In short
How Erewhon (Air One) uses “cult-like” branding to turn an ultra-expensive grocery store into a social destination and media engine—via a “third space,” scarcity, membership incentives, celebrity smoothie collaborations, and tightly controlled product standards.
Guest backgrounds
The episode is a discussion between the hosts (including one who says they spend about $4,000/year at Erewhon and mainly buy hot-bar plates) and a co-host/guest who also frequents Erewhon and discusses membership math, plus mentions of other industry guests in passing (e.g., Alex Costa, Max Tuning) but no formal guest introductions in the transcript.
Key claims
- Erewhon is designed for lingering/networking, unlike Whole Foods/Ralph’s.
- Membership (about $200+/year) is pushed at checkout with “cash back” and guilt/pressure.
- Celebrity smoothie partnerships are framed as PR “stamp of approval,” not direct celebrity kickbacks.
- Brands pay to be included in smoothies; Erewhon’s ingredient approval is “ruthless.”
- UGC/UGC-like hype is amplified by aesthetic lighting and “perfect backdrop” merchandising.
Notable examples
- $19 Japanese strawberry; $26 water; $40 hot-bar plate.
- Hailey Bieber smoothie; “Hayley Bieber ice cream”; Lisa (Blackpink) collab pulling 20M TikTok views in 24 hours.
- 40,000 Miss Bieber smoothies/month at ~$20; $10M+ in a year (claimed).
- “DIY home kit” for ~$100.
- Charity donations: $2.5M through celebrity collaborations in 2024 (claimed).
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOThe Cult of Erewhon
0:39 to 3:08
Exploring how Erewhon transformed into a cult grocery store with a unique experience.
“I also didn't realize the ridiculous spending problem I have there.”
Air One's Unique Offerings
3:08 to 5:32
Discussion about Erewhon's premium products and shopping experience, including celebrity items.
“It's supplements, and it's the hot bar, and then it's the smoothies and coffee, and you can go.”
Smoothies and Celebrity Collaborations
5:32 to 7:40
The impact of celebrity smoothies on Erewhon's brand and revenue.
“I'm not sure why they have kept it only in California, but I love that they've done it because it's like In-N-Out.”
The Economics of Erewhon Smoothies
7:40 to 11:41
Analyzing the business model behind Erewhon's smoothies and brand partnerships.
“And then - I'm telling you, try the ice cream, bro.”
Social Sharing and Brand Exclusivity
11:41 to 14:03
The role of social media and exclusivity in Erewhon's marketing strategy.
“We also didn't realize this, but they actually donate a ton to charity.”
Celebrity Endorsements and Brand Approval
14:03 to 16:41
Explains the dynamics of celebrity endorsements and their impact on brand perception.
“And so they're willing to pay a lot of money to be in the ingredients.”
Consumer Preferences and Product Quality
16:41 to 19:22
Discusses the quality of beverages available and how brands differentiate themselves in a crowded market.
“And the fact that brands are willing to lose money to play ball there, I think tells you something about just how culturally relevant they are in this little sector.”
The Power of Brand Merchandise
19:22 to 22:44
Analyzes the significance of merchandise for a grocery brand and its cultural relevance.
“store to have merch to rock a grocery store merch it's a nice hoodie dude it's not some like gildan shit it's a nice ass well dude i remember when it's nicer than this one that i have on this was like a$200 hoodie.”
Untapped Marketing Opportunities
22:44 to 26:39
Proposes innovative marketing strategies that could enhance the brand's visibility and engagement.
“They have these like massive celebrity collaborations.”
Collaborations and Creator Culture
26:39 to 28:00
Explores potential collaborations that could bridge creator culture with the grocery brand's offerings.
“A lot of brands aren't actually allowed to be carried in Air One.”
Show all 28 chapters
Exploring Collaboration Ideas
28:00 to 28:40
Learn about innovative collaboration ideas for brands and creators.
“and they test it and see what the vibe is.”
Air One and Kith Collaboration Insights
28:40 to 30:00
Discover the impact of collaborative brands like Air One and Kith.
“It's Kith's, it's not like Soho House for Kith.”
The Power of Limited Edition Merchandise
30:00 to 31:50
Understand the significance of exclusive merchandise in brand marketing.
Maximizing Brand Potential
31:50 to 32:40
Discuss strategies for brands to leverage their full potential.
“If you can hold a certain standard, but they're not even tapping into the lower lift pieces of content.”
Valet at Grocery Stores?
32:40 to 33:00
Explore the unique aspect of Air One offering free valet parking.
“I think the biggest takeaway for me is just that they need to fix the parking lots.”
Road Rage Storytime
33:00 to 35:40
A wild story about an unexpected road incident before the podcast.
“Because people that shop at Erwan don't know how to park.”
Upcoming Travel Plans and Projects
35:40 to 37:00
Hear about exciting upcoming travel plans and projects on the horizon.
“If you see this crazy dude on the on-ramp.”
The Evolution of Video Production
37:00 to 38:20
Learn how video production techniques have improved over time.
“We were on a huge million dollar commercial.”
Concert Photography Challenges
38:20 to 40:40
Discuss the unique challenges faced in concert photography.
“when we went out there for Nike swim, we did a scout day beforehand and we pretty much just like he test shot everything.”
Festival Experiences and Humor
40:40 to 42:00
Share funny experiences encountered at festivals and concerts.
“But there was one festival where I'd never seen anything like this.”
Shifting Focus Back to Creators
42:19 to 44:35
Discussion on returning podcast focus to creators and the challenges of guest scheduling.
Brand Partnerships and Financial Insights
44:36 to 46:02
Insights about how podcast views affect brand partnerships and financial success.
“us have stuck with us for a really long time, which has been cool.”
Anticipation for Tyler Babin's Return
46:03 to 47:28
Excitement about bringing back Tyler Babin and discussing collaboration opportunities.
“Babin actually, I forgot to tell you this.”
An Encounter with a Rock Star Artist
47:29 to 52:47
Hosts share a memorable encounter with an artist and discuss the creative process.
“Yeah, that's why Babin asked me to come shoot.”
Reflections on Entrepreneurship and Success
52:48 to 56:01
Hosts reflect on the challenges of entrepreneurship and the impact of success stories.
“We got to have like a piece of Chuck Sperry to put on the bookshelf.”
The Struggles of Entrepreneurship
56:01 to 57:29
Discussing the challenges and pressures of entrepreneurship amidst success stories.
“And then you see that it kind of makes you feel like shit in a way.”
The Podcast Run Dilemma
57:30 to 59:03
Exploring the drawbacks of repetitive podcast guest appearances and scripted content.
“I have the agency and we have the podcast and stuff, but everything's content related.”
Niche Creation in the Content Space
59:04 to 1:00:02
Talking about carving a niche in the content creator space and potential collaborations.
