Liquidity & Liquor - Zeke Pike | How to Sell Products on Amazon

We're going to start. Yeah, let's kick it off. We don't use the action one, right? You bought it for no reason? The action? OK. All right, guys. So we're excited to have with us Zik. Zik has a very interesting story. And I had just a cool, good-looking guy. He's also a quarterback. Was a quarterback. Was a quarterback. Was a quarterback. And today, a very successful entrepreneur, eight-figure business. And we're going to hear a story. It's got, it's got, obviously, we'd ask. I mean, I know Zik already. I know Zik already. So I think I'm going to let you dig in and ask all the questions. I know it's shit. Yeah, I know. So OK, so when I read your, so I read from your podcast. And then I sent them the video you put out, too. I did not see the video. I did not see the video. It was a good video. OK. Yeah, it was a good video. We'll watch it after. OK. You learned everything we're going to talk about, you missed. Well, I read. I mean, I read the documents you gave me. You gave Google Docs, so I wanted to read. That's it. It's usually a watch. I don't like, if you do something, I can watch it somewhere. So I'll do that. I'm like, I have to watch, I have to watch. So you're basically selling people a business right now? Yeah. That tells them, look, you want to sell on Amazon, but you don't need the hassle and customer service. I got you. It just paid me $30,000. How much do you charge people? We charge $40,000. What do you buy? $40,000. And then we have a higher package, which is $65,000, which really is just a different profit split. We've had a lot of people who are like, how can we make more, right? In terms of the model, obviously, we're going to scale it over time. But there's really nothing other than, I'm going to make a little bit more upfront, because I'm giving more of my back into way. We've done that as well. But you've been in the e-commerce space, obviously. And you know, it's just like, it's the market's crazy, right? And so we're really looking for brands. Like, that's what we're really looking for. The right products. The right products. Yeah, absolutely. And so we've heard all these horror stories about dropshipping and all these Amazon automation companies. And for us, we just saw e-commerce as a whole. As like, this is going to be around for a long time. And if companies don't have an e-commerce platform, like, chances are they're going to flag behind. And so we're really just trying to focus right now on building the relationships with the brands. We know that our clients are happy. We don't really market selling businesses anymore, because a lot of our business will come through word of mouth. We don't really run ads on it or anything anymore, just because we really like to focus on the relationships. The one thing I've learned through it is, I love working with good people, right? So when you work with the right people versus trying to work with everybody, we've just seen that partnership form, which is what we really want. We want partnerships. We want people to understand that we're bustin' our ass to make this work and it's hard. Give me an example of a person, because I think a lot of the listeners would, I'm like, so, okay, can I make mine with this guy? So it's like, if a guy goes and gives you some cash, okay? And you go in, how long does it take them to actually don't profit? Yeah, I mean, obviously this is not a get rich quick. It's not going to happen overnight. And if you want to see more in terms of revenue and returns, you got to be able to put more money into the business, right? Our upfront costs are really just, we're building the business, we're putting the people in place, we have the infrastructure, we have the fulfillment, we have the team, we have everything that's in place in order for the stores to be managed and run. So, for us, I think it's like... But if we can say, if you have to kind of give, someone tell you, look, what's my ROI? On this one, I think. I would say conservatively 12 to 18 months. Okay, that's fair. That's 12 to 18 months. That's not actually not that bad. Imagine you buying an apartment to rent and make money on it. If you're lucky, if it takes you 10 years, who pay for the apartment? Or if you buy a business, if you buy a cash flowing business. This is a business. You can always sell the business out there. It's also not going to be a lot of our clients. They're just like middle class people, right? That have either had really good credit and we've been able to fund their business. Or they have some equity that they're like, I don't really have the money to get alone for a house, but I want to make some passive income. We have all different types of clients, but the majority of our clientele is middle class people that are really only leveraging like $5 to $10,000 a month and they're making a 1500, $2,000 a month conservatively, right? Then we have the client that has the ability to scale and they're seeing five figures a month and obviously on. So now you didn't get into it right away, it was first you or the Amazon seller for yourself, you kept looking for goods and you mentioned, it's all about the product, right? And I can totally relate every time I own two companies and the first one was a whole siliconation and I had a bunch of Amazon sellers buying for me. I mean, turn off my phone, so I bought that guy's technique. Okay, but the second one was boxy charm and it was really about the product. I mean, you can have the best marketing and all that but it doesn't really make sense if you don't have the right product. But the second part is so you're doing that and eventually you said, look, I can scale this and I can sell it to people. My first thing I'm gonna tell you is that you're selling a business, now it's a whole different, now it's a B2B instead of a B2C. Why did you switch? I enjoy helping people. Okay, like for me, it was like, I saw especially when the pandemic hit, right? When the pandemic hit, several of our clients had stores. This was right when we were really transitioning, like let's acquire some warehouses, let's get space, let's get some of the infrastructure in place to scale. Did you see more money on the second business than the B2B instead of just dealing with clients every time? Yeah, I mean, the ability to scale was like, you know, you're really, you're using, you're leveraging the clients, you know, capital to be able to scale the business as a whole, right? And so for us, it was like, you know, you could go straight to the bank, right? And try to get X amount of money for it for this or you could use it from a B2B standpoint where it's like, we can not only help the person, but build a business long term for them. Like, it's kind of cool, because you get the cash upfront, you secure yourself, it's a short exit for your revenue, right? And then you still get upside in the future. And I know that some friends that run Wi-Fi money, and they have the same thing in the total that we found out that eventually Amazon's gonna cut your stores, not gonna let you sell the same product that much, they want to diversify with different vendors. So it will look okay, we can own all of those. So we want you to have the LLC, we want you to have all that, and then we can manage that for you. Exactly. Well, and then it's like, obviously, Amazon's very strict. Like, they're policy, but they really only want one person to have one store. Yeah. And so that's where we were like, what do you mean by that? Like, they only want it in, they only technically want one individual to have a store, right? It was meant for individual sellers, and then obviously people are coming in like as businesses, like we want to take it. Originally, it was like, just gonna be an eBay type thing. I don't think they ever really thought it was, you know, and then it became so much more now. So they private equities are buying Amazon business. Exactly. Any other business. Yeah. They're saying, okay, there's no more, because they'll ask you when you run a business, when I was trying to sell Boxy Chum, attacking the first thing that investment bankers tell you, okay, tell us is that Amazon proof. It's a thing. So they said, okay, well, obviously you are selling within that ecosystem, you are proof because your Amazon proof, well, unless they decide to compete with you directly within the own ecosystem, but it's been a shift from Amazon from trying to compete with their own vendors to kind of like, you know what, let's go that, let them be them, and they're getting to it better. And if you sell it within the same ecosystem. So today, you'll find the, you'll find private equities investing in real estate, just like regular rent, buying and then Amazon searches, they're going into the lower end here. That was, so do you run into issues when a business spends up, when a true business is supposed on individual selling? Do you run into issues with Amazon? Like what's the currently state of Amazon TOS in terms of how to set up a store, what you can and can't do? No, I think Amazon just wants good sellers. They ultimately want, they don't need more sellers. They want good sellers. Like people that are going to ultimately represent them in a good, good sense, right? They want good customer service. They want timely, you know, shippings, X, Y, and Z, and ultimately good products. Like it would be very easy to go find some cheap, shitty Chinese product. That's, it's like not, this is what I ordered, right? Like we're really trying to find the, again, it comes back to the product. Good products that people are going to come back to buy, and not necessarily products that are like here and there, like we're really trying to capitalize on some relationships, like some really big companies that I can't say the names of right now, but that would really put us over the edge in terms of what we're allowed to sell, right? They currently are not, not that well, like they're not these companies you're looking at. Some of them are very well known, but they're well known, but they don't have a lot of representation on Amazon. With some of these do, some of these are like products that are used in our everyday lives, and that's what we really are trying to focus on right now, is like, how many excuse do you guys have? Thousands, thousands, 20,000. Oh, but I mean, like what is the process for somebody who say, say like a proctor and gamble product? Okay, that's a household name. I want to take that onto Amazon. Like how do you have those relationships versus somebody starting out? I mean, do you have those relationships? We're getting there, right? We're getting there. And now that we're starting to do the numbers, it's like, you can have those conversations with people like, okay, well, you have 200 and some stores that are doing X amount of dollars every month. Like, okay, it makes sense. If you're coming in with $1,000 a month of purchase orders, like, yeah, we would entertain it, right? Yeah, okay. So now we're at that point where we can start making some of them offers and in work. As long as you show them you control the price. Right, meaning you say, listen, tell me what the price. And I can tell you that there's just a lot of bureaucracy went to going to the big wells. Yeah, it is not easy. They need to go and make sense. They need to control everything. It just so many people have to make that decision. And the reason it doesn't always come through, it's because you need to say the CFO to agree on one thing. And then everyone sits down in a room and everyone wants to sound smart. If everyone said yes, someone has to say no, just a sound smart. It's okay, we'll push it for next quarter meeting. And you have that problem. I am here selling your product. I'm taking your POs just like any other store. I have a chain of stores. You don't need to worry about the fact that each one is a different LLC, but that's how my new business model is. And that is going to be in a future there. So the ones that are going to try harder, that's going to enter sooner, needs to lock it down with exclusivity so they don't sell to your competition. Right. And we go to like, we go to trade shows all the time. Like that's another where we're going to try to find a SD show. Yeah, we're going to Vegas in like two weeks for a big show. We just went to like a big cosmetic show just like two weeks ago. I don't remember what the name was. It was like, it was so boring to be like, every time. It was so not interesting. But that's kind of what it is. It's just like me, one shake in hands, being personable and ultimate, they'd be like, this is what I do. And then getting them to take you serious, right? Like getting them to be like, you're not just selling on Amazon. You look like a football player and then why are you thinking that I'm there? Yeah, but there's a lot of like good brands and good products out there that aren't, like they're not even really big yet. You know, and that's kind of like, we're trying to form something. We just like go to these trade shows and try to find some of these products that's like, maybe you hit a home run. Maybe you don't, you know, but some of them you gotta be willing to take the chance on. So now we're at the point where like, even as a company liquidity wise, we're starting to be able to get some of the prices that we want on some of these things just based on, you know, the orders. And then again, it comes down to scoos, right? The more scoos you're able to get. And then ultimately like, you can get a skew, but like, is it gonna sell, right? Like, is it gonna be bought? And, you know, so. So that's the true value that you give the people that sign up with you, like you're getting relationships they would never have access to. So when you look at somebody who's selling a business, you always have to answer the question, like, why would that person not just do it themselves? So there's things that that person could do immediately. I mean, they can set up an Amazon store that they can start selling, but there's things that the volume that you have access to, it would totally gait somebody who's starting you up from ever doing it at the level or with the products that you're doing. Yeah, basically. Anybody can do it themselves. How many, what's your growth revenue like last year? We did about, say, just shy of 17 million last year. Okay, and 2020. 