Billionaire Mike Repole on NOBULL; College Coaches Making Millions Powering Big Wins

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1:03Bloomberg Audio Studios. Podcasts. Radio. News. This is the business of sports. Sports are the greatest unscripted show on earth. The next generation of players really grew up with tech and believe in tech. Your face is your ticket. Your face is your wallet. Your face is your access to a club. These are such iconic and important buildings for businesses, for fans. COVID was one of the best things ever happened to golf. The NFL is a bulletproof business. Racing's unique because there is absolutely no reason why we can't compete with the guys. Come on, is pro pickleball real? Are people really going to tune into this?

1:39If you're playing money ball with a huge bag of money, you're going to be really, really good. Bloomberg Business of Sports from Bloomberg Radio. This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports where we explore the big money issues in the world of sports. I'm Michael Barr. And I'm Vanessa Perdomo. Damien Sassauer is out this week. Coming up today, we speak with billionaire entrepreneur, co-founder of Vitamin Water, and now owner of No Bull, Mike Rapoli. No Bull wants to be that 360 brand for you for today's athlete. You know, the emotional part, the mental part, the physical part. It's not just about the gym.

2:16It's not just about running. And that's straight ahead on the Bloomberg Business of Sports. But first, we spoke with Bloomberg's own higher education reporter, Janet Lauren, about the big ending of the college football season and how Indiana was able to spin their way into a national championship. A century of futility is forgotten. The Indiana Hoosiers are the kings of college football. It was really a full, full season there for Indiana. Janet joins us to tell us now how they really made it happen. Janet, welcome to the Bloomberg Business of Sports. And you wrote a great article about the Indiana Hoosiers and the Miami Hurricanes and their college football national championship game with Indiana just taking it to the house undefeated.

3:08That is something special for any organization. It was very exciting to watch. And I grew up in Chicago, so I'm very familiar with the Big Ten in Indiana. And it was a really exciting game. And in that fourth quarter, you could see why Signetti was paid almost$12 million a year with his very gutsy call to land Mendoza an amazing touchdown. Yeah, I think, you know, one of the interesting things that to see there is obviously the journey that Indiana has been on and how they've been able to change the athletic department. In your story, one of the things you had quoted was from one of the donors that said, for the coach, with what he's done, I don't know if you could pay him enough.

3:53Tell me about, you know, what they've been able to do and how they've been able to change the program. Great question. So we had a great comment from Michael Petri, who is chairman of a bank called Merchants Bank based in Indiana. He's an Indiana alum. And the NCAA allowed logos on fields starting in 2024. And Mike told me he was approached to put his bank's logo on the field. And this was before they had a winning season. and he said, look, I run a successful bank. I don't want it associated with a losing team. So the answer is no. And as everybody knows, this year is very different because colleges are paying players to the tune of$20.5 million a year.

4:43It's going to go up 4%. Colleges are on the hunt for revenue. So a deal like a sponsorship for a logo on the field is really important for colleges like Indiana. So fast forward, he got a new coach. He did extremely well in his first year. And guess what? Merchants Bank signed a deal for$50 million over 20 years. And that includes naming rights for the home field. So I reached out to Mr. Petri to talk about his... The deal he actually ended up doing. The deal he got. And as he said, you know, you read his quote with what he's done. I don't know if we could pay him enough. And he went on to say he's filled the stadium, which means there's more revenue from the stadium.

5:32There's more revenue from concessions. There's more revenue from sponsorship. So he sort of paid for himself. in Indiana brought a huge amount of excitement. In a story I did last year about other ways that colleges are looking, literally hunting for revenue, selling things in their stadium, they're selling more alcohol. A couple of the schools, Nebraska this year, it was the first time that they have sold alcohol. So previously schools didn't even have this part of their concession. That is correct. It was more popular in the SEC, but you've seen more schools selling alcohol. Michigan last year was their first year.

6:16Wisconsin, because, again, they're trying to find ways to pay their players. And it's a big change. Colleges are – most of the big schools are paying up to the cap, which is$20.5 million this year. But it's going to increase next year by 4%. Talking with our very own Bloomberg's Janet Lauren, and you mentioned about NIL, and more colleges are going to have to pony up some money because this has taken off like wildfire. And you wrote about also that sometimes like a Zach Ryan concert where the University of Michigan Wolverines play at, you know, I love Michigan. So I'm just going to come out and say that.

