Transcript

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Jared Ward: 0:00

Modern commerce has evolved so much. Every brand wants to be omnichannel. Now they want to go into retail. E-commerce is the new way. Going to the mall isn't even going to be around in a couple decades.

Jay Davis: 0:12

I don't think we've seen e-com fully evolve Like there's still so much happening. You don't actually need a whole team. You don't. You need a brand manager and you need fractional teams that can help them at times. My goal is to have nine figure brands that have 10 people on them. Raising tens of money will not solve it Like what solves it is.

Jared Ward: 0:36

Welcome to Ops Unfiltered. We got Jay Davis here. How's it going, jay, going good, thanks for having me. So, jay, jay is the founder of a lot of things Pillow Cube, stairslide. Well, you guys acquired Stairslide. Yeah, mutiny Brands, creatably. We do a lot and actually I've worked with your companies so much over the years. It's insane. This is our first time really sitting down and obviously we've met over the years, but we haven't had a chance to really sit down. And obviously we've met, yeah, over the years, but like, yeah, we haven't had a chance to like really sit down and talk. Yeah, I'm excited to start out. I'm curious what was? Um, because you've done so many top of funnels and you guys have shown so many cool videos, um, what is your personal favorite video of all the the creatively ads that you guys have done? I guess maybe we can just say all time, like every single top of funnel you've have done.

Jay Davis: 1:25

I guess maybe we can just say all time like every single top of funnel you've ever done. Dude, that's, that's tough. Uh, pillow cube, the pillow cube story. The cube ad is really fun. I really love that one, um, even though I had to be in it, which I don't love, I know. So, cringe watching yourself Like dude. It's so hard. It's always like, oh, how hard did I do that? And people are like no, it's great.

Jay Davis: 1:47

You're like, really, I think your guys' Lemonade ad is hilarious. I think that's another one. I love the stuff that I wasn't expecting it to be. I think that's such a key to virality and to great content is when you're not expecting something, and so those are the moments that I love. I love the manly bands ad. I think that's another one.

Jay Davis: 2:10

that's just like the lord of the rings one so that one I but I actually really love their like. They had like a top of funnel that was all about like girls expectations versus guys expectations.

Jay Davis: 2:20

I don't know if you've seen it has like dolphins in it I haven't no oh man, it's hilarious, like it's still, I think, one of the one of the funniest ones. Um, it's just all about like girls have been dreaming about this moment since they were like little kids, uh, but guys still want a cool ring my next question is there's been so many modern commerce has evolved so much.

Jared Ward: 2:44

Yeah, the the 2010s e-commerce.

Jared Ward: 2:47

I mean, there's so many brands that it was just like an arbitrage of facebook to yes a landing page and um, and obviously there was the meta at apocalypse, when apple changed their as their settings. That was that killed so many brands. Covet, yeah, and. And then now I feel like we're experiencing this emergence of like every brand wants to be omnichannel. Now, yeah, they want to go into retail.

Jared Ward: 3:14

Yes, and it's like I remember in the 2010s there were like, at least from my perspective, there were like two totally different schools of thought in the 2010s and like one was, oh, e-commerce is the new way, going to the mall isn't even going to be around in a couple of decades. And then, like you had like these old school retail heads who were like, no, all the volume is in retail and D2C is just a fad. Isn't retail and D2C is just a fad? How have you seen, because you've got to be a brand owner during all of those times, are there any times, like during COVID or the meta ad the apocalypse, this new emerging thought of, okay, we have to be omni-channel, retail and D2C. Do any one of those things stick out to you would not think back yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, I mean those are.

Jay Davis: 4:09

I think I think it's been a great and I think this is what's fun being an entrepreneur like I love entrepreneurship. I'll be an entrepreneur the rest of my life. Um, I think when you find something you love, there's like kind of an interesting. You almost have like an interesting shift in thinking. There's like kind of an interesting. You almost have like an interesting shift in thinking because it's like you're honing your skill. And when I meet people, I think you're one of these people who, like you're going to be an entrepreneur for the rest of your life.

