Spotting Billion Dollar Investments Was Hard Until I Learned These 3 Rules | Rohan Oza

Transcript from https://podmenti.com/t/c44cbeea46fcbe55

Every deal on ShockTech, that's a beverage. I know they're looking at me. But nobody wins the lottery seven times. You got sharks spitting out the product, you've got a terrible brand name, and you pick up twenty five percent of that company. Sold
For billion and a half. Is this just art or is there a sub science behind it?
Biggest line with Robert Woodruff was like he wanted Coke to be with an arms reach of design. Brand is creating that design. One in ten Americans influence the other nine. The goal is to spot that one. Can you teach us more about how it's done? It's actually three things. One is spotting stuff early. One is building the brands.
And the others actually.
I put my law in it like my days off. You are working back. You're the grandfather.
You have been brand you you have been
Crushing it in the beverage space. I was reading the like
research on you the last couple days. I knew about Poppy.
I knew about vitamin water, but I didn't know the extent of it. Can you can you
Brag for a second. Give me shout out some of the brands that you've been involved with. I actually have started none of them. I only co-founded one, which is Poppy.
And I'll tell you that story.
But the rest I just bought'em early or I bond with founders.
I think it was like vitamin, smart water, they were tight age.
Vida Coco.
Even things I lost money on.
Well well known like pop chips.
Uh Vital Proteins one bar.
Bulletproof, lost money, but still no well known.
What else we have Farmer's Dog?
Once upon a farm.
And then probably Poppy is my sort of most famous one. That's an insane insane roster.
It was it's funny, actually one of our founders who you know, um
A guy Glorez who's the
Co founder of Jim Carnaby Foods.
Yeah.
The brands and the teams and growing stuff and like you sometimes
Bury yourself.
In the weeds you don't sometimes ladder up and he's like, Grove.
When you look at the sheet of brands on Car Vu, which is the
The fun that I have.
S.
Masthead.
It's insane.
This ecosystem you've created, and I think you do you need to do a better job.
Of almost
Library ecosystem.
And it kind of the light bulb went off'cause he's a founder.
Right, he's growing an incredible brand and
Yeah.
Part of it I focus on
individuals and sometimes
We gotta bring the whole gang in.
To realize the strength of what we have.
It's sort of amazing because when a lot of people say the word brand
It's sort of related to taste and both of those are can be pretty nebulous.
But
you sort of are are like Paul McCartney or John Lennon, where like you've made enough hits where you're like, Okay, is this just art or is there some science behind it? No nobody wins the lottery seven times. Yeah. I
I mean that's quite high accolades to be in in any conversation that uses the the Beatles name, but there's always luck, guys. It's not like this you can't. You've got the dice has gotta roll your way a little bit.
But
If you haven't
Game plan, which I've sort of honed over time.
The on
flow in your favor. And so I've you know, I've created some mantras and some
Principles and so on and so forth that
I actually created
After the fact
'Cause you don't go in saying, All right, guys, I've got five mantras. You almost like you have a few hits, you're like, How did this happen? And then I rewind and go, Okay, this is kind of how it happened. Give us one. What what's one of the first ones you realize, like, Okay, all right, that this is one that matters. We gotta put that concrete.
Couple of big ones. One is
Influence the influencer.
So
You got a pot of money.
Right? One of them.
A hundred grand, a million, a hundred million, whatever you want to spend on your marketing budget.
Who do I get to?
But I can't get everyone.

Amazon has the budget to get to everyone. But most people when they start a company don't.
So
From my perspective it's
One in ten Americans and I say America'cause
Ninety hundred percent of my career actually is America.
In terms of success. So
This is the greatest country in the world to be an entrepreneur. I say that everywhere I go. I truly believe it. So in America, one in ten Americans influence the other nine.
The goal is to spot that one.
And that has evolved over time. So when I

Honestly, and I'm aging myself here, but some of the biggest influences and I'm talking about back in the day with like Sprite.
Even
And even violent water?
Was radio DJs.
Now, radio's dead and you guys are the heroes online, right?
But before you before you podcast kings came along.
Uh it was radio DJs. And so at one time in Vegas I picked down award show.
Annually.
And I would fly in the top.
Twenty five cities and the top
Two DJs from every city.
So you have fifty people coming in.
And
Every single artist that came
Two bah
Award show.
would want to go to this place'cause you could hit twenty cities in two hours.
It was almost like the cities came to you versus you traveling. And back then you're releasing an album, a new product, whatever it is.
You're right back.
And I did it back in the day on
a brand called Sprite. It's a corporate brand.
We did something cool. And then I did that with vitamin where
I took on all the DJs in the local markets and I hired people
On my team.
That felt that vibe.
Because in order to bomb with a D shirk it's not gonna work. So I hired people who kind of
In my which is my next mantra, who live the brand.
They didn't market the plant. They lived vibe and water.
That was their vibe.
And so
That's now evolved today.
To like the Alex Earls of the World or the
You know, if it's a music it's the fifty centers having a amazing resurgence, but now it's digital social media influences that were the early DJs and the keys to SPARP that one in ten.
So that's been a big sort of philosophy of mind every company we go into is who is that one in town.
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Back to the show.
Can you define what a brand even is?
I think a brand is something that allows a consumer
To have an emotional connection with a product.
So
This is just a can. Gratuitous uh
You know, product of certain.

I drink it, I like the product. Liquid's great.
But I gotta create an emotional bond.
What people
So they request a poppy.
They reach for a puppy.
And the I work for Coke back in the day and
One of the
Biggest line was a
Robert Woodruff was like
One of the godfathers of
Making coke orders today. He said
He wanted cope to be with an arms reach of desire.
Brand.
is creating that design.
Right. And then the distribution is putting it in arm's room's reach. You nailed it. Exactly.
Sam sent texted me a clip this morning of
when Poppy walked into Shark Tank. And at the time they're not called Poppy. They're called like
Mother or mothers or something like that. They're not a
Soda that tastes good. That's like prebiotic. They're uh apple cider vinegar. So it's amazing because it's like
You know when there's these documentaries and they're like
The dude who followed Kanye around ten years before he became famous at all. And you're like, I can't believe we're so lucky.
That this guy happened to just follow this young artist in Chicago
Who happened to become Kanye West. And so there's this thing where it's like
You see them come into the shark tank.
I think they have something like two hundred fifty thousand dollars in revenue. Some some
Two hundred to four hundred K of of annual revenue at the time.
Different brand, different drink.
No revenue.
All the other sharks go out. So it's you're you're in a bidding war with no one. Yeah, nobody. Nobody.
They uh they go, All right, sharks.
Taste this healthy drink. And they make people take a shot of apple cider vinegar and they're like, This is horrible. And they're like
Yeah, it is horrible, but it's great for you. Now what if it could be great for you d and also taste good?

