This Guy Is Making $100M/Year Selling Quilts To Your Grandma (#354)

Sam Parr 0:00 You're so bad at telling your own story.

Al Doan 0:01 All right. W- well, you just said the intro.

Sam Parr 0:03 [laughs]

Al Doan 0:03 This isn't my story. You want me to tell-

Sam Parr 0:05 Well-

Al Doan 0:06 Well-

Sam Parr 0:06 I would say-

Al Doan 0:07 The hook

Sam Parr 0:07 ... yeah, I would say I started-

Al Doan 0:08 All right

Sam Parr 0:08 ... a quilting company called Missouri Quilting.

Al Doan 0:11 Missouri Star Quilt Company.

Sam Parr 0:12 Miz- Missouri Star Quilt Company.

Al Doan 0:14 Yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 0:14 That, that-

Al Doan 0:15 It, it's a behemoth of a quilting company. It is-

Sam Parr 0:17 Can you, can you say what the revenues are?

Al Doan 0:18 Uh, yes.

Sam Parr 0:18 Well, it's the biggest. Let's f- first start with that. It is the biggest.

Al Doan 0:21 It's the biggest. It's the biggest. It's, uh, let's see, we're, we're 400 some employees, over 100 million in revenue. Like, it's a, it's a bigable, it's a bigable. [upbeat music]

Sam Parr 0:36 We're live, by the way. Uh, this is it. This is the pod.

Al Doan 0:39 Okay. Okay. The-

Sam Parr 0:40 How... Wait, how did you meet him?

Shaan Puri 0:41 Well, you gotta keep the Hoobastank story in.

Sam Parr 0:42 [laughs]

Al Doan 0:42 That needs to be, like, one of our... Could you just-

Sam Parr 0:45 So-

Al Doan 0:45 Did we get it?

Sam Parr 0:45 So, like-

Shaan Puri 0:45 Or should we say it again?

Sam Parr 0:46 Yeah.

Al Doan 0:47 Say it again funny.

Sam Parr 0:48 The joke-

Al Doan 0:48 It will not just-

Shaan Puri 0:49 [laughs]

Al Doan 0:49 ... exact same way.

Sam Parr 0:50 The joke, the joke was when we started The Hustle, we would... For some reason, I picked Hoobastank as the band that I liked.

Al Doan 0:56 [laughs]

Sam Parr 0:57 Like, and we would-

Shaan Puri 0:58 But you don't have to pick a band when you start a company.

Sam Parr 0:59 No, no, no. It's like, what, what-

Al Doan 1:00 Well, there's no form you gotta fill out, like, what's your band that you like? [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:03 What, what's your tree? What's the flower?

Shaan Puri 1:05 [laughs] Yeah, exactly.

Al Doan 1:05 What band are we?

Sam Parr 1:07 It was, like, our insiders joke, and we, in the email, we would be like, you know, like, "This young kid who just raised a bunch of funding, like, he's gonna be one of the greats like Elon, like, uh, Steve Jobs or, or Hoobastank."

Shaan Puri 1:18 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:18 Or, you know, like, slip it in.

Al Doan 1:20 Wait, would people notice?

Sam Parr 1:21 Yeah. [laughs]

Al Doan 1:21 Would you get replies that are like, "What the crap are you talking about?"

Sam Parr 1:23 Every once in a while. So I put it on my LinkedIn.

Shaan Puri 1:25 [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:25 I put that I'm the, the webmaster of the hoobastankfanclub.com.

Al Doan 1:30 Yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 1:30 And I, I-

Al Doan 1:30 When, when you endorse a skill, it's like, "Good at Hoobastanking."

Sam Parr 1:32 [laughs] Well, and when I wanted to, like, m- make a joke with someone, I would email them from sam@hoobastankfanclub.com.

Al Doan 1:38 You own that.

Shaan Puri 1:38 Oh, you have it.

Al Doan 1:38 Of course you own that.

Sam Parr 1:39 Yeah, yeah, I still have it.

Al Doan 1:40 Well, why not? [laughs]

Sam Parr 1:40 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 1:41 Still have, you're renewing it?

Sam Parr 1:42 Yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 1:43 Just in case.

Al Doan 1:44 That's $9 for a great joke that's still going.

Sam Parr 1:46 [laughs] Dude. Wait, so dude, you gotta give your intro. Who are you?

Al Doan 1:49 Uh-

Sam Parr 1:49 What do you, what would you say you do?

Al Doan 1:51 Oh, yeah, yeah. M- uh, I'm Al Doan. What do I do? I, uh, uh, not, not as much right now. I just shut down a, uh, a software company. I own, or I'm the own and the executive chairman of, uh, of Creativity, Inc., which is... You know, it's got a quilting company, a big quilting company, and a, a knitting company and an art company. A lot of, lot of stuff in that space.

Sam Parr 2:11 Dude, you're so bad at telling your own story.

Al Doan 2:13 All right. W- well, you just said the

Al Doan 2:15 intro.

Sam Parr 2:15 [laughs]

Al Doan 2:15 This isn't my story. You want me to tell-

Sam Parr 2:17 Well-

Al Doan 2:18 Well-

Sam Parr 2:18 I would say-

Al Doan 2:18 The hook

Sam Parr 2:18 ... yeah, I would say I started-

Al Doan 2:20 All right

Sam Parr 2:20 ... a quilting company called Missouri Quilting.

Al Doan 2:22 Missouri Star Quilt Company.

Sam Parr 2:24 Miz- Missouri Star Quilt Company.

Al Doan 2:25 Yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 2:26 That, that-

Al Doan 2:26 It, it's a behemoth of a quilting company. It is-

Sam Parr 2:28 Can you, can you say what the revenues are?

Al Doan 2:30 Uh, yes.

Sam Parr 2:30 Well, it's the biggest. Let's f- first start with that. It is the biggest.

Al Doan 2:33 It's the biggest. It's the biggest. It's, uh, let's see, we're, we're 400 some employees, over 100 million in revenue. Like, it's a, it's a bigable, it's a bigable.

Shaan Puri 2:41 You own the largest quilting company of the world. It does over $100 million in revenue, and you also have now bought two towns.

Al Doan 2:49 It was... So, so the quilting company in Hamilton, right, we, we bought the entire downtown district, so 27 buildings downtown.

Shaan Puri 2:55 Because you had to or because that's awesome?

Al Doan 2:57 No, this was the... So, like, when we started this quilt company, the, the challenge is, like, there's 3,500 quilt companies in, in America, right? Like, they're in every little city. And mo-

Sam Parr 3:06 You're saying that like we know that.

Shaan Puri 3:07 Yeah.

Al Doan 3:07 You're like, right, you know, yeah, yeah, I know.

Sam Parr 3:08 3,500. [laughs]

Al Doan 3:10 You're with me, right? 3,501 doesn't really pull the eyeballs in. And so I... Like, there's no ESPN for quilters, right? I can't just go advertise for this. And so I'm like, how are we gonna get this? And so our, uh, like, we were in this little town. We, uh, we, uh, we grew big enough online that we had to, like, like, we couldn't fit all the, the inventory in our space or in our, in our store. And because, like, we could either go open a warehouse, which would've been the normal sane thing to do, or we were like, we're like, "Man, it's awesome," 'cause when people come to our town, there's normally no customers. And so, like, the, the impression you get if you walked in there and it was just retail is like, "Nobody's here and this is really sucky." And so instead we had, like, 12 people cutting and fulfilling fabrics. So you'd walk in and there's, like, this energy, this buzz that was happening in the shop. And so we split it out and bought... or, and bought the n- the next building over and put fabric in there. And then I was like, "Man, w- who has the most quilt shops of any town in the world," right? Like, that was like, it's the biggest wooden nickel in Minnesota. This was gonna be my thing. And, uh, it was some town in Germany I think had four, and I was like, "We're gonna, we're gonna take it to the ladies."

Shaan Puri 4:14 So you wanted to create a tourist destination-

Al Doan 4:17 Yeah, you, you're-

Shaan Puri 4:17 ... for quilting enthusiasts

Al Doan 4:19 ... just, just be a novelty, right? It was just supposed to be a novelty. And so then we ended up-

Sam Parr 4:22 What's that, like Dollywood or whatever? It's like-

Al Doan 4:23 Yeah

Sam Parr 4:23 ... that sort of thing.

Al Doan 4:24 Yeah. I mean-

Sam Parr 4:24 And-

Al Doan 4:24 ... so then, like, if you're driving by on the highway, you're like, "The most? Are you kidding me? All right, let's go check it out."

Shaan Puri 4:29 I gotta see it.

Al Doan 4:30 Yeah. Yeah. And so in, in that process, dude, we got, like, uh, we... People were coming to town. We only had, like, Subway and the gas station for food. So we started restaurants and we've got a Sleep and Sew, where, like, it's a slumber party for ladies to come and they-

Shaan Puri 4:42 But so you're saying it right now-

Al Doan 4:43 ... come in

Shaan Puri 4:43 ... like it's like, you know, this is a natural thing to do, but, like, the first part of the idea, which is like, "Let's create the town with the most. Let's create a tourist destination"-

Al Doan 4:51 Yeah

Shaan Puri 4:51 ... that's not what most companies do.

Al Doan 4:53 No, yeah.

Shaan Puri 4:53 So you, you have this idea from where? And then aren't people saying, "Yo, this is crazy. We don't have to do this"-

Sam Parr 4:59 Well, and-

Shaan Puri 5:00 ... you know?

Sam Parr 5:01 Do you and your family own the whole thing?

Al Doan 5:02 Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Sam Parr 5:03 So you're able to do crazy shit like this?

Al Doan 5:04 Well, well, we're bootstrapped, but, like, dude, fabric, a fabric company is a hard thing to bootstrap because, like, like, fabric, you order your fabric six months before you get it. We're growing 200% a year. We gotta hold the fabric for nine months, recover your, your initial cost in the first 90 days, right? So that you can cover terms. And, like, it's, like, a really complicated... We're betting the farm every three months and, like, if we're wrong, we go under.

