There’s a Great Business Hiding in Your State⏐Holdco Bros. Ep. #209
34m 54s
The transcription involves a conversation about starting businesses in all 50 states in the U.S., inspired by Ryan Trayhand's series. The idea is to launch low-cost, easily manageable businesses in each state within a day. Different business concepts unique to each state are discussed, such as shed hunting in Wyoming and tour guiding in various national parks. There is a suggestion to involve entrepreneurs from each state in the business launch process. The conversation emphasizes the need for thorough planning and logistics to execute the ambitious project successfully. Additionally, the potential for collaboration with state tourism boards and innovative marketing strategies like showcasing the business journey through an RV rental service are explored. The discussion showcases a blend of creativity, entrepreneurship, and strategic thinking in setting up businesses across the U.S.
Transcription
7225 Words, 38843 Characters
Do you know how much fire departments pay
to clear acreage by hand?
$28,000 an acre.
It's like government sanction theft.
They have over a million people every single year
that come and shop at the store,
which is just nuts to me.
There's been stories of Rolexes, 40 carat,
emerald being sold there, well below retail value.
You just need knowledge.
You just need to watch the series and you can monetize it.
And then you're playing middleman
with local municipalities.
It's such an easy lift.
We're gonna start a business.
And little twist, I'm gonna give the business away.
(dramatic music)
All right guys, this was a fun one.
I had Nick on again, my business partner and best friend.
I had kind of an announcement that I'm really excited about.
We talked about a bunch of business ideas
that are specific to certain states.
I don't know how else to describe it.
Just business ideas that are unique to certain states
and that really fit well in that state.
And then some other random business ideas
thrown in as well.
There's some good stuff in here.
Please share with a friend and enjoy.
Did you see that video I posted about Ryan Trayhand?
Do you know who Ryan Trayhand is?
Honestly, I did not know who Ryan Trayhand was
until you posted that video.
- Okay, so this kid, he's from Texas.
Went to college at Texas A&M.
He was like a state champion runner-up
for cross country and high school.
Super likeable guy, he's blonde, he's like late 20s.
And he's a YouTuber.
He's got 27 million subscribers.
Kids love him, adults love him.
He's really charismatic, he's got the Riz.
Anyway, he's doing this series
where he's visiting 50 states in 50 days.
Which, of course, me and my family,
we visited 50 states in 60 days, right?
- Yes you did.
- So we're watching as a family and it's super good
and he's raising million dollars for St. Jude's
and he said, if you donate $5,000, I will say thanks
on one of my videos and his videos get, that was it.
His videos get four to 10 million views each, right?
- Wow, okay.
- And so, come all, this is come all this idea.
I can't claim it.
He's like, what if you started a business
in 50 states in 50 days?
And like, it didn't even go through the cycle of like,
that's crazy, who would do that?
Then me thinking it's good?
Like immediately it's like, that's an amazing idea.
That's something that I would do, I would love doing
and I will, like immediately I'm like, I'll do it.
Talk to the wife about it and she's like, heck yeah,
let's do it, because those two months when we did that,
we're the best two months of our lives.
It was the best. - Really?
- Absolutely, not even close.
- Wow.
- All day, every day with your family,
seeing a new state every day in an RV,
like adventures and getting stuck
and like, it was just incredible.
So we're gonna do it again next summer
and we're gonna, I'm going to start a business
with my kids in every state in 50 days.
- In every single, how do you even do that?
(laughing)
In all seriousness, this is gonna be a chip on shoulder moment,
but like, that's not possible.
- Oh!
(laughing)
- It's not, I'll tell you right now.
- Okay, okay, all right.
- Okay, let's on.
- You know what, okay, if there's a betting line out there,
so our polymarket is sponsoring this podcast.
So let's get a betting line over under,
whether or not a Chris starts 50 businesses.
- First of all, let's start by defining what a business is.
- Okay.
- According to this challenge,
and I'm making up the rules here.
- This is my challenge.
- Business or business?
- Take your pick.
- Depending on which state you live in.
- Okay.
(laughing)
- So, a business, I'm not gonna file an LLC.
I'm not gonna have an EIN or a license.
I'm gonna start approachable low cost of entry,
low barrier to entry businesses in every state
that is something that could be started in eight hours or less.
I started a business in 56 minutes,
live on YouTube last week.
- Okay.
- So, farmers market business, service business,
door-to-door cleaning gutters, pressure washing,
I go by a pizza oven at Home Depot
that I post up at a farmer's market the next day.
