Side Hustle King: The Most Profitable Business You’ve NEVER Heard Of! | Chris Koerner

0:00 How did you become known as the side hustle king? >> Probably by starting 80 side hustles. I've always said that the overlooked businesses are the ones that are the most profitable. Any side hustle can become a full-time business. Anything. There is a million ways to make a million bucks. This is a business that nobody talks about. >> So, how much are you making in total from all of these businesses? >> Millions of dollars a year net to me personal income. >> Why do you think most people never even start? >> What do people think about me? That's the number one thing. They need to care less about that than they care about being broke. There has to be a great enough need. I like to say that everyone needs to hit their own personal rock bottom. >> What do you think could be a death sentence for an entrepreneur? >> The worst situation we can be in is when our job is just good enough. But sometimes when the boats are burned for

0:47 us, it can be the best thing that ever happens to us. >> And what qualities make the best business? >> It comes down to Chris Kerner, thank you so much for coming on the iced coffee hour. >> Thanks for having me. >> So, you have some pretty crazy statistics with all of the different businesses that you run. But first, we have to ask you, is passive income a scam? >> No, it's there's just a big asterisk by it. You you have to work your way up to passive income, which takes a lot longer than most people think. >> So, it takes active work to then create passive income at some point in the future. >> Yes. for money for a lot of money. >> Why do people think it is a scam? >> Um because there's a lot of course creators that make a lot of money by putting those two words in the name of

1:33 their course. >> So there's a lot of passive income stuff that isn't actually passive income. >> Yeah. Because the click-through rates and all the metrics show that it converts better if you call it that, but it's not actually that. >> So how many businesses have you built? >> Over 80. >> How many have failed? Well, do you define like me pivoting away from it as a failure or like probably uh less than five? I've like properly failed. >> So, why spend your time building all of these businesses when you could spend that time building one massive one? >> Yeah, cuz it's really fun. And I no one will be able to prove that I made the wrong choice, right? I can't AB test my life and say, Chris, if you just want to focus on that one, like, who knows? There's too many variables. But what I do know is that like I don't want to report to a board. I don't want a bunch

2:19 of shareholders. I don't want to take a company public. I don't want to be in meetings all day or Zooms all day. I don't want to be away from my family. And to build a billion-dollar business, I feel like I would need to do those things. >> And what's the biggest business you currently run? And how much does that make? >> Um, let's see. I have a portfolio of RV parks that I'm a partner in that is worth in about a month or two it'll be worth $250 million. Um, I'm one of many partners in that. Um, but that's the biggest asset I have. >> So, how much are you making in total from all of these businesses? >> Millions of dollars a year net to me personal income between two and six depends on the year. >> How is there so much variance in your income? That's crazy. I feel like very few people we talk to have a 3x variance. >> It just depends on the year. It depends on do I exit something? Is there a big

3:06 distribution one year? Did something fail the year before? Um, did I have a good year in some, a bad year in others? It's just all across the board. I've had multiple years in a row with zero dollars of income. So, if you would have asked me a few years ago, it would have been much, much lower number. I could be getting the numbers wrong here, but if I'm doing some reverse math, if you run 80 businesses, but you can make $2 million a year, then wouldn't the average business be like $25,000 a year? >> I've started 80 businesses. I don't have 80 today. >> So, how many do you currently operate? >> Um, like 9 to 11 depending to what you call like a business versus an investment. It's It's kind of fluid. Yeah. >> Okay, that makes sense. >> Call 10. >> And so, how many businesses have you exited? >> Um, less than 10. Most of the 80 businesses that I've started, I've just moved away from. >> Why would you move away from a profitable business? >> Um, opportunity cost. Sometimes they

3:52 weren't profitable, right? They weren't failing. I could see like the path to scale, but shiny object syndrome, ADHD, opportunity cost, whatever you want to call it. I just decided to put my energy and efforts elsewhere. >> And how did you get started doing all this? What sparked the interest? I grew up poor and I lived across the street from a golf course and these golf balls would fly into my yard and for whatever reason I had the thought to sell them to sell them to golfers. And so I lived on this busy road um in Logan, Utah and I put up this big piece of plywood. I leaned it against my mailbox and it said use golf balls three for a dollar. And at 8 n 10 years old um I would just haggle with these golfers and just sell them used golf balls so I could pay the bills. Did they know you were so young when they would show up and see the

4:37 sign? >> Probably not. Um, looking back, I think it's kind of crazy cuz I have a 9-year-old. >> I mean, I would let him do that, but I just can't imagine him doing that. Like, talking with 35-year-old golfers about like, can you do four for a dollar? Like, but that's what I was doing. >> Why were you different than your son in that capacity? >> Well, my son didn't grow up poor. Um, and I to me it was just like a necessity, right? A lot of times people ask me like, "Why are you an entrepreneur? Why do you start businesses?" And they want like this big like philosophical answer. And it was just like I just wanted to be able to have money for a yearbook or a bike or candy. It was just a necessity. >> A lot of people are going to hear your story of selling golf balls when you

5:23 were young and they're not going to be able to relate to that at all, but they know that they want to be an entrepreneur. And so there's going to be like this this weird dissonance with most of the viewers where they're like tuning in because they want to be a business owner, but they're like, I I have not been that person. What would you say if they could look inwards are the main traits that would be indicators of them being a successful entrepreneur? >> There has to be a great enough need, right? Cuz some people just like the idea of entrepreneurship, but then they try it, they taste it, or they have a good job that pays them well, and they just it doesn't give them energy because they don't really have a need. So they they kind of need to be at like their own personal rock bottom. I like to say that everyone needs to hit their own personal rock bottom, right? And that looks different to different people, but there needs to be a big enough need there. And they need to have a bias for

