How a guy turned 3 YouTube Channels into $3 Billion Dollars

24:33I wanted to just put my texture on it. But also when I realized I hate remote work, I hate it more than anything. And I wanted to create an office where I live and an office culture. because those are some of the greatest memories that I have. You and I used to work across the street from each other at the corner of Bush and Montgomery, right? Was it Bush and Montgomery? Yeah. I loved that intersection, just walking out and seeing the action and seeing my employees upstairs and be able to just like go for lunch and just like shooting the shit during breaks. I loved it. And I just felt that this was a really good way to make all of my selfish wants come to reality.

25:10Right. Yeah, that's great. You know, I think that a lot of people are probably feeling this right now because everybody went remote during COVID. And now we're what, two, three years into that, that full remote decision. And at first you have the honeymoon period of remote. Ah, look at this. I don't have to commute. I don't have to even get dressed. I don't got to wear pants. I just got to top up. Here we go. You know, oh, this is great. I can see my kids. And then you're like, God, I can't get away from my kids. I haven't left the house in weeks, you know, or whatever, right? Like you start to see some of the consequences of the negative side of those decisions.

25:47And I think the biggest one for you and me, at least I felt this, is I miss just being creative and serendipitous with my team. So it's like, A, have a team, right? And B, be able to just whiteboard, sticky note, go for a walk, go for lunch. Like I brought Diego out here. So Diego was living on the other side of the country. He's living on the East Coast in Baltimore. How long has it been now? Diego's been out here for a couple months, two, three months, something like that. How has your life changed? For the better, dude, way better. First of all, I get to kind of still do basically what I do.

26:22But now I just have a buddy to do all of it with, right? So it's like, I kept the same schedule where it's like, in the morning, he comes over the first two hours of my day are like my creative block, right? Where it's just I don't do anything else. I just write or I podcast or I read. I only do something on the creative side. It's like a creative gym session. It's like going to the gym. but for creativity. All right, so we do that. Well, we do that together now. It's great. And then my trainer comes over. We work out together. He's working out with my trainer now. So it's great. Yeah, you know, we do a hard workout.

26:52Then we go grab tacos. And while we're grabbing tacos... Dude, you guys are like a prison gang, man. That sounds exactly like a prison gang. You wake up... Yeah, we just need some enemies, dude. Yeah. The problem is only just like old retired people around us. But if they... Dude, go start a beef. Actually, I do have some neighborly beef. I could actually just double down on that. I just had it. Now that I think about it. Start calling them homeboy. get blown into your yard. I'm sorry. I don't control the wind. Um, so, but then we go. And what I told him, I'll go notice this dude of our best ideas.

27:20How many of them have come while we were at this taco shop? Cause there's something in the creative process to like the bounce as they used to call it, the pickup artist game. And in the book, the game, they talk about this technique called the bounce. It's like, you're at the club or bar, you meet someone. If you really want to like accelerate your connection with that person, don't just stay there for another hour with them. just be like hey let's go grab a bite to eat i know a great place and if you leave if you do the same the same hour with that person but in two different places connection goes up well there's something like that with creativity where we're working on a problem here we end up getting you know like slightly stuck or we come up with what we think is a solution but in our gut we're like doesn't seem great oh let's take a break let's go for a walk so we walk or bike to a taco place at the taco place it's always that's where the idea comes once we've taken our mind off it once we've change the environment.

28:07And I was like, dude, notice how many how often that happens. If we were just remote, none of that would have happened because I would have gotten off the zoom with you. And then I would have gone to take a break, you would have got to take a break, I wouldn't be like, hey, let's just leave our phones on. Like it would have just been like a little bit weird to do that. And we would not have had, you know, those next ideas. And if you're in the creative line of work, those ideas are gold, those ideas is what you're in it for. Right? Right? Like, unless you're in a like factory type of work where it's all about productivity, um, you know, for us, creativity is the pro is productivity.

28:39It is the new productivity. And so we need to set up a situation that lets us be more creative, which being in person was, was pretty massive for that. Yeah. It's funny. We're both craving the same stuff. And I think that a lot of people are, um, and I, yeah. And so like, I went and looked at apartments this weekend and, um, I, uh, we have I think my lease starts May 1. And so I'm going all in on this, this in real life stuff. Like I need an office. Will you move or you're going to like split? I don't know yet. I'm still working out logistics. I went and looked at this apartment building. Have you ever been to like, I don't know if this is happening in San Francisco.

