will Smith lives there. Like, this is where the rich and famous live. It was nuts. And so I get there, I'm like, "Oh, shit." Like, "Yeah, we're in for it." So we show up. We actually stayed at someone else, uh, at FTX's house.

Shaan Puri 34:49 They put you in the guest boat? [laughs]

Austin Rief 34:51 Yeah. Which, which was a pretty, [laughs] pretty nice guest house, though. No, it was not a boat, but it was a house. And so we show up and we get there. Here's the first thing I observe, right? It's like the penthouse corner, $25 million apartment. I had no idea what I was walking into. I walk in and there are 50 pairs of shoes lying everywhere, like crappy Nikes. I'm like, "This dude's worth 30 billion and there are all these weird Nikes laying around." And my friend's like, "Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you. Like, the entire exec team lives together in this one apartment."

Shaan Puri 35:19 [laughs]

Austin Rief 35:21 And I'm like, "Oh, boy. What are... Yeah, what is going on?" And so obviously now we know in hindsight, like, you know, there are articles, who knows if it's true, they were having orgies and all, all type of, of weird shit. So we... I knew all this. Like, I knew some weird stuff was going on because 50 people-

Sam Parr 35:36 Did you get the orgy vibe? Did you get... Like, did, could you smell it?

Austin Rief 35:38 The smell? [laughs]

Sam Parr 35:39 Yeah. [laughs]

Austin Rief 35:41 No smell, but there was a weird alpha attitude that people had towards Sam. Like, he was clearly the alpha in the room, even though he's super nerdy, super techy. But he just had this weird thing where people, anyone who said anything looked to Sam to make sure they approved. Like, it was clear he was in charge, he was the man. And so again, first thing, shoes. Second thing, you look to the left and Sam is in the kitchen cooking food, which I was like, "Oh, well, probably the chef cook us dinner." No. Sam is there cooking us food. He does not turn his back, uh, his, his face to us. So his, his back is to us, and he starts having a full conversation with us without ever making eye contact.

Shaan Puri 36:19 [laughs]

Austin Rief 36:20 Like, zero eye contact. He goes, the first thing he ever says to me and my friend is, "So what do you think about Indian crypto exchanges?"

Sam Parr 36:27 What?

Austin Rief 36:28 And I'm like, "What is going on?"

Shaan Puri 36:31 He thinks you're Indian 'cause he hasn't turned around yet. [laughs] He doesn't realize you're a white guy. [laughs]

Austin Rief 36:36 I, I don't, I, I don't know. So, so when my friend who knows-

Sam Parr 36:38 Did, did you, did you have an answer to that?

Austin Rief 36:39 I probably said four words the entire dinner. They, they, they were speaking a different, a different language. You know, all, all, all crypto stuff. Um, so I show up in the kitchen, and Sam's cooking us dinner. I put dinner in quotes. Everyone got one Beyond Sausage and two Brussels sprouts. That was the meal for everyone.

Shaan Puri 36:57 [laughs]

Austin Rief 36:58 So I think the vegan stuff's true, 'cause he cooked us all Beyond Sausage, right? So that was pretty weird. We sit down. So again, $20 million apartment, but there's hardware everywhere, cables everywhere. It was like post-apocalyptic, right? It was super, super weird being in this $20 million apartment, but there's like PS3s and Xboxes like everywhere.

Shaan Puri 37:18 [laughs]

Austin Rief 37:18 A complete mess of an apartment. And so we sit down, and I think the craziest thing about the dinner was Sam was a genius when it came to the things he had to know for FTX and crypto. So for example, Tom Brady was a, like, sponsored by FTX, right? Sam could've told you every single thing about Tom Brady. Could've told you his stat line, everything about him. But I don't think Sam knew what a first down was. I don't think he knew-

Shaan Puri 37:46 [laughs]

Austin Rief 37:46 ... a single thing about football, but if it benefited crypto, he was the smartest person on the planet. Same thing with politicians. He could go, every single senator, every Supreme Court justice, he could tell you their exact stance on crypto. I don't think he could tell you a single other thing about them. It was incredible.