“And I think that would be a really fun episode.”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Air One is the most expensive grocery store in America. A single Japanese strawberry costs$19, a bottle of water$26, and a trip to the hot bar$40 for a plate. And yet there's a line out the door at every location every single morning. 10 stores all in California, 100 ,000 customers every single week, 60 ,000 paying members at over$200 per year, and wholesale brands losing money on every sale just to stay on the shelves. There's no doubt the celebrity smoothies help put Erwin on the map, but here's what nobody's talking about. A grocery store built a cult following. So how does the most expensive grocery store in America turn overpriced lettuce and a hot bar into a movement people line up to be a part of?
0:37That's what we're breaking down today. Let's get into it. So you're a member, huh? You're one of the 60 ,000? I'm a part of the club. I also didn't realize the ridiculous spending problem I have there. So you checked your app, dude. What grocery store has an app? I have spent$4 ,000 this year at Air One. Lifetime savings, though,$1 ,200. What do you typically buy at Air One? It's just the hot bar. I don't go like - Which is insane. I don't go grocery shopping there. So if we do a little bit of mathematics here, let's call the average plate 30. Yeah, I've been about 130 times. That checks out. Yeah, you go often.
1:14Yeah. I mean, if it's - Are we in May? We're in the fifth month of the year? Yeah. May just started though. So it's four. This doesn't math. This has to be lifetime because there's no way that I've gone 26 times in a month. There's just no way. This is not tracking. Yeah. But anyways, Air One is what me and Brayden get before every single podcast. It feels the show. It does feel the show. And if you guys are an OG rock listener, you know we've been talking about Air One since day one. It has truly become a classic, a staple in our not day-to-day life, but our week-to-week life. It's a, they've built a world at these stores and now there's one that's literally a block away.
1:59There's one like at 505 when we used to live, the OG 505, there was one about two blocks away. Dangerous place. Yeah. Dangerous place to get to like welcome to LA. Then now at our new spot, there's one like a mile and a half away and then they just move one. I mean, 30 seconds away from our spot. It's gorgeous and beautiful. Gorgeous in West Hollywood. But a few things that they nailed is they've built this third space that you can go to. Yeah. So it's like not only are you going to shop or whatever, you go to your grocery store, you go to Ralph's or Whole Foods or something like that. What do you do when you go to Whole Foods?
2:28You get the hell out of there. You leave. You leave immediately. I feel like Whole Foods. They have a little area that people can sit in, but like you don't really see tons and tons of people like eating the hot bar at Whole Foods. No. I used to be a connoisseur of the Whole Foods hot bar section. And then you guys introduced me. Amazon ruined it. To Erwan. um the whole foods hot bar used to be an elite staple and the food quality has just plummeted to the bottom of the earth i just think it's rare for a grocery store specifically to be a place where people can go like network and go hang out it's a thing to go to air one like you look forward to it most people in my opinion are not super stoked to go to the grocery store no it's like you have your list of groceries you're gonna buy you go you get what you need you get the heck out Now, Air One has created a space that's not only gorgeous, but it's not just the groceries.
3:27It's supplements, and it's the hot bar, and then it's the smoothies and coffee, and you can go. People go take meetings at Air One. It is a place to be. They've created a third space, not just a grocery store. Yeah, and they also have – they got everything. I just went and got Chloe's Moisturizing Cream there the other night. I was like, they have this there? Yeah, it's right in the little section. it's uh it's it's actually ridiculous and the smoothies i think really became like kind of a cultural moment for these guys yes they got a 19 smoothie i'll tell you guys that hayley bieber smoothie that is an elite an elite concoction you're a fan oh yeah dude they have they got ice cream hayley bieber ice cream i buy that shit up too hayley bieber's glaze ice cream it is elite but they got a 19 smoothie and people buy them like hotcakes and i it's interesting right because they're priced in an interesting way where they want people to get the membership i also notice it's an upsell if you guys ever go i'm always fascinated by this i love the business of like how something makes money and they strategically like as you're checking out you go down this row all these cpg brands are paying a shit ton of money to be at the like the last second grab area right so it's like you got all these little snacks to give it a test out right then when you get up there and you go to check out they're like oh you're a member so They already kind of make you feel like shit if you're not a member.
4:44You're not a member? Like, oh, dude, you should. You ever thought about checking out the membership? I listened to them. They're basically calling you poor. They're like, you don't have the money to be a member? You come here often? Yeah. It's great. I listen to it. They'll be like this. So are you a member? And you'll be like, oh, no. And they'll be like, oh, you thought about being a member? Do you come here often? And then people will be like, no, I don't. Like, oh, OK. Well, you should think about it. You get 10 % cash back. So it's like, it's an easy little deal. I pay for my food all the time.
5:07Do you think it's worth it? Oh, 100%. If you go there consistently, I don't go to grocery shop. I've saw one girl fill up her whole cart,$4 ,000. Swear to God. It's the craziest shit I've ever seen. I was like, I gotta take a gander at what that bottom number was,$4 ,000. It was just a normal size grocery cart. But everything is like organic and it's one of a kind. You're not gonna get stuff that you can get any other place. It's just like that single Japanese strawberry,$19 dollars yeah dude but the food the food is high quality i will say like they have kept even though they've opened more locations i think that that can hinder a brand like they expand too quick they've they got a process but they've been around for a minute no no i know they've been around for a minute but i'm saying like it feels like as of the last like two years you know we've had the weho location has opened up like they opened up a location silver lake they're opening locations quickly yeah and they've still kept the same standard across all the stores they're very clean.
6:02There's like beautiful plants going on. If anything, they've become nicer. Agreed. I also think it's a pretty genius move. I'm not sure why they have kept it only in California, but I love that they've done it because it's like In-N-Out. It is like In-N-Out and it's become this thing where it is a staple thing to hit if you are coming from out of town. Yes. And I mean, our guests, you guys know it's funny, our guests when they come on the show, they're like, oh yeah, we've been four times since we've been in town or we went right after we got off the airport. like it's a thing it's hilarious yeah it's packed 24 7 there is a i don't want to say a benefit there's what's the word i want to look for um tell me because it's exclusive and i think a lot of brands can take something away from this it's like you have to be in california it's exclusive like you're coming from out of town there's this uh there's this scarcity about it because you can't just go to anywhere in the U.S.
7:00and get Air One. And it's funny because I was talking to someone about this a couple of days ago who lives in New York. And we were talking about, we brought up Meadow Lane because that's the new like high-end grocery store. Yes. Like, oh, what do you think of Meadow Lane? I was asking my cousin and she's like, it's great. She goes, it's no Air One. It's different. That's funny. The smoothies though. The smoothies are. Change the game. Crazy. So Miss Bieber's smoothie, okay? They sell about 40 ,000 of them every month at 20 bucks a pop. Yeah. That is insane. It's crazy. They've done over$10 million in a single year.
7:38And it's four years after the launch. Dude, I mean, it's because it's great. And then - I'm telling you, try the ice cream, bro. I got it. I'm telling you. They did so well that they created a$100 DIY home kit in October. Shut up. so you can you can make it you can make it for yourself at home you can make three at home for the price i wonder how many you get out of that diy i mean you also got to think right i mean travis scott had a smoothie yeah yeah the cactus jack had a smoothie sabrina carpenters had a smoothie paul saladino is like the meat guy he had a smoothie sofia richie sofia richie who else we got bella hadid olivia rodrigo kim k emma chamberlain yeah i liked emma chamberlain smoothie Lisa from Blackpink.