Jay Davis: 4:35

I had these friends who had, like this is what we love. Even if we didn't make good money, we'd do it. Like, even if I had to do it for free, I would do it. I love talking to people about entrepreneurship. That, like I will do it for free, I will talk to people and you know, like at a neighborhood party, I'll just talk about entrepreneurship. That's what I love. So I think when you then think that way, it's really good to analyze and kind of look at like, oh, in what ways were both of those groups wrong, because it's very true and kind of look at like, oh, in what ways were both of those groups wrong? Because it's very true, like there was this, you know, there was the kind of e-com people who were like we're going to get rid of the modern mall and it's like the mall's busier than it's ever been. And I still hear people saying this. I still like.

Jay Davis: 5:18

Two months ago someone was like, I mean, retail's basically dead and I was like, are you insane? Like 80 personal commerce, a storyteller, yeah, like did you go to the mall this christmas? Like I went to a bunch of malls this christmas. They were so packed. Like our offices are pretty close to university mall in oram and I would drive by every day and it's like we'd go. We go there a lot for lunch or we'll be around there, and it's like, dude, there's no parking spaces at university mall. Seven years ago ago, eight years ago, that was not true. Like it did seem like it was dying, but things react Like I think that's one of the things I've learned is like nothing's going to die easily, and so the mall, the people who own malls they got a lot of money in malls.

Jay Davis: 6:03

They're going to make sure that they do things to bring people back, and I also think that COVID in many ways, like it kind of killed retail for a second, but now we're all going back because we all miss it. We all realize, like I don't want to sit in my home and order every single thing. I want to go out, I want to shop, I want to touch things. I want to go out, I want to shop, I want to touch things, I want to like, like my kids I think this was probably different of teenagers three years ago my girls want to go to the mall every weekend, like every weekend, can we go to the mall, can you drop us off at the mall? And it's like, dude, that's what we did in the 90s. Like in the 90s, that's what we did every weekend. We went to the mall, them all.

Jay Davis: 6:49

And then I think there was a time where that kind of went away. Now it's coming back, and so there's these ebbs and flows that you got to really think about, and so I think that's what my bigger point is Be very careful who you listen to and usually assume that people will be somewhat right and somewhat wrong. So in some ways, yes, e-com has become bigger. In other ways, retail has become bigger. E-com has not. I don't think we've seen e-com fully evolve. There's still so much happening and I think we're going to see advertising change. I was just talking to Tyler Howells from Cozy Earth and we were talking about this that I think in the next year we will see an ad platform launch from every major AI platform and you will be able to advertise inside of AI.

Jared Ward: 7:30

That will shift and it's going to totally change. Imagine how AI advertising is going to be. We have this conversation all the time. We have this conversation all the time like what?

Jared Ward: 7:48

What we're trying to do at luminous is I am trying to document every single little, every minute detail question that anybody could conceivably ask, because I I feel like where ai advertising will go is it the brands who have the most comprehensive content database for it to pull from and to answer any questions? I think those are going to be the ones that win, especially the ones who you're going to be interacting with a brand through AI. But AI is just going to be querying all the data and you can ask questions and I feel like the principles of brand. Ai is just going to be querying all the data and you can ask questions and I feel like the principles of app, the principles of brand building, are still going to be similar, like people will still be drawn to humans, like they want to see like real human content, but AI will just help them find their answers. Yeah, that's kind of how I think about it.

Jay Davis: 8:39

How do you I think you are 100 right like I think I think you're gonna see the people who can react quickly, and I think you're you're dead on that like the people who are like hey, ai, you know, hey, chad tbt, here's a library of 500 questions we have answered with video and text, and and then you look at like one of your competitors and they're like we don't even have videos, yeah, and they're, they're still stuck in the like, well, can we just pay you to? You know, can we pay 50 million dollars a year to just be the sponsor? It's like no, because and that's what I think's happening is like look at how long it took for people to realize tv was kind of just an advertising game. Like people didn't realize that. Now, like, look how quickly influencers came and I, I would say, has has shifted, because people realized, oh, all these big influencers are just being paid, so that has shifted.