2020 was like 12, between 10 and 12 and 19. 19, we were doing it. We were like doing a whole different method. We were doing the drop shipping thing. Okay, so what was it then? It was like, we, it was so inconsistent. I only had probably 40 stores. So if I tell you that right now, you take your 17 million a year and you go to a private equity and you said, like, do you want to come in with me? They'll look at your business and they say, what's your EBDA? And they'll say, all right, 17 million. That was around what I was kind of like doing when I, so, okay, your business looks to us like 26 million a year. I'm just throwing a number. We'll give you 12 million to your pocket. You'll keep 30, like whatever percentage that comes out of it. And we might put a couple million on the balance sheet. So we're gonna have, say, 60% of the business, but three more million for operating capital, 12 to your pocket. And that's how, so that's phase one. Yeah. If you keep growing it, you might go into a 50 million dollar valuation. So, and that's the, the ideal way for you to go in and really cash out sooner, right? Not going waiting until it's 100 million because you can have a lot of views doing the same thing. As I see, just in Miami, I have two friends that are doing the same exact thing. I believe you're gonna be bringing Kevin on and they're doing something like it and there's another. So there's, back, there's just so much space to make it. It's a formula. Do you have a warehouse, do you guys, for all the, Okay, so, but I want to get back to that point because you said, yeah, it's nice if you have 17 million top line and then you have, you know, you have your multiple on EBITDA and then you have your EBITDA, then you have your multiple on that and that will give you evaluation. But for you, personally, do you want to build this as a business, you want to exit? Do you want to build this as like a nice cast flowing lifestyle? I love to like get into people's minds. Like, I'll be honest, we're at the point right now where we're starting to have that conversation. Like we gotta, we gotta, we have to start looking this way, right? Because everybody, you want to exit, right? And you want to, you want to exit? I don't know, do you? Yeah, I mean, I think it's like, yeah, you do, I mean, if you get, if you get paid, I don't know, you tell us. Yeah, well, I mean, of course you do. I mean, in a way, right? Look, yeah, look at you, you exit it and now you're looking to do other stuff. Yeah, but you have that, you have that. I'm not saying there's a right way around. The thing is, you sell something by the end of the day. You sell a product and you sell a business. It is a business is a product. Yeah. And you ask yourself, okay, do I want to have a big payday for the next 10 years on this valuation with a little bit much more tax efficient because of the capital gain versus ordinary income? Why not? And can you do something else later? Now, when you sell a piece of it, you don't really sell it completely like that. It's, you do risk yourself, right? So you, you're saying, well, I will secure 10 million in my bank account. So I no longer have to worry about money at that point. It's like, now in the next phases, unless I come out with a hundred, I'm not selling. So I want a bigger next time. Yeah, so, so you keep a piece, you take it to a next level and so on. Right now, down to many of you doing what you're doing, but it's a business that's going to be sold. You can go and look at the, at the future and stuff. You've got me over here, scratching my hand. It's exciting. No, no, no, it's good. And I also want to just like, if you go back into your history, I also think it has to do with where you think you can scale the business, too. So if you're in liquidity and merchandising and what, yeah, so if you could have, if you thought you could scale that, you probably wouldn't have exited when you did. If bought, it wasn't able to scale without having some people around me and then having that cash in the bank, knowing that on a, on a really raining day, fuck, I'm still operating very, but boxy charm as well, boxy charm as well. It was right time, right place. You didn't take it to IPO, you exited. You could have taken it to IPO, but you saw the signs, saw the writing on the wall. You're like, there's a good time. So when you look at your industry, you look at Amazon, Ecom is probably getting hit pretty hard in the recession, but it's not like, it's not like it's not going to be, you feel it on your end? I mean, or are more people trying to go out, but I was, no, because I feel like people, I mean, no, honestly, our numbers, no. I think we went through a period where it was tough with shipping and all that, was kind of like it kind of made of like the block, the chain, the supply chain. Yeah, the supply chain was just kind of not right. We had to like be selective, but we're not really seeing that anymore. Yeah, I'll tell you why it doesn't also see it, because he's not affected by the iOS 14. He's already in Amazon, he has a different ecosystem. I'm talking about the people that purchased stores from him. I mean, your customers could be hit. But that's organic, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, in terms of, no, because here's the thing, people are afraid to buy real estate right now too. Like, you know what I mean? So this is a cash flow. Like they are. People are afraid, are afraid to sell because what are you going to buy? You're going to buy, you know, you sell, and you're going to have to go buy something, you know. So I think people are, you know, I mean, I'll buy, I don't care, but it's like people are like, they don't, you know, right now. So are you promoting yourself on a paid or a paid search, or are you doing it just organic and just right now? That's organic. Like we did. Yeah, I mean, organic. Organically like, we, organic stems from keyword search terms and the volume could decrease. No, no, no, no, if you do paid on paid, you pay every click and you get one clicks. When it's organic, organic, it's much easier for the algorithm to go and give you the right traffic. There's nothing is paid. So if someone is just searching something and he sees people talking about this organically and stories like set up Amazon store would be a keyword, sir, a long time. Haven't seen Wi-Fi doing any, any paid. They've done everything organically. I don't even know a Wi-Fi. What are you talking about? There are not other guys over here. It's just, it's a, it's the same exact thing, right? You know those guys? Yeah, but I don't know if they're doing what we're doing. Like I have so many people. Similar, not, and it's similar. Similar, not plain long, plain long, plain long. Yeah, it's the same thing that they sell you a store in Amazon for 40 grand. Oh, okay. Just call it exact thing. But what they'll do is they go organically and they show how much money they're making. You want to make money come here, click here and all that stuff. Okay. That's, that's pretty much the idea. And people are there and they're making money and I know people that are doing good with them. So it's a, it's a thing that works, right? And the idea was that whenever I understood what you're doing and said, okay, I see what it is. You cannot go and have one store selling say a cookware that's non-branded cookware and just scale so much. But they find that everybody find that, oh, you know what? Like two or three stores, each one get a new privatization after a while. So, okay, how do I get more? Oh, well, it has to be someone else. I can't create so many outlets, he's a mining. They find out, okay, let's get out of people. Oh, you know what, let's let them pay for it and then die. They get a little bit shut down. Like if you have stores that are linked together, they'll get shut down, you know? And a lot of these people like, they don't even know what to do when that happens, you know? A lot of, for a while, people were, were taking money and they were sending it, you know, they're, they're getting these people in India to like run the back and these stores and they were trying to drop shit, right? Drop shit, it was really good. Like, 2016, 2017, like it was very easy to get away. It wasn't. And then Amazon like started to restrict because, I mean, it just, I don't know, I think they were, they were getting cut out, they were getting, you know, a lot of, they were getting cut out. Like that's the hardest part that you did. The hard part that you did is you needed to know what to sell. Exactly. This is the hardest part. So, and then the second part is systemizing it, making sure that the quality of the experience can be at the right quality. You store the right merchandise, you know what to sell, you take the risk, okay, someone else doesn't want to do it. And I'll give you the money. I'll do revenue split, whichever it is. I am going to come across it. Or clients don't care, like they don't really care what we're selling. As long as they see sales and they see the revenue, like they don't care really. And a lot of times they're like, I can't believe, because some of the stuff we sell, they're just like, what? Microcore, like hundreds, thousands of dollars of microcore, like why? Like, people are buying it. And stuff for selling on places like Amazon, more than you're going to just open. If you're going to open your own website for an ad product, it's going to be very hard to find that consumer. But the consumer, if I've seen this with makeup, when I had the liquidation business years ago, I would have e-bears in Amazon sellers walking in every day, every morning, waiting for my containers to come. And they would know exactly when they're coming. They would just come in and they would scan the items, the Amazon, they would scan it. So, you'd find those ad discontinue products that some brands would do. So, maybe lean mascara, pink color, nobody buys a pink color, but guess what? The only one that wanted that pink color would search for it online. So, they would buy it for me for a dollar, because I bought it for 55 cents, and I wanted to get rid of it, because just like that, people don't buy it. But they would come in and how many do you have? 20,000 give it all. And they would, a friend of mine, she sold it all for $13 a piece, right? And there was like, I think I sold her 20,000 units. And she, like this, within a week or two, bam. All those people who wanted that particular crazy color, and their multiple crazy color, but that particular color, you can scan it, you can see. This is the ranking. This is what they're selling for, give it all. And I think that's the coolest thing about, exactly what you're talking about with what we do, is like, we're never locked into one product, right? Like, we're never so, no matter what happens, if some product just goes off, we can sell it, right? We get the right to do so, it's like we're never, especially when the pandemic hit, like we really started to see it. But it's the whole, so like building out like an Amazon like storefront, like if there's no one genre of product, does it not matter at all? Like if you can just pivot products like that, if you go from like toys to, I don't know, this like context, you have to be ungated in these categories, you have to have still Lego, you can't sell Legos unless you have a, right, Legos is said, yes, you can sell it. You're like, you can't or Amazon will shut your store down. Yeah. A lot of these people who are trying to run this, they're not doing things the right way. You have to have the relationships with these people, they have to give you the green light to say, again, it was box-charm, you're not gonna let somebody come sell your stuff. Are you crazy? Like you just would it, right? So, reselling, reselling box is on it. Yeah. They were reselling them though, by the way. And then you probably had somebody that's given sending out season to sister's letters, like, Well, I mean, mine, I didn't own a brand. I just found our products on eBay. I just found patches on eBay. Yeah, I mean, people, once you sell, once you sell a product, if I sold you my product, okay, you have the right to do whatever you want with that. So, when I technically sold you the box, you can do whatever the fuck you want with the box. And so, the way we did this is you can only buy one box. You have to create a whole new email to your everything. Yeah, I gotcha. So, you could have two or three, and then some brands would say, Hey, listen, I saw someone selling it. Yeah, but they had five boxes. They created five accounts. And there was just nothing. But ultimately, if you sell it, you lose the rights to go and complain after that. It is my receipt, I bought it. It doesn't matter if it was full price. Well, and the reason for us getting the warehouse and kind of starting to hire more because there's a huge opportunity in the white, private label space as well, where that's kind of where we see the opportunity to go. And again, build some of these, build a white, private label brand. And, you know, ultimately, if you get to the source and you figure it out, right? You can sell multiple stores, right? Multiple different brands and quick exits, right? Build them and get rid of them. Absolutely. I've seen brands that are just Amazon brands. And they build, we have a friend that has, I think he sells about 20 million a year, makeup brand on Amazon. He would never know what it is. He's just as about 15, 20 million a year, just don't let makeup run. Is that one store? It's one store. Impressive. That's a brand. Yeah, that's impressive. I would say we'll do 30 million