Podcasts about so alex

Tune in now and don't forget to sign up for www.solciety.co! Speaker 1 (00:03):Welcome to the Solarpreneur podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong and I went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fail. I teach you to avoid the mistakes I made and bringing the top solar dogs, the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro and closing more deals. What is a Solarpreneur you might ask a Solarpreneur is a new breed of solar pro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.Speaker 2 (00:42):What's going on. Solarpreneurs we're here and this very special episode because we're alive at, I guess it's not door to door Fest, but, um, Danny Pessy Taylor McCarthy's knock star event here live in key west Florida, and we have got someone super awesome on the show with us today. We got my man, Alex. Thanks for coming on AlexSpeaker 3 (01:03):Daily. Thanks for having me. I'm super, super grateful to jump on. The first podcast I've ever done is exciting. Something new.Speaker 2 (01:08):I know. And it's well deserved too. You're crushing it. We've had conversations and I'm just super impressed with what Alex has been able to do and Alex Smith, right? Yeah. Okay.Speaker 3 (01:19):Got to make sure that the quarterback yeah. Most injuriesSpeaker 2 (01:22):Though. Okay. Okay. He played for Utah. It's my favorite football team. So it's a good name. He's also from SanSpeaker 3 (01:28):Diego. Yeah. Alex would like the quarterback to every one of my clients, literally every time. Cause they was like, like that's not a real name. I'm like, trust me. I told my parents that made it a little too generic. That's what I got. There you go.Speaker 2 (01:40):Well, this guy, he's the quarterback of solar. You can call him that because he is every time you throw in a solar deal, it's getting installed up there. So he's doing some pretty awesome stuff. So Alex, do you want to start off telling us kind of your background in a door-to-door, how you first got in the industry into solar and all that.Speaker 3 (01:57):So I went to FSU fun school, good times. Good memories met a lot of good people, developed a lot of bad habits. A lot of friends that kind of bring me in the wrong direction. Um, but it was a good time. It was part of growing and, you know, experience. I'm happy I had. So when I graduated from FSU or was about to graduate, I didn't know what I was going to do at all. All my friends already accepted the roles like 50, 60, $70,000 a year jobs. And I thought they were crushing it because I didn't go to any career fairs. I didn't show up to anything. And I was like, man, and then the interviews I did get, I didn't show up because the people that were recruiting me, I was like, I don't want to be like those people. Like I don't, I wasn't trying to say like an arrogant way or think about it go away.Speaker 3 (02:30):But they were trying to bring me in. And I was just like, I don't think they are very happy with where they're at. So I never went to any of the interviews. And so luckily someone I became friends with because he worked at a bar, he just hit me up and told me about the opportunity. And he's was in California, said he made $10,000 his first month. And I was like, that's a heck of a lot better than 50, 60, 70 K a year. And then he dropped the ball. It's going to be door to door. And he just done. And I was like, man, I was a triple major. I did finance professional sales and marketing. So definitely didn't expect to go door to door. Um, but at the end of the day, I was willing to take a bet on myself for that one. And I didn't have anything else lined up.Speaker 3 (03:07):So I was pretty excited to get away from everyone I knew and just get a chance to kind of recreate myself rather than just being this frat star or whatever else you want to call me at FSU. I wanted to like, all right, let me peek in a different bubble. Like I did really well in this bubble. It's a small vicinity, you know, 2.3 miles or whatever. And Tallahassee wanted to bring that to a bigger area. Right. And like my career path. And so I moved out to California and started, started solar door to door. Wow. And when I, the funny thing getting out there too, I don't come from money. Um, so I had a bar of four grand for my grandma to get out there that was enough to ship the car. And then I had to pay the security deposit, which in Walnut Creek, for those who know it's very expensive.Speaker 3 (03:46):So my security deposit and the car, I basically had no money when I got there. So it was freezing out. I didn't have money to buy a jacket or anything. And so when I got out there, it was do or die a hundred percent. Commission-based getting paid a lot less than what we're getting paid now. So I'm always grateful thinking back to what it was before and just put my head down, deleted all my social media. Didn't talk to any girls. Didn't have anyone dragging me in the wrong direction. So it was, I was just hyper-focused and I was sleeping on a pool float, so I didn't have any furniture. So it was an expensive apartment with nothing in it, standing up eating. And then, uh, yeah, so they've got a pool full, you wake up really early. Cause those things deflate, you exceed a certain body weight, you ended up on the ground. So it just wake up. And there's the only thing I eat, slept and breathed every single day. And so that was, that was the kickoff to my career.Speaker 2 (04:31):That's crazy dude. And um, yeah, if you haven't seen, uh, Alex on social media, go give him a fall. We'll drop his info after, but this guy you can't tell if he has a Bulletproof vest on or if it's real life. Cause I mean, he's jacked out of his mind. So if you can imagine this guy, all pure muscle sleeping on a pool float, I think I'm sure it's the plate in pretty quick. SoSpeaker 3 (04:51):2, 3, 2, 3:00 AM start feeling the ground four or five. I got to get up every single day.Speaker 2 (04:58):So were you staying at like someone's house thereSpeaker 3 (05:00):Or whatever? Yeah, I was in an inexpensive apartment, so splitting it with another new guy. And so the total rent was about 3000 a month. I don't know why they put us in this place to start. That's where they told us we should live. I guess the other guys were living there. So it made sense. And then, uh, yeah, so my half is 1500 a month. Uh, but we hadn't, we had literallySpeaker 2 (05:18):Nothing, no furniture in there. There's like we were literallySpeaker 3 (05:21):Standing eating. We had plastic forks. You'd stand either sit on the ground for four. That was a full month. Geez man. Guess what? My first investment wasSpeaker 2 (05:30):A couch cushions, the bed,Speaker 3 (05:34):First thing I spent good money on and I appreciate bed so much because of it.Speaker 2 (05:39):That's crazy, man. I mean, I thought I was bad. I was a similar thing. Um, but I at least had a bed. We had company housing, so I didn't have to pay any rent. I had 50 bucks in my bank account, but I didn't pay any rent out there, but in California. Yeah. So I went out toSpeaker 3 (05:54):Good. They're covering the rent that'sSpeaker 2 (05:57):But I can imagine, I mean, if you're, if you have no other options, just burn the boats. Right. I mean it's like do or die out there. Yeah. You don't get to sell. You're not, um, you're not eaten basically. So do you feel like that was one of the main things that's first helped you out success? Just like, no,Speaker 3 (06:12):That was one of the biggest things for me. That was when I first realized how true it is that like, you have to get outside your comfort zone. Like you have to, I don't know for everyone, you have to go to a different place. But I think for a lot of people, they want to stick around in their hometowns. They want to stay where they're at because it's comfortable. They know people and the idea of getting to where they don't know anyone. And they're just going to be with a bunch of new guys, new, new people. They're not friends with. Yeah. Essentially on their own is usually too much. Most people pull the trigger. But the fact that I did that, I wasn't even scared about it. Cause I was excited more than anything else. And like, just knowing that, Hey, I'm stuck with a 12 month lease because a lot of people will try to say like, all right, we'll get an Airbnb for a month.Speaker 3 (06:49):Like, dude, you're not going to make it. I already know you want to get a HomeAway place where you stay in a hotel. Like, dude, you're going to be out of here within a week. As soon as it gets hard, you like, you can just go. And so coming out there with nothing else, but solar was the best thing, best thing I ever did. So like now it's like, all right, how do I, when I see someone as a really comfortable or a new location or something that, uh, you know, as new it's like, I gotta, I gotta attack it.Speaker 2 (07:11):Yeah. I love that. And um, I think you've probably seen it too, Alex, but like local guys that come in, it's like so hard to get them bought in they're reading. Cause like you're saying they can just go back to mom and pops, Allison just hanging out. They got the financial support. If it doesn't work out, but it's like so hard to get these guys getting results. If they're just still have that like lifeline, they can go back to it anytime. So I think that's a huge secret for anyone that's listening to this. If you are struggling, if you're just working in a local market, I mean, I think gets the point where you just got to switch things up. Maybe go someplace else, go to a new market, burn the boats. But I don't know if you been able to have success with like local guys. Have you S do you have any, I dunno, tips for people who maybe are like staying home, like maybe out of thatSpeaker 3 (07:55):In California, I didn't really have that much success with local guys and my power base people. I would bring people out there was from Florida. So, and that was a hard sell. Yeah. Cause even though it, I could show them my pay stubs. I changed my life. A lot of people weren't willing to move across the country, but those that did, they usually ended up being successful because they had no plan B. Um, so, but now in Orlando we actually have, uh, a couple of decent amount of local guys. And so I'm super impressed by them because I know even for myself, if I was in my hometown, I would have a very difficult time, not falling back into my old habits, not hanging out with the friends that were anchors, right. That were holding me down that wanted me to keep doing their thing.Speaker 3 (08:36):So I, I, I give kudos to guys on our team that are doing, and I think a lot of it is because we, our culture is really strong. So we're meeting every day. Like one of our guys Lewis, for example, he, um, you know, he left his fraternity, like, you know, he, he quit his fraternity and he was just super happy because it felt like he was in a fraternity again, just the same brotherhood, except it's more focused on getting better and making money and, you know, leveling up. So he just turned what he was doing before into something else. But similar premise just now it's focused on growth. And so he's, he's just super happy with it. So the local guys have kind of figured it out, which is awesome. And I think a lot of that comes from, uh, the daily meetings for meeting every single day. So these guys are like, you know, they have to do something different.Speaker 2 (09:13):Yeah, for sure. No. So we'll get to all that for sure. Um, yeah. I want to dive deep into that, but before that, I was curious to know like three in California. How long were you out there then? In total three and a half years. Three and half years. Okay. What, uh, what company was that? Where you go there?Speaker 3 (09:30):I started with sun grid solar. Okay. And then I went over to Coda energy group. Okay. And so that's where I spent all my time between those two companies. Okay.Speaker 2 (09:40):So yeah. Tell me about like when you first started out, was it like instant success? Did you have to like build up into it or what was your experience out? Just getting out there at first.Speaker 3 (09:49):So it would be when I started, like I said, I didn't know. I thought California is always sunny and always 70 degrees. It's not the case in the wintertime. It was pretty darn cold. And so I didn't have a jacket the first night they took us out to our first day in the morning. Um, I want to leave, just took me out to a breakfast Andrews and Betty took me out to breakfast. I ate the food there. I got food poisoning. And so I was going out to the doors, like having to throw up. And I was in fetal position every night when I got back. But I just kept thinking. I was like, no, I can't have this failure. Start this early in my career. Like, that's literally, I was thinking, I was like, no, like this cannot be me my will to survive my will to do something was way higher than like those problems pouring rain, freezing and food poisoning. Yeah. So still knocking through that and then pushing through that and made everything else easy. Like a lot of people complain when it rains is like, dude, I was in a monsoon. I was in the worst monsoon of California for like five, six years. Everyone was saying go. And so pushing through that, I got, yeah. Had some, had some quick success, but it was just cause I was, I was putting a lot out.Speaker 2 (10:45):Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. You're telling me this story the other day when we were talking, um, at least I think that was you about, um, how you're like running. I know this translates like all areas of your life. So Alex, he's not just like this in solar, but you're telling me like, when you would work out, you're drawn. Like what was it when you were doing 75 hard, you're done like 10 miles at night. It's doing 75 and stuff like that. Right.Speaker 3 (11:11):I had David Goggins via because I can't say it was all me. I had a complete, absolute beast in my ear all the time. Yeah. So 75 hard. I think a lot of people already know what it is, but my second workout at nighttime, I just turned it into 10 miles a day and it was fun to see how far you can push up. Cause I'm working out heavy every single morning