A Breakdown of Trendy New Businesses & Boring 9 Figure Businesses | My First Million #202

Sam Parr

Innovative! How can I be new in reality in order to make a lot of money? It's about how do I get locked into this to where it's going to be a pain in the ass to go anywhere else. Alright everyone, we've got a good episode. We're going to talk about class rings. The class ring business shockingly brings in close to **$1,000,000,000** a year for a company that you might have heard of. But we're going to do a breakdown of them. What else is there? We're going to talk about stretching gyms. I'm a huge fan of paying **$100** and going to the stretch lab. We're going to break that business down. What else are we going to talk about?

Shaan Puri

We talk about the business of **ephemeral tattoos**, which are tattoos that only last for a year. This is a trend that I'm watching. We also discuss some of the podcast stuff, how we're looking at YouTube, and how we're thinking about content right now. Last but not least, we talk about a couple of businesses that are interesting—kind of **Google-based businesses**. I call them "couch cushion businesses" because they are like those little things in the cracks that you don't really think about. Once you look in the couch cushion, you might find some money, but you don't really consider these businesses. Some of them are scams, and some of them are not. We discuss those at the end.

Sam Parr

Yeah, in my opinion, most of them are scams. We actually do a breakdown of them around the 50th minute of this podcast, so wait till the end and we'll get to it. You'll love it! Talk soon. Did you see... did you listen to the episode that I released today? Or today's Monday, it's... did you listen to that?

Shaan Puri

no what is it

Sam Parr

I consumed like 8 or 9 pretty interesting pieces of content last week, and I talked about 4 or 5 of them. Did you see this guy named Ben Moola, who I talked about?

Shaan Puri

no who is that

Sam Parr

Okay, so Ben Moola. I put it in the doc. If you've heard the Monday episode today, this is a little bit of a repeat, but I cannot stop watching this guy. He's this big old fat guy, like 400 pounds, probably around 63 years old. He's disgusting; he smokes cigarettes, and he looks like he smells. He always hits people on the back really hard. He's just gregarious and in your face. On the surface, he appears incredibly dislikable and cocky, but I love him. It turns out he seems quite charming, and he's a real estate tycoon down in South Florida. All he does...

Shaan Puri

I Google this guy ben moola

Sam Parr

Yeah, that's who he is. All the photos of him, like, it's just an immediate turn off. But then you get into the videos, and he's basically a successful guy who's now just starting to do YouTube. He's probably in his mid-fifties, so he's not like a typical YouTuber. He does it the right way—where he's successful and now he's doing YouTube. It's very fascinating. I can't stop watching this guy. Do you see what he looks like?

Shaan Puri

Yeah, so his name is Asa Benmala. He looks like... what's Joe Rogan's friend's name? Joey Diaz. He looks like Joey Diaz does real estate. It's as if Joey Diaz moved to Florida and started doing real estate.

Sam Parr

And he wears like **gaudy clothes**. He's sitting there smoking Marlboros outside of like a Ramada Inn or a Holiday Inn that he's about to buy for **$20,000,000**. But then he gets into like a **$500,000** Bentley. So it's like a really funny juxtaposition. He's a really interesting guy and gives great advice on real estate and business.

Shaan Puri

nice

Sam Parr

very fun youtube you'll you'll have to start watching this guy he's brilliant

Shaan Puri

I'm gonna subscribe

Sam Parr

He's beautiful, and that's actually what we need to do with our podcast. Our podcast... actually, I'm gonna figure out how to do this. We need to become a YouTube channel that happens to have a podcast. Do you know what I mean?

Shaan Puri

yes I know what you mean explain why you say that though

Sam Parr

So, for one, I've been a YouTube fan for 5 years. I've been a paying subscriber and it's my life. If it's not on YouTube... I don't... I only watch YouTube, including YouTube TV though, which is basically TV, but so that's a little cheating. The discoverability is so good, and I've been watching Gary Tan's videos. You know Gary Tan?

Shaan Puri

yeah yeah

Sam Parr

I think he's wonderful. I don't believe his content is any better than ours, but I think it's packaged better than ours.

Shaan Puri

for sure

Sam Parr

And there's a lot to learn from that. I think that whenever I see a video he does, I'm like, "Oh man, I totally could have done that." He just packaged it in such a wonderful way. The discovery of discoverability on YouTube is significantly better than podcasts.

Shaan Puri

For sure, and it's just more fun. It's more fun to watch a YouTube video. And I don't know if we have it kind of skewed because we're able to... we have YouTube Red or whatever the premium thing's called. So we're able to go in the background and basically make it a podcast whenever we want. I think for a lot of people, they don't pay for that thing, so that's probably the main difference. But once you pay for that, YouTube is just amazing. It's so good.

Sam Parr

Yeah, we're... when you're getting to make that shift, I'm going to work on that this week actually. And then, one last quick update. One thing that I'm trying to do, that I've actually done for the last... tell me what you think about this. I've done it for the last 5 or 6 days, and I didn't mean to do it at first, but now I don't want to break it. I've walked around 20,000 steps a day for the last about 5 or 6 days.

Shaan Puri

what are you using to track it

Sam Parr

Well, just my iPhone. I was using the Health app, then I downloaded a... what's it called? A PETA... what’s the... anyway, I downloaded an app for...

Shaan Puri

it gotcha

Sam Parr

And it's awesome! A pedometer—that's what it is, a pedometer. It's awesome! Have you ever walked? Have you ever tried to do like 10,000 to 15,000 steps a day?

Shaan Puri

Bro, walking is the new running. No, I don't know. I've never really liked step counters. I always found them to be kind of underwhelming. For example, I had a Fitbit, or whatever, one of the early ones, and I hit 10,000 steps on what I felt like was a very lazy day. Immediately in my head, I thought, "Oh, this is for like old sedentary people," and I can't use this as a barometer of success for me. But you're really fit, and you seem to care that you hit 20,000 steps. Who cares, right? Isn't like an hour of intense exercise really what you want and not 20,000 steps?

Sam Parr

Yes and no. There are pros and cons. The con is that for the amount I'm walking, it takes forever—like 3 hours. It's just 3 hours of straight walking. In some regards, that's a pro because it's fun to be out there and seeing stuff. I'm in a new place exploring, so it's enjoyable. But the pro is also interesting. Basically, if you run 10 miles really fast, that will take you about 60 minutes. However, if you walk 10 miles, that's going to take you 3 to 4 hours. Interestingly, you can actually burn the same amount of calories doing it.

Shaan Puri

right you

Sam Parr

It takes the same amount of energy to move your body that distance, but when you walk that much, you don't get that hungry. The problem is, whenever I run a lot or whenever I work out a lot, I get really hungry and I out-eat the calories that I consumed. With walking, I haven't done that. I don't out-eat the calories... I don't get starving. So it's been like a really easy way to slim down. Anyway, I just thought I'd bring that up. You want to get into it?

Shaan Puri

yeah let's do it

Sam Parr

alright which one you wanna go with first it was I know jocelyn's right

Shaan Puri

Well, actually, you just... On your random life updates, so two things on that: 1. I don't know where this came from, but over the weekend I guess you were talking about step counting. 2. I was just remembering there's this little clip I watched on YouTube from *The Office* about when Dwight gets a standing desk. I don't know if you watched *The Office*, but have you ever seen this? Do you remember this? Probably not, it's pretty obscure, but...

Sam Parr

Deaf dude, I mean, I'm like a normal 30-year-old. I could quote every single episode of *The Office*.

