Shaan Loses $700k In Crypto Crash And The Mentality of A Downturn

I am trying to be intentionally out of touch in the same way that I intentionally avoid the news.

All right, we're live. What's going on? Well, yeah.

Well, Sam.

Yeah.

Yeah. You're, uh, my first million has become my first $100,000.

Yeah.

Your first, uh, my last million.

Yeah. On a good day. What, um, You took something out of the Milk Road. I texted you this, but you didn't reply. You— so in the Milk Road, my favorite part was you had— what was the starting amount? A million or $500,000 or what was it? You had your portfolio.

It was actually a little bit less. It was $950,000.

So $950,000 portfolio. And every day you would say what it's at compared to where, what it was. You took it out. What's it at now?

Correct.

Why'd you take it out?

Uh, I don't even want to look. We took out the prices today because, uh, or what do we do? We today, we did a little different thing. So the crypto prices crashed over the weekend. And so we were like, okay, people are definitely going to want to know like what's happening, what's happening, all that stuff. So no, not Saturday, uh, Monday we sent it today.

Um, no, you sent a weekend, basically weekend version.

Where's your head at? Are you freaking out or are you still calm like you always are?

Uh, I'm still calm. Yeah. So, so this is, it's a funny little like story, I guess. Um, I don't know why I said it's funny. There's actually no humor at all in it, but it's interesting how, how I feel about it. Um, Ben flew in. So Ben flew in last night, not producer Ben, business partner Ben. So business partner Ben flies in last night where he's going to be here for the week. We're going to like work on a bunch of stuff and like basically like, you know, from the time he took off, the time he landed, like our whole business has changed. And what has changed is basically like, well, aside from our own personal net worths, uh, you know, going down and the Milk Road public portfolio going down. Like, we have just entered, uh, like the whole economy has entered a recession and crypto has entered for sure like a big downswing, bear market crash, whatever you want to call it. And it's not going to like just bounce right back and all is going to be like fun and dandy again. Like, if you think about this time last year, not this time last year, but let's say like 6 to 12 months ago it felt like money was raining from the skies. Like, you know, I, I invested in a bunch of tech stocks. Everything was up every day. Everything was up. Zoom is tripled in price, and Amazon is up because everybody's ordering all their shit online. And like, every company that we invested in, private startup, was like raising money at crazy valuations. And literally, like, there's a phrase of money raining on fools. Money was raining on fools. And like, NFTs were selling, you know, NFTs were selling for ridiculous prices. And it's so crazy that like, you know, on a dime it feels like the whole world has changed and everybody's mindset mentality has also changed, which is that like now it feels almost impossible to make money. It's like, well, where do I go make money? The stock market is down brutally. Crypto has crashed. Every business is now laying off people or freezing hiring. On top of that, you know, companies are cutting their budgets and ad spend. So if you're— if your business relied on ads, you know, that's getting cut. And so now, you know, money was raining on fools, and now money's being drained from, from smart people too.

You're seeing advertisers run— I tweeted out like what's going on in the ad world because I'm not in it anymore. You're seeing it go away?

Not this fast, but yeah, like, you know, the first, uh, shoe to drop was like kind of like consumer brands, like D2C brands and whatnot. They were the first, I would say, the last 3 months to start like reducing spending, whereas before it was like, how do I spend more? And then there was like companies that are like, well, it's hard to have a big ad budget when you're laying off a bunch of people. So they're— and now that they went into hiring freezes or layoffs, their ad budgets are certainly tightening up. We don't see it this month. Like, this month's an all-time high in ad revenue, but like, I'm sure in the next 3 months that ad budgets are going to constrict. They'd be crazy not to. Um, in our e-commerce business, we see sales— like, this month is good, but you could see the tightening happening where it's like, you know, people just are, you know, they're not getting stimmy checks that they can go spend on, you know, you know, um, electronics and toys and, and, and clothes and, and all this good stuff. And so consumers are slowing down their spending. And so it's like— and all these things are interlinked, right? Like The— when the consumer spends less, the business makes less money, then it has less money to hire, less money to advertise, and then the platforms get less revenue and then they do the same thing. And it's all interconnected, right? So this is interesting to me because I have not lived through a bear market as a founder or investor, right? Like 2008, I was a sophomore in college or something like that, right? Like, I don't know, you're probably the same, but you're like a freshman or sophomore in college.

I graduated high school in '08. So basically this is our first time as like money-earning professionals that we've experienced anything like this. Yeah, dude, it is crazy.

Yeah.

In my head I have this thing called loser brain, winner brain. It's like a loser's brain will bring these thoughts up and bring its attention to these things. And a winner's brain will have these, like, so we basically wrote down all the scary thoughts. It's like, uh, you know, and so I was like, Ben, just rattle 'em off. So I, I'll read you some of these if you're interested, but like, Uh, well, our, but we did this exercise in order to reframe our thinking.