Jay Davis: 9:38

Influencer marketing, where we've had some of the biggest influences in the world post about our products. Some of them, you know, they've driven a couple thousand dollars in extra revenue. And it's like, and had we paid them full price, they would have asked for a million dollars. And it's like, yeah, because the game is up. People know that you're being paid. You know, originally, back in 2016, 2015, kind of the height of influencer marketing, when it was really good, kim Kardashian would post about something and it would go crazy because she wasn't being paid for it and so people were taking it as a true recommendation of, like you know, this is truly what she loves. I think Oprah has actually done like a good job at that of like you still have to be something she likes to get on her list. Like it's not. It's not just the jd power and associates which, if people don't know, you just pay for it. Like jd power is just a paid thing. You just pay the money and they say that you won, uh and so. So, yeah, I think we're getting through that.

Jay Davis: 10:45

Where I think you're totally right, it's going to be the brands who are transparent, who have tons of content, who, like you know, chad GBT is a content monster. I mean, it just devours content and needs more content. And so we've said this about social media. Social media is the same. Look at how, how we're now to a point where people complain all the time like, oh, ugc is not lasting like it once did. I'm putting it up and a week later it's already burnt out and I need more um.

Jay Davis: 11:13

And it's like, yeah, because that that content wasn't built to last. We're built to have staying power, um, to be something that can convince people again and again. You're kind of just like this quick angle. So I think you're totally right. We're going to see that huge shift where the groups that can be like, hey, chatgpt, you're this devourer of content. Here's 3,000 hours of content of us talking about every single detail, and so ChatGPT is like okay. When someone says, hey, can I connect this platform with, or this retailer with, luminous, it's like yep, here's a video, exactly, founder, talking about it and how you do it, and they're going to much prefer that to like Oracle having this complex wiki about it.

Jay Davis: 12:00

Yes.

Jay Davis: 12:01

No, there's a person telling me how and then he shows me and there's like the text yes, yes and so a lot of those like I I think this is where ai is also going to support this from the creation side is now it's just going to be easier, like we as a, as a brand owner, like I'm pushing, and I think one of the most important metrics for every brand owner is going to be revenue per employee. Like ai is opening up possibilities where there's a couple guys that I'm friends with, um in in the d2c space and we're all kind of like who can build a brand that does a hundred million a year with five employees julie, yes. Like jolette, yeah, yeah, I think he hit like 50 with four Right, four or five people. Amazing, like amazing entrepreneur, but like and not a, but amazing entrepreneur. And what he's doing is really awesome. And I think pushing the boundaries of that world and I think we're going to have to push the boundaries Like you just aren't going to need as many people to run big brands because ai is going to do it for you. Like customer service, yeah, it's amazing what ai is doing, what you guys are doing to to make supply chain and integrations easier. Like all of this stuff is going to be so much faster, so that's like a trend. I look back um, I'm friends with some of the guys who were founders of Kaie, which I can't remember which year they won like the business plan competition at BYU.

Jay Davis: 13:30

But like early, early e-com company, like pre-Shopify, pre-everything, like they didn't even have WooCommerce, they didn't have big like nothing, and so they talk about how they had to pay like $150,000 to develop a custom website just to run basic orders. Not even like now with the $300 a month plan with Shopify. You have something that's literally probably 100,000 times more powerful. Like you can, oh, hey, recharge, okay, upload, recharge for subscriptions, upload this, upload this.

Jay Davis: 14:04

And all of a sudden, like we have one developer part-time who's building complex, complex e-com sites with all of this powerful stuff, and it's like 10 years ago you would have had to hire 20 devs or 10 devs and have them in-house, and like I think that's why it's been hard. So I think one of the things that we're not maybe talking about enough is some of these e-com companies that are struggling and these consumer brands that are struggling. It's like they just are not accepting how much things have shifted. You know, like Allbirds is in the news a lot right now because they're still losing a ton of money and things are really tough and it's like what all birds needs to do is realize that, as a brand doing 200 million a year in revenue, they should have 20 employees Like and that's a tough realization this is a great segue like this is something that we taught, literally.