7:10But do the concerts and things like that at usually we think of it like at, you know, down at Madison Square Garden. And now they're playing at the University of Michigan College for the Wolverines. Is that another way they can bring in money? Absolutely. Michigan's concert was Zach Bryan. It was the first time they'd ever had a concert in the big house and sold out. And it was the largest concert ever attended in the United States because they have a huge amount of seats. It was over like 112 ,000 or something to that regard. And Stanford also, for the first time, had Coldplay. They'd never held a concert there.

7:53So universities are saying, look, we need to find ways to get money. We have these massive stadiums and they sit empty except for eight times to eight or ten times a year. We're going to do more events there. This is the model for professional sports. I mean, every single professional sports owner, this is exactly what they want for their buildings, right? All the NFL owners who are trying to build new stadiums and they want them to have domed roofs. And it's not because of for the games. It's because of concerts and all of that. So is it just that now these college sports are going to have to follow the professional model of revenue and how professional sports really get revenue from, you know, for themselves?

8:41Absolutely. Because they have a new cost structure where they're having to pay the players. And universities are having to find also ways to cut expenses. And the Trump administration has been a little unforgiving to higher ed this year. And they're doing belt tightening all around, less in federal funding, lots of concerns in that regard for money. so yep uh college sports are really going undergoing massive changes in so many different ways when you talk to people in this space jane i'm curious you know obviously the story forever was college coaches get paid a lot of money and the student athletes weren't necessarily getting paid i mean wink wink we all know they're getting right but it's not maybe yeah like that it's not what they're getting paid now so when you talk to people and you talk to athletic directors and people like that and coaches are how big of a struggle is this for them to wrap their minds around how they have to change their structure of how they do business how they run their programs well it's completely different you know as you've seen um they're having to deal with agents you know lots of different money questions um raising revenue many schools have hired a new position general manager like Andrew Luck is a GM at Stanford.

10:02Yeah, I see your face. I did not know that. His former, his alma mater. So schools are hiring new positions because, you know, being the AD, you're hiring a CEO for your team because you're having to make a lot of different financial decisions. It's not just looking at X's and O's anymore. See, you can have Boise State host the Blue Man Group. Now, nothing, nobody gets the joke is, come on, man, it's a blue field. It's Blue Man Group. Oh, my gosh. Anyway. Went over our heads. Yeah. Goodness. In other words, it wasn't funny. Anyway, I want to go back to the Indiana game. Yeah. Because they were charging up to$30 ,000 for a seat.

10:52And then they were charging$9 ,000 to park the car. Gee whiz. It's like, I see why they make a lot of money out of this for NIL. Yeah. And it's just a different ballgame. No pun intended. I like that. That was good. Yeah, colleges are, you know, we're in really uncharted territory because the transfer portal, you know, look at how it changed Indiana's team. You could never construct a team like that if you didn't have something like the transfer portal. And the ability to move players with a coach. And, you know, that will also, on the opposite end, you know, destroy teams. You know, when coaches move, they're, you know, they're taking their players with them.

11:43And then there's also how do you negotiate salaries for the players when they're not even members of the school? You know, they haven't even enrolled in the school yet. And then you've got agents. So it's a really different ballgame. One of the things that obviously they're trying to offset these costs with is private equity is trying to come into college sports in a big way. Tell us about the relationship between private equity in college and what really they're trying to get out of the college system. private equity firms? So there's been a lot of rumblings. The Big Ten was approached by several private equity firms, didn't really pan out.

12:21The University of California Investments, which manages$200 billion of endowment and pension, they were interested in a deal ultimately that was put on hold. You've seen the Big 12 has a potential deal, University of Utah that would close later. The interesting part about private equity is you need an exit. And how are you going to exit making money? I mean, I wrote about university endowments for a long time. I still do. So I'm very familiar with how private equity works in these firms that they want to make a profit. And it's not really clear how that happens with college athletics. I wrote about another firm that we had at Power Players Elevate.

13:07And, you know, they basically do sort of a private credit, private, like a loan. They will be expected to be repaid, you know, certainly once they've put in, helped the schools or conferences get capital to make improvements that will get them bigger revenue streams, and then the ability to pay that back. That was Bloomberg's own higher education finance reporter, Janet Lauren. Up next, we speak with entrepreneur Mike Propoli about his latest venture, Noble. That's straight ahead on the Bloomberg Business of Sports. For my colleague, Vanessa Perdomo, I'm Michael Barr. And don't forget to catch our podcast on all your podcast platforms.

13:45And right here on Bloomberg Business of Sports from Bloomberg Radio around the world.