product. Which is it was a really good actually pitch.
Yeah, the title of the video is um
Sharks disgusted by the poppy like they were spit it out. I can't remember a bit. So you got you got people sharks spitting out the product. You've got a terrible brand name. Mothers and cursive and it looks like a old like um sparkling wine or something like that. Yeah. Uh totally different formulation.
And you pick up twenty five percent of that company. I think Poppy sold
From
Billion and a half or something like that. No, no, come on. Not a too, but
Oh north of two. Okay. Unbelievable exit.
What happens?
And it's amazing that the whole thing was captured. What happens between the time you see it
What are you thinking then? And then what were the things that actually transformed that business?'Cause I think
That's a perfect like case study.
Yeah.
Let's go to phase one. So these guys come out. Every deal on Sharp Tank
That's a beverage.
Or food, but really beverage. Like I can do the range, but
Beverage is kinda my wheelhouse. I don't know, DNA gifted with that. So beverage comes out and like I I know they're looking at me.
Like Cuban's a bigger name than me. Kevin's a bigger name than me. You know. Lori's the queen of, you know
Uh digital and Q and Q V C, but Beverage they're looking at me.
And then these guys come out and like here we go again'cause we I'm now three seasons in, I'm like
You know.
Someone's gonna hit me up with some nonsense beverage, you know. And we had some real dumb ones along the way.
But the really good looking couple comes out, you know. Husband and wife, like straight out of central costing.
Like they look like Sam. You know, like this chisel good looking you know white boy. And uh I'm I'm I'm friends with Steven and we became friends because I DMed him and I just said
We look alike. Yeah. I swear to God. It does look a little bit like Stephen Harkin King. So this glittered two good looking guys come out, a guy and a and a lady. She's like, I don't know, eight months pregnant. She could deliver any second. So immediately I'm like
They've got Huffle.
So
One. Then they pitch the product and I'm like
Horrible packaging.
I don't like the brand name. You know, I like the word mother, but everyone has a mother. You can't trademark us
Not really a
Trademarkable thing.
But like let's try it.
So that
That
The train's running on that track, okay?
In the separate track in my head.
I'm a soda kid.
I've been looking for soda.
I grew up in Zambian Africa, right? So
In Zambia when he had three beverages coat
Sprite and Phantom.
That's it.
But I came off sodas, because sodas a ton of sugar. They're not good for you. They're no van, but in the back of my head, I've always been looking for soda I can feel good about.
But
I didn't go into the show thinking that.
But in the back of my head, that's the running track.
I try this.
Actually it was this one.
Ironically, it was the orange one.
And so for me
That it's still this is my top two. Orange is my favorite, and cream soda is my second. So funny. The two flavors I drank when I was a kid. It's amazing what
Forty years of years played it. It's throwing back to the nine, ten year old Ron. Anyway.
So I try the orange one and I'm like, Oh my God.
This is
Fanta meets Orangino.
We got it.
And like
This liquid is in my head takes me back.
This is my modern soda.
But I don't get excited because I know it's the minute I get excited.
These guys get excited.
And so
I think you were the last one to talk, at least in the edit. I don't know if that's actually how it was, but I thought that was incredible patience.
to let the other sharks play out before you chimed in,'cause obviously you would influence them.
Exactly right.
I did not. I specifically remained mute.
Because the minute I seemed vaguely excited and by the way
Even them.
Cuban and Bethany both turned to me and say, Ro, should we split this?

And I'm like
Kind of in a nice way, no.
Because
If this works
Which you did.
Why would I want to split it? And if it doesn't work, I'm fine to lose it, but
In the end.
I'm betting on myself, right? Right.
I like them.
Like I like Steven Allison.
But that's a very short light, like
I you know, we go up for dinner the next day I'm like, Oh god, they're horrible.
The first thing I did
When we got when we became partners, I shut it down.
I shut down mother.
And it was a tough conversation. And then basically
Steven, Allison, me and a lady on my team called Stevie
We basically co founded Bobby.
There was no puppy.
And
In my mind.
I wasn't focused on an apple cider vinegar beverage. I was focused on making this modern soda for today's use.
And so I'm like, Okay, if I love soda and everyone else loves soda, this is modern soda.
And so we kind of created the whole Malt and Soda category.
But I wasn't thinking apple cider vinegar. And so we shut mother down.
Stevie, myself, Alice Steven, and Stevie took charge of the packaging design actually.
We then all debated which is the best one to go with.
We voted on it and that's where Poppy came into play. What about the name? We had uh David Plastic come on who who named Blackberry and Swiffer and he w he gave us like a master class on naming product.
Popy is a is an incredible name.
Right, for a soda pop brand. Uh to to find that
Super easy to say, recognizable, fun. It almost feels bubbly in the name. Like
So I'm
Strategically creative.
Right. Stevie and my team is what I call tactically creators.
That sounds like something I would say when I don't want to do work. Yeah, good one.
So it's a triangle offense, right?
Allison Steven have created the product.
It's a great product.
But their their insight was
Apple cider vinegar, healthy healthy beverage.
My insight is I want soda.
So
What's America for So does pop, right? So that's uh everyone in England it translates less all the pop he's exploding in in the UK now, but
And and Stevie's goal was how does she take
What they had created, what my strategic gate game plan was, and create a name that rolls off the top.
Yeah, we had a bunch of them. At one point I even liked Mom and Pop.
'Cause I'm like it was a throwback to like
Mom and pop stores and all that.
And people told me it was stupid and they were right. But but then when they came out with Poppy
And Steve you presented, I'm like
Okay. Right.
Can we all right, let's go back to the right.
You only invested, I think, two hundred and fifty or or four hundred thousand dollars into Poppy.
And so it's really small business.
You shut it down at half a million in revenue and you rebranded it and restarted it as Poppy. Do you remember what was the revenue growth up until you exited for two billion dollars?
Yeah, so
And at this point I give Alice and Steven full credit because
Mother was that baby.
And to go to a founder and say good news, bad news.
Good news.
You know, I'm your partner.
Bad news was shutting down Mother.
Um, you know, we're not co founding Buppy together.
That takes a lot of faith.
On that part.
And
We launched.
In March of twenty twenty, right? With SAP.
I said guys
I don't want plastic'cause plastic's bad.
We can't do glass'cause it's inconvenient. We're gonna go back to cans.
Oh gee.
It's telegraph soda. I'm sitting sitting here drinking out of a can. We launched March of twenty twenty.
What happens in April?
Covid.
The world shuts down.
Yeah.
So
We
We've started to be a more digital company.
Because that's just the nature where life was.
But we tell about that.
Because then suddenly
All retail.
So
In our first year we did like a couple of million bucks only.
Because
The wall shutdown, which is still incredible for that.
But then we went from like
A couple of million to over half a billion.
In the next four years. So from
Twenty one to twenty
Five.
We
We exploded.
And did you put more money in in the beginning to
Push marketing or did you guys raise? What did you guys do?
Yeah, we kept raising. I mean there's I mean, beverage is expensive, by the way.
Like I put more money in, my fun cargo came in, so my business partner Bratt was like look
I believe in you. I don't
Get beverages early. If you get it.
Cavlo's gonna back it.
So we
Everybody went in, right? And so we kept backing it. We raised a chunk of money.
But everyone got a great return because of the exit number.
It's normally what you get in at, it's what you get out at. How much did you raise in sum?
What a word. I mean all in?
Forty maybe?
Wow. That mean that's amazing to go from that much.
I didn't realize you guys were that new.
So twenty roughly two thousand twenty one to two thousand twenty five, twenty six.
Zero to two billion dollar exit.
Yeah.
What was the most satisfying
When you had. Was it poppy or was it something earlier? Was there something
Where maybe even it wasn't as big financially, but just you just were proud of kind of the way you made it work.
No, Poppy hands down.
Because
Pump everything else I went then someone else
Had a product that I built build.
Here, Stephen Allison a creative mother and that it was brilliant. Without
the liquid that they had created, we wouldn't be anywhere, right?
But
I got in early enough to basically
co found Poppy with me and Stevie added to Alice and his TV in and it was amazing.
And so
I think that was satisfying because
I
I have the vision from the beginning.
I had a great
Team.
With
Steven Allison's TV, and then we brought in a CEO.
Because at some point I'm not an operator.
Allison and Steven super smart, but
also realised they weren't
Operators and so
Once we got to like thirty, forty million, we bought a guy called Chris Hall in.
And that guy's a legend.
I think one of the other lessons you have to learn as an entrepreneur
Is
Having him.
A a founder.
Uh and create a mind.
Doesn't always align with having
More often doesn't. The one guy I think was really good at it
Um
Cut.
From vital proteins.
Cut.
founded Vital Proteins. We partnered with him as well. And that guy was he was actually a rocket scientist, like legit.
So he was a founder and a brilliant operator, so that's you know, it's a unique rarity. But in this case we brought in Chris Hall.
And Chris Rand sparkling eyes.
So I'd spend a lot of time like
Coaching and uh
begging and then convincing and a combination of all of the above.
To get him over, but he was a game changer because
You need to operate. And he helped take it from like
Fifty to five hundred.
Man, it's still amazing how good you are at this. And and I think we should talk about that because
There's a handful of skill sets that are you you just I call'em ATM skills where you just become like a a moneymaker.
You know, like if you can um
create an audience, you're probably a moneymaker. If you could sell, you're probably a money. If you could do good branding, you're probably a moneymaker.
And you've done it many times in a row.
Where did you learn how to do this?'Cause I know you worked for Mars, you worked for Coke.
Is that where you learned how to do this and and can you teach us more about w
How it's done.
Actually it's interesting you bring up that point. It's it's actually three things.
Um
One is spotting stuff early.
Right.
One is building the brands.
And the other is actually how to sell'em.
And it's people forget the last part.
Because it there's there's a there's a big graveyard of brands that have got built, got a scale, but never fully exited.
Uh, and there's a bigger graveyard of those who just didn't go anywhere.