29:15So the new thing in New York is that there's these apartment buildings. And it took me a long time to realize what they are, but I've nailed it. They're cruise ships. And so basically what they are is they're really cheap. I mean, they're super expensive, but the build quality is like kind of crap, like all like basic builder quality apartment units. But then the actual lobby has a bowling alley. Oh, like the amenities are amazing. Yeah, like a rock climbing gym. And it's like all like in the basement. And then it has like the best gym you've ever seen in the world. And then it has like a playroom, a golf simulator.

29:49It's basically built to be sort of like a mall where like it's built for like the 35 year old three, two kid, all under eight type of like families. And so I went and looked at like an apartment like that. And I was like sitting in that apartment building. And I'm like, I don't know if I go to bed here at night. And these like tight ass walls, like hearing like honking in the city. And so I haven't decided if I can like put up with that. I'd rather commute. But potentially I would move to the city. I like here's what I did. I sat down and I was like, what's my dream day? Well, my dream day is I get up at 7.

30:19I go and work out. And then I get coffee with Austin Reef, who lives next to my in-laws. Or I'd get coffee with my in-laws. And then I'd go to work at 9.30. And then my wife would show up at the office to do some work. And then we're both home at 5 to have dinner. And then maybe at 7 or 8, after the kids go to bed, I would go for a walk outside. I'm like, that's the perfect day. All right. How can I create that? And so I'm still working backwards on how could I create that. The problem is, I forgot about going to bed at night and how I need a huge ceiling because I get claustrophobic. And that's going to cost$60 ,000 a month because New York City is like the craziest place in the world when it comes to renting an apartment.

30:56And so I'm still trying to figure out, you know, some of those logistical details on how on earth like I could pull off this. It was like super relatable with like walking and doing whatever until you're like, but I need 16 foot ceilings to sleep. No, I just like at your house, like you're like a lot of apartment ceilings are eight feet tall. And it like, I don't know, you feel like claustrophobic. Dude, the rent in New York City is outlandish. So when we were younger, do you remember like the idea of when we were 25? I think I spent like$800 a month, a$10 ,000 a month apartment nowadays in New York City.

31:27It's not nice. It's like a shit two bedroom. It's crazy how expensive Manhattan is. And so that's wild. I got to like figure out all the logistics. But that's my spiel. I'm going all in and I'm going to go all in on in real life. I need it. My soul is aching. How much were you working on Hampton anyways? Hours a week? 40 hours a week. Like it was like, what's going to change your CEO now? Well, I can't like, like before it was like, well, how can I convince this person that my idea is the right way? Or how do I respect the boundaries? You know, like I was a very respectful boss, I felt like it was like, but now it's like, I don't, I'm not really going to be respectful.

32:08I'm just going to say like, this is what I want to make. I need you guys to help me make this type of energy versus before I think I was a little bit more hands off. And I was thinking a lot. Now I'm actually operating. Yeah. What? Oh, no, that's just funny. Like, I feel like I was just reflecting like, you know, you, I think Andrew has a good gift to this. I do this too, which is like, we tell these great stories. You're like, you know, I was reading this article about Palmer Lucky and he said this beautiful quote and you have this quote, you're like, I decided I too need to commit and choose a path.

32:38But it's like, and it's a great way to frame a story like this. It's like the truth, I think, I'm going to speak for you for a second, but I think the truth in a lot of these situations is just like, it's irritating to be out of, like, to not have your hands on and not be in control. It's like, I just like to be in control and do things my way. But like, wow, that's a less fun story to say. It's like, you know what? I just really feel like we all chase optionality and we're better off to commit and really just make it work. No, that is the truth. And it's like, I think it's the truth, but I don't think that's why you're the CEO now.

33:10No, usually, usually discovery. Because you read this Palmer Leckie quote. No, usually discovery for me, and I bet it's for you and for many other people, is you feel a certain way and you're like, this freaking sucks. And somebody puts words on it. And then someone puts words on it and you're like, oh, that's like normal to feel. Or this person said... I guess what I'm saying is you weren't choosing multiple options. You just weren't in control. The quote that Palmer Leckie should have said is like, if you're the founder, put your fucking DNA in the company and just go like, be hands-on, be a micromanager.