I just use the skills that I have
to start businesses in every state.
Maybe it's even an online business,
and I happen to be in North Dakota while I'm starting it.
- So, the idea is, could I generate a dollar in a day
while I'm in this state?
And it could be any of those things.
It could be pressure washing,
it could be selling e-commerce,
it could be selling a course,
like whatever it is.
- Could be flipping stuff on Facebook.
- Flipping stuff on Facebook marketplace.
- Could I generate a dollar, and how would I do it in this state?
That is doable, that's doable.
- Dang it, dang it.
We need to change the betting line.
- Nope, it's that.
- Mohammed, edit that in.
- And this is like, I'm laying no bones about it.
I'm blatantly copying Ryan Trehan's concept
by putting a business angle on it.
I love the concept.
- And you know what?
Guess who saw 50 states before Ryan Trehan did.
This guy did.
- Okay. - Sorry.
- Sorry. - Going back.
And a little twist, I'm going to give the business away,
whatever you call a business.
That's not going to be anything very impressive.
I'm going to give it away to a local in the area,
and I'm going to give him all the revenue that I generated
to help him run it as like operational expenditures.
- First of all, I love the idea.
Second, I think you said that Ryan Trehan would have people
pay him in order to get him to thank them on their videos.
- He raised money for St. Jude's and non-profit,
and if you donated 5,000 or more,
he would shout you out on his video.
- So, I'm going to play this video.
So this is a clip from Ryan Trehan's episode
where he's thanking me.
And there were like dozens of people on this one episode,
this one day that donated over $5,000.
I was just want to, so here we go.
- $1,050. - What?
- In 2022, our family saw 50 states in 60 days.
You inspired us to start a business in 50 states
in 50 days on our YouTube channel, the corner office.
Oh my gosh.
Dang, you guys took it up a notch.
That's amazing.
I love it.
- That's it.
- Dude.
- So, that was like the official launch.
And I had kids come up to me at church,
and like, "Shut up, I saw you on Ryan Trehan."
You're gonna see all 50 states?
- Yeah.
- So was that video literally just him,
like, "Hey, I'm here thanking people
because they paid $5,000."
- Yeah.
- That was one of many, one of many thanks he gave out
in that one episode.
- And that episode will still get three to four million views.
- That already has, yeah.
- That is mind blowing, dude.
You know what's crazy to me?
I was just talking, I went and visited.
I told you a guy in my ward's business.
He's a carpecleaning company, zero res, here in Boise.
And he was talking to me about how he gets customers.
And like, radio was really big for them for a while.
And he was like, "I haven't really seen the ROI."
So he stopped, he was spending a lot of money on radio
for a month.
He stopped and he didn't see a drop off.
You spent five grand for Ryan Trehan to shout you out.
How many millions of people saw that?
- Yeah, about five million.
- Like, if you were to just do the cost analysis.
- Yeah.
- Whatever the CPM is, right?
Like, it's like $10 CPM basically.
It's a no-brainer.
- Yeah.
Well, dude, did you hear about electric bikes?
Have you ever heard of that company?
- No.
- Okay, it's an electric bike company called Electric.
And in his second episode of 50 States,
they donated $100,000.
It's the end of every episode.
He would just start swiping on his donations with his wife.
And he came across that.
And he's like, "Shock, he's like $100,000."
And then they showed up at his house.
And they gave him a bike, which he did not expect.
And then they said, "If you ride this every day, in every episode,
we'll give you $10,000 more per day that you ride this."
And he's like, "Holy crap, you're so generous.
Thank you so much."
But if you add up the 250 million views
that his series gets against the $600,000 or whatever,
they donated to him, it's nothing.
Like it's pennies.
And now, if you go look at electric bikes,
Google Trends, keywords, backlinks, they are blowing up.
They are like the de facto electric bike company now
because of that $600,000 investment.
- I know that's not what we were planning on talking about right now,
but you put out an episode that was like,
if you could play the lottery for free every single time,
why wouldn't you?
- Yeah.
- And you were talking about short form video, right?
Like just the ability to grow an audience and outreach.
To me, like that's, that's as a creator.
We're talking about like the other end of the spectrum here
as someone who's buying media.
It just seems, that's kind of like a lottery ticket as well.
I think it's a little bit less risky.
But like, yeah, $5,000 for someone to see or hear about me,
four million times.
- Yeah.
- Also like I'm donating to like, you know, help treat kids' cancer.
