🛌 “Air Mattress” — United’s premium pivot. Labubu’s bubble pop. Social media’s verdict. +Dogfooding

0:28This is Nick. Jack's glam up literally broke the Apple podcast app. I'll have to wear a vest again for a real premiere on video. You look too good, Jack. You look too good. But besties, we've got three fantastic stories for the cool spice of capitalism. Jack, what do we got on the pod? For our first story, a jury handed Meta and YouTube yesterday a huge loss in a landmark court case. It zucks a black lung moment. If you think social media is the new cigarettes, the jury agrees. For our second story, the LeBouBou doll is officially dead. At least Wall Street thinks so. Peak Labubu. Labubu stock dropped 23 % because you can be like Mickey or you can be like Beanie.

1:06And our third and final story. In the middle of all the travel chaos going on, United Airlines launched something pretty awesome yesterday. I mean, it's unprecedented. United is turning three seats into a bed because Coach is officially dying. But yetis, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. I mean, what a mix. No one else is doing the mix. The best mix, Jack. The buzziest verb you gotta know right now. From Silicon Valley to Wall Street, what is it, Nick? Jack, that would be dogfooding. Hey, Merriam-Webster, can you sprinkle on a definition for us? Well, Encyclopedia Britannica, I would love to.

1:38Dogfooding, it's when a company uses its own product to make that product better. And it makes sense. If your product has issues, you better be the one who discovers them first, because you use it. When you stand by your product, you better be eating it every day. That's why Kellogg's CEO eats cornflakes every day for breakfast. That's why Uber's engineers don't take Lyfts to work. And that's why Microsoft doesn't slack, they teams. Teams, we don't have to use it, we get to use it. Now, these are all examples of dogfooding. And the term actually goes back to a pet food commercial from 1988. That's right, a dog food company was so proud of their product that every single employee was feeding it to their puppies.

2:13They had to feed it to their puppies. And now in the age of AI, every startup is bragging about their dogfooding. Like Anthropic, which vibe-coded Claude Cowork by using Claude Code. Dog fooding has gotten so big that in the car industry, they're reverse dog fooding. I mean, Jack, what happens over a Jeep if you don't show up at work in a Jeep car? You must park in the shame parking lot that's way over there. Oh yeah, non-Jeep cars can't park with the rest of the Jeeps. So is that dog food shaming? Jack would be dog food shaming. It's reverse dog fooding, Jack. That's Purina pounding. Besties, there is nothing cringe about dog fooding.

2:46Trust us, you want to be doing it. Which is why this is the only podcast we ever, ever listen to. Nothing else. The only thing we listen to. Jack, let's hit our three stories. 15 years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dorm. They had an idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but the best is the norm. Jack Nick, that's it. I don't even think they need to practice. 50 % that's a fat tip. T-Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, cause we ready to go. We can't wait no more, so just start the show.

3:20Start the show. First, a quick word from our sponsor.

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5:25For our first story, a jury just ruled in a landmark lawsuit that Meta and YouTube are responsible for mental health harm to minors. Is social media the new cigarettes? This verdict says yes. Now, yeah, it is. Funny thing about Jack and I, we decided to not go to law school because business school just looked way more fun. Even though I love My Cousin Vinny, one of the best movies of all time. Jack, you can't handle the truth, but Jack and I are both of the sons of lawyers, so we should sprinkle on a little Law 101. What do you think over there, Jack? In criminal cases, you might be found guilty.

6:00In civil cases, you might be found liable. And in this epic social media case, the plaintiff claimed that Instagram and YouTube were responsible for her mental health crisis that she suffered as a minor. Because she started using YouTube at the age of six, Instagram at the age of nine, she was addicted immediately, and both of those apps started messing with her head. Well, years later, yesterday, in a Los Angeles courtroom, a jury ruled 10 to 2 that Meta and Alphabet were negligent in this case. They were liable. They were responsible. So now Meta must pay at least$2.1 million in damages and Google 900K.

6:34More fines could be coming. But$3 million for Meta and Alphabet? Trillion dollar companies? That is nothing. Nada. The problem that these verdicts set is the precedent. The precedent. In tech speak, Yetis, the problem here is the scale. Because there are thousands of other lawsuits saying the very same thing as this one. And each day, new potential lawsuits are being born as the apps addict new young people. And they could also be held liable for those lawsuits. Now, we should point out, having watched the show Suits, that Meta respectfully disagrees with the verdict and is evaluating their legal options, as they said.