8:19And now, you know, it's interesting. So the brands, they are paying to integrate on these smoothies as well as on the juices. So the other day, if you're a member of your big dog, I went in there and the guy was like, you remember? I go, yeah. He goes, it's free juice day, baby. Handed me one for Pets or yeah, Pets, Secret Life of Pets 2 or whatever the movie was. Wow. So I got it. I got a free little thing. They're like 12 bucks or something like that. And then every month, if you're a member, you get a little signature smoothie, like a little one. It's like a smaller version, probably like seven or eight bucks, 10 bucks, something like that.
8:48But like they're constantly giving those members incentives to be like, hey, that 200 bucks a year is worth it. So you can talk about it on the pot. You can talk about it on the pot. Tell people you remember. What's interesting, we have here Lisa from Blackpink. Okay. She put out a collab smoothie and the launch pulled in 20 million TikTok views in 24 hours, which is insane. You guys got to know to get about a million views of ad impressions,$20-ish thousand dollars. You do the math. You do the math on like how much that was worth to them. They've built a world with these collaborations and the smoothies where it's built in media.
9:29So it's like, not only are you profiting from an actual revenue standpoint, but because it's so absurd, because it's like this beautiful concoction, people want to go, they want to try it. Because it's so expensive, you're like, is it worth the hype? And then they have people coming from out of town just to come try it and make videos around it. Yeah. I mean, I think that's the other thing. If you go into, if you go into a store, you'll more than likely see someone vlogging or phone cameras, like DJI little mini camera situation. They've built like the perfect backdrop of aesthetic. You walk into the grocery or is it like the produce section?
10:10It's like every tomato is hand selected to be perfect. And if you guys go into Ralph's or Whole Foods, Whole Foods is a better job of this. But like for the most part, shit's like straight on and perfect in Whole Foods. But at Erewhon, it's very similar, but the lighting's great everywhere you go in the whole damn store. It's like the light's perfect. They're always adjusting the cans, bringing them forward. If through your pick, you'll notice employees walking around like bringing them forward. It's an operation. Would you be game to win$100 ,000? I think it depends on what I would have to do to win the 100 ,000.
10:40All you got to do is post a video using Artlist AI toolkit. Yeah, dude, count me in. 30 seconds minimum. I mean, I think I'd lock in. You guys need to focus up here, okay? Because by the time this video is out, we have until May 20th to submit your piece of content. And it's pretty easy, okay? You got to use their AI toolkit to craft a minimum 30 second video that tells a little story, okay? Then what you're going to do is you're going to post it to social media, okay? And you're going to use their Artlist watermark. This is all linked in the description. All this stuff linked in the description.
11:10You're going to submit it on a form on their website, post it to your Instagram, and you're going to use the hashtag Artless Studio Challenge. Seems pretty damn simple. Count me in. Okay, now they're going to accept 10 finalists and give you like a ridiculous amount of credits, 5 million credits to go make some more stuff. And then they're going to pick one lucky winner, like a runoff with the top 10. Okay, one winner of$100 ,000. The link is in the description. It's the top link to go check it out. Go submit. I would love a rock to win$100 ,000 and we'll count you in there. Let's keep it rolling.
11:42Not only will you not go to Whole Foods or Ralph's or another grocery store and post something that you got from that, but it's rare for any other brand for somebody to come in and like document the process of them coming in and buying something. And so I think for brands, If you can think about, if you can create a moment, whether you have a store, like a physical location, or even the checkout, if you can create some sort of memorable moment for someone to want to share that, it's media that you can't buy that you can only get if someone is so hyped on your brand and it has this exclusive thing about it that people are wanting to share with their social media followers.
12:30We also didn't realize this, but they actually donate a ton to charity. I didn't realize that the smoothies, a lot of the profit was going to a charity. So we thought that the celebrity was getting a cut of this, but it seems to our knowledge, from what we've Googled and looked up for this episode, that the model isn't actually like that. They're donating two and a half million through celebrity collaborations, and that was just in 2024. So we don't have the updated number for 2026, but I'm wondering if that has maybe changed. I'd assume they still probably do donate a lot. I remember when I got the animal smoothie from Paul Saladino, like the animal base, whatever, it was donating to some cause.
13:09I remember seeing it like on the bottom. A lot of the smoothies too have like a little board and it'll say like the cause that it's going to. I totally forgot about that. So that's also another interesting play. What's also interesting is every smoothie has up to five brands paying tens of thousands of dollars to be in the ingredient list. Like it is known, it is known when you go to Air One. Unlimited money glitch. It is known when you go to Air One that you don't have to think about, am I making a healthy decision here? Because they have a very ruthless, what's the word I'm looking for? They have a very ruthless process for deciding whether or not a brand or something can be carried inside of the store.
13:55And so because that's the case, these brands for the ingredients, they want to be inserted into the smoothie. And so they're willing to pay a lot of money to be in the ingredients. And then Erwan can turn it around and be like, oh, we have this thing, which has ashwagandha and it's going to help you chill out. But it also tastes really good. When we were doing research for this episode, we were mind blown to know that the celebrity doesn't get a kickback or they don't get paid for it. So it's like just good PR, man. You're talking about pairing? Talk about pairing? That is the price of rice, dude.
14:32So you're wondering if the celebrity isn't getting actual money out of the endorsement, out of the partnership, why do it? Why do it? There's a few reasons. Okay, tell me. For example, if you take Haley Bieber, she gets massive awareness around her name because she is paired with Erwan. So it's almost this level of, or this, it's a stamp of approval. It's like, I am big enough and culturally relevant enough to be paired with Erwan. And I'm a big enough of a celebrity that people are going to want to come try this new smoothie because it is attached to me. It kind of reminds me of like getting the stamp of approval to play at Coachella versus like any other music festival.
15:16That's like your big moment as an artist. so like hailey bieber because she's paired with air one she is then seen as her her like status as a celebrity gets put in a certain tier and it's not like she's getting paired with ralph's or albertson's it's like she's with air one so then her other brand road is now also seen in the skincare line as something that would also be carried at air one and it's of a certain echelon. I agree. I agree. I agree completely. The other thing too, is I was just back in Indiana for a shoot and I was looking for caffeinated beverages. All right. So I went to the local 7-Eleven.
15:5999 % of the beverages in the energy space are dog water, just dog shit ingredients, sucralose, like just the worst shit ever. I'm not saying I don't love a white monster every now and then when I'm on vacation, but they're terrible for you, right? All the other beverages I'm looking, I'm like, oh, there's this one from this popular creator who everybody knows dog water ingredients. Like most of the things that are out there are bad. They have, if you go on that shelf, you're not finding like refined sugars. It's like organic cane sugar. It's not going to be like sucralose or something, something like that, which is really interesting.