this year between probably, maybe more now that we have. And that's impressive between one store, you know what I mean? He's been doing it for like a hundred, well, no, he's young. That's what I'm saying. He's been doing it for a while, but it's makeup. It's different, but I will tell you the difference between him and you is that when you do anything makeup related, it's kind of challenging because supply chain is tough. Makeup takes a minute to manufacture, but what I would say is that it doesn't matter which one has its own business. How do you find it? Okay, so like I know there's tools that you can use to sort of search trending products and whatnot, but I feel like that's obviously not what you do. If you're heading up trade shows, then you're like actually going to sellers. I mean, you can figure out who's there before you go, right? So before we even go to trade, you can look at the list and stuff. No, but if a product, so you probably have a pretty good, a pretty good win rate of what's going to actually. I mean, there's just some categories, right? Like Cosmetics is a great category. You know, home goods, toys, right? Anything baby related, it's kind of like getting into these different categories and you're seeing the products, right? And so it's really, that's, that it is. It comes down. Yeah, there is certain categories. Be honest, like we were in the sporting goods, we've been selling like knives. I don't know, I guess everybody is like. You know, you know, there's a guy that, two guys I know from Israel that they run this store on Facebook, I don't know if it's still on because at the time Facebook, you could just sell anything, but they had a system. What they would do is they would have a way to find what are the trending products on, on. That's right. So they have tools like that for Amazon. Yes, they would have tools. So what they'll do is they're okay here. They would have couple stores and they would have spiders that would find all the products that have nudges. If it's running out, almost they would know that this is a trending product. Automatically, they would look for it in AliExpress because they would know that that's what they're buying it from. It's okay, here's the price that it's in AliExpress. That's what they're selling it. This is going to be where we can beat them on Facebook, just a penny less, whatever it is. Create almighty can add boom, putting an ad set for it and start trawling this ad with a particular crack. Everything was already systemized. So they'll sit down all day drinking beer, down there in Tel Aviv and all that. And the store was running and they would do like 5% profit, but 50 million a year. It was like sitting down like everything was systemized. They just do developers, they're like put that all in. But ultimately, if you take up a couple tools, they can find the right product that are training in an Amazon. It's easy because you can see the one that has the right rankings. You can see the volume. Of course. The ranking gives you the volume over there and then you can see, okay, I can get it for that price. How much can I sell it for? Let's buy more and you can just tell the supplier give me that amount and yeah. You have, when you, when you first started speaking about how like you were selling to consumers and then you started going B to B, I feel like a lot of brands go to Amazon before they talk to you. So do you have, and maybe I'm wrong, I don't know, but I assume a lot of people go to, I mean, a lot of them tried it. A lot of them don't even know how to do it. I'm talking about like brand on Amazon. Like scaling your business. Like do you run into problems like that? Like how have you sort of solved for the fact that your average consumer is trying to afford like a $40 to $60,000 price tag, like middle class, trying to start a store, okay? So they may be leveraged a little bit of money, but ultimately it would be an easier sale. I think we've spoken this before. It'd be an easier sale if you just sold the businesses that wanted to move their brand on Amazon. Yeah, but we also tell them like, look, if on $40,000, five of it goes towards inventory. You don't need to use any more if you don't want to. That's true. So we don't ever encourage them to use their credit or anything to start purchasing more inventory until they've seen this business work, right? So we're like, we'll show you what we'll do with just 5k worth of that. But if you have right now, 300 new stores, will it still be the same volume that you can sell within just one month? No, no, it's not. I mean, you gotta build a reputation in a history with Amazon and like, it's still, it's like there's algorithms, it's like, it's really weird. But you're gonna be able to, if you had this month and you sold, you know, say, five stores, and then in another month, you did very good, you went on our podcast and everybody calls you even, Bill Gates calls a Clissa Man, it's staff now, no one's doing vaccine, I need to make more money. It's buying from you some stores. 300 of them, 3,000 of them. Would you be able to go and scale those 300 or 3,000 the same way that you're able to scale this? We have a team that you have. You have limits on how many you can roll up, no? Yeah, and I think that's where it comes in. Let's say that it was not a team limit, is it an Amazon? Yeah, because you still comes down to being able to find enough products, you know what I mean? And so it's like, we also, you know, we have, we have a lot of room right now for growth. But there was a period where we kind of like, didn't take stores for a while because we were like, we want to be able to grow internally before we grow externally, right? Like in, it was a good thing that we did because I was like, we started to see like, wait a minute. We got to make sure we have enough products, enough relationships, enough skews, enough things to sell before, you know, we go and try to sell. I think we're at the point now where we could probably take another 500 to 1,000 stores. Oh wow. Over a year, right? Over a month? No, I would say, I would say probably over the next 12 to 18 months. And I would say at that point, like, I would probably, like good, I wouldn't probably not take anymore. Until we might say the right deal for you is. And I don't even know if we would go that high, right? Like, yeah, yeah, I'm just not in the pain. Now where I'm like, it just becomes more, it's more, more, more, more, more, more. Yeah, it's like, you know how, how, how are you, okay, let's, let's talk about your organization because I think when you said that, you know, when your organization come to a limit in terms of running like chickens with a headscarf, it basically shows a flat organization that need to be tuned a little bit. I mean, I have some really, really good people that are involved. And I think, you know, I'd be honest, like, I've got burnt in business, like in this business, right? And it got to the point where I was like, trying to find the right people to partner with. Yeah. Kind of getting taken advantage of, you know, and it got to the point where I was like, I went back, I told my brother-in-law I was like, bro, quit your job. I'm gonna teach you what you need to learn. And this was like, no, no, this is my brother. I'm talking my brother-in-law, he's married to- Oh, you're in a law, okay. He's married, yeah, he's married to, and Mark, I was in school at the time. So I'm like, he's gotta finish school, right? But I'm like, I gotta come back to my family. Like, the people I trust, the people that I know, this is before I thought we were ever gonna be as where we are now. And so since I did that and got the right people involved, like, I'll be honest, like Jake and Drew, who, Drew's just a great friend from growing up, Jake's my brother. How many employees do you have right now? Not including wearings. Oh, we have, don't need administration, that. We have 30 in-house now, and then we still have another, well, we have about 40 now in Columbia still. Okay, so take away customer service, I forgot customer service warehouse, we'll discuss later, just administration. We have 40, we have just under 40 right now. Okay, and they're divided into, say, people who search for products and things like that. I don't know. People, product research, we still do a lot of our, a lot of our product research is still overseas. We've gotten rid of a lot of people because we get better quality work over here, you know? And I have more control over here. I'm kind of a control freak. And so it's like, but we've found a couple people that are still in our office over there, that are really good. I have no one who's gonna get the energy when they're in another continent or somewhere else from the founder, right? They've never the same. And so we have, we had like 90 people over there, and we've like kind of like slowly gotten away and been hiring over here, but it's also hard to find the right person here that's willing to work for the price that the job is. And you know, you gotta earn it, right? When I tell all of our people to come on, like if you or put your nose to the grind, like I'm gonna take care of you, you know? And that's why we have people that have been around with us for the last couple of years, just because they're, you know? So, but I do think it's like, it gets to the point where it's, I don't know if you're able to, it's tough to say. To take on more stores. Jenna did say that your glasses always empty, so. She did, yeah, yeah. I don't think you're in a relationship, yeah. Oh my God, give me shit because she's like, Scott, it's a liquor podcast and you're glass always have to be like, it's good to drink too quick. Yeah, it's good. Listen, I mean, now, so again, I have to ask now Zika about his, so you don't drink with us alcohol. I'm, I'm not. I brought the alcohol. He didn't drink alcohol. Yeah, I asked, I was in Muslim, why not? What's going on? I love to drink, honestly, that's the problem. No, you know, we didn't, we didn't talk about your story and your story is hell inspiring. You can go into whatever part you want, man. No, I mean, I'll, I'll keep it, I'll keep it light, but it's, you know, for me in my life, I love the party. I love the drink. I love my, a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot. And it took me a, you know, a couple DUIs, a couple times in jail to realize like, just bad shit happens when I drink. And so I kind of teeter-toddered with it a little bit when I kind of, because I'm like, you know, I'm an entrepreneur, right? Like you go out, you have a drink, you're meeting. And I just kind of like, I would, I've always drink probably one, one too many, right? And it wasn't done anything bad ever. But I would wake up feeling shitty. Like I would wake up low energy, wake up, just not like foggy mind. And I just was at a point where I'm like, you know, I lost my dad in December. So yeah, and so I went, when that happened, I was like, he hated when I drank, because I, he, I was wild, right? You know, my brother that we're here can tell you, like I, I'm like, we're in a party, right? So I brought you some good, you know, a good drink, you know, you'll enjoy it. So you can talk you bourbon, right? But that's really it. For me, it's a personal choice. I have no judgment. I love to still go out and have a good time. I still will have no problem bringing a bottle for the boys and ultimately it's just, I've seen better things happen in my life, since I've stopped. You know, it's, it's, you're smart for thinking that way, because every time I'm down here too, it's like, and it's easy to do it down here, it is easy. Well, I'll tell you right now, in Toronto, like seven months out the year, you're, you're in a house, like you can go out if you want to, but it's a mission to go out. You got to, you got to go out, you know, it's not like you walk outside. There's like 25 restaurants bars everywhere, and you got to work, like we're like 25 layers too. Here, it's like you can walk out, we're in four lotter, like you walk down Las Olas, you hit any bar, any restaurant. Miami, there's an event from Monday to Friday, you have like Ayokia on Monday, you have like, like, you know, you have major DJs all week, you have like, yes, so on Wednesday, yeah, I'm dating myself, I'm sure there's more relevant DJs now. What the point is? There's a lot of, there's a lot of partying all the time. I mean, like you can go out to a restaurant and then go to a bar, like any night in Miami, a networking event will be on yachts and clubs, like it's nonstop. And I thought you got to take it off. This is, this is one of the reasons I don't really travel as much anymore. I mean, people look at me. I've been down here for how long? I mean, living in Florida? Yeah. 21 years. Yeah. Yeah, I finished the Army in Israel. Stay a little longer. Then I came down here. I was supposed to go and just do my, just I was, I completed my high school examinations after the Army. Then I came down here. I did my bachelor in business thinking, I'll finish that, then go back. But then I started my first company, the liquidation business. And you know, how do you leave something that does? I did good. So, you know, you get married and everything else. And now you don't want to go back to Israel. It's like that. I'm not when I go back to Israel. I'm kind of like, I feel like American, you know, Israeli who moved to America. I don't live like, I don't feel like Israeli. And over here, I'm feeling like Israeli who moved. It's all the different way. But yeah, I mean, that's, that's the thing. So you go to McDonald's, right? Like, fuck, like, I mean, it's nice and all, but I mean, you go to the beach on the street. It's just a different topography or something, but it's all the same. Like, I'm not, it's not an other beach like I, that could give me something completely different, maybe mountains, but yeah, it's not, and nothing beats Miami. No, but that's why you got to pace yourself down here because you can