Everything that I think about right now, and I've been, I'm calm about it because I, I've always, I'm you, everyone gives me a hard time that I'm conservative and it's kind of working out right now, but even still I'm down a huge amount. Um, and my fear is always rooted in like, I'm going to run out. I'm like, I'm, I'm homeless. Do you have those fears of like, I'm, I'm going to run out?

No. Um, because if I actually— if I asked you, do you actually think you're gonna run out? No, but there's no way you, Sam Parr, think you're gonna go broke, which is the combination of you got a lot of money still, and secondly, you always have— like, your core skill is the ability to make and sell products that people are going to want.

Well, I'm not saying—

have you ever—

Would you do that, by the way? Would you take that trade?

No, no, I wouldn't. But, uh, no, no, I, I think that the world— so he said that probably in 1920. I think like, I think that I still am bullish on America and I still think that over the next 100 years, like, I'm gonna— it's gonna average 7 or 8% a year and I'll be okay. So I'm, I'm okay with— no, I, I wouldn't do it. I, I still think— and everyone talks about America like like, oh, like empires only last 250 years and we're, we're there. And in my head I'm like, but do you think that we're going to go to zero? Like England, like, has been around for 2000 years and they're not number 1 or number 2, but like being number 7 is pretty good too. Do you know what I mean? And so whenever people talk about like America is going to collapse, I'm like, well, like, wait, this—

they still got like a dude standing in front of a building all day like a statue. You can go take pictures of them, right? So like, life can't be that bad there. They got the guy with the fuzzy black hat on.

Yeah, like, it's not that bad. Like, I wouldn't mind being Germany or France and like, they, they like were the best for 2000 years and now they're not number one or number two. But like, you know, I'll be the Red Sox. It's okay. Like, it's not a big deal. So anyway, I'm pretty like long-term bullish on America. So no, I wouldn't give away half our Italians.

Italians still eating pasta. Are the Spain— the Spaniards still taking naps in the middle of the day? Like, yeah, you don't need to be number one to live a very sweet life.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So like, it's not like I'm, I'm happy.

So I want to describe, because I think this is the main topic, right? Like I had a bunch of like, you know, random ideas and stuff like that, and we can get to those, but I do think the main topic is probably where most people are at is our audience is, I would say, heavily entrepreneurial and/or work in tech. If you— let's just go through both scenarios. If you work in tech, You're likely, um, you know, have a lot of your net worth invested in either the stock of the company that you're being paid in, or you, um, you know, you might be invested in the market, crypto, the crypto markets or the stock markets. And, um, most likely you are, you've taken a bath of like, you know, something between 30 and 60% of your net worth in like the span of 5 months has evaporated. And like whatever plan you had for buying a house, you know, you're like, oh wait, you know, the— my money is sort of, you know, a lot of my money is gone and the interest rate has gone up. And like, you know, or like, you know, I wanted to have that kid, another kid, and like now I need to like think twice before I do that. And like, shit, I've been ordering groceries like 3 days, you know, ordering DoorDash 3 days a week. Like, do I really need to pay like, you know, $32 for, you know, a burrito and chips? Like, you know, you start to reassess a bunch of things in your life. Um, especially because the last 10 years, like if you're around our age, we're like, you know, kind of like early thirties. Like all you've seen since you graduated was numbers go up. And so it's kind of jarring to suddenly see numbers go down. At least that's my perspective. Did you think I accurately like labeled one part of our audience?

Yeah. In particular the last, uh, 2 years, like it's been like up, up, up, up, up like crazy. Yes. That, and that, that is our audience.

And then you have business owners who are like, great, this thing I've been, you know, working so hard at every day for the last X years. Like, here's the, here's the good news. Uh, long silence.

Okay.

Here's the bad news. Now your valuation is like cut in half. Your customers are likely going to, you know, start tightening up and paying you less money. You're probably going to have to do some layoffs, trimming somewhere in your business and your cost structure. And like, there's a, I don't know, 30 to 40% chance you go out of business in the next year and a half, uh, on top of whatever your normal risk of going out of business was. And so like, great, you know, we have, you have risk of going to zero. And so that's a kind of stressful thought. And so on both sides, you have this kind of stressful, kind of depressing thought. And, uh, I would say. And, and if you're an investor, you know, all the same thoughts, you know, times 2. So where does that leave you? You know, you're either in a puddle of despair or you're gonna be like, okay, I need to kind of like giddy up and re— and, and I have to realize the environment has changed. And if that changed, what needs to change in my world? And so I think there's like a pretty healthy exercise to go down of like, what needs to change in my world? Uh, and I would say like, that's the productive conversation. So it's not enough to just be like, I'm just going to close my eyes and think happy thoughts and be positive. It's like, well, I need to be realistic. A lot of shit's changed. I probably need to change with it, but also like, do I want to sit here and feel depressed or hopeless? No. And so therefore I got to like, you might have that thought of like, I could lose it all, or this could all go to zero, or like all my hard work is gone, or like, whatever, all those thoughts. But in my mind, it's like, I need to reprogram my brain to operate in this new world. And I need to like, basically I need to like consciously reprogram my brain so that I have—