33:39Go in there, do it. I was going easy. See, I was in like the dad phase. So like it was like I wanted to be available at like noon. Now I'm more so like, look, I can be there in the morning and in the evening. And I think that I'm still being a good dad. Before it was like I have to have X amount of hours of FaceTime. Now I'm out of the honeymoon phase of being a dad. And I'm like, look, I could like be with you for breakfast and be with you for dinner. And I think I could still be a good father. And so that was partially it. Gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah. I, uh, I was talking to somebody and, uh, recently and they were like, you know, I just want to like, I'm working, I'm working hard on this.

34:18They're like chasing some project, some deal. And I was like, why are you doing this? You're so like, you've done so many deals. You're post-economic, you've made so much money. Why go so hard at this? And they were like, I just really want my kids to see what they're, you know, their dad working. And I was like, I don't, I don't even think he was lying. I think he genuinely believes that, but I'm like, dude you're doing this deal because you like doing deals that's all you've done you you've done deals for 30 years you're amazing at doing deals it's a rush to do a great deal it's fun to win it's fun to dunk the basketball and you're trying to dunk and you don't have to be like i just want my kids to see a hard-working dad it's like dude you're sitting on your laptop sending emails like it's not like they see your their dad you know sweating it out in the soul you're not chopping on wood dude yeah so i was like but people tell themselves all kinds of stories and i just find it hilarious because of course i do the same thing but when you see it in other people it's much more easy to spot like, oh, you've told yourself a story.

35:11That's cool. Like that makes it's fine. Whatever, whatever gets you to do the things you want to do is fine. Hey, this episode is brought to you by Mercury. They're the fintech of choice for over 200 ,000 companies. I myself use it for eight different companies. The reason why we all choose it is because it has everything you need under one roof. So like my e-commerce company, it's super important for us to be able to easily wire transfer, pay all our different vendors and suppliers all around the world. And the old way with our more traditional bank that shall now be named, I try it online. It would say no.

35:41It would freeze my account. Then I'd have to go in, book an appointment, speak to a specialist who would try to upsell me on something I didn't need. And then finally, after 30 minutes there, then they charged me 50 bucks for the pleasure of that terrible interaction. And now with Mercury, I just go online, push two buttons, and I'm done. It's such a seamless experience. It's very intuitive. Everything's under one place. They basically took all the things any company would need for their financial tech and they made it super easy to use to put it into one platform. So highly, highly recommend it.

36:08If you're not using Mercury, I question your judgment. So that's it. You've heard it on My First Million. For more information, check out Mercury.com. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Check show notes for details. Would you want your children to work with you? Is that even in your wants? I would think that would be really fun or cool to do. I worked with my dad for about a year and it was actually a lot of fun, much more fun. Like working with my dad was more fun than just like hanging out with my dad and not working. You know what I mean? Like it was actually like a better dynamic.

36:39It was a cooler dynamic. I learned more that way. And I saw him differently and he acted differently in work mode versus he did in home mode. So it was kind of cool. So I think it would be really fun, but it's not something I'm like trying to gear up. You know, I think I've told you this before, like my new sort of dad ideal is Ben's dad. So Ben's dad, Andy, he, he did a very simple thing. That's going to sound like, it's going to sound like nothing, but I personally think it was quite profound, which is the way I initially was trying to be a dad and how other people are dads is you have things that you're into.

37:12I love basketball. And I keep trying to buy little basketballs and like put them near my son. I buy the hoop and I like take them to a class. I'm like really trying to get him into basketball. Cause like, Oh man, I really just want him to like, love the things that I love. And then we could share that. We could bond over that. Whereas his dad was like, he's like, what's that type of blood? That's like, it's the universal donor. It's like O negative or something like that. He's O negative. So he's like, he's got one son who's into standup comedy. So he's like, great. I'm now into standup comedy.

37:40Yesterday, I knew nothing. Didn't care. Today, everything I do is eat, sleep and breathe standup comedy. Bought books, watch videos, goes to shows by himself, starts practicing himself, starts giving his son feedback on every single thing that he's doing in a helpful, supportive way, making connections, whatever, whatever he could do. He's like, I'll meet you where you're at. And Ben loves the Phoenix Suns. Guess what? Andy now watches every Phoenix Suns game, is a hardcore fan, is always talking about the Suns because he's like, I'll meet you where you're at. If that's what you're into, I will get so into it that we can bond over that.

38:09And I just thought that was like a really selfless kind of amazing thing he did. And I just hadn't seen a lot of dads do that. I think my instinct and many dads instincts is just to try to get them to like the shit we like. And then they don't. And then we're like, all right, like I support you, but like at an arm's length. And I just thought it was much cooler to go all in on what your kids are into. So I hope and I'll expose my kids to like business and like I'll be totally open to them working with me. But I really want to do the Andy thing, which is if they're into whatever musicals, then do re mi.