You know, like worst case, I'm helping kids with cancer.
- Cheese.
- All right.
So what do I think about your idea?
Same freaking thing, it's genius.
Are you thinking logistically?
You could just do like the same thing in every state.
You know what I mean?
I'm just gonna flip something on Facebook Marketplace.
And so it's like, yeah.
It could be a different item every single state,
but it's all Facebook Marketplace based.
And then it would sort of take out the mental lift
every single time.
Or is that how you're thinking about it?
Or are you thinking like, nope,
it's got to be a different thing every single time.
'Cause those are two very different lifts.
- I wanted to be unique.
I want every video to be different and unique.
And ideally I start businesses that are kind of unique
to that state, you know?
But I've got 10 months to plan this.
And so I'm probably gonna be hiring someone
like just for this project, like an assistant to call
do logistics because like if I'm going to Montana
and I'm coming through like the Southwest corner,
I can't start a business way up there
in Glacier National Park.
It doesn't work.
I have to find a business that would fit in that corner.
'Cause I just don't have time to drive all over every state.
I've got to hit the parameters like we did
three years ago as a family.
So there's a ton of planning.
Like I got to have plan A, B, C for each state.
Because like, what if I,
what if I'm gonna sell pizzas at a farmer's market
and then the farmer's market gets rained out?
I got to have a plan B, you know?
- I think it was Sam par, I can't remember.
But there are examples of people starting up
almost like local yellow pages in their local markets.
There's like a renters.
I couldn't remember, dang it.
I can't remember exactly what it was.
The gist is people are interested in their local markets.
And so if they see a link that's like
the top 10 restaurants to eat in Boise, Idaho
or the top 10 restaurants to not get in Lucas Texas.
- Oh, you're talking about his roommate finder
in San Francisco.
- That's what it was, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like they're gonna click on those.
So for this to be maximally effective for you,
yeah, you do wanna do all that research.
It's like, okay, if I'm going to Wyoming,
what are the top 10 things in that state
that are gonna be most attractive to those people?
How am I gonna get them interested in it?
How do I make it unique?
Like there's a ton of work for then each one of those.
- Even if you're flipping one thing on Facebook.
- You just saying Wyoming gave me a great idea.
You know, there's a whole industry in Wyoming and Montana
for shed hunting where like every season on a certain day
- What?
- The season that you gotta chase these sheds down.
The season opens up where you can go find elk antlers
that the elk shed during the winter.
And you sell them for a lot of money.
And so like people will wait until sun up.
And then as soon as the sun comes up legally,
they'll go rush out with their backpacks.
And with their dogs and they'll just start looking
for elk antlers.
And then they'll strap them to their backpacks.
And then at the end of the day, they'll all come back
with sometimes like hundreds of pounds of antlers
on their shoulders.
And then they'll carve them up, they'll sell them.
They'll sell them as dog bones.
They put them on the wall.
Like what if one of my episodes was shed hunting
in Wyoming and you could only do that in Wyoming?
You know, like that would be awesome.
And then I have to go sell it.
Or what if it was like, oh, I know for a fact
anybody who goes to Zion's National Park
has to either get an orthotic or sunglasses.
Let's just say it's sunglasses.
Yeah.
I'm going to go to every gas station that I know
is at a choke point that goes into Zion's.
And I'm going to launch a product in those gas stations, right?
Like that's my project for Utah.
Like every single state is going to have a similar type thing
that you can do the research on and then find
that is going to be unique to it.
But yeah, you definitely got to hire somebody for that.
Or I could be like a tour guide for the most famous hikes
and like Nero's, the Nero's hike.
Like, hey, give me 30 bucks.
I'll take 10 people.
And I'll give you guys all like the history
and the behind the scenes of the Nero's hike, you know?
Chris, Chris, this would be really cool.
I don't know how big of a team you'd have to do.
You'd have to hire out for this.
But this potentially is awesome.
You could reach out to the state tours and board
for every state and say, this is what I'm doing.
This is the number of subscribers I have.
Like you have a couple million.
It's legit.
I'm coming to your state.
A, who do you think I should go talk to?
But B, they might have some state funds for this.
Like states set aside money for their tourism boards
so that they can, you know, attract people to it.
You might be able to get some of these businesses funded.
Oh, yeah.
That would be, that would be really cool.
That's what Ryan Trayhand.
I mean, he got to stay in a free Airbnb every night.
And Airbnb didn't officially sponsor it.