well, what I'm, my point is I do believe like, or I do have that fear of it's all going to go away. And my reaction is not quit. My, or my reaction isn't even spend less. My reaction is, yeah, it might go all the way. It might go away. Let's get after it. Like, let's go get more. Or let's go, you know, like it, to me it's a very stressful period, but it's a period and it's not actually stressful when I actually like logically think about it. I'm like, it's not that big a deal, but it is a, I think that whenever I look back at the shit that I've made that's been successful, it typically is when there's not a lot of alternatives. Um, and it's like, oh man, this needs to work. So, right.

I do my best work. When, when back against the wall. That's a, that's a one thing that a lot of people believe, and that's a belief that can serve you well when things get hard.

So it is stressful, but, uh, you, you, I, I think I said this a while ago, I go, you're, I think I'm more likely to be like a slow and steady, like, success, whereas you're more likely to become a billionaire in like 5 years or lose it all. And so Because you take— or you take— well, you take a lot of risk. Or both. You'll become a billionaire, then lose it all. You take way more— you're risk-on. Um, so that's why I'm interested in hearing your perspective on this right now, because you're like, you're, you're all in on a couple things that, that just so happen are getting hit the worst.

So what would be fun to talk about? What would be interesting to talk about? Like, you know, we can go into like why we think it's happening, we can go to like what are you going to do about it, we can go to— well, I don't have to feel bad, like Where do you want to go?

I don't want to go into why it's happening. And I was thinking about this. We're in this text group with all those guys and they're all like, it's just a bunch of like supposedly smart people. Uh, no, they actually are smart, but like they, uh, they're— what's crazy is that like America has been around for hundreds of years, uh, capitalism has been around for thousands of years, and yet the smartest people don't agree on the cause or the solution, and they can't predict what happens. And that's kind of interesting to me because at your business, at a business, like you have a pipeline and you have a funnel, and when you build a good business, you're like, all right, there's a 90% chance that blank is going to happen. And I understand that business. America is kind of like a business just with 330 million people and like a weird government, a weird corporate structure where like you can't really like do whatever you got to get all these checks and balances and all this shit done. But what's— isn't it kind of fascinating that we still don't entirely understand the cause or the solution to a lot of these different problems?

That's always been very unsatisfying. It's like stock market goes up or down, then there's like this race to make up the cause. And it's like, um, okay, so you're saying every time that happens, this will happen?

No.

Okay. So you're saying that you could have foreseen this? Well, it's like, And what it is, is like, you know, sort of this backwards application of narratives. And it's not that there was no cause or there is no true narrative. It's just that it's not easy or clear to see what is the true cause and what are the true narratives amongst the many possible explanations and reasonings you could have, right? Like, did it rain today? Cause I did this dance or did it rain today because, you know, the clouds have, you know, heavy, whatever precipitation and why do they have that? Well, because of, The changes in weather and whatever else, like, you know, it's very, it's very hard to separate the people who think things are happening because they did the fun— they think it's raining because they did a funny dance.

It's just that we can predict certain human behavior relatively reliably. Um, like, you know, the whole Pavlov's dog thing. Like, I, I know that if I do this, this, and this, most of the time, uh, a creature is going to react by doing X, Y, and Z. And I was— and it just kind of has always baffled me. I'm like, well, why can't we just take all of this input and put it together and figure out what the solution or what the cause is? And that's always baffled me. And it also freaks me out that, uh, so many people who I view as smart say opposite things. Do you follow Zero Hedge on Twitter? Yeah. So Zero Hedge is like this pretty hardcore— I don't know if it's like libertarians the best way to describe it, but like they're pretty much always like doom and gloom. And every article is written by the guy from Fight Club. What's his name? Tyler Durden.

Tyler Durden.

Yeah. And every article is written by that guy. And their Twitter profile, they only tweet in caps. Every tweet is a caps lock.

And they panic.

Yeah, they tweet the scariest stuff all the time. And it's incredibly easy to believe and trust for some reason, because I don't know what it is about emotion that I just automatically assume that the worst is actually the truth. And I've had to like unfollow that. Did you have your— do you follow that handle?