totally, you can totally party all the time. And if you're trying to build anything, it's tough enough. It's already tough enough. Yeah, and you know, I did, I got married and I had a daughter that slowed me down a lot, right? And I purposely chose to buy a house up north. So we live, I live in Parkland, so not too far north, but like, you want it to stay away? Yeah, because I know, I already know how I am, right? Like, I mean, dude, if I'm down here in the heart of it, like, why not? We still go to Miami all the time, you know? But it's like, I can go there, I can go out, I can go to dinner, I can have a good time, and I can go back home, and I can sleep, and not have to worry about just people everywhere around me. Well, but it's actually interesting because all my many years over here, I never really went out. I started going out only when I had to take influencers out for a long time. That's when I started experiencing Miami. I had no idea, they would come from LA and they're like, hey, we're going to go and I didn't know. And I see more really are influencers. I'm like, shit, this is really fun. What the fuck was I doing all this time? I mean, I started going at the time, but only, and then you hear about Papi Stakes, like, this is fucking, what the hell, all those years? And it was so different, because when I met, when I met my wife, my ex today, but at the time we were dating in the, and I had this relative of mine that was a bounce. It was, you know, it was, it was, what do you call it, a guy that gets, we fill up the club, it would be a pro-demo, a pro-demo, a pro-demo. And I told her, oh yeah, my cousin, kind of like a cousin, not really a cousin, but his name is Mani, which Mani, the wine, the decent, she discriminated, oh yeah, the team. Oh, I hate him, he never let us see, you know, it was like, so I call him, you asshole, no, I'm dating, bro, she's like, tell her to come, I'll get it. It's like, I had no idea about the clubs in how it is, because I was just busy making money, and here it is, you find out, you don't have to fucking kill, all those motivational speakers, like, you get it, cry, and you get it, here it is, you made it. You fucking made it, without grinding like this, like I was actually eating rice and ketchup. I think, what the hell, I missed 20 years, look at you. Oh, you were like, you're the only person who writes a ketchup now, so. No, so now you can live life, man, but no, that's very good. I mean, well, you build now, it takes a lot of dedication, and I think the reason why you're doing, as well as you're doing right now, is probably because you set limits in your life. I mean, but you hit rock bottom in a very real way, like people talking about hitting rock bottom, I don't think anybody can hear your story, and compare their rock bottom to your rock bottom. Like, multiple DUIs, arrest, J. My mind stems strictly from mental health, right? So, like, I was molested when I was a kid, right? Which my whole life changed when I was molested. I was, I was, I had just turned 10 years old, and it was by a man, right? And so for me, like, I was a big kid at 10, kind of like, didn't, I didn't tell anybody, and then I was really good at sports, right? So then it was like, from the time I was like, 13, 13, like I was already really good, I went to high school, I got recruited by everybody, but I like had this, I didn't know how to deal with it, right? Well, didn't want to tell my mom, didn't want to tell, I just didn't, I froze up, I like, it didn't happen to me. Yeah. And so like, that kind of stemmed this, like, anxiety, and this, like, just really, just, like, they started up the mental health in me, right? And like, I never took care of that side of things, you know? And so I would drink to, like, not feel this shit, or not think about this, or I would, you know, use drugs, or women, like, everything did, like, making me feel good and escape, right? And, you know, I think part of the reason why I choose not to drink now is like, I had every opportunity, if I would have just not made some of the decisions, I mean, I would have, I would be making hundreds and millions of, hundreds of millions of dollars right now in the NFL, like, it's a no-brainer, we're seeing these NFL quarterback sign, 280 million dollar contracts to play football. I was a five year quarterback, he was there. You know, it was Jamieus Winston number one, I was number two, Jamieus has been in the NFL for eight years. Like, it was a no-brainer. And even if I, I didn't, you know, I could have had a really average career and probably been a backup for like 10 years, you know? Like, I still would have made money. And so, for me, I was like, this is the only way I'm gonna make money, it was football. How do you, but back to that point, before you keep going, how did you ever get over that? I mean, did you ever do plus a thing we did? Yeah, so I came, so I moved to Florida, I actually, so let me back up a little bit. I got, got's really bad for me to the point where I was like, screw football, I'm done with this, it's brought nothing, but like chaos and just like negative publicity to me. Like, I was always in the spotlight, I didn't handle it well. I had just gotten kicked out of Auburn basically for another DUI, right? I think they had no choice. The media was like, it was no choice. They had to let me go to where I had, was dating a girl at Louisville who had passed away. I'm like, I can't go back to Louis. It was just a lot of crazy shit was happening in my life. And I got, like, very, like, I was ready to die. Like, I was going to kill myself. And that's like, the same night I was going to kill myself, I was literally going to drive back in the woods. And I was like, this is it for me. Like, I was March 6, 2016, I was 22 years old, I think. And I was just, I was done. Like, I was strung out on cocaine. I was, you know, I was drunk all the time. Like, had a really bad Xanax addiction from a prescription from a doctor because that was going to fix my anxiety issues. And it just was like this crazy. I was just in a fog. And literally the same night I was going to, like, I was driving to go back in the woods and kill myself. I got pulled over. And like, I remember not really, like, knowing I was pulled over but not really know what was going on. And I remember I woke up like two days later. I kind of like came to isolation jail cell. And I spent the next 364 days in jail. Watch my draft class in jail, you know, like a lot. It was kind of in there. I was like, I got to figure out my life. Like, I'm definitely not going to be a jailbird. Like, I'm, you know, my dad played 13 years in the NFL. I came from a good family. Like, you know, I'm not, this isn't who I'm supposed to be, right? And so it was kind of in there that one, I like kind of dove back into my faith and like really strengthened my faith and like kind of started to realize, like, there's things that I need to like, I need to focus on personally, right? Like, there's things up into in jail. So what? It all happened to in jail. When I, when I realized all this, I got like, I was sober, right? Like I got my mind cleared up and I'm like, feeling all these emotions. I'm sitting in here with like dudes that are getting ready to go to prison for like 20 years, you know? Like, I'm just like, not, I don't belong here. Like I, this is just not where I belong. But it was also in there that I realized like, you know what, no matter what is good. Like I have no idea what the future holds. Like I don't, I couldn't see anything. Everything that was happening to me right now, I didn't see any of it. I was just like, I know that God has something more for me out there. Like there's a reason why I didn't kill myself that night. There's a reason why I'm in jail. And there's a reason why like, there's no bond. Like I would, my dad would have bailed me out and like I had no bond. And I was facing 15 years in prison because like I called with cocaine, possession of fire, I'm like, and it was just like, just like another all in the media, right? Like just a lot of guilt and shame and just remorse. And so when I got out of jail, I started speaking. I had like tons of people. Oh, did you get out of the 15 years? I went to, so I had to go to this like program in jail. And it was like, it was a eight month program that I had to basically jail, but it's like a program in jail, like a rehabilitation, or what? No, it was like, it was inmate ran. Like talking about like having an inmate tell you what to do, but it was like, I couldn't, like if you, you know, like you, you had to, I had to get through this nine month program in order for me to get out. What's the, what if I would have gotten in trouble? If I would have called a charge in there, if I would have done it, it was nothing. It was just some chaotic like military style, like just set you up for sale. Oh, it was, it was a good thing. It was really weird because it was in there that I like, I, I just was so like myself in there. I was like, I don't know, none of these people on okay, what they think about me, like, I'm gonna, like, I'm not gonna act, like put this front on, like I'm this tough guy, like, and people respected that, right? I'm big dude. So the second eight, technically, where you see down, and I said, my name is Joe, and I'm an addict, something like that. But it was like, you were, we were locked in a jail cell. Like we was still a jail cell. It was like, you could go to, you would go to a library for a group, and then you'd be back in your cell. Like, and it was just set you up for failure, right? Like they wanted you not to get through it. But if you got through it, it would give you time off the end of your sentence. They have enough 15 years. So, well, for me, it was like, look, if this dude can, can get through this shit, we'll, we'll give him, we'll see, we'll see where he's at. Cause they didn't think I could get through it. They thought he, you know, it was interesting. And so I ended up going back from the judge, and he literally told me he's like, look, you come back here, and you'll serve every last second that you have on the shelf, which was like, three and a half years would have been the time I would have had to serve, right? Okay. So, I was like, all right, so when I got out, I started speaking ahead. Tons of people reaching out to me. Cause again, I was like, yeah, cause like I was pretty like high profile, you know, and so people were like, do you wanna come tell your story, right? So I started traveling and speaking and sharing my story, but I still had, like, and I spoke to over 300 different high schools, middle schools, universities, all across the country, over like a two, like a year and a half, almost two years span. And I was just speaking everywhere. I started making, like, you know, I started making decent money doing it, but it became more like a job for me, right? I started in the beginning doing it because I felt like my story had purposed. There was, it was to help a kid not make the same decisions, not have to feel the same way I did. If they went through what I went through at nine years old, you can tell somebody, you don't have to wait till you're 23 and try to, you know, self-medicate for many years, you know, like, when you speak, when you speak through so many schools and children. You feel like it changes you because first you have to, kind of like put yourself in the shoes of a role model and then you also get to inspire yourself. And you said, I give my a little bit more discipline than what I had yesterday because I just spoke and have to more, and other engagement. Or yeah, like, in the beginning, yes, but I felt like the ending of my story was so shitty at the time. I'm like, I went to jail and here I am telling you about it, like, you know, I was really good. I blew it all the way and here I am. Like, I just felt like there was more for me, right? And I also was telling my story and like, I'm continuing to almost remind myself of the shit that I went through without getting any help. I came to Florida to get help. I came down here and checked into a treatment center to get help from my mental health. I had no idea I was gonna stay down here. And then when I got through that, I started like, I got a really good therapist. I started to learn. What did you end up in Florida though? What was specifically especially about Kentucky versus Florida? It was gonna be nice weather. I thought maybe that would be like, you know, take a break. I wanted to go somewhere for like 90 days and like really figure, like, I needed help, you know? I got, I didn't, I was, I don't, I didn't wanna die, you know? Like, I don't wanna feel this way, you know? Like, I have a great life. I didn't know where I was gonna be, but I just knew I needed to figure out. Because I felt like, you know, I was just on the verge, I just, I didn't see anything in the future, right? And so, that's what I did. And when I came down here, I was like, dude, I don't wanna leave here, right? Like, look at it, look at this place, you know? And so, I chose to stay. And I was also like, you know what? I'm gonna give this football thing a shot again. Like I was just... Good thing you didn't go through Seattle. Right? And then, that would have been really depressing, you know? Oh, hey, it's funny. Because people should themselves be there. It's funny because I went to, I actually, I started, I started training again. I got, I got an opportunity to go play for the Indianapolis Colts. And I was up there for a little bit. I got cut in the XFL, actually, had reached out to me. And... By the way, by the way, when I read these documents, they said he joined the Colts. And they said, you joined the Colts. That's what I understood. Oh, football, because I don't know. Okay, good. Anyway, so then the XFL, which was like another organization. Now, the rock, actually. I know the XFL. But Seattle was like, we want you to come out. We want you to come out and play for us. It was like $60,000 a