Shaan Puri

So, Dwight gets a standing desk. Like everybody who gets a standing desk, it's awesome for 15 minutes. Then you start doing the thing where you're on one foot while you're letting the other foot chill for a second. You're stretching out your ankle, and then you're doing the other side. You're kind of squatting a little bit because you're tired of standing. At first, they're basically like, "Oh wow, Dwight." He's shitting on everybody, saying, "Oh, you're sitting. You know, I feel like I'm working in a suicide cult," because you guys are all deciding to sit. Then they turn the tables on him when they know he's getting tired. They're like, "Dwight, wow, I can't believe you've made such a great decision. You're for sure gonna just do this forever, right? There's no way you'd go back on this, right?" He's like, "Of course not," but secretly, he's fatiguing really hard from the standing desk. Anyway, they sort of guilt-shame him, and he ends up with this little hidden stool in his pants so that he can sit while pretending to stand. This reminds me of the step counting thing, which are these little phases that everybody goes through. You know, where you're like, "I need to hit my 10,000 steps." I feel like everybody has this phase in their life where they buy the device, do the thing for a bit, and then they get off of it. Most people do, at least. Anyways, the reason I say this is that over the weekend, I was supposed to be working because I got back from this trip. Instead, I was just watching a bunch of content. I was watching, you know, Aaron Sorkin.

Sam Parr

so I was like yeah I mean the famous director

Shaan Puri

Yeah, the writer... he, you know, kind of like... I don't know if he's a producer, director, or writer, but maybe all three. He created *The West Wing*, *Newsroom*, and *The Social Network* movie. He's amazing; he's brilliant. He's known for his dialogue. So, I was just kind of trying to branch out and learn about how to write dialogue. What is it? What makes it great? Why is this guy so much better than everybody else? I was watching a bunch of his videos where he talks about how he does it, and it really made me want to write a TV show. Not to make a TV show or a career out of it, but I just want to write one episode. So, I decided I'm going to write an episode of *The Office*, and I'm going to release it. That's my challenge for the next 30 days. In the next 30 days, I'm going to write an episode, and it's just going to be text. I'm just going to steal all the characters from *The Office*, and I'm going to see what I can do. I think this is going to be a lot of fun, and I'm going to release it to anybody who, I guess, follows me on Twitter, my newsletter, or something like that.

Sam Parr

My prediction is that it will, at worst, be mildly good. I think you're good at it. I think you're gonna be...

Shaan Puri

good at it done it right so like that's the beginner part of it but I think I could be I I'm also like

Sam Parr

I think you could

Shaan Puri

I think I'm a bit cocky about it. I feel like I can do a good job. Did you ever read about this guy, Ross? He wrote an episode of *Silicon Valley*. This guy, he used to be an early Facebook employee. He's also the creator of Mozilla, the browser.

Sam Parr

yeah

Shaan Puri

or or firefox or whatever or no his name's blake I think blake ross is yeah

Sam Parr

yeah yeah yeah yeah

Shaan Puri

So he went... he just, like for fun, wrote an episode of *Silicon Valley*, the HBO show, and it's amazing. If you've never read this, you should definitely Google it and read it. If you watch the show and then read it, it's as good as a normal episode of the show. It's crazy! I was very inspired by that. I was like, "Man, what a polymath!" The guy can create a browser, [was an] early Facebook employee, and is just able to write a screenplay basically on his first try, which I thought was incredible.

Sam Parr

I think... you... I think at worst, it's going to be pretty mildly good. I think at best, you could actually have a home run. That's my prediction for how this is going to be. So today's July 19th. You now have... now you're on the ball. Well, no, let's do August. The end of August. August... what is there, 20... how many days are there?

Shaan Puri

31 days

Sam Parr

alright you have till august 31 and and then now you're on the hook

Shaan Puri

And in general, I'm thinking about content... okay, content strategy. Because I haven't been posting much on Twitter or anything like that, and I feel like once I started getting really into Twitter, I just noticed all the other kind of... Twitter thread wannabe people like me out there who were just doing the same thing. And it was really a turnoff. Like, I enjoyed doing it and I enjoyed the results of it...

Sam Parr

that's what I told you but I

Shaan Puri

Hated that everybody else was doing it. It made me feel like such a schmuck. I felt like, you know, going to a club and then being told, "You need to get a table if you want into this club." It's like, "Oh, okay, here's my credit card. I guess I'll pay a thousand times what the bottle cost." That was how I felt like a big chump the first time I did bottle service. The second time I felt like a chump in life was when I was doing Twitter threads of, you know, generic business advice like everybody else. So now I think I'm gonna zig and zag in the opposite direction. I'm just gonna go with a few pieces of content that I think are pretty badass and extremely challenging for me. If they flop, they flop, but I'm gonna go all in on them. Like, I'm gonna write a rap song or I'm gonna write a screenplay. I'm gonna try to create something that's much more intense and possibly awesome.

Sam Parr

I think you're right, and I'm going to take credit because I wrote about this and talked on this podcast about it about 6 or 7 months ago. I was like, "These threads are killing me." I think longer-form blog posts are going to be coming because everyone's saying, "I want to start a newsletter. I want to get popular on Twitter." I'm like, "Alright, great, do that." I actually think that there could be a bigger opportunity to create a more in-depth blog post. I have a feeling that this is kind of what humans are craving. I don't know what people are craving, but I think every time the content will...

Shaan Puri

Always be at least one-tenth as much content, but have it be 10 times as good. Because of that, stand out from the crowd and have more fun. Like, because I'm not constantly just doing quick hits, I'm trying to do great work each time, which I think is harder but more fun... maybe.

Sam Parr

Something that I've been thinking about is related to content. I ask myself all the time about how I can repackage content. There are a few things that I've always been interested in regarding content. So, there's this thing with email. A lot of people think of email as like 2,300 words that you can fit in there or whatever. I forget what the space is; it's a certain megabyte space. But you should actually think of it like... I'm just going to make these numbers up; these aren't right. It's 150 megabytes, and it just so happens that 2,500 words is 150 megabytes. But what else can you tell them in that story? There’s some interesting technology that I've tinkered with, and we've never gotten into it at The Hustle, but I think we should. You can actually host a GIF on your own server. This might change with Apple's new update, but you can make it so when you send someone an email, you can have like a 30-second GIF on there. A GIF is basically a video with text, which is the same thing as Instagram without sound, right? It's the same thing. What I've always wanted to do was to put that on there and then have a part one. At the end of part one, at the end of the 30 seconds, you say, "Alright, now hit refresh," and you actually hit refresh, and part two shows up on your screen.

Shaan Puri

oh interesting

Sam Parr

And I've always wanted to do things like that. I think that's an interesting medium. I think that could be hacked, and you could have a really, really cool storytelling experience. Yeah, I think so. I would suggest someone try that on email. It is possible; like, it's technically possible to do that, and I think that could be really cool. Another thing is, I've always asked: if you were using Twitter for a longer form blog post, what would it look like? If you had a blog post on Twitter that was something like 500 tweets long?

Shaan Puri

right

Sam Parr

I've been thinking about, like, what would... how do you hack the rules? Yeah, that's kind of interesting to me anyway.

Shaan Puri

Alright, let's look at it. Okay, so that's my content. I'm putting my stake in the ground; I'm announcing it publicly. So now I'm committed to having to do it. Do you?

