Screw Nick Huber talking about RV parks and storage units.
We're gonna be talking about flea markets.
That's what I think is gonna happen.
I feel like I could rule the world.
I know I could be what I want to I put my all in it like a days off on a road less travel never looking back.
I wanna talk to you about a topic.
And I think this is a topic.
It's my passion, this topic, but it's also...
I'm gonna bring it up because I think it's A.
a trend, and that's what we're about, and B, I, it's sort of a prediction.
I think I have a prediction here and it's gonna be like be interesting in the next five and 10 years, okay?
Sweaters, denim, tobacco.
Yeah. You're in the ballpark.
Yeah, we're in the zip code.
We're definitely in the.
The newspaper industry.
We're in the zip code.
So years ago, this doesn't matter to you because you're not from the South.
But if you're above the age of 30, a lot of people here probably remember this TV show, American Pickers.
Did you ever even watch that show?
Never watched it. Okay, two guys who go and buy junk and they tell the story of the junk and then we - From storage containers, or that's a different show?
That's a different show but again, same ballpark.
But they would drive around the South, they would knock on old people's homes and say, can I come and look in your barn?
And they would find old, cool stuff, tell the story of it, clean it up just a little bit, bring it back to the store where I worked and we would resell it.
That's basically it.
That's all it is. But we would have lines out the door because at the time this show, we were, it was like David Letterman was number one and like American Pickers was number two in terms of the most watched shows on TV.
There'd be days where we would sell, I'm not exaggerating, $100 ,000 in American Pickers t -shirts because all these guys would come in and wanna buy anything that was American Pickers related.
How much revenue do you think that store did overall?
I would imagine $10 million.
One location. One location.
Big store or just like a normal shop?
It was so small that we had a script to let people, people would come in and be so disappointed at how small it was, because they would think it was like this big, like, cause the cameras didn't look huge.
It like... It sounds familiar to my life.
I do have a script.
So it was like a tidy store, but we killed it.
But I experienced something that, but the thing was that it was all like hillbillies.
It was like redneck hillbillies from like Alabama.
For some reason, the pick in culture.
It's all like Hillbillies in like rural Alabama.
Like how you said for some reason.
I figured it out. Yeah, I don't know.
Like, like cause they like old shit or they like to reuse stuff.
I don't know just part of the culture.
But this weekend I experienced something that has totally changed my worldview on this topic.
So there's this thing called Alfargo's marketplace.
And I went to it the other day.
Click this photo that I'm highlighting right here.
So it's based, the story is basically it's these four guys and they're...
They look like they're 24 years old, and they started organizing this flea market in New York City, and they host it at this place called New House, which is like the hipper version of WeWork.
So it's this weird combination of urban New York stuff, but flea markets which are historically old people and southern heritage, it's not like a New York cool kid thing, it is now though.
All right, can I just describe what I'm seeing?
So describe what what you see and who you see.
Every photo looks like it's taken with the Polaroid even though we have like 4k cameras.
Everybody has a beard and a bald head so a lot of hair on the face no hair on top.
I mean the style is eclectic there's a DJ it looks like is this a party in a goodwill shop is that what's happening?
Dude it's a high -end vintage flea market and it was packed and I'm 35, I was the oldest person there.
All the guys are dressed as girls and all the girls address as guys There's a lot of weird stuff going on.
And when you and they're all wearing it's all like 24 year old single guys wearing suits and ties I went there with my daughter and it was just me and her I was I felt like I was the oldest person there No one had children your daughter to the We were just like hanging out for the day and I like was like let's go to the fucking flea market and it was Adam Sandler and big daddy We wore matching sweaters.
We were the hit. We made the Instagram of these guys.
But they built this flea market and it was packed.
It was like I was regretting bringing her because I was like, dude, this is way too packed and I can't even get around so we didn't even stay for that long.
But it kind of got me thinking about flea markets because I think that...
Have you noticed that by the way, that millennial hipsters have just disappeared?
they're just gone. They're no longer a thing anymore.
Hipsters, I have just like where'd they go?
Do you have a theory?
These are the new hipsters.
Young people who wear like nice clothing like this and are into vintage, this is the new version.
Who's doing this? There's like a branding genius.
Look at these posters.
Just like, this is just so well done.
Like how do you turn, this just shows you can make anything, anything can be done anyway.
way. You could make a sandwich Gourmet, you could make a sandwich terrible, you could make a flea market.
cool and you could make a cool thing feel like a flea market like this is all.
This is so well executed as far as the branding goes.
It's unbelievable like this thing, the Instagram looks like a magazine is unbelievable.
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But here's the thing.
This is why I'm bringing this up.
It isn't just these guys.
So go to the Instagram it's if you're listening, it's called al Fargo's marketplace and look at the photos of the, whoever you see that's a stylist young man click their pro in their tag, click their profile.
Tons of them, tons and tons of them have a hundred, two hundred, three hundred thousand followers and it's these like young 23 -year -old guys showing off their outfits and the engagement on these Instagram handles is insane so I'll give you an example of Do you see one right there?
I'm trying to find it, but give me an example.
So go to... The handle is Denny six two three.
So I'll post it in here.
Dude, what a big day for Denny.
He had no idea this was gonna happen for him.
So look at Denny. All right, Denny, wow.
Cowboy hat, flare. He's wearing Chris Saka shirt, but the rest is fantastic.
112 ,000 followers. He's a digital creator, a menswear blogger.
Content creator since...
Oh wait! Oh my God, he's been in the game.
He's a creative director.
Is this a, what flag is this?
Is this Philippines?
