Why Most Creator Businesses Fail (& Which Don't)

0:00We bought products from eight different creators, and today, we're going to put them head-to-head and decide [music] which one is the best creator product. We've been reviewing creator products for almost a decade now, and we've seen a lot of products succeed, but even more fail. But, the opportunity now has probably never been greater to start a creator product. We're seeing headlines every day about new products being launched and major investments being

0:21made into creator companies. All right. Our first [music] match-up, we got Feastables versus Long Weekend. Long Weekend is a collaboration between Moment, who is an existing gear brand, with Willem Verbeeck, the YouTuber and a fashion designer and his friend Allison Simon. So, they designed the products and did the branding and initial shooting. Moment handles manufacturing,

0:44supply chain, and distribution. That looks really cool. It does look cool. Okay, so completely different companies. Yeah, so we wanted different types of creator products. So, there are four absolute juggernaut, massive YouTube channel companies, and then there are four companies from more niche creators that are either partnerships with bigger brands to help out with distribution or are completely bootstrapped distribution, designing, manufacturing

1:10completely themselves. So, this is David versus Goliath. You You okay right now? What are you doing? I don't [laughter] I I Batteries are sometimes really hard to put in. I can see that. Do you want me to put the batteries in? No, I'll get I'll get it. I got you. I got young hands. [laughter]

1:24Keith, you want to do it? Yeah, it may not be USB-C, but I got it. No, I'm confident. I'll get it, guys. Carry on. Okay. Connor, tell us about the rubric in which we are judging. Yeah, so we are judging on four criteria. Number one, authenticity. Does this product or business feel like it's an extension of the creator? Number two, scalability. Can it grow into something bigger? Do you have to be a fan of the creator to enjoy this product? Shareability. Does the product make you want to tell your friends about it or post pictures on Instagram? And then, the last one is just general cool

1:58factor. Like, is it fun to talk about? Is it cool? Do we think it's good? I think Colin's going to need help. No. Come on. You don't [laughter] Let me see this. All right, you ready? [laughter] How come you figure That's crazy. You never used a disposable camera? I have. You just go like this.

2:20I was doing it. You wind it up all the way. winding it. Disposable cameras are cool, they're in right now. There's that uh short form format where somebody walks up to somebody else and is like, "Hey, take this camera, shoot your trip, and bring it back to me." Uh that feels like the obvious format

2:34for this to like keep this in the world. The difference between this disposable camera and another one is this one looks cool. And it's reusable. And it's reusable. What's the price point? That is $50. Ooh. That's expensive. It's reusable. I get it, but that's expensive. Like that At 50 bucks, you have to have a

2:52deep relationship to make that purchase. And how much is the film cost? I bought Portra 400, and it was $35 a roll. But there's much cheaper film. All in to get yourself shooting here, it's $85. With a name like Long Weekend, this needs to be way more about the community that you get to be a part of if you buy

3:09this camera than the actual camera. Yes. This should be about going on long weekend trips that are planned for you that maybe at a much higher price point. Like, we're going to take a photography trip to Zion National Park or Joshua Tree. Bring your Bring your main camera, but also because you bought this, you're like, you can be a part of the community that

3:28even has access to these trips. This also feels like a great collaboration with Airbnb. Like, this feels like a mechanism for the creator to do more interesting brand deals. Does that make sense? Like, Airbnb is going to buy 100 of these and ship them out to subscribers who get to go on trips and then take photos, and we're going to make a big photo book. So, it to me, this is not a business in and of itself. It's a product that gives these creators a cool story to do better

3:56brand deals. This is just a way to find people who are into a thing so that you can honestly sell them something else. But I think honestly products are great for creators because they give you something to talk about. Willum probably is making a ton of I remember watching his videos about photography. It's really cool, but then you kind of like at least for me I tapered off cuz it's

4:13like, you know, I need a new narrative. And the new narrative could be like what you're talking about, long weekend trips, meeting communities, connecting to people, stories about photos. There's a lot in here, but the product can be that mechanism to tell a story. Yeah, it's not super scalable. It is honestly more similar to when someone buys one of our Press Publish hats. It's an identifier It's an identifier

4:32of our community. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. to wear that. Yeah. Like that bag, one thing I really like about it is that it's a camera bag, but it doesn't totally look like a camera bag. Like there's a little bit of ambiguity about what it is and how you use it. So even if you're just a fan of Willum, but you're not like a photographer and you like the bag, you

4:51could still buy it and use it. What's up with all the Pokémon tins? That's my personal bag. That's understood. Understood. I didn't know. Yo, you said that's so judgmental. You said that very [laughter] judgmental. That's so judgmental. crazy. Yeah, I'm sorry everybody. I did not mean to offend everyone who loves Pokémon. [laughter] I just like you all acted like it's totally normal. We're reviewing a product and this one looks

5:10weathered. about, man. Yeah, I know and I him your whole life. [laughter] Yeah, and I appreciate you and I like that you have their interests. It's great. Um cool bag. All right. If we talk about Feastables for a second. So Feastables is Mr. Beast's candy and snack brand started in 2022. They're sold in over 30,000 retail locations in over 30 countries. It's