Sam Parr

wanna talk about let's talk about stretching labs or stretching gyms can we talk about that

Shaan Puri

Yeah, let's do it! You were talking about walking, and this is actually what I was going to transition to, which is kind of like the slow exercise movement. I was working out with somebody who's, I think, 41. They're a former bodybuilder, and I asked, "So, what are you working on nowadays? Are you trying to get shredded or build muscle?" He said, "Bro, just function." I was like, "What?" We've been talking about the super mobility training. He mentioned he has a personal trainer, and he pointed at the bench press and then at the stretching table, saying, "I want to spend more time there, not there." I found that interesting. By the way, I woke up with massive shoulder pain today, so I'm all about it right now. I noticed there's a trend, and I have this segment called "Trend Watching." I got two trends today. The first one is stretching labs. I had never really heard of this, but there are gyms dedicated to stretching. I don't know if you've ever been to one. One is called Stretch Lab; it's a franchise, and I think they have like 1,000 locations in just five years or something crazy like that. They're definitely franchising pretty hardcore nationwide. Then there's another one I like the name of: Stretch Relief, which is kind of like stress relief. It's based in New York, and it was a physical place, but with COVID, they now do online sessions. I'm kind of into this. It's a place you go, and it's not yoga, it's not Pilates, it's not cycling, it's not spin class, and it's not high-intensity training. It's just stretching. I think there's a market for all of these. What do you think about this? You've definitely thought about mobility and stretching a lot.

Sam Parr

I am obsessed with stretching. I stretch a ton. I download all types of different apps because I enjoy trying them all. But I stretch on a consistent basis.

Shaan Puri

trying to do the splits and stuff right

Sam Parr

Yeah, yeah. Like, I work really hard at it and I study different types of stretching. One of the very few types of stretching that's proven to work—I forget exactly what it's called—but basically, it's this idea where if you want to stretch your hamstring, like in a split, let's say you're doing the front splits and you want to stretch your hamstring, you actually need to push down for 10 seconds really hard. So, you want your hamstring to flex for 10 seconds, and then you release. That allows you to stretch even further. I don't entirely understand how it works, but I read a lot of studies, and it's one of the few proven ways. I've been obsessed with that. I've gone to StretchLab; it's $100. I've done it in San Francisco and in Austin. Totally, totally fun and totally worth it. I loved it! I've been trying to find a place in Brooklyn, where I'm staying now, but I can't find one that does this. I'm completely on board with this. I've also tried to buy different stretching machines. Stretching machines have always fascinated me because stretching is one of the few exercises where you don't actually have to put that much effort into it to get results. Someone can kind of do it to you. It's not like running, where it's just like, "I gotta put all the effort in." I can just kind of be numb, and someone can do it. So, there are split machines where you can do side splits. You sit in this thing and crank a wheel, and your legs open up. That's okay; that's fine. But what I've been looking for is front split machines and different types of stretching machines. I have found close to nothing. At my gym in my house, I was thinking about buying a set of winches—like a winch that goes on a Jeep to pull a cord. I was going to put some on each side of my wall and create a stretching machine. It's probably going to look like a sex machine.

Shaan Puri

was gonna say I think these you could just buy something else and just use it for a different purpose

Sam Parr

I guess you could just buy a sex machine or like a reformer. But anyway, I'm totally on board with this. I think stretching is actually a trend that's going to continue to grow. We've talked about it now for a year. We've discussed RamWod, which is called "Range of Motion Workout of the Day," right? It's an app that's killing it. We've talked about Kelly Starrett. We've discussed a lot of this. I'm totally on board with stretching.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, stretch tech. So, I'm keeping an eye on that trend. I have another trend if you're ready to move on to my second trend here.

Sam Parr

Really quick, what another thing could do with stretching... So, it's stretching. In order to have one of these franchises, you really just need a table, right? Like nice tables with some bands. Another two things that are really interesting to me in this space: 1. Chanting 2. Breathing work I went to a breath work class where I paid $30, and we just sat there with 30 other people doing breathing. Then eventually, you like... chant. I don't understand the science behind it, but I know that I felt great. It was fun, it was a good experience for $30.

Shaan Puri

absolute high so before not in a fitness context but one time I was when I started the sushi restaurant I was staying in la with the sushi chef his his mandate was all right if I'm going to start this business with you guys you're going to each come I had 3 co founders there's 3 of us he said you're each going to come you're going to live with me you're gonna work every day at my restaurant for 3 weeks each and only one at a time so you don't have each other as your little safety net and I said okay so you know 1 guy went out there a second I went out there then I went out there and with me he goes it was like you know kind of a life altering experience he's a very wise guy like kind of like a mister sort of character for me and one of the things he did he's like are you religious and I said no I don't believe he said he said I'm buddhist I said okay cool do you know anything about buddhism no and he goes alright tomorrow morning 7 am like meet me in the living room I was like oh shit here we go and we went there and and so I I didn't know anything about buddhism and I still know very little about buddhism but buddhists have this chant that they do as like or at least his practice or his maybe his sect or whatever was they have this one chant it's called nam myoho renge kyo so it'd be like nam myoho renge kyo nam myoho renge kyo and you repeat that for like 1 hour straight you're chanting nam yoho renge kyo nam yoho renge just 1 hour straight and so we start and I'm just trying to be nice and I'm like okay I guess I'll just kinda sit here and like what are these 5 words what are they what do I need to know what they mean no oh they I don't need to know what do you mean they're he was just like just sit just the sound is therapeutic and I was like oh that's interesting because like in hinduism om it's like o m is like the there's like om and like you hear that in yoga a lot too and there's something about the vibration of making this sound audibly making the sound that by the end of it you feel different than you did at the beginning and so by the end of this hour I had this like I don't know what it was it's like a rush of euphoria basically from chanting and he was like I do that every morning it's like a med it's like a audio I forgot what it's called transcendental meditation or something it's a form of meditation where you're not trying to it's like a way to quiet the mind by chanting the same thing on loop and when you quiet the mind you know you you finally you know you get a sense of peace that's very hard to achieve otherwise and after I did that I was like a big believer in chanting so I've continued to I'm not buddhist but I've continued to do this chanting thing on and off for like the last 10 years of my life

Sam Parr

Well, you feel like an idiot doing it. So, if I told you to do it without your guy there, you would feel like a fool. I went and I felt like a fool too. I went to one of these classes, and you do breath work, which I don't understand the science behind, but it felt awesome. It felt like a very mild drug. Part of it is chanting, and it felt great. When I talked to the guy, he was like, "Yeah, this is like our MVP. I found it on Eventbrite. We're thinking about scaling this and doing..." It was all startup-y guy, and I was like, "Dude, this is the greatest business ever! You just need a space for like 50 people and nothing else."

Shaan Puri

yeah the floor

Sam Parr

Yeah, you don't need anything. Like, I'm in... If you ever... So, anyway, I think that's interesting. I also think ice baths are interesting. I know I've been noticing loads and loads of ice baths on Instagram. We talked about this company... What was the ice bath company called?

Shaan Puri

the barrel company icebarrel

Sam Parr

Ice Barrel - so icebarrel.co or something like that. I know the guy who started it, and they're selling an ice barrel for like $1,200 or $1,300. I'm seeing them everywhere. I think ice baths, particularly places that you can go just to take an ice bath, are going to get quite popular. I think an ice bath also has a slightly meditative purpose to it. So I would add those two things to stretching to look out for [as] pull trends: 1. Ice baths 2. Meditative practices

Shaan Puri

Yeah, same. Just yesterday, I sent this TikTok. This guy is like, "Hey guys, I just want to take you through my morning routine." He's like a 60-year-old dude who's just absolutely chiseled. Somehow, it's like, "Okay, I don't know how your body looks like that. A little unnatural, but okay."