Or else he would have legally had to put
like hashtag Airbnb sponsor and he didn't.
And I'm sure he would have.
But they paid for all of his stays.
And he stayed in a different unique Airbnb every night,
which was like another retention hack.
Like I want to see the potato that he stays in tomorrow, you know?
- What if you did this instead?
What if you said, hey, I'm opening up applications
for any entrepreneur around the country.
I'm going to choose one person from each state.
Just hear me out before you cut me off.
I'm going to choose one person from each state.
Pitch me your idea.
And then when I get to your state, we're launching the business.
So it's like you're just staying in your zone of genius,
which is, I'm going to show you how you can go
from zero to dollar in one day.
And so maybe for one person, it's Facebook and Meta ads.
Maybe for another person, it's, you go to outscraper,
you get a bunch of text messages.
And then, and then that's how you're landing business.
Maybe for another person, it's optimizing Google LSA, whatever it is.
That way the lift is a little bit lighter for you.
And there's an easy handoff to a person in that state
that you can then come back to and say,
how's this business doing six months later?
I don't know if you do that.
But that might be a really cool.
It might be a dumb idea, actually.
No, I think it would add to the intrigue a significant amount.
It would also add to the logistics, the significant amount.
So the question is, would that be worth it, you know?
Would it add to the logistics?
Yeah, because now I have to manage 50 relationships
in every state and what if they flake out on me?
What if they don't show up, you know?
So, but what I was going to say,
if I'm going to have plan A, B, C for every business anyway,
then plan A might as well be with another entrepreneur
and then plan B and C could just be solo, you know?
Dude, or you could take a owner's members.
Like, there could be some people that you kind of handpicked there
where you're not just necessarily starting from scratch.
Like, you have some relationships in there.
There's always a chance somebody flakes out,
but that might be a good place as well.
I love this idea, man.
I don't know.
What do you want me to say, Chris?
What do you want me to say?
You've done it again?
To your genius?
Tell me it's going to fail.
That would be extra good.
Oh, yeah, I mean, like every other business
you've ever started in your entire whole life,
it's going to fail, Chris.
How big of a chip did that just put on your shoulder,
be honest?
I'm selling like this.
I'm sorry, that's not quasi-motor.
That's just Chris with a chip on his shoulder.
All right, you know I'm always talking about data,
the numbers that actually matter, because you need data to grow.
And you need to grow to make real money.
Beehive is the newsletter platform
that I've used for over a year and a half
because of their data.
Well, for multiple reasons, but especially because of their data,
yes, most platforms will tell you someone opened your email.
It's cool, but beehive tells you everything.
Engagement drop-off, which links people ignore,
and which ones they click again and again,
what keeps readers scrolling?
You get real-time subscriber insights,
AB testing results, even predictive analytics measures.
It's like having your entire subscriber base
give you feedback live, and you can set up automated sequences,
welcome emails, re-engagement campaigns.
All based on that behavior, because the truth is,
if you can't measure it, you can't improve it.
And beehive shows you what's actually happening.
So head to beehive.com/Chris for 30% off three months.
That data will change how and what you write.
It's petty, but it'd be really cool.
Take an RV, use it.
And then as you're doing the 50 states and 50 days,
every single day show that after you're back, right?
So let's say you're in June, you open up bookings for October.
And you just show every day bookings that are coming in
for your RV that you're driving around.
And then you look at all the people who were like,
you can't start an RV rental company.
And you'd be like, oh, that's so weird.
I'm booked out, booked out for the next nine months.
I'm driving with my family right now.
And yet I'm getting revenue up front.
It's weird.
It's going to be called a negative cash conversion cycle.
You ever heard of it?
So that's summer of 2026.
It's going to be awesome.
We'll see.
We've got to do something in Idaho.
Why don't we do that?
Why don't we talk about some like state specific business ideas?
You said you started talking about an RV
and that kind of gave me an idea.
You want to hear this one?
Absolutely, I do.
Now, you're going to have to forgive me
because I'm going to talk about a state
that is not our favorite in Mexico.
Oh, my gosh.
Oh, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.
But let me share my screen and show you why I had this idea.
I have to look at it.
You do.
It's not in New Mexico yet.
Don't worry.
OK, that's fine.
Do you remember in a guy, but do you remember Napoleon Dynamite?
Of course.
This was the van from Napoleon Dynamite.
Uncle Rick.
He felt Lord.
Do you know this guy built a business
around renting this van out?
