Spotting Billion Dollar Investments Was Hard Until I Learned These 3 Rules | Rohan Oza

Every deal on Shark Tag, that's a beverage. I know they're looking at me. Nobody wins the lottery seven times. You got sharks spitting out the product, you've got a terrible brand name, and you pick up 25% of that company. Sold for a billion and a half. Is this just our or is there some sides behind it? One of the biggest lines of Robert Woodruff was like, "He wanted Coke to be with an arms-wish of desire." Brand is creating bad design. One in ten Americans, and it's the other nine. The gold is a spot that one. Can you teach us more about how it's done? It's actually three things. One is spawning stuff, bully. One is building the brands, and the other is actually-- You are-- You're the brand father. You have been-- you have been crushing it in the beverage space. I was reading the research on you the last couple days. I knew about Poppy. I knew about Vitamin water. But I didn't know the extent of it. Can you brag for a second? Give me a shout out some of the brands that you've been involved with. I actually have started none of-- I only co-founded one, which is Poppy, and I'll tell you that story. But the rest, I just bought him early, I bought him with founders. I think he was like, vitamin water, smart water. They were tiny, vital cocoa. Even things I lost money on, well, well-known like pop chips, vital proteins, one bar, bullet proof, lost money, but still well-known. What else do we have? Farmers' dog, once upon a farm, and then probably Poppy is my most famous one. That's an insane-- insane raster. It was funny, actually. One of our founders who you know, a guy called Gores, who's the co-founder of Jim Conor Fine Foods, was at a-- we had an LP conference. And we're so focused on the brands and the teens and growing stuff. And you sometimes bury yourself in the weeds, and you don't sometimes ladder up, and he's that grown. When you look at the sheet of brands on Carvveau, which is the fund that I have sort of mastered, it's insane this ecosystem you've created. And I think you need to do a better job of almost leveraging that ecosystem. And it got the light bulb went off, because he's a founder, right? He's growing an incredible brand. And part of it is I focus on individuals, and sometimes we've got to bring the whole gang in to realize the strength of what we have. It's sort of amazing, because when a lot of people say the word brand, it's sort of related to taste. And both of those can be pretty nebulous. But you sort of are like Paul McCartney or John Lennon, where you've made enough hits where you're like, OK, is this just our or is there some science behind it? Yeah. I mean, that's quite high-occupied to be in any conversation that used the Beatles name. But there's always luck guys. It's not like this. You can't. You got the dice has got to roll your way a little bit. But if you have a game plan, which I've sort of holened over time, the odds flow in your favor. And so I've created some mantras and some principles and so on and so forth, that I actually created after the fact, because you don't go in and say, all right, guys, I've got five mantras. You almost like, you have a few hits. You're like, how did this happen? And then I rewind and go, OK, this is kind of how it happened. Give us one. What's one of the first ones you've realized? Like, OK, all right, this is one that matters. We got to put that concrete. A couple of big ones. One is influence the influencer. So you got a part of money, right? One of them. A hundred grand, a million, a hundred million. What have you got to spend on your marketing budget? Who do I get to? Right. I can't get to everyone. So I'll boss me. You know, unless your Amazon has the budget to get to everyone. But most people, when they start a company, they don't. So from my perspective, it's one in ten Americans. And I say America because 90, 100% of my career actually is America in terms of success. So this is the greatest country in the world. I've been entrepreneur. I say that everywhere. I go. I truly believe it. So in America, one in ten Americans, influence the other nine. The goal is to spot that one. And that has evolved over time. So when I first started doing this, honestly, and I'm aging myself here, but some of the biggest influences. And I'm talking about back in the day with like Sprite, even, and even Vibingwater was radio DJs. Now radio is dead and you guys are the heroes online, right? But before you podcast, Kings came along. It was radio DJs. And so at one time in Vegas, I picked down a war show annually. And I would fly in the top 25 cities and the top two DJs from every city. So you have 50 people coming in. And every single artist that came to that award show would want to go to this place because you could hit 20 cities in two hours. It was almost like the cities came to you versus you traveling. And back then, you were releasing an album, a new product, or whatever it is, you'll write that. And I did it back in the day on a brand called Sprite. It was a corporate brand. But we did something cool. And then I did that with Vibingwater where I took on all the DJs in the local markets. And I hired people on my team that felt that vibe because in order to bond with a DJ, if you're a dog, it's not going to work. So I hired people who kind of in my, which is my next monitor who lived the brand. They didn't market the brand. They lived Vibingwater. That was their vibe. And so that's now evolved today to like the Alex Earls of the world, or the, you know, if it's a music, it's the 50 seters having a amazing resurgence. But now it's digital social media influences that were the only DJs and the keys to spot that one in 10. So that's been a big sort of philosophy of my every company we go into is who is that one in town. Hey, I want to tell you about something pretty cool. We have a database of all of the unsexy business ideas that have been discussed on this podcast. So hundreds of episodes, the team at HubSpot went through. They pulled out all the unsexy ideas, so not the super high tech ones, but the simple, relatable, interesting, profitable ideas that we have brainstormed. And they're all available for download for free. Just click the link in the description below. Thank you to our friends at HubSpot for sponsoring this podcast and putting together this free resource for you guys back to the show. Can you define what a brand even is? I think a brand is something that allows a consumer to have an emotional connection with a product. So this is just a can gratuitous, you know, a product of certain. I drink it. I like the product liquids great. But I got to create an emotional bond with people. So they request a puppy. They reach for a puppy. And I work for Coke back in the day. And one of the biggest lines that Robert Woodruff was like one of the Godfather's of making Coke word is today said he want to cope to be with an arms, we should desire. Brand is creating bad design. Right. And then the distribution is putting it in arms, we reach you nailed it. Exactly. Sam sent texted me a clip this morning of when Poppy walked into Shark Tank and at the time they're not called Poppy. They're called like mother or mothers or something like that. They're not a soda that tastes good. That's like prebiotic. They're apple cider vinegar. So it's amazing because it's like, you know, when there's these documentaries and this the dude who followed Kanye around 10 years before he became famous at all. And you're like, I can't believe we're so lucky that this guy happened to just follow this young artist in Chicago who happened to become Kanye West. And so there's this thing where it's like, you see them come into the Shark Tank. I think they have something like $250,000 in revenue, some 200 to 400 K of annual revenue at the time. Different brand, different drink, no revenue. All the other sharks go out. So it's you're in a bidding war with no one. Yeah, nobody nobody. They go, all right, sharks taste this healthy drink. And they make people take a shot of apple cider vinegar and they're like, this is horrible. They're like, yeah, it is horrible, but it's great for you. Now, what if it could be great for you and also taste good? That's our product, which is it was a really good actually