Sam Parr

was it mark sisson

Shaan Puri

No, I don't... He wasn't like a famous guy; he was just a guy. He's like, "First things first, I get in the cold plunge." He said, "I get in and I don't do a lot of... I just get in. That's it." Then he's like, "At 3 minutes, I get out. I go in the jacuzzi." He has cops over his pool to get to his jacuzzi. He's like, "Then we're gonna go to the sauna." All the comments are like, "Sir, I don't have these amenities at my house. I don't have all these things." I think that's the opportunity. When people have these things, they sort of swear by them. Like our friend Ramon swears by it. Tony Robbins always talked about this; it's how he starts his day. He goes straight into the ice plunge, then goes straight to heat. There are definitely some anti-inflammatory and neurological effects from waking the body up like this with such a drastic physiological change, a stimulus. You don't need caffeine; you don't need drugs to get your body to respond. But I think there's a problem: they're so inaccessible. So, we talked about Ice Barrel, and then somebody reached out—a guy who's in my club, LTV, the e-commerce group I have for people who have an e-commerce store of $1,000,000 or up. He said, "Oh yeah, I have this one brand now, but I'm starting a new brand." His first brand's pretty successful; I think $30,000,000. His new brand is going to do ice baths, but it's just a device you put into any tub, like your normal bathtub, and it makes your bathtub water really cold. I was like, "Oh, that's way better because I don't want to do ice management."

Sam Parr

I don't

Shaan Puri

Wanna buy ice all the time? That's a huge pain in the ass. And this ice barrel thing is a $2,000 barrel.

Sam Parr

yeah and you can only you can't you can't use it if you have an apartment

Shaan Puri

Right, and so I'm like, "Well, if I already have a tub and you just let me fill it up with normal water and I put this thing in for 10 minutes and it gets cold... that's awesome actually." Like, now you've just built a $150 device that does this without the headache.

Sam Parr

is it like electronic like you plug it into something

Shaan Puri

how you put electric things in water like I'm a little bit suspicious

Sam Parr

it's like a it's like the opposite of a heating pad

Shaan Puri

Yeah, exactly. It cools water, so I'm very excited about this. If anybody has either ice or sauna technology, send it to me. Show it to me! I really want to try these. I'm very big on this stuff.

Sam Parr

great same so the second for trend spotting is tattoos

Shaan Puri

Yeah, **ephemeral tattoos** specifically. So if you go to **ephemeral**, which is kind of hard to spell, it's **ephemeral.tattoo**. Check that out. Basically, this is a trend I've been noticing. First, there was a company called **Inkbox** that just made temporary tattoos. You know, temporary tattoos are kind of like essentially a body sticker. They started doing pretty well. They came out a while ago and they do kind of like $20 to $30 million+ in revenue, last I had heard, which was a few years ago. So **Inkbox** had done pretty well. Now, this new one, **Ephemeral Tattoo**, just raised **$20 million**. It got my attention, and I said, "Well, what's going on here?" What these guys have is a biodegradable ink that can go into even a normal tattoo gun. So you have to go to a place. **Inkbox** is sort of like a sticker; you just put it on your skin and then it fades away. This is like actually a legit tattoo, but it's a one-year commitment instead of a 50-year commitment or whatever like a normal tattoo is. You go and actually get it tattooed onto your body, and it degrades after **12 to 15 months**. It fades away. They have one studio open in **LA** and one in **New York**. They raised **$20 million** to do two things: 1. Release colored tattoos because right now it's just black and white. 2. Open more studios. The way it works is you put down a **$20 deposit**, which lets you basically book a reservation at this thing. They have like **$1 million** worth of pre-booked reservations at their studios that they are just backlogged on and need to fulfill. What I thought was interesting about this is that I was like, "Okay, cool, just some kind of material innovation on the material science of the ink." But I like that this can go into a normal tattoo gun. I think it's sort of stupid to open up their own tattoo parlors. Maybe they'll do a few of those, but there are **21,000 tattoo parlors** in the United States. That's like the same number of high schools in the United States. So there's essentially one tattoo parlor for every high school.

Sam Parr

is that is that a real stat

Shaan Puri

yeah there's estimated 21,000 tattoo parlors and there's about 20 20 20 24,000

Sam Parr

I think you're wrong by the way them having this studio is awesome it it doesn't matter if it makes money or not

Shaan Puri

I guess what I'm saying is, I think what they should do is sell this to every tattoo parlor as the "Hey, you want diet Coke, right? You want the diet tattoo. You don't want the lifelong tattoo commitment." Hey, we sell this thing, it plugs right into our normal thing, and we have the staff, we have the brick-and-mortar locations. So I think they could roll out to 10,000 locations like this rather than opening up their own store brick after brick. Anyway, I'm pretty excited about this. I think it's kind of a cool idea.

Sam Parr

I'm gonna sign up. I'll go to it. They have a Brooklyn one. I was about to get some more tattoos. I would totally do that.

Shaan Puri

right you have a few a few interesting tattoos on your body that you could talk about

Sam Parr

I've got a few bad ones. So, I have one, two... I've got four homemade ones. The way that you do homemade ones is you use a sewing needle.

Shaan Puri

and that

Sam Parr

And ink, and you just make a ton of dots. I did that when I was like 21 and partying. I was highly intoxicated. I don't entirely regret them, but they looked silly.

Shaan Puri

I saw like it says like what what do you have on your foot you have like something on your foot I saw it it's like mom it's

Sam Parr

A great... no one says "wow" or "mom." It depends. And then I have feet tattoos that say "act now," which are kind of cool. They're kind of cool, but yeah, like they're...

Shaan Puri

self administered tattoos

Sam Parr

not not

Shaan Puri

every day you see one of those

Sam Parr

Which is actually quite popular is homemade tattoos. It's called "stick and poke." When I did it, I didn't think that they were that popular, but I think they actually are quite popular. Anyway, this tattoo business... I'll 100% sign up for that. It looks... sign up for them. It looks pretty sick. They are black and white, so they do look basic.

Shaan Puri

yeah

Sam Parr

yeah they look pretty like like I would get it but if you're like a cute girl then you probably don't

Shaan Puri

It's not just that they're black and white. It looks like they're not colored in, so they're just like an outline of a shape. At least that's what I see on the website. It's like a cat, but the cat is just like the outline of a cat.

Sam Parr

I'm into this

Shaan Puri

shade it

Sam Parr

ephemeral tattoo so I I think you're on board there

Shaan Puri

It just opens up the market, right? Like, if there's a circle that represents the number of people who are willing to get tattoos for life, and now there's an option that you can have a tattoo but it's only going to last a year and it'll fade away... okay, that circle just got like 3 times bigger, 4 times bigger. You're just increasing the size of the addressable market for tattoos, which is smart.

Sam Parr

I think that's cool because you get to try something for a year that could potentially impact the rest of your life. You know, it's always freaked me out... and we don't discuss it too much, but as a society we accept that it's normal: buying a home. You basically go into it for like 10 minutes, and you're willing to spend all of your money—every dollar that you have—and 30 years of your life after like a 15-minute walkthrough. Is that crazy? Is that us?

Shaan Puri

A 100-page disclosure that you can't understand. Then you read some scary stuff in there, and you're just like, "I guess I just live with that termite issue."

Sam Parr

I always thought it was mind-boggling that you have to spend 15 minutes making a decision that, for most people, is all their money and also for 30+ years of their life. Right off a 15-minute walkthrough. That's always been crazy to me. So this is... well, this is good for tattoos that they get that moment. Do you want to talk about these top two things? I think...