6:09 action. Like they need to just be impatient. Impatience can be a superpower. They need to just just do things like not just like research endlessly, but like be willing to go out there and like try to get a customer. And if they're not willing to do that, then they probably don't want to be an entrepreneur. And then what personality trait do you think could be a death sentence for an entrepreneur? >> I think anyone can be an entrepreneur. Not that anyone should. >> Anyone can. >> Yeah. >> I don't agree with that. >> Really? >> Yeah. Yeah. I think some people are just naturally can't do it or they're way too impatient. When Jack talks about qualities, the first thing that comes to my mind is impatience. >> Yeah. >> Uh and wanting something too fast. >> I think that we are survivors as humans, right? We haven't had to survive in

6:55 centuries. But if we truly had to, if if I'm a father and I have to feed my family and there are no jobs, I would if I didn't have an entrepreneurial bone in my body, I would find a way to make it work to feed my family. I might not like it. It might not be my true nature. I might be terrible at it, but I think the everyone has the capacity. I don't think everyone should. I don't think everyone would like it. I think most people would not like it. It's not as free as people would like to think. Um, but I maybe I oversimplify it because it's all I know. >> No, I think that's that's a better justification is like, okay, everyone's sure they may have the capacity like if they if it was that or death, then yeah, I would assume people could find a way to spin up some bucks to continue living. But also like would they end up living a fruitful successful life? I would say not many people have that

7:41 ability. >> It's all I know. So it looks easy to me. It feels easy. It's all I've ever done. Um, and so I I tend to oversimplify it. But >> how do you scale up from golf balls, though? Like you're making money as a kid. >> How do you turn that into all of these different businesses? >> At 11, I moved away from Utah. I moved away from the golf course. I moved from Utah to Florida. And I just worked odd jobs. I wasn't even an entrepreneur. It just kind of went dormant, right? I waited tables. I mowed lawns. Whatever it took to to make money. >> Um, my parents got divorced at 13. My mom um raised by a single mom. She was a waitress. She busts, she waited tables at this Mexican restaurant. I bust tables. Um, and then everything changed when I went and served a two-year mission for my church. I went to Hungary. I learned Hungarian and I

8:28 knocked doors and I approached people on the street as an extreme introvert for 2 years. >> And that just like completely rewired my brain uh to make me embrace failure, embrace embarrassment, and and just not care anymore. What sort of failure did you see knocking doors? >> Everything like we were selling Jesus. We were teaching people about our religion and in a postcommunist European country. In most countries that doesn't go over well in Hungary it especially didn't it was especially difficult. >> And what did that teach you about people going door to door like that? >> It made me grateful for America honestly because these people that's all they knew. They had lived in like this communist society for decades and all they knew was Darus. There was no hope. M >> and so it didn't like make me a

9:14 pessimist. I'm an optimist. It made me grateful for America. And so to answer your question about how do you go from, you know, selling golf balls as a 10-year-old to 80 businesses. I came home with like no fear of failure, no fear of rejection. And that entrepreneurial gene that was, you know, implanted in me at age 10 was reawakened. And I came home just like ready to take on the world. >> How long did it take you to get over the fear of knocking on someone's door? This might surprise some people, but for the entire two years of my mission, every time I knocked on a door, I would kind of silently hope they didn't answer. I never got over it. Like, it was hard the entire time, right? Um, now when they rejected me and said no, that got a lot easier. I didn't take it

10:00 personally after a week, maybe, >> but I never like I never wanted them to answer the door. >> But then when they did, I would go all in. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, >> it's kind of like you you don't want to go to the gym, but you go anyway and you're glad you did when you're done. But >> I had a similar occurrence. I did a video where we would go doortodoor window washing. >> Mhm. >> And I hated it. Going door to door was so scary for me to knock on a door and feel like I'm intruding. I'm bothering them. And every single time I I thought the same thing. I hope they don't answer. >> Yeah. >> I did the same thing for a video like a month ago and it was no different. I was It was just cringe. It was >> It was bad. But when you start your first big businesses that start making money, how much did that cost you and what gave you that idea? >> Yeah, so I was a student at the University of Alabama and I had learned

10:47 about another business that was fixing iPhones from a retail location and they were they were like bragging to the local news that they were making 20,000 a month and I had been reading these business books. I'd been like looking for my thing to start and for whatever reason I said I can do that. I can fix phones. And so right around the same time, one of my classmates um gave me a broken iPhone and I saw like a flyer on the bulletin board for a guy that fixed iPhones. And so I went to his dorm room and um I had him fix my iPhone in front of me and I asked him all kinds of questions. And then I went and signed a 5-year lease on on a store, a storefront. >> How did you sign a 5-year lease on a storefront with no income? >> So I went to all my previous bosses. >> Um cuz I didn't grow up around wealthy people. My parents had no money. Um, and I basically said, "Hey, Danny, like I

11:33 want to start this business fixing iPhones." This was 2010, so iPhones were still very new. >> No one thought it was viable, right? And the only data point I had was one news article I read about some guys, right? Um, but he's like, "No." I went to my boss at the Thai restaurant where I was waiting tables. He said no. Everyone I knew said no. Um, until I went to a guy that I met on my mission in Hungar in Hungary. He was Austrian, but he was living in Hungary. And I knew he owned a few businesses. And I told him and he's like, "No question. How much do you need?" >> Um, and I had some Pell grants. I had some credit card advances. >> Um, but I needed 20,000 and he gave me the 20,000 and um, and I put my PEL grants in, my credit card advance, and started the business. >> Why could you not just do that from your dorm? >> That's what everyone told me to do, right? Um, and that would have been

12:18 wise, but I looked at it as um, every day that I don't open, I'm losing money. Like, I'm effectively losing money. And so if I start small and scale this um I'm losing money. I want to be at scale now. And I did do some research. So I I scraped every single um iPhone repair shop in the country with some random piece of software I found online. And I learned that a city of 100,000 could support about two iPhone repair stores. And the city I lived in coincidentally had 100,000 people. And there were no stores. And it was it was a similar demographic city as Baton Rouge where Louisiana State was. So I thought, okay, 30,000 students, they're all going to get iPhones or smartphones. Uh there's no one here fulfilling this need. I just

13:04 knew like this will work. This works in all these other cities. It will work here. >> And how much did you make from that? >> Um I sold it a few years later for a million bucks. Right at a million bucks. >> Who bought it? >> Um a private just a guy that wanted to quit his W2. He had a six-f figureure job and he wanted to own his own business. >> And you just had one storefront? >> We had four by the way. >> Okay. So you had expanded. And how many in that city? >> Um one. And it's still there 15 years later that store is still there. >> So how much did you make in your first year running this iPhone screen business? >> Not much at all. >> No. >> No. The second year maybe 60 70,000 and then I partnered with another business and they took over it. I owned a third at that point and then they added one or two more stores and sold it. So why do you think most people never even start?