pitch. Yeah, the title of the video is sharks disgusted. Yeah, by the poppy like they were. They can't spit it out. I can't remember. So you got you got people sharks spitting out the product. You've got a terrible brand name. It's mothers and cursive. It looks like a old like sparkling wine or something like that. Yeah. Totally different formulation and you pick up 25% of that company. I think poppy sold for a billion and a half or something like that. No, no, come on. No, so too many. Oh, north of two. Okay. Unbelievable exit. What happens and it's amazing that the whole thing was captured. What happens between the time you see it? What do you think it then and then what were the things that actually transformed that business? Cause I think that's a perfect like case study. Yeah. Let's go to phase one. So these guys come out like every deal on shark tag. That's a beverage or food but really beverage like I can do the range. But beverage is kind of my real house. I don't know. DNA gifted with that. So beverage comes out and I know they're looking at me like Cubans are big in name than me. Kevin's a big in name than me. You know, Lori's the queen of digital and KVC. But beverage that look at me and then these guys come out and I can't we go again because we I'm not three seasons in. I'm like, you know, someone's going to hit me up with some nonsense beverage. You know, and we had some real dumb ones along the way. But this really good looking couple comes out, you know, husband, wife's like straight out of central cost. Like they look like Sam, you know, like this chisel good looking, you know, white boy. And I'm friends with Stephen and we became friends because I DMed him and I just said, we look alike. Yeah. One of your friends. I swear to God. He does look a lot of them like Stephen hard. So this bloody two good looking guys come out and guy and a lady. She's like, I don't know eight months pregnant. She could deliver any second. So immediately I'm like, they've got hustle. So, want, then they pitch the product and I'm like horrible packaging. I don't like the brand name, you know, I like the word mother, but everyone has a mother, you can't trademark. It's not really a trademarkable thing. But like, let's try it. So that's the trains running on that track, okay? In the separate track in my head, I'm a soda kid. I've been looking for soda. I grew up in Zambia, in Africa, right? So in Zambia, when he had three beverages, co-spri-t and phanta, that's it. But I came off sodas, 'cause soda, it's Chateau de Chagat, they're not good for you, they're no bad, but in the back of my head, I've always been looking for soda, I can feel good about. But I didn't go into the show thinking that, but in the back of my head, that's the running track. I tried this. Actually it was this one, ironically, it was the orange one. And so for me, that is still, this is my top two. Orange is my favorite and cream soda is my second. So funny, the two flavors I drank when I was a kid. It's amazing, well, 40 years later, it's throwing back to the 9, 10 year old Rohan, right? Anyway, so I tried the orange one and I'm like, oh my god, this is phanta meets orangeina. For you guys, and I'm like, this liquid is, in my head, takes me back. This is my modern soda. But I don't get excited, 'cause I know it's a minute, I get excited, these guys good excited. And so I think you were the last one to talk, at least in the edit. I don't know if that's actually how it was, but I thought that was incredible patience to let the other sharks play out before you chimed in, 'cause obviously you would influence them. Exactly right. I did not. I specifically remained mute, because the minute I seemed vaguely excited. And by the way, even then, Cuban and Bethany, both turned to me and said, "Rosh, should we split this?" And I'm like, kind of in a nice way, no, because if this works, which you did, why would I want to split it? And if it doesn't work, I'm fine to lose it, but in the end, I'm betting on myself, right? I liked them. Like, I liked Stephen Allison, but that's a very short like, like, you know, we go for dinner, then I stand like, oh God, they're horrible. The first thing I did, when we got with me, became part of this, I shut it down. I shut down mother. And there was a tough conversation. And then basically, Stephen Allison, me, and a lady on my team called Stevie, we basically co-founded Poppy. There was no Poppy. And in my mind, I wasn't focused on an Apple Side of vinegar beverage. I was focused on making this modern soda for today's use. And so I'm like, okay, if I love soda, and everyone else loves soda, this is modern soda. And so we kind of created the whole modern soda category, but I wasn't thinking Apple Side of vinegar. And so we shut mother down. Stevie, myself, Allison, Stephen, and Stevie took charge of the packaging design, actually. We then all debated, which is the best one to go with. We voted on it, and that's where Poppy came into play. What about the name? We had a David Plastic come on, who named Blackberry and Swiffer, and he gave us a masterclass on naming product. Poppy is an incredible name, for a soda pop brand to find that super easy to say, recognizable, fun. It almost feels bubbly in the name. He is, so I'm strategic creative. Stevie and my team is what I call tacticic creators. It sounds like something I would say when I don't want to do work. It's exactly a matter of fact. Yeah, she works, she's taught it. Yeah, she works. So it's a triangle offense, right? Allison, Stephen, I created the product. It's a great product, but their insight was, Apple Side of vinegar, healthy beverage. My insight is, I want soda. So what's America for soda's pop, right? So that's the, everyone, in England translates, that's all the pop he's exploding in the UK now, and Stevie's goal was how does she take what they created, what my strategic game plan was, and create a name that rolls off the tongue. And we had a bunch of them at one point, I even like Mom and Pop, 'cause I'm like, it was a throwback to like, Mom and Pop stores and all that. And people told me it was stupid and they were right. But then when they came out with Poppy and Stevie presented, I'm like, okay, right. Can we go, all right, let's go back, because you only invested, I think, 250 or $400,000 into Poppy. And so it was really small business. You shut it down at half a million in revenue, and you re-brained it and restarted it as Poppy. Do you remember what was the revenue growth up until you exited for $2 billion? - Yeah, so at this point, I give Allison Steven Full Credit, because Mother was that baby, and to go to a founder and say, good news, bad news, good news, I'm your partner, bad news was shutting down Mother, and we're not co-founding Boppy together. That takes a lot of faith on that part. And we launched in March of 2020, right? We're in, I said, guys, I don't want plastic, 'cause plastic's bad. The can't do gloss, 'cause it's inconvenient. We're gonna go back to cans. OG telegraph soda, that's what I drank. I'm sitting here drinking out of a can. We launched March of 2020. What happens in April? - COVID, the world shuts down. - Yeah. - So we, we had started to be a more digital company, because that's just the nature where life was. But we turboed that, because then suddenly, all retail was dead, and everything became digital, and so on and so forth. So, in our first year, we did like a couple million bucks, only, because the world shut down. We're just still incredible for that. But then we went from like a couple of million to over half a billion in the next four years. So from 21 to 25, we exploded. And did you put more money in in the beginning to push marketing, or did you guys raise? What did you guys do? - Yeah, we kept raising. I mean, beverage is expensive, by the way. Like I put more money in. My fun, Kavu came in. So my business partner, Brad, was like, "Look, I believe in you. I don't get beverage just early. If you get it, Kavu's gonna back it." So we, everybody went in, right? And so we kept back here. We raised a chunk of money, but everyone got a great return, because of the exit number. 