Sam Parr 38:05 Dude, Shaan, you and I, I don't wanna, I don't wanna say their name, 'cause I don't want this to be an insult, but you and I hung out with someone who was the best in the whole world at what they do. And, oh, fuck it, I'll say it. It was MrBeast. Y- he was the best at, at-

Shaan Puri 38:18 [laughs]

Sam Parr 38:18 ... [laughs] at, whatever, this is not an insult, I guess. [laughs] It was MrBeast, you know, he's the best in the world, and I remember, I think it was either you or me, or me and someone else, and I, we were just shooting the shit about, like, a TV show that I, I thought everyone knew about, and he had, he, he had no idea, and I was like, I was just like curious about this, so I asked some more pop culture stuff. Didn't know anything about, like, just normal stuff. He's like, "Sorry, I just pay attention to YouTube. Like, I, that's all I do." He had the exact same thing, where he didn't know anything about anything outside of his expertise.

Shaan Puri 38:49 There's a funny, uh, interview with Conor McGregor on BBC. It's like, uh, you know, usually UFC gets covered by these small niche outlets, but one time, like, he got on the main BBC, they were like... They were shooting the shit before the interview. They were like, "Oh, how about the game?" You know, uh, whoever. Like, some soccer game.

Sam Parr 39:04 [laughs] Yeah.

Shaan Puri 39:05 Like, some famous soccer game. And he's like, he just laughs and he's like, he's like, "Ha ha, yeah."

Sam Parr 39:10 It was great.

Shaan Puri 39:10 And he goes-

Austin Rief 39:10 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 39:11 Yeah, he goes, "Yeah, it was great." And they go, "You don't watch soccer, do you?" He goes, "No, I have no idea what you're talking about." [laughs]

Sam Parr 39:16 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 39:17 And he goes, he goes, "D- " He goes, um, "I don't know what's happening in the news. I don't know what's happening in the world." Uh, he goes, "I have lost my mind to the game, and I only know about my shit. I don't give a damn about anything else." And I think that's, like, actually kinda common for people who get, like, top .0111% of, like, what they're trying to, trying to become.

Sam Parr 39:35 It's like when they asked Trump what his favorite, like, verse in the Bible was, and he goes, "You know what? I love all of them."

Shaan Puri 39:40 [laughs]

Sam Parr 39:40 "I, I, I love all of them."

Shaan Puri 39:41 It's hard to pick. [laughs]

Sam Parr 39:42 Yeah. Too hard to pick, I love them all. [laughs] That's what Conor McGregor was like. "I love all the sports." [laughs]

Austin Rief 39:50 Well, have you seen the, the video of, of LeBron? He's on Instagram Live, and people are like, "Oh, who are your favorite soccer players?" And LeBron's like... 'Cause he's like, "I love soccer."

Shaan Puri 40:00 No, no, they asked him about the team he owns. They were like, "Who are your favorite-"

Sam Parr 40:03 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 40:04 "... PSG players?" Or whatever. [laughs] And he's like-

Sam Parr 40:06 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 40:06 ... he owns the team, and he's like, [laughs] he names one, and he's like, "You know, such as, such as, I mean, you know, so and so forth. There are so many." It's like, [laughs] what?

Sam Parr 40:17 Et cetera, et cetera, such as. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 40:20 Yeah, you're, you only used the, the, the middle words of a sentence. You didn't say the subject. [laughs]

Sam Parr 40:26 Did you get fraud vibes when you were there? Or were you also tricked?

Austin Rief 40:31 I mean, I was totally enamored. I, I, uh... 'Cause the perception at the Albany, like, there was a buzz. We took a cab to the Albany, and the guy's like, "Oh, you're going to, uh, you know," Like, "The Albany, that's where they, that's where FTX is headquartered." We're like, "Oh, yeah." We're like, "We're going to see Sam." And everyone's like, "Oh my God." Everyone's like... You know, one of the security guards said, "You know, here, you know, you think the celebrities are famous? The famous people? They wanna meet Sam. Sam doesn't wanna meet the people, they wanna go meet Sam." Like, this guy, he just had this aura around him. Everyone wanted to meet him. Now, in hindsight, I feel like a complete moron, because there were so many red flags. Every... Y- you know the, the whole effective altruism thing he, he parroted? You guys know about that?