5:34huge. had this in a long time. I don't really eat chocolate. Yo. [laughter] But this is really good. Like for chocolate. Like you're a chocolate guy. You eat chocolate all the time. Big time chocolate guy. What do you think of this? It's delicious. I have pieces of it regularly at my home, primarily because Jimmy sends it to us all the time. So,

5:52I'm a little bit biased here. I haven't tried the new products. How many products does Feastables sell now? They sell like five variations of chocolate bars, peanut butter cups, hazelnut cups, and then the new sour strikes. To answer the scalability question, I would say like this product is distributed in 30,000 retail stores. We looked up prior to this how many

6:11McDonald's there are around the world. There's 45,000 McDonald's. Just to like orders of magnitude, like he has distributed almost at the scale of one of the most widely distributed brands in the world. He is one of the most scaled creators in terms of his reach right now, so it makes sense that his product has also

6:28scaled. The question is like is always about repeat purchase with chocolate, right? Like how many times can you buy these chocolate bars, but seems to be clearly working. This I think is an effort to get to more repeat purchases. Mhm. I actually think gummies, new product skews like this, probably have more repeat purchases than chocolate. Can we pull up the video he made about

6:49how his chocolate's made? You've heard me say that Feastables is the best tasting chocolate in the world. How Feastables chocolate is made, 61 million views. Is that not insane? Think about this value proposition. Like the fact that him and his team can make this video and 61 million people will watch it is crazy. Just at a high level, this is the advantage of being a creator and

7:11launching a business. Yeah. When a creator launches a product, it's sort of entrepreneurship in reverse. Yeah. Right? So, normally you come up with an idea for a product or a business, you build that product, and then you go, "Okay, how do I reach the people that this product serves?" The creator is already developing an intimate relationship with a large group of people who care about something, and they have an idea of what their need may

7:32be. Then they can get a product. They also have a system to produce content about it. Yeah, reaching their audience is not the problem. Like 61 million is remarkable for a Hershey's, but it's a competitive advantage for a Mr. Beast. Yeah, but sometimes you see a creator launch a product and they don't know how

7:48to talk about it. Mhm. I think he like kind of brute forces like there is constantly content about this. I think the important word here is world building. Like Jimmy and his team are doing a great job of world building. Feastables is a character in the Mr. Beast world. Even when he goes on another channel like when he's on Niga Giovanni's channel, he is bringing Feastables in that cooking challenge

8:08with him. Let's go to the rubric. All right, Feastables versus Long Weekend. Authenticity. Long Weekend actually has a pretty good case here to take it for authenticity just because Willem is a film photographer. This is a perfect extension Sure. of his brand. You like Willem, you like what he does, you want to take photos like him, go on similar journeys, buy

8:26the camera. Yes, you're right. Jimmy was not making videos about chocolate before he launched a chocolate brand. Willem was making videos about photography when he launched a camera. Might be point Willem. Scalability, Feastables. And easy. [laughter] I wouldn't say that. Come on, guys. Yeah, yeah, there's potential here, but I mean look, this is David versus Goliath. Like There's there's potential You're talking about the most scalable

8:45creator. That's not meant to scale. Exactly. Yeah, that's not meant to scale. Also, even the price point is Between Pokémon and that, I'm like I'm like a real villain. Yeah. [laughter] Sorry, everybody. Shareability. Shareability, I think if you looked right now online of how many people are sharing themselves eating Feastables and even Jimmy's ability to create content around this,

9:03he has wins. Long Weekend has a lot of potential if they can find their repeatable life on film style format or their Long Weekend format. That that has a ton of potential. Yep. And then just the it factor. Is it cool? What do you like? I mean, this is cool. cool. Yeah, yeah, it's very cool. Long Weekend should do like a collaboration with the Creator Camp kids. Like the the YouTube new wave kind of like I thought you were going to say us, but

9:24yeah, yeah, no. They're [laughter] cool. They're cool. Those guys are cool, too. Yeah. Yeah, but I think like Feastables has the scale to win this one. Obviously, if we're judging on this rubric like it's Feastables. So the eight seed is not going to upset the one seed in the first round. Mr. Beast moves on. In the context of this competition, in the context of me as a buyer, I'm buying

9:42Long Weekend. I'm not buying chocolate. Yeah, if I could strap one of these to my chest, it would be the camera. For the next match-up, we have two seed Mark Rober with Crunch Labs against the color cube from art YouTuber Sarah Renee Clark. Okay, I know what Crunch Labs is. Obviously, subscription box, Mark launched this a couple years ago, very

10:04successfully. Value prop on his channel is he'll teach you to think like an engineer. This literally, you can take it home with you. There you go. And you can think like an engineer. He has it for different age brackets. The Crunch Labs box is for a younger age bracket. Hack Pack, which is what we're holding here, is for I think what's the age that this