year. I was like, so what is XFL semi-pro? They had shut down. They shut down the pandemic and the rock. And now they're going to do it again. But I'm thankful I didn't do that. And for me, when I went back to play football, I was like, you know what, I'm just going to, if it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen. But I'm just going to, I want to put a helmet on my head and be like, I made it back, right? And it was completely being ignorant. But isn't that true that NFL players, they win their 50? I mean, is it true the whole life expectancy? It's not really a thing. I mean, I don't know. I mean, I think, I mean, I heard that one time, I read it in an Instagram meme, so I don't disagree. I think that it's like, listen, any sport where you get smashed up for like years at a time, violent. Yeah, like you're, you're, you're, I don't know if you'd die, but I'm sure like, I mean, they're, they claim that the life expectancy for football players, 51 years old, like, I'm sure Rodney's probably sick of the kickers and the one that kicked the ball doesn't have that problem. I feel like nowadays they have better technology in the game, so there's like a little better equipment, but do you have my dad played like? Yeah, like when you see a helmet nowadays versus the helmets they would have been like, and this is, I'm talking, these dudes, think about that in the day, they weren't leather helmets. Like, but like even my dad's helmet, like it was just a shell, like it was still not that the technology is pretty crazy. Okay, now where, now that you hit with your head, you get a flag, like they really are trying, but these dudes are still violent, they're getting paid millions of dollars to go out and put their life on the line, they're playing it at a high level, they're violent. So, I mean, I would say, yeah, you know, I don't really wanna know what is wrong with that. Yeah, I remember, I remember. No, because you said it's a thing, you could have been hundreds of millions, but yeah, but you would enjoy it less time, so. You're right, and you know what? That's why you maybe got a bigger plan for me, maybe it wasn't football, right? You know, and I don't know. It didn't work out, but everything's worked out, I feel like the way it's supposed to. So, I do feel like going out now is less and it helps your business, because I still have to kind of understand how people are making it while they're still partying, and I didn't party all those years. I don't know who it was in the mistake. Tell me I'm kind of like, okay. No, I mean, to be honest with you, you saying that you didn't do that for many years, and you just sold your company for extra amount of dollars, like, dude, I look at that, and I'm feeling like, honestly, in my person, some people can do it. Some people can drink and wake up in the morning and just get shit done, and I mad respect for them people. But I can't, right? And so, I feel like, from the success, I just couldn't enjoy it, I just couldn't enjoy, man. From the successful people, I feel like, if you ask them, do they do it? Like, there's no way. There's no way they're out. Maybe after they've built that one, I think that's it, that one. So, this is now, and now it's gonna be happening. Well, I think, this is the issue I have, I have an issue with, like, Instagram entrepreneurs. I have a big issue with that, that people talk about, like, only lifestyle, and all they're doing is events and party and whatnot, and they're not putting in more. That is their business. That is their business. I have a video, otherwise they'll be relevant. Yeah, I mean, for some of them, I have a buddy that makes, you know, 200 grand to show up, I have a, and just throw a party out of bar, like, okay. Yeah, but that's not, that's not, we're not talking about, like, 200 grand, we're not talking about a million, we're talking about how do you build, like, $50 million, $100 million business, and I think that it's an insane amount of effort and energy, and you have to be, like, I know that there's all these motivational, you know, quotes about this, but you have to, like, shut a lot of your life out to get to that level. Like, shut a lot of the social out to get to that level. I don't think, I think the phrase is, entrepreneur is giving, sacrificing couple of years of your life, like, no one would, so you can leave the rest of your life, like, no one could. Yeah, exactly. That's it, but, I mean, I have a friend at Exit, right, around the same time I did, and a bigger Exit, and mine was $500, he was $720, and he, he wasn't even 30 at that time, but check this out, he was partying the whole, fucking time, until the end of the world. Yeah, and after that, when I thought, you can party more than what you party now, then he was, like, going even more, he was just, everywhere, just out. Yeah, but how many, okay, so how many, so what was his percentage on the cap, people? I mean, no, no, no, pretty good, pretty good. Lana, he's, he's, he's, he's good, and I'm telling you, that, that was the thing, but what's he, what's he feel like, you know what I mean, like what? He's actually, business wasn't that far from yours, he's a fulfillment center, and he's sold for such a high multiples, because during 2020, everyone thought, well, this moving online, okay, let's, the same company that made him the offer for $720, was Summit Partners, in the beginning of the year, in January 2020, they offered him $120, and then they came back, and they said, we'll give you $720. Someone else offered him $900, but he declined the $900 because the percentage that they want, they wanted to buy on a higher evaluation, but just a smaller one. How does he go from $120 to $720? Oh, that was COVID. COVID, that was COVID. Everything moved online. The, the, the valuations were like insane. What was the valuation he got? $720. I don't know, the multiple. Oh, you know? No, the company was doing like $120, $130 million a year. It wasn't that big. I mean, it was big. It was growing fast, but still they said, okay, that's gonna be trillions of dollars, gazillions of, so they thought, no one is gonna buy anything in stores anymore. We're gonna shut down all the stores in America, so that's what you took advantage of. He took advantage of right timing, right place, too. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, that's what you, back to what you said. No, but still, but yeah, it was, it was right time to exit. Yeah, no, not afraid to get out. Exit at the right time is probably superior to entering at the right time. Yeah, yeah. It's superior. I mean, in that that there's no value to enter at the right time, but exit at the right time, because when it drops, you have to sell when you don't have to sell. Yeah, exactly. And you know, you need to know that whenever, when everyone tells you, oh, you're gonna be so big, that that that is when you wanna sell it. Don't listen to that. Don't let the child in the room clad you from. You said, listen, how can you say no for a couple hundred millions? What the fuck in the saying? No one, I always eating rice and ketchup a minute ago. Yeah. Exactly. That's a crazy. Okay. That was, that was the idea. So it's like, when you go out and I remember that, I was, some people were saying, oh, you can go. If it was public billions and billions. Said, look, it was right here on the table. The money was already secured by the banks, but from the buyers, how am I gonna say no? It's just, I know that a couple more weeks and I get the money. Why am I gonna wake a year more doing COVID? Everything is, it's gonna fall apart. Like it's just, the correction is gonna come in 2021. What about you? What do you think you're gonna do? I mean, we always said, like, at a hundred million. That's what we wanted to be doing a hundred million dollars here. You know what the multiple is on like an Amazon store as a service business? I think we're at the point now where we've really started focusing on those relationships where there's, you know, if you have the right people in place and I think somebody comes in and makes the right offer on it, you know? But, you do take investment, makers? Say what? That's bringing investors to looking for a business. Have we? Yeah. No, we haven't done any 300%. Say what? You're a hundred percent owner right now. Yeah. So we haven't done anything and that's where it's like, you know. I'll give you a million for 50% of the business. Thank you so much. So, I mean, like, do we just, and even like, I'm telling you, like my brother-in-law, my sister versus my brother, like, dude, we've just like, they quit. My sister was a teacher. She quit her job. She quit her job. She quit her job. Like, and it's just been so fun to build it with my family. Yeah. Like, you know, like I said, my dad passed away in December. It was terrible. But like, to know that, like, my family is good. My mom's good. I'm taking, we just bought another house down here. Like, we're good, you know what I mean? And so, again, we do want to exit. And it's always a plan. It's always been a plan for us. But we're at that point where we're going to double, we're going to double and revenue this year. And I think we're going to double again the following year, maybe triple. And so it's like, we're right there, where we're more confident than we've ever been in this business. And so it's like, we want to just run with them a minimum that we have. You know, do you know the size of your competitors? Do you have any indication? I mean, you talked about, like, seeing these different Amazon stores acquired, right? I mean, they're getting acquired from multiple seven, eight figures with just, like, every day, right and left. So, have you seen some, do you know, the numbers behind this? You can go and look up some of these stores that are getting acquired. I mean, there's been nine figure Amazon stores acquired. You know, that are, and you go and you look at these. And what is it? It could mean not even being America, right? What is it like a nine figure Amazon store look? Is that like a, is that like a store I'd recognize now? Majority of them are going to be a specific category, right? So, which is space. Yeah. So there's like also like the non-generic product I'm assuming at that point. Like something that's like... It's not have to be can be generic. Yeah. For nine figures? Guess when you buy an Amazon ETs. Or just like a collection of products. I think either or if you can do the, I mean, it's just, it's so crazy. That blows, it just blows my mind. Like, there's more people that are buying. More people are buying on Amazon now than ever. Like, we know that. And we're seeing that, you know, based on just some of the softwares and things that we use. I mean, it's like crazy, the amount of people. 300 million active users every day. Every single day. And that's like on the low side, probably. And there's only two million sellers. Look, I mean, it's a flea market by the end of the day. When you go to a flea market, you don't have to worry about location, location, location as much. It is, but it's not. It's just you, when you go outside of the flea market, you have to position your store in the right place. You have to make sure that they're just not parking and all that stuff. But when it's a flea market, everyone park their car and they're walking and they want to see everything because they're searching for deals. This is Amazon. Amazon is definitely that place. And it's not always about the brand over there because a lot of the brands will sell their products. But if you want the product branded, it's not necessarily the spot yet. They're trying, they're trying, they're trying heavily to go into the beauty space and they've been failing because of the cool factor. Amazon haven't built a brand that's kind of like a brand builder. It's not a brand builder. You notice like, do you notice any sort of correlation between a successful Amazon product and a successful DC product? Like if somebody spins up a good Amazon store, would they take that, open up Shopify store, run some ads, see some more success? I feel like Shopify is more for if you're trying to go towards a brand or a specific category, right? Where you can really try to Amazon the best thing about it is you really don't have to drive any traffic. Like there's no, you know, you can do a PPCs and things like that. But is that right? Like have you tried, say, okay, this is your store and you can take some of your inventory and put it in the shop and try. And then when someone gets your product, said, look, if you come in from our store, some like that first order of 15% or whatever, it is if the recording members buying from you something, then you can keep the credit card, keep the here and keep all the information. And then eventually you can go and create your own brand behind this. But that's a long template, but you have to place the product inside. And you have to put that. That's what you guys did with BoxyChung, wasn't it? No, no, no. Didn't you have reoccurring though? Didn't that, wasn't it like a membership or something? Well, BoxyChung is a monthly beauty subscription monthly. So we never worked through Amazon. You had to come to my site. I had this because... What did you use? You just straight your own website. You didn't use any. You didn't use Shopify? No, man. We did. And probably what helped you. It was multiple. It was multiple time. Like we changed our website platform. Did you develop like a subscription platform? Yes and no. Yes and no. I mean, at the end when we sold it, we had a Magento Enterprise Edition. So it's a plugin. It was very customized. It was proprietary for us. Everything was made for us. It's kind of like... I'm giving you a platform to go and move whatever you need over there. And that was... It's all code. Then Shopify too cough. And we should have done Shopify. Because Shopify... You couldn't find developers for Shopify anywhere. You can find... And like the... But God, if you have to go... But God, if you