Shaan Puri 41:16 Yeah. Make as much money as you can to give it away.

Austin Rief 41:18 Yeah, so I, I heard about this, and everyone's like, "Yeah, you know, Sam lives a really low-key lifestyle." I'm like, "Guys, he lives in a 25 or $20 million apartment. It's the nicest apartment I've ever been in." And they're all like, "No, the, he only lives there because it's the most convenient to the FTX office."

Sam Parr 41:33 Yeah. Yeah, yeah. [laughs] He lives in an orgy compound and he's, and he lives a low-key life. [laughs]

Austin Rief 41:38 I know. [laughs] We, we just drove by the FTX office. There were 75, you know, neighborhoods in between here and the office.

Sam Parr 41:46 [laughs]

Austin Rief 41:46 Like, that doesn't add up. What is going on?

Shaan Puri 41:48 Yeah, 'cause these videos came out that was like, "Sam still drives his '93 Corolla." And he just, like, shrugs, like, "Why do I need to get a better car?"

Austin Rief 41:56 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 41:57 And it's like, oh, damn, this guy is full of shit. You know? Like, [laughs] wow.

Austin Rief 42:01 He's got, like, a full Olympic-sized swimming pool on his, on his balcony, but he, he's an EA. He's not spending his money. [laughs]

Sam Parr 42:07 There was a, there was a rumor that he was, uh, that they were high on some type of, like, uh, you know, Adderall type of medicine that was like a patch. Did you see any of that shit laying around?

Austin Rief 42:17 No. I wish... Again, like, hindsight's 20/20. I wish I was looking for this stuff, 'cause I was just so enamored by this guy and how well he knew crypto, but I just wish I started, like, digging and looking through more stuff. I'm sure there was crazy

Austin Rief 42:30 shit everywhere.

Sam Parr 42:31 Dude, you also, I don't know if... You probably can't say this, but you went and hung out with Kid Rock as well, uh, which is, like, a crazy story. You've hung out with some cool people. You've had some diverse experiences.

Austin Rief 42:42 Yeah, the Kid Rock thing. I think I, I might've spoke about that last time. The Kid Rock thing was awesome. He is, he's obviously super interesting. I- he told us he's the only person to play at both President Obama and President Trump's inaugurations.

Sam Parr 42:54 [laughs]

Austin Rief 42:55 And he knows both of them. Uh, he just bought a $50 million-

Shaan Puri 42:57 He's the only one that can heal this country. He's the only one that could bring us together. [laughs]

Austin Rief 43:02 [laughs] So he, he lives on this, this com- He actually, on his compound, which it is a compound, he has, like, a full bar. Uh, and I don't mean, like, the, the physical bar. I mean, like, a whole, uh, pub at, on his compound. He also lives, and I... It was being constructed, but he lives in a house that is a replica of the White House. I'll show you guys pictures. It li- He modeled it after the White House. So you walk up, you're like, "Oh my God." Like, it actually looks exactly like the White House looked like. It's nuts.

Sam Parr 43:31 All right, everyone. Really quick. This is Sam. I'm gonna do a Thrill of the Shill. So basically, I've got an ask for everyone out there. I just launched this new podcast. It's called Money Wise. It's a personal finance podcast for high net worth people. You can find it by looking up Money Wise on Spotify and, uh, iTunes or wherever else you get your podcasts. But here's the deal: this podcast is a ton of work, and I'm only hosting the first handful of ep- episodes. I need someone to be the host of this podcast. I have a feeling it's gonna be pretty big, and it's gonna be great for whoever hosts it, but I need help hosting it. I don't wanna do all the work. Our first episode, you can find it on whatever, all those platforms. It's pretty great, I think. It's with the guy who sold his company for $200 million, and we get to hear, like, how he breaks down his net worth, how much he spends each month, all this transparent money stuff that's pretty interesting. And so if you wanna host it, I'm actually not gonna give out my contact information. You've gotta figure out how to contact me, because that's what you're gonna have to do. You're gonna have to find guests. So contact me and let me know if you wanna be the host of this, and send me something that is impressive that shows that you have what it takes. All right, back to the show.