10:2014 to 101. 14 plus to what to 101? Yeah, 102's too old. Wow. Can you pull up a a a 102-year-old? [laughter] It would just be a selfie. Oh, jeez. Crazy. Oh, dude. We know what the Hack Pack is. Can we talk about the color cube cuz I I've seen this. Sarah Renee Clark, she has 452,000 subscribers and she makes like

10:45art challenge content. YouTube's biggest art collab is falling apart. 663,000 views. That's a lot of people. This is like a huge audience that I don't think I really knew about how big this audience is. The business with her channel membership and products does over 5 million a year. Wow. I want to know what you do with the

11:06color cube. So, the color cube is the flagship product. It is for artists, designers, and things like that where you physically look at color palettes for inspiration when you're making art, color grading, coloring in a coloring book, painting, anything like that. And then what do you do? Like if I look at this and I'm like, man, I really like this cream color. Oh, these are hex

11:27codes. Yes. Oh, so then I go like, cool, I'm going to use this cream color in my graphic designing or in my painting. Exactly. And then the physical color cube is $45 on its own. And if you want it with the digital version where everything is searchable, it's like a searchable PDF, it is $67.

11:46What is the consistent use case of this? I think the consistent use case is you have something that looks cool on your shelf in your house. It's like I have one of these and I've used it a couple times when I'm trying to buy a rug in my apartment. I have used it cuz I don't have an eye for color. Like I actually

12:02need help. whether you know what you're doing or not when you pick up the cube, if you have friends who just come over and you're like, "What do you think what couch do you think I should buy? Like what color?" And then you grab this cube off your shelf and you start holding it

12:14up, you seem cool. Even just having the cube on your shelf because it looks interesting, it gives you like a certain identity. That's amazing. Can Can we see one of the videos where she talks about it? Oh my goodness. I am beyond excited. I'm so happy to share this with you. I think this might be the best buy.

12:31Okay, people love this thing. It still blows my mind. I cannot rave about this enough. Sometimes you Ooh, look at that one. This is awesome. This is [laughter] I love how into color people are. This is what makes the internet awesome, right? Like this is what makes YouTube and the internet amazing. That this product can exist, people can love it, and we can look at it and not fully get it. This is

12:53classic YouTube business. Yeah. This also is one like I think this is like has expanded really well because I think she started with just one and now there's different variations with different shades, which like when you think about the number of colors in that box, it's kind of incredible that it's expanded into multiple. Yeah, the fact that this is volume two is amazing. And that you can do multiple volumes. Like now this is I know Colin, you're not going to like this what I'm about to say, but it's a got to collect

13:19them all business. [laughter] You know what I mean? Where you Where you If you're a fan of this, every time a new one drops, you're buying it. Yeah. But why do you need more than one box? So, I'll give you an example right now. Like, I'm desperately looking for hex code F6E921. I can't find it.

13:35It might be in volume one. Colin might be one of the most unrelatable people that [laughter] we've ever had on here. Yeah, I know you're What ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? I THOUGHT YOU MEANT IN the world. Am [laughter] I wrong? Isn't that an orange? [snorts] It's our yellow. Kish. Yeah, it's orange. It's the yellow of the brand.

13:56It's the yellow of the brand. [laughter] Yo, oh, wait. Everybody in this room knew this? Is that orange? told me? Please, F6E921, is it orange? All right, let's talk about CrunchLabs. Obviously, we've gone up to visit Mark multiple times. We were actually there when he was making the video to launch this, the 14 plus version of CrunchLabs. But, CrunchLabs has to be one of the most successful creator businesses we've seen. I mean, he's gone from the videos funding the product to the product now funding the videos. When we were up there, he had a huge production for a video on his main YouTube channel, which had a massive,

14:28like, blown up version of this. Of this, the Turret Con. Yeah. Within the first 6 months, they sold 100,000 boxes and already reached profitability. They shipped over 2 million build boxes in the first year and a half. And assuming a 2750 average purchase, which is if everybody was on the annual prepaid plan, that's

14:50$55 million. Whoa. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, you how much money? CrunchLabs isn't messing around. Yeah, that's unbelievable. Mark has incredible scale, but he just nailed it with this product, in my opinion. Like, the video to product experience of I'm watching a video, I'm seeing this guy do something really cool with engineering, and then I get to do it with my hands. Let alone, you get an exclusive video when you buy the product. It's also a recurring subscription. The first time we went up to to learn about CrunchLabs with Mark, he sold me. I'm buying it for my nephews. I did that. That's been 3 4

15:24years. I still pay for it every month. Wow. You're welcome, boys. Keesh, can you build this? Yes, sir. Make me proud, Keesh. All right. Uh Keesh, how old are you? 23 years old and 11 months and [laughter] 2 weeks. I have not heard somebody use months. talk about the way about my baby. That's great. Yes, cuz y'all got like 100,000 [laughter] months But, here's the situation, chat. So, Samir wants to silence my takes cuz he knows I'll check him. So, I'm going to