What is that? I think it's Puerto Rican, but I bought this sweater from Denny.
Denny was a vendor at Alfargos.
This sweater. You bought that sweater from Denny.
I bought it from him because I want to be part of this trend.
And so my point here is amongst young people, this is a huge hit.
And if you click around on these guys' Instagram, you know, there's this joke about whatever the Silicon Valley nerds are doing, in five or 10 years, it's gonna be mainstream.
This is the New York cool kid thing.
This is like walking around Soho and seeing what people are wearing.
This is it, and is happening right now.
And I have two ways.
I think this is going to be a big business.
Okay. So wait, wait, wait.
Is your take that flea, if I understand you correctly, you went to this cool flea market.
You, well, I can't even call it a flea market.
You went to a party in your - No, it was a flea market.
Okay. It was mostly a party.
Happened to have some good.
It was a flea market with a DJ.
You took your daughter, hilarious.
serious. You're saying flea markets are a bigger deal than most people realize, especially people like us who live on our computer.
And then you're are you saying there's an opportunity here or are you saying somebody's going to build the crumble cookie of flea markets?
What's gonna happen?
I think I think two things are going to happen.
I think that there's a massive like PE opportunity here.
I think flea markets could potentially be the new RV park and you could purchase them at a real estate valuation.
I also think that there's a huge amount of male, well, female as well, but male, like fashion influencers.
And that's like a hot trend.
And I've spoke to like 10 or 20 of them, and they're all fucking broke.
All of them are like, I wish I could just pay my rent with this.
Right, right. I think this business is a beautiful business.
And these alfargo marketplace guys are a really good example of how it's done well.
And I think that they're probably not savvy.
When it comes to business, they're more like artists and that there's something really interesting here.
And so you're saying this Rose Bowl flea market, 20 ,000 visitors, 2 ,500 vendors per month?
All right. So basically based on that, 20 ,000 visitors paying 12 bucks to enter the vendors paying 150 bucks to be there, they're making 600 grand per flea market, which happens what?
Once a month. Once a month, but you're forgetting so many other things like table rentals, chair rentals, things like that.
So about 7 to $8 million in revenue you see on this, from this one flea market basically.
I think it's even more and I also think the other point that I'm gonna make is that it's pretty like It's obviously very old.
So there's this one called Brimfield antique show.
So do me a favor and go to their website So Brimfield is a is a flea market that gets a million people a year coming to this festival Which is huge right?
That's we're talking like Coachella Coachella size stuff Scroll to the very bottom So if you want to contact someone, you go to the very bottom, tell me what it says about Jodi Oh, Jodi, J -M -J -Y -2 at aol .com.
Just send her a note.
If you want to learn, this is an event with 1 million customers.
If you want to learn more about it, email Jodi at aol .com.
That's what it says at the very bottom.
Go to Jodi's LinkedIn.
I looked her up on LinkedIn.
Can you click Jodi's LinkedIn?
where is it says look at Jodie Jodie's great Jodie's her name is Jodie young she is the owner of this of this business with 1 million customers Jodie looks lovely Jodie looks like a nice woman Jodie doesn't exactly look like what I think is going to be a younger generation of people who are interested in this topic you're saying the owner the owner of this business these types of businesses going to look different in 10 years and I would say that they're probably not the most.
Choose your words wisely, ants are listening.
They are probably not the most uptight operators, that's what I would say.
They're probably very passionate about this and sometimes when passion leads, maybe you're leaving dollars on the table, that's what I'm saying.
And I believe that, in the next couple years, screw the art, screw Nick Huber talking about RV parks and storage units.
We're going to be talking about flea markets.
That's what I think is going to happen.
All right. Bold prediction.
I really like this, by the way.
This is this is a Sam Parr special.
Out of applause for the Sam Parr special.
Cool find on the trend.
Cool find on the underrated business.
Flea markets, how big they are.
Wow. They're kind of stunning in terms of the visitors that they get.
I like how you wrote at the bottom and AI ain't going to fuck with this.
Part of the thesis.
this is a good like private equity roll up thesis by you.
Good job by you. Yeah, and it's thank you.
Thank you for that condescending patronizing.
Good job for you. You liked that for me.
Good job by you, that's a real compliment.
Amongst young people, do they buy a huge amount of vintage clothing.
Something like, I said I saw some crazy stat where it was something like 80 % of Gen Z ers regularly shop for secondhand clothing.
And so you have companies like Depop.
Have you heard of Depop Sean?
Yeah. It's like a secondhand marketplace, secondhand app.
Dude, they have 80 million users.
And then there's Poshmark, and then there's Grail.
And then there's like 10 other ones.
These young people are buying vintage and secondhand clothing at like alarming rates.
Not alarming, but you know what I mean?
Like surprisingly high rates.
And have you ever seen, like, thrift hauls on TikTok.
Have you seen that?
I've seen a lot of things on TikTok.
I've seen a lot of things.
That's a lot of them.
I've definitely seen that.
It's a.... It's a huge thing.
If you type in thrift hauls on TikTok, I follow so many of these people on Instagram, it's like a really common thing.
And so my whole point here being, young people are buying the shit up, man.
They're buying this secondhand clothing.
This second hand clothing is crazy.
I'm just looking up Goodwill's numbers, so Goodwill's revenues.
Last 10 years. It starts at 4 .8 billion, 5 .7, 5 .9, 6 .1, 6 .3, 7 billion.
Pandemic goes back down to 5 .5.
Then it goes 7 .5 billion, 8 .2 billion and 9 billion projected for the last year.
And if you go to a, what's it called?
Is it called GoodwillFinds?