So take my learnings.
My learnings on Mars were
Less so'cause I was in manufacturing operations.
So my learning there was almost like the importance of supply chain operations, gross margin, like the boring stuff.
But people forget that if you don't have good gross margins, you cannot make money, and if you can't make money, you go bankrupt. And by the way
I've still made that mistake.
I had an incredible product called Chef's car.
It was a Juckie.
The full chomps like my buddy
Invested in Chomps and he and I would joke'cause we were like neck and neck.
And Chefs came out first.
And I just didn't have great gross margins and I should have focused more on that.
Chefs got shut down or got sold for nothing.
And Champs became a juggernaut, and so he keeps laughing at me.
But I think from from
From that perspective.
I learned from Moss a little bit. Yeah, and you still make mistakes.
With Coke, I reel I learned how to do
Uh disruptive marketing and branding.
'Cause I was lucky. I was in Sprite back in the heyday when we
You know, sign Missy Elliott and Kobe Bryant and
I did like a bunch of hip hop stuff and it was it was really cool.
And then I
Wasn't Powerade where Coke didn't care about it?
They said, Do whatever you want.
So I learned creative disruption early.
Even though I was in a corporate environment.
And then they fired me.
'Cause I was a little too disruptive.
And so I went to Vital Mortar.
And that's where I really start to learn how to and that's my second mantra.
Is
How to make brands part of pop culture.
There's a lot of guys who report the news.
Very few people make the news.
And so for me
With Vitamin Water Small Water, I started by making the news.
And that
Those brands became part of pop culture.
That that sounds cool, but what what does that mean? Make the news. I don't know how well I I'm too dumb to understand that.
So make the news. So
The first influencer mega influencer
Ownership deal I did. Because remember, everything before fifty was
very much a sponsorship deal, right? You sign a celebrity
They get in, that's the deal, right?
The equity ownership. Arguably Michael did it in a different way than like he so but that has come up later.
It wasn't Winnie Well known then. But with fifteen.
I didn't have the money to pay fifty. He was huge at the time, right?
And so I met with Vif and his manager, Chris Lighty, and actually there's two guys I was looking at.
for Vitam Water because Vitam Water was a great brand. It was a kind of a little bit
Upper East Side.
You know, New York preppy brand, it wasn't like nationwide cool. It wasn't getting shot in the face cool, rap about it. Yeah. Exactly. Although it was only eight times because one bullet went through twice. But anyway,
Uh so
Uh I I wanted hip hop and the two bigges in the world at the time.
Well, Curtis Jackson.
And uh the hover.
It was Jay Z.
Right. So those are the two guys who are like the biggest names.
And so I call my buddy Seth Rocks game.
And I said S
You're more connected in this world than I am.
Who can I get to?
Seth could have got to both, but he had a much better relationship.
With Chris Lighty, fifties manager.
Say put me on text with fifties manager. A lot of it's also for artists, it's their manager's getting it.
So Chris got it straight away. He got the product, he got Fifth.
You think we've not done a deal, we're about to do a deal with Reebok?
But I'll kill that deal, I'll do this with you.
That's how I got connected.
And fifty as we see today is clearly an entrepreneur.
Uh, also don't mess with him'cause he will come after you with a vengeance. So I think that he got it and I said, I got I don't have money.
But I can give you skin in the game.
And he immediately said, Okay.
I'm in.
Um
I thought I was gonna make him X?
I kinda th he made 10X.
Because
I I did the math wrong, basically. He he got what, like one, two percent, something like that in the company? I can't tell you exactly what he got, but he'cause we have a deal, I don't give the exact number and he doesn't kick the shit out of me. But um but he made a lot because honestly, I gave him enough
Ecco day.
For him to make good money
If we sold the company for four hundred to five hundred million. That was our goal of Iron Water.
Like I remember Michael Boney was
The co file of item water was like
Bro, put it up as born if we get to this, this, this
We're gonna get to a hundred and fifty million in revenue. We're gonna sell for four fifty.
Without you you can't reveal it'cause Curtis Jackson will Curtis Jackson you but will he is it like would it be crazy to give someone ten percent of a company like that? Yeah.
Ten percent will be too high.