13:50 >> They're just afraid of what people will think or say and people don't care. That's the whole secret is people don't care about you. >> Do you think it is that or do you think people just overthink >> what they want? >> Absolutely. Yeah. Um they get their dopamine from research cuz it feels good to like crunch numbers, make spreadsheets, copy the sheet, make this scenario, this scenario. It feels really good and we're getting dopamine from that. But we need to get our dopamine from action, right? from calling and trying to get a customer, trying to get a sale, like trying to call and negotiate a lease. Um, we get dopamine from both things, but the the former is easier, the research side of things. So, they get stuck in that loop forever until they get bored with it and then they move on and then they tell people, "Ah, it just didn't work out." >> So, how do you encourage somebody to

14:35 start if they're either overthinking the idea >> or afraid of approval? >> I was afraid of what people thought as well. And so, I did something kind of dumb. I I put like a false constraint on myself and I was like I'm not ever going to post about this to Facebook cuz if I have to what I told myself was if I have to start a business that relies on my friends and family then it might not scale. You don't have a business. But what the real reason was was I don't want people to see what I'm doing because I might fail. I might not do it. I don't want to be publicly accountable. Right? So everything I did I did without the help of my friends and family who were willing to help. They were willing to be my first customer. Right? But I I didn't use that. So people need to like just let go of that and be willing to ask for help from their friends and family to be their first customers and

15:22 they need to do something every single day to keep the ball moving because we we focus a lot on focus right that's the question everyone asked me like what if you just done one business what if you focus what would happen if you focus but we don't focus on momentum we don't talk enough about momentum I think momentum is everything and if we keep momentum going then it doesn't matter if we focus or not, we're going to win if we just keep going. Right? In my opinion, compounding does not care if we're doing one thing or multiple things because if we're getting positive signals from an idea, we're not going to be distracted by other ideas. The distraction is a signal that something isn't right with this idea, but that would require a good idea in the first place. >> What would you say is more important for someone looking to become an entrepreneur or make a lot of money in

16:08 business? Should they try to come up with the idea first or hone their skills first? Now, obviously, spring could be a great time to focus on your health as you're getting ready for the summer. Getting outside and prioritizing nutrition are incredibly important, but it can feel impossible to fit into a busy schedule. >> And that's why we are so excited to be partnering with Hule. Hule eliminates the hassle of cooking without sacrificing your health or your bank account. For those unaware, Hule is complete balanced nutrition in two forms. You could get the ready to drink as a full meal that you could grab on the go, and the Black Edition powder gives you a quick option that you could make at home without the hassle of cooking. The ready to drink is the most convenient option. It's a complete meal with 35 grams of protein, 27 essential vitamins and minerals. It's gluten-free, contains no artificial sweeteners, colors, or flavors, and requires zero

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17:38 some protein, and I love it. So, if you want to try it out for yourself, you can get 15% off at Hule by using our code iced5 at hule.com/istic15. This offer is for new customers. Thank you again to Hule for partnering with us and supporting the show. What would you say is more important for someone looking to become an entrepreneur or make a lot of money in business? Should they try to come up with the idea first or hone their skills first? >> I think they should try to find a customer first, a paying customer on any idea. It just steal an idea honestly like a burger restaurant. It people try to think of a new idea. New ideas are more likely to fail than anything cuz it's new. I want an idea with precedent, right? I want a road map of someone that's gone before me and done that and then I just want to copy that. Um, so I

18:25 think that's what people should focus on is taking another idea that that meshes with their background. Maybe like their college major had something to do with it or their previous job or their passion or something some idea that they've seen out there in the market that looks interesting to them and they should try to find a customer there. And they'll learn so much more in the effort of finding a customer than they would in the effort of trying to research that idea forever. And at what point do you decide to cut the idea that maybe this is not working? >> Excellent idea. That's an excellent question. Um, so that answer for me is different than for others. For me, if two weeks have elapsed and I'm still thinking about it, I can go into bed, I'm on a walk, and I'm just like there's something there's really something to that cuz I come across a ton of ideas on a daily basis. And so that idea has to

19:11 compete with all kinds of others coming into my brain, right? So for me, 2 to 3 weeks is about the test that I give it. But for the average person, um, they have this thing called product market fit, which I'm sure you guys are familiar with. Um, and a normal business, let's call it a business or a business idea, feels like pushing a boulder up a hill, right? It's exhausting. It's hard. We acquire two customers, we lose one. We acquire three, we lose two. That's normal. That's okay, right? >> But 5% of the time, you've got product market fit where instead of pushing that boulder up a hill, you're sprinting down a hill. And the boulder represents demand, customers, right? Money, and they're chasing you. You can't even sleep because you're fulfilling orders, right? You just you just find the sweet spot in the market, the pricing, the

19:58 offer. It is just all align, and you have product market fit, right? That is a beautiful thing. Like that is when you should not have shiny object syndrome. And you won't like just by default of the idea being so successful, you won't be looking around. You'll be figuring out how to fulfill these orders, right? It's then when you should not look around. But if it's the normal thing and you're pushing a boulder up a hill and you still have shiny object syndrome, it doesn't mean you should just chase the first idea cuz that boulder like you could get over the hill and you could find product market fit. Keep pushing it. But also listen to those signals because if something sounds like a good idea to us, it's for a reason. And so it it might sound woowoo on the surface, but like we need to get to the bottom of like why that idea sounds interesting to