So GoodwillFinds .com, they have their own like online marketplace where they auction off like a handful of the nicer things that Goodwill collects and people love it.
I've bought a couple things from there, I think Ari's said she buys stuff from there.
It's getting really popular.
I wanna make sure I get this down for the record.
What are you saying is the like, someone could do or someone should do?
So there's a, so what I'm saying is that flea markets are a recession proof business in a highly fragmented industry.
And they last for many, many decades and they're hard to disrupt once they work well.
And also that young people are buying vintage clothing and are into flea markets more than other generations.
And then what I'm saying is I think that there's a roll up opportunity or what I would do is I would work with some of these broke passionate fashion influencers.
And I think I could create if that was my thing a really awesome flea market business.
Can I give you one other random idea?
So I used to live in Indonesia and Indonesia they do this thing that I've never really seen here.
But I really liked it.
So you don't wanna mall when you go into a food court.
So in America, you go to a mall.
There's a food court and the experience.
What's the experience?
You basically like the business model is you walk in.
There's nobody there to like serve you.
You just go and you pick do I want a slice from sbarro?
Do I want a sandwich?
Do I want some fried chicken?
What do I want? You go you buy your one thing and you go sit down right.
Did I capture it accurately?
And there's a guy handing samples.
I'm going to try all the samples.
And we're going to sit in kind of a nasty chair and just eat this crap.
So in Indonesia, the malls in general are a lot better.
But one thing that they do for their food court is a little bit different.
When you walk in, they give you a wristband, almost like it's a cotela or something like that.
And this wristband is basically your way to buy anything you want.
And the way they design the flow, it's almost like an IKEA.
that you walk around and every booth has like cool stuff in there.
And they're like it's not super low quality food.
It's still obviously faster, right.
But it is, everything's like branded kind of well, the food is like the people who are working there.
Like you can tell it's like a little more upscale and you pick and choose.
Basically you start with this tray and you just keep adding different little plates from the different vendors onto your one tray.
Right, so you have an empty tray and you're going to grab a small bowl or plate from all the different boots that you want to try something from.
And at each one you just tap your wristband so that the system knows what all you picked up.
But it doesn't feel like you're spending money, it feels like you're like opening a door.
You're just having, here's my key and give me my thing.
This is amazing. You sit down, you eat, and at the end when you leave, you put your tray down and you scan your badge and they tell you the damage and you pay for it on the way up.
That's awesome. I've always thought that American food court should steal this model.
You spend way more and it's just a more fun experience.
like paying at the end once you've already like, you know, had the little like, you know, amusement park of food type of thing is pretty cool.
I wonder if somebody could do a similar thing with thrift or flea markets.
And so the thing I'm imagining here is like, remember like Spartan Race or Tough Mudder, how they turned this like thing that seemed like work and kind of hard into something that was fun, a bit of an Instagram opportunity and almost like an - Like a, an individual rate, like a, when you raise your, by yourself, you're into like a group, fun activity.
Exactly. So a social fun event that you're planning, it's basically a party.
I think you could do the same thing with the flea market.
So I think what you could do is you could basically arrange it, whether it's a race or it's a, it's a one long path.
And if you do the wristband thing or you basically, soon as you join, you get 10 tickets.
You get 20 tickets, 30 tickets, whatever it is.
And you get to, and now you just have tickets you have to spend, right?
So instead of the goodwill problem, which is, you go, and you're like, should I get this?
Should I not? Blah, blah, blah, like up front, you just make it commit.
I'm gonna find 10 things here.
And then it's about just finding the most fun 10 things you could find at the event.
And you go and you collect, you fill up your card, you can always get more tickets as you go, and then by the end you walk out and you've got this new outfit.
So like you literally would have a photo at the start and a photo at the end, because you put it on and you basically do like a makeover on a Saturday afternoon with friends.
And you all end up with this fun photo at the end of you guys dressed up.
That's fantastic. Is that not a great experience?
It's a fantastic experience.
And also just for some reason scanning things at my wrist is for some reason like more fun than pulling out my credit card.
Do you remember that, didn't you invest in a company that was creating software so Patagonia could sell second -hand coats or something?
I didn't end up getting to invest in it.
I really wanted to, it's called...
I think North Face uses it because I almost...
It's doing well. I almost bought a North Face coat and they call it like reworked where you like mail in your old coat and you get some type of credit and then they like repair it but it kind of looks funky and cool and like guys like me could buy it.
Yeah, I think the way they call it the term for this like movement is re -commerce.
So you have e -commerce, then you have re -commerce which is when you sell that second hand thing again.
I can't find the name of this thing.
It's sad. I really wanted to use it.
I think they're doing well, by the way.
They've got a bunch of big brands.
What they were doing was they were saying, they would go to a brand like us, they'd say, hey, a lot of people are already reselling your items on these other platforms and Facebook groups and whatever.
They actually sell, sometimes they do markup, or sometimes it's a slight discount, but they're used goods.
Why don't you just make a central place on your website for people to buy already -loved items.
And so what you would do is the customers could just upload a thing and you'd basically create your own little marketplace on your website.
They power it with the software.
And when somebody, and then they don't have to wait for a buyer.
So they could just put it on the thing and get basic store credit for it when somebody buys it.
And so you could you're giving store credit, which is going to get them to come back and the other person is getting the item, which we're going to get by anyways off platform.
Makes a lot of sense.
Yeah, I almost bought something the other day with someone using their software, but they didn't have my size.
So, that's my big… The website was called Treat.
The company was called Treat, T -R -E -E -T.
That was the name of the company that was doing this.