He bought it on eBay for 12 grand.
And now he rents it out.
And he makes good money from it.
And that's his whole business.
He also bought the Delorean from back to the future.
And he rents them out.
He has like these movie props, not just movie props,
but like rentable movie props that he can monetize to superfans.
OK.
Daddy like you where you're going with this.
OK.
So then if you look over here, breaking bad, New Mexico,
you have three iconic vehicles.
You've got the Pontiac Aztec.
You've got the wagon here.
And then you've got the RV, right?
So doesn't have to be New Mexico only, obviously.
But some sort of a vehicle or a prop.
There is a website called propstore.com
where you can buy movie and TV store props.
And you can monetize them.
So what do you think about this?
Dude.
How much money would I have to pay to throw a pizza on somebody's roof?
That's what I'm saying is like that house--
I know.
--a ton of visitors.
You could just post up outside that house and monetize stuff.
Like, hey, how about I take you on a breaking bad tour
of Albuquerque?
And I'm going to show you all the scenes where this happened.
That happened.
You don't need overhead.
You just need knowledge.
You just need to watch the series.
And you can monetize it.
OK.
So the reason that Chris and I are acting this way
is because it's 10 years ago--
11.
11 years ago.
She used to lose.
So 11 years ago, I was living in Dallas
and moving to Southern California.
And Chris rode with me as I drove the U-Hauls.
And so we drove from Dallas to LA.
And we drove through New Mexico.
And Chris has always been a foodie.
Back then, he was using this app called Urban Spoon.
Was it Urban Spoon?
Yeah, I remember that app.
Urban Spoon.
And he was like, oh, dude, did this Mexican place?
On Urban Spoon is a 9 out of 10.
Anything over a 6, you know it's going to be good.
I've been using this for years.
You know it's going to be good.
And we went to the Mexican restaurant.
How's the Mexican restaurant there?
Chris, in New Mexico.
It was as good as any food in New Mexico.
Total dog water.
Total dog water.
It was terrible.
And we didn't apply the New Mexico discount
to the food ratings.
A 9 in New Mexico is a 3 in California.
It's like, you know, being a Boise 9 is a California 2.
All right, I get it.
Anyways, we did drive by the Breaking Bad House.
And I guarantee there are people who have tried this.
But I do like that idea of finding local spots
that are really popular and, you know,
maybe building a tour business around it
or the experiential aspect is really cool.
So the RV from Breaking Bad, what if you just
bought some land outside of New Mexico
and then bought an RV like that?
Outside looks awful, but inside's just sick.
Decked out, you know, it's fitted with air conditioning.
So it's like, oh, I'm kind of living the Breaking Bad
life, you know, pulling the Cody Sanchez of like,
I bought three acres and I threw up a glamping site on it.
But it's, it's themed.
It's not necessarily just a glamping site.
I think that'd be really cool.
And every state has stuff like that.
Every state has iconic things if you will go and see.
This is the Breaking Bad House.
It sold earlier this year for $4 million.
It sold due to increasing attention to the house.
Basically, the people living in the house
had a miserable life because they had no privacy.
But it's like, the fair market value for this house
was like five or 600 grand and it's sold for $4 million
because it's the Breaking Bad House.
So do you think you could just put ads on that house?
I think there's a lot of stuff you could do.
I actually tweeted about this when it first went up for sale.
It's not in an HOA.
I'm sure they're going to like just give tours,
like guided tours for a fee.
I interviewed a guy on my podcast over a year ago
who lives in the flight path of LAX
and for his business on his roof is advertising.
It's like his, but he's advertising for his business.
And I can't remember the exact stats, but he tracks it
'cause it's a specific link that he only has up
for that flight path.
And he's like, yeah, I mean, it's worth hundreds of thousands
of dollars a year in advertising for me.
That's amazing.
Isn't that cool?
This house made me think of a different framework.
It's like these people have been very public
who lived in it before about how miserable their life was.
Stop visiting our house, leave us alone,
quit throwing pizzas on our house.
There's two ways to look at it.
One is like, we were cursed.
Now, first of all, they got paid to rent out that house
to Breaking Bad to have it filmed, okay?
They chose to do that, right?
That was a choice they made.
And then they were angry at the world
'cause they didn't have privacy.
They could have been like, what a blessing.
This random TV show that ended up being
one of the greatest TV shows of all time chose our house.
Now we can monetize this any which way.
They could have moved and then like sold tickets,
like given tours, they could have moved somewhere
where they have privacy and monetized it.