have to go... You go to the App Store. You download like... I think it recharges the one. There's a million others. But like... Everything changed. The App Store. It's so easy. I will explain. Once you go to subscription because they were not built for subscription, you don't have all the perks you have right now when you just do regular e-commerce stuff. So when you do e-commerce, regular sales, you find... You can go and pay Apple Pay. You have all those plugins. When you do your own subscription, none of those plugins can do with Apple Pay. You can do Venmo. You can do any of those. So you have to create that. You have to build that up. And then... But the thing is, it's very hard to find a Magento developer. That's good. Most developers don't want to touch Magento. Very easy to do Shopify. And that's it. But eventually, we get what we need. And we were very, very creative. And we had our platform on it. But it was all about building on... In fact, we didn't even have developers in 2017. We had 250,000 subscribers. We had a team building in the back and a new platform for us and we launched it in 2018. That's how crazy it is. So we're by part of the technology company, grossing 50 million a year. But we had one developer. And it was a very junior developer. We were using something kind of like... It's a third party called... Forget her name. And it was really hard to work with them. It was not made for... It was made for subscriptions. But for small companies... It's a huge barrier to entry. Like a really overcompete. It's a huge barrier... Like I mean, that's why Shopify did so well. Yes. It's such a long time, right? Yeah. Because it just eliminates the barrier to entry. They won that space. They have better... They have superior platform. What are the competitors? I mean, they're still... I think Shopify is still winning that space. Because we're doing it right now. Like I said, we've started to do some white and probably label brands and start to build brands. And we're... We're... We're toying with it, right? And it's like... What are you toying with? It's... So... Is it a private label brand or something? Yeah, so private label brands... We just got into the candle space, just believe it or not, glass and candle, which was like... What does it cost you to make a candle? Uh... We have... Like... We have... There's two different sizes. One probably costs us about... $7 to $8. And the bigger ones... $10 to $11. That's your cost. Yeah. And we're selling them for $60 and $50, $60, $70. There's a lot of money in candles. And then, you know, they may be a little more expensive. They have a top, right? Yeah. So it may end up maybe $15. Hmm. You know, and we're selling them for $50 minimum. Yeah. It's definitely a business because there's... There are some brands obviously out there that are selling their candles. But if you like a descent and you like the... I have... I have a lot of good experience using candles in a box. A one-off, in a bigger boxes that we sold. And it was... It was very successful. You guys should talk more. Yeah. Yeah. We had some dinner. Yeah. I know for real. Yeah, for sure. No, but I have mad respect for you just because it's like... It's... Even to hear how you did it without... Like, I was fully like... They had a Shopify. Just thinking that's what... Yeah, we didn't... You had to go through a lot of hurdles. Because I mean... You see this missing here over here? What do you think? I haven't had it. I was born with more hair. It wasn't just... I mean... I've been out of states. I've been out of states. My last company just sassed, right? So we have API integrations in this stripe. And this company now, we're just pure Shopify. That wasn't even a question. Yeah. It was like... You know who uses Shopify? Fashion Nova. Yeah. Two billion a year or whatever. Billions. Fashion Nova. Yeah, boom. Yeah, you can modify so much within it. And it's just such a reliable platform that you don't have to go and reinvent everything that was already invented. It's definitely not the necessary. Many times you find engineers coming in and they'll... They'll let me build everything from scratch, but you're going to go through way more problems if you... And it's... It's really easy. It's not like a minimum $50-$100,000 project. It's easy. Yeah. If they didn't rip you off and actually been working for you for salary and they know what they're doing and they're half good. Yeah. It cost us using Magento and the development, I would say, millions. Yeah. Put it all together or everything else. And we needed that. Because there's nothing else for subscription and that capacity. It just didn't... There's nothing else. You need to do it, right? It took years to get to that kind of money that was spent on it. And it was never perfect. And there was always the part where things would fall apart. And just imagine when you go and you tell everyone, hey, listen, we're going to upgrade your box. You had that problem in 2018 when... I wouldn't say it's a problem. It depends how you see it. It might be a good thing. But they told them, look, we're going to go and... We found out that our competitors are going to come up with a full size. So I was trying to... I wanted to take their cloud and all this conversation and said, they're coming up with a $25 box. I'm going to go with a $50 box. So I can put stuff that are going to smoke their stuff. So anyway, because I was the full size product in their sample. So I get the wrong information. I thought they're going to start in September. So I said, I'll do it in September. So I went to my team. And I said, well, we have two months, three months to do it. This is how it's going to look like. We're going to go and do an upgrade subscription every three months. It's going to be quarterly. And that's what I left them with. I mean, when you work with developers, you have to give them schematics every... You have to... I didn't know. So everyone got excited. I put one post on Instagram and I went on... on this bunch of forms that the charmers were creating. And we had four million people... We had about 200,000 people clicking on the subscribe page. We told them in September 1st, 9 a.m. Eastern time. They'll be able to upgrade your box. 175,000 at 9 a.m. We're already clicking the check-ups. Wow. It was 30 million a year. You have evolved. Like, what? You had influenced... Nothing. It was just going on my social... on my Instagram one time. And going on a couple of pages that charmers... that our subscribers created. Fan pages. And I would always engage with them. But that's it. You want to talk about product market. That's product market fair. Yeah. We showed them what they're going to get. They were going... And then the site crashed. We only had 20,000 boxes to ship them. We didn't have 200,000. It's like, they... I was trolled for six months by some girls. Like, you're useless human being. I was clicking and clicking and it didn't work. Three a.m. I woke up. Three a.m. What the hell? And I'm clicking and go back to your country. You know what? You're useless. No, they don't even want you there. Because you can't even get a website running. It was so... It was so funny. I mean, after I was stressed out the first day. I was really stressed out. But it was stressful. Yeah, yeah. That was those crazy. That was $30 million. Wow. I know, like, this. Adding just one Instagram post. That's when you build a community, though. You get to build a community. Well, you said $30 million, what? Yeah, $30 million, because it's recurring. I'm not taking a $50 one time. No, the total lifetime value of the customer. That added that because you're subscribed and it's recurring revenue. So it's counting that for how many years. Well, no, no, no. It's 30... It's a year, right? So it's $30 million additional that added to us because of the subscriptions. It just won. So you basically do $130 million in that year? Well, the next year, we did $260. What was the subscription? Like... The base was... It started when you won and then we opted to $25. But then we added a $35 box and we had a quarterly for $50. And then we started doing flash sales. And the year when I sold the business, I wanted to make sure that I can show that I'm growing. So what I did was I launched at the end of 2019, because we're already getting all our bids in 2019. So really, at the end of 2019, I launched a $35 box. And I started doing e-camps sales. I did flash sales. So I did a little bit, like, $23 million in 2019, because I started really small, just as a proof of concept, can't get the gear right, running at the site, okay? And then 2020, because I doubled down instead of having, say, a hundred excuse that you're selling, I put a thousand, right? And then... So we sold about $60 or $70 million in e-com. And then we had the $35 box that you buy in addition to the $25. And that was adding energy. So we ended up going from... How did you get to cosmetics? Like, what is your company? Cosmetics, you know, this cosmetic category is doing good, right? So in 2012, we had a lot of requests from... Well, one that I noticed that caught my attention was from a company called Classybox. It was a subscription box. And every Friday, I would sit down with all my salespeople and go over the sales and talking about this kind of all get smarter about how you sell. And one of the guys said, yeah, get something for Classybox. What's Classybox? Subscription box. What's the subscription box? You don't know? What is it? He told me what it is. It was already two years of thing that was going to... So I looked at the space and I said, shit, I can do it better. And when I saw that they don't buy every time, they apparently buy from you and they get stuck, you wouldn't know, and give them fresh stuff. Like, why do they ask for free stuff? Look, that's your concept. And so, wait, so they don't have economics where they can pay for the goods? He said, no. Well, what if I create economics instead of 10 or whatever it is? I'll do it where I can pay for the products and then I can select what I want and I don't have to depend on anybody. Anyway, that's how I came up. I kind of like filled the gap. I was not a first mover. I was not even a second mover, but I was an early adaptor. But the difference between me and all the second, third, fourth, fifth movers, none of them really modify what the first mover did. They did the same. I was the first one to say, I'm going to create economics where the weight of the box is going to be under a few pounds and everything was modified. So I can pay $10 for products. So I can always give them over $100 value consistently forever. It would always be a phenomenal deal. And a figure, if I have a better product, I can win the war. And now coming in, knowing Internet marketing, it's my passion. Oh, I'm going to smoke those motherfuckers. That's how I came in. And that's what happened. And then I had already warehouse and I had office space. So I had the infrastructure to kick it off. And that's why we, you know, it's incredible. I want to do one more entrepreneurial lesson from Zeke. Who fucked you over? And how did they fuck you over? And what did you learn from that? I mean, I think we have the name name. No, it's not even that. I'm addressing. I have some address. He's a cheap profile. We're going to post this motherfucker. So we're going to put him in blast. I think it's something that like I think everybody has one of these stories. I think it's a good story to go into because I think it was likely for me. I mean, I just, I made, I started making money quickly, right? And I'm like, if I don't put it, if I don't invest it, I'm going to spend it, right? So I just made a lot of quick decisions that were very uneducated and just ultimately, people that I trust, you just, I trusted people way too, like in the beginning. And it's one wearing South Florida, like you got to watch your back. You got to watch your back, man. It's not in South Florida. Everyone is in people over here. What are you all looking about? I'm a good Kentucky boy. Like we sleep with like our garage doors open, you know? Yeah. Down here. So for me, I think it was just like, I made money. I wanted to invest and just trying to get in too much shit. Trying to just be involved in too much instead of just focusing on like really building the one thing I got to have and then put it, you know. So for me, it was just, it was just scammers. Like people are just scammed with this grimy people that like just ponging your money back. No, I mean, what do you do? What do you do? You do, you chase the money back or you keep building and you said, okay, that was my, I mean, you know, that was my, my, my immunization for my childhood disease. Yeah. Anything to run better, yeah. Exactly. So, you know, you was made in dollars and it's like, okay. Wow. I mean, this is like, you know, it's like a can't, I don't know. I don't think it's saying it's not a lot of money. He's saying it's a lot of money. It's like, you know, but I don't know. But it's game, I mean, it's a scam of a million dollar, yeah. You live, you live and you earn and, yeah. You know, it's ultimately, it's made me better. It's made me, you know, really smart around. Just surround myself with people and move slower, you know, I mean, like life's long. Life's long, right? Yeah. Exactly, right? So. It's, um, there are some people that what they do is they sell by your debt. I wouldn't mess with those people, but they'll say, I don't know what this is. I don't know what this is. I don't know what this is. Okay. So, it happened to me when someone was 56 grand. It wasn't that much. And I called a friend of mine. I said, listen, someone gave me, anyway, he, he kind of like stole 50, 56 grand. Now, at that time, those everything I had in my bank account. And he said, I'll buy it for 30. So it clicked to me right away, what he means, because I knew he's a serious businessman, but he has friends that can go and collect and so I told him, I was thinking how much I'm