and then like heavy weights going hard in the gym. And then at nighttime after work, it could be 10:00 PM. I'm running 10 miles. And so I was like, all right, what am I capable of? And half the time I would come back crippled like shin splints beyond belief, Achilles heel feels like it was ripping knee, complete knee issues. I don't even know what those issues are. I would just go into my pool and float and be like, I'm done.Speaker 3 (11:50):And then, so I wouldn't be able to move. I even bought those. Um, he does things like LeBron uses his compression legs. Uh, I don't know exactly what those are, but I got those because I need something. And the craziest thing was like, I kept pushing through all the pain and I like, every time I felt like I was going to break, like I was, I don't even know if I could work tomorrow kind of thing. I was like, this might be a bad idea. And then all of a sudden, there's just one day I think around like day like 25 30 something in that range where you might, my, all my pains went away. My shin splints went away. My Achilles problem went because I felt it. Kelly was like in a snap break. It had this like clicking, feeling like a rubber band. And then my knee was given out, like I had all these like compression things on.Speaker 3 (12:25):I looked like a robot running around and all of a sudden my body just completely adapted to it. And all the pain went away and 10 miles became a breeze. I wasn't winded tired or sore after it, there was like a flip a switch. And that just made me realize what David Goggins found out. Like he found out that if you push yourself really hard, like your body and your mind can figure it out. And so that's like something I've carried that little nugget, that reference point with me through a lot of other things. So even though that was a physical thing, like it, it definitely is a yeah,Speaker 2 (12:52):No, it's so true. And that's something we've talked about with a few guys here at this event is just like, I don't know at first, not going in sore. I mean, a lot of them guys in our team would only go out and knock for hours, but it's like, it came from pest control. We're knocking like 10 hours a day in pest control. Yeah. So I first came out, was guys and solar, we're only doing four I'm like, why are these guys complaining about knocking a lot to do 10Speaker 3 (13:15):Totally different mindset. Yeah.Speaker 2 (13:17):Like I've been in solar five years now. And so yeah. There's times where now I complain about, I'm like one of those guys sometimes where I'm kind of complaining about knocking for hours, but then we get guys coming to our team that got back from alarms. It's like, same thing that like, you guys only knock four or five hours here. And it's like, it's just adapting because we can do so much harder things. Um, if we condition our minds, like we knew we harder things, but guys get complacent. It's so easy to let yourself be like, oh, this is hard. This is, I can't, I can't do more than this. That's like a max effort. But just like the same thing. Once the first guy hit the four minute mile, it's likeSpeaker 3 (13:54):Those a little bit. And do you recall it after that a lot of people from alarms or pest then into your business, have you felt that yeah,Speaker 2 (14:01):Yeah, we do. And like, I'm work, I'm out here with Jason newbie's team now and he's obviously alarm backgrounds. He brought tons of people from alarms.Speaker 3 (14:09):It brings a ton of like lifeblood to the team. Yeah. Just they're exposed to the people that have done it at a high clip. They're like, oh crap. I'm really not working that hard. That is valuable. Having those people like come in, cause they're like, I was doing this for 10 hours a day, unless they revert to the, what you guys are doing. But hopefully they bring in, you know, that leadership there. Yeah.Speaker 2 (14:27):Yeah. So I think it's super important. Just bringing in guys that are from maybe different industries, guys doing different trainees, keeping it fresh. None of that's something you've invested a ton into and we'll talk about, but just bringing in like Taylor McCarthy, trains, your teams dropping a ton of money on just keeping your team motivated, working with other guys and you know, going to events. We see all your guys here. Um, but yeah, huge. Yeah. That's huge. And then I guess last thing I wanted to ask you about California, Alex, what was your biggest struggle starting out as you like, you know, first started hitting doors. What was the biggest thing you struggle with and how did you overcome it? And honestly,Speaker 3 (15:03):The, I, I did a really good job when I started out. So like by deleting all my social media. Okay. Not talking to any girls, like just head down. I didn't think about anything else. There's literally nothing else I thought about. Yeah. So I think I gave myself the best start possible. So there was nothing. I, I felt like I really struggle with the beginning cause I enjoyed it, doing it every single day. Yeah. Like it was, it was a good time and I was working from morning. I literally saw the other guys, they were getting out at our meetings were at 8:00 AM every day. Wow. So you're knocking. So I, other guys, I was waiting, I didn't have my car cause it was getting shipped out. So I was waiting until 10 30, 11 they're dragging their feet. I didn't understand. I'm like, I need to get to the doors.Speaker 3 (15:39):So when my car got shipped out, dude, I was out to the doors. As soon as the meeting was over. I didn't go back to my apartment because the office was right across the street. Just go to the car, go straight out turf. And I was there until it was pitch pitch black. And so, yeah, I think at the beginning, if anyone's new getting into this, but you don't need social media, you haven't gotten to the point where you need to share anything. Probably it's probably not that much stuff for success to share. Yeah. And so, um,Speaker 2 (16:03):Well, so no, that's a super awesome though. I think three's and for your success is just like burning the bridges, just getting rid of everything. Um, I mean, honestly, probably most of the problems that people have can be solved by just like working insane amounts of hours. Would you agree?Speaker 3 (16:18):Yeah. I think that's really, it. One person told me like any problem I had, whether it was customers, cancels, installation, cause all that stuff happens. The solution is at the next door. Like it will literally solve whatever probably have the next door will solve it and thinking anything else is going to do. It won't happen. Like it just won't work.Speaker 2 (16:35):Yeah. Yeah. For sure. How many hours would you say you were hitting then? In the beginning, likeSpeaker 3 (16:40):In the beginning, in the beginning I was there nine 30 till whatever dark was like really dark, like rain, shine, anything. It was the entire time. And that was my big advantage because all the other guys are veterans there. Yeah. I jumped well like way past them for anyone that's new in the industry. Like I don't think any company operates based on a hierarchy or in a structure where it's political, it's all based on production, effort results. And for anyone that's new into the business. I think the biggest thing you can do is separate yourself early because you can either take three months to get incredibly good or you can take three years. A lot of people take the three year out, then they're gone within a year because they don't realize without that early success without really grinding the beginning, it's going to, you're going to be four or five months and you're not producing you're out. You're going to leave because you never went down head first at the beginning.Speaker 2 (17:27):I agree for sure. What about, were there guys where you like the hardest worker at your company starting out or was that kind of like the culture was everyone like doing those amounts of hours and you're just followingSpeaker 3 (17:38):Along. There's only one other, guy's got a manual that was a new guy with me that was working just as hard as me. Um, so that helped having someone else working really hard too. But everyone else is funny. Like within a month all the veterans were asking to go knocking with me and I literally told them, no, I was like, I can't go out knocking with you because I can't my goals. I won't hit my goal if I'm splitting commission with someone. So everything flipped and like, this is weird. Like you guys have been doing this for awhile and you know, they're still cooking lunch and staying out of the apartment and whatever they did, I was just basically doing the opposite. And then they started wherever I would go and turf, they would draw a circle with sales rabbit right next to mine. Cause they thought wherever I was was just like this magical bubble. So everything, everything changed pretty, pretty drastically. They had just started trying to do whatever I was doing and then, uh, try to hop on the train and it seemedSpeaker 2 (18:21):Like, yeah, geez. So you've changed. The culture sounds like and gotten, kinda got their button to gear probably because they were like, dang, gotta keep upSpeaker 3 (18:27):With this guy. Yeah. It exposed a lot of people. A lot of people that are veterans are sliding by to expose them. And so, you know, based on their time and effort they put in, you know, it seemed like they should have been the next person to be a manager in office. But other than the first month I was asking, what's going to take for me to be a manager because I knew I wanted more out of it. And uh, so yeah, I just passed all of them.Speaker 2 (18:49):That's awesome. So what would you say for guys, like maybe the inner company where yeah. It's like people aren't working much and culture. Isn't great. Um, maybe you had times where you've had to, I dunno, like maybe on your team guys, aren't working as hard. Do you have any experiences or ways that you think are good to change that and kind of turn it around and then I'll inspire guys to work more.Speaker 3 (19:09):Yeah. I think the number one is, and this is the cliche lead from the front. That's the easiest one. Yeah. But the thing you can always do. And I think even me, I didn't really want to do it for a while. A lot of companies we'll meet, do correlation once, twice a week, maybe do something zoom. And so for any new guy or anyone that's feeling burnt out those days where you don't have a meeting, you don't get dressed. You don't put on your superhero outfit. Right? Like you don't play the part and you don't act it like you don't do it. So meeting every day has been crucial. So we meet every single day, either at 9:00 AM or 12:00 PM. We do team buildings when we're doing like a sport. So football, basketball, Frisbee, golf, bowling, you name it. We do a sport from 10 to 12 and then Saturdays we're meeting at nine.Speaker 3 (19:47):So we're with each other six days a week, sometimes seven, if we're doing other activities on Sunday. Yeah. And so at the end of the day, anyone that wasn't working when you're seeing the numbers every single day and you have to put up a bagel, you have to put up a zero. Cause you're, you're going the numbers every day. Not just what you did the last three days recapping that, that right there alone. I think can, if any company adopts that, I think that's the easiest, quickest solution to boosting production because then your guys get dressed and ready to go. They're not gonna want to go home the dress. They got to the office, they just ready to roll. Man. Put them in a car group, put them in a car group. That's number two, put them in a car group, have a leader in the car group, call him the commander, general, whatever you wanna name and make them feel important because yes, have him running the show, let him be a leader for his group of guys. It could be three guys. See what he's capable of. You might empower him. And then all of a sudden, you know, like he's the guy for the job. He's gonna run the next office. And so that also is critical because now these guys are forced to go out. Um, I was against hardships for awhile, but once I started doing them, I'll never go back to anything else. Just let the leaders have a chance to shine. Yeah.Speaker 2 (20:43):Well I know it works because we were just talking yesterday about how like they pretty much the same schedule you're doing. It's what Jason newbie in our squad here is doing, doing. I mean, he's I think how long have you been? How long have you started your like dealer out here? Uh, March. March. Okay. Jason started about the same time. Um, and yeah, he's got a team like 40, 50 guys. I know your team's crush an hour. So it's like success is leaving clues. These are the top guys areSpeaker 3 (21:09):Doing they're meeting everyday too.Speaker 2 (21:13):Um, we meet at 1130 right now. So 30 minutes,Speaker 3 (21:20):30 minutes on these guys. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. It's funny to hear that because you guys are crushing it rain a ton of momentum. Everyone I think sees what you know, Jason and you guys are doing over there, so yeah. Yeah. You're right. Success doesn't. Yeah. And I mean,Speaker 2 (21:32):I mean, I, I didn't implement this so I should have done it earlier. Cause I had my own squad out there and we weren't doing daily meetings and our production was for sure suffering because of it. We were just meeting like once or twice a week. It's like you said, those two days we were seeing guys produce, you know, pretty good. But then the rest of the days it's like guarantee you guys were getting out at least two hours later than they would have just because yeah, they didn't have, in my opinion, like 90% of the purpose of the meeting is just like to get the guys to get it together and go out there. And there, cause like, you know, you can only do so many trainings. I mean, trainings are good, but it gets to a point where you're just getting out, you're building the team, building the momentum and getting out there. SoSpeaker 3 (22:11):Yeah, no, it brings some energy to the meetings. Give him, give him some boost. Yeah. Give him a little boost. Give him some shout outs, give him some recognition. Let them jump some ranks of other people on the leaderboard. Yeah. That's it. Get out there. They have a fun time getting together and it's fun to see that you're doing that too. Yeah.Speaker 2 (22:24):And it's fun. And I see, I see your means. You guys are like screaming and shouting and getting guys fired up and stuff do. Right.Speaker 3 (22:29):That'd be a little ridiculous. Try to make it a little different. Every single time we like to do energy exercises. A lot of stuff. I picked up from other people in the industry. It's nothing I created on my own. Yeah. Um, but yeah, that stuff works as a cheesier. Weird. As it sounds running around an office and yelling random stuff just creates energy.Speaker 2 (22:45):Well, yeah. I don't know if you've been to like Tony Robbins events, but it's like the same stuff Tony Robbins is doing. You're like standing up screaming and shouting and allSpeaker 3 (22:52):That. You've been to a Tony Robbins event.Speaker 2 (22:55):I've seen him speak like two or three times, but it's pretty exact same thing. He's like his big thing is you're changing your state. And if you change your states, it's going to like, you need to change something about your state in order to change your like, you know, momentum and change what you're doing, change your state. So I mean, it's something I forgot about because yeah. I'll be honest. Like I was a lot of, sometimes I would run some pretty boring meetings, just like, all right guys, what's your goals. Cool. All right, let's get out there. Clap. And then that was it.Speaker 3 (23:24):I've done that to men too. ButSpeaker 2 (23:26):Yeah, the stuff works. The fact that the same thing that Danny, Danny and Taylor are doing here, then it's like, they're having to stand up scream, shell, whisper, yell, and really, uh, get afterSpeaker 3 (23:36):It. Yeah. I'm guessing the ma it's funny with, with like Danny and Taylor, one of the main things I was taking notes on was exactly how they're handling us. Yeah. Like how they getting our energy, bringing us the present, you know, the snaps snap three times. If you can hear me. Okay. Snap four times and then eventually the homes aren't now be quiet. Yeah. I was taking notes, all that stuff because that stuff is like super effective. Yeah.Speaker 2 (23:57):That works. It works. So yeah. Any boring sells managers or company owners out there, if you are not getting your guys fired up, I think you're doing them a disservice because even if they don't like it, but it works and you need to get your guys on a different level because then they can take that out on the doors too. If they're feeling like at a low state on the doors. I mean it's the same stuff. Yeah. Do some jumping jacks, get your guys fired up and teach them how to change their state when they're out there on the doors too. Yeah.Speaker 3 (24:24):How do you, how do you cheat him on that? What do you do to rehearse, to change their state on the doors?Speaker 2 (24:29):Um, I mean, just like the affirmation stuff. I'm sure you've taught your guys. Just like, you know, the brain Tracy stuff. I liked myself. I like myself and I love my job. It's like repeating that between the doors works for me. And I know for me, if I've gotten like a hard rejection, it's just like affirmation affirmation before the next door that in popping on my, a little sidewaySpeaker 3 (24:48):Thing lately. Yeah. It's funny how cheesy it sounds though. Like I think a lot of people listening in like, man, if you haven't ever done it before you think self-talk affirmations, like that's just for, gazy for Godsey because I thought the same thing. And then you hear people like Taylor doing it every second, we can be playing tennis. Taylor McCarthy's out there just talking to himself, always talking positively, come on, Taylor, you got this really good at this stuff. And so it's yeah. It's one of those things until you actually try, if you haven't tried it and you're listening to this, absolutely. Try to love my job. My job is easy. Yeah. All they do is write a line down a piece of paper. So your current situation, what your new situation would be, just keep saying that kind of stuff out loud. It surprisingly works. And then just smiling. Just smiling to just remembering, just to smile. That'll change your state too, for sure.Speaker 2 (25:32):I know. Yeah. It works a hundred percent. So yeah, definitely go out and do it if you haven't tried that for all our listeners. Um, so I'll see. I want to jump into now. Like, I mean, like I was saying, you have what? Seven or eight guys here though, man. Yeah. Include me. Okay. And you have what? Like around 20 guys or something in your officeSpeaker 3 (25:50):Right now? Yeah, I think we just went up to like 23. Okay.Speaker 2 (25:54):So grown a ton. Um, but yeah, that's pretty, pretty impressive to have that many guys here. And I know it's just, uh, you know, shown what you guys have built. I can see that your guys are like hungry to learn, want to grow a ton and like just eat this stuff up. So, um, any company I've been with even, you know, how to like 50 guys with my company, we only got three of us here, not to say they don't like learn in, but pretty impressive that you can bring like a whole crowd here and get them all excited about these things. So yeah. What do you, um, how have you kind of built that or how do you get your guys to buy into this whole, like culture of learning ins and get them to show up for these things?Speaker 3 (26:30):So these kinds of trips are basically incentive driven, right? Like there's always good to do incentives for prizes. Cool watches, a segway, whatever it is. But the most beneficial, and these they're fired up to just have the opportunity to come here and be able to expose them to higher level people. Even if we're losing three, four or five days of production is going to pay off tenfold. Yeah. So just having guys that understand the value, personal development, and if you're not working on yourself every day, like they don't see you becoming better. Like I'm always posting when I'm reading books, I'm always writing quotes. I'm always like showing things. I'm learning on social media so everyone can see it. And part of the reason I do, it's not because I just, you know, have an ego for it. It's because they're going to see what I'm doing on a regular basis and realize that personal velvet getting better is really part of the process to be happier.Speaker 3 (27:20):If you're becoming better every day, you're going to be happy. Yeah. That's like, I think that the easiest way to boil it down, if you just feel like you're becoming better, it could be in fitness, health, business relationships. If you just feel like you're getting better, learning more stuff, you'll be happy. So just having the whole culture based around that. And then in the past, I used to think like whatever, whatever leaders I had in my circle or in my company, I could get everything I wanted from them. Yeah. That was like, what I thought of you like felt that too, like, Hey, this is like, I'm good. I don't need to pay for anything else. Yeah. And once I realized that paying to play is the most important way. Quickest way to hack time. Yeah. It's, it's like been a game changer for me. I'll pay for all my guys, good ticket. Anyone that's working, putting the time I'm gonna invest as much time and money as possible into them. Because if they can understand the same value of like what what's like the CAC time and pay to play and just get a few shortcuts, a few nuggets from these things will do it for the rest of your life. That'd be happier. Guys are going to come back more motivated, hungry, and then bring that to other guys and bleeds over. It just keeps bleeding over. Right.Speaker 2 (28:20):I love that. And I think it's important that you're saying like do it as an incentive too, because it's like, I've been, I remember my previous company I was with, they like, you know, bought a bunch of bunch of people, like take us to go see grant Cardone. Yeah. Um, but then I, I don't, I can't remember if it was an incentive or if it was, maybe it was like a really easy one. So we went there and then half the guys like showed up for half the events and you know, half the time they're like on their phones. And I dunno if like, like not like appreciating it. It's like people when people pay, they're going to pay attention. Right. So it's like at least get them to like earn it. So they're going to come in and show up.Speaker 3 (28:59):That's that's so funny. It's it's true. But people don't pay for it. It's like you give someone a book, they won't read it. You just give it to them for free. Like one of the guys, Mike, Mikey that came to talk to us, he was like, Hey, we're putting this code and you'll get a book for free. I'm like, dude, I want to pay for this book. No, don't, don't give me this sort of for free. If I, if I don't pay for, it's going to sit on the shelf a lot longer. And then they, you know what they did with telling everyone to silence their phones or put their phones in the room. I'm doing that. Any of these kinds of ads, I grabbed everyone's phone on my team and put it all in the room. Everyone's everyone's phone was gone. And so, uh, yeah. Cause every, when everyone takes a ping or check something else, there's so many of the things going on. So like when there was at the grand Cardone event, that's just like, makes you not want to do it again. Like why would an owner want to bring people out to another event where no one's paying attention.Speaker 2 (29:41):I know. So super important run, figure out a way to get these guys they're bought in. And yeah, I was telling you about, I mean, we have this sole society app, we launched the training platform, which will be all of our listeners are on, but it's like, I can't remember. I told you, but all the people I gave free access, we did kind of like a trial period gave like, I don't know, 15 people free access. And it's like, guess how many of them logged on like three or four of them at something like that? And then probably two of them have actually like, you know, done something with it.Speaker 3 (30:10):So yeah. And then what about the people that paid? Yeah. What about those people that were paying?Speaker 2 (30:16):Um, yeah, I mean, they're going through it. They're the ones that are actually getting results. So that's awesome. It's like, yeah. And it's what Danny do. We're talking to these events. They're super expensive, but if people don't pay their lights, like they're doing us a disservice. If they don't charge us because we're not going to take it seriously, we're not going to appreciate the content. So, um, yeah, no, I think it's just getting your guys to buy in with that. And if you are, I don't know, using some sort of training platform, figure out a way to get them like skin in the game. Cause if not, yeah,Speaker 3 (30:46):Yeah, yeah. That's right. You show me your app. I'm pretty excited about it. I felt like that was the one thing. Um, I really want a smooth transition from when someone gets onboarded, the content they consume that I can actually track and measure all the way to when they start and then for the next month. Right? Like I've always thought I need to get a good source of content for that interactive engaging. Yeah. And um, I mean, I'm not here even plugged down and this is like legit. What I think about what you showed me, super interactive, super engaging, and be able to bring in my own content to it on an app on their phone where people are glued to already, I'm excited to white label it, bringing those content, have your content on it. And so I could have that part of the standard operating procedures dialed in from the second a person gets onboarded. They have to complete all this all the way until they start for the next month. I think that's going to hack time too. So that's really quick. Great that it looks clean. It looks,Speaker 2 (31:34):I appreciate it, brother. I didn't tell him to do that. SoSpeaker 3 (31:36):Look looks, it looks clean, man. And it's good. It's good,Speaker 2 (31:39):Bridget. That, yeah. We'll get your team on it for sure. Um, but yeah, man, so no, it's just super impressive. What you've been able to do with your team and get them bought in and really get them, uh, coming to these events. And it's like, it's not really a secret. I mean, I'm another guest. I know, you know, Mo in his crew, but yeah, they're doing pretty similar things. You guys are both doing, he showed up at door to door con with like his, basically his whole team there and they're all getting up on stage. So doing all these things that as a team getting guys bought in, um, it's just helped you grow a ton. So yeah. How have you, uh, so you started in March. How many guys did you start with back in March then?Speaker 3 (32:15):So March was just me and one other person. Um, and then I think it was mid March. I got two other people and uh, then we S it was, I was just meeting my house and that was a pretty slow growth in the beginning. Brought in a couple other people. Um, obviously didn't have any systems or anything dialed in. Yeah. And then what was it in, uh, April? I think we were at nine people did a, we experiment with different stuff. Like hearing it from other people was working. I got some, some tips from Mo, so shout out to Mo flaw. Like he was, you know, providing some help on that side of things. I really appreciated that. Cool. Um, so blitz was effective as fun, getting everyone around each other. Um, and then we brought in, we got up to like 20 guys in June and brought a guy has got an office space.Speaker 3 (32:59):Office space was huge. Uh, you know, that was big. And then, uh, we actually went on a hiring freeze for like a month and a half, two months. We just started hiring again because I didn't want to plug people into a model that wasn't fully developed. Nice. And so I've done that before where I just bring people in and it's not where it needs to be in, you know, in your heart, if things are good to go, when can you bring it someone in? Are they going to be successful quickly or is it only gonna be a few people that are going to survive because it's only, you know, designed for the people that are ready to go on their own. And so