Let me tell you what I'm doing with the— I don't exactly have a biz. I don't really have like a business business, but I have a, a, a small version of that that might become a proper business. Let me tell you what I'm doing and then you tell me what you're going to do. But basically my reasoning, and keep in mind, I'm like a— I feel so stupid when it comes to this finance and economy stuff. I don't know. I really don't. I don't understand anything, but my belief is basically like, well, now's the bottom. And I actually discovered this with The Hustle where I was like, I was creating something that people kind of dismissed or thought it couldn't work, but then it takes like 4 or 5, 6 years to get to like, uh, a substantial business. And by that point, people took it seriously and I was the biggest and the best and therefore could get acquired or was making a lot of the revenue. So with my— the thing I'm working on now, my, my logic is, well, now is the time to work really, really hard and it might suck for 1 or 2 or 3 years, but when things start changing a little bit, that's actually around the time where I'm going to have a team, I'm going to have process, I'll have systems, I'll have product-market fit, and then we could accelerate really hard then because we've already done the hard work during the hard times. Is that, is that kind of how you're looking at it too? A little bit?

Yeah, definitely. I think that's That's definitely the case. So what I'd said was I said kind of 3 things to myself. I said, number 1, this is a good chance to remember what I truly believe. It's like, this is like, first I needed to calm my nerves because if I'm in a sort of fight or flight, if I'm in a state of like panic, anxiety, and stress, I already know my decision-making is not very good. My decision-making is at best rushed. And at worst, it's, uh, you know, like operating from a place of fear. And therefore all I'm trying to do is like, um, you know, like minimize pain and never like get any, any advantage out of it. Just like minimize the amount of disadvantage I'm having in the short term. And so my first step for me is get out of a fight or flight mindset. And so that's where I first just check myself. I'm like, well, what do I really believe? I truly believe this in the bottom of my heart. I don't mean this in an arrogant way, but I truly believe that like If I look at my life over like a 10 to 20 year period from here, right, I'm in my early 30s. So by the time I'm 40 or 50, like, I think I'm going to have more money than I'll ever know what to do with. To me, that's like the spoiler of my life. It's like if I flip to the end of the book, I'm like, oh, it ends happily ever after. Yeah. Like, I truly believe that. I truly believe that. Like, I'm just going to keep doing business projects. I'm going to keep investing in things. And like, on the whole, I'm going to end up so far ahead even if any individual investment or any individual business project doesn't work out in a 10 to 20 year period, when I check the score at the end of the game, like, I'm going to be ahead. I'm going to have more money than I know what to do with in my personal life. I truly believe that about myself. So if I knew that was the ending, there's no real reason to panic. Like, if I know that's what the score is at the end of the fourth quarter, then like, it doesn't really matter what happens in the first quarter. Like, I should, I should for sure be playing and doing my best, but like, it doesn't matter if I fall behind or if I like lose a little bit of money here. If the score doesn't go my way for this next 12 to 18 months, that's okay. So that, it's like, I gotta remember, do I believe that or not? All right. I do believe that. Then chill first, chill the fuck out. Okay.

That's, that's like stage one. Wait, let me, let me tell you something though, really quick to, to let me be the huge pessimist here. Um, I believe that that is true about you as well. I believe that that is true about a bunch of people who we know, but here's the thing that I think about all the time. It's like, I don't want to be— I don't want to have more money than I know what to do with when I'm 70. I want to fuck it now when I'm young and I can experience all this crazy stuff and like enjoy life. I don't want it then, I want it now. By then I don't care, like I'm okay with having way less. I want it today. I want the freedom now when I'm healthy and can go do whatever I want. That's why I freak out with like—

I'm with you, but it's sooner the better. It's not now or never. So sooner the better is very different than now or never. And so, okay, we got a sooner the better mindset. So we're gonna take a bunch of shots and we'll take a bunch of action now to increase the odds that it comes sooner rather than later. The second thing is, does it matter? Did my day-to-day actually change because my stock portfolio, my crypto portfolio, my net worth changed, right? Like your net worth, it's not a figment of your imagination, but it's sort of like a figment of your, uh, like ego or sort of like a figment of your like perceived sense of safety. And so like, in reality, the stock market go down, the crypto market go down, it doesn't actually change my like day-to-day lifestyle or comfort based on where I'm at. For some people, it's going to change that, but for me, it's not going to change that. So that also helps take the edge off, which allows me to think with a clear head.

Then I start thinking, all right, you're not changing, you're not changing your spending patterns.

Oh, like in a small way, but nothing that like my happiness on a day-to-day level doesn't change whether I You know, like, like, you know, have a chef or not, you know, like, oh, cool. It's cooking season then. Right. OK, cool. I'm buying. I'm going to— like I went to Trader Joe's yesterday instead of Whole Foods. Yeah, I shift some, shift some small decisions, but like, that's cool. Trader Joe's is sick. Like, you know, who cares? Like those sorts of things don't actually like sway how I feel. Wait, I was going to get another car. Did you actually do that? I guess I'll hold off on that.

You're doing Trader Joe's now?