20:43 us. Um, and then maybe spend a little bit of time just kind of exploring it a little bit. >> You probably get pitched so many ideas. What are some of the common ideas that you hear that are just a waste of time? >> Mhm. >> Like a lot of times I like the first thing that comes to mind for me is always like >> uh dropshipping or like Amazon FBA or like things like this that are so saturated, it's just not worth anybody's time. >> Yeah. I think that with the right distribution, the right marketing, any idea could work. Like literally any business idea could work. Um, if I were to think of the dumbest idea like um like uh a Hello Kitty themed mousetrap, right? Just objectively dumb. And if I

21:28 were to tweet about that, I might get zero customers, right? If Elon Musk were to retweet me, I would get some customers because it's more distribution. That's it. it's not suddenly a good idea, right? So, >> um I think that people should spend less time on the ideation and more time on the distribution strategy, more time trying to find customers. Um and if they do that, then a bad idea can become a good idea. >> And how do you test that idea to make sure there's enough demand? Facebook ads, Facebook groups, Facebook marketplace, um, meta ads, Instagram ads, short form video, Facebook posts. >> And what are you doing? You're running an ad to a landing page and then seeing if they just put their email address in. >> You don't even need to go that far. You

22:14 could just post your idea to Facebook Marketplace. It doesn't need to be a product idea. U, it could be a service idea. Post it to Facebook Marketplace. Post another variation of it with a different price point or a different title and just see how many impressions each one gets. and then you got one signal, you're like only 5% of the way there. Then you just do it again. You change the price point, you change the picture, you change some variable, leave the other ones the same, and just keep testing. Um, and by the end of a week, you're going to have a really good um idea if that idea is worth anything or not. >> How difficult is it to be decent at Facebook ads? >> It's not that difficult to be okay at it. um you watch a few YouTube videos, play around with it for a few hours, and you're probably you're where you need to be to post ads and start spending money

23:00 and start seeing some signals that look promising or not. >> Most people seem to want to do this for the money, but do you find that there's an underlying reason beyond the money that someone wants to take on a side hustle or try to get passive income? Seems like in a lot of these cases, they just want time. >> Yeah. And they don't want to be told what to do. Uh they probably had a crappy boss. They they just want to own their time and they want to be able to provide for their family. I mean, the American dream is ownership in all its forms, whether that's ownership of a house or of your time or of your idea or money, financial situation. >> What do you think of the 4-hour work week? >> Uh, that book changed my life. >> Do you think it's possible? >> Um, absolutely, 100%. >> Have you seen it in real life? Someone working four hours a week and making that much money? >> Yeah. Like if I wanted to work four

23:46 hours a week, I could and I would make really good money. Uh but I like work is my passion. Like I love working. You guys love working. It's fun to me. So I'll never retire. >> Do you think though that if you only worked 4 hours a week that after maybe a year someone else would take over that spot who is putting in the time and the effort? >> 100%. Yeah. And I think the same thing about remote work versus in person. I think if two companies are selling the same product or service, one is in person, one is remote, the inperson company wins. So I I look at that as the same principle. >> So if in person is so successful, why do some of the biggest companies not demand inerson work? >> I don't think they agree with me honestly. I think that they like good is the enemy to great and they think they're they're doing fine remote so they're okay with that. >> So you demand all of your companies to

24:33 be in person? Uh, no I don't because I it I'm not trying to build a world beating company. Like I I know my companies would do better if I were in person, but I've got really good employees that were are remote and they don't want to uh move and I'd rather keep them. And I don't want to go into the office every day anyway. I work from home. >> But you're saying if all of those employees were in the same place with you, then the businesses would be more successful. >> 100%. >> What's the biggest advantage that that gives you >> just being in person? It's hard to quantify like the those water cooler conversations or just being able to go right down the hall and talk to someone because if I needed like um a file from you and we were in the same office and I just went down your your uh into your office to ask for the file, we'd

25:18 probably start talking about something else. Like, what are you working on? What's out on your whiteboard? And we would just start talking and amazing, beautiful things come out of those conversations. I've seen it. I've I've had businesses where I've gone into the office every day and it's incredibly fulfilling to do things together in person and you that is just a soap box of mine. You cannot replicate that. >> I agree. It also lowers the bar for what makes something conversation worthy. So, for example, if I have a problem that comes up, I'm not going to call Graham and bother him if he's not here at the studio like working just to try to, you know, workshop the idea, come to a quicker conclusion, or maybe I won't even come to a conclusion at all to just stave off the problem. Push it off, push it off. But if Graham's there, then I'm like, "Hey, by the way, you know, what do you think about this?" Just lowering the bar for what's worth bringing up, and then we solve the problem right then

26:04 and there. At what point would you say you became rich? >> My late 20s. >> And what caused that? >> My second real business. So, I had my iPhone repair business. I ran that for two years and then right at the end of year two, I merged with another company that basically took it over and I still had a third ownership stake in it. The day after I merged, I started a business that started selling iPhone parts and recycling iPhone parts. Um, it was called LCD cycle and we we did 28,000 our first month, 60,000 our second, 150,000 our third month and we ended up doing over 2 million the first year and we doubled every year for 5 years. >> Was that the easiest business you ever started? >> That's a good question. >> Cuz to make close to $30,000 in the very

26:49 first month of operations, like that's crazy. And you seem to be, you know, have your finger on the pulse of that market. >> Yeah. Um, when you say easy, it wasn't easy operationally, but it was the second like most successful business I had started in a short amount of time. Does that make sense? >> Yeah. >> It was like the the second most successful business I had gotten from zero to a million in a short amount of time. >> Mhm. And why would you say you became rich then? >> Because we had a lot of free cash flow. Um, I was in my mid20s and we were netting 700,000 to a million dollars a year. Um, and I was distributing most of that to myself. >> Did that make you happier? >> What made me happy was showing to my wife that I I could do it. It wasn't the money.