waiting for that, hiring freeze, get everything dialed in our systems, our processes, how we do business. And now it's like, all right, let's open the flood gates. That's why I hired like, started creating these guys to do everything else. Nice.Speaker 2 (33:36):Yeah. Shout out to Serge. He's here. He's Sarah, I'm recording this right now. So you're going to see some video with this episode. ISpeaker 3 (33:43):Appreciate it. I'm laughing.Speaker 2 (33:46):You're laughing. It's these Russians laughing at us. Um, but uh, no. So another thing that's been cool is you've invested a ton just in your growth and your team's growth. I mean, yeah, you're missing in surge. He's doing content for your team. You missed in Danny and Taylor. They're blowing things up. So I know a lot of, a lot of companies listening to this, maybe a lot of like team leaders, they're nervous to like invest in themselves dropping money. I mean, some pretty serious money that your job to work as closely as you are with TaylorSpeaker 3 (34:15):And Dan, it was the cheapest thing I ever bought. No, I was kidding the cheapSpeaker 2 (34:20):Stuff. No, but, um, so it's gotten you crazy as old, but I know you're telling me you're pretty like nervous to like invest in that. So what's been, I dunno, what's helped you, I guess, have confidence and like Joplin that kind of money and, um, just seeing your game grow.Speaker 3 (34:33):Yeah. I just saw other people doing it. And then I was like, they're dropping all this money. And like, not everyone, very few people are doing it, but I saw the people that were doing it, showing up all these events, bring the teams, doing this stuff. We're seeing a lot more success. Yeah. And I just realized like, yeah, I got to start paying. I got to start paying to get around the right people to expose myself, expose the team. And man, when I dropped that money for DocStar star select, it is, it is it's, it's, it's a decent amount of money. And in the beginning I was super nervous. I was like, man, did I just blow this much money right now? Um, because in the first month or two, I didn't really know exactly how to get what I wanted out of it. And the main reason I did it was because I to tell them McCarthy, like all the money was made, mostly just like even the master of it.Speaker 3 (35:14):I was even thinking about that. I just want to tell the McCarthy to be in my office for three days. Yeah. And so he came and blitzed with our team for three days and it completely changed everything. Yeah. Like it's one thing to show people how great this lakes are and like to use little tactics, um, myself. And then it's another thing to have someone that knows how to use it to the highest level, like highest technical level. Yeah. They see that stuff and you just realize what is possible with what you can do. And so just those three days pay for the entire thing without a doubt. And then having this mastermind events and everything else on top of it, one of the best decisions I've ever made. That's awesome. I'm going to keep doing it. That kind of just sparked it. I actually, the first thing I invested in was Knox our bootcamp, which Allison was hesitant to pay $5,000 for it.Speaker 3 (35:58):I was in it with you, we're in the same bootcamp. I was like, man, five grand for one zoom a week. Is this going to be worth it? Yeah. That was that paid for itself within three, four days, just got the motivation, got the competition going. And then it's like you, I think the biggest thing is just taking the first year, invest in like books. Then you might invest in some little training platforms and then you level up, you invest in, you know, something like $5,000 ticket item. Yeah. And then you just start to realize that at each level you're unlocking the next level. You're like, okay. I spent 5,000, so now I can spend 50,000. Yeah. Okay. So now I can spend a hundred thousand dollars on getting better working with the right people. And you know, even, even, uh, uh, Jerry that was talking today spending $400,000 on his coaches and he said he he'd pay more. If you could find more coaches that could help him out and level them up, we thought they could. And so it's like, yeah, like all the, all the real G's out there doing that. So it's just keep, keep, start small and keep growing that for sure. And it's cool. I think that's been,Speaker 2 (36:55):Yeah. And I don't know if you heard Jerry, but he was saying like, some of the programs seems in the mastermind groups, he didn't even like invest in it to, for the training. He just did it to be around like the other high level people. I was like, all right. If I'm paying 150 grand, there's going to be some people pretty committed in here that I'm going to be able to like, like make connections with. So he said that alone is made, I'm like millions of dollars just being able to network with those.Speaker 3 (37:17):Yeah. He said 150,000 made him 2.2 million. Yeah. Just being around the right people. That was a pretty aha moment. It's like, you don't even need to pay to get the training. It could just be purely the circle. Yeah. It was just the circle of people could change your life. So that was another aha moment with just like how far you can go with this thing. Yeah.Speaker 2 (37:33):Yeah. No, that's awesome. And if you, have you ever made any like bad, I dunno, investments on the business that you regret making or has it all been a pretty, pretty good?Speaker 3 (37:43):Don't think I've made any bad investments on the business. Um, I think the only thing I didn't do is invest enough. Like in the past I think that was the biggest thing. I just didn't invest enough. And I think the worst investment I made was just not spending the money. Yeah. That was, that was the worst thing I did with the cash is put it toward dumb things. Yeah. You know, rather than back into the people, back into myself. Yeah.Speaker 2 (38:02):Yeah. Well, yeah. No, and it's pretty easy. I mean, you just look at the results. Like he's a mess then surge surge is getting massive results with his video clients and then Danny and Taylor, they get massive results for everyone they work with. So it's pretty simple. I mean, just look at this. I was asking Mikey this same question. Cause he's in all of these mastermind groups, I'm like, Mike, you, when you invest in so many, like you're in like four different mastermind groups, like that's not how you can track that. It's like, how do you figure out that they're all going to be worth it? So yeah, he just saying, I dunno, it's like Jesus said right by, by their fruits, you will know, um, what's going on with it. So for anyone that's doubting on investing in things like that and training, just, you know, go look at the results, see what other people are having success with. And I mean, it's just gonna come down to the work. You put into it too and apply it, which is what you guys are doing.Speaker 3 (38:50):One thing, one thing I heard that always stuck with me, there's three steps and basically laws to constant human improvement. The first one is you have to add knowledge. Second one is you have to act on it or apply it. And the third one is you have to evaluate how that went. Is it something you're gonna keep doing? A lot of people just add the knowledge. Like they'll come to these kinds of events. They get hyped up about it. And then they don't reflect on it. Right. They don't spend the time polishing or learning and studying what they just learned and then acting on. And then one thing I always left out of the equation, I was pretty good at acting on it. I left out of the equation, the evaluation part, like evaluating how that stuff get. Did it, did it make the, there was a result of worse? Like did not help me out or is it like something? Okay, this is really good. I need to fine tune this. So evaluating and reflecting on that, falling those three steps with reading a book with anything else, any mentorship, if you just follow those simple three steps, I think that's the key. That's the key toSpeaker 2 (39:42):Improving. Yeah. That's fire ad knowledge. What was the ad knowledge evaluate and then reflect,Speaker 3 (39:47):Add knowledge, act on knowledge. Evaluate.Speaker 2 (39:51):Okay, bye. Right. That's awesome. That's super good stuff. Fire. Um, well, yeah. And so, um, I know you're you guys are what, uh, uh, I was talking to some of your guys and they're telling me you're closing like 70, 80% of your deals, which is like super good. Is that just been working with Taylor? You guys just implementing all this stuff and that's, what's taking you to the next level on the closing.Speaker 3 (40:16):Yeah. I, I can't take credit for that man or working with Taylor, just getting little tips and tricks, something as simple as his hypothetical, he throws in, you know, hypothetically, sir, if you already had the panels on your roof, you just have this, it's been three years, you just have this fixed payment of $150. So you've already added, you know, $4,500 of equity, $6,000 of equity to your home. And it's never going up. And then you have duke energy or whatever, utility knock on the door. And they try to convince you to rip all those panels off. They want to extract those three years of equity. So that four or $5,000 back to the CEO's pocket, and then go back to a variable rate. That's, you know, pretty high, much higher than what you're paying today. What would you tell duke energy? And so like just little things like that, just even the most simple one on the doors.Speaker 3 (41:01):This is a nugget everyone should take and apply to me to like, because it's so easy getting the appointment or even getting the clothes. My job is super simple. I just draw a line down a piece of paper. I show you what your current situation is and then what your new situation would be. Now, if this doesn't make sense, I wouldn't expect to do it. In fact, I won't even come back, but if it does make sense as logical, you're going to do it, right? Like it's not going to be a thing that you have to think about it. Just going to be a side-by-side comparison of your current and your new situation. And at the end of the day, if it ends up costing you less to own something, is there any reason you'd want to continue to rent it duke and pay your energy landlord? So just little, little nuggets like that.Speaker 2 (41:38):Boom. That's that's the thing I'm coming to these events. You just pick like I started making like a notes, just folder of all like the one-liners. So it's like all that stuff. It's just a game changer. And I know people have gone and listened to Taylor's podcast episode just on repeat and yeah, I think several year guys were telling me they've doneSpeaker 3 (41:56):It, but they posted, posted every day. Like you guys got to listen to this thing again. Let's do it again. Listen to the car. Yeah. CauseSpeaker 2 (42:03):It's like that kind of stuff. It's yeah. It's just changing everybody. Those things. It's the little buy in the customers it's taking. What was your closing ratio? Would you say before you started working with those guys?Speaker 3 (42:13):I would say my closing ratio was about 40% or so I would say it's about 40%. Um, so it significantly went up. Yeah. There were just a lot of little tactics I used at the end. There's like a lot of people, like they'll a lot of new reps or they just started closing. They'll say all these objections that happen in. And like, they want to think about all these concerns. It's like, that doesn't happen to me anymore because all the little jabs I throw in that I've learned from Taylor and other people in the industry all along the way, by the time I get there, it's purely just, is this the correct spelling of her name? Okay, great. Is this the right last name? Okay. What's the last four of your social? Like there's no, there's no questioning what they're doing. There's no like pauses or breaks. And if you are having people throwing stuff at you at the end, when you get into numbers, it's because you haven't dialed in your technique before that point. So dialing the word tracks, getting the technique, thrown in enough jobs to where it makes complete sense for them. And it's just a no brainer. Yeah. Is something that a lot of people don't do and you have to get training from the best people to do it. Otherwise you're just going to try to figure it out on your own. It's going to take forever. Yeah.Speaker 2 (43:16):Fire. So yeah, guys, I know, uh, I know it sounds like knock star paid us to do this, but we're doing this for free Danny. And we promise that Danny and Taylor don't have a gun to our heads telling them to sail. Just kidding. But no, it's true. So yeah. Learn from the best and just yeah. Implement it, memorize those lines. Cause I think that's been a game changer for all of us. So last thing I wanted to ask you, Alex, before we kind of wrap up here is you have obviously huge social media following. I know it's probably 99% chicks to just want to, you know, feel your abs and all that stuff, which is yeah. But, uh, so you're big on social media and all that. And I know you've recruited a lot. How, um, how, how many followers you have on Instagram? Like a hundred, a hundred gay,Speaker 3 (44:00):Like 100, 105. K yeah. Hopefully that's going to go upsurge. Yeah. Right, man. We're going to need 200,000 or something or blows up. Yeah,Speaker 2 (44:07):Let me go up. But yeah. So how has that, uh, as far as like recruiting goes, is that been a big thing for you? The social media, or do you have anything else that's helped you kind of like recruit these guys and bring on more people.Speaker 3 (44:18):I'm glad you brought that up. Cause that, that is like the key I've used. Uh, I've restarted multiple times for anyone else. That's like grown a business or grown, uh, you know, like just talk about solar and you've grown a sales team and you leave that or something happens and you know, you have to move out and you're starting from square one. I've done that multiple times and that's gave me confidence that I could do it again. Like I know at the end of the day, I've always been able to do it again. So like, I keep that as a reference point that no matter what's going on, I can do it again. And the way I always did it