going to lose, but I said, wait, so what he's saying is he's going to give you a 30 grand. And I just give me his name, whatever information you have. And if I couldn't find him, I couldn't find him, but if I find him, I'll take with him. That's what he said. I'll buy the debt. I never thought about it. It's so interesting. What happened was I called a guy that stole it from me and I left him a message because he didn't pick up before that I would call him any time. He said, it's fine. If you're not picking up, don't worry, give me 24 hours. I don't know why I said that. It sounded threatening, but so he called me right away. And I told him, it's your decision, man. It's either I sell your debt to someone else, or you're going to give me the money tomorrow morning. You have until 9 a.m. And he gave me the money back. And I didn't have to go because I never, I would have never done this. Can you give some of these people? Can you give Zeke some of these people? Can we try the recording? No, but I think it's just ultimately, it's just like, you know, you want to be involved with good people. And I think that's the thing with this business is like, I've really tried to avoid getting other people involved. They're giving any of my equity away, you know, really holding the full value of the business. And I'm glad that I have because I've tried to do other business. You get burned a few times and you, yeah, why's that? You've got to make sure that that, when you get burned, it's not so bad, right? But so. This is where, this is where you said, like, no matter what, how many times people would warn you, how many books you're going to read, nothing is better than to experience it because it's going to be crazy. You feel that, man? You feel when you get burned? Everyone's been burned. Everyone's been burnt before. Like I have lost a million bucks, thank God, and I never, hopefully, never will. But like, when you get burned by somebody, like, you feel that, you don't forget that. Never, never. I mean, usually, I mean, a million bucks, I'm still in shock when you said, and you moved on, but that shows. I mean, we're working on it, but it's like, you know, what do you, you know, it is what it is. You maybe, maybe you're not going to go. Possibly, I'm supposed to get the money back, but. Yeah. Well, you're not going to go on the other side for that because you have something else and you have that money. Yeah. And if I sit and just like, Fred, like, I just got to keep moving, you know, like, there's money to be made. Slow you down. Yeah, I got it. Ultimately, it's like, I won't lose my knives again. I'll tell you that once for sure. I do. What are you working on? Okay. So what are you working on now? What's next for you? Even you were saying you want to put, you want to not pivot, but like, you know what I'm saying? I think for me, I always said I wanted to get one, like, I want to write a book. I think my story is crazy. You know, I think people need to hear it. I think even just from a level of, you know, I think a lot of athletes need to hear it. I think a lot of, you know, just people who have been lost in life, have struggled in life, have had any type of adversity that they've gone through. It's motivation, right? And it's more about like personal development and growth. Like, you know, you've made a lot of money. Like, you know, I hope and aspire to make that. But it doesn't, doesn't feel like it doesn't, it's not the answer, right? You know, like, it doesn't, you know, it doesn't fill anything, right? And so I thought when I started making money, that was going to fill all my issues, right? And of course, you want to make money. You want to make a lot of money so you can do all kinds of things and fun things. But it's not, it's not why I'm here, right? And so I want to pivot more into space like where I can just provide value to people. You know, I have a good following. My businesses aren't going to slow down if I change what's being done on social media. And it's not like I'm going to stop it. It's just more about thinking about some other ventures and avenues that I can get gratification from. Because I get a lot of gratification and a lot of, you know, just, I get a really good feeling from helping people. And, you know, being real with people because you'd be surprised. Like, I told you about being less than a nine years old. You wouldn't believe the amount of men that have told me the same thing. Men that have never shared it with an NFL athlete's big time celebrities. People that have never, ever told a soul and they have told me and trusted me with this. And it's like that's insane to me, right? So I know that like if I've been affected in this way, like other people have been. And it's got to affect them in their life. Because until I really like started to like be like, you know, I got to do certain things. I got to stop drinking. I got to see a therapist. I got to wake up in the morning. And before I do anything involving my business, I got to like have my time to myself. And I guess that's your question about this. So processing, right? Everyone has something in their life. Yes. They need processing for because it's kind of a wound that you just leave open, right? And you need to heal it. So you said you came down to Florida and you took some, you get some help. Tell me about how you felt about this kind of before the processing and after. And what was really helping you? You think the catalyst that really helped you be more like waking up, not feeling that you need alcohol to stay away from this? What was, what did they do? What did they say to help you with that? I think it was. Like there was so much pressure on me from a young age, right? My dad played the NFL. I was a really good athlete. There was like always eyes on us, right? There was always a little bit of extra added pressure on me not to mention. I was like pretty good at sports. So I had a lot of guilt and shame from like the failures as well that kind of stemmed into again, these things that I dealt with as a, as a young child and then going to jail. And like I saw some shit in jail that would give you PTSD for the rest of your life. You know, like dudes getting their faces burnt off with oil, baby oil in the hot pot. Like just crazy stuff, right? That like, I needed to process that, right? I got out and sort of speaking. But like that, I come from a good family in a good home. Like I was sleeping with a child molester above my head. Like the same dude that literally destroyed my life in a lot of ways, right? So there was also, there was like, when I got out, I kind of tried to like, I'm just going to forget about it. Like I don't want to think about it because it was terrible. Like can you imagine not having a handle on the door and being able to open it? Like you're just locked in like a dog. Like it was crazy. You know, I just not how I was late at this time I lived. So I knew like because I was speaking and I was reminding myself and like I started noticing. Like I'm like feeling this more like in a negative way, right? Like I'm not I'm not having a dealt with it. I'm telling you, right? I have getting freedom from telling you but I haven't actually processed it, right? I forgot like I thought when I was nine years old, I thought I was like 18 and then I was supposed to be strong enough to like beat this man up and like I was nine. Like look at a nine year old kid now, like they're a baby. You know what I mean? Like that's that I didn't deserve to happen to me, right? I blame myself for many years but there was things in processing this where like I was drinking to black out. So I didn't think about this, right? Yeah. When I was younger. So they tell me technically it wasn't your fault. And you had to kind of like get it out of your system but talking about this and understand that that might have been the catalyst. And when you said look it, that was not supposed to happen. You are not at fault. You kind of needed to hear it. Even though consciously you know it but subconsciously you needed to come up for a system. And then you know again it was like I drink and drug like really to mask that. And then when the stuff with football happened like I mean you could Google my name. And you know it's like you're going to see some negative articles from when I was an athlete, whether it's a mug shot or an article like here I am. You know in 2012 Twitter just came out. You know what I mean? Like this is when social media just everything I read I thought the whole world is seeing this, right? The whole world is like fucks up. The fucks up. I got home, I got out of jail and I turned on ESPN. It's like freshman quarterback Zeke Pike arrested for public intoxication. My mug shot. I'm like the whole world sees this. Like I don't. You know I just didn't handle that well. I dealt. Very bad. I ended up. And it was just like you know and then I'm like okay well women like I'm going to just use women and like sex that's going to like change it and then I'm going to drink and that's going to. But it just all caught up to me right. Like again it was never I would it would work for the time being and then I'd wake up and I'd be facing the same problems. Right. So when I moved forward I was like I just want to deal with my problems. I'm done like trying to push them off because they I was I hadn't dealt with them. Like they just kept coming back. I think men have issues. What do you think men have issues like talking about their problems? Yeah. Of course. I do fix that. I don't know. No one that men. Women are much more than women. We have certain ego that we don't want to be vulnerable. I'm not going to you know go into this is a very deep psychological issue. But or like how do how do men better address their problems? I don't deal with it for 10 years. I mean you know the one thing for me that I've realized and it was very very hard to first open up and be vulnerable about some. When was the first time you told anybody about this? I was 20 when I like when I first went to jail and I'm like sitting here like trying you know like trying to figure out. Like what is why you know and it like it really hit me when I realized that why the dude above me. Yeah. They're talking about like getting this dude out of the cell. Like he's a child molester and I'm like guys like I at this time like people respected me in there. I'm like chilling. This ain't happening in here. It's my it's myself like we're we're grabbing peace in you. Like I was in there for the point where like they respected me for whatever. And so I've chose to like just let it like I'm going to forgive this situation in my life because if I keep holding on to it. Like I'm just going to be miserable about it. So that was the first time you spoke about this when you were 20 years old. It was the first time I told my mom and dad. Okay. So over 12 years. 12 fucking years. Do you feel it made it different after you spoke about this the first time? Yeah it was so freeing. Oh so freeing for me. Okay. I for a long time I felt like like people are going to judge me right like. Again I've ate when like I've really buried it to where I thought it didn't happen to me. And then it started to kind of get spiked back up when I was like probably 15 or 16. And you're like a high you're in high school right. You know there's all these whatever homosexual jokes or whatever. And it's like I'm not right. I know that but like what I I know this secret that happened to me that nobody else knows. You know what I mean? And it was like torturing to me. Yeah. And then like this fear of like what if somebody finds out or those or tells or like how embarrassing that would be. And then I'm like supposed to be a five star all American quarterback who's getting recruited like wow what would they think right? Yeah. It was just like a lot. You kept it in your head. Yeah and it was more mental probably where I probably should have just told somebody when it happened right. But I was so scared. And again I think it does have to do with being a man. And we as men I think tend to try to handle things inwardly which in returns comes out like for me like if I hold my emotions in it may come out in like irritability it may come out in frustration like I may lash out and be short fused. And it's all subconscious too. Yeah. But you don't even realize half the time. I'm like bearing that. I do you speak about this. Do you feel like you don't have that problem anymore? Oh I do but I work on it all the time. Like I still go see a therapist twice a month. Being aware of the problem. Being aware of why you would have like this. I think it makes sense. I think it's being aware and like realizing there's there's no stigma against mental health. Yes. Like it is so prevalent in every household in America it's crazy that it's there. But I mean we used to be dealing with it yourself. There's a different between each mental health. Yeah it is. But it's some from what I struggle with. What I struggle with is not the same thing other might mean. You know my sister's very open about it my sister had an eating disorder right. She suffered in a completely different way which was from you know a relationship that she had that was very you know verbally abusive that made her my sister's been skinny her whole life right she thought she was 250 pounds. She wasn't she had an eating disorder right you think she's the only girl that suffered from this like that's mental health right depression not being like I have depression and anxiety I have you know I work on it and I I do the things that are necessary just like before a game when I go and stretch before the game so I do the same thing every day in the morning to try to get my mind woken up and prepared for whatever the task may be but there's so many people that are struggling with it and yes it could be very severe mental illness and when we see all these negative shootings and tragedies in the news and they always want to go towards like oh he's psycho he's