Jared Ward: 14:59

Your point just about Modern commerce is it's gonna become incredibly and that's just like the DNA. They outsource everything Fractional bookkeeping, fractional, this fractional, that Shopify is so easy to set up. I think so many brands got bloated in the late 2010s and a reason, I think, is vc money decided to play in the space, which, yeah, uh, it never should have. No, not to say that people shouldn't invest in brands absolutely not, but like vc money, yeah, I think that was a. That was a pipe dream to think that we, you know, we can dump, and all it led led to was teams like Allbirds having ballooning up to 200, 300 employees and it's like guys. You could run that with like 10 people If it was set up correctly.

Jay Davis: 15:55

And I think that's the harsh reality is you think about it and it's like, as a brand owner, constantly thinking of, like, what are the things we're doing that are actually driving results, and what are the things that we're doing that is like, that's just ego stuff. Like hiring a lot of people can often be an ego thing, it's. I don't want to tell people how much money we're making, so instead, what I do is I tell them I have 300 employees and so, and no profit, yeah, and so I think that's something that like, and everyone got caught up it. We got caught up in it. Like, every single consumer brand got caught up in this. Like, money is cheap, it's, it's almost free, it's easy to get, and so everyone just kind of like leaned into this world of like, yeah, like we're all going to grow to infinity. And now we're coming to the reality of like oh, there are hard limits on these things. Like, there are hard limits. The reality of like oh, there are hard limits on these things, like there are hard limits. Um, one of the things I think I've realized is, like the category you're in is so important to how big you can be. Um, you know, like, I think that's where a lot of people are realizing like, oh, I thought, and vcs thought this, vcs thought every single brand can be a billion dollar brand and and you start thinking about, you're like, yeah, but like, what's the aov, what's the ltv?

Jay Davis: 17:08

One of the two, two like the key metrics I look at is like revenue per employee uh, per year. And then, um, uh, yearly revenue per customer. Like no one really talks about that metric but if you look at, like our customer, how much are they going to spend per year with us? Because LTV is so fuzzy, it's like is that a true lifetime? Like the lifetime of this human being? Is that a five-year LTV? Is it a 10-year LTV? Is it a two-year, three-year? No, if you ask every D2C person, they all have different views on that. A D to C person, they all have different views on that.

Jay Davis: 17:43

A lot of people are like, well, no, I think it's kind of like a two year. Some people are like, no, it is like the lifetime of the lifetime of them as your customer. It's like, well, what's that? They might come back and buy something in 25 years. Is it 25 years? Yeah, and so instead it's like if you don't, you got to look at yearly revenue per customer and if you don't have a high yearly revenue per customer, I think you should probably be more Omni Retail Channel focused than D2C.

Jay Davis: 18:11

D2c is perfect. A D2C first approach is really perfect for the categories that have high yearly revenue per customer. And if you look at the things that are doing really well in D2C, that's very true. Why is supplements doing so well right now? Yeah, I was about to say ag1 because it has high yearly revenue for customer. They learned the pillow cube had a bigger impact on my life than ag1. I take ag1 every day and I spend 80 bucks a month on ag1 90 bucks a month, and so it's like been 90 bucks a month on AG1, 90 bucks a month.

Jared Ward: 18:43

And so it's like Spend 90 bucks a month on pillow care.

Jay Davis: 18:46

Yeah, and so one you buy a pillow every three years and it's a single purchase, and one you spend $90 a month, and so the yearly revenue per customer is 1,080. That's wild. So I think that's like we are now in this evolution of realizing like okay. I think that's like we are now in this evolution of realizing like okay, d2c is not this like perfect hammer. And we got into that mode where we had this perfect hammer, we thought, and so every problem behind the nail. And so now we're realizing like no, d2c works for some things, like high recurring revenue. Things are great for D2C.

Jared Ward: 19:24

Is this why you're starting your supplement brand? Oh?

Jay Davis: 19:27

yeah, the reason we're working on supplements and getting more into supplements is because we're like I think this is another category that is perfect for creative lease ads, how it's about the sales can stand out. Yeah, exactly, it's so good. So that's where I get really excited about doing other things and we're even looking at like, okay, how do we bring supplements into other stuff we're doing? I think that's the shift that smart brand owners are getting. I mean, it's also why we have ownership and it's why I founded an ice cream company, because I'm like food is huge Food. Now it's not D to C per se, although we are doing some very interesting things that are coming with ice cream, where you're going to be able to get ice cream to your house in under an hour. I don't even know when that actually happens.