I still wish I had invested this thing, this thing's great.
It's awesome, this is great.
So, that's my big pitch on flea markets.
I think… Oh, and by the way, there are one or two PE guys in the space doing this.
I think there's like UnitedFleeMarkets .com or something like that.
But I think you're gonna see more.
So this is my prediction and also my opportunity spiel.
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All right, back to the pot.
Okay, I like that you made a prediction, because the next thing I'm going to tell you about is a giant I told you so but nobody likes hearing I told you so.
In fact, there's a great tweet that went viral over the last week.
This guy Matt Lasky to this out he goes, my wife just taught The professional way to say I told you so.
I saw that so funny.
You say, this was identified early on as a likely outcome.
I'm going to be using this a lot.
So let me just say that me and Sam identified this early as a likely outcome.
And what I'm talking about is true crime podcasts.
Okay, so... This doesn't sound like the sexiest thing, but do you know what the most popular podcast in America is?
Joe Rogan. Correct.
Do you know what the second most popular is?
I would have guessed like call her daugther.
Okay, great. Also would have thought it's some famous personality podcast.
Like the opposite of like, Jo Regan for Women.
Yeah, exactly. It's actually Crime Junkie, a podcast that was started by a 36 year old podcaster.
And here's the headline.
This 36 year old podcaster is making $45 million a year of profit.
$45 million a year.
It's insane. And where is she based?
That's the crazy part.
So let me tell you the story here.
So this woman, Ashley Flowers, she's working at a normal day job and she grew up loving like Agatha Christie stories, like these mystery crime stories growing up.
In fact, so much so that she joined, maybe volunteered at this place called Crime Stoppers, a local crime stopping organization for, in her town.
And it was supposed to just help people report crimes to one central place.
Now, to promote the organization, And she volunteers and says, hey, what if I create a weekly radio show called Murder Monday?
And she does it and she realizes like, Hey, people kind of like this.
Like they like Murder Monday.
This is working. And she's just doing this, again, for fun, volunteering on the side of her day job.
And then she hears, serial podcast, it comes out and then serial becomes this phenomenon.
And she listens to it and she says, Oh, that's cool.
What if I do Murder Monday type of like my radio show that I'm just doing for my local But what if I did it as a podcast and she jumps in, this is back in 2017, she records, she comes home from her day job, records her first episode, uploads it, and off to the races.
Now, here we are later, she's got 65 employees.
Her business just raised $40 million from churning, has valued the company at $250 million and has a reported or a rumored $45 million of EBITDA per year, which honestly sounds a little high.
Some, the valuation's off.
Exactly. It's only 5X, even as I don't think that's.
And why would you raise money if you're making $45 million a year in profit?
And the valuation's likely more true than the rumored profit number, but whatever.
Let's say, I think 20 million would be a very real number at the low end here.
Insane. She hosts two podcasts herself.
She's the producer of the shows.
She sells the ads, she closes the deals, she's touring all around the country, all around the world.
She was working 15 hours a day, now down to 10 hours a day.
She's got a little three -year -old daughter.
She has racked up $500 million plus downloads in the last five years.
Just insane volume.
That's ridiculous. Do you listen to True Crime?
I listened to a bit of True Crime.
So okay, here's the, I told you so, part of this.
If you go to the MFM Vault, MFMvault .com, which is a place where you can go find old episodes and you can search.
So I just went on to MFM Vault and I just searched True Crime because I know we've been talking about this.
Guess when the first time we talked about this is?
Just like, guess the year.
I don't know. A year and a half ago.
So that would be like 2023?
2023. Nope, 2020, five years ago.
And it was an episode where Lance Armstrong popped by the office and literally popped into the podcast while we were recording.
And you and Lance Armstrong are talking about your favorite type of podcast and you both love true crime.
And you guys are geeking out about true crime.
Sam and Lance Armstrong are the greatest cyclist all the time.
Like Michael Jordan, Michael Phelps, Tiger.
A guy who owns a bike, and Lance Armstrong the greatest biker of all time.
Talking about how we live.
What do you like to get scared by it?
Like that's the conversation.
And we started talking about true crime, then we talked about it again in 2023.
We talked about Parcast.
You had brought up that this guy had created to this True Crime podcast network, 16 shows, and he sold it to Spotify for like $100 million, 50 million in cash, 50 million in the earn -out.
What was his name, Mac, something?
Something. And then again we talked about it a few years ago, we talked about Law &Crime, which was this media company that was dedicated to true crime stories, as well as like just reporting on actual court cases that were going on and it was also required for more than $100 million.
And all along the way, we've been talking about how true crime is this thing where there's this underrated appetite more than you would think for this.
We had Mr. Bollin come on, Mr. Bollin comes on, and he talks about how his content is all about telling strange dark, mysterious stories.
People just love this shit.
And we've been talking about it.
And every year that we've been talking about it, it sounds like it's too late.
And every year we've been talking about it, another nine -figure company has essentially started or grown during that period of time.
And so even now now that this is still like, you know super established I still think there's a ton of opportunity here and I want to brainstorm this a little bit with you.
I I'm totally on board with this.
I am a huge fan. My new one is the law in crime network on YouTube and Whenever like the Diddler comes about or there's like a new crime like P Diddy's like a lube stuff I was watching that like like what's the Luigi Manjani?
This is like a gift from God for the true crime people.
Like, I've been obsessed with all of this stuff.
Like, learning about freakoff parties, learning about, you know, like, deny, what does the Luigi say?
This is like when LeBron James enters the draft.
This is like, oh, we got a new hot prospect, we got Luigi, oh diddys here, oh my God.