Sam Parr 5:26 So if you do 150 million in revenue, how much, uh, EBITDA can this do?

Al Doan 5:30 Uh, it's, uh, so we're, like, a normal e-commerce b- or, like, e-commerce business, so our goal is about 20%. We're not there yet, especially this year, right? But, like, we'll, like, that's where we, that's where we'll end up.

Sam Parr 5:41 But then you take the profits out and buy-

Al Doan 5:43 Yeah, I've made, like, seven nickels, uh, along the... [laughs] No, I pay myself a fine salary, but, like, but, like, all the money goes back in, right? We-

Sam Parr 5:50 Next purchase order. Next purchase order.

Al Doan 5:51 Well, because, because we're growing by significant amounts every year, and most of that gets tied up in inventory.

Sam Parr 5:56 In two years, what do you think you could sell the business for?

Al Doan 5:59 Well, our goal right now, man... Well, I, I, I think we can get 20% growth, uh, for a couple of years, right? Which w- should move our valuation to, like, a 5X revenue.

Sam Parr 6:08 So like a billion dollars?

Al Doan 6:09 Yeah, that's the, that's the idea.

Sam Parr 6:10 How many, uh, uh, is your... Like is it like your wife or your sister or your mom? Who, who all is the shareholders? So like your whole family's gonna get-

Al Doan 6:18 Yeah, so it's me and my sister, my buddy Dave are the, uh, are the, are the main ones. And then like all of our family. Th- just this year, just this year we cut in like all of our employees that have been there for any kind of time, and that was a cool feeling. But-

Shaan Puri 6:29 But, but you started it with your mom, or your mom started it and you-

Al Doan 6:32 No, me, me and my-

Shaan Puri 6:32 Tell that little bit in the story

Al Doan 6:33 ... so the idea, like me and my sister have been talking about starting a company for a while. W-

Al Doan 6:38 I was, I was like a year out of college, right? And so like I, I was, uh, I don't know, everybody's sort of an entrepreneur right out of college. That's what I'm gonna do. And, and we were sort of that same way. And my mom had taken a quilt into a, to the quilt- She's, you sew the top together and take it to a lady that's got a big $40,000 machine, and they're gonna stitch all the, the, the backing and the fluffy stuff in the middle and the top. They're gonna stitch it all together. And this lady was out a year, and she's like, "Oh, I made your sister a quilt. I took it in. I'll get it back in, uh, you know, 2008." And I'm like, "Nothing takes a year to do." Like you can build a house in less time than it takes-

Shaan Puri 7:14 Right

Al Doan 7:14 ... to get this quilt done. And so-

Shaan Puri 7:15 Like either she's terrible or there's a lot of demand

Al Doan 7:17 ... well, well-

Sam Parr 7:18 And by the way, it, it-

Al Doan 7:18 That was literally my market research. I was like, "Uh, there is gonna be a market here for this. Are there others?" She's like, "Yeah, everybody's backed up." And I was like, "Great."

Sam Parr 7:25 And when you say quilt, like literally just a blanket, right?

Al Doan 7:28 Shut up. Okay?

Sam Parr 7:28 [laughs]

Al Doan 7:29 How dare you.

Shaan Puri 7:29 Yeah.

Al Doan 7:30 It's a quilt-

Shaan Puri 7:31 The Hustle is what? Just words?

Al Doan 7:32 ... not a blanket. [laughs]

Sam Parr 7:33 But I mean like quilt, like 'cause I know some people like hang shit on their walls.

Al Doan 7:36 Y- yeah, yeah. So, so-

Sam Parr 7:37 And then some people have like a decorative quilt, and then some people, like I had a quilt like comforter.

Al Doan 7:42 Yeah, yeah. It's, it's exactly that. And like my mom's shtick, uh, is she's like, she's like the McDonald's of quilting, right? 'Cause nor- quilting, like most of these hobbies are very like s- I don't know, like very defined. You know, there's, there's a quilt police that's gonna come and get you if the, if the seams are off or whatever, right? If your points don't match. And every... I feel like getting into any hobby, there's that sentiment that you're like, "I can't go to the group yet. I'm not good enough."

Shaan Puri 8:07 Right.

Al Doan 8:08 And so, uh, Mom's like, "Ah, no, finished is better than perfect." Well, and our big innovation that we made like, uh, the, the Lego blocks of quilting, right? So it's a pack of five-inch squares and a pack of 10-inch squares, and you sew them together and cut them like this, and whack, it makes this. And so like really simple tricks and techniques. She was a costumer, uh, when we were kids.

Shaan Puri 8:25 And you, you're saying McDonald's 'cause he like kind of pr- made a process-

Al Doan 8:28 Yeah

Shaan Puri 8:28 ... out of a burger-making process-

Al Doan 8:29 Well, well, well like-

Shaan Puri 8:29 ... where it's like anybody can make this burger.

Al Doan 8:30 Well, no, I'm saying McDonald's 'cause it's like, it's like not fancy, right?

Shaan Puri 8:34 Gotcha. Okay.

Al Doan 8:34 It's not... Y- you're not spending a lot on it. It's like it's... You're trying to do it to get to the... It's serving the purpose of filling you with food.

Shaan Puri 8:41 Right.

Al Doan 8:42 I mean, I mean, it's funny 'cause like quilting, I never thought that, uh, you know, quilt... [laughs] My, my business buddies and stuff will sort of laugh at like my whiteboard that's like, "Layer cake's up 17%. Turnover's down."

Shaan Puri 8:52 [laughs]

Al Doan 8:53 You know, "Jelly roll's, we gotta get these back," you know? It's like, it's, it's all sort of, uh, you know, goofy terms for people that aren't in the space. But like, man, it's, it's a 45 to 70-year-old demographic is the majority of my customers, and there are so few people building awesome experiences for them that like I f- I f- [laughs] I feel like a, you know, a lion among sheep being in there-

Shaan Puri 9:12 [laughs]

Al Doan 9:12 ... just like we're gonna build amazing, great experiences for these people. And-

Shaan Puri 9:16 Sam's phrase for that is a, a, a dwarf amongst midgets? Is that, [laughs] is that your phrase?

Al Doan 9:20 Yeah. No, everybody normally says that, a dwarf amongst midgets.

Shaan Puri 9:23 [laughs]

Al Doan 9:24 That's very clever.

Sam Parr 9:25 It's, it's not, it's, that's, it's not allowed anymore, but, uh, well, we're both Missourians.

Al Doan 9:29 Yeah.

Sam Parr 9:29 We probably grew up in somewhat similar environments, and that was a phrase. And I, like that and like-

Al Doan 9:33 Wait, wait. [laughs]

Sam Parr 9:34 What-

Al Doan 9:34 It's the same people, right?

Sam Parr 9:35 [laughs]

Al Doan 9:36 Is, is, is, is-

Shaan Puri 9:37 These are-

Al Doan 9:37 Am I on the i-

Shaan Puri 9:37 That's why it's hilarious

Al Doan 9:38 ... am I in on the joke too?

Shaan Puri 9:39 No one understood it. He just said it.

Sam Parr 9:40 A dwarf among midgets, it's like a dwarf is like a tall midget. Look, like that's just a phrase. I didn't even realize it was like-

Shaan Puri 9:45 Don't cancel him. All right, all right. We're not gonna cancel you.

Sam Parr 9:46 I didn't, I didn't realize it was bad.

Shaan Puri 9:47 No harm, intented.

Sam Parr 9:48 Another one is, "Tough titty," said the kitty, "but the milk's still good." Have you heard of that one?

Al Doan 9:51 Yeah, yeah, sure.

Sam Parr 9:52 So anyway,

Sam Parr 9:53 w- what, what do you think it's gonna be like in two or three years if you ever sell? I mean, are you guys-

Al Doan 9:58 So-

Sam Parr 9:58 Like you're gonna be the richest per- person in like, by hundreds of miles. What are you gonna do? Just buy thousands of acres?

Al Doan 10:04 No, well... [laughs]

Sam Parr 10:06 I mean, what do you, what do you do?

Shaan Puri 10:07 Such a crazy question. [laughs]

Al Doan 10:08 This, this, this-

Sam Parr 10:08 Because everybody says things like-

Al Doan 10:09 This feels very aggressive the way-

Shaan Puri 10:11 [laughs]

Al Doan 10:11 ... that you're phrasing this. I'm just gonna say that right now.

Sam Parr 10:13 [laughs]

Al Doan 10:13 Uh, [laughs] uh, the, the, well, the idea is not to... Like I don't know if, I don't know if we'll sell it, right? But there's a big question in my head of like, of like I don't w- my, my, my mainstay is like I don't want my kid to grow up and say, "I gotta be a quilter 'cause Papa was a quilter," right? It's like, [laughs] it's a business. You gotta get in here and-

Sam Parr 10:32 The tail is, has all this time.

Shaan Puri 10:34 [laughs]

Al Doan 10:34 Tough titties with the kitty-

Sam Parr 10:36 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 10:36 [laughs]

Al Doan 10:36 ... and the milk and the goods. Uh, but, uh, but like I... So I- I'm trying to figure out how to navigate around that. Like how, like is there, uh, h- how do you maximize value and create the most opportunity and all that kind of stuff? I'm very attracted to a finish line, right? Which a, a, an IPO or a sale or something would be, but also, you know, get to the point where it's shedding off EBITDA and it's a very-

Shaan Puri 10:57 And you've been doing it-

Al Doan 10:57 ... business you want to just keep running

Shaan Puri 10:58 ... 12 years.

Al Doan 10:59 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 11:00 You didn't know... Were you even like into quilting before that?

Al Doan 11:03 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:03 Like were you an enthusiast?

Al Doan 11:04 No. No. My-

Shaan Puri 11:05 And-

Al Doan 11:05 My mom makes me... She's, uh, she made me make one quilt, 'cause she's like, "You can't run this company and not be a quilter." So I, I've made one. I'm making another right now.