'Cause no one wanted what you get it out of. It's what you get out of. - How much did you raise in sum? - I mean, all in? 40 maybe? - Wow. - That's amazing to go from arch. I didn't realize you guys were that new. So roughly 2021 to 2025, 26, zero to $2 billion. - Yeah. - What was the most satisfying when you had? Was it popular? Was it something earlier? Was there something where maybe even it wasn't as big financially, but just you just were proud of the way you made it work? - No, it popped, he hands down. Pop, it was, pop, everything else I went there and someone else had a product that I built. Here, Steve Nelson had created a mother and it was brilliant. Without the liquid that they had created, we wouldn't be anywhere, right? But I got in early enough to basically co-found Poppy with me and Stevie, added to Allison's team and it was amazing. And so I think that was satisfying, because I had division from the beginning. I had a great team with Steve and Allison's TV. And then we brought in a CEO. Because at some point, I'm not an operator. Allison and Steve in super smart, but also realized they weren't operators. And so once we got to like 30, 40 million, we brought a crack called Chris Hallen and that guy's a legend. And I think one of the other lessons you have to learn as an entrepreneur is having a founder and creator mind doesn't always align with having operator mind. Sometimes-- - Yeah, more often it probably doesn't. - More often doesn't. The one guy I think was really good at it was a guy called Kurt from Vital Pro teams, that I've known. Kurt founded Vital Pro teams. We partnered with him as well. And that guy was, he was actually a rocket scientist, like legit. So he was a founder and a brilliant operator. So that's a unique gravity. But in this case, we brought in Chris Hall and Chris ran Subokling Ice. So I had to spend a lot of time like coaching and begging and then convincing and accommodation of all of the above to get him over. But he was a game changer because you need to operate and he helped take you from like 50 to 500. - Man, it's still amazing how good you are at this. And I think we should talk about that because there's a handful of skill sets that are, you just, I call them ATM skills, where you just become like a money maker. Like if you can create an audience, you're probably a money maker. If you could sell, you're probably a money maker. If you could do good branding, you're probably a money maker. And you've done it many times at a row. Where did you learn how to do this? 'Cause I know you worked for Mars, you worked for Coke. Is that where you learned how to do this? And can you teach us more about how it's done? - Actually, it's interesting you bring at that point. One is spotting stuff early, right? One is building the brands, and the other is actually how to sell them. And it's, people forget the last part. Because there's a big graveyard of brands that have got a scale, but never fully exited. And there's a bigger graveyard of those who just didn't go anywhere. And I think part of it, so take my learnings. My learnings on Mars were less so, 'cause I was in manufacturing operations. So my learning there was almost like, the importance of supply chain operations, gross margin, like the boring stuff. But people forget that if you don't have good gross margins, you cannot make money and if you can't make money, you go bankrupt. And by the way, I've still made that mistake. I had an incredible product called Chefscott. It was a jerky. Before Chomps, like my buddy invested in Chomps and he and I were joke, 'cause we were like neck and neck and Chefs came out first. And I just didn't have great gross margins and I should have focused more on that. Chefscott shut down or got sold for nothing and Chomps became a juggernaut [BLANK_AUDIO] He keeps laughing at me. But I think from that perspective, I learned from Mars, a little bit, you know, and you still make mistakes. With Coke, I learned how to do disruptive marketing and branding, because I was lucky. I wasn't spright back in the heyday when we signed Missy Elliott and Kobe Bryant and I did like a bunch of hip-hop stuff. And it was really cool. And then I wasn't power-aid where Coke didn't care about it. So they said, do whatever you want. So I learned creative disruption early, even though I was in a corporate environment. And then they fired me, because I was a little too disruptive. And so I went to Vidal Water. And that's the way I really start to learn how to. And that's my second mantra is how to make brands part of pop culture. There's a lot of guys who report the news, very few people make the news. And so for me, with Vidal Water, Smotherwater, I started by making the news. And those brands became part of pop culture. That sounds cool, but what does that mean? Make the news. I don't know. I'm too dumb to understand that. So make the news. So the first influencer, mega-influencer ownership deal I did. Because remember, everything before 50 was very much a sponsorship deal, right? You sign a celebrity, they get in, that's the deal, right? The equity ownership. I evenly Michael did it in a different way than I key. So, but that has come up later. And it wasn't really well-known then. But with 50, I didn't have the money to pay 50. He was huge at the time, right? And so I met with Fairf and his manager, Chris Lighty. And actually there's two guys I was looking at for Vidal Water. Because Vidal Water was a great brand. It was a kind of little bit upper-sized, New York preppy brand. It wasn't like nationwide cool. It wasn't getting shot the face nine times. It wasn't getting shot on the face cool. And wrap about it. Yeah. Exactly. Although it was only eight times, because one bullet went through twice. But anyway, of course. So I wanted hip-hop. And the two biggest names in the world at the time were Curtis Jackson and the Hover. It was Jay-Z, right? So those are the two guys who were like the biggest names. And so I called my buddy Seth Rotsky. And I said, "Seth, you're more connected in this world than I am. Who can I get to?" Seth got a got to both, but he had a much better relationship with Chris Lighty, 50s manager. He said, "Put me on text with 50s manager." A lot of this also for artists, it's their managers getting it. So Chris got it straight away. He got the product. He got fifth. He said, "We've not done a deal. We're about to do a deal with Reebok. But I'll kill that deal. I'll do this with you." That's how I got connected. And 50, as we see today, is clearly an entrepreneur. Also don't mess with them because he will come after you with a vengeance. So I think that he got it. And I said, "I don't have money, but I can give you a skin in the game." And he immediately said, "Okay. I'm in." And I thought I was going to make hip-axe. I kind of think he made 10x. I did the math wrong, basically. He got one, like, one, two percent, something like that in the company. He got until exactly what he got, but he, because we have a deal. I don't give the exact number. He doesn't kick the shit out of me. But he made a lot because honestly, I gave him enough equity for him to make good money if we sold the company for 400 to 500 million. That was our goal of item water. Like I remember Michael Boney was the co-founder of item water. It was like, "Bro, put it up and it's born. If we get to this, this, this, we're going to get to 150 million of revenue. We're going to sell the 450." Without you, you can't reveal it because Curtis Jackson will Curtis Jackson do it. Well, is it like, would it be crazy to give someone 10% of a company like that? Yeah. 10% will be too high. Got it. But we sold the full billion. So you could do the math on, you know, what he would have made. All right. Let's take a quick break. And I got a question for you. When a buyer asks AI for a solution like yours, does your business come up? Well, most companies have no idea. And by the time they found out, they've already lost the deal to another company that did. HubSpot has AEO, which helps you show up in the moments when the right buyers are looking for a company like yours. Before the first click, before they fill in the form, that is the moment HubSpot AEO is built for, check out HubSpot.com, the agentic customer platform for growing businesses. It seems like that, you know, the kind of the influence of the international things, obviously works. Obviously makes sense. But also, obviously goes wrong sometimes, right? You