was through social media. So I would simply find a better opportunity. I can offer other people. And then in the day that's what I'm always was always chasing.Speaker 3 (44:52):Like what's the best opportunity. Not for me. Like, that's a cool part, but like, I really want to find the best opportunity to bring guys in because the end of the day, if I have a better offer for them, I have a better culture. They're going to join me in the only way they're going to see that is if I'm posting stuff about it. Yeah. So that's all I've ever done ever since. And I've been consistently posting my lifestyle. I used to share my own success. And I think in the beginning you share your own success, right? Like how much you made. And it's not about ego. It's not about being arrogant. A lot of people think it's like that, but I can't tell you how many guys I brought in to this business because they said they saw their, or someone shared my story with them.Speaker 3 (45:26):And they exposed like, Hey, I just made $20,000 in a week. Like they got exposed to that. And they wanted to reach out because if I didn't do that stuff, which a lot of people steer, cause it is weird in the beginning, like sharing financial stuff. A lot of people steer away from that. But if you post that out there consistently over time, some people will hit you up immediately. Like there's going to be people that are ready for change right now. Just like Taylor says, the hardest part of my job is timing. And that involves social media too. Then I've had people three years later, like, Hey dude, I followed your journey for three years. Like, what you're doing is awesome. Yeah. Actually I just saw that you moved to Orlando. Like this might be perfect for me. I'm over in Tampa. Right? So those things start happening three, four years later and you don't realize it at the time that it's going to be that way.Speaker 3 (46:08):But it's just like the, just like investing. Like if you think about like, okay, I'm only going to make 8% this year. That's not that much more money, but it's like compounded over time. You keep doing it consistently and sharing success versus my success. Then I really now only focused on other success. So I share what Liam's make and I show what Will's make. And I started Sawyer, Jake, all these guys, they're closing all these deals. I shared their success because they ended Dave. You just keep talking to yourself. That's not going to be much family because they just think you're a one-off. Yeah. So showing new guys success in the industry on social media has been pivotal to growing all my businesses because that's where my teachers always used to tell me, LinkedIn, man, the LinkedIn is going to be a thing. You gotta be able to network and you need to, and have people write out your, you know, your level 10 or you're excellent at communicating Excel.Speaker 3 (46:52):And like, dude, that is from gazing from Gaza. If I've ever heard it. When I heard that stuff, I literally thought I was like, this is BS. And the fake platform in the world, people are just putting on a face and a front. I was like, they're not real. They're reaching out like, Hey Alexander, I really liked the things you're doing. I think it'd be great to connect. And you could be great for this opportunity. Like this is, that is dead. That is not the way it may work for some businesses. But I already knew that wasn't gonna work for mine. I didn't know Instagram was going to be the thing, but that's just where I shared my life on. And so, uh, yeah, it was, it was funny just reflecting on like the teachers were completely off for this business for sales and everything is social media. Man. Look at grant Cardone, look at anyone. That's good at high scale. That's where it's at.Speaker 2 (47:29):Yeah. I know one year taking advantage of it. I mean, I just started doing, doing this stuff. Like semi-recently, I mean, I got like 700 followers growing long, long ways, but you know, consistent stuff. But even with my 700 followers just by posting these videos, testimonial, videos, stuff like that, like I'm getting referrals, I'm getting people like reaching out. I'll be like, oh, Hey, I didn't know you do solar just from like doing that with like 700 people soSpeaker 3 (47:53):I can get referrals for solar, for solar. Yeah. So, so I think that's an interesting, I think that's an interesting point. I don't have that at all because I think you could approach it two ways, either a it's going to be customer facing or B it's going to be sales rep facing, right. Like new guy facing recruiting facing. Yeah. It's pretty hard to do both. I think you can. Yeah, but I know for a fact, if my clients follow me on Instagram, there's going to be some cancels. There's going to be some problems that they can follow me on Facebook. Facebook is separate. Facebook is like, okay. Old people hang out here. This is a good platform to be friends with them on. Even though I don't really want to because they'll see my old college days. So yeah, I think it's like, you can go one or two ways about it. And for me, I picked like, okay, my lifeblood is bringing in new people. That's what makes me the most happy. I love selling deals. I love selling deals. But at the end of the day, like my lifeblood is bringing new people in bringing new people in sharing their success, helping them be successful. That's really what, what I want toSpeaker 2 (48:49):Focus on. Yeah. No. And I think you gotta have a focus. I mean, this was kind of like a lucky thing because it wasn't, it was like a friend from Utah that just recently bought a home. So it, that go Hey on the out.Speaker 3 (48:59):But yeah, that's awesome. I know some of my friends are good at that part too. They get like friends and stuff through social media, so everyone, everyone could do differently. Yeah.Speaker 2 (49:08):Yeah. But now it's a huge tool, so yeah. And we'll have to have a Mr. Serge creator on, in another episode, he can share more about the social media part, but uh, yeah, man. So no, I appreciate you coming on Alex and dropping some fire for us and for our listeners. So yeah. Speaking of social media, where can people connect with you and hang out with you on social media and find out more about what you're doing?Speaker 3 (49:28):Alex H. Smith. Okay. Alex H. Smith on Instagram. I don't think I have anything else. Just Instagram man. Uh, but surge is going to add some platforms to that. Right. I'm going to tick Docker. And I would say, I would say one last thing I just wanted to bring up just because it was so pivotal in kind of creating a hockey stick trajectory for me. Yeah. And I don't know who this is going to lay to or who it's going to help out. But for the longest time you're in the sales cycle, you roll, you can ride the roller coaster. I had a lot of ups and downs. Yeah. And I even got to a point, you know, where I cleared my first a hundred thousand dollars in a month. And I, I literally was not happy. Like I wasn't feeling it. Like I was like, what is going on?Speaker 3 (50:07):I have all this stuff's going. Right. But I just didn't feel good. And there were just a couple bad vices I had, I always knew for me, and this is different for everyone, but I was new for me. Like drinking was one thing that always like caused me to go into a downward spiral. So like I would drink and then I would be depressed for three or four days. So if I drank on the side, I wasn't drinking everyday, venturing on a Saturday. I wasn't into myself by Thursday. And by then I was feeling good. It's like, okay, now I can do it on a Saturday. Yeah. So every time I would show up for my team, if I did that, I would go to every weekend. But if I did that I'd would be, you know, 40% of who I am. Yeah. And I always knew that was a problem.Speaker 3 (50:40):And it took, it took a long time. I tried to, you know, stop drinking because I used to say like, I can't drink. That was like kind of thing. Cause I started out just FSU, gave me some habits. So I would say, a

Ben is out this week. So Alex invited SCG Number 1 Ranked Modern player Zach Allen to discuss how the Modern meta is looking, what MH2 has done to the format, and whether the format needs a ban! Special Guest Zach Allen Twitter: @A22en YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChPxnTWWPdZlKPRSAVvoMaw Ben Bateman is going on tour! Show dates and tickets here: https://benbateman2021tour.bigcartel.com Want to pick up any of new cards you saw in this week's episode? Click over to TCGPlayer.com using our affiliate link here! It's a free and easy way to support the show. Thanks! - https://bit.ly/3fW7fqV Deck Lists: Hammer Time: https://infinite.tcgplayer.com/magic-the-gathering/deck/Hammer-Time/446772 BG Yawgmoth: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/4156567 Join The MMCast Patreon https://www.Patreon.com/TheMMCast Discord: https://discord.gg/fjYdTwS MMcast Twitch: twitch.tv/kesswylie Instagram: @TheMMCast Kess: Twitter: @Kesswylie Instagram: @Kess_Wylie Twitch: Twitch.tv/Kessco Ben: Twitter: @benbatemanmedia Instagram: @BenBatemanMedia Twitch: Twitch.tv/BenBatemanStreams Michael: Twitter @Dudardd Website: kess.co/themmcast Email: themmcast@kess.co Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/170382890167965/?ref=share Produced by Time Traveler Media - https://www.timetravelermedia.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

That’s right! Finally! We…have…VIDEO! So Alex was out on vacation and TMI wasn’t sure if he would be able to come on due to guests. Enter Joe Cunningham. Joe is a Senior Editor at Redstate, cohost of his own podcast, … Continue reading →

Missed the show? No worries, we got all the highlights on the ON point podcast:  Alex talks with Dr. Pascal Lavoie,  an investigator at BC Children's Hospital, a pediatrician and an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics at UBC. Dr. Lavoie is also the principal investigator on a new study that finds schools are not at a higher risk for COVID-19. So Alex and the good doctor dive into the study and discuss its findings.  Next, Alex talks with an expert in all things Military law, Michel W. Drapeau, Colonel-Maitre, Senior Counsel, and Founder of the Michel Drapeau Law Office. They talk about the scathing report delivered by the Military Ombudsman on how vested political interests have been found to impede the office, and what this means for the Trudeau government, and Canada's Military. And finally, Alex talks with John Robson, Columnist for the National Post, and the Executive Director of the Climate Discussion Nexus. They talk about Trudeau's recent comments directed at the Chinese government for their inhumane treatment of the Uyghur Muslims, and how China got a coalition to stand against Canada. Let's get talking  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The PROTECT Study is testing how well an investigational medicine works in children and teens with type 1 diabetes. The hope is that this drug, called teplizumab, would help people continue making more of their own insulin and reduce the need for injections, have better glucose control and/or fewer complications of T1D. To enroll in the study, you need to be within six weeks of diagnosis. That's a tough time to make a big decision like this. We caught up with the Lahners family - 16 year old Alex just marked one year with T1D and he's spent almost that entire year in the PROTECT study. He and his father talk to Stacey about the decision to take part and  what happens during this trial. Alex doesn't know whether he got the drug or a placebo, but he's only using six units of insulin or less a day! Info on the PROTECT study - including how to enroll Previous episode which included information on PROTECT In Tell Me Something Good  - A big achievement for one of the first families Stacey found in the online community. ThisIsCaleb is a high school valedictorian! Learn more about Medicare coverage for Dexcom: www.dexcom.com/G6-Medicare This podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Check out Stacey's book: The World's Worst Diabetes Mom! Join the Diabetes Connections Facebook Group! Sign up for our newsletter here ----- Use this link to get one free download and one free month of Audible, available to Diabetes Connections listeners! ----- Get the App and listen to Diabetes Connections wherever you go! Click here for iPhone      Click here for Android Episode transcription below:  Stacey Simms  0:00 Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dario Health. Manage your blood glucose levels increase your possibilities by Gvoke Hypopen, the first premixed auto injector for very low blood sugar, and by Dexcom take control of your diabetes and live life to the fullest with Dexcom. This is Diabetes Connections with Stacey Simms. This week, imagine being newly diagnosed and having to decide right away whether to take part in a clinical trial. The protect trial is for kids and teens and needs to start within six weeks of diagnosis. Alex Lahners agreed to do it.   Alex Lahners  0:42 I know that I don't want future people getting diabetes. And I didn't want anyone I knew to get diabetes. So I ultimately was like, I'm not just going to do this for myself. I want to do this for other people who are in the future going to be diagnosed.   