27:34 >> My wife is incredibly supportive, incredibly patient. Anything I've ever wanted to do, she's like, "I trust you. Go for it." Right? And even when things didn't go well, she never had like a snide comment. Nothing. Not even once. So being able to say, "Hey babe, like look at the bank account." That made me happy because she's never asked for handbags or nice things or anything. Right. >> But did you get her one? >> Um, she doesn't want Today she doesn't want. >> But you didn't ball out at all. You're in your 20s. A ton of money. >> We ball out by >> We have a night we got a really nice house that we still live in today. And we go on really nice trips with our family. Okay. >> And we eat. We're foodies, so we eat really well, but we don't we don't have like fancy cars and clothes and handbags or anything. >> How did you become known as a side hustle king? >> Probably by starting 80 side hustles. 80 businesses. >> Who gave you that name? Did Did you name

28:20 yourself? >> No, I didn't. That was uh Ben Levy. He's friends with the He's business partners with the My First Million guys. Um and I think he came up with that and then they titled one of their videos with me as that and then it kind of stuck. I actually just spent four grand last week on sidehustle king.com. I just wanted to own the domain. I don't know what I'll do with it. But >> But you wouldn't even consider what you do side hustles. You'd say they're most most likely businesses. I kind of like cringe at that at that phrase because anything can scale. Any side hustle can become a full-time business. Like anything, I will go to my grave in saying that. So, yeah. It's just I don't know. It seems kind of like a a negative connotation to me. >> Are there any true side hustles? >> Like something that can't scale? >> Yeah. >> I don't think so. I mean, a lemonade stand can scale. Anything. Used golf

29:08 balls can scale cuz we have the internet. like we have unlimited distribution. >> What did you crave so much to continue working in business and to get started in business in the first place? Like what did you feel like you were missing in your life? >> We I I was poor. I was always poor and I hated it. My best friend, one of my best friends was wealthy and I I lived in a very middle class area, right? Titusville, Florida, you can go look it up, is very middle class, if not lower middle class. I was below middle class. My close friend was um my close friend and my boss, my wrestling partner's dad. Uh they were both business owners and they did very well. One lived on a river, one lived in a really nice house. And it was just this weird dichotomy for me to be poor. Like I never had name

29:54 brand shoes. My shoes came from Payless Handme-downs. I had these jeans that would get holes in them. My mom would cut them off, hem them, and turn them into shorts. Like I I went back and looked at my school pictures as a kid and you can just see in my picture. I was poor and I just didn't like I didn't like it. I didn't like not having money for a field trip like $35 for a field trip or a yearbook. And so I just I wanted to grab that myself and fix it myself. >> But did you have an abundance or scarcity mentality around money? >> Cuz it seems like you have an abundance mentality like you can make money wherever. You know, money is everywhere. >> I think definitely abundance. I know I have abundance mentality now. Back then I didn't know what it was, but if I had to label it, it would be abundance because I saw what was possible in my friends. >> Have you noticed that most of the

30:40 successful entrepreneurs have an abundance mentality towards money or a scarcity one? >> A thousand% abundance. >> So what do you think is so important about an abundance mentality for an entrepreneur? And also if you have a scarcity mentality, what is the advantages that can come with that? >> I don't know if I can think of any. I mean honestly >> maybe being a little conservative on things, >> tight with the budget, maybe uh not overexpanding, not overindulging. There's got to be a few things >> that's true. I don't know if I see that as scarcity, though. Maybe that's just like being financially conservative. Like, I think you could have an abundance mentality and be frugal, right? >> Yeah, probably. >> That was a two-part question, though. The second part was >> Yeah. Why do you think the abundance mentality is so important for people that are growing in business?

31:26 >> Yeah. I think what people don't understand is that when a new entrant joins an industry, in most cases, not all cases, it grows the entire industry. Right? The reason that some of the world's best venture capitalists passed on investing in Shopify because back in the early 2000s, Shopify's total addressable market was like $10 billion, right? And so they said, "Okay, if Shopify owns 50% of this market, it's a $5 billion outcome. Their valuation today is 500 million. Is 10x really worth it for us at a series C?" And they passed. What they didn't know was that Shopify's market would become a trillion dollar market and now they own 15% of it there, which is 50 times

32:12 bigger than they thought the entire market was. So to me, that stat right there is the abundance mentality, right? When you join a market, it grows the market. I knew a woman who made a million dollars decorating porches with pumpkins, right? That's all she does. October hits and she's she charges $700 to put fancy pumpkins on a porch. and I posted about her and it went mega viral. >> I think I might have seen that on Twitter. >> You probably did everywhere. 20 million views, right? And now like she was literally the only person decorating porches with pumpkins. Now there are hundreds and her business is thriving because now people know I can pay someone to make my porch look awesome. So that helped her. But most people I reach out to like, "Hey, let me profile you." Like, "No, no, no. I don't I don't want people to copy me." But they don't realize it. It doesn't work like that.

32:59 >> Yeah. The Christmas lights is another huge opportunity. Like we pay I think it's like 800 bucks >> for them to put up the lights and then take them down and they're doing the entire neighborhood. So you could imagine like 150 homes at $800 each. >> Yeah. >> It's a lot. It's a lot of money for a seasonal business. >> Your to your example Elon Musk right very abundance mindset and he wants Mercedes, Ford, Toyota to make electric cars. He wants his market share to shrink because he he knows he'll sell net more cars if they own 40% of the EV market as opposed to 60%. Because they're that much more normalized. That's the abundance mindset. >> So, what do you think of the term side hustle? It it doesn't sound like anything of what you're doing is really

33:44 a side hustle. Just seems like starting a small business and expanding that. >> Yeah. Well, I think any business can be proved out as a side hustle. I don't think people should just outright quit their jobs to test something. There's probably an exception out there, but basically anything can be proven without having to quit your job and go all in. So, if someone hears side hustle and they think that's my escape hatch from the 9 to5, like that's what I need, a side hustle and that's what they get from that term, then I love it. If it enables more entrepreneurs, then I love the term. But I just don't want it to be seen as like derogatory or demeaning. >> How many people are just better off though working harder at the job they currently have instead of doing side hustles or side businesses?