know, for example, this podcast, we got bought by HubSpot. HubSpot was like, yo, we want to reach entrepreneurs. We want them to use our software. So they went to us because we influence a lot of entrepreneurs. We influence a million entrepreneurs. We're valuable to them and many other brands. And so, but there's many people who get that partnership wrong. You know, celebrities are busy. They're divas. They don't really care. Maybe you didn't make it incentive enough. And it's hard to claw back. So like, I guess how confident were you and what made it go right versus go wrong? I think what makes it go right and happen with 50, happy with Jennifer Allison or smart water. And I think it happened most recently for me with Alex Earl on Poppy. And the connective tissue that 50 Jennifer Alex all share is belief in the brand, creative connectivity. Like they creatively got the brand and connected with it. They believed in it. They creatively connected with it and they went above and beyond. Those are the three things when consumers, consumers are smart. No, okay, that's the real deal, right? Like Alex loves Poppy. I see the cool shit she's doing with it. And she's probably the smartest 24 year old. I've a map washing nose a brand, nose a DNA makes me feel old like she is on it, you know? Love of the brand cultural creative connectivity and then going above and beyond. When you're looking at these deals, what would you say are the traits that the winners have in common? And what would you say the traits are the losers? So for example, we had this guy named Chad who started Groons on and he had sold it. Yeah, so he sold it for $2 billion. I said $1.2. $1.2 billion in 35 months or something insane. And we were like, he was like, basically, he was like, I called my shot. I worked at a PE firm and I realized that the tam needs to be big. My CAQ2LTV needs to be one to three. Like he's like, I kind of had it down to a little bit of a science. He didn't say it that way, but that's how I interpreted it. What's the science in your head? Not for investing, but for building a winning product. Yeah, it's similar. I mean, one, let's talk about big categories, right? At Kavu, our game plan is what basically trying to, in a nutshell, upgrade the products that every day Americans are using with better quality, right? So I'm not recreating the wheel. I'm just giving you a better wheel. That makes sense. And so take the biggest tabs in food, in beverage, in beauty, in pep. At Kavu, we're like, okay, well, you like soda? Maybe a Coke or a found is not good for you. We're going to upgrade you to a poppy. You like pet food, but extruded kibble that has very low nutrient value and good. We're going to give you Fama's dog, right? The goal is, how do you give Americans what they used to, but elevate it so they can feel better up themselves? What are the big tabs that are left where you're like, we still haven't found the winning kind of brand or product in a certain category. Like, if I go to that grocery shop or I go to the supermarket, where do you see the opportunities right now, which aisle? Everywhere. Let me explain why. Go down every aisle. Next time we go, my wife gets super pissed with me because she sends me a phone call. Maybe I'll have to get stuff in the grocery store and like two hours later. It's like, where the hell have you been? Like, honey, this is my business. Like, my dumbass wondering around the grocery store figuring out what's broken. But that's the scenario. Go down and say, okay, would I buy all these products? And my guess is if you go to a traditional grocery store or a most American shop today, you would probably say, no, no, no, no, yes. So you have seven knows before you get to a yes. Go down the candy aisle. Okay. So, the investment in a brand called skinny tip, do you have a bearder? Yeah, I love this. Do you have these? So addictive. Right. But the almond tam is okay. Wait, it's chocolate. It's this almond tam is this big. Creating sweet treats that don't have guilt, right? Is this big. So skinny hair, chocolate cup almonds. The brilliance of the founder was after X number of years, she's like, this shouldn't working. It's doing five, but my tam's all big enough, right? To the point you made with Chad. She pivoted. She created peanut butter cups. She created coconut bites and she created wafers. You want to name me the three products that do that? Racers, almond joy and Kit Kat. By the way, all three of these products sub two grams of sugar. So now I can have and I do a coconut bite every day with my coffee or after dinner because I need a, I've had with sweet fix, but zero shits given because it's two grams of sugar. You don't care if you're a sugar, you give it a kid, you'll have it. Ten grams, twenty grams, your mind starts clicking a little bit. Is it possible to even be more specific when you're walking around the aisle? Is there a spot where you're like, this product should be right here on the shelf and it's not. Yeah, so go to the confection shelf and say, what will I eat? And I look down and I'm like, almost nothing because everything is fully loaded with sugar and it's really highly processed. So now take the process down. There's a lot of good stuff that's less processed, better ingredients. Can we agree on that? There is. However, the sugar content is still high. So now I evolve from horrible stuff to maybe like an alter ego chocolate or a huge chocolate that great, but they still go to high sugar content. So you ask me what I do. I go to the entire confection shelf and put my arms up and listen to the ground, what would I eat? the only thing that I can eat is skinny and maybe one of the the product because I feel good about it. So let me ask you a question. You had this great line where you go, the shelf space is the original algorithm. The same way that content creators are constantly trying to figure out how to get on the YouTube shelf or the Instagram shelf. How do I get discovered there? It's even harder, arguably, because there's very like mafia-like business practices that occurs in behind the scenes of these shelf spaces. I've walked through one of our events that we do, guys have brands at Target or Safeway or whatever. We walk through and we do store walks and then they explain, Mr. Beast, who will explain how the candy aisle works and who will explain Mars and Hershey's and the tactics they use and how your color blocking, your section, etc. So you get this sort of PhD in each aisle. I think his market's a little bit different. So you sell, let's say skinny dips, a little higher price point, better for you is like the bigger angle. You know, he's, I think, the number, like one of the fastest growing brands in Walmart. Right. And so his price point has to be a big constraint. So he has to play a slightly different game, but he's doing a lot of stuff with like, his better for you isn't in the ingredients, it's in the business practices. So like, we don't use child labor and the cocoa farms and stuff like that, which is, you know, he cares, he's trying to get everyone to care. Will it change people's purchasing decisions, I think, as a question? But I guess the thought process is like, how do you get the shelf space? Well, I think it's our reverse engineer. Why do the advantage I bring to the mix? Right. We talked a lot about influence and so on and so forth. The second influencer, and probably as important, is retail buyers. And I have now established, because I brought up a lot of great products and exits and scale. I have great connections with the top people at Walmart, Target and Albaton's and Cervor, etc. And just maintaining those relationships are key because when I bring a product that I have invested in or Carbos invested in, they will give us a shelf space. And I think that's a lot of entrepreneurs come to us because they're like, okay, great. I can do X, Y and Z, but if I just get one meeting with the top guy at Walmart, that could inflect, you know, inflect my business in a way that's unique. So I have the relationships now. However, retailers are smart and they are actually closer to the consumer than big corporations. So they are seeking the products of tomorrow while maintaining what I call the brands of yesterday. Because you can't eliminate the brands of yesterday, too