Trader Joe's. Yeah. Like, literally. Literally. Yeah. Like, again, I like Trader Joe's. This is not a big problem for me because I drove 4 extra blocks and went to the Trader Joe's, you know, like, cool, you know. So, you know, and again, not everybody is fortunate where like these are like their situations. I get that. But like, I'd like to believe that in general, my, my day-to-day like kind of happiness quotient is not so, so weak that it's like dependent on these like material or frivolous things. It's like, sometimes I get stuck in traffic. Well, guess what? Crank the radio, baby. It's a concert. Right?

A big-ass Honeycrisp apple from Whole Foods is not trivial if you ask me. But I don't know.

I've always had this feeling of like, I've always kept myself honest, which is what I want is to have a fat mansion and be eating a feast with all the people, my friends and family, all at the table. We're laughing and joking. That's my ideal. But what's even better than that? What's even better than having the sick mansion with the feast with all your friends and family all around you and you're laughing at the great joke you just cracked? Okay, that's what I thought was the peak. But the actual peak of the peak is you're the type of person that you can get stuck in an elevator and have fun because then you're invincible. What's better than invincible mode is like you can put me in the shittiest situation and I'm still going to be laughing.

So now what? Now I don't really have anything to fear because my, my situation, my, my feelings weren't dependent on having all those, those items. All right. Even though I prefer them. So, so yeah, I think that I guess like, yeah, I do make some shifts in my lifestyle, but it's not like to me I'm like, oh cool, it's a new season. Like it's tightening up season. It's like, you know, it's like getting shredded for the summer for, you know, your body. It's like, cool, I'm also going to go and cancel a bunch of subscriptions I don't care about. Because it'll make me feel good. Like, I'm, I'm, I'm putting a healthy amount of discipline in. Like, I kind of accrued a bunch of excess fat when it was one season, and now it's time to cleanse. And like, good. Like, you know, where, where am I spending that I don't really want to be spending? You know, where are we, where are we advertising that's inefficient? You know, who's on our payroll that's not really pulling their weight? Good. Let's get rid of all that weight. Now is like spring cleaning, baby, right? So it's like, that's the next step for me, is like, you do an actual spring cleaning and be excited about it.

I've been using Truebill. This is not an ad, but have you seen it? Yeah, it's called Truebill. I bought like the $100 subscription. Have you ever used that? You know what that is?

I haven't used it, but I've used stuff like it. Yeah, it basically like looks at your subscriptions and like suggests— how does it know what you're not using? It suggests what to cut, right?

Yeah. Like, like I didn't realize that me and Sarah both had Amazon Prime subscriptions. Like apparently I thought I canceled one of them. And so it catches that. And it also, like, I just see how much I'm spending every month and I'll say, you have an upcoming $300 subscription coming up. And it's like, oh, that's my trainer. Um, but there's been times where I'm like, oh damn, I thought, I didn't know I had Xbox Live or whatever the hell that thing's called. Uh, it's a $29 thing and it's coming up. And so you can like cancel it. But then what they do is if you need to cancel something that you want to call, they'll like do it for you.

They'll do it for you. 40.

It's pretty cool.

How about Moiz Ali saying he had, in the interview you did with him, saying he had $50 million in cash and he was like, I just am waiting. It's like, oh, okay. Now, uh, yeah, I understand what you— now I understand your— yeah.

Yeah, exactly. I remember, uh, just as like a small anecdote, like I remember maybe 7 years ago, 6 years ago, something like that. I don't know. I bought Bitcoin for the first time. I think I bought 10 grand of Bitcoin back when Bitcoin was like at $600, $700, $600, $700 bucks. And the next week it goes up to $800 and I'm like, there we go, baby. Just as I wanted. Buy the thing, price goes up. Love it when they stick to the script. And, uh, like I think 2 weeks later or something like that. I don't remember, I'm making up timelines here, but very short soon after that Bitcoin crashed to like $200. So my, like what was $800 was now, you know, I lost, you know, whatever, 75%. I don't do public math, but you get the idea. Lost a bunch of money in that process. And at that time, $10,000, like I was making $150K a year, I think was like my salary. Actually, definitely not $100K. I made either $120K or $160K. So that was—

Dude, I remember when that was, and I remember you told me you made $150 grand a year in salary and I was like, Oh my God, you're the richest person I know.

Dude, what I've been learning about this, and I tweeted this out, was like, I'd rather just earn more income and build more companies than worry about these losses. Um, so let me— can I— let's, let's shift a little bit. Can I tell you about a company or this? You remember how you said I find these things that are kind of interesting and weird? I found another one and I want to tell you about it.

All right.

Have you heard of this conference called ShopTalk?

ShopTalk? No. Uh, but name sounds familiar. One second. Let me go to this. Start to describe it. Let me see if I have heard of this.

All right. So it's a conference that I think you would've been involved in because it's for e-commerce people, but it's not just like e-commerce. It's not like D2C entrepreneurs. It's like Shopify as well as like every Shopify plugin as well as like, uh, retail brands. Like, like the founder of, or the CEO of J.Crew might go and talk to like the— see, talk on a panel with like the someone at Stripe. I don't know, just like, it's like online commerce but like for retail stuff. Does that make sense?