34:30 >> 80 to 90% of people maybe. Yeah. >> The worst part about losing your wallet is not even the cards. It's the next 3 hours of your life calling banks, cancelling everything, and trying to remember what was in it. And I've honestly been through that way too many times. No joke, since I've known Jack, he's probably lost his wallet at least about 20 or 50 times. And that's why we're partnering with Magack and their smart wallet. Magbach's smart wallet has Apple Find My built into it. So, if you leave it somewhere, you open up your phone, tap it in Find My and it plays a sound right where it is and it will show you exactly where it is as well. So, I was just at Coachella and it would have been an absolute nightmare to lose my wallet. And knowing that I lose my things all the time, I had to make sure that I had my Magabback smart wallet with me. It holds up to nine cards and cash, snaps magnetically to your phone, and is super slim. It's really nice

35:17 because I hate when wallets are bulky and it just doesn't fit right in your pocket. But with Magack, you could carry a lot and you forget it's even there. The MagBback wallet also charges wirelessly. It's made of premium leather, doubles as a kickstand, and is compatible with Qi wireless chargers, so you don't sacrifice any MagSafe capabilities. And in addition to wallets, Magack offers minimalistic phone cases, multi-chargers, wireless chargers, Tesla rim cases, and key tags. Seriously, guys, if you're anything like me and you lose stuff all the time, I could not recommend this wallet more. Obviously, it doesn't stick like that, but it's very sticky, holds all the cards you need it to, super sleek. I genuinely recommend it. The link is down below in the description. Use our code for a discount, and honestly, this is just one of those things that once you get it, you wonder how you live life without it. Seriously, don't wait until

36:03 you lose your wallet to get this. Now is the time while you still know where your wallet is. And I've used this on more occasions than I care to admit. So again, check out the link down below in the description. Get one for yourself. Enjoy. Thank you so much. Now, let's get back to the episode. At what point should you decide to quit your job to pursue your side hustle? If you can see the path to scale, right? if you're not making enough money yet to to replace your income, but you see what it would take, for instance, um you're running Facebook ads and let's say you have a pressure washing business and you you're making $10,000 a month in your full-time job and you're making $3,000 a month on the side in your pressure washing business and you're tinkering with Facebook ads. You're tinkering and finally you're like, "Oh, I got it. I

36:49 just need a 15-second video that leads to an instant form." That is the winning combo for my industry in my local market, right? I'm going to let Facebook decide who to show it to, but it's got to be a vertical video. It's got to be an instant form. And I know that I close 30% of those leads and they cost $20 each to acquire, right? So, they can see the path and then they even test it. They're like, "All right, I'm doing $50 a day budget. Let's do $100 a day. All right, instead of costing me $50 to acquire a customer, it cost me 60, but my average job size is 700. I'm still very profitable. I can see the path to scale here, but it's kind of a chicken and egg situation. I don't want to increase my ad spend before I quit because I don't have time to do all these jobs or even quote all these jobs. But they know at this point like if I quit, I can see the path to scale. I can

37:36 replace my income with this one marketing channel. See, I've always felt that the ideal time to go all in on something else is when it's consistently making more than you could make from your day job. And once that becomes stable enough to rely on, then at that point, I think it might be worth it. >> That's certainly the better route, right? What I say is maybe um more approachable to more people cuz I think it's a lot harder to get to that point to where your pressure washing business on the nights and weekends is making 11,000 a month and your job is making 10. I just think it's harder to get there. In a perfect world, that is superior. >> Yeah. So for someone who wants to start, where do you recommend they begin? Does it start with a good idea? How do they find that idea? How do they make that

38:22 into a reality? How do they know that they know enough? >> Mhm. >> Or know what they don't know? >> Yeah. Well, I think if someone is asking themselves that question, they probably already have some idea, right? A lot of times we get business ideas from things that we see in our job. Like we see a vendor that's just making a lot of money. They're like, "Huh, I know how to do what the vendor is doing." That's where we should start. Like, start with an idea that you already have. At that point, do whatever you can do to find a paying customer as soon as possible or a free an unpaid customer, someone to say yes to your product or service, whether they pay you or not, because that is going to be as hard as finding the next 20 customers. but it's going to give you so much more motivation and knowledge

39:08 and skills than just endlessly researching that idea. So don't try looking for ideas. If you're watching this, you're listening to this, you probably already have ideas. Start there and see whatever you can do to acquire customer as fast as possible. >> If someone does not feel like they have any sort of advantage, what's the thing that they could leverage that gives them a a one-up? humility um and gratitude. It sounds generic, but it's not. Having the humility to ask for help. Ask for a a conversation. Tell me what you think of this idea. Right? And then if they think favorably of it, can I do that for you for free? Can I run your Facebook ads for free? Can I implement AI into your business for

39:54 free? If it's not helpful, then they learned. If it is helpful, then they probably will turn that friend into a paying customer. See, that's I I like asking someone else, but oftentimes I feel like a lot of people will just say, "Oh, that's a great idea." Because very few people want to be honest, be like, "That's kind of crap." >> Would it be better though just ask? Perfect. If you like the idea, would you pay me for it? Where how do you get honest feedback? >> Yeah. I mean, you answered your own question. You if they're willing to pay for it, then they actually think it's a good idea, and there actually is a demand for it, preferably, unless they're willing to waste money on you. Is there a popular piece of advice that you hear very often that's shared that you think is total garbage? >> Don't share your ideas cuz people will copy them. That's total garbage. We