16:32There's like no artificial colors. You're not going to find like a blue Gatorade in there. No red 40, none of that stuff. So most of the brands, they can't even make it. They can't even apply to make it onto that shelf. And the fact that brands are willing to lose money to play ball there, I think tells you something about just how culturally relevant they are in this little sector. It's a stamp of approval. It's wild. For sure. 100%. And dude, they're on a probation. If they don't sell, you get kicked out. We were asking Alex Costa about this with his hair care brand, which is in Target, Forte.
17:08You guys should go check it out. But Alex was explaining to us, and so was Max Tuning about sour strips. If you get into Target or Erwan or any of these grocery stores or, you know, big retailers and you don't move product, you buy that shit back. Can you believe that? They're like, yeah, we're giving you the chance. But if you guys don't move product, you can't hang here. You can't hang here. Like they have so much power by just having like the foot traffic. It's fascinating. And if you'll notice too, like when you guys go to check out at any of these grocery stores and there's like a fridge, that's not because they just like the brand.
17:40Yeah. That fridge is paid for, man. And like they rotate the drinks at the very end of the thing. So it's like as you're going out, at least the one by the Grove, you'd be like, all right, am I going to try this? Like this new poppy or ollie pop, whatever the heck the thing may be. They'll put those like premier flavors right there. You want to give it a little dance? It's so interesting. What's also interesting about the smoothie in particular is like you think that they're just making money off of like the smoothie itself. but it's not necessarily the case yes they are making 10 million dollars a year just off of like one skew of this smoothie which is insane but then you also get the paid media side because there's just like an unlimited ugc glitch going on because everyone wants to come make a video about it it brings people from out of town um they have the at home make it yourself thing and i think the best collaborations they have multiple streams of revenue and they're they're tapped in on more than one vertical it's not just like what you see at face value yeah you have you have so many different things other than just the just like the regular grocery store it's like the hot bar is its own little entity the smoothie bar is its own little entity and then the bags talk about the bags i keep seeing these damn bags everywhere you know how much those bags are yeah the big one's like 150 yeah 150 for a tote bag they don't they donate some of it to charity as well but like the hoodie same thing dude it's like a two i will say that hoodie is soft soft soft every time i go check out i'm like i see brothers in the hats are out and about i'm like dude you paid for that hat man do you know how strong of a brand you have to be as a grocery store to have merch to rock a grocery store merch it's a nice hoodie dude it's not some like gildan shit it's a nice ass well dude i remember when it's nicer than this one that i have on this was like a$200 hoodie.
19:35I remember. Which is also ridiculous. Yeah. I remember when me and Sarah Catherine went to Italy for a wedding about close to two years ago now. She rocked a green Air One tote to like walk around Italy. And I, in my mind, I go, it's a little ridiculous to wear a fucking bright green tote. And she's like, no, no, this Air One tote is sick. And I'm like, all right we swap with any other brand it's not sick that's what i'm saying yeah it's totally sick because it's like in my mind i'm like the green kind of didn't really go with like the outfit she's rocking more like reds and blues you know but then she's got this green one but she was really rocking with the air one you think they're leaving any money on the table i do and they're doing pretty well okay i'd argue that they're doing pretty good you know what i'm saying yeah they're doing pretty good but i think that there is room to squeeze more of the lemon juice I think they need to play more into the whole, I don't want to say influencer culture in LA, but I think they need to play more into and lean into how absurd of a grocery store it is because - It struck me.
20:45Get you ready? This is a multimillion dollar idea. Multimillion dollar idea. We need a hilarious short form social show with funny - Oh, totally. We need like a Michael Scott-esque character who's like the boss coming up with marketing ideas. We need, you know, maybe a Dwight Schrute kind of character-esque in there. We need four or five consistent characters that show up across like a 10-part, 12-part series. 30, 60 seconds filmed in the store. I think that would crush. As we were doing research, as we always do, I was taking a look at their Instagram. And so much of the content that they're putting out is like super high polished.
21:22a lot of it is featured around the smoothies that they make for the video stuff and it's super high polished like pro video stuff again similar to the Coachella episode we did I think there's so much money being left on the table and so many impressions that they could get and earn media through iPhone stuff and playing into the like this whole world that is air one okay it was a tear fest in the Coachella short form. Okay. Everyone's crying. I'm going to be honest. I don't give a shit about the short form people because I know the real people are here on the ground or on YouTube. Okay. I understand that the big rocks are here.
21:59Got the little rocks over on Instagram, just crying in the comments. Here's the deal. Coachella missed out on that opportunity. Totally. I stand by that. People were in my DMs screaming. I'm like, Hey dude, no tears in the DMs. Voice memos. No tears in the DMs. If you want to cry, send me a video, man. We're not going to cry over text. Very interesting, though, because many of you guys agreed. Some people disagreed. I think they're wrong, and it's fine. And I think that this is also, I think this is a truth. I think they're obviously doing really well. Oh, we're giving Erewhon advice. Like, they have 650 ,000 followers.
22:32They're clearly doing something right. I think, though, we want to give the kerosene to the fireman. That's what we're here to do. I think a little show would be fantastic. And I think it's just a mix, dude. like it would be fun because they do something with the the uh their their menu can change sometimes the chef special selection yeah i would love to see a short form iphone-esque video of like 100 i'm chef donnie today this is my new creation this is the lamb chop we got this sauce on the side make sure to come get to the weho location only because it varies on location there's another very great great little short form piece of content yeah we didn't see a ton of content around the new opening no you know what i'm saying i did i would i should we should have been getting hit with ads i know they did a billboard like outside of our spot but i wanted local ads dude funnel my face that we're having a new store opening i just think they're missing out on a lot of the raw moments and i also don't think they're capitaling i also don't think they're capitalizing enough on micro influencers in the LA area or coming out of town.
23:41They have these like massive celebrity collaborations. But do you feel like, do you feel like the, the caveat there is that everyone is coming to town and posting about it? So that's the, that's the like hard part about the organic stuff. Like we, you and me don't really post about it, right? We go for, I go all the time. I don't really post about it, but everyone, when I go, I see a lot of people taking photos or like holding up their smoothie and taking pics. So I feel like from like the organic, like people posting about it, like Coachella has their little engine. I think that works. You know what I'm saying?
24:11So you think that they're getting it? You think it's the classic example of like people are going to post it anyway, so they don't need to. No, no, no, no. I think that that's like one component of it. So like, I think like similar to Coachella and everyone's like, oh, the people are posting. Yes, no shit. We don't think we know that. We know that people are posting about it. So there's that angle, right? The UGC machine is already in place and it's there. I think they need to go deeper with like their own little formats, like their own show, their own consistent little format that could be the chef explaining what the dish of the day is or the smoothie of the month and like how it came.
24:44I think they do do the smoothie of the month. I think I've seen that before, but I would love to see other stuff, other behind the scenes. you know there's like an opportunity for really fun content and to play into the fact that they're expensive and that they're like funny well they're getting parodied on snl yes so lean into that or the characters dude when i tell you guys the characters first of all like i ran into russell westbrook in erwan the one next to us i was like post up i go russ what's good he goes oh you you use pictures and stuff i go sure yeah pictures and stuff that was me dude we're we're co-workers don't forget that shit but i saw him there we chatted for a second he met chloe chloe thought I used to like me and Russ used to work in the marketing department together.