But it's like, give me the use case. So who, who goes? I'm, uh, I'm an e-com store, so should I go to this?

Uh, probably not. But if you're like, you would go and speak And like executives at Gap would be like, oh, like these young startups, here's what they're doing. Maybe we should like consider changing our strategy to X, Y, and Z, or we're making apps for this, we're making software for this ecosystem. Let's go and talk to other apps and maybe we could do business together. Does that make sense?

Let me ask you slightly, slightly differently. There's like kind of like trade shows or like—

it's a trade show—

conferences where it's okay. It's more like a trade show.

Gotcha. It's a trade show.

All right.

But here's where things get interesting. So the guy who started it, I linked, uh, to his, uh, his LinkedIn down there, uh, in the document. And I think his name's Jonathan Weiner and he has this co-founder, he's an Indian guy named, I forget the Indian guy's name, but, uh, so listen to their background and let me tell you what they're doing now and why this is so fascinating. So I linked an article from Vox and it said the guys behind Money 2020 conference wanted to do the same thing, but for commerce. So what that's— what that will explain is basically this guy, Jonathan, and his partner, they started a company. By the way, I saw you smirk when I said the guy's last name. That was hilarious.

Um, I was trying so hard to come up with a good joke. Uh, and I just, you know, my filter in my brain was like, you know what? Not worth the risk.

This is amazing. You've done it again, Sam. You have done it again, dude. I love these. In fact, I remember you telling me about Money 2020 a little while back because you've always been interested in conferences, trade shows, businesses from the HustleCon days. And, uh, I remember every time you told me about these, I was like sort of consistently blown away as to how much money these make. Um, now what do you think is the playbook to do this? Because like, for example, well, this is kind of in transparency. We've talked about this with the Milk Road of like, dude, there's a lot of like, there's a lot of money and there's a lot of moving parts to like people who are, you know, have some interest in this, whether it's like Wall Street people kind of want to get educated on this stuff, you know, insurance, you know, let's call it like mutual funds, hedge funds, bankers, whatever. And then there's like crypto people, there's VCs, like all these different people who are like professionals. And there are tons of conferences, right? So it's not like some uncompetitive space. But what are these guys doing that's better or different? Because I don't believe most conferences' businesses are scaling this fast or selling for this much. So what are the— what's this guy—

what are their—

what's their playbook compared to how most people do it? Do you know?

A little bit. So the misconception with a lot of these—

make some conjecture, make some guesses, because of course you don't know exactly.

Yeah, he's like the Vegas casino guy, right? Or is that his cousin?

Yeah, he's a mean as fuck old billionaire. He's like known for being like a huge asshole and he's worth like $20 or $40 billion.

Jabba the Hutt looking guy.

Yeah. Like, he's like, looks like this and he like thinks that like weed is like the end of the world. And so he like buys all these ads about how like weed is— you remember like Uh, those commercials, like, Julie used to care about stuff. Now she just smokes weed all day.

And then, you know, like, it's like, it's like someone like, this is your brain on weed.

It's like cracks an egg. Yeah. It was, it was like, it was like they used to have these commercials with like these, someone like melting into the couch and they're like, she used to go for runs all the time. Now she just sits and watch TV. It's like, anyway, he's like this huge anti-weed guy. And so, but he's this like 90-year-old guy. I think, I forget what he owns, but it's like the largest.

He basically, this guy definitely just had like a bad weed experience. He like definitely smoked weed in college and like peed his pants, got made fun of for it. Like, there's got to be some deep-rooted—

like, I've looked it up.

Angst. What is it?

At least 40% of participants must have a tucked-in button-up shirt or polo. And, you know, like half the jokes need to be about their wife, you know, like something, something complaining about their wife. And then like if you said the old ball and chain, you'd get like a default smirk from anybody, you know, like their badge needs to be like, you know, semi-tucked in under the belly. Like that's who you need at these conferences for this to work. Yeah.

And if you don't have a tucker in your crew, you're out. You're just, you're not part of this. You have to have a tucker in your crew. Right.

So it's like a dog, like a bomb sniffing dog that's just looking for tuckers. In line. It's like, guys, there's not enough tuckers in this, in this queue. Shut it down.

Yeah.

So that's what it seems like.

He's a German shepherd. That's, that's where it seems the money is. Um, it's like joining these, uh, industries that are fast growing and making it a, a real estate, thinking like a real estate person.

And how do you, um, how do they go get people to go buy these tickets? So like, I'm assuming they're basically selling— or is their model you sell tickets for a couple thousand each and then you sell sponsor booths for, you know, tens of thousands each, something like that? Is that the model?