Stacey Simms  0:56 Alex is 16 he was diagnosed last year, he and his father talked to me about the decision to take part and what happens during this trial. And tell me something good. A big achievement for a kid I've never met but feel like I've known forever. One of the first families I found in the online community. This podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Welcome to another week of the show. Always so glad to have you here. We aim to educate and inspire about diabetes with a focus on people who use insulin. My son Benny was diagnosed with type one right before he turned two. That's 14 and a half years ago. Now. My husband lives with type two diabetes. I don't have diabetes, I have a background in broadcasting. And that is how you get the podcast. I told you a couple of weeks ago, I had a meetup It was my first in person parent meetup since COVID. I used to do these things all the time. And I've done them for years, I run a large parenting Group here in the Charlotte, North Carolina area. And it felt so good to see people again and have these meetups. But what was amazing, and this is what I told you about is that two of the families, newer diagnosed already have their kids in clinical trials. And we live in Charlotte, which is not where a lot of these take place. So I was really impressed. And I think that obviously speaks to the access that we have. We have fabulous endocrinology groups. And we have really great outreach programs from JDRF here in our area. But I think it also speaks to the availability of these trials. These were not happening back when my son was diagnosed back in 2006. And I covered one of these trials though, and we're going to talk about today. I talked about this briefly in an episode a few weeks back with Dr. Henry Anholt from prevention, the group behind the protect study. And here's what he told us at the time. If you missed that episode, I will link it up. But in a nutshell, the protect study is involving about 300 children and adolescents. They're in clinics across the US, Canada and Europe, you have to be eight to 17 years old, you have to be diagnosed with Type One Diabetes in the previous six weeks. So as I said in the tea's it's really quick, you got to know you have it and get in here to the study really quickly. You have to be positive for one of five T1D auto antibodies, you have to produce a minimum of your own insulin, they do those two tests as part of the study. And then you need to be otherwise generally Healthy Kids in the study are placed into one of two treatment groups, two thirds of the participants will get the actual medication here and 1/3 will be assigned to the placebo group. It's decided at random and the medication in this is decided at random and it is blinded which means nobody not your child, not you not the doctor will know what group you are in. And the medication is going to sound familiar it is teplizumab This is the medication that we've been talking about for several years. That is in many trials that is in front of the FDA right now, as a prevention for type 1 diabetes. It's been shown to prevent the onset for a couple of years. This is a little different, though, right? This is using teplizumab in kids who are already diagnosed, seeing if they get it right away. What happens. So the Lahners family was kind enough to talk to us about their experience here and I'm going to go ahead and sort of spoil the ending because I was amazed by this. Alex is Benny's age he is 16 He is not a small kid, and he is using about six units of insulin a day, a day a day. If you're at all familiar with teenagers, it just sounds absurd. We would love to say of course just from that that the city is a big success the medication works for Get Out Of course, you know, quick look, they don't even know if he was actually in the the part of the group that got that to close him up. He could have gotten the placebo and I guess be in a very long honeymoon be a really exceptional case. I don't know. We will talk about it in just a moment. But first Diabetes Connections is brought to you By Gvoke Hypopen.  our endo always told us that if you use insulin, you need to have emergency glucagon on hand as well. Low blood sugars are one thing we're usually able to treat those with fast acting glucose tabs or juice. But a very low blood sugar can be very frightening. Which is why I'm so glad there's a different option for emergency glucagon Gvoke Hypopen pen is pre mixed and ready to go with no visible needle, you pull off the red cap and push the yellow end on to bare skin and hold it for five seconds. That's it, find out more go to Diabetes Connections dot com and click on the Gvoke logo. Gvoke shouldn't be used in patients with pheochromocytoma or insulinoma visit Gvoke glucagon dot com slash risk. Alex and Jeremy, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining me. Thanks for having us.   I'm really excited to learn more about your story. You know, it's it's interesting at the same age as my son, but very different circumstances before we get to the studies and to play the map and all that stuff. Jeremy, let me start with you. Tell me the diagnosis story. How did you know something was going on?   Jeremy Lahners  6:03 Well, it was a, it was a warm summer night almost almost a year ago. Now, we had noticed over the course of really a couple of weeks that Alex just was not feeling well. And he's always done kind of a good job of hiding some of his symptoms from us a little bit. And he had just not been feeling well. He was drinking a lot of water and was sleeping a lot. Probably the sleeping was the thing that we noticed more than anything. He just wanted to sleep all the time. Now, school had just ended maybe a week or two prior to this. And a lot of what we saw as symptoms we really chalked up to a teenage kid wanting to just be left alone. Now that school was done and wanting to sleep all the time. So we we sort of wrote a lot of stuff off, we did take him in because he had had indicated he had some symptoms kind of leading up to some of all of this. And our doctor at the time, based on the way that we described things really thought that it was allergies. And so we started allergy medicine, then the day before we took him to the hospital, we just noticed that he was really looking thin. And he's a wrestler, he has lost weight over the course of the many years that he's been wrestling and so we know what weight loss looks like for him. But this was very unusual weight loss. And so I actually asked him to weigh in that evening, and he had lost over the course of about a four week period he had lost about 30 pounds. And as 150 pound kid at the time, you know, losing 20% of your body masses is a lot. The next morning, he got up and he just he looked like a ghost you know, fail thin. And   Stacey Simms  7:53 Alex, do you remember how you felt?   Alex Lahners  7:56 I vividly remember all of this. I remember when it first started happening like that said I was drinking a ton of water. And it really just felt like my tongue was constantly sandpaper. And I would pour like, I pour water into my mouth and it would just wouldn't go away. And I was just drinking so much water. I think my water intake like quadrupled, or more. And it was really odd. I've never loved drinking water. But I think that was the first time I was like, Oh my gosh, give me all the water I can have.   Stacey Simms  8:29 What did you think when you got on the scale? I mean, 30 pounds is extreme. I   Alex Lahners  8:34 knew that I was losing weight. I knew that I'd lost weight and you know, every sickness you sometimes you just lose weight. But when I got on the scale, and I think I said I was at 134. And I had previously weighed in like 160 something. Yeah, I was that's not right. I remember weighing myself a second time, just to make sure. And it came up with the same number. And I was like, it's I went downstairs I told my dad I was like it says I'm 134. And we couldn't believe in I remember everyone like my mom, my dad and maybe someone else who was there. We were all just like really shocked at how much weight I had lost.   Jeremy Lahners  9:11 Like I said, the next morning he woke up and just look real thin. And so we took him to the ER, we kind of had decided that was that was the line where it just something was clearly off. We didn't know what it was. They ran all of their tests, and probably within 20 minutes or so they came back and said, we're not sure exactly what's going on. But by the way, your son is a diabetic that could Yeah, I mean it was it was very kind of in passing a little bit. And I remember, you know, this was all during COVID. So only one parent could be with him at the time. So I'm texting my wife, and I'm texting her I said they're saying that Alex has diabetes, and she says there's zero chance of that. Tell them to rerun tests because they have no idea Do what they're talking about. They came back in and said, Yeah, his blood sugar is at 588. And that's tremendously high. He's clearly diabetic, we think you should probably take care of this problem. They put us on an ambulance and drove us down to the pediatric hospital in Charlotte. And we spent three days in the ICU, and they were able to get his blood sugar recovered, of course. And it was just a massive, massive crash course in all things type 1 diabetes. At that point,   Stacey Simms  10:31 I didn't really have the opportunity often Alex to talk to you know, a newer diagnosed teenager who actually wants to talk about this stuff. I have to ask you, how difficult was it? I assume in the hospital, they made you do your own shots? And had you figure everything out? You know, what was that like? So give yourself the first injection.   Alex Lahners  10:48 Honestly, when you first get diagnosed, or at least when I got first diagnosed, I got really lucky because I have some people around me who I had known previously, who were type one diabetic, I got extremely lucky with having resources to reach out to and people to talk to, I have always released previously to diabetes, I had always hated needles, shots, I hated everything. But obviously, getting diagnosed with diabetes, you kind of have to learn to get over it. I just kind of put it in my arm. And I was like, this is going to be a new reality for me, and I just accepted it. And I never I don't think I remember feeling any sort of way with how the injection felt or how it made me feel. I think it was just kind of like a, this is how it's gonna be.   Stacey Simms  11:30 So you leave the hospital, you go back to trying to figure out how to do life now with diabetes. But your experience took a turn in that you pretty quickly got involved in a pretty cool clinical trial. Jeremy, how did you find out about the protect study?   Jeremy Lahners  11:46 Well, we sort of jumped headfirst into things, the nurses at the hospital were outstanding and, and gave us all the wonderful material on on jdrf, I reached out to our local jdrf contact to submit Alex's paperwork and material and whatnot. And, of course, that put us on the mailing list of the various jdrf webinars and things that are going on and we follow it on Facebook, join the Charlotte type 1 diabetes parents group, all those types of things, we sort of dove headfirst into all of those resources. Within maybe a week or so I happened to see a webinar about that was upcoming about this protect study. And we thought, well, we should we should at least listen in we we weren't really convinced that it was a great idea at the time. But we figured we're in this now we need to at least listen to what's happening in the space a little bit and try to participate. You know, it was hard enough, sort of coming to grips with all the things coming at us. But we really did want to try to educate ourselves on on the various medical things that were going on. So that was what led us up to listening to the the details of the protect study.   Stacey Simms  13:04 So what was involved? Tell me, you know, we haven't been involved in a clinical trial, much to my son's regret. He's always pushing me to get him in and we just haven't been successful. After all these years, I keep trying. So can you share with us a little bit of the process? Because it's not a local study?   Right back to Jeremy, but first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dario health. And one of the things that makes diabetes management difficult for us that is very annoying to me and to Benny. It isn't actually the big picture stuff. It's all the little tasks adding up. Are you sick of running at a strips, do you need some direction or encouragement going forward with your diabetes management, with visibility into your trends help you on your wellness journey? The Dario diabetes success plan offers all of that and more. No more waiting in line at the pharmacy. No more searching online for answers. No more wondering about how you're doing with your blood sugar levels, find out more go to my daario.com forward slash diabetes dash connections. Now back to Jeremy as he starts to take us into their study experience. I had asked him about whether there was a local site it wasn't a local study.   Jeremy Lahners  14:20 It's not it is a nationwide study. However, the nearest facilities to us were far from local. I think our nearest facility is technically Atlanta. But we had the opportunity during the the webinar they were interviewing Dr. Haller out of the University of Florida. And he was describing this protect study on to plumas AB and we thought it was a good study for Alex the sort of entry criteria for the study. They were accepting children kids under 17 years if I if I remember correctly, who either Were pre diagnosis or had been diagnosed within the last 45 days. So that immediately qualified us, I reached out during the webinar using chat tools inside the zoom to say, My son was just diagnosed, we'd like to learn more. And Dr. Haller reached out to us via email. The next day, we had a zoom call with just him a day or two later. And he talked to us in a lot more detail about how the study goes and and provided some options for us. So that was all the sort of pre work if you will, from there, we did take a day or two and, and we sat down as a family and talked about whether it, it made sense for Alex to participate. Both my wife and I had participated in some medical research studies. When we were in college, there was a paid program at our college, that you could take participation in some of those programs. So we had a background in it. And I think we were both pretty encouraging of Alex to participate in in the study. But, you know, Alex was 15, at the time, and we felt he was old enough and mature enough that he should really make the decision. And so we didn't leave it up to him, maybe with some heavy encouragement. But nonetheless, it was his call at the end of the day. And we would have supported that   Stacey Simms  16:27 Alex had to make the decision. What were you thinking?   