Shaan Puri 11:13 [laughs]

Al Doan 11:13 A nice bear paw on point.

Sam Parr 11:14 So what did you know how to do? You didn't, you j- you worked at, you were a software guy.

Al Doan 11:18 Yeah, these are such mean questions. [laughs]

Sam Parr 11:20 [laughs]

Al Doan 11:21 No, I, uh, I- [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:23 The funny thing is at this event-

Al Doan 11:25 Why are you here?

Shaan Puri 11:25 ... Shaan's basically been having an intervention.

Al Doan 11:27 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:27 'Cause he's asking questions that he thinks are completely normal questions, and everybody here's been like-

Al Doan 11:31 Wait, and women would date you?

Shaan Puri 11:32 Yeah, but-

Al Doan 11:33 That's so weird.

Shaan Puri 11:34 Yeah, he's, and people are like, "Sam, when you ask questions, it's like a full frontal attack."

Al Doan 11:38 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:38 He's like, "What do you mean?"

Al Doan 11:39 Well-

Shaan Puri 11:40 He's like completely oblivious to the fact that these questions are outrageously aggressive.

Al Doan 11:45 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:45 So, like, his mom is, like, the face of, like, their YouTube, and he was explaining to me what she was like. And I [laughs] I s- looked up the YouTube and was like, "Oh, she looks exactly like I w- I expected."

Al Doan 11:54 Yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:54 And he was like, "What's..." He goes, "What the hell?"

Al Doan 11:56 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 11:57 I was like, "What? I expected her to be, like, a nice-"

Al Doan 11:59 He's like, "That was a compliment."

Shaan Puri 12:00 [laughs]

Al Doan 12:00 I was like, "Very rarely is, 'Oh, she looked exactly how I thought she would,' be a compliment."

Shaan Puri 12:06 Yeah.

Sam Parr 12:06 A lot of misunderstandings going on.

Al Doan 12:08 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 12:08 I was like, "I thought... She sounded like a lovely, nice woman."

Al Doan 12:11 Yeah, yeah.

Shaan Puri 12:11 And she was cool. And, and I was like, "And she looks like it."

Al Doan 12:14 Sweet Dorothy Manton.

Shaan Puri 12:15 But, uh, but-

Al Doan 12:16 She- [laughs]

Shaan Puri 12:16 Well, and [laughs] but he also said that you own 200 acres and you, like, own-

Al Doan 12:20 I d- I do own... So I, like, like, this is sort of the issue-

Shaan Puri 12:22 But what do you do in Missouri when you become that smoky?

Al Doan 12:23 I'm 100% hillbilly rich, right? Like, like, give me $100 million tomorrow, my life doesn't change at all.

Shaan Puri 12:28 Right.

Al Doan 12:28 Uh, I've got, I've got a, a, a car that I like to drive. I've got a house that I like to live in. I got three beautiful boys and a wife, and a beautiful wife also. I mean, beautiful extends to all of them.

Shaan Puri 12:40 [laughs]

Al Doan 12:40 And, uh, and, like, I'm, I'm done, right? And so it's sort of a weird spot where I don't need, I don't need the finish line. The, the only value that a finish line would offer is, like, the pass the mantle, right?

Shaan Puri 12:51 Opportunity.

Al Doan 12:51 Like, I no longer wake up and, and have to stress about, like, "What if we ruin it all tomorrow? What if the person that we hired to do this, like, screws it all up?"

Shaan Puri 12:59 What were you good at? The, uh, uh, the-

Al Doan 13:01 Oh, yeah, yeah

Shaan Puri 13:01 ... what skill, what, what, what attributes did you bring to the quilting table?

Al Doan 13:05 Mm. Great question. Great question. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 13:07 Yeah.

Al Doan 13:08 Uh, n- not a lot. Like, like, uh, I mean, I, so I came out of, I came out of college, uh, and, and my first job was with Symantec. Like, I, I was a really good, uh, kinda networker, right? And, and, uh, not, not networker, but, like, I, I like people that I like, and I hate people that I hate. [laughs] And I like some guys that, like-

Shaan Puri 13:29 Yeah

Al Doan 13:29 ... we're doing this all-

Shaan Puri 13:29 You're the most popular guy in the house right now, by the way. I don't know if you know this.

Al Doan 13:32 No. For real?

Shaan Puri 13:32 There's like 25 people here.

Sam Parr 13:34 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 13:34 There's some famous people. Everybody's like, "Big-"

Al Doan 13:36 Oh.

Shaan Puri 13:36 Everyone's got a different nickname for you.

Al Doan 13:38 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 13:38 It's like, "Big Al," then somebody's like, "Big City," 'cause he's buying cities.

Al Doan 13:40 Oh, yeah.

Shaan Puri 13:41 And the other guy's like, "Oh, Al Doan."

Sam Parr 13:42 Big City's good, man.

Shaan Puri 13:43 And, and so th- Big City's a cool name.

Al Doan 13:45 Yeah.

Sam Parr 13:45 I mean, it's like, it's like, you know, Tom-

Al Doan 13:47 Big City.

Sam Parr 13:48 Yeah, man.

Shaan Puri 13:48 That is good.

Sam Parr 13:49 It's like-

Al Doan 13:49 Yeah

Sam Parr 13:49 ... it's like tall, calling, like, a really tall guy Shorty or something.

Al Doan 13:51 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 13:51 You know? This is perfect.

Al Doan 13:52 It's better than Big Country. I get Big Country a lot.

Sam Parr 13:54 Yeah.

Al Doan 13:54 But Big City.

Sam Parr 13:55 No, it's not funny when you are.

Al Doan 13:57 Oh. [laughs]

Sam Parr 13:58 You know?

Al Doan 13:58 Then you'd have to be, like, Tiny Country or something like that. [laughs]

Sam Parr 14:00 Yeah, yeah. [laughs]

Al Doan 14:01 Like, it'd have to be some opposite thing.

Sam Parr 14:03 Yeah. No, Big City's good.

Al Doan 14:04 Okay. Thank you.

Shaan Puri 14:04 But anyways, you're super likable. I was calling you out there, like, "Who, what did you..." You go, he's... You're like, "He's rich, he's smart, and he's [laughs] and he's funny."

Al Doan 14:12 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 14:13 And I was like, "Yeah, you need to be the next Bachelor, dude."

Al Doan 14:15 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 14:15 You know? Like, this is amazing.

Sam Parr 14:16 How did you meet him?

Shaan Puri 14:18 Well, the, I mean, we, I don't even know. I'm just here.

Al Doan 14:20 No, no, no, Pa- Patrick was on the podcast.

Shaan Puri 14:22 So Patrick came on the pod. That was the first time I thought about the word quilt in like-

Al Doan 14:24 It's the only... Yeah

Shaan Puri 14:25 ... 12 years.

Al Doan 14:26 Well, he was telling my story, and all my buddies were like, "Dude, you were on this podcast, dude. You gotta check this out." So I'm like, "What the crap?"

Shaan Puri 14:32 And then he DM'd him too.

Al Doan 14:32 So I listened to him, and then I DM'd you, and I was like, "Oh, man, that's my story. Like, if you wanna hear it, I'll happily tell it."

Shaan Puri 14:37 'Cause Patrick was like, "Oh, there's this-"

Al Doan 14:38 Yeah, yeah

Shaan Puri 14:38 ... "there's this niche market of quilting that's way bigger than people realize." And I was like, "What? Really?" We remember we were, like, blown away, and then he, uh, we were like, "What's..." He's like, "Yeah, there's companies that are huge."

Al Doan 14:47 The, the conversation was great because you were like, "Oh, that's rad, man. Love to hear it sometime. Do you bowl?" [laughs]

Shaan Puri 14:51 Yeah. [laughs]

Al Doan 14:52 Do you wanna come do a thing with me on, like-

Shaan Puri 14:53 Yeah, he DM- me. I s- think I ghosted you for, like, a month.

Al Doan 14:55 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 14:55 And then I was like, "Oh, hey, by the way, yeah, I do wanna talk about that, but more importantly, you wanna meet up in person and play basketball?"

Al Doan 15:01 [laughs]

Sam Parr 15:01 But you didn't know anyone here, right?

Al Doan 15:03 No, no, no. A no... Yeah, this is, this is great for me.

Shaan Puri 15:05 Did you even know Patrick?

Al Doan 15:06 No.

Shaan Puri 15:07 Oh, wow.

Al Doan 15:07 No, I'd never met any of these guys.

Shaan Puri 15:08 You took a amazing leap of faith to show up.

Al Doan 15:10 Well, and then, and then, like, dude, and I turn out to be, like, six foot seven and love playing basketball-

Shaan Puri 15:14 Yeah

Al Doan 15:14 ... and, and, uh, yeah.

Sam Parr 15:15 Dude, he kicked my ass on the court.

Shaan Puri 15:17 Yeah, he was amazing.

Al Doan 15:17 Nah, except you, dude, you smoked us. For the, for the championship game, drained three threes in my face.

Shaan Puri 15:22 Yeah, I had like the greatest moment of my life today.

Al Doan 15:24 Yeah, yeah.

Shaan Puri 15:24 So, you know, whatever.

Al Doan 15:24 It's, it's all good. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 15:26 So okay, so you do the, you do the quilting thing.

Al Doan 15:28 No, wait, wait, wait. My skills before this, uh, just, just buddies that, like, that, like, connected me up. So I was working in a software company, lost that job, uh, in dramatic fashion. I'd never been without a job at the time. I was like-

Shaan Puri 15:39 What does that mean? You got fired?

Al Doan 15:40 Yeah, like, me and 20,000 people got laid off in 2008, right?

Shaan Puri 15:43 Yeah.

Al Doan 15:43 And, uh, and so I'm, you know, I'm, like, consulting and trying to, like, just-

Sam Parr 15:46 How old were you?

Al Doan 15:47 I was 26.