Shaan Puri

we could so so I was thinking about class rings or I think somebody ben shared a tweet with me that was just like a meme it was like the the if people wanna know how we get ideas for this so me and ben just send these other shit off twitter all day and then some of it you know it's just like memes but but I felt sorry to think about it he goes some guy coleman oates he goes y'all y'all remember when a company would come to your high school and gaslight you into buying a $400 class ring and you know there's just like whatever like a 100 likes on this tweet and I just thought it was so funny and I remember that happening I remember buying a class ring and I don't know I lost it I don't know where it is it was like a waste of money it's so ugly I was never gonna wear it but I bought it because I was like oh I guess this is like the moment I'm supposed to commemorate these 4 years and you know it's now or never basically to buy this ring so I like kinda got pressured into buying it and so I started thinking about this class ring business so let me tell you some things I discovered alright so this guy is kind of like my billy of the week I got 2 very boring business people that I'm gonna feature here so the first guy is called auto justin and auto justin is the founder of justin's which is the number one class ring maker and auto justin he invents the class ring basically so they he started this thing in 18/97 in ottawa right this is like you know over a 100 years old and and so he invents this thing and basically says okay great we're gonna have these rings that commemorate the occasion and and so he he creates a classroom and so what how does this work so basically high school or college you go to the school at the end of your senior year you get upsold into all this stuff you get upsold into like you know shirts yearbooks but the class ring is like kinda like one of the more expensive items $400 $500 $600 for a class ring sometimes and and so I was looking into the history of this company so basically the company you know existed for a long time goes public in like 1965 or whatever stays public for a while ends up getting acquired by private equity so it gets acquired by by by something called newell brands and this is like an interesting company to look into they own rubbermaid crockpot oster like all these like home home appliance companies then they own like elmer's glue sharpie yankee candles like all these brands that we know about they have 10,000,000,000 in revenue across their portfolio of brands and so they had they bought johnson's and they were like look this company makes about $700,000,000 a year but it's been flat or declining like the yearbook and class ring industry is sort of like declining 5% a year and so I was like ah you know maybe there's room to turn around so they buy it for 11,500,000,000 I think

Sam Parr

yeah

Shaan Puri

And then they try it for a few years but can't do anything with it. They sell it to another company, Platinum Equity, for $1,300,000,000. So, they take a $200,000,000 loss on it when they sell the company. It's still owned by Platinum Equity, and it's just this thing that exists. This started getting me interested in how this whole business model works. What I couldn't find is what's in it for the schools. The schools definitely give these people real estate on campus or on premises to sell this stuff. So, I wonder if there's a revenue share. I couldn't find that detail, but it got me thinking: how would I compete with this? If I was going to compete with this, I thought this would be a fun brainstorm. So, alright, boring business—how would you compete with this?

Sam Parr

So, well, let’s walk through how seniors come into this. You know, did you use Josh Johnson's in high school?

Shaan Puri

I think I think we bought johnson's yeah

Sam Parr

So basically, if I remember correctly, you're a senior. Do you get a magazine? Like, do they hand out a pamphlet to all seniors?

Shaan Puri

I remember buying it from a table. There was like a table set up with a little tablecloth, and on it was a bunch of rings. I think they did have a brochure of like, "Here's all the different models you can order." You try them on, and then you place your order and pay. The thing then arrives, you know, months later.

Sam Parr

And your school knows who's ordering. I think because I didn't order one. I was like, "I don't... this is nonsense. I don't like high school this much. I don't want a ring." My school came to me and they were like, "Are you having trouble at home?" I was like, "No." They asked, "Do you need money to buy the ring? We'll buy it for you." I was like, "No, that's lovely. I appreciate you guys, but I just think it's stupid. I don't want a ring." Then they had a ring ceremony and they just handed me a plain box. It had, like, I went to a Catholic school, and it had a cross or something in it. So that was just... this.

Shaan Puri

high school you're talking about

Sam Parr

Yeah, so they had some type of thing to give me, and I was like, "I appreciate you guys, but I don't want any of this stuff." But anyway, the school knows who orders as well.

Shaan Puri

Right, so... okay. I was thinking about this. I think there are two models to this: 1. Distribution 2. Product On the distribution side, I would definitely try to figure out how to partner with either: - The schools themselves - A sub-entity within the school So, did you invest in that company, Copper, I sent you?

Sam Parr

we passed we

Shaan Puri

Passed. Okay, so one of the clever things that they do—I won't go into their whole playbook, but they have an awesome playbook on how to grow. They make it like a debit card, essentially, for high school students, and they grow really well. The people who were behind it created a different product for high schoolers and had a playbook on how to get high schoolers on board for their thing. One of the pieces of the playbook is that they partner with one of the organizations in the school. They can't partner with the school itself; it's too complicated. But they'll go to the baseball team or the volleyball team and say, "Hey, you guys need $500 for your uniforms this year? Great! We'll sponsor it. In exchange, you help us promote our thing. You become an affiliate, and for every additional student you bring on board, you get more money for your organization." So it ends up being a direct ad affiliate deal with the groups, and they're obviously highly motivated because they need to pay for their stuff. Similarly, I guess what I would do is try to partner with either the school or a group in the school, like the band, and say, "Hey, if you help us sell this, you get a revenue share." So that's how I would get my foot in the door. Then the question is, what product? Because I think class rings are incredibly ugly. I think there's sometimes a good thing about ugly things because they stand out and seem special, unique, or different versus... like a...

Sam Parr

Not ugly, they just all look alike. Like every class ring since, you know, this thing has been invented. I'll be like 1890; it's the exact same thing.

Shaan Puri

if you see someone wearing a class ring it's like alright al bundy like we're you're living in the past here right

Sam Parr

like well yeah I'm like you're

Shaan Puri

a fucking like

Sam Parr

you're a dork you peaked

Shaan Puri

it's a dork move right so how do you so first if you can make it a halloween or

Sam Parr

you were like one of the early classes of harvard or a little bit of like alright I get it right it was like

Shaan Puri

Unless you won, like, you know, the NCAA championship, then you can wear your championship ring. Yes, and even then, you should probably just keep that on a shelf in the house. But like, I think it's okay. It's not meant to be worn necessarily. So here are the opportunities I see. My best idea that I came up with, and this was like an hour before we started recording, is class sneakers. I think sneakers are like hot real estate. I don't know if you've ever seen people who make custom sneakers, either for celebrities or for brands. They're awesome.

Sam Parr

they're like

Shaan Puri

they have like a paint gun or like it's like a tattoo gun basically

Sam Parr

yeah

Shaan Puri

They can create a graffiti mural on a pair of Air Force Ones. So, that's the first thing I would try to do: class sneakers. I would try to basically say, "Great! How do I come up with a base model?" Maybe it's like Converse or Air Force Ones or something like that—a plain, plain white shoe. Okay, everybody's graduating right now; they're all, let's say, the class of 2021. So, I'm going to have "Class of 2021" on them, and then I'm just going to make different color schemes for the different schools. If you pay extra, you can get your name embroidered on them or whatever phrase you want on the back. I would basically sell commemorative class sneakers that can either be worn or just put on the wall or in the house somewhere as a piece of art.

Sam Parr

way which shoe which brand and model

Shaan Puri

I think maybe I'm out of touch here, but I kind of just like the old school plain white Air Force Ones. I think those are great.

Sam Parr

that's what I thought

Shaan Puri

you were gonna do canvases to to use for something like this but you

Sam Parr

know I

Shaan Puri

Don't think it really matters. I think you basically need some shoe that, in reality, if I was doing this, I probably would find something that's shaped like that but it's not already like $100. Right? Because I need to get the shoe for like $12, and then I need to do the custom, you know, the paint work on it for like another $8. Then I need to sell that shoe for like $180 or $200, something like that. I think that's the model here. I think you could do this with Instagram ads, Facebook ads, and partnering with school organizations to do like kind of revenue shares. I think it could be cool. I think it's like a status symbol. So that's how I would attack Justin's. If they're making $700,000 to $800,000,000 a year on their ugly class rings, I would start with class sneakers as my first idea.