Shaan Puri 44:29 Austin, did you ever hear the story Cody Ko told on our pod about when he went to Elon Musk's house for a party?

Austin Rief 44:35 No.

Shaan Puri 44:35 [laughs] It's so funny. Yeah, it's a very short story, but I find it hilarious even though it's not meant to be a funny story. He's just telling what happened. But the, the whole idea is so funny to me. So he goes... He's like, "Yeah, I was hanging out with, uh..." So Cody's like, you know, LA YouTuber cool guy, also makes some music. So I think they were hanging out with, um, Post Malone. So he's at, he's at a thing with Post Malone. He's like, "Oh, Elon asked us to, you know, come over for a party." He shows him his phone. He's like, "You wanna go?" And he's like, "Uh, of course. Okay, let's go." So they go to Elon Musk's house. [laughs] And I was like, "What's it like?" He's like, "First thing, no furniture in the entire place." [laughs]

Austin Rief 45:12 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 45:12 Literally an empty house. And he was like, "Uh, does anybody live here? Like, what is this?" And he's like, "No, Elon's house is across the street. This is, like, his party... He hosts people here. He lives over there." I was like, "Oh, naturally. Okay." Stupid question by me. Dumb. "All right, I, I won't ask any questions." He's like, "So we're just sitting there," and he's like, uh, there's like a fire, and they're just kind of, like, eating. You know, like, uh, eating marshmallows or whatever the fuck. And he's like, he's like, "You know, it got kinda late. People are doing their own thing." And he's like, "You know, all right, I'm just gonna go. I'm just gonna kinda dip out of here. This is, like, you know, it's, it's late. This was weird." And he's like, so he, he's trying to leave. He doesn't know his way out of the house, so he's, like, trying to get out. He turns the corner, and it's just Elon making out with Grimes. [laughs]

Austin Rief 45:52 What?

Sam Parr 45:52 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 45:53 And so he just turns, and he opens this door, and he's like, he's like, he's like, "Dude, I thought I was just gonna open this door, and there's just a rocket." And they're like, "Get in. There's no time."

Sam Parr 46:01 [laughs]

Austin Rief 46:01 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 46:02 He's like, he's like, "I just wanted to leave so bad." [laughs]

Austin Rief 46:06 You guys read the, the Elon book?

Shaan Puri 46:09 I didn't read it. I, I'm kinda over Elon.

Sam Parr 46:11 Shaan and I are both over him hardcore, but I don't wanna read that book because it sounds so stressful.

Austin Rief 46:17 Yeah, I, I just finished it. I read it, uh, over the holidays, and it definitely gives you a different lens into Elon Musk. You really see the full spectrum of, of who he is as a person, and I think people try to draw inspiration from Elon, and I think you can in little bits and pieces. But to me, my big takeaway from the whole book was, like, Elon is hardcore. Like, that is the one word he uses, and, like, that is who he is. He's hardcore. He's extreme. I don't think you can be, like, 70% Elon and be successful. Like, he just has no regard for any person he works with. He's basically fired everyone he works with, right? He, he, you know, he treats his family like shit. He's scarred from issues with his dad. And my big takeaway was like, Elon's this unique one, you know, one in a billion, one in 10 billion people. And all these people who are inspired, that's great, but don't try to copy him because this guy is, is to the extreme. And I, I don't think almost anyone can, can be as extreme in every facet of life. He doesn't sleep. He doesn't vacation. He has crazy relationships. I mean, obviously that's all public with, with all, uh, you know, he has so many kids, but it's all, everything's extreme. Every single thing he does is to the as extreme as you can possibly do it. It's, it's incredible. You, you should read the book.