Sam Parr 15:50 In Missouri?

Al Doan 15:51 Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but like, but... Well, I was, like, living in Boston at the time. They moved me out there, and I was visiting my buddy up in Toronto, and then I moved in with him and his wife and their new baby, You, Me and Dupree style.

Shaan Puri 16:02 [laughs]

Al Doan 16:02 And it was like, "We'll start a company up here. Let's do it." So we tried, like, three of them. We tried an ozone cleaning technology that we'd sell to real estate agents, and that was, like, a terrible time to sell to real estate agents [laughs] was 2008. And, uh, we tried to do a little wealth management thing, 'cause he wanted to be a wealth management advisor, and so we tried to start that. And then, uh, and then this, the quilt company we had already, and I wanted to do, like, a daily deal version, 'cause at the time it-

Shaan Puri 16:26 GroupOn was hot, right? Or no

Al Doan 16:27 ... w- it was, like, woot.com and Steep and Cheap and, uh-

Sam Parr 16:30 We just talked all about Woot

Al Doan 16:31 ... and, like, Chainlove and all that stuff. Man, I loved those in college, 'cause they were, they were great, and I'd wait up till midnight, which in, in Hawaii, where I was going to school, was, like, was, like, 7:00, right? And I'd be like, "Wait to see what it is."

Sam Parr 16:41 They're still cool.

Al Doan 16:42 It's cool, but, like, I, but, like, it hooked me as a college kid, and, like, every site was built for, like, for, like, "Are you a dude that loves riding bikes? Get Chainlove.com," and there's a new thing every night. And, but, like, nobody was building them for the 45 to 70-year-old demo. And so when I did the Quilter's Daily Deal, it, I think it was literally the first time anybody had done a daily deal site for my demographic.

Sam Parr 17:02 Which, which is, like, a, a, a discounted fabric.

Al Doan 17:05 Well, it w- I mean, it was discounted items, right?

Sam Parr 17:08 Okay.

Al Doan 17:08 And, like, dude, at the beginning it was so funny, 'cause, like, I was, I was the guy doing it all. We were just scrapping our way through it. So, like, I'm, I, I'm not a good writer for my mom, right? Where, like, I'd write these stories and it would be like all these-

Sam Parr 17:19 Yeah, what would you say? Like, "Hey, ladies." Like... [laughs]

Al Doan 17:23 Well, no, no-

Shaan Puri 17:24 Hey, fellow women

Al Doan 17:25 [laughs]

Shaan Puri 17:25 [laughs]

Al Doan 17:26 No, no, Joe. So we started a forum, and the f- the first six months of the forum, 'cause nobody wants to join an empty forum, I was Jeannie B. and Sarah Sue, and my buddy Dave was Carmen and Elizabeth.

Shaan Puri 17:36 [laughs]

Al Doan 17:36 And we'd just have these, like-

Shaan Puri 17:37 Chatting all day [laughs]

Al Doan 17:38 Oh, dude, we'd be... "Yes, uh, what kind of quilt did you make? Oh, that's so cute. How's the brother... " And eventually, now it's, like, 90,000 members and, like, it's a great old thing.

Shaan Puri 17:46 Wow. So that's really... So you... But your mom had, must've had some following or something? Is that how it started or...?

Al Doan 17:50 No, she had zero following. No, I, I literally, like-

Shaan Puri 17:52 So you started with the forum, like-

Al Doan 17:53 When we... No, no, we launched...

Al Doan 17:55 So the, the chronology, we launched with the website that I, like, sat and built. We launched with a store that we started. She was doing quilts, and then I, I built this website on, uh, 1and1.com, if you remember that old shared hosting, man. It was a disas- they lost my site a couple times.

Shaan Puri 18:10 Yeah.

Al Doan 18:10 I was like, "I'll start over. Thanks, guys."

Shaan Puri 18:12 [laughs]

Al Doan 18:13 And, uh, built this site, a- and, and it was a daily deal site that I would change at midnight. I didn't have any automation and I would just, like, go in, you know, be on a date and be like, "Hold on a second. I gotta [laughs] log in to my quilting website and change it up."

Shaan Puri 18:26 Tens of women are waiting for this.

Al Doan 18:27 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 18:27 [laughs]

Sam Parr 18:27 [laughs]

Al Doan 18:28 And, and we l- we l- [laughs] dude, we launched it. The... I still have the Facebook post in, like, February 2009, and then it's like, "Hey, I made a quilt shop for my mom. Check it out." Two likes, right? Like, zero orders the first three weeks, and, and... But, like, every day I'm going in there writing these stories.

Shaan Puri 18:40 But you didn't give up.

Al Doan 18:42 Didn't give up. Didn't give up. Persevered.

Shaan Puri 18:43 Why? Just like...

Al Doan 18:45 Uh, I- well, I mean, it was, it was a marketing challenge at that point, right? Like, we knew, we knew that we had a product that was interesting. Uh, like, like, we're selling fabric online, and, like, the other sites were, like, were, like, built on Yahoo Stores and crap. And I'm like, "I can... Like, this is a way better experience for this, and we're just gonna, we're gonna take better pictures. This is our novelty. We're gonna, we're gonna sell it better." And, uh, and so we, we kept working at it just thinking we n- had to figure out how to find people. And our... Dude, like, [laughs] I would write these deals every day and be like... Like, they were always some version of the Pinocchio nightmare scene. I'm like, "And then he turned into a donkey, and then he was in the whale's belly, and jumbo rickrack is $3.99 today." [laughs]

Shaan Puri 19:22 [laughs]

Al Doan 19:22 You know, it was, like, some weird thing, 'cause I, like, I was just trying to be creative. And eventually-

Sam Parr 19:26 Well, that's how Woot did it, too. They were pretty funny.

Al Doan 19:27 I... Well, dude, the... I was modeling after that, just trying to, like, be humorous and, and turns out, like, my mom's like, "This isn't good. [laughs] You need to, you need to stop doing this."

Shaan Puri 19:34 This is weird, son. [laughs]

Al Doan 19:35 My buddy Dave ended up doing it for the next, the next while, and he was much better than I was. But, uh, so we, we went three weeks without a sale. Finally, my cousin Jennifer orders something, and so th- th- you know, we're like, "Oh, that's all right. Thank you, Jen. That's very nice."

Shaan Puri 19:46 [laughs]

Al Doan 19:47 And, uh, and we'd get, like, an order or two a day. And one day, one day we meant to price something at, like, $2.88. It was the Crazy Eights charm pack. We meant to price it at, like, $2.88. Accidentally priced it at 88 cents, and we sold, like, 11 of them. But, but shipping was $5, right? And so, like, our cost on it was four something, and so we're like, "We still made money. Like, th- this works." And the average order size was actually, like, $28. Like, th- "Dude, [laughs] a loss leader. We should lose money-

Shaan Puri 20:13 [laughs]

Al Doan 20:13 ... on this in a meaningful way, and, and we can build this." And so it turned into, like, the deals are, are great deals and people love them, and, uh, but that's what ended up building our business. And then as we went, like-

Sam Parr 20:22 Where were you getting the fabric and supplies from?

Al Doan 20:24 W- we buy them from vendors, so, like, even, even today, there's probably 40 vendors that we buy from. Then to grow it, we started, uh, making videos. Like, the, the education stuff, YouTube was only a year and a half old at that point, and so, like, you know, late 2008, early 2009. A- and, uh, there's, like, a, there's, like, this guy Quilting Buck on there, and it's, like, a webcam-

Shaan Puri 20:42 [laughs]

Al Doan 20:43 ... that he'd show on his quilt, that... And it was, it was cool. People were trying to do stuff, but nobody had, like, done it well. And so I bought, like, a Canon Digital ELPH that was, like, the best resolution at the time, and just, like, held it in my hands and, and, uh, z- [laughs] you know, the manual zooming stuff. But, like, w- got Mom to start doing these tutorials, and because I'm a 30-year-old bearded guy, I'm like, "Don't say your lingo, right? I need you to talk to me so I can understand. I'm not a dummy. I have no idea what, what a wuf is, right?"

Shaan Puri 21:11 Right.

Al Doan 21:11 A width of fabric. But, like, I'm, like, j... Because normally teachers, when they try and start teaching, they'll try and, like, like, give themself some, uh, some validation by, like, "Look, I know all-"

Shaan Puri 21:21 Right

Al Doan 21:21 ... "the cool stuff, and I'm, I'm, I'm nerdy like you guys." And I just wouldn't let Mom do that, so she had to speak in a way that anybody could understand, and we became this very approachable, if you've never made a quilt, you start with Missour- with Missouri Star. And because we were making this content every week, we'd put it in our emails that we'd send out, and it was... So, like, we'd lead with that. It was like, "We made this great new tutorial for you with all these cool tricks and tips and stuff." And, uh, and we'd, we'd ended up with, like, a 70% open rate on our promo emails, which was just-

Shaan Puri 21:49 Wow

Al Doan 21:49 ... the magic that we built around.

Sam Parr 21:50 And you, you're 12 y- you're in, 12 years in, you're-

Al Doan 21:53 Yeah

Sam Parr 21:53 ... like, 100, 150 or something like that revenue. What were the first five years, do you think?

Al Doan 21:58 Uh, first year was 100 grand, then we did a million, then we did four, then we did eight, and then we did 14.

Sam Parr 22:03 And then did it, it kept growing at that rate?

Al Doan 22:05 Yeah, yeah. It w- and... But, uh, but again, man, like, bootstrap through that was intense. It was crazy.

Sam Parr 22:10 At what point were you able to pay yourself and make money?

Al Doan 22:13 Uh, so we paid Mom after three years, right? Like, it's crazy 'cause, uh, m- I have, I have, like, seven siblings in my family, and five of them work on the quilt company.

Shaan Puri 22:19 [laughs]

Al Doan 22:20 And, like, we couldn't have done it if they couldn't have l- just, like, worked for free for the beginning. And, like, I mean, it's, uh, it's, like, volunteers, right? I mean, like-

Sam Parr 22:27 What, what year was it making enough money where you're like, "Fuck it, let's buy a town," you know?