We're going to have content for years.
Dude, I listen to the stuff on my runs, And I I'm all about it.
So what do you want to brainstorm?
You listen to it on your runs like you're just running away from the problem like what are you doing?
I think my my hypothesis, so basically with the true crime stuff.
It's basically me and a hundred million women.
It's like Eighty it's like 80 % women.
I think you're into this And I think that women listen to this from the perspective of how would I how would I get away?
Like how would I get out of the situation and men listen to it from the perspective of like, how would I get away with this?
That's like the perspective, I think, that each of the genders listens to these things.
Yeah, exactly. It's like American Kingpin, yeah, my hero.
My hero did this. Yeah, so, by the way, already, opportunity, so, you know, when you run, I think most running apps or running, like, music playlists, they try to have a certain beats per minute to keep up, keep, like pace you during a run, right?
They try to be up tempo.
true crime, 150 beats per minute, already, innovation, White Space, you know what I'm saying?
For zone 2 workouts I only listen to Solved Murders by Parkast.
Oh, I gotta go do a 60 -minute run?
Turn on Solved Murders.
That's 60 minutes of like we're going to get through two 30 -minute episodes and I'm going to learn about some crazy people.
But they're kind of slow, right?
So like what if somebody created a higher energy?
All right. So here's my brainstormer.
Can I give you some pitches on my brainstorm?
this was my five minute brainstorm before the podcast of what would I do.
Because it's one thing to say, there's an opportunity there.
Great podcasts already, how I would do it?
But Sam, do we settle for great?
I don't know about you, great doesn't get me out of bed in the morning.
I mean, grades pretty good to be.
Honestly, it'd be a huge compliment.
It'd be greatly flattered.
I'd rest on those laurels.
But all right, here's the brainstorm.
so white space in the true crime space right now.
First, OK, the obvious one.
This is not that fun of a one but YouTube.
So most of these that started they were just audio only podcasts like serial.
They were inspired by serial, they were podcast and most people thought podcasts were all audio.
YouTube came out recently and announced that a billion people a month watch podcast content on YouTube.
So if you're a podcaster and you're not doing YouTube, where are you at?
And if you're listening to this podcast and you're not subscribed to us on YouTube, where are you at?
That's what I have to say, go find my food on YouTube.
All right, but so the first thing is, go all in as a YouTube -first podcast.
Even Crime Junkie, she started off heavily in audio, then started doing video just as kind of an add -on.
If you watch their video, it's like, it started off really scrappy and now it looks a little bit better.
And then when she raised this money, she's investing in a full video studio to do this for real.
But the format is actually pretty great.
Have you ever listened to her podcast?
It's basically she sits on a couch with her friend, but unlike most podcasts where it's two equal hosts or something, they're going back and forth, it's her explaining to one friend what's going on with the crime.
And her friend is like active listening.
She's like sitting there and like - And asking questions.
Nodding her, mostly just nodding her head and be like, oh.
And then like ask the clarifying question when the listener would have one.
So smart, by the way, that little thing is so smart because most content gets better.
the more you narrow it to an audience of one.
If you're writing, write to one person.
If you're doing a podcast, like this podcast works well, cause we kind of do that too, where it's not saying, all right, listeners, we'd like to tell you about some great businesses it's like, dude, Sam, have you seen this?
You're like, no, what?
I'm like, check this out.
And then it's that vibe that actually works well.
The podcast, that's a little bit of the secret sauce.
All right? I gave you three of Colonel Sanders nine, I think it's I said, twice there.
That's the last week last week.
episode it was leverage I just broke your brain what happened it was leverage to the tits now it's I just gave you three of the kernels 9 spices it gave you a quarter kernel there I was gonna say something and you that was great I nuked your brain all right my bad oh I was gonna say with this podcast like I did not know that you were going to bring this up and you didn't know I was gonna bring the other thing up so that's like a little bit that's how we surprise And intentionally, right, we could say, let's share notes, let's do research, let's be prepared.
That makes for a work podcast.
We surprise each other because the show is.
You need a reaction.
I want to tell you something.
I want you to react, I want you to riff for real.
And then I want you to surprise me and that makes it fun for us to do.
So she does the same thing.
She basically tells the story to her friend.
Her friend says, they're active listening.
She started off just taking existing shows and now has like a team of 10 journalists that do original reporting.
She now has another show called The Deck where she works with local cops and they give her access to evidence and they try to solve, actually solve cold cases.
Awesome. Isn't that insane?
That's the greatest.
She is basically the Mr. Beast of true crime.
Like when you see how she just took a very simple idea and took it very seriously and she scaled it up.
It's like, yeah, why not?
Why not have her own journalist?
Why not scour the country for stories?
Why not partner with the cops?
Why not build a studio?
Why not have a hundred employees?
Why not turn this into a full on production company?
She just kept going with the very simple idea, right?
Mr. Ries is like, what if I gave away $1 ,000?
What if I gave away five, 10, 100, 1 million, $10 million?
What if you stood in a tiny circle?
What if you stood a big circle?
What if you didn't have to stand in the circle?
What if you just lay down?
Like when you know, he just keeps going with these like ideas and takes a very simple idea, but takes it more seriously than anybody else.
So I feel like she's done that.
She's coming to Radio City in New York in May, should I go?
I would totally go to one of her live events.
Yeah, you should go.
Why not. She has a huge tour.
She has a huge tour.
You're going to become a very big fan of her.
Let me. I found something that, when I found it, I go, oh, Sam's going to love this.
And I'm like the mama bird, and you're the baby bird.