15:56see how fast I can build the hack pack. And if I build it in under an hour, the show is going to be called the Colin, Samir, and Keesh show. That's crazy. That should take you like 20 minutes. What are you talking? There's electronics in here, man. [laughter] What are you It's literally for children. All right. So, let's talk about our

16:14rubric here. Number one, authenticity. This is a dead match for both of them. Both are incredibly authentic. That's a tie. Yeah, that's a tie. Scalability. I find Crunch Labs to be far more scalable. I think there's an element of being a fan of Simone Renee Clark. Like you you can definitely buy the Color Cube without knowing about Simone Renee Clark. But, Crunch Labs, you've got kids playing with it together. You've got people buying it for like holiday gifts. It's The thing is it's a great purchase and when you purchase, you're buying a

16:41subscription. Yep. So, you're buying a repeat purchase. It's a great great product. Uh this though, I I don't want this to seem like this is not a excellent creator business. This is an excellent is a really close heat. Yeah, I love this business. I think this is actually like this is the business to

16:56aspire to be like for most creators. 100% and and part of that is cuz like Crunch Labs has 50 plus employees. Simone Renee Clark's team is like her, her husband, and maybe a handful of other people. It's like Yeah, she's killing it. But, this this is a lifestyle business and I think it's great. I think this is what the creator economy offers is like build an audience that's die hard about something and then offer them a product

17:19that matches that enthusiasm. Shareability. Mark has gone to unbelievable lengths to make sure that the videos talk about the product and the product comes with videos. Super shareable. And then for cool factor, I think look, they're both cool in their own ways. They're cool to different audiences. This one you get to say you're someone who cares about color. Crunch Labs, your kid gets to age

17:37with it. It's hard not to push Crunch Labs through. Yeah, the scale is crazy. Okay. Crunch Labs Crunch Labs. Mark Rober wins. But this is awesome. Mark, you got to put letters on the tools, man. You got to put letters on this. Like [laughter] how am I supposed to know the tall the tall one from the

17:52small one? [snorts] this to be like IKEA? [laughter] Yes, exactly. Understood. All right, before we get to the next creator matchup, let's do our own matchup. Press Publish hat versus Press Publish socks. Socks. For me, hat. All right. Hat? Yeah. Usually hat. The socks are really nice. Now, if you want to check out this hat or these socks, they're available on our Press Publish store, which is built on Shopify. Almost all these creator businesses that we're talking about

18:15today launched their stores on Shopify. And Shopify just made it much easier to design, build, and edit your store with Canvas. It's actually so easy to use that I showed it to my 76-year-old dad, it took him 4 minutes to completely redesign his store. One of the ways my dad was able to use this so easily is that it actually asks you follow-up questions to get you

18:34closer to exactly what you want. This is Shopify. Yeah, this is Shopify. [laughter] They also have AI. They also have AI, yeah. And then you can actually just look at all of the pages on your site next to each other so you can tell if they're all cohesive and work well. Shopify has always been the best way to launch a product online. That's why millions of people launch stores on Shopify. So, if you ever thought about launching a business online, go to shopify.com/colinandsamir and check it out. All right, now, our next matchup, I don't even know what I'm looking at, but I know I'm looking at

19:03Dude Perfect. Next matchup, three seed Dude Perfect against six seed Chef PK. The Dude Perfect is their toy and game line, and Chef PK's product is Cooking with Chaos, which is a recipe card game. Interesting. Chef PK, his name is Paul. He makes anime cooking content. So, he'll make food from popular animes, video games,

19:30things like that. I like that. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, it's 20 proteins, 20 sides, 20 sauces, and you mix and match. How does the dice work? If you don't want to go through and choose, you basically roll it, choose a random one within 20. Cuz it's set up like a magic deck where each has 20 in the D20

19:48die. What? [laughter] Oh, wow, you're going You're going way too fast for me. What did What did you just say? Uh it's set up like a magic deck. Is this Is this Pokémon? Magic: The Gathering, the card game. [laughter] All right, so hold on. I rolled a 20. What does that mean? So, you could go and choose the the last

20:11card in red. Okay, pineapple chicken. Cool. Got it. Pineapple chicken, and then you would do the same thing for blue, and then same thing for green. Roll again. Oh, cuz they're different sauces. Okay, okay. So, it's pineapple chicken All right, miso cucumber salad, and then same thing for blue. Yep. 20. Last card, easy. What are we eating for dinner? Pineapple chicken with miso cucumber salad with a zesty goddess

20:33sauce. I think though, like going into a pain point of every human, which is indecision around what to eat, Yeah. and then making it your own for your own community, I think that's really cool. And then, um how much does it cost? The base box is $40. The way he wants to scale is expansion packs and licensed expansion packs. So, right now it's the rice bowl expansion, which is 30 new cards, but he wants to get into licensed ones. So, it would be like One Piece, the anime, or other cooking creators where it could be like mythical chef Joshua's last meal with three cards,