Al Doan 22:30 Well, it was-

Sam Parr 22:30 "Let's do this"

Al Doan 22:31 ... w- w- so, so, uh, f- four years in, we s- we bought our second building, right? Or three years in, we bought our second building, and, like, we remodeled it all ourselves. We did all the work, and then we bought... You know, we, we piecemealed the beginning one. Like, it's, we can look back on it now and be like, "Oh, yeah. Well, we got, we got everything. This is great. We did a good job." But, like, that was never the intent in the beginning. My thought was that, like, people would see that we were bringing more people to town, and they'd start these other businesses and do stuff. And, uh, and by the time, like... Because we were running so far ahead of our own curve, uh, we just ended up with, like, our whole downtown. And now we have, like, like, there's a few other businesses in town, but, uh-

Shaan Puri 23:06 And is there, like... Because y- what normally happens if you start to, like, buy everything in a town, like, there's always, like, one or two people who are like, "I'm gonna hold out," and will, like, you know-

Al Doan 23:13 Oh, yeah, yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:14 ... negotiate.

Al Doan 23:14 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 23:14 Like, yeah, 'cause you need it. You need to complete the set. [laughs]

Sam Parr 23:17 Yep. [laughs] And then Tiny comes knocking on their door.

Shaan Puri 23:19 [laughs]

Al Doan 23:20 Yeah. [laughs]

Sam Parr 23:21 Like, "We need to talk."

Al Doan 23:22 No, you... [laughs]

Shaan Puri 23:23 I cannot promise you protection. [laughs]

Al Doan 23:25 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 23:26 Like, did you guys run into that at all?

Al Doan 23:27 Oh, yeah, like, like, the average price for a building in a small Missouri town like that was, what, about 20 grand? And, uh, and by the, our last building's about 80, right? So the, so we... I just bought this other town down the road from us, Kingston, right? And so, like seven-

Sam Parr 23:40 Kingston, Missouri?

Al Doan 23:41 Yeah. So seven miles-

Sam Parr 23:42 Yeah

Al Doan 23:42 ... down the road, our, it's our county seat.

Sam Parr 23:43 Like, with the really nice, like, King- like, wh- they have a huge... Is that on the way to M- Mizzou from St. Louis?

Al Doan 23:48 No.

Sam Parr 23:49 Oh, I'm thinking of Kingsland.

Al Doan 23:50 Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, Kingston is by me, [laughs] and, uh, on the, the other side, by Kansas City, but it's seven miles from our town, and, uh, and so we bought... It's, it's, I think it's eight buildings, and it's like, it'll be, like, 70,000 for all of them, right?

Sam Parr 24:05 Wow.

Al Doan 24:05 And so they're just these old, like, condemned, just sort of overrun buildings. We'll, we'll put two million into them to get them fixed up, right? But, like, but, like, the, the real estate is cheap, and the fact that it's already there and we're just kinda fixing what's there is-

Sam Parr 24:18 Do you, uh-

Al Doan 24:18 ... is great

Sam Parr 24:19 ... w- I mean, I lived in St. Louis, which is way bigger than where you're from, but even that-

Al Doan 24:24 It, it's not a competition. [laughs]

Sam Parr 24:26 [laughs] But even St. Louis, I felt like, "Oh, fuck, no one gets me. I feel like a freak here 'cause I'm building this internet shit," and so that's why I left and I moved to s- eventually San Francisco. And there's a reason why, like, a lot of companies are started in San Francisco or New York or Chicago or Austin, like these, like, bigger cities, 'cause you, you meet people, and you, like, spread ideas, and you, like, are inspired by one another, whatever. And it, like, rubs off on each other. W- other than the internet, which i- I mean, where were you learning how to do all this stuff? And did you ever feel like-

Al Doan 24:55 But-

Sam Parr 24:55 ... "What the hell, man? I need to get out of here."

Shaan Puri 24:56 [upbeat music] I can't find this client info.

Speaker 25:00 Have you heard of HubSpot? HubSpot is a CRM platform, so it shares its data across every application. Every team can stay aligned. No out-of-sync spreadsheets or dueling databases. HubSpot, grow better. [upbeat music]

Al Doan 25:14 Uh, so after co-

Al Doan 25:15 I actually left this part out. This is the cool part. A- after college, I, uh, when I, when I lost my job, this was, uh, let's see, 2009, I, I declared my year of the MBA, right? I was looking at, like, going to, back to, to Harvard. I had lived in Boston. It was like, "I should, I should really go sp-" and it was, like, 200 grand to get, I was like... [laughs] to get an MBA there. And I was like, "Man, that's, that's too much money for this broke farmer." And, uh, and so I declared the year of my MBA. I emailed all the guys who were, like, successful in business and were like, "What are the three books that you'd recommend I read?" And I got, like, a, a constrained list of, uh, of, like, 37 books, right? And so I bought them all on Amazon for, like, $200. And, uh, then I, I had a bunch of buddies that were, like, doing cool stuff that I wanted to try, like a guy who was doing import/export out in Hawaii and, and another dude was doing, like, venture capital in Salt Lake. And, and so I was just like, "Let me come work for free for you guys for, like, three months. I just wanna... I'll, I'll shine your shoes and make your coffee. I just wanna see how you run your business." And, uh, and so I, like, I hopped around to some of that. And then I got into, uh, ag- like, I got to be an, an intern in Techstars in 2010, right? So, like they-

Sam Parr 26:17 Which, which one? Colorado?

Al Doan 26:18 Boulder, yeah. So it, it, it was only B- Boulder at the... Well, Boulder and Seattle, but, like, um, it was David Cohen-

Sam Parr 26:23 You were, like, 26?

Al Doan 26:23 ... and Nicole Glaros, 2010. And so, like, while I'm building this quilt company on the side, we've got these, like, world-class mentors coming and, and, like, they'd mentor these companies doing, you know, cool robots and stuff. And like-

Sam Parr 26:34 So you're lis- you're listening to all these office hours.

Al Doan 26:35 I was like, "Yeah, Dick Costolo, that's super interesting. What would you do if you had a quilt company, man?"

Sam Parr 26:39 [laughs]

Al Doan 26:39 "I'm just curious. Like, how would you, how would you move this?"

Sam Parr 26:41 How would you like a deal daily? [laughs]

Al Doan 26:43 [laughs] Yeah.

Sam Parr 26:44 You like deals, right?

Al Doan 26:46 Does that do anything for you?

Sam Parr 26:47 Yeah. [laughs]

Al Doan 26:47 Okay, great. And so, well, so, like, I was getting, like, this way out-

Sam Parr 26:49 I noticed you reached for your phone when I said that. [laughs]

Al Doan 26:52 [laughs]

Sam Parr 26:52 Are you trying to tell somebody about this? [laughs]

Al Doan 26:54 Talk to me about what, what's, what are you feeling right now? Yeah, no. And so I was getting this way outsized, like, brain for, for the internet stuff, and I, I always thought that I would do something like... Like, I thought I was gonna work for Microsoft or Facebook or something, right? And, uh, and, and in the end, in the end, like, I just took all the learnings that I had from this, m- and my desire to sort of be an internet tech entrepreneur and, uh, and shoveled all that into, into this quilting company, which is, uh, you know, again, like, it's v- it's very technology focused, uh, way, way early adopters on a lot of stuff. And, like, it's given us a huge advantage as we've, as we build this stuff, 'cause there's no other... Like, dude, there's no kids coming out of their MBA school trying to take my margins, and that's, that's... Except for Patrick.

Sam Parr 27:33 But, uh, how-

Al Doan 27:34 Once Patrick told all your listeners-

Sam Parr 27:35 [laughs]

Al Doan 27:36 ... you, you screwed me over. [laughs]

Sam Parr 27:37 How do you have, do you have peers? And how are you... Do you have, like, peers in the internet world or e-com world who you're, like, you're chatting with on a regular basis to be, uh, inspired by?

Al Doan 27:46 No.

Sam Parr 27:46 Or learn from or share ideas?

Al Doan 27:47 No, I, like, I got buddies, right? Like, I'm a, I'm an angel investor. I'm in 50 companies doing stuff. We, I, I have a, a early-stage fund that I run with some buddies. Like, like, I'm still, like, these are still friends. We still talk. But, but, uh, there's... Like, from an e-commerce standpoint, honestly, man, like, I, I think I'm world-class. I think I, like, I think I'm one of the best brains at selling stuff on the internet. And, uh-

Sam Parr 28:07 Man, that's awesome.

Al Doan 28:08 Yeah.

Sam Parr 28:08 That, that's awesome. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 28:09 Also, the, the, the MB- the, like, give myself an MBA thing, the way you approach that, that's like-

Al Doan 28:13 Yeah

Shaan Puri 28:14 ... uh, th- that is so smart. But also, once you hear that story, you're like, "Of course this person's gonna be successful as a hustler," right?

Al Doan 28:21 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 28:21 'Cause you, you basically do the math. You're like, "Okay, what do I want? What's the normal way to get there? Oh, this, like, kind of long, two-year, really expensive way. Can I just get that in, like-

Al Doan 28:29 Well, dude, that was my reason. Is I-

Shaan Puri 28:30 ... nine months for $250?" And you're like-

Al Doan 28:32 Yeah

Shaan Puri 28:32 ... "Oh, yeah, what if I just emailed all the smart people, asked them-

Al Doan 28:35 Yeah

Shaan Puri 28:35 ... 'What are the best three books?' I read all those books, and then I, like, go shadow f- you know, the three smart people I know," right?

Al Doan 28:40 Well, you, you work for free for a dude for, like, three m- like, like, Cohen and Glaros, these guys, they'll still go to bat to me, for me to this day-

Shaan Puri 28:47 Right

Al Doan 28:47 ... because of that three-month investment that I made of, like... A- and, uh, dude, I was the first one in, the last one out. Like, I knew I wasn't getting paid, but, but, like, I was trying to soak it all up. And, uh, y- I mean, you do that, and, like, they'll open every door you ever need to get through, so.