25:23Nice. She goes, who's that? She goes, you guys, does he do like the editing stuff? Sorry, man. He's a little tall, you know, but yeah, Russell Westbrook posts up at Irwan. The amount of celebrities that you'll run into are like, it's pretty random. I ran into a, who's the actor in Oppenheimer, the main guy, Killian Murphy. Killian Murphy. I saw randomly at like, as I'm checking out. So it's pretty funny. And do the fits comedy. We could do a funny bit on the craziest fits. You know what could be really funny? You couldn't post the people, but you could do a funny bit of people wearing crazy shit.
25:57They should do a video version of Overheard LA. Oh, yeah. That'd be funny. But you can't film people in your store. You'd be like, damn. You know what I'm saying? No, but I think you'd hire... No, no, that's what I'm saying. You hire funny. Yeah, yeah. You hire talent to make it a bit. One thing I would love to see them do is more founder-led content. From Tony and Josephine, who are just absolutely killing it. Shout out to Tony and Josephine. I think that there's such a story behind how conscious they are of the products that are actually inside of the store that are allowed. A lot of brands aren't actually allowed to be carried in Air One.
26:42they have their own supplement line they have supplements they have soap i got oh i got another another fifty thousand dollar d after go i'm just saying i think that if the founders were to share more of the story and like what what it means to be a part of air one and like more storytelling content i think that would eat okay ready i'm just baking money for these guys dude okay $15 ,000 to$25 ,000 concept here. Okay. You're a brand. You come to us. You're going to get put on the shelves. We'll do a little profile on you guys. We'll post it to the feed about why, like why your product, why it's super special to be in this place and like kind of where you came from.
27:2745 second video gives awareness to the brand that they're there. Post on the feed to Erwan. Does a little collab post. Payment from the brand to be put on the feed. Oh. Yeah. Now we're talking. So instead of an end cap, you can pay for a collab? Yeah, brother, you got a$25 ,000 collab. Are you kidding me? Yeah. Dude, sign me up for that. I'm just coming with these on the spot. Dude, you guys might have to hit them up for BlueStream. I didn't even have this written down. No. This is all off the dome. That is crazy. Yeah, I love that. What else? Oh, okay. I got another one. The cooking creators in Los Angeles should have a signature dish for the week, and they test it and see what the vibe is.
28:07I think that would be fun. And you could donate a proceed of whatever the, I mean, it's like 40 bucks a damn pound for something. You could donate a portion of that to charity. I mean, now we're talking getting people, I want to talk about getting creator culture involved. You get the, what is it? Jack's dining room. Jack Cook. Jack Cook. How Kev Eats. Yeah. We get these guys to get a little dish or a little, their hot bar plate or something like that. I like that. Now we're talking. Yeah. Now we're talking. It's like, dude, it's like, it's like Travis Scott with McDonald's, but this is way cooler.
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28:36One thing that's really interesting about them, and again, through doing research, we found this out. Through doing research? They did a collaboration with Kith Ivy. Which is what? It's Kith's, it's not like Soho House for Kith. It's an exclusive members only thing that Kith runs in New York, right? Yes. Okay. And it's, how much is it? Well, they started selling Air One smoothies for 25 bucks at this place. and it did well. And they paired themselves with Kith. And I feel like if you shop at Kith, you're probably also going to Air One. But what this proved is that the brand itself can travel and can hold space and do well without having to open a location in another area.
29:22And so I think that there's a lot of power in the IP that they hold and in their brand. And so I would love to see them activate at a lot more places and events that like... F1. Yeah, that influential people are at or like the high echelon people that shop at Air One are also going to these events. Like you said, F1 would be great if they... Dude, if they did a fucking Coachella pop-up. Oh my God. Oh my God. I think they did. They did one at Poosh. Yeah, they did one. Oh, did they? Yeah, they did one at Poosh. okay well if maybe they could even collab with soho house in some way um i just think that there's there's room to create moments that are outside of just opening a new location in la because people are already traveling from not only different states but outside of the country because they want to come check it out i can't i can't keep getting away with this are you ready takashi murakami x air one merch tell me it unfit could be sick could be a vibe we get like a big flower right here with the little air one logo he does some flower things exploding in the logo dude i could i feel like i could pod for a living yeah you could you could for sure i think um that would be sick i think they should do they should do like merch drops i agree capsule drops of those specific colors never release them again yes like they had a one i believe one hoodie or maybe it's just a bag it was like that yellow that goldy yellow sure my aunt bought one which is so funny she just texted me a photo of it and was like she came up to la for something to meet me and my mom for lunch and she texted me a photo and was like what do you think i was like you would you would totally buy that tote bag i think that if whenever they do a celebrity uh endorsement or a celebrity partnership for the smoothie they should also make like an exclusive piece of merch love that love that for the celeb dude yeah maybe we we should we should have a little t-shirt line and dude talk about this is more money to charity if they're they're gonna like charge a high price to like donate a portion of those proceeds give me another hat give me a different color hat yeah give me a little little like how cool would have been if you had the cactus jack uh you know like a hat yeah hat or a hoodie or something like that it's like people are gonna buy that shit up like nobody's business people love a collab people love a if done well if done well if done well people love a collab yeah yeah it just it just drives people to talk about it and it's it is one of one like if they don't release it again you're like it drives hype to get people to show up and show out yeah i think the biggest takeaways from this episode would be there's no in my opinion there's no downside to like upping the volume um because i think that they're still like of content.
32:20If you can hold a certain standard, but they're not even tapping into the lower lift pieces of content. And I think that for a business of their size, who has the money to spend, they're clearly doing well. And the content that they're putting out is great. But I still think that there is a little bit of money to be left on the table. I think the biggest takeaway for me is just that they need to fix the parking lots. That's it. Really? They're better than Trader Joe's. Trader Joe's, Erwan, whoever did the parking lot was like, let me actually just draw a couple of lines here. What is crazy though is they do have free valet.
32:58Yeah, they have valet. What fucking grocery store has valet? Because people that shop at Erwan don't know how to park. There's like some of the silliest people I've ever seen in my entire life. I actually have a crazy story for the pod today. Okay. To like really wrap us up. This is insane. So today I was coming here. Today I was coming here to come to the pod. And so I'm getting onto the freeway and I'm in the far right lane. Okay. Normally I am the cause of the road rage. Normally. Okay. I've had some, you guys know about the motorcycle stories back in the day. This is actually insane. Hooking a right.
33:27I'm in the far right lane. There's about six cars, right? We're all going straight. And then we're going to pop right onto a freeway. All right. You guys paint the picture. Okay. I'm the leader of the charge. To my left, I see this, this white car. I'm not thinking much of it. It's in the lane next to me. There's one lane to enter onto the freeway. Okay. We have a video. I have a video. This fucking crazy guy. I can't see it's murdered out windows. I'm like, this dude could have a gun. I don't know how old this dude is. I don't know what the situation's like. You also got to understand I'm fully capable of going like, you know, crazy mode, right?