Sam Parr 47:36 Dude, I just don't want my blood pressure to rise reading that.

Shaan Puri 47:38 [laughs]

Sam Parr 47:38 Like, just hearing you talk about this. Because on one hand I'm like, when I hear about him I'm like, "Oh, I'm soft. I should step it up." And then on the other hand I'm like, "His life sucks. I do not want that." And so there is that whole, you can't be, you can't be like him and be sev- uh, and be 70%.

Shaan Puri 47:54 Have I told you my David Goggins point? I think that's what applies here.

Sam Parr 47:57 Which is what?

Shaan Puri 47:58 You only wanna be David Goggins for one hour a day.

Sam Parr 48:00 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 48:02 And that's, that's, that's the whole trick with David Goggins. You, you, you can't be... You don't wanna be out on all of David Goggins 'cause he's inspiring, and he's so tough, and he's so, like, mentally strong that there's something to learn there. You also don't wanna subscribe to the David Goggins lifestyle or even, like, try to emulate, you know, half of what he's doing. Uh, uh, you just want for one hour a day when you're working out to just shift into David Goggins gear for that one hour, and then never, never touch it again. Like, I don't know if you saw this post that was, uh... So David Goggins is engaged, and his-

Austin Rief 48:33 Yes

Shaan Puri 48:34 ... fiance-

Sam Parr 48:35 Fucking insane. It sounds like an Onion article.

Shaan Puri 48:38 I was just gonna say, there's this video of- Her fa- I didn't even know he was engaged. I, I don't know how he's in, in a relationship, first of all. But I, here's the, here's what I actually saw. We're gonna put this onto YouTube, but just like get s- YouTube may delete our account.

Austin Rief 48:50 Like-

Shaan Puri 48:50 There's a picture of his toes

Austin Rief 48:50 ... are they like, we just got home from dinner or something?

Shaan Puri 48:52 First is there's a picture of his toes, which is just like, I don't know if you've ever seen an ex-athlete's toes, but they're like all nasty as hell. This guy, I don't even know what's going on. And he's literally just ripping off his big toenail 'cause he's like, "Ah, don't need this shit anymore." [laughs] Like-

Austin Rief 49:05 Oh, no

Shaan Puri 49:05 ... and then his fiance's like, "No, David, please don't." And like, whatever. And he's like, "Why are his feet so jacked up?" 'Cause he's running 100 miles at a time. And so she posts this thing. She's like, "Yeah, a lot of people think that David only turns it on for the camera. I just wanna show you this." He ju- he's two we- two months out of s- uh, you know, no, two weeks off of surgery for his leg where they like broke his leg and fixed it for whatever reason. And, um, he just came home and was like, "I wanna run 100 miles tonight." And so she's following him in the car. She's been with him in the car for like eight hours. She's following behind at like five miles an hour or whatever, and he's just running. He's, he's on, you know-

Austin Rief 49:38 Like 3:00 AM

Shaan Puri 49:39 ... hour seven. Yeah, hour seven, it's like, you know, 3:00 AM and he's almost done with 100 miles.

Austin Rief 49:44 I think it said like, I think it said like, "Should we g- got home from dinner," and David just looks at me and goes, "I've gotta go run 100 miles now."

Shaan Puri 49:50 Uh, or, or like, "I gotta run a tr-" What's it, what are they called? Trucks or something like that. "I gotta go, go do a truck tonight." Uh, I forgot what they're called. But like, a ruck. He said, "I'm going for a ruck tonight." And I, I don't... I'm at this out of shape, I don't even know what a ruck is, let alone have run a ruck.

Austin Rief 50:02 It's just like running with a... It's running or walking with a backpack on that has weight in it.

Shaan Puri 50:06 Okay. So he's doing 100 mile weighted run. And, uh, you know, then you see that and you're like, "Well, this is fucking stupid. This is not the way to live."

Austin Rief 50:13 [laughs] Yeah, right.