Sam Parr 29:00 What was the most game ch- changing book of all those that you read?

Al Doan 29:03 Uh, [laughs] well, honestly, dude, it's this book that's out of print. Uh, like, like, I didn't, I didn't read any business books that changed my life, right? Like, I... Once you get through like six or seven, I quit reading them because I'm like, "It's the exact same thing." The, the principles for business are the exact same, just told in a different parable every time. And whatever your parable is, that's what you glom onto, say-

Sam Parr 29:22 [laughs]

Al Doan 29:22 ... "Oh, man, it's Good to Great. That's the best one."

Sam Parr 29:25 [laughs]

Al Doan 29:25 "This one, I... You..." It's your Bible. Um, but for me, like, the most impactful was this one called Coming Out of the Ice by Victor Herman. Which is this, uh, this, this dude that, like, uh, went over to Russia and, like, ended up being an amazing Olympian athlete, but, like, Russia wanted to take credit for it, so they... And he was like, "No, I'm American." So they throw him in jail for, like, 50 years. And it's this, the-

Sam Parr 29:45 Wow

Al Doan 29:45 ... crazy story that I'm like, "This guy's an American hero. Somebody should know this story." But it, uh... Like, d- dude, reading that while I felt like my life was so hard was like, "Oh. Oh, no, I'll be fine. [laughs] I'm good. Yeah, I'll be great."

Sam Parr 29:56 Dude, I read that. I do the exact same thing. I'll read a-

Al Doan 29:59 It's, like, better than therapy.

Sam Parr 30:00 Yeah.

Shaan Puri 30:00 For sure. I, I-

Al Doan 30:00 You want, you want the fast version of therapy? [laughs]

Shaan Puri 30:02 It's, it's, it's David Goggins back in the day. [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:05 Totally. Like, I'll read, like, a, like, a book about Navy SEALs-

Al Doan 30:08 Yeah

Sam Parr 30:08 ... or about, like, I just read about, uh, the Cherokee, uh, Native Americans.

Al Doan 30:12 Oh, man.

Sam Parr 30:12 And I'm like-

Al Doan 30:13 It makes... Your problems are so small

Sam Parr 30:15 ... oh, my God.

Shaan Puri 30:15 Yeah.

Sam Parr 30:15 I'm like, "I'm such a punk."

Al Doan 30:16 Yeah.

Sam Parr 30:17 You know what I mean? I do the exact same thing.

Al Doan 30:19 Yeah.

Sam Parr 30:19 It's way better than business books too.

Al Doan 30:20 No, it's, like, my favorite one out of that whole list, 'cause, 'cause just a buddy of mine was like, "Oh, this is the best book I've ever read. Read this." And I was like, "All right. I'm in, man." And, uh, that, that one's still to this day is, like, great. But, but, like, dude, the books... And the, this is my problem with college is, like, every marketing class I sat through or something, I'm like, "Oh, this is your great idea? You, you say sell it for more than I bought it. Oh, you guys are clever."

Shaan Puri 30:40 [laughs]

Sam Parr 30:41 Right.

Al Doan 30:41 "Thanks. I'm glad I'm paying for this," right? And it's all these professors that used to be in the industry that you wanna get into that no longer are, that might have connections that could open the door for you. And so when I was looking at an MBA, I was like, this, this fee... Like, what if I just go to the people that are in the industry right now and somehow network with them? Like, that's gonna open way more doors for me and-

Sam Parr 30:58 How many-

Al Doan 30:59 ... be great

Sam Parr 30:59 ... how many people do you... You have 450 employees, but how many of them are doing, like, uh, like, white collar jobs, like SEO-

Shaan Puri 31:06 Knowledge work

Sam Parr 31:07 ... or, uh-

Al Doan 31:07 Yeah

Sam Parr 31:08 ... or, like, internet, internet-related things?

Al Doan 31:10 May- maybe 100 of them.

Sam Parr 31:11 100 of them?

Al Doan 31:11 Yeah.

Sam Parr 31:12 How many of them live in the town?

Al Doan 31:14 Uh, gosh, I, I, I don't know. I'd, I'd say probably-

Sam Parr 31:17 I mean, how many of them are, are, are on site in, in Missouri?

Al Doan 31:19 I think, I think we have, I think we have, like, 40 remote, like, fully remote. Like, our engineering team is remote. Like-

Sam Parr 31:24 Where are they?

Al Doan 31:24 ... the, the, like, all over from Seattle to Serbia, right? Um, and then we have, then we have, like, our design team is mostly remote. Like, the, a lot of, a lot of the ones that make sense to be remote are remote. Um, but then, like, in town, I don't know, there's probably 250 of them that are, like, right there in town.

Shaan Puri 31:41 Is buying a town with good business besides... Like, you had a, you have a business, and this is kind of like, uh-

Al Doan 31:48 Yeah

Shaan Puri 31:49 ... adjacent, helpful.

Al Doan 31:50 Well. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 31:51 If I didn't have that, but if I was like, "Oh, there's this kind of, like, abandoned-ish town, really cheap real estate. I could buy that."

Al Doan 31:56 You know, so I, like-

Shaan Puri 31:57 "I could reinvigorate." Is that a good idea or no?

Al Doan 31:59 Well, well, like, I think, I think every company should have [laughs] a town.

Sam Parr 32:03 Well, like, they did.

Shaan Puri 32:04 Wow.

Sam Parr 32:04 Carnegie.

Al Doan 32:04 Hot take, dude.

Sam Parr 32:05 Yeah.

Al Doan 32:05 That's a, that's a really hot take.

Sam Parr 32:08 You know, so we could list a few. Ford, uh, Henry Ford tried doing this in, uh-

Al Doan 32:11 Yeah, Pella Windows is up in Iowa. They have their own to- like, like, there's... Well, a lot of them-

Sam Parr 32:15 Be- uh, Bethlehem PA

Al Doan 32:16 ... a lot of them did, and when a lot of towns were built around, like, that big company, right?

Sam Parr 32:19 Or, like, a coal mine or something like that.

Al Doan 32:20 But, but my thing is, like, is, like, every dumb internet brand should, should have one, right? Like, like, a, a buddy of mine does, uh... And w- well, this, this is my thought pattern here is, like, is, like, if you're a 10-year-old girl and super into baking, where in America do I have to take you? Nowhere, right? But somebody, if they s-

Shaan Puri 32:38 Could just take that opportunity

Al Doan 32:39 ... they, they grab it, and they're like, "And, and we're gonna have Dutch ovens in this store, just going and cooking stuff. And then g- the KitchenAid mixer, you come and have the, the experience. You're gonna come and spend two weeks here, try everything they've got, and you're gonna learn how to make all this cool stuff, and then go home. And your mom's gonna be stoked to spend three grand to give you the experience because it's magic."

Shaan Puri 32:56 Right.

Al Doan 32:56 And the whole town is built around that thing you're passionate about.

Sam Parr 32:57 And that, and that's what you're doing for quilting.

Al Doan 32:59 That's what we're doing for quilting. That's exactly what I'm doing.

Shaan Puri 33:00 Actually, are peo- people doing this for everything? Like, if I wanted to go learn cooking-

Al Doan 33:02 They should. They're-

Shaan Puri 33:03 ... people are like, "Oh, like, I need to go to Paris to get that experience." But, like, if I'm only into, like, cooking or design or-

Al Doan 33:07 Well, what's funny, like, let's say, let's say it's cooking-

Shaan Puri 33:09 Where do people go?

Al Doan 33:09 ... right? And you go to Paris. You go to Paris and you take a class, b- but it's like you have not gone to the cooking mecca.

Shaan Puri 33:15 Yeah.

Al Doan 33:16 Right? The, the, the cooking mecca looks like, we bought every building on this street, and, uh, and walk in this one. We have, we have all the cake decorating stuff in here, and then we've got all the baking stuff in here, and then we got all this stuff.

Sam Parr 33:25 But you're gonna gi- and so you'll give tours or-

Al Doan 33:28 Uh-

Sam Parr 33:28 I don't know what you wanna call it

Al Doan 33:28 ... well, no, you sell the stuff. You're a retailer, right?

Shaan Puri 33:31 Yeah.

Al Doan 33:31 And, and, like, tours, tours are part of it. Like, people-

Sam Parr 33:34 Right

Al Doan 33:34 ... people... Well, 'cause when I go there, I'm all of a sudden a part of the community, right? It, it's kind of like-

Shaan Puri 33:39 It's like if you go to a brewery-

Al Doan 33:40 It's Comic-Con, right?

Shaan Puri 33:41 So, like, you go to a brewery, you could buy the stuff, or a winery. You would g- it's like, uh, like, Napa is a good example of this.

Al Doan 33:46 Sure.

Shaan Puri 33:47 Like, wine. It's like Napa.

Al Doan 33:48 Well, well, and if you're a consumer of it, yeah, right? L- and it would be cool to go and take the wine tour and do the whole thing.

Shaan Puri 33:54 Right.

Al Doan 33:54 If you're a beer maker, where in America do you have to go? There's no... Somebody should do it, right? We... I was, I forget who I was talking to, but they were like, they... Oh, uh, Patrick, right? He's from Wisconsin. I was like, "It's crazy, man. If I wanna get into cheese-making, give me the town that, like, it'll teach me. It has, it has 20 stores, and I buy the cloth and I... You have every kind of cloth, and I'll buy the basket and all, every kind of basket." Like, somebody's just gonna take that branding and go build their, their town around it and, like, it's the biggest wooden nickel in Wisconsin now.

Shaan Puri 34:23 Right.

Al Doan 34:23 And I gotta go see it 'cause it's novelty at this point.

Shaan Puri 34:25 What is this example you're giving? I don't-

Sam Parr 34:26 Yeah, wooden nickel. I don't understand that.