7:09And Meta's stock yesterday, it actually rose a tad on the news. It did. Because this outcome was expected. It was baked into the stock already. But besties, to put this into nicotine terms, this is Zuck's black lung moment. He was just told, in a court of law, that he's basically the Marble Man, but with way less musk. But besties, this is what Jack and I find fascinating. This is the first case like it to reach a verdict. And why is that shocking, Jack? I mean, social media is 22 years old now. For decades, Meta seemed like it was tech, Teflon, unsuable because of a law called Section 230. Section 230 is a law that frees platforms of liability from the content posted on those platforms.

7:48So like even if YouTube's algorithm boosted some harmful content to you, it's been unsuable because of Section 230. So this lawsuit took a different approach. It didn't sue the app's content. It sued the app's design. Yes, the infinite scroll, the autoplay, the recommendation, algorithms that just don't stop. The stuff that's addictive. The stuff that keeps you scrolling, not because you want to, but because you simply can't stop. What's the way you put it to me the other day, Jack? Unless you have the impulse control of a toddler who passed the marshmallow test, it's hard to get off Instagram without throwing your phone in a lake.

8:22Yeah, it's a quote Tupac Shakur. I didn't choose the feed life, the feed life chose me. So the argument the plaintiffs made was that intentionally addictive design plus awareness of harm plus a profit motive equals legal liability. So here we are. One jury just agreed that Meta and YouTube engineered irresistible addiction that harmed kids. And future lawsuits could make the same case, not just for kids, but for adults too. Good point, Jack. We got two more cases like this scheduled for this year. And what happens if the social media apps lose those, Jack? If they lose their third straight case, we don't think there will be any more cases after that.

8:56Yeah, but not just because Zuck hates wearing suits, which, by the way, he traded the hoodie for a Xenia for this one. It's because of our takeaway. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over on social media? This is exactly what happened to Big Tobacco. So here's what happens next. Yetis. In 1998, the tobacco companies found themselves in the same situation as social media right now. Back then, it was the states who were suing Big Tobacco on behalf of their healthcare systems. They were facing a tighter wave of expensive lawsuits, so cigarette companies signed one huge settlement to end them all.

9:28Maybe Meta, YouTube, TikTok, and Snapchat could do the same thing. Yeah, they could, Jack. One gigantic settlement to end all these lawsuits once and for all. I mean, let's look back at what tobacco did. Like, Big Tobacco paid$206 billion over 25 years. They added warning labels, agreed to huge marketing restrictions. Interestingly, though, Big Tobacco did not change the product. Cigarettes are the same today as they used to be, just as addictive. So maybe if Zuck and all of social media want a grand settlement like the cigarettes got, they might have to make the apps less addictive. This could change the way the apps look.

10:01Maybe the settlement requires the apps to not send you push notifications or not show you videos of people you don't follow. Basically, if social media looks like cigarettes now, maybe they make it look more like Zin in the future. A slightly less harmful version because their harm has already been proven in the court of law. Best use of Instagram, follows Big Tobacco. The next up is one mega settlement, digital warning labels, one enormous fine, and maybe a less addictive app. For our second story, it's a LaBooBoo BooBoo. Wall Street thinks the LaBooBoo party is over. So they're dumping the stock 23 % after the latest tall earnings.

10:38The question now, is LaBooBoo Beanie or is it Mickey? Ah, Beanie or Mickey. But yet it is. Let's start with our friend Barbie, because Barbie does not get jealous of Ken, right Jack? No, but she did get jealous of what's draped to Ken's backpack. Ah, Labubu, the mascot of 2025. The little monster, the athletes, actors, everyone at the summer fair I went to this summer. We had one on our microphones for a bit. It's like a Furby and a Teletubby had a baby who was raised by where the wild things are. Labubu doll. It was created and owned by the Chinese toy maker Popmart, a publicly traded company.

11:12Jack, could you sprinkle on some financial context, please? Well, Pop Mart is a company nobody had ever heard of outside of China five years ago. True story. But today, Pop Mart is worth twice as much as Hasbro and Mattel. Combined. That's how big a deal LaBouBou was in 2025. But sadly, Ken wasn't enough. That seemed like an unnecessary dig at Ken. I regret it as soon as the words came out of my mouth, Jack. And powering the explosion of LaBouBou dolls last year, it wasn't the design or how cute they look or how scary they kind of look. It was their mystery box growth hack. It was the mystery box growth hack.