38:41You know what I mean? That's awesome. That almost makes me emotional here about Ben's dad. What a great dude. He really is. do you want to end there or do you want to keep going i have one quick one this is actually kind of cool this guy josh on twitter so joshua ogundu uh tweeted this out it's a cool find so he tweeted out about this company called shotzi have you ever heard of shotzi it's an app no yeah didn't we talk about shotzi no so shotzi is an app for tracking your ozempic injections oh that is funny and it just crossed a million in arr and all it does is it basically is a it's a shot tracker so you know it's i guess i i don't know maybe you could tell me like i guess it's somewhat cumbersome to keep track of maybe i don't know if it's when you did it how much your dosages a reminder it's time for your next shot um by the way how about that little jab of uh i don't know maybe you could tell me like how do people use this you've talked with Ozempic you have to increase the dosage a lot so let's say you start with like 5 ml after two weeks you have to go to seven and then you have to go to like 10 and it's not like incremental so you so when you hear this idea were you like yeah that was a pain point or for you was it like nah I don't I didn't take it enough to be a pain point but it's very clear it's just sort of like imagine taking vitamins and like you have to add a pill every two to three to four months and it's like it just it is easier to track if you want to follow it by the book i'm more of a like eyeball and see how i feel type of guy look in the mirror do we want to party today or not that's like you know that that's kind of they call it vibe coding i was a vibos epic guy it was just how do i feel that day yeah so the the woman who made this i think her name's aja she uh she was an engineer at the athletic like a software engineer at the at the media company the athletic and i guess on the side she just built this like for her own pain point and then i think it took off in like the reddit communities and just off of reddit and then some tiktoks about it it's gotten downloaded like a hundred thousand times it's got this paid subscription crossed a million in arr um what niches and riches man like this is uh riches and niches is like just such a simple just problem solution app right that that that somebody realized okay if if ozempic is the next big thing, right?

41:06If these GOP ones are the next big thing. I don't know how many people take them. I think it's like 40 million people or some like really big number of people who now all are on some schedule and realizing that you could build an app just for that population is a smart idea. Have you seen like the Oscars and the Grammys and things like that? Like everyone looks great. Everyone looks great. Luka Doncic is losing weight quickly. Is it, is, are they illegal in sports? I don't think so. No. I mean, it's kind of like a... You lose muscle mass, right? So I don't think athletes would really care too much about this.

41:43You cannot lose... I'm not a scientist, but you, obviously, you can... If you eat enough protein and you lift weights, I think you can maintain. It basically just makes you not eat. So if you can say like, yeah, but I'm going to eat, and I'm going to hit my protein, and I'm going to lift weights, even though I don't want to eat today. Yeah, you could keep protein. It's just you don't want to eat. You're full. Let me ask you a random question. I was watching this video today about somebody was speculating that LeBron does like whatever. PEDs. I saw the Lance Armstrong thing about it. So Lance Armstrong was talking about it.

42:19Chael Sonnen has talked about it. Chael's like, yeah, we have the same drug guy. I know. I know what he's taking. I'm not going to say, but I know what he's taking. But Chael's also like a professional troll. So you don't know when he's being facetious or truthful. But also was a drug cheat. Yeah, but also did use performance-anicy drugs when he competed. And he was basically like, he's on EPO. And like, you know, if you wanted to do what he's doing, if you wanted to be doing tomahawk dunks at age 40 in the NBA, like, you know, playing 30 minutes a game and averaging 27 points or whatever, like you would do this.

42:49And I actually just was thinking about this in like the world of business. Is there PEDs at business? And like, how would you feel about people doing that? Have you ever taken Adderall or Ritalin? I've never taken it, but I know I have several friends that do it to focus to be more productive. I don't do any. I don't do any drugs. But 10 years ago, before I got sober, I for some reason, a doctor gave me a Ritalin prescription. I have no idea why. I don't remember what happened, but I got it. And I took it for about four days. And on the fifth day, I had like a mental breakdown. It made me too speedy.

43:25I was like, I may be anxious. I'm like, I'm going crazy. This is horrible. And I was like, I'm never taking this crap again. But those four days, I was on fire. I was like laser focused and I felt on top of the world. And so obviously a lot of people take this and I would not feel bad if my competitor took it. Is that what you're asking? I just, I don't know, like in sports, it's definitely seen as, I think for most people, when they would hear about an athlete doping or cheating, it'd be literally like you're cheating and it's a tainted record, right? But I think those drugs should be legal in sports a little bit.