40:39 should share ideas with everyone. I I >> What if we share an idea here on the podcast though and we have all these listeners? Is that a bad idea or do you think that's that's fine? >> All I do is share ideas. That's all I do. >> Cuz Graham and I we have an idea. >> Yeah. But let's just say you have a really good idea that you could implement that very few people have been doing and if we share it to 200,000 people statistically a few of them will actually do that idea and do it really really really well and it might uh you know compete with us if we have a unique advantage. >> Yeah. Well, let me give you some exceptions to the rule, right? So maybe it's like a unique product that needs to be patented and if you share that to 100,000 people, someone goes out there and it's a very specific idea for a specific product. Let's say it's in the

41:26 um used car parts industry and someone out there has been in the used car parts industry and they're also an idea guy and law of large numbers and they it just all overlaps and they're like I've also patented something and for some weird reason they have all the tools and skills and knowhow to steal that idea. that would not be a good idea to share that in that case, right? That could be stolen. Um, but that's so specific, it's not likely to actually be the case. I'm curious to hear what you guys have because in in your case, you have an unfair advantage of an audience. >> So, most likely your idea could be grown with your audience and most likely the person that is capable and willing and has the money to copy that idea does not. >> You want to explain your idea? >> Yeah. So, the idea is, and this already exists, but I think we could do our own rendition of it. probably do it better.

42:11 >> Uh if you have a bunch of different credit cards that have benefits and bonuses, then you have one dashboard that has all of the deadlines and it can send reminders to you. Hey, by the way, make sure you spend this or ring credit. Make sure that you spend your cozy earth credit, whatever it is. >> Um and then also there's like rotating categories for a lot of credit cards where you can get 10% back up to a certain amount of spend. And if you could do a small survey or put in some companies that you're already interested in or your credit card can look at where you've spent money and you can like scrape that data instead of just giving someone 700 things that all have different expiration dates for a bunch of companies that you're unlikely to spend money at as a user if it was a little bit more curated of a list of like hey you know like I notice you spent money here you can get 10% if you just want to check out then. And so it's

42:57 kind of just like a lot a lot of data consolidating it and I'm going kind of broad here. We don't want to get it exactly into like the nitty-gritty specifics cuz that might be unwise. But as a general idea, it would be credit card optimization for our very credit card heavy >> 100%. And the MX page is so convoluted with hundreds of offers, no one looks through it. But if you have the data, AI should be able to sort, hey, you're most likely to shop at these places, get these rewards, or uh these rewards are the highest ROI based on your current spend and where you spend your money and where you're likely to get value. And then these ones expire and at the end of the quarter they're gone forever. Like I missed the Dell credit for the MX Platinum I just forgot about. But that's >> credit that was bucks. I actually didn't even do a hotel credit one time which

43:43 was $300 with the MX Platinum. In fact, there was an old credit card I was going to go cancel. And I pop it open and I'm like, what kind of benefits do I even get from this card? >> Uh there was no annual fee. I just didn't want the card anymore. I look and I see the rotating categories. One of the categories was Cozy Earth. They're a sponsor of this channel. This is not a sponsored segment, by the way. Uh, I genuinely just love their product. And so, I see that I can spend $500 and get 10% back. And I also with our discount code, sorry guys, I swear there code iced or whatever it is. You guys can check it out on the screen. I was like, well, I could stack this with the credit card thing and I can get like a pretty sizable discount. Um, I was going to go cancel the card. This was something that I kind of wanted already and I got 10% stacked on top and I saved a lot of money because of it. So either way, this

44:30 is something that people do not realize. If they were just to get 5% back on 10% of their spend, like that could be a pretty large number. >> Yeah. >> Hey everybody, this is Grant from the future and we did actually end up building this idea. So if you want to be a part of it and get early access and join the wait list, we'll have the information right here on screen or down below in the description. Would love to have you a part of it. We're really excited and you're the first to hear it right now. So with that said, thank you so much. We'll get back to the episode now. That's an amazing idea because I do credit card hacking and I think what you should add to that idea is upload uh your bank statement and it could tell you what cards to buy like what cards to add to your stack and you could just use the affiliate links um to put them onto those cards cuz is there an affiliate link that's more profitable than credit

45:16 card? >> That's pretty good. I mean any sort of like fintech company affiliate link sofa affiliate link I know they pay >> like hey you're spending five grand a month on Facebook ads MX was it MX gold it gives four four points back per dollar >> and then you send them the link for MX gold um and you could charge a monthly fee on top of that I think that's someone's going to do that like that's a no-brainer. I think ideas are more valuable than they ever have been. I think even with AI ideas are incredibly valuable. >> What would you say are the best AI tools that people should use? the lowest hanging fruit if you're trying to build a business. >> Um, you need to be vibe coding apps. >> What is vibe coding? >> Um, using natural language just like we're using today to build an app. Um, hey, build me a credit card dashboard where I can do travel hacking all in one

46:02 place and see when my cards expire so I don't pay the renewal fee on cards I'm not using, etc. One prompt to get one app. I mean, if you think about it, colleges are teaching students today what AI can already do better. So, how do you recommend being on the right side of that curve? >> Every new tool, every new update from the Claus, the Chad GBTS, the Geminis of the world, you have to play around with. You have to get to know even if you don't like it. It's it's a non-negotiable. It's like moving to America and refusing to learn English. >> That doesn't work. Like, if you want if you want to move to America to get a better life, you have to learn English. >> If you want to have a better life in anywhere in the world, you have to learn AI. Period. >> What's one of the biggest mistakes that beginners make before they even start >> with AI specifically? just with starting any sort of business. It could be AI. >> They think about what they learn in

46:48 college. They try to be smart. They they overthink it. They need to just do it. They need to just go out and fail in small ways and make small mistakes because they're going to learn a lot faster during the execution of things than in the learning of things. >> And what qualities make the best business? Are there things that you look for? >> 100%. Um it comes down to high gross margin. It's very very hard to overcome uh a business that does not have high gross profit margin. And then leadership like you can't you put a good leader in a crappy business and you've got a good business. You can't sacrifice that. >> How do you find good leaders? >> I don't spend a lot of time in interviews and like going back and forth and doing reference checks. I just look at this like a numbers game. I just tell

47:35 everyone it's a 30-day test. And don't be offended if it doesn't work out because in my experience, other people probably have different experiences, but in my experience, there's no correlation between how much time I spend really digging into someone and the likelihood of them working out or not. Because the fact of the matter is some people show really, really well. Some people interview really, really well. And often times there's an inverse correlation of those people and how they turn out. They put their energy into showing well, >> but then they don't show up. They don't perform well. And what do you notice from the people who don't perform well? >> Like are there any signs that you start to notice or like when they interview well there's like a little tick or like they shuffle this way like >> that's a red flag.