Jared Ward: 20:19

It will be this year, so I eat a pint of ice cream every night. Just not fine, dude, no way. It's like it's handles are Ben and Jerry's Now, when Cold Case was on DoorDash. It's bad, but I can't find it's not in Saratoga.

Jay Davis: 20:32

Springs, I was going to say, yeah, so we're that's, we are selling out too fast, so it's, I think it is back now in Saratoga, so you should be good to which ones. But no, that is the challenge. But yeah, I think that's where you're seeing people kind of shift and realize like, okay, now let's look at other things. Let's look at food. Food has all these huge exits, and why? Because people eat it every day. You have people eat ice cream every day, and so I think that's one of the realizations.

Jay Davis: 21:10

I mean, that's one of the interesting things about ice cream is we have people who are buying it three times a month and so, over the course of like, if you do want to do a three-year ltv um, like over the course of three years, of spending a lot of money on x-ray, um, so I I think that's what's going to happen and continue to happen is we're realizing, like going back to originally what you were talking about, like you kind of had these people who were saying, oh, this is what's going to happen or this is what's going to happen, and both of them are right and both of them are wrong, and now we're adjusting and we're evolving. E-commerce, just like you know, I look at what e-com was in 2010. It's like not even close to what it is now. I mean, it doesn't even resemble itself and things are accelerating. I think in five years we'll look back and be like remember when we were running Facebook ads and we didn't have this chat GPT ad platform. That's like a million times better than how's the thing?

Jared Ward: 22:09

I remember remember when you could just like buy a product on Alibaba and like sell this piece of crap and like you could actually make money, like I think that's where it's going. It's just the most transparent. Best products people invest in brand yes, they stand out. Those are going is just the most transparent. Just best products People invest in brand yes, they stand out. Those are going to be the ones that win.

Jay Davis: 22:30

That's, I think, the problem China's making. They underestimate brand, and brand is important. It's important Like people don't want to buy stuff and then get it and find out you know, we saw this a lot during COVID but you'd like order something and it would come and be like a picture of the thing, yeah, and you're like that happens enough times and people start being like I, so I've, like I'm only gonna buy with a brand I trust, and so that actually, I think, has pushed a lot of people back to brands like. People are like, yeah, I don't want to take the risk on buying the the picture of a peloton because it was a thousand dollars cheaper, and you're like there's a reason, it's a thousand dollars cheaper, so, and like ai is going to help with that, it's going to eliminate a lot of fraud. Um, it's going to be able to show like, hey, you, you're not, and I think that's happening right now like you just can't scam people, like you could, which is a good thing.

Jared Ward: 23:27

like you shouldn't scam people, jay, you've you're one of the only brand owners I know. Um. Back to our topic about the 2010s and vc money started to play and then every band brand got bloated with employees. So I feel like there were there were three things that were true in the like late 2010s when vc money came to play. Uh, number one companies got bloated, so that massive employee count and then that's, that's the settle there. Number two is um, everybody hired like a really expensive coo. And number three is everybody everybody implemented net suite. Yeah, because they could afford it, because they they got it best to MFA. Why didn't you implement NetSuite? You're like one of the only people that didn't get burned and didn't fall for it.

Jay Davis: 24:15

Spike isn't cheap. I think that it was. I was seeing that like I think I just kind of felt that A, we didn't just kind of felt that A, we didn't raise tons of VC money or really any VC money. We had some angels come into PillowCube but we mostly just either bootstrapped it or did it with you know kind of like partners and brought in you know some angels. So we were never like, oh yeah, we got 400 grand to burn.

Jay Davis: 24:43

I think I also had seen some other people integrate it earlier. Like I was at Vivint in like 2008 to 2012 or 2011. And them and then Color Run as well, like they both implemented it and it was like so hard. And I'm like man, if that company doing like you know Vivint at the time was doing $400 million, $500 million a year, I'm like man, if that company doing like you know Vivint at the time was doing four, five hundred million a year, I'm like that was really rough. How, how is a little brand like, why would we do this?