much money, too much revenue. At the same time, you then also have to bridge to the brands of tomorrow. And Sam, to your point, let me take Bobby. I mean, a regular soda is probably a buck for a can, right? A puppy is probably a buck. 60, 70, 80 depending where you buy it, 90. Would you pay the extra 50 cents, 60 cents, 90 cents? Probably. I'm not, so like I'm buying a, you know, a BMW versus I'm buying a Toyota. I think a 20,000, 30,000 difference there. Here, it's a 30, 60, 90 cents difference. So a big part of what I do also is when I go to retail is whilst the product might be premium. I still want to try and appeal to a larger amount of Americans in the ability to reach those products where they're attainable. And so I think that the retailers are looking full brands that are attainable, even though it's a slightly premium, that all the future brands. You said something earlier that was kind of important. You go, the third thing I do is how to sell it. And there's a huge value swing at the end. When me and Sam sold our companies is kind of amazing. And then 50% of the value is going to be how good you are at the Sam and A thing at the end. It's crazy. That you've never done before, but it's the biggest deal of your life. And so I've seen that firsthand. How important that is, how it is a separate skill set for an entrepreneur that you're very low repetitions in. So it's hard to even get good at it. Yeah. It's a really unfair advantage because a reputable buyer has done this many times. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter to them necessarily if it fails. They'll just get fired worst case scenario. So for you, it changes your life. Completely. Yeah. So how do you go get coaked the buyer company for $2 billion? What do you do? How do those conversations happen? How do you negotiate those deals? And why do they buy them for so much? So that's again, why I mean, I have established, I don't have relationships everywhere. But I have a relationship with a lot of big CPGs, right? Co. Pepsi, Hushy, Mondaleys, KDP. So I've done that over time. A lot of these guys have either worked full, worked with over time because I've been doing this now for 25 years in the industry, right? Maybe longer. And so relationships with the top guys, it's critical. And so, you know, with one bar, I walked them in back in the day to Hushy to the CEO of Hushy the time, right? I didn't negotiate the Vite and Water Deal, the founder of Vite and Water Darius, dead brilliantly. And I learned from him, by the way. So I'm on the sidelines, washing this guy go to town. I brought Coke to the tip. So I called Coke because I used to work for them, Sandy Douglas, the mentor of mine. He brought the CEO, he was a president and they negotiated with Darius and I saw what he did and I learned from that out of that negotiation. What was one thing you picked up? If you have a great brand, it's okay to be slightly unhinged on your expectation. Like when he said the number starts with a four, I almost fell off my chair. But did he just say four and I took four B and Coke came back at four point one. I'm like, all right guy, he, you know, sometimes you get nervous because there's a fine line guys. This is Sean, you made such a great point. You spend anywhere from four to 10, 15 years building your baby and then the finish line is where the where the money is made. And so sometimes you get scared because if you overreach, which I've also done and you fail, you might be catching a falling night. But if you under the reach, then you keep kicking yourself with how much you left from the tape. Dial in on that, that's interesting because knowing if you have a great brand is actually a bit challenging, but overreach and underreaching, that is also very nuanced. Is there like, is there like some more specific details that you can give on how you know, like for example, do you look at comps and you say we're just going to be the top quartile? What do you do? Yes, very good. Timies everything by the way, right? Like poppy sold for half a word, vitamin water, except poppy grew faster than the vitamin water is the biggest scale brand that vitamin water ever was. But timing was different, right? At that time, there was a willingness and the money was more liquidity was free and greater to pay more, right? So at risk were different. So I think the same with tech valuations, right? Before investing in 20, 20, 20, 20, 20, a bonkers valve that slowed down and now AI is also not so there's a timing mechanism. So you should have belief in faith and do what you are, but do not always benchmark against the biggest number you've seen. And that's a danger entrepreneurs have. They're like, look, this company sold for seven times revenue. I'm going for seven. And if I don't get it, I'm out. I'm like, bro, take it easy. Beauty is in the eye that beholder. But at some point when you're ready, you're going to have X number of beholders. And if they say your beauty is 600 million, that's your beauty. Now you can take a risk and pass and wait for a big number. And that's okay. But the groups that pass and wait for a big number are few and far between and they don't always work out. Some do. I also think that there's definitely like a, as you can see, there's a showmanship that is involved here. I've only known you now for 57 minutes. You have it. You have a likability, a charisma, whatever it is you want to call it. Are you in the room to go shitting these deals? I in some way. So with Poppy, it was a good, you have to have a banker and bankers have done this, right? So get a good banker, get good rep. So we had Goldman Sachs with Poppy. I built a great relationship with them. They actually brought Pepsi to the table initially and without getting into it, the number and the offer was inadequate. So I did what I said is a risky move, which is I walked because I didn't like the constructor of the deal. And then someone else came to the table. I also walked because I didn't like the constructor of the deal. And before I speak to Steven Allison, they were probably getting nervous at this point because I was blessed to have had exits before. They haven't had any and even Stevie was losing it at one point because they're like, this is life changing money that Rose saying no to. But I just didn't like the construct because it wasn't a full buyout. The unabsw it. And so third times a charm. So when Pepsi came back, I ended up negotiating that directly with them. Did it change your life too? Yeah. It's, you know, you, you, when you have a massive win like this, you always have to step back and realize how blessed you are, not take it for granted, see what you could do for others and those around you. And a good thing for me was I let a lot of people into the deal. So it wasn't just me. I had family friends. One of my closest childhood friends was in the deal. And so when you affect other people beyond yourself, that's huge. Yeah. 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Banking services are provided through Choice Financial Group and call them NA members FDIC. You said a bunch of things earlier that I want to ask you like the same question but with a different caveat because sometimes I'll be like, hey, how do you sell this company? Well, I call the guy. I know. How do you get on the shelf? Well, they know me and I know them. That's true and great and an extreme advantage today. But two problems. One, you didn't wake up. You weren't born with that. You earned that somehow. And the second is it's not most entrepreneurs don't have that advantage. If they don't partner with you, you know, just in general, people have to figure out how do you survive. No one's going to come save you. Do you have an insane hustle story from the beginning? Because that's what gets me excited. After this, I'm going to go work and nothing fires me up more than a good hustle story. You have to have hustle at every stage, by the way. So I'll give you a puppy story which is later. I've had a bunch of exits but I'm still hustling because guess what? People change out of roles in corporations. So when I say I know people, historically I've used bankers, I've used brokers, I've used people in the industry which you have to use in entrepreneur. You've got to build a relationship with everybody so that