But instead, they just complained for a decade
and then sold them from $4 million.
- Oh, and I guarantee the person who paid $4 million
for it was like, you see how many eyeballs a month?
They've got to be monetizing that somehow.
Even if you just turned it into a Breaking Bad Museum.
- That's it.
How much would you pay to go take a dump?
What's Walt's brother-in-law's name?
- We just got demonetized in every platform.
- Sorry.
(laughing)
- Where he's reading his brother-in-law's name?
- Hank.
- Hank's reading and he's like, Walter White
is Eisenberg?
- It's a famous scene.
Man, I didn't know.
If you want to go to the bathroom in that bathroom,
it's right there.
- I'm so glad I wanted me to watch that show again.
- I like that idea.
Okay, so I guess that's to put a bow on that idea.
It's like movie props, something
that's state-specific that you can buy
and monetize in some way.
- Yeah, that's it.
- Also, a couple other data points.
There's Mayberry, the old, what's the show?
- Antigriff Show.
- Antigriff Show, in the same city where that was filmed,
they have a car, like the Mayberry car,
where you can pay $40 to go on a ride in the Mayberry car.
So, there's other examples of this.
- I love it.
Can I tell you about a business that I found this week?
- Isn't that what this podcast is for?
- Guilty.
- Chris, what happens to all the unclaimed baggage
that the airlines don't know what to do with?
Do you know, this throwed away?
- They don't.
- No, they don't.
I didn't know this, but after like,
after 90 days of an unclaimed period,
all the unclaimed baggage in the United States
goes to one place because there's only one place
that is licensed to resell unclaimed airline baggage.
And that is...
- Unclaimed baggage in Scottsboro, Alabama.
- Freaking, where is Scottsboro, Alabama?
I don't even know where that is.
- It's Northeast, in between Chattanooga and Birmingham.
- Is it in the middle of nowhere?
- Yes, it is.
- Okay, so this place gets between five
and seven thousand pieces of luggage.
Every single day, every single day.
It's nuts to me, it's this 50,000 square foot center.
They take a third of the items that they get
from the airlines, and they just throw them away
'cause they're crap.
They take a third of them that they get from the airlines,
and they then donate those to charity,
and then they take a third, and they resell it.
So it's like the world's biggest flea market,
it's not even the right word, thrift store.
- It's like government sanction theft.
- Dude, in a way.
- Like, it really is.
And there's only one licensed reseller in the United States.
It's a monopoly.
They have over a million people every single year
that come and shop at the store,
which is just nuts to me.
There's been stories of Rolexes, 40 karat,
tamarold being sold there, well below retail value,
and this part's nuts to me.
It's been around since 1970.
Could you imagine owning a monopoly for, what is that?
60 years, no, 50 years at this point, 55 years?
Do you know who owns this?
I looked into it a while ago, and I've been there before,
but no, I don't know who owns it.
I don't know who owns it either, but it's a private.
- When we were living in Alabama, we had heard about it.
- We're like, dude, let's go on.
We had, it was like a Saturday.
Let's go on Clang Baggage.
Let's go get some deals.
Let's go check it out.
We go there, and it was just a big nothing burger.
Like really, from the business concept is amazing,
but it's not cheap.
Like they can sell stuff for whatever they want
because they have so much demand.
It's such a, you know, it's such a unique tourist attraction.
They have a captive audience,
and it's like more expensive than a thrift store.
You go there thinking you're gonna get deals,
but I just think they have so much demand.
They don't have to sell stuff at a discount.
I just looked it up.
Founded in 1970 by Doyle Owens,
he used a borrowed pickup truck
and a modest $300 loan to launch his venture
purchasing unclaimed luggage.
And in 1995, his son Brian Owens
and wife Sharon purchased the business.
So they've just owned it privately since 1995.
It's nuts.
So this got me thinking, what other businesses could there be
like this, where discarded, forgotten assets
for lack of a better word are just left
that you could resell?
What are some of the things that might look like this?
- Dude, it makes me think of my kid's school.
I go to my kid's school and near the end of every semester,
you walk in and they'll have this big display of clothes
and it's basically 90% clothes and tumblers.
And it's like, come get your crap.
We're gonna throw it away.
You can't tell me that every school in America
doesn't have that, right?
There's gotta be something like a lost and found
as a service or like software
that enables these schools to better get rid of it
or sell it or donate it, some sort of a system
or something where you can aggregate all this stuff
and liquidate it, sell it on eBay, whatever.