Jay Davis: 25:13

And I think that for me just never passed. Kind of that like this doesn't make sense and I I felt very strongly that like no, like someone's gonna come up with a sass version of this that does 90 of what we need or 99 of what we need for a fraction of the cost. It just doesn't like every pitch and they would send us presents and food and humble. I'm like you can keep sending this crab like I uh I remember there's one that night sweet guy who just like kept I'm like dude, I love the free products, I love that you spend Crumble here every two weeks. It just never made sense to me. It was always like this is crazy, this is so overkill, we don't need this. And I think that VC money exactly like you said, it became this thing that bloated and everyone started doing things without asking themselves do we actually need this? Is this a good idea? Like, do we need to have? And and I think that it's funny to see how how that's flipped.

Jay Davis: 26:12

I think the joe lee uh founder and some other founders who are really smart, like uh ryan, the founder of true classic, I think, is another one who were like they were looking at that. They really like clued me into you know, revenue per yearly, revenue per employee. They were super aggressive where they're saying, hey, can I do 5 million, can I do 10 million? And you look at the best businesses in the world, like I don't think it's a an accident that, like Apple, is like $4 million per employee per year in revenue. That's probably why they make so much money. When your average employee is whatever cost, it's a lot less than $4 million. Hopefully they're at an average of $100,000 a year or even $200,000 a year. It's like, yeah, you're making so much money comparatively, and so I think that that's something that I saw and I just felt like there's no way this can continue. There's no way that, you know, 10 million dollar brands should be getting net suite. I thought smaller do that.

Jared Ward: 27:19

We see it all the time we're, and now that the dust is settling, where Luminous is coming in. There are so many brands that were $3 million, $5 million and they implemented NetSuite and they're on the entry of their contract. Margins have shrunk and NetSuite's raised their price to $20K a month and they're just like. The system didn't even work for me and I'm locked in this contract.

Jay Davis: 27:43

Probably a lot of them never even got it fully implemented because they ran out of money to fully implement. I mean, that's what's. I think that's what's hard. So, yeah, I don't know that it was some like genius on my part beyond, just like being like this how does this work? Like what's gonna happen if, yeah, if, in year three? You know, it's like we're still paying these crazy, crazy fees. So I think that that's that is what's going to happen with ai.

Jay Davis: 28:10

Like I, I really do think that, um, and that's my goal, my goal is to have brands that, like I wanted to have nine figure brands that have 10 people in them, um, 12 people. You know, like, where you're, like, every single spot is so precious and I think that's where we're headed. I think that's where you know and those big. I think what will happen is a lot of people go back to being in the tech roles, a lot of other things Like. I think we definitely get to a point where too many people were in e-commerce. There were too many people who were like, oh, oh, I think this is a get rich quick scheme. They didn't love it and and we've seen a lot of those people flush out, yeah, so, so, uh, I my my last question um, any parting words for um aspiring entrepreneurs?

Jared Ward: 29:02

I know, know different brand builders and operators watch this podcast. You said that commerce is going to be totally different in five years. Yeah, what are you guys doing now to make sure that you keep up with it, because you guys always seem to be on the cutting edge of marketing and just e-commerce trends in general?

Jay Davis: 29:25

well, that's super nice of you, I hope. I hope we are. I think that's something we try to do is is to really think about where are things headed. How can we be ready? But I think I think one if you're an entrepreneur, like really push yourself. I try and do this all the time, where I'm pushing myself to say what makes sense, I try and go back to first principles. I try and really think through, like don't listen to what everyone's saying. If everyone's saying something it might be true, but it also might not be true.

Jay Davis: 29:58

Like, uh, I think ai is going to be one of those things that, like you can use it in the right way or the wrong way, um, and so you got to push yourself to really think, like what are the ways that are a trap? You know, this has always been, I think, a focus of my career is like I'm trying to always zag while everyone else is zigging, and so you know what are the things. As I thought about tariffs, this was again a reason I got excited about. Ice cream is like, well, you can. You can't make ice cream, so maybe you can, yeah, but I don't think there's one of you listening here. It's tough, uh, but like you can make it here, source it with everything from here, and so, as we get into kind of the tariff craziness that I think we're headed towards, I think it's really great to own a food brand. Um, warren buffett talks all the time about how See's Candy has been like one of their greatest investments, because it was just a cash machine that then funded a bunch of other stuff, and so I think it's always trying to look at kind of like what are true principles that are always true? People will always eat food. They will always consume. Like. Ai will not change consumption. I don't think on food right, humans are always going to need food.