they get you in the room. And then when you get you a shot, you make it work. So I'll give a shout out to my buddy Danny Stepper. But if you know Danny, Danny's kind of a legend of the beverage industry. I went to the beverage pouring just finished yesterday. It's probably the best beverage conference in any beverage entrepreneur should be there. The best beverage conference in America. And I went there two years ago and Danny said, "Roh, would you speak?" I said, "Yes, I'll speak, but is a buttonless thing. I need a Walmart and a target meeting while I'm at your conference." And he had some of the lead guys from Walmart and Target. They don't know me, like at me, they know of me, but it's not like just because I walk in, they're still Walmart. They're like, "Roh, it's for you, this is where Walmart." And so I went in and I danced. Me, Alison, Chris Hall, the CEO, and I danced. And I danced the modern soda dance because we were sucking winded Walmart. We were doing everything else. And I'm like, "This is my one shot." And I came in and I painted the vision. It's a guys. This is not pre-botic soda. This is modern soda for tomorrow's generation. And I made a full story. And the light bulb went off at Walmart's end. And the head by a well-amazing guy, right away believed in the vision, Scott behind it. His boss Melanie was a rock-start Walmart, accelerated it from 2025 into end of '24. And Poppy did this. That was the moment Poppy went into explosive growth mode. And I'm doing the hustle. I'm doing the dance. And by the way, I've been bright successful. But if you come in with an ego and you know what it is, dance for retailers. Regardless who you are, they don't give two shits. I know that Kavu is incredibly successful now. I know that I believe it's many billion-dollar funds. You've had multi-billion-dollar exits. And I know that you started in the Mars factory. Like I think you said counting M&Ms. Sorry, twigs. The show is called My First Million. I don't know the middle ground. What did you do to make your first million? Because was it investing your own money in brands? Was it because you got equity in vitamin water? My first million. So I got fired from Coke, too creative, disruptive. And I went to this known-in-company, cool vitamin water. In fact, I sent a bunch of product to my friends at the Deemah Drinkit. That's the pile of brand, by the way. They didn't drink it in two years later. The same jackass that's called me. Ro, vitamin water is huge. My kids love it. I'm like, dude, I said that two years ago. You never said shit to me. Anyway, so I put my own money in. I borrowed from my dad. So I'm broke as a joke. And I borrowed from my dad. And I get equity. And so I went from, you know, fumes on my back account because I was basically spending everything I was making to the vitamin water exit. And that was my first million or more than that. But it was putting everything that I had. And I think that's honestly what you make a big bet. You put everything into it. And if it works out, that's kind of where you get your biggest paydays. Did you raise money for a fund right after that? Really? No, I did my own thing. So I did vitamin water, smart water. I exited. I had my own money. So what's the phrase that you invest off your balance sheet, some bullshit finance phrase. So, no, yes, I invested up my balance sheet, meaning I went in solo Rohan into Vita Coco, into buy, into pop chips. And Stevie was my right hand wing woman in this case. And so she was my, she loved marketing for me. We did it together. And now she's the head of marketing of a car. That's really interesting. And what I'm asking is really personal. So you can avoid it or you can give as much information as you want. But I find that to be cool. And there's a lot of people listening who are like, I would like to make a little bit of money and spend a little bit of money doing what this guy's doing. That's badass. I don't want to start a fun yet. Are you able to give any type of numbers as to what you had when you started investing in pop chip and all these companies? Yeah, I can give you a raise. I was investing anywhere from probably half a million to two million. That's a shitload for an angel investment. Yeah, I wasn't that smart, dude. I was a little bit unhinged. Long term, I worked out great. I don't advocate you go that heavy. Were you really rich? No, I was just, I was a, I think I better myself a little too much. So, yeah, I had a lot more money than that. But I think you have to be willing to lose if you're going to win. Did you tell yourself like, okay, I'm willing to lose 10 million bucks, but I'm going to bet, I'm going to bet on myself to go make a few concentrated bets. Did you sort of mentally partition like this is loosable money or you just, you were just going and you didn't even think about a lot of stress. So basically, I was kind of doing the math. I'm like, okay, I'm in for this, I'm in for this, I'm in for this. And then like, you know, X years later, I'm like, well, you know, I mean, you know, I mean for 10, but I've made, you know, 10 times that. So I think I'm good. You know, I'm saying so it's like, it's what those organic, you know, what print man math. I like it. What percent, what print for the principle, not the markups, what percent of your liquid net worth was in private deals? Yeah, a lot. I also, I should have done a better job with my publics. I was very like into my private because I had made my money on private. So if I too high, was it like, was it like all? No, no, it's bright, worry about a third though. I mean, like, okay, okay. So I don't know, like, I don't know. I was a decent amount. I can't do them exactly. I was rolling heavy. I was like in my 30s and like, pop chips was a great brand. And I bet all that, but I didn't understand the importance of a pref stack. So you were just like making bets and then like going out and hustling on your behalf. You're like, hey, I'm going to beverage form. And I'm just going to figure out how to wheel and deal a little bit. Yeah, I was working with these companies. Like I would help the pop chips guys with influences with you know, all with marketing or team. Like I bring in the head of sales, the head of marketing or you were free, you were like a free hire a little bit. I was, yeah, I was like, I'm like, let me in. I'll help you out. Sometimes I got equity for helping. And so the good news is my hits in in Vita Coco, the coconut water by vital proteins and poppy far outstripped whatever. And so the, the order of winners was vitamin water. You did that with you did it with smart water. And then what was the order the next five deals? I did vitamin. Smart. I did Vita Coco. The coconut water, which is great cupboards. It incredible operator. Did that accent? Shit, the guy's gone with the companies with two and a half billion on the public stocks. It's like, oh, wow, I didn't know that. Okay. Wow. With the thing like coconut water, right? Like my, my business partner Ben, he's been trying to get me to drink frickin banana water. He's like, oh, banana water. And I do, it's nasty. Can't believe he likes it. But he's like, banana water. That's the next coconut water. I'm like, I don't think it is. How do you spot the real trends versus the fall trends? Are you just trusting your own taste buds? Or is it some research you're doing? Are you watching what high schoolers are doing? Like what are you doing to figure out real trend versus fizzle out trend? Yeah. Taste buds in town. Coconut water wasn't a coconut water. It was a hydration term. Right? Taste buds. Maybe it's bad because I'm of Indian origin. I like coconut water. But, let's be honest, I got an early, I got out at a $700 million valuation. Right? So I got in at, I don't know, 30. So I mean, 20 times my money. The things now worth north of two billion. So I didn't have the vision that Mike has was a CEO founder that this could be north of a $2 billion public company. No chance I had that vision. I was, because to me, the tab was limited by the taste of coconut water in America. So I, sometimes he's knowing where to hold him, knowing where to fold him. So I got out. I made good money. I get, I will never begrudge the money that I could have made. But, I got it. So I was out on that one. But then, you know, but then