Shaan Puri 50:14 Um, that's like the only, the only intelligent [laughs] response to that is that. And so the trick with David Goggins, you wanna be David Goggins for one hour a day. The trick with Elon Musk is you only wanna be Elon Musk like 15% of the time in your company, right? When you're establishing the vision of like thinking big about what you're doing. He's amazing. You wanna channel your inner Elon. When you are, um, you know, telling a story about your product, the way he demos, you know, Tesla every time and sells hundreds of thousands of cars before they're even ready. People pay money just to b- pre- to wait for the car, right? That's when you wanna, you wanna reserve your thing. Or like when he came into Twitter was like, "I'm gonna do this really hard thing, hardcore. I'm gonna do a sprint. I'm gonna sleep in the office." And like, I'm gonna make sure everybody knows if you're in this, you're in this in a hardcore way versus like, Dude, Austin, I don't know how you run your company, but I was always on eggshells with my employees. Like, like, "Hey, we got, uh, you know, we gotta do this tomorrow. But if that's too much, Tuesday's okay, right?" Like-

Austin Rief 51:06 Yeah. [laughs] Is that okay with you? [laughs]

Shaan Puri 51:08 I don't, I just don't know what the boundaries are versus like MrBeast or, or David Goggins or Elon. These guys have like kinda no sense of boundaries. They just, they're on their mission, and you're either all in or you're out. And, uh, I think that's pretty cool, and that's the part to steal.

Austin Rief 51:23 Yeah, I think so. I, I think the, the thing to steal i- in particular is that vision, right? Elon starts with the vision and then builds the business, builds the business model. That's really impressive. I think the way he treats people, the way he, you know, some of the things he says, that could, that could be in the 85% of stuff you leave out.

Shaan Puri 51:40 Right. Right. And actually, SBF is kinda the same way. The, the SBF book kinda highlighted a bunch of things, uh, that happened. My friend read the SBF book, and he was like, "I think I'm supposed to hate SBF, uh, you know, 'cause of everything that happened. But reading this book made me like him more." And it wasn't because of the spin. He's like, "Actually, I found a few things I really respect about what he did." He's like, "Let's take away the fact that he was taking c- customer funds to do these things. But like, let's just say he was using the company's money or his own money or whatever," right? Which he was also doing. He just overextended and used company, uh, the customer funds too. But they were like, the fact that he was like, "Okay, if I have $100 million," he didn't like feel any fear towards losing it, nor did he feel any attachment to it. He's like, "Great, let's use the 100 million to pay off Steph Curry, you know, uh, Tom Brady, and whoever 'cause we're gonna build the brand that way." And like go, go and cut absurd deals in order to pull these things off. Or like there's that email that leaked of him and the guy in LA where the guy, he's like, "I went to this dinner with this guy in LA. He's the most connected person I've ever seen. At this dinner was whoever." Like, you know, uh, Nancy Pelosi, Leonardo DiCaprio, and like whatever, 12 other people. He's like, "We need to give this guy $200 million to invest in his fund, and I think he'll open all the doors for us after that. Wire him the money now, please." And like just the ability to throw your weight around is actually pretty badass. And if you take away the fraud stuff, I, I know other successful people in our life that do this. Andrew Wilkinson does this. He throws his weight around. When he wants something or he like sets his target on someone, a relationship, or a, a business he wants to buy or whatever, he really throws his weight around in a way that I definitely don't. Uh, right? Like Sam, when he wanted to buy The Hustle, he's like-

Austin Rief 53:21 Dude, he flew me private up to his house

Shaan Puri 53:23 ... yeah, he's like, "Oh, you..." He's like, "I wanna buy this company. Let's talk." And you're like, "Cool, we can talk on the phone." He's like, "No, let's meet in person." You're like, "Ah, I don't like to fly, and Canada's far away." He's like, "My jet will be there tomorrow. Let's go." And, uh, you know, he throws his weight around in a way that I think I am like often either too cheap or too afraid or, or just don't even think about those options. Um, and I'm learning to steal that part of my, my game. Have you guys thought about that? Or do, do you guys think-

Austin Rief 53:46 Yes

Shaan Puri 53:46 ... about how you're gonna use that?