Alex Lahners  16:29 So the decision was really, honestly hard for me at the time, I was still trying to get over like, just recently being diagnosed and trying to get everything under control, just to understand what was happening to my body. Ultimately, it boiled down to not only had mom and dad done, I guess, trial before they've done studies before, but I don't think anyone who has type 1 diabetes would tell you, oh, yeah, you should go out and get type 1 diabetes. It just it sucks. It's, it really is not fun. I thought if I would have had someone else 50 years ago, been able to prevent or tell me that I was going to get diabetes and have a drug to prevent the onset of diabetes, I would have taken it in a heartbeat, I would have done whatever it was. And I know that I don't want future people getting diabetes, and anyone I knew to get diabetes. So I ultimately it was like, I'm not just gonna do this for myself. I want to do this for other people who are future in the future going to be diagnosed or are going to be diagnosed later. I guess.   Stacey Simms  17:36 That's really a wonderful sentiment. I mean, Jeremy, I don't need to tell you this. Alex, you're, you know, you're so well spoken and really mature about all of this. So thank you very much for for sharing that. We can be goofy later, I'm sure. So Jeremy, you fill out the forms or do whatever you need to do what happened in this trial. This is not a survey, this is a go to Florida, go to the hospital, get a treatment, what happens?   Jeremy Lahners  17:59 We went down to Florida a couple days early so that Alex could get a COVID test. I think he was the first person in our family to get one of the touch your brain nose swabs. He really enjoyed that, I'm sure. And then we started the study. The study was sorry, the the first part of the infusion was 12 straight days of infusion. Generally, it was anywhere from three to four hours per day. We typically did that first thing in the morning. And thankfully, number one, Alex was at a school so it didn't interrupt school. Number two, my job is flexible enough that I was able to fulfill my work duties in the afternoons and evenings. So it really all worked out for us very much a perfect storm of good, if you will. But for 12 days straight we did the study, the infusion, and that first 12 days was probably the roughest simply because going in you don't know. It's a blind study. So you don't know if you're getting the drug or not. You could be getting the placebo. So there's a lot of trepidation and a lot of do I really want to go through all of this pain multiple times through if all I'm getting is the placebo? We really had a lot of conversation about, you know, what's this going to look like in six months or a year? That was ultimately the study we did, because of the nature of this drug. It is an immunosuppressive. So we did have to quarantine especially again, given it was the COVID times we really had the quarantine. We spent a lot of time in the hotel room just hanging out and like he does Alex slept a lot. That was the two weeks that we spend down there.   Stacey Simms  19:49 Oh, it's was it painful at all? I mean, is it just a blessing? Just I mean, is it just an IV and the pain is just sometimes when you get an IV put in that hurts, or is there more to it   Alex Lahners  19:59 honestly It's really just the IV, they do a great job of like, counting you down, like, they'll be like, Alright, we're gonna put dive in, you know, take a breath 123, and then they'll put it in, I have never had problems with it hurting too much. I still like clench my fist and my jaw when they put it in, because you know, I don't like needles, but it only lasts for maybe 10 seconds at the most. And it is really fast. And once it's in, everything else is super easy. They tape it to your arm, so it doesn't move, and there's no chance of it being pulled out. And they're just super careful when either the placebo or the supplements AB is injected into you. It just felt like there was cold, I would say water running through my body, and you get this salty taste in your mouth. But besides that, that's all I can notice.   Stacey Simms  20:52 Well, and I know. And Alex, as you mentioned, they they're very careful. They're very good. And Jeremy, when you and I spoke previously, you really said that this was a top notch staff, let me just give you a moment to give them the kudos that you had already mentioned to me off air.   Jeremy Lahners  21:06 Sure. I can't go into the details of how good a crew they really are. As much as I love our primary endocrinologist, she does a wonderful job with us here in Charlotte, having the opportunity to spend 12 straight days with an active scientist of the study of diabetes, good or bad than sort of being locked in a room with us for a period of time while they administered the drug to Alex, it really gave us an opportunity as a newly diagnosed type one family to ask a lot of questions for, like I said, 12 days straight. We had access to Dr. Haller, and the other doctors plus all of their nurses and assistants, some of whom also have type 1 diabetes. And we were just able to ask all of the questions that are just reeling around in our heads. And all of them had been through different experiences, or had treated patients with different experiences. And they were just able to answer so so many questions, so many of the fears that we had as parents and I think fears on Alex's behalf as being a newly diagnosed patient were so easily allayed as a result of just being able to spend so much quality time with such good individuals.   Stacey Simms  22:33 What happened after this, you you came home? I mean, I feel like I know the ending to the story. And you're spoiling a little bit in my introduction in that it doesn't seem like you've got the placebo, it seems like things are working out, let's just say very differently for Alex than for a typical teenager, in the first year of his diabetes. Is that safe to say   Jeremy Lahners  22:53 it is? And admittedly we don't know for sure. One of the disadvantages of participating in the study when we did was there's still that honeymoon period that many kids go through and and so a lot of what we experienced very early on was still questioning, are we just seeing the effects of honeymoon? Or are we seeing the effects of this study drug because his his insulin requirements have been very, very low. That really just continued, we would go back to Florida every four to six weeks, and do blood draws and just a quick one day blood draw to test absorption. So no more drug was ever injected. In fact, his next injection is coming up in about six weeks. But again, he just he seemed to stay in what we thought as new parents to be the the honeymoon period. And even today, nearly a year later, that's still where we're at, we're still kind of in this wonderful period where his insulin requirements are insanely low. From what I've heard from other parents.   Stacey Simms  24:02 Let's talk about that. Give me an example.   Alex Lahners  24:05 I currently have heard from my primary endocrinologist that a kid my size and just my age would probably take around 60 to 80 units a day, somewhere around there. I think I am currently sitting at total daily usage of like 6.4 units a day. So that's, you know, a 10th   Stacey Simms  24:28 I don't want to get too personal. But would you mind giving us approximate weight and height? I mean, you're 16 years?   Alex Lahners  24:35 Absolutely. I'm 16 I'm probably around 178 pounds right now and I'm about 510. So generally speaking, I should be taking substantial more amounts of insulin than I am not tiny, though. He's got a small kid.   Stacey Simms  24:52 I'm not even sure what to ask Jeremy and Alex because you without knowing the typical experience. It's I'm not quite sure we know What to ask you in terms I keep, I put it this way. And I'm stuttering around because I can't ask you what's the difference? Because you? Yeah, you don't know. I mean, my son is 16. He's 215 and almost six feet tall, which is great for wrestlers. We know everything about your bodies. We know how big you are, we know tall you are, when you weigh on a daily basis, but you know, and he probably uses definitely 80 units of insulin a day. I mean, it's, it's just remarkable. So how do you treat it? Do you I know you were an insulin pump? Can you use it? I mean,   Alex Lahners  25:30 oh, I do use my insulin pump. But the good thing about my insulin pump is and especially just the T slim in general, is it's all programmable. And you can set it up by yourself. So I have to set my insulin crazy low. And I have to make these crazy schedules. Because when I first got diagnosed, I think I was on a one to five, ratio of units to carbs. And then I hit my honeymoon phase. And my endo backed it off to one to 15. And I was like, Oh, yeah, this is awesome. And I remember I went out and ate like a fast food burger. And I took like, obviously, like a third of the insulin that I've normally taken, I was like, This is great. And then as time progressed, it just kept needing to be moved back, because I would take too much insulin, and I would get low. And I was constantly fighting lows. And I still have that problem today. So there was a time where I was at a one to 100 carb ratio. And I am currently at a one to add carb ratio. And I have to space out when my pump gives me insulin, because if it gives me insulin, like a correction dose throughout the entire day, the amount of insulin that I need to correct is so low that my pump won't let me put it in. So I have to default to the smallest amount which is like point 100 units of insulin in order to correction me down to where I need to be. That's your that's your basal rate. That's my basal. Yeah, so   Jeremy Lahners  27:00 his basal is point one units. And I think right now you're on every other hour. Yeah, every other hour. So   Stacey Simms  27:07 every other hours zero. So you go like a point one and then a 0.0. Yeah, that's amazing. I don't want to get too far ahead of everything here. And Alex, I hope this continues for you, you know, indefinitely. But Jeremy, what is the goal of this study to see kind of how long they can extend this honeymoon or keep these insulin uses low? Or, you know, what is the hope of they expressed it to you? Or do you kind of just take it, you know, month by month,   Jeremy Lahners  27:34 what they described to us very early on was that some of their participants, were seeing this honeymoon period effectively extend for two to three, sometimes even up to four years. That was really kind of the goal. When we started, as we look at where Alex was in his sort of mature ation process. We sort of thought, you know, if Alex could get through high school, and maybe well into college, still on the honeymoon period, that would be a wonderful experience for him, he'd still have the opportunity to do all of the sort of traditional things that you think of without necessarily significantly having to worry about his diagnosis. That was our mentality going in. I've heard suggestions that possibly there's maybe kind of a continuing dose that you can get over the course of, you know, follow on years. But that wasn't part of the study or anything that we did,   Stacey Simms  28:32 they are still looking for about 40 people for this study. This is for new onset, folks with type one. What would you say if somebody's listening, they found the podcast pretty quickly. And they're debating, is this something that you all would do again, because you said it. I mean, there's like I said, it's not as easy as you stay home and take a pill this may involve travel is definitely involves two weeks time and a lot of pokes.   Jeremy Lahners  28:57 Yeah, I mean, looking back, if given the opportunity, again, I would, we would jump on it in a heartbeat. I would say anybody who has the opportunity, and the ability to take the time to do this study, not just the drug itself, but again, the time with the doctors, the combination of those two things is nearly invaluable. So to me that there's no way that that I would turn down that experience again, even if Alex would have gotten the placebo. I mean, ultimately, even if he would have gotten the placebo, he was still gonna end up in the same condition just sooner. So at the very least the time that we got to spend with the doctors has paid for itself trillions of times over. I guess maybe the other thing that's that's worth noting is these are paid studies. So Alex got a little bit of money to spend on his car and turning 16 he he got a little bit of money to spend towards that mostly on gas. So there is some monetary value to it. As well, that's that's worth mentioning. But that wasn't our purpose by any means. It was really the drug and the opportunity to spend time with the doctors would be my two key selling points.   Stacey Simms  30:12 You don't have to go on the record with this question. But can I ask you how much it paid?   Jeremy Lahners  30:17 It paid? I believe it was right in the neighborhood of $75 per day of visit.   Stacey Simms  30:25 I mean, it wasn't $5,000 No, no, I want to be clear when people are you know, we're thinking about it. I wish Yeah. No doubt. It's a lot of gas.   Jeremy Lahners  30:34 They'll spend it. But But yes, no, it's not quite that much. But, I mean, hey, you know, absolutely, yeah. So we go back the end of July. And that will be our next two week visit. We've had a couple of visits since then, about every six weeks or so. We take a one day trip to Florida, just to do checkups. But otherwise, this will be the next big one. And then I think from there, if I remember correctly, I think our next visit is six months afterwards.   