But what we sold for four billion.
So you can do the math on, you know, what he would have made.
All right, let's take a quick break and I got a question for you. When a buyer asks AI for a solution like yours, does your business come up? Most companies have no idea. And by the time they found out, they've already lost the deal to another company that did.
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It seems like that uh you know, the kind of the influence the influence of things obviously works.
Obviously makes sense.
Um
But also obviously goes wrong sometimes, right? Um you know, for example, this podcast
We got bought by HubSpot. HubSpot was like, Yo, we we want to reach entrepreneurs, we want them to use our software.
So they went to us because we influence a lot of entrepreneurs. If we influence a million entrepreneurs, we're valuable to them and many other brands.
And so but there's many people who
Get that partnership wrong, you know.
Celebrities are busy, they're
They're divas, they don't really care. Maybe you didn't make it incentive enough and it's hard to claw back. So like
I guess how confident were you and what made it go right versus go wrong?
I think what makes it go right, it happened with fifty
Uh happen with Jennifer Addison on Smartwater.
And I think it happened most recently for me with Alex Oh.
On Poppy?
Uh and the connective tissue that's
Fifty Jonathan Alex will share.
Is belief in the brand.
Creative connectivity.
Like they creatively got the brand and connected with they believed in it, they they creatively connected with it.
And they went above and beyond.
Those are the three things.
When
Consumers'cause consumers are smart.
No, okay, that's the real deal.
Right, like Alex loves Poppy. I see the cool shit she's doing with it.
I don't she's probably the smartest twenty four year old I've ever met.
Where she knows a brand, knows a DNA.
Makes me feel old like she is on it, you know?
Love of the brand, cultural um
Creative connectivity.
And then going above and beyond.
When you're looking at these deals
What would you say are the traits that the winners have in common?
And what would you say the traits are of the losers? So for example, we had this guy named Chad who started um Groons on and he shoulder.
Yeah, so he sold it for two billion dollars, I th one point two one point two billion dollars in
Thirty.
five months or something insane.
And we were like
And he was like basically he was like, I called my shot. I worked at a PE firm and I realized that the TAM needs to be big. My CAC to um L T V needs to be one to three. Like he he's like I kinda had it down to a little bit of a science. He didn't say it that way, but that's how I interpreted it.
What's the science in your

Not for investing, but for building a winning product.
Yeah, it's similar. I mean
One, let's start with big categories, right?
Uh
At Kavu, our game plan.
Is
We're basically trying to
In a nutshell.
Upgrade.
The products that every everyday Americans are using.
With better quality.
Right, so
I'm not
recreating the wheel.
I'm just giving you a better wheel.
That makes sense.
And so
Take the biggest tabs.
In food, in beverage, in beauty, in pep.
And a cov we're like, Okay, well, you like soda?
Maybe a Coke or a
Found is not good for you, we're gonna upgrade you to a poppy.
Do you like pet food?
Burnt extruded kibble.
That has very low nutrient value, ain't good.
We're gonna give you farmer's dog.
Right.
The goal is how do you give Americans what they're used to
But elevate it so they can feel better about themselves.
What are the big Tams that are
left where you're like, Mm, we still haven't found the winning
kind of brand or product in a certain category. Like if I go to that grocery shop or I go to the supermarket, where do you see the opportunities right now? Which aisle.
Everywhere.
Let me explain why.
Go down every aisle. Next time every grocery by the way, my wife gets super pissed with me'cause she sends me out to get stuff in the grocery store and like two hours later, she's like, Where the hell have you been? Like, honey, this is my business. Like my dumbass wandering around the grocery store figuring out what's broken.
But
That's the scenario. Go down and say, Okay, would I buy all these products?
And my guess is if you go to a traditional grocery store or most American shop today, you'd probably say, No, no, no, no. Yes.
So
You have seven no's before you get to a yes.
Go down the candy aisle.
Okay. I have a investment in a brand called Skinny Dip. Have you heard about have you heard of it? Yeah, I I love those. Yeah, this is so addictive.
Right.