Austin Rief 53:48 I, I'm the same way as you. I appreciate it and I'm fearful of it. It's, it's a very scary thing and, but I, when I see it, I get inspired.

53:56 Yeah, I think it's a... For me, it's a, it's a conviction play, right? I, I'm more inspired by, uh, like I read the, the Warren Buffett book, for example, right? And he's more cerebral in the way he does it, but it's the same thing. It's like he sees an opportunity and he's not dipping his toe in the water. He's not a, a diversification guy. He's like, "Oh, Bank of America's going under. I'm gonna buy a ton of preferred debt. This is a can't lose bet. And by the way, I'm sitting on however many billions of dollars on my balance sheet, so I'm gonna own, whatever, 10% of Bank of America." And so I love when people have conviction and they just say, "You know what? This is it. I'm taking all the chips, all the social capital, everything I've made, and I'm doubling down on this."

54:35 Dude, your chips on the table moment right now is just praying Bill Ackman doesn't crush your company

Shaan Puri 54:40 [laughs]

Sam Parr 54:40 Because [laughs] Morning Brew is owned by-

Shaan Puri 54:42 Just taking your chips and running away, hiding under-

Sam Parr 54:44 Yeah

Shaan Puri 54:44 ... the table actually. [laughs]

Sam Parr 54:45 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 54:46 Speaking of throwing your weight around, right? That's what he's doing right now. He's trying to throw his weight around in a way. I think, I actually don't think it's about-

Sam Parr 54:51 Well, Morning Brew is owned by Business Insider, which is owned by Axel Springer, and Bill Ackman is at war with BI and Axel Springer.

Shaan Puri 54:57 Austin, I'd like to hear your response to this. [laughs]

Sam Parr 54:59 [laughs] Yeah, what's-

Shaan Puri 55:01 Your-

Sam Parr 55:01 ... your official response? [laughs] You-

Shaan Puri 55:03 I'm like-

Sam Parr 55:03 You just gotta message Bill Ackman and be like, "Bill, same team, same team." Like, [laughs]

Shaan Puri 55:06 [laughs]

Sam Parr 55:07 "I'm all right."

Austin Rief 55:08 Yeah. I'll save my response for the private group chat.

Shaan Puri 55:11 [laughs] I think that, uh, the i- I, I think you don't wanna be excited to, to just, like, plow chips into something 'cause you're, you're, you're naturally gonna just kind of make the, make an impulsive wrong decision. But I do think there's a good question, which is, am I throwing my weight around, right? Like, am I, um... You know, how har- how, how much gas versus how much brakes am I applying to the things that I want in my life? That's one of my themes, I think, for this year that I'm gonna, I'm gonna focus on.

Sam Parr 55:39 Ramit Sethi has this good thing where he talks about spending and he was like, and he'll message me privately. He's like, "What interests you?" And I'm like, "Well, I've got this cleaning lady that comes every two weeks. I w- I wish they would come every day almost." And he's like, "I'm gonna challenge you to figure out what makes you happy, and I want you to spend 10 times the amount that you're spending now." Um, and so, like, for him, it's, like, travel. And he goes, "When I travel, I will spend $50,000 on a trip, and that's a ton of money, but that, I know that's what makes me happy and I'm gonna 10 times spend what I used to spend because that's what I love." And that's what he was saying to me about, um, services, like cleaning ladies, things like that. He goes, "I challenge you to spend 10 times more." And that's like a miniature version of what you're talking about.

Shaan Puri 56:17 Austin, what about you? You made a bunch of money selling Morning Brew. Do you use it in any way that was interesting or, like, improved the quality of your life meaningfully?

Austin Rief 56:24 Yeah. The big thing for me is I love traveling. I love staying at nice hotels on vacation. And so I, when I, when I travel, that, that is my money dial, is travel. I think Ramit's in, is too, actually.

Shaan Puri 56:34 You were-

Sam Parr 56:34 Yeah

Shaan Puri 56:34 ... texting us about this Aman Hotel. What, what's the deal? Do I need to know about this? What, what is it?