Sam Parr

I think that's good. So I'm looking at it... dude, they sell some ugly-ass shit. I cannot believe this business is in place. And here's the take, here's the takeaway: once you get locked into a certain contract...

Shaan Puri

yeah

Sam Parr

I would actually phrase it like it's hard to fuck up

Shaan Puri

boring default if you're the boring default it's so good such a good position to be in

Sam Parr

And a lot of times when I think of entrepreneurship, and we think of starting things, we consider how we can be innovative or new. In reality, to make a lot of money, it's about how to get locked into something to the point where it's going to be a pain in the ass to go anywhere else. That's the takeaway here. I'm looking at Johnson's; they started, you said, in 1890. Okay, so if you started something 124 years ago and you are still in cahoots with these high schools, this is significantly better than any enterprise SaaS company. This is significantly better than a newsletter. When I think of this, it is idiot-proof. Johnson's is idiot-proof. I used to say that real estate has the highest number of low IQ millionaires. Johnson's is the best example of that I've ever seen. I love this company. I think that when I start things, that's what I should think of: how can I create something that people will buy forever, and I have to innovate on the product zero? That's exactly what they've done.

Shaan Puri

The best example of this that we came up with on the podcast was the workplace compliance poster that you have to have for HR safety or whatever. It's the poster that every office has in the break room. You just have to buy it every year; it's like $100 or something. If you don't get it, you're out of compliance, you're out of code. And you know, zero employees care about it. It's just an auto-renew where they send you this 1¢ poster for $100. It's such a beautiful, beautiful business. In fact, I almost want to come up with another compliance poster. Actually, this is my next idea here, live on the podcast. What's another like, "bullshit" compliance poster that I could make and sell to every company? Maybe it's something with the modern-day woke stuff, like anti-hero openness, anti-harassment, and pronouns. It could be a reminders poster about how to not be canceled. So, it's basically just a reminders poster that gets updated every year with the latest cancellation policy. You just need to make it seem like a totally boring company thing. You sell this to every agent, send it to them once, and then you drip them on file to have this in their restrooms every year or something like that.

Sam Parr

If you work for a company like this, like one you're describing or Jossens, it looks like on Glassdoor they've got 3,000 employees. Dude, if you were to...

Shaan Puri

johnson fuck

Sam Parr

do what

Shaan Puri

They do. You're asleep. You've been able to sleep for 65 straight years. What do you do? Air in hibernation?

Sam Parr

What do you like? Why do they even need employees? That's what I'm looking through this like, what's the point of having a person do this? You could fire most of your people and just build stuff that automates it. You simply have salespeople that just try to sell stuff, but you don't need anything. I'm looking at their Glassdoor, and I'm like, what? They have 1,000 to 5,000 people? I thought it said 3,000 in another place. I don't even know what you do. If you're the CEO of this company, what do you do every day? Are you like, "Hey, this week we're gonna try this"? It's like, no, you're just keeping the lights on the whole time. I'm okay with that. It sounds like I'm criticizing it, but I'm not. What the heck do you do if you work at this company?

Shaan Puri

Has the little mini putting green in their office? You know, that little putting green of a one-hole putt-putt golf you could put in your office? **Michael Burrows**... Justin, yes, Michael Burrows! He has one of those in the office. He's probably listening to this right now, looking at the putting green and being like, "Goddamn it, those guys are wrong about everything, but they're right about the damn putting green. I gotta get rid of this thing."

Sam Parr

this is what I I wanna start something like this where you just have to do no work ever

Shaan Puri

I mean, I just... I model is just undercut them, right? So I think you could advertise on Facebook and Instagram and be like, "Hey seniors, don't get ripped off by Justin's! Same ring, half the price."

Sam Parr

yeah this amazes me

Shaan Puri

I have none of the employees, and I'm going to drop ship this out of China. So, like, "Hey, don't get ripped off by Justin's. That's bad." That's my ad creative. Again, somebody wants to do this. Just keep me updated. I just want to hear how this plays out. If you end up doing this, just to advertise against this, alright? So that's it.

Sam Parr

this is crazy I want to talk about the second one this paint one this is interesting though

Shaan Puri

I sent you an Instagram. There's another person who's trying to compete with them, and they're just making a classroom that doesn't look tacky. So that was also like one model, which is like these rings look cool. It's someone called Jay Hannah or something like that. That's her Instagram: **J.Hannah**. And she...

Sam Parr

has got meaning meaningful traction

Shaan Puri

Yeah, these are kinda clash rings. There's only 4, it's like they just stand for something like earth, wind, fire, and ice or something like that. But they're just kinda clash rings with the year, and they just look better. They look cool when you wear them, so that's another way you can go about this. Alright, here's... you wanna know about... here's another company that you're gonna be mind blown about. Do you know what the Pantone color chart is? The Pantone Matching System?

Sam Parr

I googled it and I see things that I recognize, like a color wheel.

Shaan Puri

yeah okay so here's here's the story here's the story you need to know okay so there's a guy frank who sent this to me on twitter so shout out to frank he's got like an egg profile on twitter but he he listens about it he just goes hey pantone this has gotta be a huge business these guys sell this freaking color book for $500 and so I said wait I have one of those color books on my desk what the what's there's a business behind this and sure enough okay so here's the backstory there's this guy okay so otto josten was our first you know billy of the week lawrence herbert is my second lawrence herbert basically they these guys they owned a print company print a printing company and they got tired of the fact that like they had all these inconsistencies in colors right so you would try to just describe a color or it's blue color but like which shade of blue and then all these different inks they're trying to keep track of and name or whatever and they said screw it we're gonna create the global standard for colors so all they did was they took every single shade of color and they put a number on it and they gave this to every like manufacturer fashion house architecture firm like you're picking the colors for your curtains what pantone color are you gonna use you're picking you know the color of your fabric for your clothing brand what color are you gonna use you're you know crazy like ben and jerry's uses color chart for they have a quality assurance group that basically looks at the brownies that are gonna go into brownie fudge bites or whatever and if the brownie color is between you know brown 690 and brown 669 then it's good it's properly baked and if it's under or over it's like too baked or it's under baked so they just hold this up and they look at the brownie and they say does this match this color or not and so this thing is used ubiquitously so they created this pantone color system the matching system it's like 25 100 colors they make over a $100,000,000 a year just sending out this little brochure this little pamphlet this little booklet with all the colors in it and everybody buys these things we have one here because when we need to communicate with our manufacturer for our brand we have to tell them hey use pantone color 506 c or whatever it is so they know that we want that specific shade of blue

Sam Parr

how did this product start

Shaan Puri

So, the guy who owns the printing company decides to create the Pantone Matching System. The number one way they got the word out was through a marketing stunt. We talked about Michelin stars and that system, so they started coming out with a "Color of the Year." They would put a ton of money and effort behind this initiative. For example, in 2016, the color was Rose Quartz; in 2015, it was Marsala; in 2012, it was Tangerine Tango; and in 2011, it was Classic Honeysuckle. They do this big marketing blitz around what the Color of the Year is. To come up with it, they have a hush-hush process where they invite 12 trend spotters to their office. Each of them gives presentations and debates around culture and where society is moving. Then they come out and declare, "Honeysuckle is it!" Immediately, they blitz the market with that announcement. They send it to all the fashion houses and ad agencies, and then those brands start using it in their campaigns. You'll start getting emails saying, "Oh, buy our thing! It's got the Color of the Year—this is Honeysuckle, the color of the year for this dress." So, brands begin using that for their own marketing, and it starts spreading that way. They sell these booklets for anywhere from $85 up to $500. Every year, they launch about 100 new colors, so you have to get a new booklet with all the new colors in it. It's like a dictionary! I just thought this was amazing. I didn't know there was even a company behind this, and it makes over $100 million a year.