34:03This guy just sends it over onto me. I like barely missed my car. I'm like, yo, what's going on? So I start recording. I'm like, this is crazy. He stops on the on-ramp and then proceeds to go sideways. What? Blocked everyone from going onto the on-ramp. He's an older dude. He's older. I'm like, bro, bro, bro. So then I was like, I've never seen that before. I've never, bro, I've never seen it before. Yeah. Call 911. I'm like, yo, there's a crazy dude who is guys. I'm talking like horizontal on the on-ramp. So like no one can get by. Like I couldn't go around him if I wanted to. It's just curb and curb sitting there flipping us all off.
34:39The one dude behind me gets out of the car and I'm like, are we going to beat this guy's ass right now? Like me and this dude going to go together? Like this dude was big. I was like, okay. Then he gets back in his car because this dude was huge. And he's like, we're going to get this guy. I'm like, the guy driving the car was massive. No, no, no. The dude behind me was like, yo, like let's get this dude. And I'm like down, but like, let's give him a chance, man. This guy's old, but like this guy's crazy. So I call 911. one they're like appreciate that i'm like dude dude we're getting an officer to get on that go i gave you the license plate and i gave you the car i gave you the guy so what ended up happening he just like after a minute that dude like kind of ran at like up and he like moved over to the side and then we drove by and he's like flipping all of us off and i'm like i'm still so confused that's crazy craziest video right is that not insane that is like guys i'm talking like blocking the whole ramp you couldn't get by there's like nine people behind laying on their horns we'll We'll put the video in the pod.
35:32I'll toss the video in because I'm giving it a narration. I'm like, what is actually going on? But yeah, that was... We'll toss his license plate in there too. Volkswagen Atlas. Craziest shit I've ever seen. It was insane. So if you see him... If you see this crazy dude on the on-ramp. Do you have any other stories that you would like to share? We just started up the DCA again. We started up the DCA again, which has been sweet. We've got a great group of rocks in there. Very excited to work with them on their video businesses. I am going to Chicago to do stuff for the NBA draft, which will be fun with this company.
36:05It's like in a doctor app, which will be super dope. So that'll be fun. And you're going to Hawaii? I'm going to Hawaii tomorrow morning. And then to Miami for my first ever bachelor trip that I've ever been on. Oh. Should be pretty fun. Where are you going? Miami? Miami. I've never seen a more ridiculous itinerary. Are you guys like doing the club shit? It's like 11. Like they're going. I get a thing. It's like 80 foot yacht. I'm like, who's paying for the yacht, man? Yeah, did they? Yeah, we got a deal. My boy loves a deal. Sick Airbnb, like right on the water in Miami. It's gorgeous. I paid for that months ago, so that feels really nice.
36:41Yeah, it feels free. It feels free. Oh, dude, it's a free Airbnb. I'm going to pull up and be like, let's go. So we're going right from Chicago. Literally, I land from Hawaii on the 12th. I fly at like nine o 'clock. I fly out the morning at 7 a.m. to Chicago. Shoot three days in Chicago. Fly right to Miami. me come back home back to dc like the next week later for like three days for another shoot with venmo it's been a busy it's been a busy last like few months but we're we're staying busy our nike swim campaign officially dropped dude i saw the photos you guys dropped today for me it was great the photos are sick i didn't take those shout out to muzzer they were so sick i was there too watching him watching him cook dude oh my lord these turned out so fun and i think the I think the big difference from back in the day that I can share with you guys when we would just pull up and shoot it's just all planning like everything is made in pre-production yeah for these bigger shoots it's like still the same process as of camera lights key light backlight hair light I remember taking a three-point lighting class in college thinking this is some bullshit I'm actually like I obviously I didn't know any better I'm like this is whatever like I don't really know if this is going to apply.
37:55That applies all the way up. We were on a huge million dollar commercial. We were doing B unit stuff, social media campaign stuff. And it's the same. Yeah. It's the same. Just bigger lights and stuff. A little bit bigger. They cut it a little bit more. They shape it more. They have a little bit more time. They're doing less shots. They're doing like eight shots instead of 12 or 15. And like running and gunning with your camera. And like for this, for this Nike campaign, when we went out there for Nike swim, we did a scout day beforehand and we pretty much just like he test shot everything. So we knew exactly all these different angles were shot on iPhone before.
38:34So we have these already like sketched out. I already had all my frames sketched out where I wanted the light to come from, where the sun was going to be in the sky. And I think those are just the little details that take something where i like was the classic person of like you pull up with your camera and i'm like ready to rock and roll and that's what sports is like sports you just like whatever you give me i'm taken you know and there's like definitely an art to it but i'm same with concerts right you pull up you're like i kind of know what there's no you're just no like pre-planning there's no pre-plan you know like okay i'm gonna get the shot of the guys at the front of the booth facing like facing the crowd and then i'm i need to get a wide when the pyro goes off or the fireworks go off and then you're like everything else is kind of a the only um funny story tell me a funny story first time i ever did a concert okay uh what can you share with the people i um i didn't know what front of house was dude this is before chat and we were yeah we were we were in the we were in the suite like they were finalizing their set and I was talking to the manager and he's like, yeah, so I think you'll start.
39:45Or no, I go, where do you want me to start? And he goes, front of house. And I go, okay, cool. So like that's, where exactly is that? And the manager goes, I'm a little worried you don't know what front of house is. And I was like, no, it's like, it's like in the crowd, right? Can I guess, is the front of house that thing that is in the crowd where their monitor control, that's what I thought, okay. And back of house is like backstage? Is that a thing, is that a term? I don't know, I was just guessing. Back of house? I don't know. But yeah, front of house is where like the sound and lights. That's what I thought.
40:14Is monitoring everything. But yeah, the only issues I would run into when doing concerts was like, I remember this one specific festival in, I think it was San Bernardino. Frequency with the lights? No. That happened to me the very first time where it's like, I was getting lines in my photos and videos. And I was like, I don't know what's going on, but it was just frequency with the lights. So do you just, what do you do when that happens? There's a way that you can change the shutter speed to be like decibels. Yeah, 180 dot whatever. And that fixes it. But there was one festival where I'd never seen anything like this.