48:21 >> I'm going to answer that a little differently. You will get your absolute best out of an employee the first week. And so if you're doubting or questioning a little bit that first week almost certainly they're not going to work out. You need to be completely surprised. Holy crap, this person's even better than I thought they were. They're doing even more than I thought they would. But if that first week you're like, "All right, this is good, but this is good." Okay, well, they're new. And you just start like making excuses for them because you want them to work out because your pride's on the line, right? You're the one that made that decision to hire them. It's almost certain that you'll end up firing them. So, why not do it right then and then just go on to the next person? >> What about beyond that? Are there things that you see that are red flags for you? >> Not being able to work well in

49:08 ambiguity. I I thrive in ambiguity. Most employees don't. They want to be told exactly what to do. And that's okay. In some of my relationships and roles outside of business, I have like a boss. My wife is kind of my boss. And when she tells me exactly what to do, go to Home Depot, buy this thing. I don't have to think. It's really nice, right? Um, but if an employee in the interview process says they have they can tolerate a high degree of ambiguity and then in the first week it's clear that they don't, that they're not taking the initiative to get creative and go to go find answers to their questions before coming to you, that's usually a tell that they're going to fail in other aspects as well. >> And how do you keep people motivated to keep operating at their top performance?

49:55 >> Cash incentives. um the Netflix approach. They don't have these complicated bonus structures with RSUs that vest. They just pay their people a lot of money and they directly tie them to the outcome of the projects that they're working on. In my experience, that is the best way. Not sharing equity, not like dangling a carrot for weeks and months and years on ends on end that may never pan out because most equity goes to zero. By definition, most equity goes to zero. But if they have a direct incentive, if their project is directly tied to more cash in their personal checking account, they're more likely to be successful. They need to see it then, not to just hope for some payout in the future. >> And where do you find people who work with you? >> The best people I hire come from

50:41 personal references, friends of friends. >> And what about working with friends? >> It's high risk, high reward. um working with like a a business partnership with a best friend, a 50-50 partnership where you're both there in person on site every day building the same thing. One of you doesn't have a side hustle or a job. You're you're all in. That can be the most magical amazing thing ever, but the statistical chance of it working out is very slim because usually one of them has invested more money or more time or one of them still has a job or one of them is remote, the other one's on site. All of those variables means that it's probably going to blow up at some point in the future. >> What's the messiest situation you've seen from that? >> A $50 million business that I was building that went to zero overnight

51:28 when my two business partners just pushed me out. >> Why? >> How could they do that? >> Um, they started a new entity. The agreement that we had signed did not allow them to do that. But they had this big deal on the table with some investors and they said um they went to the investors and said, "Hey, there's not really enough room on the cap table here. So, we got this. Chris is going to do something else." And so, they just tore up that agreement, started a new business, and told the investors to join him there. >> Did you pursue it at all? >> Like, did I come after them? >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And it it all blew up. Everything blew up. like the business we had, the business that they were starting, it all just went to zero. >> So, nobody won. Why couldn't you just remake that business? >> I didn't want to. It It was a capital

52:14 intensive business. It's not something that I would have started on my own anyway. I joined up with two guys from the ground floor. One of them raised the money. I was the operator. And it's it's not something that I wanted to do by myself. >> Why did you go after them >> to destroy it instead of just like, "Ah, whatever." because I had invested 18 months of my full-time focus in person, not remote, tens of thousands of dollars, and the opportunity cost of everything I said no to over those 18 months was very high. And we had not made a profit yet. And so, this was a life-changing deal for all of us. >> And I felt they had done they had done wrongly. >> Did they end up having to pay you anything for that? It was literally just

53:01 >> they paid their lawyers, I paid mine, >> and then you just it was like mutually assured destruction by the end of it. >> Yeah. >> Where's that relationship today? Do you speak with them? >> They're best friends, Graham. >> Yeah. We had him over for dinner last night. >> Um, one of them >> I don't speak I I don't hold anything against him anymore. >> Uh, one of them I don't talk to because we weren't really friends in the first place, but I hold nothing against him. And the other one we're still friends, honestly. >> He Yeah, our families are still involved. We together. We live 5 minutes apart. Uh I would not go into business with him again. I not knowing what I know now. But I mean if you don't forgive someone, it'll eat you alive. >> What did you not see in these partners? >> I didn't vet them enough. I didn't know them well enough. It I I didn't do due diligence like I would with a spouse.

53:47 >> How would you have Would you have been able to find this out by doing more due diligence? >> I think so. Yeah. >> What would you have seen >> when you're in a relationship? any relationship, business or otherwise, you see red flags or yellow flags, right? Even if it's with a potential spouse. And those flags do not turn into red flags unless it's in retrospect. Does that make sense? >> Because if you start dating someone and something they do is like a yellow flag. It's either just an imperfection or there's something seriously wrong there. And you won't know until it's all played out. So, I chose to overlook red flag after red flag, things that he would say, stories about his past and I overlooked them just like I would in in

54:32 a spouse, right? But in aggregate, it adds up and you start to see patterns and because of the fact that I was already months down the line in this business relationship, I just continually chose to overlook them until it was too late. >> What about in a spouse? What qualities do you look for or recommend for entrepreneurs? You need a spouse that A has a reason to believe in you. They need something you. So that needs to start with you. You need to give them a reason to believe in you. >> But B, you need a spouse that just keeps believing you. Like is truly there for you and knows that you're capable of doing it and supports you wholeheartedly. Uh, I have several

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