Is okay. Wait chocolate. It's this almond uh almond time is as big.
Creating
Sweet treats.
That don't have guilt.
Right.
Is this big.
So skinny head up, chocolate couple albums.
The brilliance of the founder was after X number of years, she's like, This shit ain't working. It's doing fine, but my TAM is not big enough, right? To the point you made with Jad?
She pivoted.
She created peanut butter cups.
She created coconut bites.
I should create a wafus.
You wanna name me the three products that do that?
Resist?
I'm enjoying.
And KitCap.
By the way, all three of these products sub two grams of sugar.
So now
I can have and I do.
A coconut bite every day.
with my coffee or after dinner because I need a s with sweet fix.
But
Zero shit given.
Because it's two grams of sugar.
You don't care if two grams of sugar.
You give it kid, do you have it?
Ten grams.
Twenty grams.
Your mind starts clicking a little bit.
Is it possible to even be more specific when you're walking around the aisle
Is there a spot where you're like
This product should be right here on this shelf and it's not. So go go to the confection shelf.
And say, What will I eat?
And I look down, I'm like, almost nothing.
'Cause everything is fully loaded with sugar.
And it's really highly processed.
So now
Take the
Processed down. There's a lot of good stuff that's less processed, better ingredients. Can we agree on that?
There is. However, the sugar content is still high. So now if I evolve from
Horrible like
An alter ego chocolate or a huge chocolate.
They're great.
But they still got a high sugar content.
So
You ask me what I do. I go sit at the entire confection shelf.
I put my arms up and look around, what would I eat?
The only thing that I can eat is skinny and maybe one other product because
I feel good about it.
So let me ask you a question. You had this great line where you go, um the shelf space is the original algorithm.
The same way that content creators are constantly trying to figure out how to get on the YouTube shelf or uh the Instagram shelf. How do I get discovered?
There.
It's even harder.
Arguably, because there's a m very like mafia like
business practices that occurs in behind the scenes of these shelf spaces. Like I've walked through
one of our events that we do, the uh guys have like brands at Target or or Safeway or whatever. We walk and we do store walks and then they explain, you know,
Mr Beast will explain how the Candy Isle works. He'll explain Mars and Hershey's and the tactics they use and
But how the color you're color blocking your section, et cetera, et cetera. So you get this sort of PHD.
In each aisle.
I think his market's a little bit different.
So you know, uh you sell like let's say skinny dip just y a little higher price point, better for you is like the bigger angle. Whereas you know, he's I think the number like the one of the fastest growing brands in Walmart. Right. And so his price point has to be a big constraint.
So he has to play a slightly different game, but he's doing a lot of stuff with like
His better for you isn't in the ingredients, it's in the business practices. So like we don't use child labor and the cocoa farms and
You know, things like that, which is a uh you know
He cares, he's trying to get everyone to care. Uh will it will it change people's purchasing purchasing decisions, I think is a question.
But the I guess the the thought process is like
How do you get the shelf space?
Well I think so I'll reverse engineer.
One of the advantage I bring to the mix, right? We talked a lot about influence and so on and so forth.
The second influencer and probably as important.
His retail buyers.
And I've now established because I've brought up run of great products and exits and scale.
I have great connections with top people at Walmart, Target, and
Albertson's and Crover, et cetera.
And just maintaining those relationships are key.
'Cause when I bring a product that I've invested in or Kavu's invested in
They will give us the shelf space. And I think that's a lot of entrepreneurs come to us.
Because they're like, Okay, great.
I can do X, Y, and Z, but
If I just get
one meeting with the top guard Walmart.
That could influence you know.
It inflect my business in a way that's unique. So
I have the relationships now.
However
Retailers are smart and they are actually closer to the consumer.
than big corporations.
So they
Are seeking the products of tomorrow.
While maintaining what I call the brands of yesterday.
Because
You can't eliminate the brands of yesterday. Too much money, too much revenue.
At the same time you then also have to bridge
And Sam, to your point.
I mean take Poppy.
I mean
A regular soda is probably a buck for a can.
Right?
A poppy is probably a buck.
Sixty, seventy, eighty, depending where you buy it, ninety.
What do you pay the extra fifty cents, sixty cents, ninety cents?
Probably.
I'm not it's not like I'm buying him.
You know, uh how uh BMW versus I'm buying a
A Toyota. It's like a twenty thousand, thirty thousand difference there. Here it's a
Thirty, sixty, ninety cents difference. So a big part of what I do also is when I go to retail.
Is whilst the product might be premium.
I still want to try and appeal to a large amount of Americans.
In their ability to reach those products.
Where they're attainable.
And so I think that
The the retailers are looking
for brands that are obtainable, even though it's a slightly premium, that are the future brands.
You said something earlier that was that was kind of important. You go, the third thing I do is how to sell it. And there's a huge value swing at the end.
Yeah, I've done when me and Sam sold our companies, it's kind of amazing. He works six years, seven years, eight years.
And then fifty percent of the value is gonna be how good you are at this MA thing at the end that you've never done before, but it's the biggest deal of your life.
And so I've seen that firsthand, how important that is, and how it is a separate skill set for an entrepreneur.
That you're very low repetition and so it's hard to even get good at it. Yeah, it's it's it's a really unfair advantage because a uh a a reputable buyer has done this many times and it doesn't matter it doesn't matter to them necessarily if it fails, they'll just get fired, worst case scenario.
Uh, but for you it like changes your life.
Completely.
How do you go get Coke to buy a company for
two billion dollars. What you what do you go what do you do? How do those conversations happen?
Uh how do you negotiate those deals?
And why do they buy'em for so much?
So that's again why
I mean I've established and I don't have relationships everywhere, but
You know, I have a relationship with a lot of big CPGs, right? Cove, Pepsi.
Hushy Mondalay's
You know.
Um KDP
So I've I've done that over time. A lot of these guys have either
Worked for
Worked with over time.'Cause I've been
Doing this now for twenty five years in the industry, right? Maybe longer.
And so
relationships with the top guys is critical and so
You know.
Uh with one bomb.
I walked them in back in the day to Hershey.
To the CEO of Ash at time, right?
I didn't negotiate the Vite and Water deal. Uh the founder of Vitan Water, Darius did.
Brilliantly, and I learned from him, by the way. So I'm on the sidelines.
Watching this guy go to town. I brought Coke to the table.
So I call Coke'cause I used to work for them.
Sandy Douglas is a mentor of mine. He brought the CEO, he was the president.
And they negotiated with Darius, and I saw what he did.
And I learned from that.
out of that negotiation, what what was one thing you picked up?
If you have a great brand
You
It's okay to be slightly unhinged.
On your expectation.
Like when he said the number starts with a four, I almost fell off my chair.
But did he just say four? And I thought four B?
And Coke came out back at four point one. I'm like, All right guy
He you know
I I
Sometimes you get nervous'cause there's a fine line, guys. This is
Sean, you made such a great point.
You spend
Anywhere from four to
ten, fifteen years building your baby.
I mean
The finish line is where the
When the money is made.
And so sometimes you get scared because if you overreach
Which I've also done.
And you fail, you might be catching a falling knife. But if you under the reach
Then you keep kicking yourself with how much you left on the table.
Dial in on that. That's interesting because A, knowing if you have a great brand is actually
A bit challenging, but overreach and underreaching, that is also very nuanced.
Is there like is there like some more specific details that you can give on how you know
Like, for example, do you look at comps and you say, We're just gonna be the top quartile, w what do you do?
Yeah, it's a very good question.
Timing's everything, by the way.
Right.
Like
Popy sold for half of what Vitam wanna did.
Except.
Vitam puppy grew faster than vitamin water.
Is a bigger scale brand than vitamin What ever was.
But timing was different, right?
At that time.
There was a willingness
And the money was more liquidity was greater and greater. To pay more.
Right. So and risks were different. So I think
Same with tech valuations, right? People were investing in
Twenty
Twenty twenty one to I'd bunkers valve, then slowed down and now AI is
Also not so there's a there's a timing mechanism. So
You should have belief and faith in who you are.
But do not always benchmark against the biggest number you've seen. And that's a danger entrepreneurs have. They're like, oh
This company sold for seven times revenue. I'm going for seven. And if I don't get it, I'm out. I'm like, bro, hey, take it easy.
Beauty's in the eye of the beholder.
And at some point
When you're ready.
You're gonna have X number of beholders.
And if they say your beauty is six hundred million
That's your beauty.
Now you can take a risk and pass.
And wait for a bigger number?
And that's okay.
But
The groups that pass and wait for a bigger number?
A few and far between.
And they don't always work out. Some do.
I also think that there's a there's definitely like a a Jesuit quoi. There's a there's a showmanship that is involved here. It's very I've only I've known you now for
Uh fifty seven minutes. You have it.
You have a likeability, a charisma, whatever it is you want to call it.
Are you in the room negotiating these deals?
I am some I am. So
With Poppy, uh we brought up it's also good to you have to have a banker.
And bankers have done this, right? So get a good banker
You know, get good rap. So we had Goldman Sachs uh with with Poppy.
I built a great relationship with them.
They actually brought Pepsi to the table initially.
And
Without getting into it, the number on the offer was inadequate. So I did
What
I said is a risky move, which is I walked.
'Cause I didn't like the construct of the deal.
Uh and then someone else came to the table.
I also walked'cause I didn't like the construct of the deal.