21:11things like that. it. Understood. Um Keith, can I ask you a question? You like anime. You like anime, right? Does this speak to you? Um I would watch the videos and if I were to ever buy a cookbook, it would be this one. Wow, that's a that's pretty good. Okay. Okay. Yeah, I also know him. Yeah, yeah. By the way, he's been commenting on a video since the

21:28beginning. He's like he's great. Yeah, he's the goat. supportive people. Thank you, Paul. The struggle he has and what you're going to have with this is that um actually being able to use the correct brand name. Like the IP. Yeah, the actual IP. Yeah, but if he can get there, people would buy it, right? There's a ton of these that are licensed and they're the most of the official ones are horrible. So, him being positioned as like one that's like actually good would it would it would be so big if he was able to partner with

21:56the IP. Okay, I feel like he's on his way. Maybe this exists within the product, but I would want to know how rare is pineapple chicken with the miso cucumber or salad and the green goddess sauce. Oh, that's cool. You know, like I I would want to know there's only a certain amount in circulation and that's

22:10Oh, you're talking about the Pokédex. So, I know you don't I know [laughter] that's crazy. Colin that's not even remotely what I'm talking about. Realizing he's into Pokémon. [laughter] Let's dive into Dude Perfect. This is sticky Tic-Tac-Toe and it's part of their toys and games line and it's part of a larger suite of like general merch

22:32aimed to kids like 5 to 15. Where is this sold? On their website and then Walmart and Amazon. Yeah, it seems like a partnership with a toy company All Star on the bottom here that like is probably licensing the Dude Perfect brand and then making a bunch of different toys. In 2024, Dude Perfect's chief brand officer said their games line with Walmart was the number one selling toy

22:56in the holiday season. Wow. I mean, Dude Perfect's big. All right, should we play a quick round? All right. Did you bounce or no bounce? I no looked. And it just went bullseye. All right, go ahead. Damn Nope. Damn it. Yes. Oh. THIS IS ACTUALLY GREAT. NO. I'M OVER. UM this is really fun. [laughter]

23:27Yeah, that's fun. I totally get holidays. You traveled home to your snowy hometown. You're going to your parents' house. I can see it. Right? Yeah. It's snowing. You stop by Walmart. Nope. Wawa first. Sure. [laughter] Pick up meatball sub. You stop by Walmart to pick up stuff for for the holidays and you just are passing this. You're like, this would be a great game for the family to connect

23:49over. How much is this, Connor? This was $20. That's I mean, that's amazing. All of a sudden, I'm uncle of the year. Yeah, great product. I I love this. I think this is great. You watch Dude Perfect and you go can I do that? And then they give you an opportunity to play a game that's like can I do that? Oh, I'm as good at trick shots as Dude Perfect. [laughter]

24:06Yep. Authenticity. Both. Both. Both are very authentic. Scalability. I mean, you just told me this was the top-selling toy brand. The toy line, yeah. Yeah. It's like, I mean, there's a difference here and it's hard to say like distribution in retail stores is ultimate scale. Yeah. I think also it's just like the scale of these products is matching the

24:28scale of the creators. Right. Shred PK is more of a niche creator with a niche community. He sells a niche product. Dude Perfect, similar to Mark Rober or Mr. Beast, these are mass scale creators. They have mass scale products. Shareability. This I I could see being set out in somebody's house, but I I think niche

24:45niche creates shareability. Mhm. So, like anime fans are probably quicker to tell each other about a product, right? The more tight-knit the community, the more shareable something becomes. Yeah. What What's our last one? It factor, right? This is very fun. I get this. I'm not an anime fan. So, I I get this, but I don't think I get the intricacies of

25:08it. Yeah, I am more likely to play this and then just look up some recipes online. So, we'll take it to a vote. I'm giving this to Cooking With Chaos. I'm giving it to Dude Perfect. you dudes. I just want Cooking With Chaos to progress through this game. I'm voting Cooking With Chaos. Cooking.

25:26Cooking. Wow, okay. For the record, show I was the only one. [laughter] I love this game. I'm going to play this game. I'm pushing Cooking With Chaos through. We got to We got to push Cooking With Well, to my guys in Frisco, don't forget. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But all my guys in Frisco, you're you're welcome to come

25:42compete with us in this. Sounds like you're not. A lot of this has to do with me kicking the field goal at Dude Perfect. Oh, yeah, that was atrocious. Yeah, yeah. And I'm an athlete. Doesn't look like it. [laughter] I'm an athlete. Doesn't look like it. wasn't my day. It wasn't my day that

25:55day. You're a Hyrox athlete. Yeah, yeah. [laughter] I'm an athlete. TBD. All right, let's get to the next match up. So, next match up we have Sincerely Yours from Jordan and Salish Matter and Lone Fox from Drew Scott. And Lone Fox are the surprise products that you guys don't know about. Oh, great. What is that? [laughter] That looks like That looks like uh the candle from Beauty and the Beast. You know what I

26:20mean? What? What is this? So, we got [laughter] This is an ashtray. It is It is a vintage greyhound ashtray from the 1950s. What are you guys [laughter] What are you guys doing? What are you What are you guys have fake cigarettes? It's an ashtray. [laughter] So, here's the thing about working with Colin and Samir.