44:03Do you think that? So you would, you think in business, I guess there's two questions. Do you think a lot of people are taking this type of stuff? I remember Sam Bankman-Fried had the patch. I think a huge amount of people are taking it. Dude, I think there was a joke on Reddit. There was a guy who was like, I'm naming my daughter Vyvanse because I love this drug so much. Yeah, I think there's a, yeah, I think everyone, I think if you're under the age of 30, I would assume that you're taking it. Oh, wow. That's great. That's you think it's that popular? Yeah. I think that I am now a very wholesome, straight edge person.

44:40And I think you have always been that way. So I think perhaps we don't. I'm just naive, dude. I didn't even like nobody. Nobody offered me any. I didn't I didn't get any. It's not like I'm like, I think that superior. I just didn't even know. I'm not I'm not saying that it's morally superior to be this way. I just think that you and I have never well, since I've known you, I have never partied and you have never partied. or at least been part of like the drug or alcohol scene really and I do think most people uh it's like getting weed you know like oh like I can't sleep but the doctor's like gotcha I understand do you know what I mean like waking like right yeah that's how I think it is the closest thing I have to that is like calling my dog a service animal so I can like you know yeah take her into some place dude I so when we were younger our parents would like my parents gave me Ritalin because like every boy who couldn't sit still in fourth grade, they were like, oh, you have an illness, son.

45:31And we need to keep you from standing up from the chair. And like, you know, you have to take this pill. And I remember taking the pill in fourth grade. And after like a few months, I'm like, I didn't have like the vocabulary to explain to my mother. But I was like, this is making me sad. Like something was going on. And so she was like, oh, this is crazy. What are we doing? But I remember taking it. It changes you. And I do think that when I took it as an adult, it felt like I was on EPO and I was having to do the Tour de France. Like it felt, I'm like, oh, I understand how this is like a PED.

46:02Did you see how Chamath wants to come up, which I don't really respect a lot of what he says, but do you see how he said he wanted to have the PED free poker? Oh, yeah, yeah. He was saying like a no Adderall poker tournament, basically. Yeah, yeah. That's sort of intriguing. Dude, I must just be sleeping on this. I didn't realize this was as I have a couple of friends who I know they were they told me like, oh, yeah, I'm going to stop doing that. I was like, oh, you've been doing that. What is that? Why? For what? Like, you know, it didn't even really occur to me. I guess as you guys are saying this, I'm realizing that, oh, I've probably just been foolish about that.

46:39Yeah, it wouldn't surprise me. OK, so like what do you call the listeners of this pod? The yuppie class, like the white collar class or whatever. I would bet that 30 % of the people between the ages of 22 and 35 who are in this white collar or yuppie or Henry class are on ADHD medications. That's my prediction, 30%. It's a lot, right? If you're on that Addy in the comments, let us know. We're going to poll the YouTube comments right now. Natty or Addy? I had friends that would buy it in the Silk Road. Can you even buy it online? I guess you don't even need to buy it online anymore. You can just go to your doctor.

47:22There's probably like an Adderall toothpaste at this point. And if not, great idea. Yeah. Brush in a rush. Let's go. 10 out of 10. 10 out of 10. You nailed that one. All right. That's it. That's a pop. I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off On the road, less travel, never looking back

47:53Alright, this episode is brought to you by Mercury They are the finance platform of choice for over 200 ,000 companies Shouldn't be surprised because I use it myself for not one, not two But I have eight different Mercury accounts I have seven for different companies that I'm a part of And then I have my own personal account because now they have personal banking, which is a really cool feature. I highly, highly recommend it. Like I said, I use it myself. And the reason why is because the way that Mercury works is beautiful. It's very intuitive. And you could tell that it's actually made by a startup founder.

48:23It's an entrepreneur. You could tell it's made by somebody who used other banking products in the past and didn't like all the different rough edges and annoyances and decided to actually fix it himself. And really, any type of entrepreneur you are, let's say you're an agency, well, one of the things every agency has to do is be able to send invoices, easily create them, send them to customers, and stay current on your balances with all your customers. Well, you can do that inside Mercury. And so I think that Mercury is great. Highly recommend you check it out. And thank you for sponsoring the show.

48:48For more information, check out Mercury.com. Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Check show notes for details.