And they, based on their team, they have, you know, that Spider-Man meme, the Spider-Man meme where they're all pointing at each other, like Spider-Man. It's that, but just sponsors at the booth. Being like, buy my stuff, buy my thing. No, buy— like, you buy my thing. I'm here to sell, not to buy.

Yeah, it's a circular economy of just like, you know, buying, buying one another's crap. Um, but, uh, anyway, it's kind of cool what they're doing. And I think this business— I think events can be a headache, but there's a way that you can build it. What?

I think it is. This is great. Uh, I really liked this one. Um, anything else on this? Otherwise we could do another topic.

No, I don't. I fucking, I just, so I have so much stuff backloaded by the way.

Uh, and I know I spent like half of 40 minutes of this podcast just being like the mentality of a downturn. But again, I think it's the most, whether you're an employee, you're an employer, or you're an investor, like Nobody is going to be spared from the economy going into a recession, the stock market tanking, the crypto markets tanking, and global inflation. Like, this is like, you know, like, hey, you— like Oprah comes out and she's like, you know, you get a disaster, you get a disaster, you get a disaster to everybody, right? Like, nobody is going to be untouched by the effects of this. Some people are going to get hit to the point where their business goes under, they declare bankruptcy personally or in the business, whatever. That's going to happen.. But I don't see anybody getting untouched by like a stack of problems like that, man.

When I remember when Biden was saying that Putin was going to invade Ukraine and I was like reading about Putin and listening to Ben's podcast, How to Take Over the World, and I was like, hey, Putin, why do you— why do you want to fuck this up for everyone? Like, things are pretty awesome right now. Like, what are you thinking? Like, just— that's just the conversation I wanted to have. You know, like, Putin, like, everything's pretty, pretty good. What, what, what? Like, you're gonna blow this for everyone. We're all gonna get screwed. And that's like a conversation that I've—

that's like the kid in class who's— the kid in class who raises his hand is just like, hey, miss, you forgot to collect the homework. And it's like, dude, what are you doing? Are you joking? We are 7 minutes away from getting out of here.

Dude, do you buy— okay, so this is like, sounds like a very like, uh, yuppie asshole thing to say, but I don't really look at gas prices because I don't drive that much. But you know, it's just like, it's— I gotta buy gas and it's not gonna hurt me. However much it costs, I'll buy it. And, uh, I was driving up here from Austin to Brooklyn where I'm living now, and I was listening to the news and they're talking about gas prices, and I was like, oh shit, I haven't even looked at the gas prices while I've been driving up here. I wonder what it is. And it was like $5.50, and it was crazy. Again, I know like what the news was saying, but I just wasn't looking because I don't drive that much. What's the gas in California where you are? Are you paying like $6.50?

$7 a gallon.

How the fuck are normal people doing this? That is crazy. That is crazy. $7.

Yeah, when you said $5.50, I was like, wait, you're saying you found a good deal? You were trying to say that's a bad deal, right?

I thought that was real. I mean, I haven't lived in California in 2 years. I remember in California it was $5, but what is it in Austin, dude? I don't even know. I just looked in like West Virginia when I was driving up here. I don't pay attention to gas prices. I don't drive that much, and I just don't— I'm buying it no matter what it says. Uh, but like $7, how— this is where we sell, by the way, fucking fools right now. How much gas does a car take? I don't even know. Like, I mean, it would cost like $150, I guess, to fill up. Like, how big is the tank?

I don't know. Yeah, I drive an SUV, so it's like, you know, 20 gallons basically. Basically. Um, all right. Jonathan says it's about $4.50 in Austin, dude.

So you're spending $150 to get gas.

Yes. Um, yeah, it's bad, but, uh, you know, asking for a friend, you know, like, okay, I got like a, you know, a card that says like you should use the good, you know, pay the most on when you go to the gas station. You're like, pick the, pick the top of the, the 3 options. Um, like, let's just say, what do you drive?

What's your SUV?

I got a BMW, uh, X5. And so it's like, let's say your boy's been, uh, putting the shitty one in for a while. Like, you know, does this matter? Is this, is this like marketing? Or, uh, you know, like, do I pay some price later in life, or do I pay some price now? Like, I actually never really knew how big of a deal that is. Like, is it pretty strict?

I don't know. I, I, but you're paid. I feel like, you know, Ben I don't know, but I'm gonna be honest, it doesn't sound great. It doesn't sound like that's what you want to be doing.

To me, I'm like, you know, is this— this seems like a recommendation, not a rule. And, uh, you know, so I've been going with the 87, whatever that stands for, instead of the like 90 or whatever the, the top-end gas is. And I've just been like, okay, so the most expensive thing is like eating McDonald's. It's Uh, the most, yeah, I don't even know what the, yeah, it's basically around $7, uh, $7 a gallon. I think it's, I think that's kind of the top.

Oh my God. That's crazy. Yeah, that's, that's wild. So every 18 miles is $7 for you basically.