Al Doan 34:27 The biggest wooden nickel in Minnesota.

Shaan Puri 34:28 You've said that, like-

Sam Parr 34:28 That's from Real Country. [laughs]

Al Doan 34:29 So, so in Iowa, dude, driving down, what, what is it, I-70, Iowa City has the biggest wooden nickel in Iowa, or in the world maybe.

Shaan Puri 34:38 What is a wooden nickel? What are you saying?

Al Doan 34:40 It's, it's like a giant-

Shaan Puri 34:41 [laughs]

Al Doan 34:41 ... 16-foot buffalo nickel that's, like-

Sam Parr 34:45 He doesn't even know what a buffalo nickel is

Al Doan 34:45 ... made out of wood.

Shaan Puri 34:46 What is a buffalo nickel? [laughs]

Al Doan 34:47 So in the olden days-

Shaan Puri 34:48 Sorry, am I, am I, am I the only one that's never-

Al Doan 34:49 ... before Washington was on the quarter-

Shaan Puri 34:51 Do you know what he's talking about? [laughs]

Sam Parr 34:51 Yeah, it's-

Al Doan 34:52 A buffalo nickel-

Sam Parr 34:53 ... a buffalo nickel, a buffalo nickel is just a nickel that was made before, like-

Al Doan 34:57 I love that I'm looking at you like-

Sam Parr 34:58 Like-

Al Doan 34:58 ... how do you not know buffalo nickel?

Sam Parr 34:59 Like, 1905. What did it... Was it, like-

Al Doan 35:01 I don't know when they stopped making it.

Sam Parr 35:02 Any, any nickel made in the 1800s, I think it had a picture of a buffalo on it.

Al Doan 35:06 Yeah, that's right.

Sam Parr 35:07 That's it.

Al Doan 35:08 Well, well, so-

Sam Parr 35:08 The Amer- the, the nickel used to have a buffalo on it

Al Doan 35:10 ... I hear it's, it's, Topeka has the biggest ball of twine, right? Like, it's, it's all the, just the roadside novelty. Come see the biggest whatever. The biggest pecan is in, like, Minnesota, I think, or something, right?

Shaan Puri 35:22 Gotcha.

Al Doan 35:23 And you, and you're like, "Well, all right. I'm just gonna get off this highway and go look at this stupid huge pecan," take a picture by it, and, like, then buy a bag of pecans.

Shaan Puri 35:30 So what are the economics? Let's say somebody does this. Like, what's a, what's a vertical where you're li- or, like, a, a category where you're like somebody should definitely do it for, I don't know, beer or whatever.

Al Doan 35:37 Well, dude, so, like, we just had twins a couple years ago, and I wanted, like- Where do we have to fly to? If you're gonna have a baby and they have the coolest experience, you race the, the, the, you know, the stroller around the track, and then you try 15 different car seats.

Shaan Puri 35:52 Oh, like Baby Town America.

Al Doan 35:52 Yeah, yeah. It should be in like Lehigh, Utah or something, right?

Shaan Puri 35:55 Yeah.

Al Doan 35:55 Put it right with the Mormons and-

Shaan Puri 35:56 Baby Nickel you've ever seen. [laughs]

Al Doan 35:57 Yeah. [laughs] But, but, but like, but like the novelty of they have 20 stores and you're gonna go and spend a week there and come out with $8,000 worth of baby stuff is, is the draw, right? You're gonna... All your shopping's done there.

Shaan Puri 36:08 Wow.

Al Doan 36:08 Every baby product's represented. Like, that's, that's the novelty of it. And, uh, the economics, the economics are gonna vary by, like, like interest to interest.

Shaan Puri 36:17 But where is the money made? Is it in the retail, the sales, or is it in the land appreciation because you now made a destination?

Sam Parr 36:22 Yeah, is it just a, just more... Is it just a retail business that has higher than normal volume?

Al Doan 36:26 No, no, no, no. I'm, I, I worry that I'm doing a bad job explaining this, and if I am, like, let's keep digging on it because it's great. But like, but like-

Shaan Puri 36:33 We're just dumb.

Al Doan 36:33 So, [laughs] so for, for, uh, an internet business, right, the, like our company, there's a bunch of no-name warehouses on the internet that sell fabric, right? But we are a little quilt shop in Hamilton, Missouri. In fact, we're a, we're a cool quilt shop with all this branding and all this cool stuff that we've done, and we'll never be the nameless, faceless warehouse, right? So, if you're starting, if you're starting a, you know, whatever, whatever goofy company you're doing, right, like, uh, the second you open up a town... So l- one of the guys here, he- he's doing, like, Firebrand Tea, right?

Shaan Puri 37:06 Yeah.

Al Doan 37:07 Uh-

Shaan Puri 37:07 David Siegel.

Al Doan 37:07 And I, and I'm like, I'm like, "Bro, like, go, go open up a, a retail store," 'cause the second you do that, I'm not just buying from your crappy warehouse where you're importing it and trying to resell.

Shaan Puri 37:17 You're saying you just see an e-com lift because you're like, "We're a real place-"

Al Doan 37:19 It's a branding-

Shaan Puri 37:20 "... with a real sign"

Al Doan 37:20 ... it's a branding play. Yeah.

Shaan Puri 37:21 And, like, people like this. You'll never come here, even if you'll never come here-

Al Doan 37:25 Yeah

Shaan Puri 37:25 ... 'cause 99% of your-

Al Doan 37:26 Totally. Yeah

Shaan Puri 37:26 ... traffic never goes there. You're saying that m- that stands you out against every other e-com DTC brand.

Al Doan 37:31 Yeah, there's a direct... And our split, our split-

Shaan Puri 37:32 That's interesting

Al Doan 37:32 ... like, we g- 90% of our revenue is online, 10%'s in store. M- A little less than 10, like 8%'s in store. But, but, like, our marketing is 98% the town. Y- Let me tell you the story about what, oh, Susie brought her quilt in. Oh, look at this new display we did. Oh, all this stuff, right? And that's, that's the story that we tell, uh, while most of our traf- or most of our revenue comes from online sales, right? And so that's why I'm saying, like, dude, if you're, if you have a brand-

Shaan Puri 37:58 That's fascinating

Al Doan 37:59 ... so, so many of these guys are just trying to flip Shopify stores, like, "Ah, we import. It ships out of ShipBob and it's great."

Shaan Puri 38:04 [laughs]

Al Doan 38:04 And it's like, yeah, but, like, people know they're just getting, like, scammed by... Uh, I mean, the, you're just buying to resell and try and make a profit. And, uh, the second you build a little bit of a, of an experience around it, right? Like, do the work to m- to build the physical manifestation of your brand, it's... The, the, the company all of a sudden is much, much more interesting in my mind.

Sam Parr 38:23 Let's say you, uh, you sell the company in two years. Your, your, you or your family collectively are maybe a billi- uh, worth a billion. You're not working with quilting anymore. What, what do you wanna do? W- Do you wanna start another company, and if-

Al Doan 38:35 [laughs]

Sam Parr 38:35 ... what type of company? What do you wanna do with your time and money?

Al Doan 38:37 I have n- I have no idea. I started a company I loved called Pretzel this la- like two years ago, and, uh, it, we, it was the, it was the, the photo roll meets the credit card statement, right? So, we itemized all of your transactions and show you this very beautiful like, oh, here's all the stuff I bought. It was... I thought it was super cool and, like, the, dude, the SKU-level data ar- aggregated around the user was so interesting to me. And, uh, c- couldn't finance it, ended up shutting it down. And so, like, that was, that was my, my big play at it, and now I've, I've got some major PTSD of, like, I never wanna raise money again. I felt, dude, o- once you take somebody else's money and, like, don't give them a return, I'm like, I'm an investor. I know it's fine, but I felt so bad,

Al Doan 39:17 dude.

Shaan Puri 39:17 Yeah.

Al Doan 39:17 So bad.

Sam Parr 39:17 So, what do you wanna do then?

Al Doan 39:18 Uh, well, so now I'm just doing lemonade stand stuff, right? It's like l- like my therapist says, she's like, "I think you wanna be Da Vinci. Uh, you, you wanna, like, design a bridge and then a helicopter and then go paint a chapel." And I'm like, "Yeah, yeah, I think [laughs] that's what I wanna do." I just like, I'm gonna do little lemonade stand style businesses, just like little things that can't scale, do-

Shaan Puri 39:38 Like, what's an example? What do you mean by that?

Al Doan 39:39 Uh, like I wanna do a barbecue place, right? Like, and I'm like, "Oh, yeah, it'd be great," and I'll like have a, have the meat, the pickle, the, and the sauce.

Shaan Puri 39:47 Right.

Al Doan 39:47 Like, that'd be cool. And, and I could do the branding amazing, and as long as I was cool to like let it die in four months, I think I'd really enjoy it.

Shaan Puri 39:54 [laughs]

Al Doan 39:54 As soon as it turned into like, "Oh, now I built this thing-"

Shaan Puri 39:56 You gotta grind it. Yeah

Al Doan 39:56 ... "I gotta grind it out," like i- I'd be miserable. And, uh, and so I'll just try, like, little stuff like that. I th- I, I mean-

Sam Parr 40:03 Did y-

Al Doan 40:03 ... at, at some point I'll get into another thing, but, like, right now, I don't know

Sam Parr 40:06 ... when you were in your early 20s and, and late teens, did you think you were gonna be wealthy and then, uh, uh-

Al Doan 40:10 No, no. Well, I, I... Dude, that's interesting. Uh, no, not at all, right? And it's kinda jacked... It jacks with your head a little bit. And, like, I never m- I never dreamed in my wildest dreams that I would be where I am today, right? And so, like, I, I s- [laughs] I was talking to my wife a couple days ago. I was like, "I think I might need... Can we do a vision board?" I've never dreamt of, like, what else is out there, what else I wanna, I wanna do with my life.