Sam Parr 56:38 Have you heard of it? It's this, like, supposed to be the fanciest hotel ever.

Shaan Puri 56:42 I've heard about it, like, two times this year, and I don't know if I just started hanging out with different people or it's new. Is this... [laughs] I'm guessing this has been around for, like, for, like, a while. [laughs]

Austin Rief 56:49 We're growing a lot, but essentially Aman, I, I think, is the standard for customer service, uh, for any business, right? You know, we're talking about the, the Milk Road for X. I think the... a good way to think about a business is what's the Aman for X? So Aman is just the absolute top customer service. I mean, I think the cheapest Aman, there's maybe 60 or 70 of them, the cheapest one is maybe 1,500 bucks a night. I think they're regularly 2,500. There's one out west somewhere. I think it's Aman Giri.

Sam Parr 57:17 In Arizona. Yeah.

Austin Rief 57:18 Yeah.

Sam Parr 57:18 That's what people love.

Austin Rief 57:20 It's like six grand a night, and people go there, and they're like, "It was worth it."

Shaan Puri 57:24 What do they do? Why is it, how would that be worth it?

Sam Parr 57:26 Well, it's beautiful, for one. But it's sorta like, remember, Shaan, The Bear, that episode? Like, it's like season two-

Shaan Puri 57:31 Someone better be touching my body for six grand a night. [laughs]

Sam Parr 57:34 But yeah. [laughs] But you remember, like-

Shaan Puri 57:36 That's all I want

Sam Parr 57:36 ... you, I, like, I remember the e- there's, like, season two, episode six or something. It's where the guy goes and learns how to, like, wash the silverware perfectly.

Shaan Puri 57:43 Yeah.

Sam Parr 57:43 It's like that.

Shaan Puri 57:43 Seven, yeah.

Sam Parr 57:43 And I think that, that, that type of excellence helped make it popular, where people are like, "Oh, I respect this craftsmanship." But have you been, Austin? I've never been.

Austin Rief 57:51 So I've never stayed at one. I'm, that's, I'm planning my honeymoon now, and that's, that's our goal is to stay at a bunch of, uh, Amans. But I've been to a bunch when I travel. So when I travel, I always try to get, like, a drink or go to them. They're also interesting 'cause they're typically not in the heart of a city. They typically are on the outskirts a little bit. They actually, and I think this is really cool, I think they do this intentionally. They make you travel there a little bit, right? It's not accessible, and that's part of the allure is it's like a destination. You have to really wanna go to Am- an Aman to be at the Aman. Now they've grown and they have one in New York City, so maybe that's not quite as true. But they really want you to, to, like, be in the Aman essence when they're there. And it's just, again, it's, it's the pinnacle of customer service.

Shaan Puri 58:34 Well, give me an example. What, what are they doing that's such good customer service?

Sam Parr 58:37 Yeah. Like, I went to a Motel 8 with a Slip 'N Slide. Do they have that?

Austin Rief 58:41 I mean, it's the, the highest quality food, the best quality bed, bedding, the mattress, every little thing, right? When, you know, the toilet paper is folded the right direction. Every detail is perfect. And if, if, if nice hotels is not your money dial, you're gonna be like, "I just wasted five grand a night." But if, if luxury and having everything you need catered towards, if that's something that you get joy out of, you're gonna go and you're gonna love it.

Sam Parr 59:09 Eh, I get why you like it. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 59:11 So no Slip 'N Slide. [laughs]

Sam Parr 59:12 Yeah. Is there a mini fridge though or not? [laughs]

Shaan Puri 59:16 [laughs]

Sam Parr 59:17 I just need, like, Kit Kat and animal crackers at midnight and I'm gravy. Like, life's cream cheese.

Shaan Puri 59:21 Right.

Sam Parr 59:21 Just give me that and w- and we good. Uh, and a little Keurig machine. Um, Austin, thanks for coming on, man. This is good.

Austin Rief 59:29 Yeah, this was fun.

Shaan Puri 59:30 All right. That's the pod. [upbeat music]