11:46Although, a story for another pod is Jack's fear of labubus. The mystery box, it created a sense of scarcity, right, Jack? We called this the Forrest Gump strategy, like a box of chocolates kind of a thing. It's also similar to Beanie Babies. They found a way to create a sense of scarcity by not letting you know what would come in the box you ordered. So you had a desire to order a dozen of them to make sure you collected them all. And before you know it, you got to collect them all and your room is labubu'd. But mark your calendars in history, because March 24th, 2026, yesterday, Wall Street declared LabuBu was a dead trend.

12:18And it's all because of PopMart's earnings report, which looked kind of great when we first heard it, right Jack? Revenues nearly tripled last year to$5.4 billion. Profits quadrupled to nearly$2 billion, both all-time highs for PopMart. And yet, the stock of PopMart plummeted 23%,$8 billion of stock market value erased in just a minute. The first big reason was the numbers. Fourth quarter growth slowed big time, and they're forecasting that revenues will massively slow this year to just 20 % growth. Okay, but the second part, interestingly, wasn't the numbers. It was the words. The CEO said, we're more than just Libubu dolls, you know.

12:54Sounds a little defensive, Jack. And then the CEO said, we're like a rookie race car driver suddenly being pushed into Formula One. Last thing investors want to hear is reckless driving analogies from a CEO. He's basically asking Wall Street to lower their expectations, which they did by selling the stock. So yet is Jack and I dove in T-boy style on your behalf. And honestly, the dude does have a point, right Jack? Despite Labubu getting all the attention, Labubu Doll is just 38 % of the business. That's right. Two thirds of the Labubu company ain't Labubu. It's Hirano and Crybaby and Demu Demu Dolls.

13:26And Twinkle Twinkle Dolls and Skull Panda Dolls. And a dozen other similarly sized plush toys as Labubus. See besties, Labubu gets all the attention. But Popmart's real business is that it's a character factory. Sales of the Crybaby dolls, which are crying babies, nearly doubled last year. Sales of Twinkle Twinkle dolls, which are doll-shaped like stars, $300 million worth of sales last year. Yet he's added a lot of Pop Mart. Has birthed more IP than Marvel has in just five years. But back to La Boo Boo. Is it really dead? Wall Street thinks so. Sellers on eBay seem to think so too. But is it peak La Boo Boo?

14:02Jack and I got the right takeaway. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies looking at the La Boo Boo Pop? Will a boo-boo go Beanie Baby or Mickey Mouse? Yetis, Disney is the upside precedent here because Mickey Mouse is still signing autographs after 98 years. Walt Disney loved to say it all started with a mouse. Yes, he did. And the key was that Mickey didn't stand still. Disney expanded the character into film, TV, merch, toys, theme parks. They blew up the IP. The downside precedent is Beanie Baby, a story of an obsessive CEO and a huge bubble popping. CEO so obsessive, he limited the IP to toys and didn't allow the Beanie Baby characters to really grow.

14:40Yes, last week, Popmart did announce plans for a La Boo Boo movie in co-production with Sony Movies. But Jack, by the time that La Boo Boo movie hits theaters, could La Boo Boo be La Who Who? Might be way too late. Sorry, who's that again? So yeah, Mickey Mouse took risks, jumped across media, became a personality, and became three-dimensional. But Beanie Babies didn't take risks. They stayed on your shelf and they remained one-dimensional. If Labubu wants to avoid the fate of being a one-hit wonder, it needs to follow Mickey. Now, a quick word from our sponsor. Top hats, baseball hats, Von Dutch hats.

15:14We wear so many hats on this podcast. Honestly, we're not great at all of them. No, we've been avoiding hiring someone to wear those hats instead of us, especially the Von Dutch one, because hiring and training can take forever. Well, I'm proud to say that we are hiring right now at T-Boy, and this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Because sponsored jobs posted directly on Indeed are 95 % more likely to report a hire than non-sponsored jobs. So besties spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes, less stress, less time, more results. When you need the right person to cut through the chaos, this is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs.