40:52Everybody had these massive like totem poles and signs. And so I went and it was packed. And I was really far back. And I was trying to get like from the crowd shot. I was like, you can't even see. You can't even see them on stage. everybody's just holding signs up and then I'm getting bumped and I'm like can you not bump me like I'm trying to stay steady my fucking arms are already shaking gotta get my hand up for like five minutes see Coachella they're not allowed to have those things I noticed the European festivals they all build their crazy I mean I will say dude we didn't talk about this in Coachella episode you gotta give respect to the guy or the gal that leads the group I was dying laughing at this like selfless job that one person is holding some silly ass thing and like leading the charge of an army of people and they're just like snaky through the crowd like there's just like 12 people deep it's so funny that was not me i wasn't the i wasn't you weren't the ringleader there's too many people not the pack dude you went a little deep to coachella yeah it was there's a lot a lot of us but dude can you believe how chill this dog has been so for if you guys watching what i don't even know if he's showing up on camera you get anything you can see him we got a sleepy dog we me and sarah catherine um inherited a third dog so we have a zoo at the house right now um yeah sarah catherine's stepdad just like couldn't handle having two dogs and so he was going to try to find a a new place for it and uh we were like we'll take it we'll find a house so we thought the dog was going to come and we were going to find a new home for it and this is the i just want to bring it on camera come here come here three he's he's knocked out dude anyways i you've i fell in love you adopted another dog yeah dude so we have three but we're gonna i think try to find a a home for one of them the um the what else dude
42:54the next few weeks of the pod are gonna be interesting so we obviously we skipped a week unfortunately it's like i'm going out of town we got really messed up with guests but i think we have a great ideas for the future of the show i think we're we're going back which is we're going back to creator land which we're super excited about i think we mentioned this on the last pod but creator land and a lot more videographers yeah just in the video photo space i think we went down a little bit too much of the route of business, which was cool. And it got a lot of views. But we realized that like, once you start dealing with this, with these very busy entrepreneurs, a it's hard to schedule the guests, we felt kind of limited on the types of guests that we wanted to actually have on um and we kind of just want to get the podcast back to just a really fun spot to back to its glory yeah back to a spot where we can and i don't think we we even like no fully went like not off the rails we were close we were close but i think that it'll be way more fun to kind of keep it casual i think for a minute we were just trying to play the game of like how many views can we get and we were getting we would get anxiety if like a if a podcast underperformed on youtube and yeah you guys also got to understand like i'll tell you guys how podcasts make money views equal brand deals yeah but if the video doesn't do well brands get sad brands don't want to work with you anymore so then money goes down so we chase views because that's how podcasts make money yeah so it was a it's been very eye-opening the brands that have stuck with us have stuck with us for a really long time, which has been cool.
44:44There's like one brand that's stuck with us since we really like incepted the show, which has been wild and like so grateful because we literally couldn't do it without the sponsors. So that's been eye-opening and interesting. And I think that we want to keep getting on amazing folks in the photo video space. I've hit up a handful of people, but we are looking for guests, uh, preferably if they're on YouTube, that would be super sick, but they don't have to be on YouTube. Uh, it's just a bonus point. It'd be a really nice bonus point, but we need someone with a really strong Instagram presence.
45:21Yeah. That is the strong Instagram presence. The reason why body of work. Yeah. The reason why YouTube rips so hard is because then we can collab and it can get sent out to their audience as well. I think we got to run it back with some folks. Absolutely run it back with some folks. Speaking of running it back for some folks, we talked to Babin the other day. Gosh, Tyler Babin. Tyler Babin wants to come on the show. He hit me up about - We're getting Tyler back on. He hit me up about shooting Hassan's new show. And y 'all know I don't really do the concert stuff anymore. And I kind of put that in the bucket, but he's like, dude, you'll be able to watch the show you can shoot some photos and you don't have to edit and i was like dude music to my ears i got dude sign me up no editing like because i wanted to go see the show anyways because when last time me and fig were in new york we went to the studio and we got to see hassan's studio and and what babin was working on and he was showing us like the early days or early start of them like making content and promotional stuff for this tour did you meet Hassan?
46:27No, but you did, right? Okay, I met him the next time. Okay, that's what I was like. I was like, I swore one. Okay, yeah. He's 6 '8", man. Babin actually, I forgot to tell you this. Guy's huge, man. No, Babin texted me and he asked me if you were like okay and you were like always like that around celebrities.
46:47He thought, he thought, dude, no, genuinely because he thought, shut up, stop, stop, stop, stop. No, dude, he was like, I don't understand because he was like, did you ever hear stuff about Fig being weird around LeBron with the late? I'm like, dude, no. Fig always told us that he was like a chill guy and like he to like act like he's been there. And he said you kind of like freaked out, asked for some photos and autographs and stuff. Oh, hey, Hasan. He's like, I'm like looking up at the sky. I forgot to ask you about that. You were just nervous? Lights were bright or what? Just a little nervous.
47:20And then, you know, I was like, would you draw this picture for my girlfriend? I feel like she'd really like that. And he escorted me out. The security came up and stuff. It was weird. Yeah, that's why Babin asked me to come shoot. I was really confused why I didn't get to ask to shoot the photos. I was like, why am I not getting to ask? Yeah. But I'm like, maybe he knew I was going out of town. Like I was going out of town. No, he had no idea. Has no idea. He knew I was going out of town. We forgot beverages for this pod. We're bringing the one-handed crack back. It'll never happen again. and we yeah we've just we're just dude we're getting it going what's new in camera land dude you guys want to know something crazy okay i ran into dude i ran into a rock at the san francisco airport his name was upon i can't forget it because he said once upon a time and i was like i'll never forget that name it's really cool dude um i know i know he went to uc riverside nice yeah cool guy but he's from out here in in the la area and we got to chat for a minute as i was passing through going to my gate but very cool to run into a cool rock out in the wild i was like dude i like your videos like holy shit this is crazy dude let me get a picture with you dog yeah dude that's proof it was cool yes it's proof this happened it was cool though very cool i went to this was wild bro so i went to film an artist like a live painter for this other software company that I'm doing work for.
48:45He builds these most ridiculous paintings that are like a, like not medieval is the word, like mythical women with like color, very, very colorful images. Okay. So think like, what are some of the ones, like, you know, the sirens or those that thing, you know, the Greek, is that a Greek thing? Mythical thing? You got to know what I'm talking about. Women? Yeah. It's like the sirens. There's like the three of them and they lure sailors. You don't know what I'm talking about. I'm not as cultured as you. Okay. Okay. Hold up. Sirens. Hold up. I'm going to pull it up for you. It's like these. They're like mythical mermaids kind of thing.
49:22Oh. But that's not exactly what his paintings look like. This is one of them. But anyways, they're like very beautiful. These crazy paintings that are in beautiful color. Well, I got to go see what the actual process was like in San Francisco. That's what we flew over there for. You saw him like make one in person. Bro, it was the craziest shit. But so what he does, and he's, I believe, 50. His name's Chuck Sperry. He was showing us the process of how he actually comes out with a print. So first sketches by hand with like pencil, right? Gets it going. Then scans this whole thing, brings it into Photoshop, and decides like what's going to be these kind of different colors that he's going to bring out to life.