Shaan Puri 40:33 You, like, overshot what you had pictured.

Al Doan 40:35 Yeah, yeah, yeah. [laughs]

Shaan Puri 40:36 You never re-pictured.

Al Doan 40:37 Oh, my God.

Shaan Puri 40:37 Yeah.

Al Doan 40:37 Sometimes you go over plan.

Shaan Puri 40:38 [laughs]

Al Doan 40:39 Uh, I didn't expect this to work. And so landing here, landing here, I mean, it's a, it's a big, it's a big thing in my head of, like, trying to navigate. Like, uh, like in a, in a very serious way of like I don't, I don't know. W- When you remove the motivation of money, what do you do with the rest of your life? 'Cause so much of our, of our world is built around, like, gotta get money. In the same year, dude, I stepped back from my company, uh, f- so the day-to-day work. I got married, I bought a house, and we got pregnant with our first kid. And I was like, every milestone I imagined I ever wanted to work for, and like, dude, n- when you're dating, it's very... It's a great reason to go to the gym. You're like, "I gotta look good." And all of a sudden I'm married and I'm like, "Screw it."

Shaan Puri 41:15 [laughs]

Al Doan 41:16 You don't care how many pushups I can do.

Shaan Puri 41:17 [laughs]

Al Doan 41:17 Like, I'm not going anywhere. And l- and it was r- like it was a full on funky depression, like, not, not like a depression like a lot of, like, grown-up people have. It was like a baby depression for me. But, but, uh, like, just figuring out what I was supposed to reach for w- was, uh, was a really hard walk for me.

Shaan Puri 41:33 And where'd you, like, what was the... How'd you get out of that?

Al Doan 41:35 Uh, yeah. Hmm.

Sam Parr 41:39 I, I don't know. Well, so like doing-

Al Doan 41:40 Like, like any man, I just buried it inside-

Sam Parr 41:42 Yeah, yeah

Al Doan 41:42 ... and moved on.

Sam Parr 41:43 Yeah, yeah.

Al Doan 41:43 It'll come back up later. [laughs]

Sam Parr 41:44 Dude, I, I leaned in heavy with the Reboot guys. I don't know if you know like Jerry Colonna over at Reboot. He's like the, like the big exec coach.

Al Doan 41:51 Yeah.

Sam Parr 41:51 And he coached ... Who'd he coach? Stu Jabbs or someone like that? Who, who's he coaching?

Al Doan 41:54 I, I don't know.

Sam Parr 41:55 Jerry Colonna.

Al Doan 41:55 He's a nice man though, and I like him a lot. And he [laughs] lets me-

Sam Parr 41:58 He's like the ... He coached somebody famous, like you know-

Al Doan 41:59 Yeah

Sam Parr 41:59 ... whoever.

Al Doan 42:00 Yeah. He, he's, he's-

Sam Parr 42:01 But they do like a retreat now for CEOs and stuff.

Al Doan 42:03 Yeah, well, so I ... Like when, when I was running the company, dude, I ... Well, 'cause I was running the quilt company and, and it had grown to like 400 employees, and I was like, I was like 30, 32 or something. Like I didn't know what I was doing. And when you, when you scale that fast and you don't, you, you don't scale your own capacity to, to lead, uh, I found myself like, you know, would sit down in a room and, and I was immediately like trying to make these other people feel stupid so they wouldn't notice that I didn't know what I was doing, right?

Sam Parr 42:30 [laughs]

Al Doan 42:30 And you're throwing bombs in your own business, and you're like, "Dang it, Rick, I can't believe you did this thing."

Sam Parr 42:33 [laughs]

Al Doan 42:34 And then like afterwards it'd be like, "I'm not a yeller, Rick, baby. I'm so sorry."

Sam Parr 42:36 [laughs]

Al Doan 42:37 "This ... You know that's not me."

Sam Parr 42:38 [laughs]

Al Doan 42:39 "I, I ... We're on the same team."

Sam Parr 42:40 [laughs]

Al Doan 42:40 And, and, uh [laughs] and like, like I came out of that and I was like, "Man, I'm hurting the people around me. I gotta fix this." So I went on a, on a, a bootcamp retreat that they do, and like m- [laughs] I came out of that and I was like, I either ... I, I need to fire my co-founders. Which, which one of three co-founders, uh, and I came back and was like, "I gotta fire you guys." [laughs] They're like, "No, that's not gonna happen." We're like, "Oh, what should we do?" [laughs] So then we're like, "Oh, well, I'll step back, and like we can, we can manage this transition." But, uh, but like to get to that point where I could sort of say those words out loud like, "Man, I can't keep doing this."

Sam Parr 43:12 Yeah.

Al Doan 43:12 'Cause it's a family business, and it's all ... It's the town. Like it felt all that weight on me, and I couldn't get out. And so went ... Did a lot of the therapy stuff, and at this point now-

Sam Parr 43:20 Have you done psychedelics?

Al Doan 43:22 Yeah. No. Dude, I'm so, I'm so intrigued by psychedelics, but like I, I'm, I'm Mormon, right? And so like the idea of doing-

Sam Parr 43:29 You're Mormon?

Al Doan 43:29 Yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 43:30 Wow.

Al Doan 43:31 No, like yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sam Parr 43:32 [laughs]

Al Doan 43:33 You look just how I thought you would look. [laughs]

Sam Parr 43:36 No, you don't. You're the coolest Mormon I've ever met. [laughs]

Al Doan 43:39 And, and you know Mormons here, so that's nice.

Sam Parr 43:41 Yeah.

Al Doan 43:41 Thank you. You didn't have to say that. That was a-

Sam Parr 43:42 [laughs]

Al Doan 43:42 That was a-

Sam Parr 43:43 There's one like in the room. [laughs]

Al Doan 43:44 No. But the, uh ... But, but, uh ... No, like I, like I think ... Well, because the stance is very murky in my ... From the religious standpoint, so I'm like, I've got, I've got a, a bunch of mushrooms capsulated in my medicine cabinet that I'm like Dre, my wife, I'm like, "Dre, someday I'm gonna go walking on the land, and I just don't know where I am yet."

Sam Parr 44:05 [laughs]

Al Doan 44:05 But I'm gonna go over. [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:07 I've never done it. I'm, I'm completely sober, but I'm, I'm totally into it. I'm trying to convince my wife to do it.

Al Doan 44:11 Dude, my f- my fear is like I just don't wanna be the one guy like, "Oh, he took it and then his brain snapped."

Sam Parr 44:16 [laughs]

Al Doan 44:16 And I'm like-

Sam Parr 44:17 No, I don't think that will happen with you.

Al Doan 44:18 Thank you. I don't think it would either 'cause I've got a good brain.

Sam Parr 44:21 [laughs]

Al Doan 44:21 But if it did, I'd be very sad.

Sam Parr 44:22 Do you, do you drink?

Al Doan 44:23 No, I don't drink. Never touched it.

Sam Parr 44:25 Well, fuck. I always thought like if I'm h- I'm ... 'Cause I don't drink either, but I'm like if I freak out I could just get super drunk and I'll be okay, you know?

Al Doan 44:30 [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:31 So you, you don't have that.

Al Doan 44:32 Wait, this, this playbook feels made up on the spot. [laughs] Did you ... Is this-

Sam Parr 44:36 No, that's what that, right?

Al Doan 44:36 Is this science backed?

Sam Parr 44:37 Well.

Al Doan 44:38 [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:39 What is science?

Al Doan 44:40 Yeah. [laughs]

Sam Parr 44:42 [laughs] No, I just thought like that's like my, uh, that's my parachute.

Al Doan 44:44 Yeah.

Sam Parr 44:45 You know, that's my es- my, my-

Al Doan 44:45 No, I-

Sam Parr 44:46 ... escape hatch.

Al Doan 44:47 I was ... Man, I, I don't, I don't know at what point I'll feel okay with it, but like at some point I'm just like-

Sam Parr 44:51 Wait, so you bought it or you have it?

Al Doan 44:53 Yeah. No, a, a buddy of mine, a buddy of mine is very ... He's like, "I'm good at onboarding people into psychedelics."

Sam Parr 44:57 [laughs]

Al Doan 44:58 I got you. And I'm like, "All right." And so-

Sam Parr 45:00 Have you ever done it?

Al Doan 45:01 No. And I meet those people, and they're like, "Dude, it'll be so great, so controlled-"

Sam Parr 45:05 But you-

Al Doan 45:05 "... so safe."

Sam Parr 45:06 He, he-

Al Doan 45:07 And I'm just like, "Uh-"

Sam Parr 45:07 He's emotionally stable though.

Al Doan 45:09 Yeah. I'm like, "I don't need this."

Sam Parr 45:10 Like he's happy.

Al Doan 45:10 I'm like, "Yo, what do you ... The, the inter-

Sam Parr 45:12 I'm like, "Do I need to get sad first?"

Al Doan 45:13 ... the interesting part is just like, is just like the, the guys are like, "I have my greatest ideas in there." And I'm like, "Can I just ... I just wanna see what some of those ideas would be."

Sam Parr 45:22 Yeah.

Al Doan 45:22 I don't, I don't think I need the whole ... Like I don't need the trip. I just need like-

Sam Parr 45:25 Yeah, you're only using 12% of your brain right now, like.

Al Doan 45:27 But then you, then you got like your barber that's like, "I saw Jesus."

Sam Parr 45:30 Yeah.

Al Doan 45:30 "He was there, bro."

Sam Parr 45:32 [laughs]

Al Doan 45:32 And I'm like, "Oh, that could be cool too. I mean, all right. I don't know."

Sam Parr 45:36 Well, dude, this is awesome. Uh, you came here not knowing anyone. We got you on the pod. This is pretty sick.

Al Doan 45:42 Yeah. Yeah.

Sam Parr 45:42 You're the most popular guy here. Do you enjoy meeting some of these people?

Al Doan 45:45 Oh, this is a blast. This has been a blast. [upbeat music]