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16:32For our third and final story, United Airlines is letting you turn three seats into one couch to sleep on in the air. They call it the Relax Row. This flying mattress situation reflects a change to the whole industry because United now has seven different classes in the skies. And coach is now the smallest. Now, Yetis, our lawyers don't want us to say this, but Jack and I love saying it anyway. You ready, Jack? You ready? Here we go. This is financial advice. We think airlines are really bad stocks to own. Big Delta fan, but not a fan of the Delta Airlines stock. Every 10 years, an airline needs a bailout, a rebrand, or it goes bankrupt.

17:12And this week, it's been particularly rough for airlines. You got TSA working without pay. You have a tragic plane crash at LaGuardia, and you've got disruptions from the war in Iran. The United Airlines CEO talked about all those things this week. First, he said he predicts that oil will be$100 a barrel all year long. So he's canceling 5 % of routes that ain't profitable at that oil price. So say goodbye to Milwaukee to Albuquerque nonstop. The United CEO also said he would raise fares by 20 % this summer to offset the high oil prices. And he said it's unconscionable that lawmakers are letting TSA workers go unpaid for this long with these insane lines.

17:46But despite those headwinds in the airline industry. Literally. United Airlines also announced they're buying 250 brand new airplanes in the next two years. It's kind of like when you're having a down day. It's a treat yourself moment for United Airlines. Sweet treat. They're in growth mode. But we did find one piece of bright news in the skies. And it's not just bright. This kind of reshapes the whole airline industry, right, Jack? And it would have reshaped my vacation last summer when I brought the whole family to France. See, Eddies, United is rolling out a new policy where if you buy all three seats on one side of the airplane, You can turn that chunk of seats into a bed.

18:22True story. It's called the relax row. Three leg rests are under the seat that fold up to create a flat lie down couch. And then they cover that thing with a mattress pad. They'll give you a blanket. They'll give you two pillows. They'll give you a plushie doll for a little kid. Hey, Nat. Now, they're targeting families with kids. And they're targeting couples who want to rest and get some sleep on a long haul flight. We're not kidding about the dolls, by the way. This comes out in 2027. 200 planes will have it with 12 rows offered per plane. Our guess, this is going to be a thousand bucks extra on top of the three seats you already purchased.

18:52But the wildest part, what is it, Jack? United says they have exclusivity on this pretty simple seat design. Delta, as MC Hammer put it, can't touch this. United will have a monopoly on the flying mattress half of the airplane situation. Not too shabby. What that leads though to is our final question. Why did it take so long for an airline to offer this? I mean, Jack, it's a very simple concept that people obviously would want. People are always like putting up the armrest and trying to sleep on that skinny little row of chairs. Yeah. Why couldn't they have added this leg rest years ago? And when you try sleeping on your neighbor, they get annoyed like 80 % of the time, Jack.

19:30The reason it's taken so long is lack of competition. That's right. The four airlines dominate 80 % of flights and all of them are flying complacent. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies up in the airline industry with the flying mattress seats? After 50 years, coach is getting killed. Premium is now the product. You see, at his post-financial crisis, airlines focused on jamming as many seats into the plane as possible. That was a volume play. Leg room gradually disappeared. The joke was you needed knee pads if you were going to get on a U.S. Airways flight. Except there wasn't a joke.

20:06But with exploding income and wealth inequality, the K-shaped economy has now changed the shape of the plane. For the first time ever, Delta expects a majority of their revenue will come from premium fares, not coach fares. Jack, as United CEO put it last week, they are now prioritizing profitability over volume. What we have is a relatively small number of very well-off Americans traveling more than ever and willing to pay more than ever. So the industry's responding. JetBlue just added first class. Never thought I'd see the day. Southwest is considering airport lounges to treat high rollers.

20:39Sorry, Frontier is doing Napa Valley pinos and Pappy Van Winkle? What's going on, man? I don't know about that, but I do know this. United Airlines now has seven classes within the cabin. Wow. The upper classes now take up more space than the lower classes. By the way, I made up that part about Frontier. Deadies, 50 years ago, Coach was most of the airplane. But now Coach is getting killed. Premium is now the product. Jack, could you whip up the takeaways for us for the new Friday? Instagram and YouTube were both found legally liable for hurting kids with addictive design. It's a black lung moment for social media.