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15:43Alexa, play Bloomberg Radio. This is Bloomberg Business of Sports from Bloomberg Radio. This is the Bloomberg Business of Sports, where we explore the big money issues in the world of sports. I'm Michael Barr. And I'm Vanessa Perdomo. Damian Sassar will be back next week. Joining us now is billionaire entrepreneur Mike Rapoli. Mike started his business empire as co-founder of Vitamin Water and later built and flipped another beverage, Body Armor, which he sold for a few billion dollars to Coca-Cola. No big deal. And Michael, he's also teamed up with celebrities, superstar athletes throughout his entire career.

16:22His partner in Body Armor was none other than the late, great Kobe Bryant. And now he's partnering with another legendary athlete, Tom Brady, on his latest venture, No Bull. Mike Propoli, beverage entrepreneur, welcome to the Bloomberg Business of Sports. Now, you're the owner of No Bull. But before we get into that, I want to talk about how you started, because you sold vitamin water to Coca-Cola for four billion dollars and body armor to Coca-Cola for five point six billion dollars. And you did it pretty much on your own, sir. That last part, Michael, you want to roll in that last part was absolutely false.

17:01I don't believe self-made, you know, I believe in self-made by others, but I was 28, 29 at Vitamin Water and I joined this guy, Darius Bykov, and we created this, we had this little brand called Small Water, it was about$100 ,000 and, you know, it was 1998 and together we created this brand called Vitamin Water that came out in 2000 and we had a 10-year run with 600 amazing employees, amazing partners, amazing vendors. And, you know, I didn't know much about being in business or being an entrepreneur. And, you know, I guess you learned on the way we went from two employees to 20 to 100 to 200 to 400 to 600.

17:45And that really got me started. And, you know, the one thing I always stress, Michael and Vanessa, is, you know, it's all about people and brand. and really the people that you put on your team, the people you surround yourself with. You know, you hear so many cliches, hire people that you're smarter than, hire people with different skill sets. But in any business, man, you're only going to get better if you hire people with different skill sets, different personalities, and that really can, you know, you get the right chemistry and you could build the biggest brands that you ever dreamed about.

18:20And it started with Vitamortor and an incredible team. And, you know, 10 years went by like like 10 long decades, to be honest with you. Oh, wow. That's interesting. Why do you why do you say that? What was this? What was the struggle? What was the grind when you were there doing vitamin water? You know, it's you know, Vanessa, you know, it's I was a first in everything. Like, you know, first time I was 28 managing, you know, two, three years into the job, managing people that were the age of my parents. You know, some were 50, 55 and some were college graduates. And, you know, for the first time really doing sales and marketing and then operations and then HR and then corporate strategy.

19:04You know, and, you know, many of you know, I'm a New York kid that grew up in Queens. And, you know, my dad was a waiter and my mom was a seamstress. And by the time I was in third grade, I had more education than both of them. And, you know, went to St. John's. And, you know, I know Vanessa, probably academically, I didn't do as good as you, but I had a 2-2 grade point average in St. John's, which I know is probably better than Michael. Listen, I was an athlete, okay? You know, I did my classes with all the athletes. So all the St. John's basketball players were in my class and my textbook was Sports Illustrated.

19:43And, you know, so when you say it's the grind, it's, you know, it's like anything in life. Like the first time you do it, the first time. and, you know, I wasn't, you know, and I always tell people I'm not smarter than anybody, but you know what? If I'm working 20 hour days, seven days a week and you're working eight hour days, five days a week and you're taking a home day on Mondays and Fridays, I mean, I'm going to beat you. And you being an athlete, you know, I mean, you know, I'm friends with, and I was friends with Kobe Bryant. I'm friends with Tom Brady. And, you know, you know, the great ones just put that extra time in.

20:15And that's what life's about. If you want something, you got to really go for it. Well, you're right about my grades because they spell D-E-A-D, which is what I was when I had to tell this to my mom and dad.

20:31Now you're into the venture of No Bowl and you bought the majority stake. And I have to be honest, I wasn't even realizing it was a struggling business back then. I thought everybody was into no bull, but you turned that all around. You know, Michael, it's a good question. We have two great co-founders, co-founders of this company. It was Marcus and Michael, and Marcus Wilson and Michael Schaefer. And at the end, what was very special was I saw these guys as entrepreneurs, like when I started out with Smart Water Pre-Vitamin Water, where, you know, you're getting started. And anytime you start a business, really the first three to five years are the survival years.