you know he's mentally ill but like that's next level right I'm talking about people that are just struggling with like the difficulties of life and it becomes stress that turns into anxiety and depression and helps them not want to get out of bed and then we see suicide rate at like an all time high right yeah these are good people right that just they they lose it you know in the world stimulated dude we're surrounded by stimulation like it's it's it's it's it's it's a scary place to be alone and I feel like you know me speaking up it just encourages other men to speak up and I've seen like for me I've seen some really high-profile people that I've opened up to that have opened up back to me and I'm like I never would have thought that this person who's living this incredible life that I my opinion is like really you know and that they went through something you know the same or similar it's like why that's what happens that's the thing like so it's like almost like the lesson is like if you have a story it's yeah for sure there's there's the fact that if you sort of talk about that to somebody else is going to help you in your life but it's going to it's going to have like a butterfly effect too yeah I'm not going to help you're going to help a thousand other people through through hearing your story yeah that they can now open up and they can talk about all the experiences they have men men need good men like we need good men like there's too many fakes there's too many faunies like there's too many people try just there's on loyalty there's mistrust there's just you know it's like you need good men who can be vulnerable hold you accountable and that's why like I don't hang out with everybody right like I keep a circle very small because I need people to hold me accountable right I don't want people who I don't want yes men around me right like I need good people in my life you know that understand who I am I can be real with like yo if I wake up like I don't want to put this front on like I'm having a great day like go I feel like shit today yeah I might have a good day you know what I mean like yeah that's what it is yeah that's what it's all about you can just go and yeah be with me doing everything not just doing the fun part and yeah absolutely yeah this is this is very good because this is this is where you said yourself like I think men are less open I mean it's not it's just where we have tons of ego that women don't have I think women are more mature intellect they have some some sort of intellect that men don't have and we have a lot of fear and forbid that we don't get to spread it around and it's about our weaknesses our weaknesses is just just a big challenge yes it's uh what do you say to someone that kind of like have a trauma whatever type like how do you tell them look if you don't want to talk about this do I mean you don't have to talk about it though right like I choose to talk about it because I feel like I have a platform right so like I'm not afraid to talk about it and I hope somebody's encouraged like because I'm sure a lot of people can look at my life from the outside and think oh I have it on together and you know my life's perfect but if I'm real about it maybe somebody else will be real about it as well you know I feel like like just opening up and being honest is a choice you don't have to be vulnerable about it but going and getting help and silence is is not you don't have to be loud about it right like you don't have to tell people you have you know mental illness or depression or anxiety like maybe you know like like I don't feel ashamed behind it because this is who I am and all the people are struggling I'll be a voice for it but I'm sure other people probably like they there is a stigma that needs to be smashed and they're afraid to talk about it or say it but you don't have to like just do go go get help go see a therapist go talk to somebody like I love going to see a therapist because I I see them for that one hour and I don't give a shit what they think about me like well I don't care I say off the wall stuff in there like really crazy stuff that my head is thinking I don't really care what he thinks about me right like I'm paying him to listen to my shit so he's gonna listen to it you know 100% so it's like you don't have to do be loud about it or get on podcasts and talk about it or get on your social media and talk about it but go get that you know it's something you know it's something that you're feeling just you gotta go see somebody and if you don't know what to do get on google and type in therapist near me and you're gonna find somebody you know what I mean like and maybe it may be you get pointed in the right direction right it helps I mean I I spoke to a therapist the first time when my ex and I went through marriage counselor and then she did they do one one because they want you to feel 100% and and they they usually try to kind of like peel the onion layers right they did to peel the layers yeah to find out what's inside and I remember when I spoke to my therapist and I like found something in my past that I never really thought it was a problem and she told me oh that's an issue yeah you get to talk about this now that time I really thought she's China she wants me to keep coming over you I'm feeling fine but then eventually before I left I said wait a minute there was one more thing I didn't tell you and then and then it it continued to lots of conversations that I keep telling myself that maybe I should keep going back there but but it's a it's like you'll never know I think everyone needs needs that type of processing for things that you might not think are significant. Remove the sigma it's not we yes it's not it's not less than it's just open the fuck up and even like seeing a therapist like you don't even have to be like have any issues right like sometimes it's just like having that other person to talk 200 even relationships right like marriages are hard relationships are hard I'm married you're in a relationship you're coming out of a relationship like that shit's hard it's not easy you know and just life ain't easy so it's like whether it be your business just knowing having somebody else who can be a second voice of opinion to kind of call you on your bullshit yeah challenge you to think about things that maybe you wouldn't think about you know and so I get a like I might my therapist would challenge me a lot and I'll be like I never thought about that but I'll start thinking about it because he said it right so it's I get benefit from that and it helps you be a better man sometimes yeah they can go and tell you a couple things that's yeah if you if you if you do it that's what the other person thing is just you need that you need that kind of like put put you in the right lane on certain thing kind of like see how everyone else fill when you when you do certain things and it really makes you be a better person on both sides right it's it's really good you know good all right what else we got that was we went through everything man went through your past we went through we went through Amazon and went Pelosi went through Pelosi that was good that was really really good and I wanted to do any any any any any closing thoughts to like closest out what are you what do you want to do what do you want to close that with man where do you see yourself in 10 years yeah in 10 years I see myself having a nice house like you actually my business for half a billion dollars and let's go being so bored I don't know what's so bored that I call Scott and say hey I I need something to do let's start a podcast I love it that's what I love that are you gonna have alcohol from now to the next 10 years you think you're gonna I mean here's the thing I don't think I don't think 10 years down the road I literally just think about today right like I just don't do it today and here's the thing I told Scott I'm like look if I exit my business for a half a billion dollars like I may have a glass of four roses and celebrate but like I I just don't ever gonna be with you yeah yeah yeah but I just you know for now I take one day at a time and I I do that I want to get to the point where you're at where it's like you know that's the goal right you know build something accident and ultimately like take care of my family forever and ever and ever and ever you know that's what my dad trusted me with yeah this is this is this is good I mean listen to this awesome I think that that was something that's gonna definitely help a lot of people and thank you for coming yeah thanks for having me it was amazing we're gonna go grub dinner you guys are invited it's a bit too late because we're gonna be leaving the restaurant by that time but what are we going noodles pinini noodles pinini the best Italian food I'm also got sticky so oh it's very picky okay the potato is like baked in with cheese like you don't even understand it's the but I am let's go eat here he's like okay no no actually we're gonna go here because this have this menu it's great I love it no no I know my food I'm I am a fat is it is good is it a world food is over here next time we can also do some steaks shadow to puppy steak my friends yes from puppy steak in Commodo right anything Dave Graftman's business is going to be coming in we want a suitcase I want to cut the line in front of everybody I don't want to be nice so we want the suitcase oh by the way when you go to puppy steak trust me there is a better steak than the suitcase steak we're gonna go okay I want you to go and show Valentina what is the suitcase find one of those okay there's a better steak if you guys want to know a better cut it's gonna be the rib cup it's a much smaller it's a little bit cheaper but once you eat it it will change your life it's say my life was enough to this take so you guys go to go to puppy steak and get the rib cup wagoo real life full change and you will thank me forever we've got to get the pastrami pastrami pastrami wagoo if you don't you need like four of them if you get those puppies taken you don't get that the smoke doesn't fill me up you need to be arrested or deported even you when in America doesn't matter you need to have that steak that is fucking amazing steak yeah and when you go to Commodo everyone goes for the dark and I absolutely love the dark but listen the hidden gem is the short ribs the beef short ribs that's we had last time like that god that was good was dark that was like melting your mouth you don't need a knife you don't even like you look at it the need break when you get this bought kind of uh she got a catered she got this podcast catered yeah for sure I mean like the whole point like the way for me grubman grubman let's go grubman grubman I've seen him do it before I've seen him I've seen him I think you're gonna have him on here for sure yeah I'm on here for sure you know what he does get catered to his house you kind of like ask yourself okay what does grubman does what does he eat okay so I have what does he go to eat that okay so if you look at his stories for Shabbat dinner you know who he catered the food from Motek Cafe Motak yes it's an Israeli place bear mine it's not even a kosher place but it is kosher in terms of the food that's here they're stopping on Saturday which makes it not kosher but this is fucking phenomenal food it they elevated all the Israeli food in South Florida forever they smoked whatever was before I've never been there before fucking phenomenal I think in South Florida yes it's there to be a location in South Florida yeah yeah yeah I'll I'll bring you guys over you guys gonna love it it's phenomenal and any other place that open after match that quality because that's it it just raised it's it's you know what talking business now we'll go back we didn't finish I feel like when a business grow there are two types of growth for businesses one can decline your business one can actually excel your business and it's really coming down to how you pick the people if your mind is I want to bring a person that's better than the current people that I have everyone else is gonna get better and the weak ones are gonna turn if you just bring more people because you need to bring more people and you stuff it poorly and your managers and your direct all the directors and above are not technical enough to know who's a good person they'll bring below average and then what you have is organizational that's kind of bureaucratical and that's when it starts sinking down it really comes down that if the people on top are a players they would hire a's if there are b's they'll hire c's and that is when it shifts because a b always have one problem they're always worried about their kind of survival and their organization so a b and an a or a threat so they choose the c and that's where you see some companies growing and you said what happened it used to be better before oh when you grow like no it's not you have to make sure that you can have nothing but a players don't compromise on that get the a players because they'll hire a's and better a's than what they've seen you know another another point about that is when you do hire an a player is going to be uncomfortable that's good because it's not going to somebody who listens to everything you're doing it's going to be something's going to challenge you every fucking idea you have fucking look at it's going to be fucking uncomfortable I I've hired a players in my company right now and it's uncomfortable as fuck but I let them do the thing because they're killing it that's awesome but it is it is the first if if somebody is too easy to deal with they're not an a player yeah because why the fuck would you hire somebody that doesn't have their own ideas right 100% yeah that's good that's good I guess we're gonna go grab dinner that's some food all right awesome thank you awesome thank you that was good thank you guys how's how's the four roses are you guys feeling yeah 100% that is you