And I'm about to puke in your mouth with something you're going to love.
Peter Chernin, when he met her, here's the quote he said about her, because he invested 40...
He met her at part of a TV show pitch, and then was like, just like, wow, this woman and is really impressive and told his guy, go find a way to invest and he like flies to Indiana and, like, hounded her for this investment.
So here's what Peter Chernin said.
He said, I find her uniquely impressive.
That's a good one, and he's - It's good, right?
He's been around everyone.
I find her uniquely impressive.
What a subtle, but like powerful compliment from a guy who's met so many interesting people.
And I think her and Pat McAfee are both in Indianapolis.
That's like, they're like at a form Like the Indianapolis podcasting like mafia two dots make a line.
So Check this out. Okay.
So here's the other white space here ready black true crime Not a lot of black podcasters doing true crime.
There's a color. Are you a follower of black YouTube or black Twitter?
I am a I'm a card carrying member of black culture So, yeah, I'm a part of like is DJ Vlad the greatest youtuber?
yeah one of the greatest journalists of our time of our era yeah getting the wait brothers to like dish on like what it's like or like Club Shay Shay with cat Williams okay dude how about Club Shay Shay getting like a hundred mil I think that was I think before Trump on Rogan or maybe even including I think Club Shay Shay and cat Williams is the number one most downloaded youtube video or YouTube interview of the year yeah exactly it's insane are they not more of these like these like true crime shows geared towards that audience?
There's only a couple.
And the very first one was called like affirmative crime or something, I was like, no, that's a bad man.
This is not right, right?
Like this has happened in comedy podcasts.
Like comedy podcasts started with a lot of like white comedians in LA, but now there's like so many really funny, you know, just two guys hanging out, two black comedians hanging out type of podcasts, sports podcasts, et cetera.
Like I think podcasting started off pretty homogenously white and true crime, Even just the way it comes across is a little bit like...
Midwestern white woman?
Like, cereal kind of was in that lineage.
I think she used to work for NPR, right, something like that?
And so it just feels very produced and almost...
Like New York elitist.
Exactly, exactly. And it needs to be more, you know, country grammars.
And it's like somebody who listened to a lot of Nelly growing up.
They all, a lot of those guys have that ira glass, today's episode, on Miss American Life.
You know what I mean?
That cadence is so good.
That's a cool one. Well by the way, world's worst impression to be good at.
Ira glass. This was the only time that was ever gonna land for you.
Alright, next one is Comedy Time's True Crime.
So I think a lot of the True Crime podcasts are very serious, they're heavy.
They're trying to be mysterious creepy.
Makes total sense, you get why you do it that way.
I think there's an opening for somebody to do true crime, but just with a comedy angle.
And, you know, not to not to toot our own horn here, but like we did this a little bit in the business space.
We, you know, a lot of the business podcast, a lot of the interviews, a lot of the podcasts were, it was just an IQ contest.
Everybody just wanted to be the bigger know it all than the other.
It was very dry, informational and being you, this is kind of how we talk when we hang out and we just didn't filter ourselves that way.
And it's not that we're compared to comedians.
We're not funny. But compared to most VCS, we're pretty funny.
Yeah, the bar's low.
And so the bar is low also in true crime.
There's nobody funny in true crime.
So if you're even moderately funny, you're the funniest true crime podcast.
Let me as a, so, there's - Am I talking out my ass?
Are they actually funny ones?
No, no. Well, you're not off But you're actually right and I'm gonna give you one piece of evidence that you're right.
So we are called MFM I have gotten like hate mail from women who are like you're not MFM The real MFM is my favorite murder.
So go to my favorite murder .com and Read the headline.
Yeah, we're not even the most famous.
We'll never be the most famous MFM podcast Yeah, it's my have you heard of my favorite murder murder have people like said like you're not really Yeah, I've never listened to it though.
Is it humorous? It looks like it The so go to the website.
The headline is a true crime comedy podcast.
Okay, and listen, you know, it's hugely popular It's hugely popular but I actually have a bone to pick dude They're talking about like Ted Bundy killing people and they're like, isn't he hot like they're talking about, you know to me It's kind of weird.
They're talking about wanting to get with Ted Bundy.
So I'm basically like, you know what, we should do something.
We should have a coffee shop with Wi -Fi.
And you're like, hey, go to Starbucks.
All right. But you're right.
Look, it's like, had you developed the theory of relativity and never even heard of Albert Einstein, I would still say you're a genius.
A few other possibilities here.
True romance. So I think there's an opportunity to do a true crime style genre, but spin off into combined two very popular genres, true crime and romance.
We've talked a lot of the past about like how the most read books and the most voracious readers are reading.
Daniel Steele, Fifty Shades of Grey style romance novels and I think somebody could do true romance as a podcast genre.
All right, I got a public service announcement for all the tech founders that are listening to this.
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And then we hit the wall and the wall was the security and compliance team.
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That's V A N T a com slash million Use Vanta, that's what all the cool kids are doing One of my favorite True crime podcast they have a series called killer couples and it's all about lovebirds who go out and commit murder Maybe you should have done this prank song because I don't really listen to true crime.
I listened to two seasons of cereal and fell asleep to a few true crime podcasts.
Dude, cereal is the JV team now compared to what's going on now.
All right, I'm on board with killer couples.
What else you got? I feel a little bit discouraged, but I'll just finish out because quitting is the only thing more embarrassing than what's happening.
Wait, hold on. Speaking of true crime, I do think that there is this weird ...
We did this one bit with the hustle about romance novels.
And there was like these crazy weird genres of like, first of all, romance novels are like a massive hit.