Yeah. I don't know. I don't even think about it. Like it is what it is. I need to get places and like, that's the cost of gas right now. Like, what am I going to do? I'm not going to drive to West Virginia and get gas. I'm not gonna not drive around, you know, like I do need to go places. And so, you know, it is what it is.

Of course, it's not a big deal for you, but, uh, you remember how we were talking, we were talking about how the economy was crushing for years and years, and I've got so many friends that they're like, man, I've got, I've been in, in my apartment for a year and a half, for 2 years, I've got money burning a hole in my pocket. Like, I, I haven't bought anything out. I have, I have all-time high savings. I'm ready to save and all these people are quitting their jobs because they're like, F that. Like, I get these checks, I've saved up money. Like, I'm not taking this thing at $7 a gallon. Like, people are just gonna run out, I guess, right? I mean, like, you're just gonna run out of savings, a huge amount of people.

Again, you, again, you got to cut back, right? So, you know, I cut back down to that low-end gas so I could, you know, save the 30, 40 cents a gallon. Other people are just going to drive less. They're going to take public transport, or they're going to carpool, or they're going to find something like people will find a way is, you know, my general mentality. And like, uh, I don't know, I spent a lot of my life living in like Jakarta or like Beijing, and you just see people like— in Beijing, right next to our house, there's just people just shucking corn like all day in a— they're just sitting in a squat just like removing husks from corn for like 10 hours straight in the heat. And they were just like, you know, and then they would like take their break, smoke a cigarette, and play some mahjong and like You know, like, that's what they did and they were fine. And then, like, you know, your driver had different set of problems. And, like, in Jakarta, like, in India, people just burn trash on the side of the road because there's no, like, waste removal thing. So they're like, you burn it and then it's gone. It's like, yeah, but, like, it smells awful all day. And they're like, what are you talking about? This is, like, how air smells. I was like, no, no, man, that's not how air has to smell. But, like, you know, I don't know, you— the range of how humans can live, survive, and thrive is so much wider than the average person thinks. And so I don't know, I just don't really pay too much attention. It's just like, you have to, I don't know, you just have to figure out how to govern yourself in a new world. It's like, are you a self-governing individual or not? Because if you are not a self-governing individual, every day you're going to get punched in the face with bad news right now. And like, you gotta learn how to parry a punch. Otherwise you are gonna get like knocked out by just taking most jabs to the nose every day.

Like I just got done, I was in Missouri for 2 weeks. Most people aren't like that. They're just like, they're, most people are not that resourceful. That's what I've, I've learned. Uh, I, I actually think that the, our audience is like that. Most are not like, oh, I gotta go start something. I gotta do this. I gotta, I think most people will just are, are just going to be fucked. That's, I mean, that's really what I think.

That's hilarious.

It is. Part of my core strategy is to be out of touch and avoid the news. And like not, not, not learn from or speak to the common denominator of the population. And I know that all of that sounds completely awful to some people. And, uh, but you know, I'm okay with that. Like, I do believe even if you disagree with that, uh, I hope you agree that like I'm allowed to have that choice to do that. And if you don't think I have the choice to do that, um, like, you know, then I disagree with you and all of your, your ways of living.

Yeah, you're like, if you— I get that. If you don't, if you don't think that my opinion is good, I get that and you're fine, but you're wrong and I hate you. That's basically what it is.

If you think my opinion's wrong, if you think my opinion's wrong, uh, I understand and I, I would expect that from a lot of people. If you think I shouldn't be allowed to have my opinion or to act on my opinion, that's where, uh, like there's a difference between I disagree and that's not allowed, or that's not okay, or no, you can't do that, or, you know, lynch him. You know, like there's a, there's a difference in like being able to disagree and disallow.

And I would say you're, you know, like, I do a little far with the lynch. Yeah. They're going to kill him. Yeah.

Lynch him. Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah. That's, that's probably a bit harsh.

All right. That's the pod. We'll see if people dig it. I, dude, what if tomorrow it just goes back to normal? That would be nice.

By the way, if, if you want to cancel me, I hope people get our voices mixed up. And this has been Sam talking that whole time. Why does people think this is Sam?

I think they're saying that you—

P-A-R-R. You could find him. He's affiliated with HubSpot. If you want to go get them, like that's the guy to go get if you didn't like what was just said, dude, I still get people messaging me saying that they, they, they confuse us still.

I don't understand that.

I guess I think there are people go watch the YouTube video and they're like, shit, I've been had you guys opposite mixed up for like a year.

Yeah. I think what they're saying is I look beefier, but I talk nerdier and you look nerdier and you talk beefier. So it is what it is. Yeah.

You, you look dumb and you talk smart. And I look smart and I talk dumb.

Uh, all right, we'll talk soon.

Peanut butter and jelly, baby. It's a perfect combo. Yeah, right here.