Jay Davis: 31:09

So I think it's trying to like, push yourself to like really look at what you think will be true.

Jay Davis: 31:16

Try and think of like where are we headed? How can I get ready for that? Um, I always try and keep like a portion of our budget for testing just like wild and crazy ideas. So, like I think 80 to 90 percent of your business should be like core principles, really disciplined, and then, like 10 to 20 should be like moonshots that are just like yeah, try some crazy stuff, try, we're trying some new adhots that are just like, yeah, try some crazy stuff. Try we're trying some new ad platforms that are like kind of wild and out there, but like put a couple percent of your budget towards stuff like that, but then keep most of your stuff other places and then shift as you see, uh, as you see stuff. So I think, try and keep innovating. And then I think, like, if you're an entrepreneur, like really ask yourself, ask yourself, do you love it for the thing? Like, would you do it for free? And I think if you would, then like keep going, just keep going at all costs.

Jared Ward: 32:05

You still have the same energy. I mean, you've been doing this for over a decade now and you still have the exact same enthusiasm at the prospect of starting a brand. Yeah, which is I? That sticks out to me because, like it's so true, so many people like, oh, they hate their life. They've been operating a brand for 10 years and, like you, still have the exact same energy for, like, these new ideas, which is it's really cool.

Jay Davis: 32:31

That's good and, honestly, I really love it, like I, and honestly, I really love it Like I think that is where you have to. I've met people and you've got to realize, like I've met these entrepreneurs that kind of have everything going for them, and I've realized, as I've talked to them, like, oh, the money doesn't solve it all. Like you know, I've talked to people who, like I kind of look up to, as you know, they raised $25 million from VCs and I'm like you know, what are you going to do next? Like, what brand are you going to launch? And they're like I'm never going to launch another brand, like I hate this. This has been the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. And I'm like, oh, so, like, raising tens of money will not solve it. Like, what solves it is doing what you love. Do what you love, be yourself.

Jay Davis: 33:16

That's definitely something that I have to like do as well and focus on is like I've had those times where I've started to shift to be like other entrepreneurs, because I'm like I need to obey the rules and I need to do what other people are doing. And then I'm kind of like, screw that, like I'm me and I don't care if people don't like me, I don't care. If people don't like me, I don't care if people don't like the way I'm running my life or my businesses. It's my businesses. I don't know. And so be yourself. And I've had great mentors, like I had a great lunch with a friend who who did a really great job, um, kevin santiago. He owns a bunch of restaurants and I was kind of telling we were at this networking lunch and I was like I'm gonna, you know, I going to stop launching new things. He was like dude, that's your rocket fuel. Why would you do that? It was so good to be reminded.

Jared Ward: 34:02

Oh yeah why am I not?

Jay Davis: 34:04

being who I am. That's important.

Jared Ward: 34:07

I've struggled with that a lot, because I feel like there's seasons of sprinting and focusing, because I have so many directions, I have so many brand ideas, because I was always trying stuff, stressing stuff and I had to really hunker down on Luminous. But what gives me hope is that, okay, I'm building Luminous to empower brand owners to have very efficient businesses and hopefully make it much easier to launch multiple brands. And I just know one day, like when I get Luminous to a certain point, which we're getting there, I can't wait to launch this product. I can't wait.

Jay Davis: 34:54

This is where I'm very bold in my belief of this and I think most vcs disagree and I've even heard direct people say like you know, tell friends of friends, like you know, what he's doing is crazy. Uh, conglomerates all big consumer brands are conglomerates. Nike is a conglomerate. They own a bunch of brands. People forget that. They forget they own jordan, that they own Converse, that they own all these other brands. Every big consumer company is a conglomerate of brands. Name one that isn't Like VF Brands Everyone, everyone, every food we eat pretty much Like 95% of what we eat is owned by four or five companies. So I think this is something that actually we went down this road and this is part of the problem. Is the unit economics work better if you own a bunch of brands? Yep, um, and this is, I think, the big shift that's coming. The accelerators kind of threw us off the scent. It's because they messed it up.