Sam Parr

Alright, I'm gonna blow your mind. Alright, we're gonna build off this. Go to **wgsn.com**. So, **wgsn.com**. Do you see that?

Shaan Puri

Yeah, I think you've told me about this one. These are the trend makers, right? They have like a "scent of the year" or something like that.

Sam Parr

No colors... it's colors. Well, exactly what you described, they do almost exactly that, which reports. Except it's really like 1 or 2 reports a year. But it's a subscription service, and they sell to businesses. They're a public company, so I can look up the revenue. Their revenue last year was €90,000,000. I think this is in euros, so €100,000,000... yeah, $100,000,000. It's been doing around that forever, so it's currently owned.

Shaan Puri

reports basically

Sam Parr

but it it it's we could dumb

Shaan Puri

We had the founder of David's Tea on here, and he was talking about how he uses a brand. He used to pay for stuff like this, and I remember asking him, "Is it just bullshit, or is this... why are you buying this?" I don't know how much this report is, like $1,000.

Sam Parr

for this report thousands

Shaan Puri

And he was like, "Oh, totally worth it!" That's how we got the new flavors and fragrances for the new teas every year. I was like, "Wow, okay, interesting."

Sam Parr

So, it's called **wgsnwgsn.com**. To dumb it down, Starbucks will buy 100,000 uniforms or 10,000,000 coffee sleeves. They want to know which color for Christmas—what shade of red is going to be right. Interestingly enough, if we're buying these uniforms for this promotion, which color is the right color?

Shaan Puri

By the way, that Starbucks red thing... My wife loves Starbucks. She goes there anytime she can, and she literally looks forward to the red cup moment when they switch the cups. It's like an emotional thing, almost. It's basically like, "Oh shit, the season has changed. Christmas time is here!" I get these warm, fuzzy feelings, and part of that I associate with the red cups, which I just find to be crazy that anyone cares.

Sam Parr

Well, yeah, it just means that it's wintertime. There's this company called WGSN. Companies pay, I think, $18 a year, and they also have someone you can talk to. You can ask them a question; it's called their advisory service. You ask them questions, but they also do two things. First, they look at loads of different data on which types of colors are selling well. I imagine it's just someone else's data. The second thing is they survey people. They survey individuals who they deem as experts and ask them questions. Then, they create this survey response that says, "Alright, according to all the experts, these colors for these types of niches are going to be the colors that you're going to use in the future."

Shaan Puri

right

Sam Parr

And if you know, if you have a company that's not growing that much but it's worth €90,000,000 a year in subscription revenue... I mean, that's like a $300-500 million company. Or a company that I think makes like $30 million a year in profit only off colors. This is the second one in a few minutes that we've named. Colors are very interesting.

Shaan Puri

And by the way, these guys, the Pantone guys, they then partnered with some other firm to come out with... So, Pantone has become the universal language of color. How do you describe color to somebody? You describe it using the Pantone chart. And by the way, the reason why there's like a sign... there's a bit of a mechanical reason why. So, like a normal printer, if you use a printer, I think a normal household printer has this thing called CMYK. If you've ever seen that, the capital CMYK, what does that mean? It's like Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black or something. Basically, you can mix those four colors and create a whole bunch of combinations just using those four. It's like RGB for TVs. But Pantone, if you have a Pantone machine, it basically has like 18 base colors. You can mix those because it's 18 specific base colors, and you can create all these really specific shades. So when you give somebody the color, it's not just so that their eye knows what it is; it's that they can punch it into the machine and create that specific pigment, or that specific ink, or that specific printed color on top of whatever it is. So, they needed something like that, which is pretty cool. But anyways, these guys partnered with somebody to come out with like the Pantone of taste and the Pantone of smell also, right? How do you describe a fragrance? How do you do this? So, they partnered with some company; they also tried to own that space, which I think is awesome. To be like the global authority in naming a color, and somehow a private company owns that, which is insane. It's like owning the periodic table or something.

Sam Parr

And we are talking about... you called it boring. I think this is fun! I actually think this is kind of fun. I don't know if I would want to do it all the time, but this is like a fun thing because you can kind of shape culture. I mean, we were talking about that red from Starbucks, or like the Coca-Cola red. Do you know that Coca-Cola pretty much invented Santa Claus? Or at least the way we envision Santa Claus. I don't want to go too much off the cuff because I didn't actually research this, but I like old stuff, and I like American history. I've read stories about those. But like the modern-day Santa, with that red suit, fat guy who's got a white beard—that's a Coca-Cola invention.

Shaan Puri

Oh shit, we need to go deep on that one. We should go back. Okay, alright, so I'm gonna call this "Business I Discovered the Hard Way." So, we were traveling. We left something at, you know, the TSA security checkpoint where you're like putting all your stuff in the bins or whatever, and we left something in there. So we get on the plane, my wife's like, "Oh no, where's that thing?" "Oh don't worry, I'm sure we can just sort of call them or like, you know, file a... file a report and..."

Sam Parr

are you trying not to say what it is

Shaan Puri

What was the item? Yeah, oh, it was... I mean, it's just like a baby stroller bag thing. Okay, so, you know, it's like a $150 item, but like, not... you know, whatever. Nobody cares; it doesn't matter what it is. I left an item there. So I'm like, "Okay, let me Google, like, just 'item left TSA at Las Vegas airport.'" The first thing that comes up is something called Instafile. It says, "Get your file, file your claim to get your thing back." I click it, and it's like, "Oh, just tell us what your item is, and we'll get it back to you. Don't worry about it." Then you go through the flow, and it tries to charge you $29 at the end. I'm like, "Oh, okay, whatever. I'm doing this." So I go through, I file this... I'm starting to file this thing, and I start to get my spidey senses tingling. I scroll down and I see, you know, Instafile is not associated with any airport, TSA, or anything like that. I'm like, "Oh, what is this? Pretty interesting business." So, first, I think it's a clever move, right? I call these "couch cushion businesses." It's like finding change in the couch cushion. It's like these little cracks in the system where you can just slip right in and create a business. Of course, people are going to be losing... you know, 1 out of 1,000 people are going to lose something in TSA. What are they going to do? They're going to Google it, and these guys are the top-ranking result for that for every airport, I think. So all they do is... filing a claim is actually free. What they do is they just rank at the top, get you to pay for it, and then they go file the claim on your behalf. They just forward your report to them, and then they forward you their response. It's like... I mean, a scam anyway.

Sam Parr

and it's not a scam it's

Shaan Puri

It's like a kind of managed service. The part... it's very misrepresentative. So, you go read the reviews, and people are very angry at them. I don't get angry about this sort of thing. I actually think, "Oh, clever, clever! You've found a way to capitalize on this." And, you know, there is some value-added service because, again, there is like an agent in the middle. I don't know how much.

Sam Parr

That's why I'm saying, like, it's very technically not a scam. It's just misleading.

Shaan Puri

It depends if they're actually better at saving you time or money, or if they increase your odds of getting your thing back. If they're really just forwarding your report and then forwarding their email back to you, then there's like zero value added. But if they are actually filing it right, following up for you, and calling to get the answer, then great! You know, that's fine.