21:26You don't know if you're going to make it to Friday. You don't know if you're going to make payroll. You know, a couple of mistakes, you can go bankrupt. And what they did is they, Marcus and Michael both benefited from starting the brand. And the brand actually caught fire early. And it grew so fast. And then COVID happened that, you know, you can lose the momentum of a brand in the first three to five years when it's getting started or five plus years when it starts to have some growth. And they got into some growing pains. And I try to reach out to them when the brand was small in 2018 and 20.

22:09And they didn't need any help. And then I saw an opportunity in 22. And I really enjoyed them. And they're still major partners with Tom and I and involved in the company, both in strategy and design. And, you know, they lost the momentum. And then we came in and, you know, we kind of not only focused on fixing the the back office operations and finance and people, but also now working to make it more scalable as we take Noble from a extreme sports CrossFit brand in that community to really, you know, crossing the chasm into like, you know, into regular sports. sports, um, um, athletic mind frames, um, mentality, um, and really just people who see, you know, you know, we're all athletes.

23:12We're all business athletes. I mean, there's a reason why you're talking about business and sport, you know, whether we're running appointment to appointment, whether we're going to, you know, pick up our kids and take them to, uh, uh, to, to places, whether we're trying to get our workout in, um, the lifestyle we all lead is, is, is, uh, you know, my sport is my life. and that's what we're trying to do with Noble, not just for elite athletes, not just for athletes, but really for people who really have that Noble mentality. The goal of Noble is to make people better, not only physically, but mentally and emotionally.

23:47I think that's really interesting. Mike Ripoli, we're talking to the owner of Noble there and I think what's interesting there that you brought up, Mike, is the mental aspect of it along with the physical aspect and now Noble is launching Noble Nutrition, which is now going to be a new leg of the business. Is that to go along with the mentality aspect of it to get your mind right, body right in all the different ways? Tell us about that because I think with apparel and fitness apparel and CrossFit and you were saying all of that, which my brother, all he uses is noble shoes. That's it. He's a big CrossFit guy.

24:22But when we're looking at apparel and then we're looking at supplements, they're both in the fitness industry, We're not necessarily the exact same sort of part of the industry. Tell us about adding that and if it is into that whole ethos like you were talking about. Yeah. Well, Vanessa, first of all, when you get a chance, send me your resume because you really get the brand already. I mean, you just repeated exactly. I mean, the whole goal of Noble is to target someone who just said what you said. You know what? I know they're all part of wellness. I know they're all part of fitness. But you know what?

24:55For nutrition, I get this. For apparel, I get this. Listen, for sneakers, I get this. And Noble wants to be that 360 brand for you. For today's athlete, you know, the emotional part, the mental part, the physical part, it's not just about, you know, the gym. It's not just about running. It's not just about walking. It's about the mentality piece, whether it's meditation, whether it's sleep, the emotional piece about just walking outdoors, nutrition being such a big part, whether it's protein, whether it's electrolytes, whether it's creatine. And Noble is for really that athlete that aspires to be better.

25:37Our job, you know, Tom Brady and I and the team at Noble, our job is to inspire people who aspire to be better, but not just at one thing, you know, because how many times, whether you're an athlete or in real life, you're dealing with adversity. How many times is something going on, you know, with a friend, a family member, a co-worker, a teammate? And a lot of times, especially now, you know, Tom Brady and I were lucky that when we were 15 to 30, there was no social media. This distraction now and hearing strangers or other people have an opinion of what you do and how you do it is very difficult.

26:17And what, you know, Nike doesn't have protein. Adidas doesn't have electrolytes. New Balance is not going to talk to you about walking and sleeping. You know, Noble wants to be this brand that talks to you in a way like that coach that motivated you, whether you were in high school or college or that teacher. It's really like a life coach. And we're not here to preach. We're not here to prescribe what you need to do. We're here to be a description like this is good for this. but at the end of the day, Michael and Vanessa, you all know, you know, whether it's you two, people can influence you. People can impact you.

26:59People can motivate you, but you're the one that has to wake up every morning and you're the one that has to do the actions in order to make yourself better. And when it works, there are people that help you, but you put the work in. And when it doesn't work, you can look around, but at the end of the day, just get yourself a mirror and blame that person in the mirror. And, you know, Noble's going to be that tough love brand. You know, we want to be real. We want to be genuine. We want to be authentic. That was Mike Rapoli, entrepreneur and owner of Noble. But man, Michael, I feel like I was listening to his motivational speech.