- I got some for you, ready?
- Okay.
- What do all the car rental companies do
with the crap that gets left?
- Steal it.
- Surely it's...
- I mean, come on.
Dude, if you're cleaning out a car and you're paid $17 an hour,
you find an iPhone under the seat.
You're not putting that in the pocket.
Come on.
No, but in all seriousness,
it's gonna be the same problem as airlines, right?
They're gonna have items that are left behind.
I have no idea, but that could potentially be a business
that is very similar to this.
Hotels, obviously hotels are gonna be
in a very similar situation, right?
Basically anything around travel, Airbnb's,
maybe there's somebody who owns 100 Airbnb's
that they license out to a property management company.
You can get in touch with some property management companies
and say like, hey, I'll buy any left behind items
off of you at a discount, 'cause literally what do they do
with them?
Like you just said, they're probably either throwing them
in a box or they're like, oh, maybe we could sell this
on eBay, but if somebody came to them and say,
- There's no system for that.
- I'll buy your junk from you at a discount.
Here's the cash, and then they wipe their hands from it,
and they go.
- There's something there.
Someone's gonna do something there.
- Fish it.
- Anyways, I like that one.
- It's a good one.
- All right, I'm gonna give you a choice.
You choose your own adventure right here, Nick.
Okay, you ready?
- I'm here.
- I'm in.
- It's like the parable and the Bible of the goats in the sheep.
I'm gonna give you an option.
Goats or donkeys.
Which way are we going?
- Goats.
- Okay, you ready?
- It took everything I had to not swear.
- Oh, just waiting on my eyes.
- That's what you were doing.
That makes sense.
- I just want you.
Thank you.
To not give in Muhammad enough to edit out.
(laughing)
Okay.
Did you know that gas, goats as a service, is a thing,
and it is quite profitable,
especially in California,
our country's biggest state by population.
- Goats as a service.
- What is a service?
- Goats as a service for two reasons.
Oh really, you could use goats for three reasons.
Wildfire prevention.
They eat out all the underbrush because I've own goats.
I've had goats in my backyard.
They don't like the grass.
The cows like the grass, the goats like the weeds.
They go to the weeds first, right?
So if you let a bunch of goats loose in an overgrown lot,
as long as you fence them in,
they will eat those weeds in a matter of seconds.
- Right, enough goats.
- They will eat it up.
So there are businesses in California
that offer goats as a service for brush clearing
and for wildlife prevention.
And so fire departments will hire them
and pay them $500 to $1,000 an acre
to load up their animal trailer full of goats,
release them, put up some temporary electric fencing,
and clear land.
And then they'll come back and get them.
$1,000 an acre.
Do you know how much fire departments pay
to clear acreage manually by hand?
- As opposed to $1,000 an acre.
$28,000 an acre.
$28,000.
- How do you know this?
That's like a number that's readily available.
- I've looked it up.
- The freak.
$28,000 an acre.
- According to CalMatters.org,
according to a nonprofit, California website.
- Oh, so this isn't $42,000 square feet.
Estimated $28,000 to clear an acre.
That sounds insane, right?
- It's public information
'cause fire departments are paying for it.
- Yeah.
- But if you use goats, it's $1,000.
- Dude, screw the goats.
If they're spending $28,000,
just come and be like, "Hey, I'll do it for $20."
- Yep.
- How long's it gonna take me an hour on my John Deere?
- Dude, there was a city in California.
Nevada City in California.
They had a goat fund me, okay?
They raised $30,000 to acquire goats
to munch through acres of vegetation
that could fuel wildfires.
Goat fund me.
- That's incredible.
- $30,000 worth of goats.
- Can we start a business called goat munchers?
(laughs)
- I mean, it just sounds funny.
There's like no connotation
that we goat munchers.
- It is.
- It sounds funny.
- Oakland, California spends
half a million dollars a year on goat grazing.
Do you have an estimated, like, TAM?
Maybe not even TAM.
- I wish I did.
- What's the goat industry in California?
- Yeah, TAM means total addressable market
for those listening.
I don't know.
But this isn't just a California thing.
This is like for wildfire prevention,
it's mostly in California.
But for lane clearing, it's in every state.
Like, I've seen viral Instagram videos
of people that own these businesses.
And it's kind of like the pressure washing guy
or the lawn mowing guy that knocks on people's doors
does it for free, espy mowing.
They're guys that do that with goats.