But there's like women who wanna like a romance novel about a military guy.
But there's like, take it a step further.
There was like women who wanna have sex with werewolves, like you know, what was that movie that shit called?
What was that thing?
Robert Patterson? The Twilight?
Like, there were some weird undertones of like bestiality with all that stuff.
Right, but so I think that there's always a niche for Yeah, but you know my the bone I have to pick with this What nobody likes hairy dudes as a hairy dude out here.
Where's that? I heard that wolves were a thing for women And then just did not translate whatsoever.
Look, gray -haired guys have rebranded to the silver foxes.
You know, we've got to do something for the hairy -backs.
I heard somebody say this the other day.
They were like, oh, yeah.
I had this like salt and pepper thing going on.
Yeah. That's a lot of salt, though.
That's the problem.
But just salt. OK, so last thing, games, do they make games?
So there's that one board game.
Do you remember what it's called?
It's kind of a mystery board game subscription series.
Catch a killer. Hunt a killer?
Hunt a killer, I think.
Hunt a killer. When we talked about it, I think it was doing 30 million a year in revenue.
Yeah, tens of millions a year in revenue.
I think that this woman, instead of touring, she should be creating a board game.
She should be creating a game that's in Target, in Walmart, on the shelf, and it's a true crime, card game or board game that people can basically solve these cases together cooperatively.
or it's some kind of like, you know, like mafia where like one person's the game master and the other people are trying to figure it out.
I think a game... take a game mechanic like that, but apply these true crime things and use your brand as crime junkies.
I think somebody should be partnering with true crime broadcasts to build those out.
Hunt a killer, I think it's called.
My whole perspective on games got completely changed.
We hung out with the guy, Elon at...
He's coming on the podcast, by the way.
What was it called, killing kittens or something?
exploding kittens exploding kittens a board or it's a card game but board game I guess and I don't know what we'll wait to see if he's gonna reveal anything but shockingly large like numbers are bananas he's also like yeah of the top five most popular games in the world we make number one two four and five it was amazing how successful it is and I was like I should start a game company he he felt like he had the excitement of a 12 -year -old.
He was so into games and making people smile via these games that I was like, this guy is so great.
In fact, that was my takeaway.
I was like, oh my God.
I wish I was doing this.
This is so cool. I could do this.
Yes. And then I saw how truly joyful he was about making the games, not not being successful at it, but the doing part.
And I was like, Oh, that's different than me.
I don't have that. I just want this.
I want to have done it He yeah you want the result he like was showing us this game And it was like half done and he had a pen that he had a written in like different points on the cards like he was making the game as he was going and he was like Wouldn't this be cool?
Let's like let's change the game to this like he was doing it in real time And we are playing the game it would be like you know playing poker and he's like actually we should come up with like an ace An ace means that he was like rapid prototyping on us Did you see what he pulled out of his pocket while we were playing that game by the way?
It's just a total side note.
Unrelated. But it was so funny.
What was it? He's trying to read a card and he can't read it he needs his glasses.
And so he whipped out a pair of glasses, but the glasses had no sticks.
It was like a monocle for two glasses.
And he just rested it on the bridge of his nose and started reading it.
and I completely couldn't pay attention to the rest of the game.
Cause I was just constantly trying to figure out, is it going to fall off his nose?
And what are the physics of this?
How does this work?
I think they're called readers.
He had readers on it or something like that.
Is that a thing? Is that a known thing like modern monocles?
It's like at Walgreens.
You see them like next to the aisle, next to the check out.
You know what I mean?
It's like the spinning thing.
But they don't have sticks?
Sometimes yeah, arms.
Is that what they're called?
I've been sleeping on this track.
Uh, I am do, I'm amazed that this woman is potentially doing $45 million a year.
I don't know if I believe it, because that is so shocking, but we should see if anyone's listening can get us in touch with her, I would like to talk to her for the pod.
That would be fun. Yeah, Ashley flowers, very, very impressive.
How old is she? 36.
She's young. Wow. That's crazy.
She's my age, dude.
That's crazy. That could be her.
She could be me. We could trade.
Isn't that crazy that like, you know, it's now we're like, yeah, that's obvious, But seven years ago to be like, I'm gonna start a crime podcast and that's gonna make me a billionaire.
That's pretty wild to think, because she potentially might be a billionaire if after another five or 10 years because of this.
That's absolutely wild.
And we called it, so we're right and we deserve all the credit.
No, we didn't call it.
It was identified early on by us as a likely outcome.
All right, I have a bunch more, but I think we're, it's time to wrap, So maybe we call it.
I think we should call it.
Wait. Wait, wait. Before we go, did you see fire festival two?
He didn't listen to our advice.
So Billy came on our podcast right after he got out of jail.
Prison. Prison. Yeah.
And he, I love that where that's like, you know, other people get like authors and they have their book tours.
We get like the post prison.
We got Shkreli. We got Billy.
We get them, we get them first right out of prison.
And, um, you told him you, what did you tell him?
You gave him some advice.
He didn't listen, He basically was like explaining all of these ideas for his, the business that he, like he owes money, so he has to like earn, he has to earn not just a little bit of money.
He owes a lot. He owes like 27 or $30 million a lot.
And he was like, I'm going to start this festival.
Uh, we're going to do like this other festival.
and we were just like, you know, maybe you maybe don't maybe you should.
Maybe you should, maybe I think you shouldn't do that.
I think that like, maybe you can, there's a lot of things you can do because you're famous, but you know, a fire fest, too, maybe you shouldn't do that, and he's doing exactly that.
So he's doing fire festival.