Jared Ward: 35:52

Thrash you yes, they did themselves, but the dollars?

Jay Davis: 35:58

but the idea that they were talking about was correct, right, that, like there is economies of scale. Why does png own a hundred different brands? Is because you actually like, and this is where this is, I think, the shift that's coming in the next five years. You don't actually need a whole team dedicated to hellman's mayonnaise or to miracle whip, like you don't. You need a brand manager and you need fractional teams that can help them at times. But once you get that cycle going, like people will be buying the same stuff, like my hope and belief is, people in 25 years will still be buying pillow cubes because it will appeal to a certain part of the audience or a certain part of the population and they'll keep buying it. And so that's, I think, the mistake we made that I don't even know if VCs recognize yet that they're all opposed to this conglomerate idea and they need to embrace it and be like oh, that's actually how you make consumer work.

Jared Ward: 36:56

I totally agree with you, I I can't wait to see where where mutiny brands goes, because I totally agree, and I can't wait to continue to support you on the operating system side, because what we're we want to build, we want. We want a system that can empower you to be able to run 10 different brands doing over 200 million. Whatever the goal is, that's exactly what we want.

Jay Davis: 37:25

That's where we're super excited working with you guys, and I would almost say to you I wouldn't hold off for too long. I think there's a real benefit. One of the best things I did for Creatably was starting our own brand, because it showed me what it was like to be our customer, and so I think, once I did that, I understood our customer in a different way because I understood what they were going through, and I can go to Creatably and be like hey, you guys don't understand this aspect. Some of the things that clients tell you are not true, and other things are true Like. Other things are like the. The agency doesn't fully understand the pain they're going through or the problem that's needing to be solved, and so that's something that I think is really important is is like getting aware of that, and so, yeah, I I'm very bullish and I think I think we'll see in five years who's right, but I'll bet I'm right. I think conglomerates are going to become the thing. I'm already seeing it.

Jared Ward: 38:25

Your position's so well to do it too. Because, first off, I think you've leaned out operations a bunch, but I think, with Creatably and all of the marketing genius that you have around you, you guys are positioned the best to be able to stay cutting edge on all the types of marketing, get all of your brands to stand out. So I agree. Yeah, I'd bet some money on you.

Jay Davis: 38:52

Well good, I think, even whether it's us, my bigger bet is that I think that's where consumer's heading. I think people are going to start realizing, like you said, like Thrasio did it wrong, it's a great model. They did too many brands that were too small. So you've got to look at like Mars or Procter Gamble. They had big, big brands. And I've said this like a couple years ago I think it was two years ago windex got a, got acquired from. I can't remember who was acquiring, but, like I think sc johnson acquired it from someone else or maybe it was vice versa, but it got acquired for three billion dollars. And how much has windex changed in the last 30 years? Like it's still a blue liquid that's really good at cleaning windows.

Jared Ward: 39:37

Maybe the chip's packaging slightly.

Jay Davis: 39:39

Yeah, they added some new thing every five years. That's like now with this you know how much has Clorox spray or Clorox wipes, like these things. Consumer goods are not, and so I think we kind of almost took this like tech approach to like let's constantly be tweaking and changing and you know, and it's like that's actually not how consumer goods work. Just be good product last.

Jay Davis: 40:02

Yeah, once you find a product that a lot of people need, you just got to let it ride, and every couple of years you got to innovate a little bit, but it's mostly then a volume game of getting 2 million people to buy it every year. Yeah, and if you can do that, and you can do that for 20 years, you have something, um, but it's not a vc model. I think you're right that, like I think, or it wasn't a vc in the way we did it, um, and so now I think things are shifting, where people are realizing, you know, maybe we're playing a different game than we thought we were playing, um, and that's always knowing the rules of the game is always the most important thing, and so, um, so anyways, I think it's really exciting. It'll be really fun to see what happens from here well, thanks for coming on, jay.

Jared Ward: 40:44

Yeah, appreciate it. You're an awesome guest and thank you, we'll uh, we'll stay in touch. Hopefully we can do a round two in a couple years. Yeah, check in, let's do it, we'll go.

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