And if you probably speak to Steve and Allison, they were probably getting nervous at this point.
Because you know, I was blessed to have had exits before.
They hadn't had any and even Stevie.
Was losing it at one point.
Because they're like this is life changing money.
That Rose saying no to
But I just didn't like the construct'cause it wasn't a full buyout the
I know.
Third time's a shown, so when
Pepsi came back.
I ended up negotiating that directly with them.
Did it change your life too?
Yeah.
It's yeah, uh you know, you you when you have a massive win like this, you always have to step back and realize how blessed you are.
not take it for granted, see what you could do for others and those around you. And a good thing for me was
I let a lot of people into the deal.
So it wasn't just me, I had
Family, friends, one of my closest childhood friends was in the deal.
And so when you affect other people beyond yourself.
Uh that's that's huge. Yeah.
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You said uh a bunch of things earlier that I wanna
Uh
Ask you like
The same question, but with a different caveat.
Because sometimes I'll be like, Hey, how do you
sell this company. You're like, Well, I call the guy, I know him. How do you get on the shelf? Uh Well, they know me and I know them.
And like that's true.
And great.
And then extreme advantage today, but it two two problems. One
You didn't wake up. You weren't born with that.
You earned that somehow.
Uh and the second is it's not, you know, most entrepreneurs don't have that advantage.
if they don't partner with you, you know, just in general, people have to figure out how do you survive. No one's gonna come save you.
Do you have an insane hustle story from the beginning? Cause that's what gets me excited. After this, I'm gonna go work.
And uh nothing fires me up more than a good hustle story.
You have to have hustle.
At every stage.
By the way.
So I'll give you a bumpy story, which is later I've had a bunch of exits, but I'm still hustling because guess what?
People change out of roles in corporations. So
When I say I know people
Historically I've used bankers, I've used brokers, I've used people in the industry, which you have to use as an entrepreneur. You've got to build a relationship with with everybody.
So that they get you in the room.
And then when you get your shot, you make it work. So I'll give a shout out to my buddy Danny Stepper. And if you know Danny
Danny's uh kind of a legend of the beverage industry.
I went to the beverage for them.
Just finished yesterday. It's probably the best beverage conference.
In any any beverage entrepreneur should be there. The best beverage in America.
And
I I went there two years ago.
And Danny said, Ro, would you speak?
I said yes.
I'll speak.
But
There's a buttless thing.
I need a Walmart and a target meeting.
While I'm at your conference.
And he had
Some of the lead guys from Walmart and Target.
They don't know me.
Like I mean, they know of me, but it's not like
Just'cause I walk in, they're still Walmart. They're like, bro, screw you, this we're Walmart.
And so I went in
And I danced.
Me, Allison.
Chris Hall, the f uh the CEO. And I danced. And I danced the modern soda dance.
Because we were sucking wind at warm art, we're doing everything else, and I'm like this my one shot.
And I came in.
And I painted the vision. I said, Guys
This is not prebiotic soda. This is modern soda for tomorrow's generation, and I made a full story.
And the light bulb went off at Walmart's head.
And behead by Will Amazing Guy.
Right away.
Believe in the vision.
Scott behind it. His boss Melanie
was a rock star at Walmart, accelerated it.
From twenty twenty five into end of twenty four.
And Poppy did this.
That was the moment Poppy went into explosive growth mode.
And I'm doing the hustle.
I'm doing the Dons. And by the way, I've been price successful.
But if you come in with an ego and you don't want it to dance with retailers, regardless who you are
They don't give two shits.
I know that uh Kavu is incredibly successful now.
I know that I I believe it's many billion dollar funds. You've had multi billion dollar exits. And I know that you started like in the Mars factory of like I think you said counting M and Ms.
The show is called My Sorry, Twix. Uh the sh the show is called uh My First Million. I don't know like
the middle ground.
What did you do to make your first million? Because was it investing your own money in brands? Was it because you got equity and vitamin water?
My first million.
So I got fired from Coke.
Um too creative disruptive.
And I went to this no name company.
cool vitamin water. In fact I send a bunch of product to my friends and then even drink it. That's the Powered Brand, by the way.
They didn't drink it and two years later the same jackass has called me, Ro, vitamin Water is huge. My kids love it. I'm like, dude, I sent that to you two years ago, you never said shit to me. Anyway.
So
I put my own money in. I borrowed from my dad, so I'm broke as a joke.
And I borrowed from my dad.
And I get equity.
And so I went from
You know.
Fumes on my bank account.
'Cause I was basically spending everything I was making.
to the Vinewood exit. And that was my
First million.
Mm.
More than that, but
It was putting everything that I had. And I think that's honestly where you make a big bet.
You put everything into it.
And if it works out, that's kinda where you get your biggest paydays.
Did you raise money for a fund right after that? I did my own thing. So I did vitamin Water, Small Water.
I exited.
I had my own money. So what's the phrase they say you invest off your balance sheet? Some bullshit finance phrase. So anyway, yes, I invest off my balance sheet, meaning I went in solo.
Rohan into Vita Coco.
Into buy, into pop chips.
And Stevie was my right hand wing woman in this case.
And so she was my
Ma she learned marketing from me, we did it together and now
She's the head of marketing for Carvoon.
That's really interesting. And the what I'm asking is really personal. So you can avoid it or you can give as much information as you want. But I find that to be cool. And there's a lot of people listening who are like, I would like to lake a little bit of money and spend a little bit of money doing what this guy's doing. That's badass. I don't want to start a fun yet.
Are you able to give any type of numbers as to what you had be f when you started investing in PopChi and all these companies? Yeah, I got I can give you a range. I was investing anywhere from
Probably half a million to two million.
That's a shitload for an angel investment. Yeah. I wasn't that smart, dude. I was a little bit unhinged. I uh
Long term, I worked out great. I don't advocate you go that heavy. Were you really rich? No. I was just I was a
I think I bet on myself a little too much.
So yeah, I had a lot more money than that, but I think you have to be willing to lose
If you're gonna win.
Did you tell yourself like okay, I'm I'm willing to lose
Ten million bucks, but I'm gonna bet I'm gonna bet on myself to go make a few concentrated bets. Did you did you sort of mentally partition like this is losable money, or you just you were just going and you didn't even think about it. A lot of stress. So basically I was kind of doing the math. I'm like, Okay, I'm in for this, I'm in for this, I'm in for this.
And then like
You know, X years later, I'm like, Well
You know.
I mean you know, I'm in for ten, but I've made, you know, ten times that, so I think I'm good.
You know I'm saying so it's like it's but it's organic. What percent what princip for for the principal, not the markups, what percent of your liquid net worth was in private deals.
Yeah a lot.
I also I sh really should have done a better job with my public.
I was very like into my private'cause I'd made my money on private, so
It far too high. Was it like all?
No, no. It's B Barry about a third, though. I mean I guess okay.
I don't know, like I don't know. It was a decent amount. I can't remember exactly. I was rolling heavy. I was like in my thirties.
And like Plubchips is a great brand.
And I bet on that.
But I didn't understand the importance of a pref stack.
So you were just like making bets and then like going out and hustling on your behalf. You're like, hey, I'm going to beverage for him and I'm just gonna figure out how to wheel and deal a little bit. Yeah, I was working with these companies.
Like I would help the pop chips guys with influences with you know all with
marketing or team, like I'd bring in the head of sales, the head of marketing or You're free you were like a free hire a little bit. I was yeah, I was like I'm like, let me in, I'll help you out. Sometimes I got equity for helping.
And so
The good news is my hits in in v Vita Cocoa, the coconut water
Bye.
Vital proteins.
And Poppy
Far outstripped.
Whatever
The the order of winners was vitamin water, you did that with. You did it with
Smart water. And then what was the order, the next five deals?
Uh I did vitamin Sma.
Did I do Vina Coco.
The coconut water, which is great. Cubans' an incredible operator. Did that axe it?
Shit, the guy's gone worth the company's worth two and a half billion on the public stock stock market. Oh wow, I didn't know that. With a thing like coconut water.
Right, uh like my my business partner, Ben, he's been trying to get me to drink
Friggin' banana water. He's like, Oh, banana water. And I d it's nasty. Can't believe he likes it, but he's like, banana water, that's the next coconut water. I'm like, I don't think it is.
How do you spot the real trends versus the false trends? Are you just trusting your own taste buds?
Or is it
Some research you're doing? Are you watching what high schoolers are doing? Like what are you doing to s figure out real trend versus fizzle out trend? Yeah, taste buds in time.
Coconut water wasn't a coconut water town. It was a hydration town.
Mm. Right. Taste buds and maybe it's bad because I'm
Of Indian origin, I like coconut water, but
Look, let's be honest. I got in early
I got out at a seven hundred million dollar valuation.
Right. So
I got in at I don't know, thirty, so I mean
Twenty times my money.
The things now worth
North of two billion.
So I didn't have the vision that Mike has, who's a CEO founder.
That this could be north of a two billion dollar public company. No chance I had that vision.
I was'cause to me the Tam was limited by the taste of coconut water in America. So I sometimes we're knowing when to hold'em, we're knowing when to fold'em. So I got out
I made good money.
I c I will never begrudge
The w money that I could have made I but I got it.
I was out on that one.
But then
You know, but then I got into buy
And I
uh rode by all the way, and the founder Ben Super Smart
And he I got him introduced to KDP.
And he built a brilliant relationship with the CEO of KDP.
And then sold that for one point seven billion.
I think one of the great tests of marketing is can you sell water?