To that what we said to him on the pod.
Did we see anything else?
We told him, you're crazy.
And he was like, he just saw the potential.
He was like, what if we did it right this time?
So article came out today.
It says, a fire festival, too, is off to a rough start again.
Days after the tickets go on sale, which is allegedly taking place on Isla Mujeres, an island off the coast of Mexico, the local tourism board claims they have no knowledge of this event.
The director of the tourism board says we have never had any contact with any person or company about this.
For us this is an event that does not exist.
If you go to the location that they list for where it's going to take place.
So I don't know if you have Google maps handy but if you open up 21 degrees, 12 degrees, do all that just.
Here's where the event is taking place.
Take a look at this.
In the. To the location in the middle of the ocean where there's no land.
also the most expensive tickets are 25 ,000 dollars like he you know how we've joked about entrepreneurs who have just taken what has worked and they just like say like alright you sold all this candy bars just did the same thing now but for a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup style product right he did that so he was of exported the the code for that old website and he just put a number two on it?
And now he's doing Firefest, too.
It's the same thing.
What did that woman's what did that guy's wife say?
Instead of I told you so it was this had a bunch of predictable outcomes.
What is she what's what's the line?
This was identified early on as a likely outcome.
Yeah, you called it.
This was this is insane.
I don't even know how he's allowed to leave the country.
Yeah, it's not good.
But hey, listen, I'm an optimist.
There's a chance. There's always a chance here.
Some other great quotes from this article by the way, we tried Billy took to Instagram to address the concerns.
Here's what he said.
Um, fire fest fire to is real.
We have incredible partners leading the festivals.
They're in charge of all logistics, production operations.
Um, there's no way they would ever take on a fake festival, right?
No, he didn't say the right.
And then the next thing he says is, well, the tourism board responded, the organizers did not even bother to approach the authorities.
It's very strange because anyone who organize events, knows if you're going to hold an event, let alone a massive event, you need municipal authorization.
I think they thought they could just announce it, see if they got traction and then ask for permits halfway down the path.
It's a bit naive. McFarland responds, we have accommodations.
Is that really what he said?
that's what he said before.
Yeah. Also there's, you could buy tickets on his website for up to $20 ,000.
But there's a great way to accept your money as a user, but like they don't list any bands.
It's a show, right?
Yeah. So, that's the other part here.
At this point, no talent has been announced for the festival.
However, McFarland responds, we have talent.
Artists, athletes and other performers are on board.
So, did I ever tell you about the time my dad, I went on a trip with my dad and I learned the power of just being absolutely delusional.
The negotiation? It wasn't even not even a full negotiation.
It was, I mean, it wasn't a negotiating situation.
We were at the airport and my dad is cheap and so he doesn't want to pay to check luggage in.
Oh yeah. So he just like bought the, he got his bag that's too big to check in and stuffed it.
And then they're like, you want to check bags.
He's like, yeah, just that one, like the free one.
And then the lady, let's like poor little lady from Singapore Airlines behind the desk was like, I'm sorry, like you'll need to check that one too.
And he goes, no, no, I'm carrying that on.
And she goes, I swear it's too big.
And my dad responds, no actually it's too small.
Not even though it's not too big.
It's okay. He says, it's too small, which makes absolutely no sense to anyone in any situation.
There's no such thing as being too small.
And by the way, she just kept saying, I think it's over the limit.
And he goes, no, it's too small.
I checked. It's too small.
And it worked. She led them on the plane.
And we got out on the plane at the plane.
They're like, sir, it's not gonna fit.
He's like, you need to check it upfront here because it's free to check when you're up there.
And he got it for free.
and he just kept doing this on the trip.
We were trying to get into this like, he's like, oh, let's go to the Four Seasons.
They have this, like the New Year's festival, like they're doing this big celebration there.
And we're like driving up, it was like, all these signs, like you must be a resident to attend.
And like dad says, we have to be staying here, we're definitely not staying at the Four Seasons.
So like, we can't do this, we just turn around and he's like, no, no, no, it's gonna be fine, it's gonna be fine, it's gonna be fine.
And we're like, there's a guy at the front, like the gate, he's checking everybody, like what room give you your ID all this stuff and um and so like my dad just goes up and he just pulls up and he goes so what do you need to see some ID or something and the guy just goes nah it's good you're fine go ahead and we got it and I was like wow something I tweeted this out he goes de lulu is the saluluh and I've been saying that for the last few days my kids they No, I'm just upset.
Delulu is the Salulu.
If you got a problem, I got a Salulu for you.
Delulu is the Salulu.
Who said that? Who tweeted that?
I tweeted out this long, thoughtful thing and this guy just responded with that.
Delulu is the Salulu.
And I was like, this is amazing.
That should be the new small boy stuff.
I don't have any tattoos, but I did.
It's up there. It's a contender.
My kid's name's in that.
Dude, that seems like a cute thing, like a Gen Z woman would say on a true crime pod that.
Just like we stole MFM, we're gonna steal that one too.
Thank you. That is now ours.
Yeah, sorry. I wish I could remember who said it.
I don't know your name.
This is a good podcast because I'm exhausted from laughing.
That's how I know. I had a really good time.
Yeah. I'd love to do it again sometime.
All right. Great show.
See you all out there.
Have a good night. That's it.
That's the pod. Hey, Sean here.
Quick break to tell you an Ev Williams story.
He started Twitter and before that, he sold a company to Google for a hundred million dollars and somebody asked him, they said, Ev, what's the secret, man?
How do you create these huge businesses, billion dollar businesses?
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All right, back to the episode.