21:14If this follows big tobacco, next comes a mega settlement, then a warning label, and then a gigantic fine. Second, Pop Mart, the owner of La Boo Boo Dolls, is now 50 % off its peak stock price that it hit last summer. La Boo Boo, it's going beanie baby. But it's not too late to still go Mickey Mouse. And our third and final story is United Airlines. They're launching the Relax Row. For probably an extra$1 ,000, three seats can be pushed together into a bed. Because Coach is getting killed. Premium is now the product. But besties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today.

21:47First, is there going to be a prediction market on the future of prediction markets? That is our question. Because a bipartisan Senate bill introduced this week would ban prediction markets from sports betting, which is a majority of their business. So stocks of DraftKings and casinos jump because it's good news for their regulated sports betting. Kalshi and Polymarket announced plans to ban insider trading to try to get ahead of this potential regulation. Okay, but baller move would be if Kalshi ran a poll on the prediction future of Kalshi. Or of Polymarket. Oh, I like what you did there, Jack.

22:20And second, SpaceX may file to IPO as early as this week, according to the information. Nick and I could jump into SpaceX's financials for the first time ever as early as today. Space stocks are already mooning on the news because this will probably be the biggest IPO ever. And finally, serious question, is pickleball over? Because the fastest growing racket sport in America right now is Padel. Nick, I'm gonna let you take this one because I've barely played any pickleball. I've never played Padel. In my eyes, they're the same thing. As my former beer pong partner, Jack, I'm not really happy with the way you're dealing with these racket sports.

22:54You see, besties, the Pro Padel League just raised 15 million bucks on top of$10 million in venture funding already. Pro-Padel, they've already got 10 teams from Canada to US to Mexico playing professionally this paddle sport. The key to Padel, of course, is that you cannot play the sport until you pronounce the sport. Is it pronounced paddle or Padel? Not possible, Jack. Now time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by legendary Yeti Laura from the great state of New Jersey. March, it's National Kidney Month. So we already did a shout out actually for a couple of Yetis who have donated their kidneys.

23:27Great people. Thanks so much, guys. Here's the fact about kidneys from Laura. Did you know that in most kidney transplants, the original kidney is left in the body? That's true. Like meaning the recipients of a new kidney transplant often live with three or more kidneys in their body. The kidneys are only removed if they cause issues. Thank you, Laura, for the fantastic fact and all the yetis who've donated kidneys. Yetis, you look fantastic over there. Jack, you were just dog fooding like a Fido over there, my friend. But Bessies, what we would love is if you would turn to a buddy today while you're grabbing that sweet green salad and say, hey, H-Y-H-T-B-O-Y.

24:03Have you had the best one yet? And have you bought tickets to our live show? We have 17 tickets left. The show is April 8th. We have two surprise guests. We'll announce them next week. It's going to be a legendary show. If you know, you know. And Jack and I will see you for the real Friday.

24:23And before we go, a happy birthday to legendary Eddie Luis Muralia from Belo Horizonte, Brazil. 52nd birthday for him, and it's the same birthday for his youngest son and his dad. Three generations born on the very same day. And happy birthday to Rebecca Milo in Truckee, California, celebrating with the kids Max, Wes, Hayes, and her brown bear hubby, Grant Bowen. And Josh Minnis is celebrating the best birthday yet with a friends and family trip through France. Enjoy the Pino, guys. Happy birthday to Vetta T in Dallas, listening with their brother and dad on the way to school. And Liz, enjoy that 30th birthday in Northville, Michigan.

24:57Welcome to the 30s. Happy 31st birthday to Dan Zuber in Denver, Colorado. And Jackson Ken is killing it in the fourth grade right now, just outside Boston. Best birthday yet. Just outside Boston. And Marc LaVosier is turning 39 years old in Brooklyn with his wife, Opal, and daughter, Madison. Enjoy, guys. And a huge happy birthday to Juan the Husky David, driving to a friend's reunion in Gainesville, Florida. Juan, 16 Husky, you know what I'm talking about. And Benny Lopez is singing in the spring musical just outside Chicago. His favorite episode of The Best Idea Yet, by the way? Pokemon, great episode.

25:31And a shout out to Ariel from the Agapal Memories team. They got a photo booth business, really cool company. Incredibly cool. And Tabitha and JL Perez have their 10-year wedding anniversary and 8-boy T-boy-iversary of listening to this show and it's Tabitha's birthday all happening in Hotlanta. And to anyone else celebrating something today, make it a T-boy. Celebrate the wins.

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