How do you sell water?
Right, what's the the the m there's a marketing genius about figuring out how to sell water and not just once
How to sell it many times in many different ways. And so I've only done one water, by the way. I've done many beverages, but only one water.
Okay, well so vitamin water, not a water, but vitamin water is flavored right? Poppy is flavored.
Vitaco, Bye, they're all flavored.
Like when you
Great water?
I still don't know how the hell I did that, but um I'll take a crack.
The founder Darius created Vitam uh smart water.
With a really good story which is vapour distilled water.
It's how water's made.
Yeah.
In the world, right?
Water evaporates from the ocean, goes up.
Hydrogen, oxygen separate.
All the impurities fall out. It comes back

Before it enters the atmosphere, before it hits the ground.
That's pure water.
That was the initial vision behind Smallwood.
The packaging was not great, it was invisible. So I read the package. The current package was me and my team with sits on shelf today.
Then we did the influence of strategy.
And I felt that.
Evan was the only player
In America that was in premium water. But it's a French company. It was in plastic, being shipped across the ocean. It didn't make sense, and neither did Fiji being shipped from basically Fiji.
Like why can't we have a premium American water?
The
Has
And the thing is your water's a badge. When you walk around with the water more than anything else, it's a little bit of a reflection of you.
Right? That's why home who cares?
You buy the
Case backs at Costco and
twenty four packs for like two dollars. But when you're walking around you want a little bit of a
A different badge
With the team I had
But the Jennifer Aniston became the face, the brand, the the new packaging we did.
Smart became this like
Go to
Accessory particularly for women.
And the brand took off. And I think
But Cokeboard Vitamin Water, if you ask them today, the brand that that has worked out for them is smart water, not vitamin. And is what is there something to this idea of placement? So like I remember when Beats by Dre came out.
And it was this headphone brand.
Just like many other bows and others, but instead of going for audiophiles, everywhere you saw it was basically hip hop artists and athletes walking into the stadium. And it became like synonymous with like the pregame lock in.
Associated with the coolest athletes and and and artists.
And uh
That was amaz they created billions of dollars of value.
By a s by that association of that placement of the pre game of the walk in, at least for me.
Um and I think that uh I I've read stories about Grey Goose and and some of the liquor brands where
They would put it in the limousines of the afterparties of the Oscars and just where it was seen was almost just as important as the story of how it was triple filtered and distilled, because nobody actually ends up knowing that shit. They just see where it's seen. Um, did you ever use that tactic or what is that?
That was huge for me back in the day.
So now this strategy is done really through social digital.
Right. So digital influences when
When
The m all top sororities are running around.
posting poppy and having it at the Sorority kickoff parties. I have an army of
Amazing college ambassadors and
Poppy is the number one drink on college campuses. The m modern day like Red Bull playbook, basically. Yeah, but it's kind of a better for you feel good vibe and definitely works better for women than, you know, like from a from a connection standpoint. So but back in the day
I did this with
The Oscars with the Golden Globes.
Smart water was the first water on the table at the Golden Globes before they're pouring out of just the and so I did a deal with them. So suddenly every table you go to, you're seeing a smart water there.
And then Vinaman, I used to sponsor mainly because I wanted to go to the parties. So Patrick White's still I found out Patrick is too big time now, but
Patrick.
You could go the coolest.
Post.
Uh Oscar parties.
Um
Uh Oscar and VMA uh golden dog parties.
in LA so just for me to get access to those things, I would sponsor them, but the good news is
All the I remember going to one and it was back in
But I call round one of
J Lo and Afflect dating.
And I'm at the party and like J on half like a
And
Everyone was drinking vinyl water back then. This is like two thousand and
Three, you know?
Two thousand and four. So I think you're dead right in the early days.
The the especially with products they've got to appear in people's lifestyle.
Areas.
As both physic and digitally.
You're a hustler. I didn't I didn't realize how big of a hustler you are. If you lose your hustle, you lose your edge. Like the guy who Sean and I know, Gulrez.
Who's the CEO of uh
Jim Conofin Foods.
Like he's like, bro, you are bloody intense. Like when I get into sessions with him, he's like, I thought you would just chill down, you're a father, you're successful. I'm like, bro, it's go time. Like we're building your empire. Let's you know, there's no uh that you gotta have a hustle mode. And I think also founders respect that.
So I wanna ask you a a little bit of a different question. I'm obsessed with brands that last a long time. I'm also a massive American history buff.
And some of the best brands in America, you know, they've been around for over a century. Coke, Snickers, Ms, like brands that you've worked with. I think Mars is like a fifty billion dollar year business that's family owned. Hershey's is run by I think run by a family trust. I think they do something like ten or twenty billion year in revenue. And these brands
You know, everyone's talks about getting healthy, but like Risa's probably isn't gonna go away for the next fifty years. Coke
It's probably not gonna go away for a hundred years.
And also you've worked with startups. Is there anything that
I or Sean or the listener can learn uh from these old big companies that have been around for a hundred plus years.
Yeah, the they do a very good job of
Two things. Uh
Mm.
They're managing their installed base.
So they have fantastic retail presence.
And they do in my opinion when I
Great marketing.
to maintain relevance for their brands. If Amazon was shocked
How well they do it.
In a world where technically you shouldn't be eating or drinking any of those products.
However.
Where they are smart and I give Pepsi credit for this.
They do go out and buy the future as well.
Like Pepsi bought Poppy not'cause it's a
Apple cider vinegar beverage because they're seeing the vision.
But this could be.
Right up there. Like Pepsi
Mountain Dew, Poppy.
That should be their s their their s soda lineup and choose what you want. If you feel like having a Pepsi.
Great. And but the growth is all coming, Sam, from the zero sugar product. So it's not coming from core Coke or core Pepsi. It's Pepsi Zero, yeah. Correct. Pepsi Zero's crushing it, Coke's crisc. And so Poppy fits into that realm. So
They see that.
You still maintain your legacy, but you have to make sure
you pick up the future, otherwise you will get left behind.
And so I think you're seeing it like you don't leave a butcher boy
Greens, right?
Like that they're buying the future. There's a lot of MA. Hush just born Lesser Evil. Like that they are buying the future.
And I think
They but they're getting a little savier and a little wiser in how they do it. Before they would build
Get brands that
I don't think we're built to last. And now to your point, Sam.
I think they're trying to find brands that are built to last. And for me
If we look at all the exits we've been a part of, whether those brands continue growing forty percent or just maintain a good scale.
vitamin small
Popy Vital Proteins by
Farmer's dog, like all these are still once upon a farm.
You know, we IPO'd that brown we see they're all still there.
And they're they will be here.
If managed right for the next
Ten, twenty, thirty, forty years.
Sean had a good question that he was telling me that he had for you, but I'm gonna ask it.
And uh cause a guy he has a guy to it, yeah. I am. He has a guy to it. He's a gifting.
Yeah, I'm gonna steal it from up. And uh it was basically um if a young guy were to go and shadow you
What would they be uh surprised about how you spend your time?
Shadow you for like a day or a week, yeah.
Quick question, Sam. So a few things.
I think what allows me th I think they will
Be a little surprise.
Of how I can change lane so rapidly.
So part of my
success and part of my
Failures.
Ha uh around my A D D
So I can go from
five different company conversations with different founders.
To then figuring out
the plumbing problem in my house to the new house that I'm trying to buy.
But getting screwed on with the price. Like I can change lanes and gears very rapidly.
And be fully engaged. And but by the end of it, I'm I'm exhausted, right? My brain shut off and then I
Have to watch.
T V to unlock to
To sort of calm it down.
So one of the things they'll find is how I rapidly able to change change lanes.
The second thing is
Even though I personally don't operate
At a detailed level personally.
They'll be surprised how detailed I get.
With the brands and
Founders I partner with?
Because I have great recall.