Sam Parr

I can't find anyone online who works at this company

Shaan Puri

Yeah, you can't find the owner, you can't find the "About" page, and that's why I'm like, "Okay, yeah, probably more towards scam." But anyway, I just thought this is fascinating. How many different businesses are there like this? There's probably a ton of different businesses like this that are just these really hyper-specific scenario searches that you can rank number one for. And when you do, I bet you kind of print money. I bet this business is, you know, a profitable seven-figure business just off this one thing.

Sam Parr

like mugshots.com or mugshot

Shaan Puri

websites what is that to look up mugshots

Sam Parr

Yeah, you've never tried to look at someone's mugshot? Oh my god, it's littered with scams! So Google like "find mugshot California" or... you know, like imagine what if a friend gets arrested and you're trying to find a mugshot. Google whatever you're gonna Google.

Shaan Puri

Alright, so I'm seeing a bunch of ads... four ads at the top. Alright, let me find "mugshots for free." Looks like a search bar. I could search their name and it goes, finds the public records, and I'm guessing it's gonna charge me something at some point.

Sam Parr

Crazy, right? Yeah, it's pretty wild. So, a lot of these mug shots that they get are just public. If you know where someone gets arrested, you can just go. Not all counties are that way, but you can just go to, like, San Francisco. So that would be like Alameda County mugshots, and you guys should go to the website.

Shaan Puri

and find it and they

Sam Parr

Just like, they just aggregate it. But they have super, super slick onboarding ways to get you to give them money.

Shaan Puri

And then, super optimized, right? Like, right next to the search bar, it says "Norton Security" and "McAfee Secure." Why do I... what does that have to do with me typing in someone's name to search for them? It's just like these random trust-building badges right next to the search bar, just to get me to do this for free.

Sam Parr

Yeah, so it's actually free. It's incredibly scammy. Anyway, it's very similar to what you're describing. We can actually do a breakdown about this very soon. Maybe next week, I'll do a breakdown on this business. Historically, it's incredibly scammy. You could own one of these businesses and make like $10 to $15 million a year in profit, although you have to live a pretty terrible life where you're just kind of a piece of shit scamming someone. But it's crazy fascinating that these mugshot businesses, I think they crush it.

Shaan Puri

yeah so do you know who naveen jain is

Sam Parr

Yes, so he is like a billionaire guy now. But the way that he became a billionaire, he's kind of done a good job of rebranding himself as this inspirational Tony Robbins guy. Yeah, but he owned a bunch of scammy businesses, and I believe some of them were Ponzi schemes that he took public.

Shaan Puri

so what wasn't a ponzi scheme I don't think exactly but basically during the dotcom boom there was this company called infospace and he was the ceo of infospace and I don't know the full story I should look it up but I've I remember reading it because I met his son his son this guy ankur jain really interesting guy and you know like he he's it was kind of like I was sort of like why is this kid so like polished why do I feel like when he's talking to me he's talking like on cnbc or something like that like this I got this like politician vibe from him and so I was looking him up like oh he's the son of this billionaire they you know grew up you know in the same neighborhood as like you know whatever bill gates and other guys and then somebody had told me somebody was like yeah his dad's kinda controversial so why is that and he said he started infospace took infospace public and then before infospace crashed and the dotcom crash he had like I don't know sold a bunch of his stock he ended up doing great all of his employees you know lost their kind of like the company went under but he ended up doing very well that's the like long and short of it now I don't know if it was like you know some kind of like underhanded stuff I'm not sure but definitely there's like a a long kind of like report that it's pretty hard to Google for it because I think he's like scrubbed it but you can find it from the old like seattle times or something like that but then he started another company that also had controversy called intellius and intellius is the one you're thinking about and intellius I think it's sold like for over a $100,000,000 but what it was is sort of like in the it was a so it's a way for people to peruse criminal records and conduct background searches online but the way the way it worked if you look if you Google like intellia scam or intellia shady you'll see that like it basically looked like one of those like free credit report like kind of services where it's like oh just type your name and you'll get your your data your report and there's like this tiny checkbox that's like you know you know you agree to pay 19.99 for the rest of your life if you do this and like and so that that's how they were making a bunch of their money was they were just taking aggregating public records making them a little more searchable and they had this sort of like hard to see subscription that you were paying for at the end of it maybe I I don't know exact I mean you must have entered your credit card so it can't be that hard to see but there's a bunch of controversy around intellius I remember yeah yeah yeah

Sam Parr

rebranded a subscription service

Shaan Puri

Now he's got this company, Moon Express, that's sending rockets to the moon. And now he's got something called Viome. It's like, imagine a world where illness is optional. He's trying to save the world, save the planet type of guy. If you hear him talk, he's extremely charismatic, as people who tend to run schemes often are. So, I don't know... I don't really have an opinion myself. I just know that there is controversy around this guy, but I find him to be a pretty fascinating character. I find him very interesting to hear when he talks. He's an inspirational type of speaker, and now he's doing these big picture Elon Musk-type of things, but he got his start doing something much less savory.

Sam Parr

We should have someone come on and talk about some of the stuff. I didn't realize that I knew what a telios was, but whenever I do these background checks, I like doing background check stuff. It's fun! Have you ever... like, don't you ever do it to see, like, "Have my parents ever been arrested? Let's find out."

Shaan Puri

No, I have... I'd never do anything like that. But I'm also not like Ancestry.com or 23andMe. I think there's a lot of people who are just really into self-exploration, kind of like exploring their past or other people's past, things like that. And I... I just haven't done that a ton.

Sam Parr

well so that's me so I understand a

Shaan Puri

lot of people most people like answers.com is a huge business

Sam Parr

So, I think... anyway, I think this... yeah, I didn't realize. I thought that someone could make $10 or $20 million a year from this. But now that I remember, Intelius was doing $100 million from this.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, I ran into another business like this that was looking for people's addresses. So when we had that situation, I came on the podcast and talked about how somebody was stealing from us. We knew who they were, and we were going to find them and send the cops to their house, stuff like that. Well, I needed to find somebody's address. I started looking into it, and if you have a couple of pieces of information—a name, a phone number, stuff like that—there are these websites that will come up. They'll say, "Hey, yeah, we'll give you this. We have a huge database of everyone's addresses. Just put in their info." Then you get like three steps down the funnel, and it's like, "Oh, to unblur the address, you gotta pay $9.99 a month." It's like, "Why do I need this monthly? I'm not doing this every month." But okay, sure, I really want this address. And they're just like, "I bet you'll forget to cancel this." It's like a standoff.

Sam Parr

A lot of times with those services, you can do a good enough job of cross-referencing a ton of them. You can actually find the name unblurred because they'll show you three possible options. The third one, which is likely it, is blurred. But then you could do some weird triangulation and figure out which one it is. It's kind of interesting. I've done it before as well.

Shaan Puri

Yeah, this is like sort of the dark parts of the internet. All they're doing, like you said, is they basically take stuff that's public record or they take guesses. Then, they aggregate it and put a fancy kind of search bar. They just do a good job of ranking in Google or paying for Google AdWords. So that's their business model. But, you know, I don't know too much about these. I've never thought about doing a business like this. However, when I run into them as a customer, I'm like, "What's underneath this? How the heck does this thing work?"

Sam Parr

and it's

Shaan Puri

really fascinating

Sam Parr

Me too. And a mugshot is a classic. I'm going to do some research on a mugshot. I'm going to tell Jake to look at mugshot stuff.

Shaan Puri

that's a great one

Sam Parr

alright I think that's the episode right

Shaan Puri

yeah let's wrap it