I got into buy and I rode by all the way and the founder Ben super smart. And he, I got him introduced to KDP. And he built a brilliant relationship with the CEO of KDP and then sold that for $1.7 billion. I think one of the great tests of marketing is, can you sell water? How do you sell water? Right? What's the, there's a marketing genius about figuring out how to sell water and not just once, how to sell it many times in many different ways. And so I've only done one water, by the way. I've done many beverages, but only one water. Okay, well, so vitamin water, not a water. Yeah, vitamin water is flavoured, right? Poppy is flavoured. Vider Coke or buy, they all flavoured. Like, when you just straight water, I still don't know how the hell I did that. But I'll take a crack. The founder, Darry is creative, vitamin, smart water. with a really good story, which is vaped distilled water. It's how water is made in the world, right? Water evaporates from the ocean, goes up, hydrogen oxygen separates, all the impurities fall out. It comes back to Earth, that first drop of rainwater before it enters the atmosphere, before it hits the ground, that's pure water. So that was the initial vision behind SmartWood. The packaging was not great, it was invisible. So I redid the package. The current package was me and my team would sit on the shelf today. Then we did the Influenza strategy. And I felt that every time was the only player in America that was in premium water. But it's a French company that was in plastic being shipped across the ocean. It didn't make sense, and neither did Fiji, being shipped from basically Fiji. Like why can't we have a premium American water that has, and the thing is, your water's a badge. When you walk around with the water more than anything else, it's a little bit of a reflection of you, right? That's why at home, you'll cares. You buy the case packs at Costco and 24 packs, for like $2. But when you're walking around, you want a little bit of a different badge. And I think with the team I had, the Jennifer Anderson became the face, the brand, the new packaging we did, Smart became this like, go to accessory particularly for women, and the brand took off. And I think when Coke bought vitamin water, if you asked them today, the brand that has worked out for them is a small water no body would. And is there something to this idea of placement? So like I remember with Deets by Dre came out, and it was this headphone brand, just like many other bows and others, but instead of going for audio files, everywhere you saw it was basically hip hop artists and athletes walking into the stadium. And it became like synonymous with like the pregame lock-in, associated with the coolest athletes and artists. And like that was a, they created billions of dollars of value by that association, that placement of the pregame, or the walk-in, at least for me. And I think that I've read stories about Greg Goose and some of the liquor brands where they would put it in the limousines and the after parties of the Oscars and just where it was seen was almost just as important as the story of how it was triple filtered and distilled 'cause nobody actually ends up knowing that shit. They just see where it's seen. Did you ever use that tactic or what is that? That was huge for me back in the day. So now this strategy is done really through social digital, right? So digital influences when, when all top sororities are running around posting Poppy and having it at the sorority kickoff parties, I have an army of amazing college ambassadors and Poppy is the number one drink on college campuses. - For modern day like Red Bull Playbook basically. - Yeah, but it's kind of a better for you, feel good, five, and definitely what's better for women than, you know, like from a connection standpoint. So, but back in the day, I did this with the Oscars with the Golden Globes. Smart water was the first water on the table at the Golden Globes before they were pouring out of just the, and so I did a deal with them. So suddenly every table you go to, you're seeing a smart one of that. And then Vitamine, I used to sponsor many because I wanted to go to the parties. So Patrick Whitesill, I think Patrick is too big time now, but Patrick, he's the coolest post Oscar parties. Oscar and VMA, a Golden Globes parties in LA. So just for me to get access to those things, I would sponsor them, but the good news is all the, I remember going to one and it was back in, what I call round one of JLo and Aflac dating. And I'm like, that's the party in like JLo and Aflac of air. And everyone's drinking vitamin water back there. This is like 2003, you know, 2004. So I think you're dead right in the early days, the, the, the, the, especially products they've got to appear in people's lifestyle areas as both physically and digitally. You're a hustler. I didn't. I didn't realize how big of a hustler you are. If you lose your hustle, you lose your edge. Like the guy with Sean and I know, Gilles Rez, who is the CEO of Jim Connifying Foods. Like he's like, "You are bloody intense." Like when I get in a session with him, he's like, I thought you would have chilled out, you're a father, you're successful in my bro. It's go time, like we're building your empire. Let's, you know, there's no, you've got to have a hustle mode. And I think also founders respect that. So I want to ask you a little bit of a different question. I'm obsessed with brands that last a long time. I'm also a massive American history buff. And some of the best brands in America, you know, they've been around for over a century, Coke, Snickers, M&Ms, like brands that you've worked with. I think Mars is like a $50 billion dollar your business that's family owned. Hershey's is run, I think run by a family trust. I think they do something like 10 or 20 billion, you're in revenue. And these brands, you know, everyone talks about getting healthy, but like Reese is probably isn't going to go away for the next 50 years. Coke, it's probably not going to go away for 100 years. And also you've worked with startups. Is there anything that I or Sean or the listener can learn from these old big companies that have been around for 100 plus years? - Yeah, they do a very good job of two things. They're managing their installed base. So they have fantastic retail presence and they do in my opinion, when I great marketing to maintain relevance for their brands. If I wasn't shocked how well they do it, in a world where technically you shouldn't be eating or drinking any of those products. However, where they are spot and they get Pepsi credit for this, they do go out and buy the future as well. Like Pepsi bought Poppy, not because it's an apple cider vinegar beverage because they're seeing the vision. And this could be right up there and they've said it to me is between like Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Poppy, that should be their soda line up and choose what you want. If you feel like having a Pepsi, great. And both of the growth is all coming from their zero sugar products. So it's not coming from coal coca-coca-coca Pepsi. It's Pepsi zero. Yeah. Correct. Pepsi zero is crushing your Coke zero is crushing. And so Poppy fits into that realm. So they see that. You still maintain your legacy, but you have to make sure you pick up the future, otherwise you will get left behind. And so I think you're seeing it, like you don't leave a butcher boy, grooms, right? Like that, they're buying the future. There's a lot of M&A. Oh, she just bought less a riva. Like that, they are buying the future. And I think they, but they're getting a little savvier and a little wiser and how they do it. Before they would get brands that I don't think were built to last. And now to your point, Sam. I think they're trying to find brands that are built to last. And for me, if we look at all the exits we've been a part of, whether those brands continue growing 40%, or just maintain a good scale, vitamin, smart, Poppy, vital proteins, buy, farmers' dog, like all these are still, once upon a farm, you know, we IPO that brand, we see, they're all still that. And they, they will be here if managed right for the next 10, 20, 30, 40 years. Sean had a good question that he was telling me that he had for you, but I'm gonna ask it. And