26:41I got you. K- This is Key Shawn the job making the hacky sack. [laughter] Key, with a cigarette in your mouth, you've aged like 20 years. [laughter] This is weird. You just blow. See, you just blow? Yeah, you blow. I used to use these in theater. Okay, so this is an ashtray. So wait,

27:02hold on. Explain to me what's going on. Like who's the creator or did you just get an ashtray? Guess how much that thing cost? 200 bucks? It's not I I'm just following my 800 bucks? What does this cost? $1,200? What does this cost? $685. Oh my god, guys. And we have the Valley side table, which is a great conversation starter

27:26statement piece for $985. No, what? This is $685 and this is $985. this is vintage furniture clearly like it's expensive. So the brand is Lone Fox, which was started by Drew Michael Scott. I've passed the store. It's on the Breya, I think. Yes. Yes. The YouTube channel does a lot of DIY sort of renovation interior design. So on their website, they have

27:54everything from like vintage chairs. extremely high-end. Yes. Okay, that's $4,000. [clears throat] So you guys got the most reasonable thing, although you didn't get the brown horse ceramic mug, which was only $45. [laughter] You opted not for that one. So now you can buy home decor furniture off of his website or you can go into

28:12the brick and mortar shop in LA. Yeah, so they have their home brand and then it's also a curated platform of other designers that sell on his site that he chooses. They'll do licensed collaborations like he just did a holiday collection with West Elm. Okay, I really like creators as curators. I think more creators should launch retail stores. I think being a tastemaker is really interesting. Now, making your own singular product is like you know, it's challenging to do, but I think when you become like [clears throat] the tastemaker of a bunch of different products, I really like that. I I still believe there's an opportunity for a

28:48bunch of creators to pair together and create like an Urban Outfitters or a Zumiez competitor where they all have their merch or their product lines in one retail store. They just rep a retail store and buy other items. I think this is very cool cuz also the brand Lone Fox is cool. And I think there's probably a lot of people who know what Lone Fox is who don't know who Drew is. 100% And I think that's that's like this is a sustainable brand if he can keep this up. There's obviously a market

29:18for very expensive furniture. Yes. Uh some of which is sitting in this room. Yeah, the website's awesome. If you have a couple thousand dollars to spend [laughter] on home stuff, you should go to Lone Fox. Well, I think there's a learning also of like pricing for premium creates a brand and there's always a market for

29:35premium. Yeah. I think it's sometimes like as an entrepreneur you think like I got to make how do I make this the most affordable thing possible? But it's not always the answer. The answer sometimes is go the opposite direction. Or actually a lot of times go the opposite direction. This is for people who like collect art. This is for people who uh in their homes have like very expensive art pieces on the wall and are proud of their furniture that they keep they want to tell a story about this

29:59greyhound ashtray. What are we going to do with this greyhound ashtray now? We're going to smoke a lot of cigs. [laughter] But it's also like the perfect starting point like cuz you can buy a $40 mug or you can buy a $4,000 chair. So if you're just an entry level fan of his, you can still buy something and just aspire towards

30:21the bigger pieces. not expecting all of the audience to buy the $600 ashtray. multiple entry points and you can try to work your way And it's cool that the channel is very DIY and that's still his brand despite like the storefront being so far opposite of DIY. It's like the high-end premium really buttoned-up things.

30:41You're welcome. Thank you for this gift. [laughter] That I bought myself. I always wanted a 1950s Greyhound ashtray. And then that is up against Sincerely Yours, a skincare brand from Salish and Jordan Matter. And we have the Sunnyside Up Mineral Sunscreen SPF 30, and it was $28. Um okay. Full disclosure, we are investors in Sincerely Yours. I think the branding and the packaging of this is very cool. Now, this is made by Salish Matter. Arguably one of the most

31:11popular creators on the internet. People on the planet. Now, Salish also has recently signed a Netflix deal going to be making multiple original shows on Netflix. And obviously one of the most iconic photos in the creator economy is Salish launching Sincerely Yours at the American Dream Mall where 80-plus thousand people showed up and the mall had to be shut

31:32down. Yeah, this is a heavy hitter because this is the scale in terms of audience of Mr. Beast. Like it's that type of creator. It's mass scale. It's going to be and probably already is mass distribution. And you have the repeat purchase. Like Right. Skincare is like you're always running out of sunscreen, moisturizer.

31:51Yeah. Like and skincare medication. Like you just you're always running out. It also delivers on like trust so well cuz with your skincare you want to be able to like trust the person making it. And the combination of Salish and then the CEO who's like a former beauty founder is such a powerful combination

32:09for like parents and for kittens. Yeah, I think also the social content for Sincerely Yours is very cool and good and like fun. And they have done a good job of separating it from Salish. And then they have the shelf space in Sephora, which I don't know if you've ever been in a Sephora.