50:00But then he screen prints every single one by hand, just him. It's one person. He's like, I love the freaking process. and I was asking him because I'm like you see like when we were in Indiana he sold a lot of money like high six figures of art while we were there in like an hour it was fascinating people flying in from all parts of the country I believe there was even people from out of the country which is freaking crazy collectors people just love this guy they love his work and I was like Chuck when did you feel like you kind of made it in art land like you were like I know I'm not a starving artist anymore and he said 32 he's like i was struggling man i like i you know people in that were in the career were my friends were quitting they're going to regular jobs like he goes dude at that point though what's your one skill you're an artist you can like teach go back groceries like your skill is like making art making art man that's your thing that you dedicate your life to and he's like i just kept at it and i wanted to share that story because when he was telling to me i was like fuck that hits home into i think a lot of creators there's always going to be like an uphill battle of like proving yourself and proving that you can be in this game yeah and he was like i hope that like with this piece we're making yeah that i could hopefully shine a little bit of light on like how cool this is to make it a full-time career and fuck i was getting sad like listening to him say because i know how like hard he worked and like this to see this crazy process of what goes into one single painting i'm like no wonder people pay for this stuff like pay great money for it because it's like so many touch points just for one piece this is crazy so does the drawing right that takes forever takes for however long then scans it then digitizes it they're talking days for each like right to draw it digitize it then picks the color then to screen print it dude it's not just like you toss all i had no idea how this process worked it's crazy so he puts the a blank piece of like cardstock nice cardstock paper into this machine every singular color that's in this painting and his paintings are so colorful it's black first goes on then they do the black then it has the outline of all the black around it then it's like the yellow then he tosses the yellow on there and then he showed me how the yellow then the orange and the blue then these specific colors need to mix together to make this one and then it does it he does that for some of them there's like nine colors for just one it's nine goes and then the one is done each one had 30 that he creates wow which is fascinating it was the coolest process in this warehouse in san francisco just to see how he does his thing and it was like this dude has so much fucking passion he's like i love this shit and i remember how hard it was to get here so i'm like so grateful and he was telling me about like other artists that he's talked to and they have like operations like 20 person teams he goes i love this so much that it's like i just get to say that like i get to make art for a living and i'm like dude that's so cool which is really cool because some people be making a lot of money off of art and it's not that good yeah and this is like this was stunning art is such like you think you think like jackson pollock just like i'm just gonna splatter a bunch of paint and fucking and fucking convince people to buy stuff it was like them it was the call it a date it's like the it's it was the the the old version of like the fake guru yeah online you know literally literally that's funny man i hope i become rich enough one day to be able to invest in like really expensive art me too me too i think it i was like i want he gave us a book he had just dropped a book very cool he signed it sent us home with the book.
53:47We got to have like a piece of Chuck Sperry to put on the bookshelf. But that was a cool, it was just a very cool experience. And I think that right now it's so easy to get caught up in the 17 millionaires. And I, dude, I even think that the people that we had on our show, I was talking to many of you in the, in our, my DMS, you were like, you know, this is cool that people are doing this well, but it can be discouraging when you're looking at it and you're like I'm nowhere even like near this oh that's how I felt for sure really I think that it like it gets to a point where the wealth is like so so ridiculously high that I think it turns it turns people off and dude like owning a business is fucking hard I'll tell you guys it's so fucking so this is okay this is I traded my nine to five for a 24 seven it's great yeah this is interesting I remember like two of my favorite episodes were probably greg levecchia okay and ross mckay okay so they and they both created beverages and i remember walking away from both of those episodes granted i think greg's an even like higher tier than ross okay and what do you say like i think that what do you mean like terms of how the brand is doing no like greg's fucking flying private jet i see what you're saying okay but anyways So you talk to this person and it's incredibly motivating.
55:18But then I'm sitting here and I'm asking these questions and I'm like, I'm never going to build a physical product. Like I don't really think I'm ever going to go for an exit of some sort and build a brand and sell it. I at least don't think so. and then you kind of start to i almost felt like down on myself or like shit because i'm like well he's doing it i feel like i should be doing that too and then i would stay up late at night after the episode just be like what kind of fucking product can i make like i want like let's get an exit let's make a brand and then you you you talk to them and they're like dude it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows like it's hard entrepreneurship's hard but then part of me is also looking at them and saying yeah I get that but like dude you're also fucking a bajillion air flying private maybe I should pivot and I think that like with the internet it's so easy to see all these highlight reels and people being super successful and then because we were going down that route we started paying more attention to like forward-facing founders and then you see people, you see these headlines of these startups selling for hundreds of millions or billions of dollars.
56:42And then you see that it kind of makes you feel like shit in a way. You're like, I should be there doing something like that. But it's not even like that isn't even my path to follow. So I'm kind of excited for that reason to get back to talking to more creators because I think it's more relatable to not only I think our listeners, but like myself as well. Yeah, I don't know. That's kind of how I felt. Like it's really cool to talk to fucking Gary V. It's really cool to talk to these like really successful, very wealthy like entrepreneurs, but it's, um, I don't know. It's like, it's kind of hard to relate to because at least in this point in time, I'm not like a founder for a physical good that potentially I could sell.
57:35I have the agency and we have the podcast and stuff, but everything's content related. I don't know. It makes sense. I think that's the sentiment that I got from people in the DMs as well. Yeah. And I appreciate the feedback. What's also interesting too, and we ran into this as well, Like a lot of these people would come to LA and they would do a podcast run of like four to five different episodes. The podcast run sucks. It's terrible because here's what happens. Okay. You listen to our show. You listen to our boy Mark's show. You listen to, I don't know. I'm just, I can't even think of more pods, but like there's like four or five.
58:18Sure. There's like four or five pods that people will do in a run in a specific sector. And people have scripts, which is super unfortunate. They play the hits. Yeah, they play the hits, man. I get it. I get it. It makes sense. But then a lot of the times I think you just end up listening to the same thing. Like if I go listen to someone on Jay Shetty and then you go listen to that same person on a Mel Robbins. Yeah. It's a very similar – not the questions. The questions are different. But a lot of the time like people just recite or they've been like PR trained. Yeah. I don't think that we've had people on our show that are necessarily like that at all.
58:56but the same things get shared and then you're like damn like this is like what makes us unique yes exactly so i'm very excited to dude we're moting it up well i don't think there's a lot of people and i'd actually really be interested to if you guys are even this far no they're this episode as far i think uh i'd be interested to hear like what other podcasts do you feel like have similar-ish guests on as us from like the creator space and like photographers and videographers because I don't feel like there's too many out there and I feel like we'll be able to really and we did this but I think that we'll really be able to like carve our little name out in like a small niche pocket of the internet pocket of the internet with the fucking people who are into photo, video, creator, content.
59:51You know who texted me? I didn't text. I texted them. Oren is down to run it back. Okay, cool. And I think that would be a really fun episode. Mr. 2X Speed. Yeah, 2X, Mr. Oren. That'd be super fun. And Giancarlo, he texted me back. We're going to get a remote podcast on the books with him, which will be very exciting. When we did the Oren podcast, was the collab feature out? No, it wasn't out. It's interesting. Yeah, I think this app, it actually struggled to get to 10K and then just went, which is interesting. We've said this is interesting quite a few times. Why do I keep saying that word? I don't know.
1:00:30It is interesting. Anyways, what a great app. What a fun app, dude. Love you guys. Make sure to leave us a comment, drop us a like, and subscribe and send this to a friend so you can help us grow the show. We'll see you guys all next week. Peace.
From the publisher
Win $100K from Artlist here:https://artlist.io/artlist-70446?artlist_aid=the505podcast_2970&utm_source=affiliate_p&utm_medium=the505podcast_2970&utm_campaign=the505podcast_2970 ( https://artlist.io/artlist-70446?artlist_aid=the505podcast_2970&utm_sourc...