he has a guy, he has a guy to it. He has a guy I am. He has a guy to it. He's a gift. He's a gift. Yeah, I'm gonna steal it from him. And it was basically, if a young guy were to go and shadow you, what would they be surprised about how you spend your time? Shadow you for like a day or a week, yeah. Quick question, Sam. So a few things. I think what allows me, I think they will be a little surprised of how I can change lanes so rapidly. So part of my success and part of my failures are around my ADD. So I can go from five different company conversations with different founders to then figuring out the plumbing problem in my house, to the new house that I'm trying to buy, but getting screwed on with the price. Like I can change lanes and gears very rapidly and be fully engaged. And by the end of it, I'm exhausted, right? My brain shut off and then I have to watch TV to unlock to sort of calm it down. So one of the things I'll find is how I rapidly able to change lanes. The second thing is, even though I personally don't operate at a detailed level personally, they'll be surprised how detailed I get with the brands and founders I partner with because I have great recall of information. And so they're surprised sometimes if I understand I've forgotten something from like a month ago when I asked them about it, you can ask all res, he's a classic. I'm like three weeks ago, we spoke about this, where are you on this? He's like, how did you remember that? He thought because I forgot to come back, he could ignore me. And so my money to recall and retain info because you have to go deeper founders because if you go shallow, you're not helping them out. It's got to be meaningful stuff that helps impact their business. And the third thing is I'm blessed to be living a great lifestyle. I'm living the American dream, random and immigrant that came here and did well. But I also am able to do high love, right? So from where I eat, I mean, you know, the taco stand or where I go, I go and do the grocery shopping, I'm not sending someone, I'm like, I'm there, I'm picking stuff up. Because I think if you don't live in reality, you then operate in reality, you kind of end up in this one percent world which doesn't help when you're dealing with products that could deal with all Americans. I was talking to a buddy of ours, who's a brilliant marketer, and I probably sold a billion dollars of products online. And he, I opened up my laptop and he saw that I had ad blocker on and he's like, how could you? He's like, you're a marketer. He's like, you have to study your craft. - Yeah. - Through every ad, he logged in, another guy logged into his Facebook and he's on Facebook, he's a woman. Like his profile is his, but he did a whole Facebook, I'm a woman. 'Cause he's like, I wanna see what they're marketing. - Right, really 40 years old woman in America, that's the prime target I need to see. Who's what's the messaging? And I was like, there's levels to this game of intensity and detail. What do you think, where's your weakness in business? I think sometimes I may have too much belief. You know, when you love a product and you like, you kind of have faith that blinds you and a little bit to the whether it's the founder, you think is amazing or whether you love the product and you're not overly focused on the gross margins because, you know, I'm a big field of dreams guys, build it and they will come. But if you don't build it correctly, I feel the dream won't come. And sometimes when I love something a lot, I end up ignoring some of the red flags. So I think passion is a super important element, but passion at all costs can be dangerous. Let's leave it with this while we're in the business of stealing questions. Patrick O'Shaughnessy has this great question he asked the guest at the end of every one of his, that's like the best episodes. And he asked the guest, he said, "What's the kindest thing anyone's ever done for you in your career?" And I'm just curious, what comes to mind when I say that? Like, what's the kindest thing anyone's ever done for you? Kindest thing anyone's done for me. You're a shout out to a guy, it's probably two of them. I've been adopted a couple of times. One time was at Coca Cola when I was about to leave because they gave me a brand called Box Woodpeer, you know that. Like, maybe I told you I have a few mantras, one of my mantras influenced the influence of the others, become a part of pop culture. The third one is live the brand. Well, I can't live Box Woodpeer. I don't understand it. I grew up in Zambia, I bloody hate Woodpeer. So I was on sprites, someone demoted me. And I ran Box and two guys, and I was about to leave and my career would have been to us because I was going to some travel.com bullshit site that ended up folding. And two guys, I got called Todd Popman and a guy called Darrell Cobb and kind of heard that we're leaving, saved me. So we'll give you something different. Don't leave. They put me on power raid and that changed the trajectory of my career once. And then when I got to Vitam water, I was doing great. I took over all the marketing, but either Fowder and I kind of had different visions on how to market. And I don't think he liked my approach, but I was what was bringing the heat to the brand. And I think he wanted to fire me at one point. And so Mike Cropoli, he was a president of the company, changed reporting structure and put me under him so that, because he and I got an ungreat, he said, "Rone, take you go aside. Either you want to report the CEO and get fired and report to me and I got you because now you're my guy." And so I said, "I want money out of an ego." So I reported to Mike and I still ran marketing, but Fowder could have fired me, right? I was an employee at Will. That would have also changed the trajectory of my career. So this is only the second podcast that you've done, is that right? Yeah, correct. Dude, thanks for coming on. Where should people go find you if they want to follow more or get more of what you're doing? You know what? It's a really good question. It's a horrible answer. You actually can't go any way yet, other than you guys. And you don't have social media. Subscribe to this podcast. If you want to see him again. The last one that was like that was Brian Johnson. He came on. Oh, wow. He was just hacking on his own body and his own privacy of his own home and then he came on this podcast. And so you know, maybe you'll have an episode. Maybe I can reverse the age by 20 years. My wife would love that. We were his first podcast. You know Sean, I don't know if I ever told you. They called me last year and he was, "Hey, I just wanted to thank you because you were the first podcast that I ever did and you guys asked me a lot of really hard questions that I didn't even, I never even thought about. It's so, "Hey, I'm thankful for you for doing that." And B, when I saw the response, I was like, "Oh, I should do media." And I should go hard. This works. It's crazy. And look what he's done. You guys in the influence about it. Remember the one in 10? You are the one in 10, guys. My, my contrary and belief about Brian Johnson is the greatest marketer alive right now. Possibly. He understands social media at a level that I don't know anybody else does. It's general rule. It's general rule. Maybe, but yeah. Exactly. Well, thanks, man. Thanks for coming on. You're awesome. Pleasure. Thanks, Jake and the time. All right. That's it. That's the pod. I feel like I could rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off. I'm on a road. Let's travel. Never look at me. I want to tell you about a podcast that you could check out. It is called The Science of Scaling by Mark Rebares. He was the founding CEO of HubSpot. And he's a guest lecturer at Harvard Business School, the guy Smart. And he sits down every week with different sales leaders from cool companies like Klavio, Invanta and OpenAI. And he's asking about their strategies, their tactics, and how they're growing their companies as, you know, head of sales or chief revenue officer. If you're looking to scale a company up, if you're a CRO or head of sales, just looking to level up in your career, I think a podcast like this could be great. Great for you. Listen to the science of scaling wherever you get your podcasts.