32:22I don't think I have. You don't go to the mall? What? You go to the mall, yeah. On I I go I've known you for 15 years. I thought that was the most interesting fact about you that you go to the mall. Crazy that that's the most interesting fact about me, but I know every fact about you. I didn't know that you went to the mall. I like grew like at the mall. Like the suburbs of New Jersey, you just like everyone is

32:40at the mall. But but wait, hold on. What happens once you arrive at the mall? What do you mean? What do you mean? You walk around the mall. around the mall, man. And then what? You look at stuff. And then what? Maybe you buy it. Okay, so there's no there's no like you don't And then maybe you get food at the food court. It's just like a thing to do,

32:55man. I mean, I go to the mall when I have to buy something. Yeah, now now try going when you don't need to buy something. It's way better. I don't know what I would do. All right. [laughter] You you walk around and maybe you buy something. Hang on. And you surprise yourself. You go, "Oh, that's cool. I didn't know I was going to get That to me feels like going to the gym in a suit with no intention of working

33:11out. You're just like there. Okay, Zuckerberg. You want to [laughter] You want to know Okay, guess what else us humans do. We buy coffee. We We go out to eat. [laughter] We God forbid, watch this, we play sports. And some of us have to sit here and make engineering projects for children at work. But guess

33:28what? That's life, guys. That's life. And I think I this whole thing up. I'm not [laughter] sure if I'm even doing Yeah, I think I'm done with this. Smoke a cigarette. It's all right. Is that what people call a crash out? [laughter] Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you got it. What I was saying was as a mall goer, someone who goes to the mall from time to time, sometimes the mall's crowded, sometimes the mall's

33:50empty, but a Sephora is always packed. Yeah, really? So, she's got Got it. Yeah, yeah. shelf space in Sephora, that's one of these things where it's like, yes, like her videos can market the product, but her shelf space in Sephora can also market who she is. Like, it is a It is a valuable place to

34:07be. Yeah, teen girls are at Sephora. Got it. Understood. And sometimes [laughter] as long as I'm I'm, you know, The the sometimes is calling. Let's go to the rubric. All right, yeah. Authenticity. I mean, both seem authentic to me. Yeah, I think for Lone Fox, this is a very clear extension of his value prop. He gives you tips about design and DIY transformations of your home, and he also can sell you the things that will make your home better. That to me is very clear. Salish is more similar to a trusted friend, a trusted celebrity like Hailey Bieber, where it's like, I will choose sincerely yours because I know

34:45Salish matter when I walk into the store or I'm a huge fan. I say that in terms of she is not making videos about skin care. Right. Right. She's making entertainment. Yeah, yeah. But she probably has one of the strongest parasocial relationships. Again, it's kind of like Mr. Beast and Feastables. Yeah. Uh Scalability. I think sincerely yours being in Sephora as a starting point is crazy scalable. I think when Salish goes on Netflix, it

35:09becomes even more scalable. This to me has like almost infinite scale. And I think like Lone Fox as it's high-end brand like isn't as scalable by design. This is anti-scale. Yes. Yeah. It mean in a good way, not in a bad way, in a good way. Yeah. Mhm. Shareability. You're sharing that? I think I think that It is way easier to share some sunscreen or some moisturizer than it is for me to take my ashtray over to my friend's house and recommend [laughter] that they

35:34buy one themselves. Shareability is taking pictures of it. Yeah. [snorts] Yeah. I think though the reality is that when you are making a product for people who are in school, it becomes very shareable. School is a place where culture is built. I think about the Prime bottles, right? When Prime came out, like Prime bottles in schools, people were filling them up with water so they could have a Prime bottle in school. So, school is where culture is made. This is built for

35:59school. And then cool factor. I love the branding of sincerely yours. I think the brand is really cool. I think the name is cool. I like the packaging. I think they did a great job. This is like James Dean cool. Yeah. Yeah. I think for for both audiences, they're cool. They're cool to different

36:11audiences in a different way. Uh let's go to a vote. Uh Salish matter? Hands? I think Colin and I we can't vote on this cuz we're Yeah, yeah. I think we need to recuse I think we have to recuse ourselves from this vote cuz we're investors. All right. The team Uh We got we we have to we will lose our

36:24jobs if we do not vote. [laughter] If you guys bought this furniture and then you don't vote for Lone Fox? I mean, listen, I like Lone Fox better just cuz it's more my style, but as far as like bonafide creator business, Sincerely Yours is what you'd think of at scale like mass culture creator

36:44brand. Mhm. So, I'm going to vote Salish. Uh given um you guys are investors, this is my opinion, my opinion alone. I think a creator I think it's two key man risk. For all you know, Salish could grow up and be like, "Nah, man. I don't even like this stuff no more." So, for that reason and uh $1,500, I go with Lone

37:04Fox. [laughter] Marilyn, tie-breaking vote. I think my vote is going to be for Lone Fox cuz I think I think it's really cool that he has built a business where it can be really scalable and the average viewer can just buy a $40 mug and there's probably hundreds and thousands of those mugs out there, but there's also this really curated like vintage special experience you can have. So, if you want to buy into that part of his business, you can like get something that feels handpicked for you by your favorite interior design creator. That

37:34feels like really special to me. Jordan, Salish, we have to recuse ourselves. Yeah, we recuse ourselves. As a proud investor, I would have voted Sincerely Yours. And it sounds like Marilyn is putting this side table in her apartment. Yeah. If you don't want to take it with a grain of salt. We bought it for Marilyn.