They'll let a bunch of goats
and they'll put up a camera with a time lapse
and we'll watch the goats munch through it all.
- One of the things that we talk about
over and over on this,
I don't know we've ever said it this way,
but our businesses where you play the middle man
or wholesaler.
- I was just gonna talk about that.
- I was just gonna talk about that.
- Yep, you don't necessarily hold the inventory,
but you're the guy or gal who finds the buyer
and the seller and places them together.
Why could you not start a business
where you just are contacting farm owners
and then you're playing middle man
with local municipalities.
That seems like such an easy lift.
- Moment, wait right there.
I'm gonna share my screen.
This is unprepped.
If I look like an idiot,
I'll just have my homin' edit it out.
But I won't, okay?
For those listening only,
I'm going to Facebook Marketplace,
I'm going to Search Marketplace
and I'm gonna say, "Bore goat."
A bore goat is a very common breed of goat.
I've owned them.
Bore goats for sale, okay?
B-O-E-R.
You look it up.
Look how many options you are.
- There we are.
- There we are.
Shhh.
- Look how many options there are.
It just keeps going and going and going.
Right?
- These are goat farm.
- And this is a radius.
- This is within 90 miles of Dallas, Texas.
So this is the DFW metrics.
- Rab.
- But these are goat farms
that are actively selling on Facebook Marketplace.
This is a small fraction of the goat farms.
How many of these guys are charging for goat grazing?
Probably almost none of them, right?
So if you want to play middle man or woman,
you go acquire customers,
put up a website, Facebook ads,
Google ads, what have you,
people that need lane clearing, brush clearing,
and just play middle man.
You be the lead source.
Go get there.
You could probably use their animal trailer
because any farmer has an animal trailer.
Load it up, say I'll have your goats back by 11 PM.
I know the curfew, sir.
Thank you so much.
I'll take good care of your goats.
Right?
And you're probably going to do some.
- Yep.
And you go, you fence them in and they get to work.
Charge 500 and Naker.
- Yeah.
I like that.
- I would have paid for that.
- So all right, so I get that side of the equation
where it's like, all right, we can go get goats.
How would you find the other side of the equation
like the demand side, right?
I'm guessing the county of Oakland
or the city of Oakland in California,
those are city or county contracts.
It's probably going to take a while.
They probably have to go through a competitive bidding process.
It's knowable, but it's still a long sales cycle.
The land clearing, that one I don't know the answer to.
- I wouldn't worry about the government contracts.
Like you said, 'cause it's so hard.
I would just go the forestry mulching route,
like the dude I interviewed,
who has a forestry mulching business in Cincinnati.
He uses Facebook ads.
That's it.
He spends $23 for a lead.
He closes 49% of all his leads.
His average job size is $3,100.
So he spends $46 to acquire a $3,100 customer.
Just do the same playbook, except your videos
spread even more organically
because it's more virulable than a bobcat munched down a tree.
It's a goat munched down a tree.
- Oh, so you would target landowners on Facebook?
- Yeah, what this guy does is he uses meta ads,
only to zip codes that have rural,
like large tracks of land, 35 years, and older,
and people that show an interest and tractor supply.
Those are landowners.
That's his whole strategy.
So I do that with goats.
You don't need to have a farm.
You don't need to buy the goats.
You just borrow them.
It's a simple borrowing of a goat.
We've all been there.
All right, would you think,
Please share it with a friend and we'll see you next time on the corner office.
Podcast Summary
Key Points:
Discussion on starting businesses in each state in the U.S.
Idea inspired by Ryan Trayhand's series of visiting 50 states in 50 days.
Consideration of unique business ideas specific to each state.
Summary:
, inspired by Ryan Trayhand's series. The idea is to launch low-cost, easily manageable businesses in each state within a day. Different business concepts unique to each state are discussed, such as shed hunting in Wyoming and tour guiding in various national parks.
There is a suggestion to involve entrepreneurs from each state in the business launch process. The conversation emphasizes the need for thorough planning and logistics to execute the ambitious project successfully. Additionally, the potential for collaboration with state tourism boards and innovative marketing strategies like showcasing the business journey through an RV rental service are explored.
S.
FAQs
$28,000 an acre.
Over a million people.
Stories of Rolexes, 40 carat emeralds being sold well below retail value.
Visiting 50 states in 50 days and raising money for charity.
By offering shoutouts for donations of $5,000 or more.
To start low-cost businesses quickly in each state.
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