And so
They're surprised sometimes the founders think I've forgotten something.
From like a month ago when I asked about her.
You can ask Ulres, he's a classic but I'm like
Three weeks ago we spoke about this. Where are you on this? He's like Sh How did you remember that? He thought because I forgot


And retain info.
Because you have to go deep with founders'cause if you go shallow, you're not helping them out. It's gotta be meaningful stuff that helps impact their business.
And the third thing, um
'Cause I'm blessed to be living a great lifestyle. I've I mean, I'm living the American dream, right? I'm an immigrant that came here and and did well.
But I also am able to do high low, right? So from
Way I eat, I mean I'm you know
the taco stand or where I where I go I go and do the grocery shopping. I'm not sending
Someone I'm like, I'm there, I'm picking stuff up. Uh'cause I think
If you don't live in reality you
Yeah.
can't operate in reality, you kind of end up in this
One percent world.
Which doesn't help.
Uh
When you're dealing with products that deal with
Or all Americans.
I was talking to
a a buddy of ours who's a a a brilliant marketer probably sold a billion dollars of products online
And he uh I opened up my laptop.
And he saw that I had ad blocker on and he's like How could you
He's like you're a marketer. He's like you have
Study your craft.
Yeah, through every ad. He he logged in another guy logged into his Facebook and he's uh on Facebook, he's a woman.
Uh like his profile is his, but he d told Facebook I'm a woman'cause he's like I want to see what they're marketing to a forty year old woman in America. That's the that's the prime target. I need to see who's
What's the messaging? And I was like, there's levels to this game of intensity and detail
What do you stink at?
Where's your weakness in business?
I think sometimes I may have too much belief.
You know when you love a product?
And you like
You kind of have faith that blinds you a little bit.
To the
to the whether it's the whether it's the founder, you
You think is amazing or
Whether you love the product and you're not overly focused on the gross margins because
Yeah, I'm a big
Field of dreams guys, build it and they will come.
But if you don't build it correctly
I feel
The dream won't come. And sometimes when I love something a lot.
I end up
Um ignoring some of the red flags.
So I think uh
Passion is a super important
Elements.
But

Passion at all costs can be dangerous.
Let's leave it with this. Uh
While we're in the business of stealing questions, Patrick O'Shaughnessy has this great question he asked the guest at the end of every one of his uh
And that's like the best episodes. And he s he asked the guests, he said, What's the kindest thing anyone's ever done for you in your career?
And uh I'm just curious, what what what comes to mind when I say that? Like what's the kindest thing anyone's ever done for you?
I understand any words done for me.
Sh a shout out to a guy. I was uh
Probably two of them.
I've been adopted a couple of times.
One time.
Uh was at uh Coca Cola.
When I was about to leave'cause they gave me a brand called Box Woodbeer, you know that?
Like remember I told you I have a few mantras.
The other has become a part of pop culture.
The third one is live the brand.
Well, I can't live box root beer. I don't understand it. I grew up in Zambia, I bloody hate root beer.
So I was on Sprite, someone demoted demoted me.
Uh and I ran box and
Two guys.
And I was about to leave and my career would have been toast'cause
I was going to some travel dot com bullshite that ended up folding.
And uh two guys, a guy called Todd Pottman.
And a guy called Daryl Carbon kind of
Her that was leaving saved me.
Said we'll give you something different. Don't leave.
They put me on Powerade?
And bad.
Change the trajectory of
of my career once.
And then when I got divine water
I was doing great. I took over all the marketing, but
Yeah, the founder and I
kinda had different visions on how to market.
Um
And I don't think he liked my approach, but
I was what was bringing the heat to the brand.
I did think he wanted to fire me at one point.
And so Mike Rapoli, who was the president of the company
Change reporting structure and put me under him.
So that'cause he and I got along great. He said, R look
Take ego aside. Either you want to report to the CEO and get fired or report to me and I got you'cause now you're my guy.
And so I said
I want money, I don't want ego, so I reported to Mike.
And I still ran marketing, but
Yeah.
Definitely could have me, right? I I was an employee at will.
Um that would have also changed the tra trajectory of my career.
So this is only the second podcast that you've done, is that right?
Yeah, correct.
Dude, thanks for coming on. Where should people go find you if they wanna follow more, you know
Get get more of what you're doing.
You know what? It's
It's a really good question, and it's a horrible answer.
You actually can't go anywhere yet yet, other than you guys. And so you don't have social media? Subscribe to this podcast if you if you want to see him again. The last one that was like that was Brian Johnson. He came on he was just
hacking on his own body and his own privacy of his own home and then
Came on this podcast and uh
So you know, maybe you'll have a network better so maybe I can I can reverse age by twenty years. My wife would love that. We were uh we were his first podcast. And you know, Sean, I don't know if I ever told you this. He uh called me last year and he goes, Hey, I just wanted to thank you because you were the first podcast that I ever did.
And you guys asked me a lot of really hard questions that I never even I never even thought about.
Uh and so A, I'm thankful for you for doing that. And B when I saw the response
I was like
Oh, I should do media.
Right. And I should go hard. This works. It's crazy. And look what he's done. See, you guys are the influence, but remember the one in ten?
You are the one in ten, guys. My uh my contrarian belief about Brian Johnson is is that Brian Johnson is the greatest marketer alive right now. Possibly. Um I think he understands social media at a level that uh I don't know anybody else does. Uh it's a poll, maybe, but yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Well thanks man. Thanks for coming on. You're awesome. Pleasure. Thanks for taking the time. All right, that's it. That's the pod.
I feel like I can root
Well I know.
But I want to
I put my lawn in it like my days off on the road, less travel, never looking at it. Hey, let's take a quick break. I want to tell you about a podcast that you could check out. It is called The Science of Scaling by Mark Robert. He was the founding CRO of HubSpot, and he's a guest lecturer at Harvard Business School. The guy smart. And he sits down every week with
Different sales leaders from cool companies like Clavio and Vanta and OpenAI, and he's asking about their strategies, their tactics, and how they're growing their companies as you know, head of sales or chief revenue officer. If you're looking to scale a company up, if you're a CRO or head of sales, just looking to level up in your career,
I think a podcast like this could be great for you. Listen to the science of scaling wherever you get your podcast.