37:47I would also take the ashtray. [laughter] All right, moving to the semifinals, we have Mr. Beast against Lone Fox and Chef PK against Mark Rober. That's a sentence that has never been said. Let's start [laughter] with uh Mr. Beast against Drew's Lone Fox. Interesting. Very different creator businesses. I really do like that Lone

38:11Fox has his priced for the premium. Mhm. I think that's really cool. I like that he has one brick and mortar that it can be aspirational as a fan to maybe start by buying the cup, to start by buying something more expensive like the ashtray, and then to maybe one day go to LA, go to his store, and make a

38:27big purchase. Mhm. So, let's go to a vote. Hands for Mr. Beast. I just think I can't not in this one. It's Yeah. Like the scale's crazy. The the sheer scale The scale and And also like the amount of experimentation he's doing, the types of things he's doing with like UGC content and marketing. But I also want to say that opening a brick-and-mortar as like a solo creator is really hard. And selling stuff at 9 10,000 dollars at a premium price, like that is unique, that is hard, and I do think like that opens the door for a lot of interesting creator businesses. Jimmy to me like has maybe even transcended

39:01the concept of a creator business. Right? Yeah, I think Mr. Beast moves on. Mr. Beast moves on. The next semi-finals, Chef PK with Cooking with Chaos. I think Mark Rober moves on. Yeah. CrunchLabs to me is is one of the most impressive brands. There was no I vote for Chef PK. Because of your experience right now? Because of my experience, uh, Mr. Rober,

39:21I will be stopping by. [laughter] Wait, how are you doing right now? Can you just like how close are you? Cuz we're almost done with this episode. I'm on page 12. What does that mean? [laughter] How many pages are left? Like let's just call it 20. Let's go to the championships here. Mr. Beast and Feastables against

39:40CrunchLabs and Mark Rober. I I have a quick answer here. If I'm choosing between these two, I'm going CrunchLabs. I knew it. 100%. I'm going to 100 dollars. And I think Feastables is a very good product. But the reason you're going with Mark and CrunchLabs is because it's subscription. Yeah, three reasons I'm going with Mark here. One, the subscription. Recurring purchases I think are just a great business for like stability of revenue and and growth of of a business. The second reason is, um, the singular focus. Mark is not making a ton of other products. So, something I really like is it's videos and

40:16CrunchLabs. Mhm. That to me is like really clean and every video talks about Crunchbase and Crunchbase has videos associated with. Like the company is video and Crunchbase. I really like that. The third reason is Mark is on the precipice of a lot more distribution. He is going into schools as like the science teacher. He's about to launch a new show on Netflix. Like I think he is on the precipice of becoming even bigger. And even like an even bigger character in

40:46everyone's life. Let me give you a fourth reason and I think this is the nail in the coffin. The product is the content and the content is the product. Yes. Yes. So the turret that Keysh is struggling to build Right. [laughter] right now Yo. again is the main story of a full length video on his channel.

41:06Mhm. And it's seamless. You don't feel like he's like saying, "Okay, this video is sponsored by Crunchbase. Let me tell you about it for 60-90 seconds." It's just seamlessly integrated into the That is what we call content product fit. Fit. Yeah, thanks Ali. That's what we call content product fit. If you are running a creator business, I think probably the lesson to learn here is the most important thing is how does the product naturally fit into the content? You should not have to break in

41:38the content to talk about the product. God. The product should be the subject of the videos. And I'm talking longer to see if Keysh can finish the backpack before the end of the video, but I don't think he's Are you actually close? I'm so close. I I just have to do the electronics. The other thing I think is really important note with Crunchbase is something Mark talked about like when he came on our show last is the experience he had with his mom in the kitchen of figuring things out. And Crunchbase is creating experiences between kids and parents all the way up as they age, which is like such an important thing

42:17for brand loyalty or even like brand equity of Mark that you are the person creating these experiences that a kid might remember putting together the hack pack with their dad when they're in their 20s and 30s and that's like an incredible use of creators making a business. Yes. Mhm. You're gifting a memory. Yeah.

42:38To the audience. Yeah. You have a clear winner, Crunch Labs, Mark Rober. Congrats, Mark. And for winning, you get a 1950s Greyhound [laughter] vintage one-of-one ashtray. Congratulations, Mark Rober. on down. Next time Mark, you're in Los Angeles, you can claim your 1950s Greyhound ashtray. With a pack of fake cigarettes. All right, thanks for watching. If there's a creator business you think we should have talked about, put it in the

43:03comments. Tell us about that business. And thanks so much to Shopify for sponsoring this episode. See you guys. [music]

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