Stacey Simms  31:09 All right, Alex, I have two non study related questions for you. Absolutely. How do you keep your gear on when you wrestled? What do you do with your diabetes   Alex Lahners  31:18 stuff? Obviously, that was a really big thing. When I first got diagnosed and learning that you're going to have all this stuff stuck to the side of you, it was like, people are going to grab that when I wrestle. And especially at a high school level, at a varsity level, there is no holding back. If you have a knee brace or anything, people are just going to attack that. That's what I've learned throughout the 12 or 13 years that I've been wrestling, I just was like really worried at the start. But I learned that if I was able to at least keep it close, and you know, tight enough in and you know, obviously you wrestled well, and got off the mat sooner than you wouldn't have any problems. The way that I wrestle with my stuff is I have my Dexcom that's always on and never take that off for any reason. Never even take the transmitter out unless I'm changing the transmitter or changing my sight. For my T slim though, I just disconnected it and I'd put a stop in, I learned that the adhesive is just as good as the Dexcom adhesive. And if I kept it more on my torso every once in a while I'd put it on my legs. But if I kept it more on my torso, because the singlets are just so tight, it just kind of glues everything to you. And I never really had a problem, I think the biggest part was locations as to where you would want to put your stuff. Obviously, if I put it on like the back of my arm, that's a more high risk area, because that's a very frequent place for people to grab while you're wrestling. So I would put it on the upper part of my thigh, kind of closer to my groin or upper groin, and I would just put it in there. And that's where I would leave it. When I put my singlet on, obviously, I'd pull it up. But a big problem for me was writing like the singlet would write up my leg and I didn't want it to pull off. So sometimes I would just pull my singlet just barely above or right on the infusion site so that I could just keep it there. And if it did pull up, it wouldn't pull my site off.   Stacey Simms  33:20 Do you use anything to wrap it but or anything or everything just kind of sticks, okay, because of your locations. Generally,   Alex Lahners  33:26 I only use like over patches, I use like two Dexcom ones. And I think we had some like aftermarket ones, whenever the Dexcom ones would run out, unless it was like on my arm or something of the sorts, I wouldn't wrap it. But if it was on my arm, or I just didn't have any other choice, and it was in a very vulnerable area where I felt like it was about to come off. I would always wrap it with just some like simple athletic gauze. And then I put some athletic tape around it. And that always seemed to hold it. I also have a little like sleeve that I use for swimming and I guess for sometimes athletics, and I just would slip that on over it. It was like a dry fit sleeve. And that worked perfectly to   Jeremy Lahners  34:08 we did wrap your leg the first couple of times, but really, we found it wasn't necessary. So we sort of stopped doing that by the end of the season.   Stacey Simms  34:17 My second question for you was telling me about the socks.   Alex Lahners  34:21 So with Dr. Haller, I learned that we have a very similar passion for extremely crazy socks, because I wrestle I love wearing weird socks because there's only two things that there's three things that you can really change to differentiate yourself from the rest of everyone. It's your singlet, your shoes and your socks. When you're wrestling on a team or just for your school. There's set singlets so the main biggest thing, you can't get to change, you don't get to change it all right. And for shoes, there are some flashy shoes but really sometimes they get extremely expensive if you're going to customize them there. Similar to basketball shoes, so I decided the cheaper option, and the only one that I really had left was socks. So I started a while ago, just getting tons of weird socks and funny socks. I have, you know, pizza socks. Right now I'm wearing these weird math socks that say five out of four people are bad at math. Stuff of the sorts, I walked into the study for this two week study. And on the first day, I met with Dr. Haller, and he noticed my socks, I don't remember what socks I was wearing. Exactly. But he also showed me that he was wearing some like, funny diabetes socks. And from then on, we've just had this competition to outdo each other, even when he's not in the room physically. Like with me, like if there's a different endocrinologist in that day, he will send them pictures of his socks in order to show me to try and one up me, but I like to think that I'm ahead. And if he's listening, I want him to know I will be winning the SOC battle.   Stacey Simms  36:01 Before he let you go. Jeremy, you have said and I forgot to ask you have said that. While he uses so little insulin you do? I guess. I don't know. I don't know if I'm struggling because I was gonna say this is a downside, I guess it is, you guys have still struggled with low blood sugars Is that something that you are still dealing with?   Jeremy Lahners  36:20 It is the struggle that we run into right now is again, because his settings are so low, right now, it's very easy for him to go low. We don't struggle with highs too much at all. And even when he does go a little bit high, he comes back down very quickly. But seemingly every day, I would say almost every day. He has a slight low episode. And and even overnight, you know, we'll we'll have to wake him up sometimes and say, Hey, buddy, you're, you're low, you know, eat some sugar. And he'll groan at us and tell us that we're wrong. But nonetheless, that is probably the one downside that we have seen. And And listen, we'll take that downside all day long. But that has been probably the one downside that we've struggled with a bit.   Stacey Simms  37:09 Alex and Jeremy, thank you so much for joining me, it's great to talk to you it was really interesting was really fun. And, you know, thanks for spending so much time with me and my listeners. Thank you, Stacey, this has been great. And I really should say thank you as well for doing the study. These studies are so important. And Alex, as you said earlier in the interview, people who take the time to do this aren't necessarily helping themselves, but they are helping the people yet to come. So I would be remiss if I wasn't thanking you and thanking your family for taking the time and the effort in going through all of this. So I think I speak for all of my listeners when I say thank you so much for taking part in this study. It's our pleasure.   You're listening to Diabetes Connections with Stacey Simms. Much More information at Diabetes connections.com or in the show notes wherever you are listening. And they are still looking for kids for this study. So I will link up more information. If you know someone who has just been diagnosed if somebody is maybe going through trial net or the jdrf testing for you know a sibling or another family member has type one, and they want to find out if they haven't, this is the kind of thing where they have to get in so early, it's really hard to find people. So they are still recruiting. It was amazing to talk to this family and find out what their experience was like because boy, 16 years old, and using that little insulin really just makes you sit up a little bit straighter. I mean, that would make a very big difference. Gosh, all right, much more to come. And again, you can always go to the website or show notes to find the links, find the transcription and share this with a friends because you never know who might know somebody who could be in the trial coming up. We've got Tell me something good. But first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dexcom. And I get a lot of questions about Dexcom coverage for people on Medicare. And why not it's not as though you stopped needing a CGM, the minute you turn 65 The good news is that the Dexcom g six continuous glucose monitoring system is covered for Medicare patients who meet the coverage criteria. If you have either type one or type two diabetes and intensively managed insulin, you may be covered. To find out more about what that means that if you qualify check out dexcom.com backslash g six dash Medicare. I will link that up with this episode. You don't have to write it down. You're going to want to talk to your doctor and you may even be able to get your Dexcom supplies at the pharmacy saving time and money learn more again it's dexcom.com backslash g six dash Medicare.   In Tell me something good this week is scrolling through Facebook as one does and a bunch of graduation pictures caught my eye now this time of year of course there's so many beautiful prom and graduation pictures and I'm so happy for all the kids and you know as my kids have And older we've grown up with so many people who are now sharing their beautiful graduations and prom pictures. But I had to stop because Lorraine Sisto posted pictures of Caleb. Now, those of you who had kids diagnosed around the same time as I did or earlier, or kids were diagnosed like 2006 2007. During the heyday of blogging, it really just started. There weren't that many, but it was growing. And man in the next couple of years, there were hundreds of diabetes blogs that so many of us met each other. And now of course, there's 1000s of Instagram accounts and social media stuff, and it's changed and it's still great to connect. But there are some moms and I think you know, who you are, that I connected with in the community and we may have never met I never met Lorraine in person. And as the kids have gotten older, we have kind of communicated to online a lot less. But I have basically watched these kids grow up and Caleb her son was diagnosed just one month after Benny. Benny was diagnosed in December of 2006. Caleb was diagnosed I think he said, He's obviously a year or two older since he just graduated high school, but he was diagnosed in January of 2007. So we have been in this together for a long time. And I have watched her post these pictures of this fantastic kid and sharing so much information. And so I will link up her blog she hasn't written in a while. But if you have a small child, and you want to see a real go getter of a kid who met Nick Jonas, they just did so many wonderful things. And she shared a lot of great information over the years that's still really relevant. But I'm talking too much because the reason I wanted to share all this is because it Caleb's graduation picture, he graduated as the valedictorian of his class, holy cow. He's going to school for engineering, he is strongly considering biomedical to research type one, I mean, just fantastic. So congratulations, Caleb, congratulations, Lorraine and to your whole family. He's got a brother and a sister and she shared about them as well. I think it's really important to include the siblings too, but so many fabulous graduation stories this year. And if you've ever read this is Caleb or you want to look back on what blogging was all about back in the heyday of diabetes blogging, I will link that up as well. If you have a Tell me something good story, feel free to reach out I might stumble upon on on Facebook again. But you can always find me Stacy at Diabetes connections.com or reach out and our Facebook group Diabetes Connections, the group. Before I let you go, a couple of quick notes on the next couple of weeks are gonna be really interesting on the show, late June, early July, I have some late breaking types of interviews. So stay tuned on social, I'm gonna be posting and Diabetes Connections, the group on Facebook, with the behind the scenes stuff, I don't believe there's gonna be any scheduled disruptions. But you never know. So stay tuned on that some of the stuff is embargoed. I can't talk about it. It's technology news, as you can imagine, and I just want to get it to you as quickly as possible. podcasting is tough that way. It's not exactly an immediate medium, you know, like radio, but I do my best. So I'll keep you posted on that. I will be friends for life. That is July 7 through the 10th. And I'm always excited to go and this year more than ever, just because this is the first for me diabetes conference that I'm going to be going to in person since COVID. I cannot wait and I'm doing a new presentation called reframe your diabetes parenting brain. I will be sharing more about that in the weeks to come. But basically, I do this online anyway, do this in my local group too. When somebody posts mom fail and talks about what they did and how they messed up their kids diabetes, I try to reframe it and show them how they really did a good thing. I mean, he wrote a whole book about it, so why not? And then, as I'm taping this episode, we are getting Benny ready for his trip to Israel. I have talked about this on and off for the last year on this show. Many of you know how nervous I am about this. As you listen as this episode goes live, he has gone he is away he has started his trip. And I don't know that I'm going to get too much sleep. Because while he goes away to camp every summer for a month, and while he's with fabulous people that I trust, he's not with us and He is very far away. So I'm probably not going to speak about it or post about it very much because many of you know me, I'm very superstitious, but I cannot wait till after when he is home and after I hug him. I will see if he wants to talk about how it went diabetes wise and hopefully we can report back. Oh my goodness, I'm you guys know, I'm just I'm so nervous. I'm so excited for him. But this is really hard for me. All right. Thank you, as always to my editor, John Bukenas from audio editing solutions. Thank you so much for listening. We've got Diabetes Connections in the news every Wednesday 430 live on Facebook and then here on the podcast on Fridays. So hopefully I'll see you back here for that until then be kind to yourself.   Benny  44:52 Diabetes Connections is a production of Stacey Simms Media. All rights reserved. All wrongs avenged

Congratulations to the LinkedIn Ads Show contest winners! It's fortunate that this week's episode is all about creating the perfect ad, when we also get to reveal the 3 winning ads in our performance contest! We had so many incredible submissions, showing us examples on how to be rockstar marketers on LinkedIn.  Here were the winners (in no particular order because they're all rockstars) along with their high-performing ads and landing pages: Winner #1: Highest CTR and Lowest CPC Zoltan Kozma from CBRE Hungary CTR: 5.60% & CPC: €0.14 Why so Amazing? LinkedIn's average Click Through Rate for Sponsored Content is ~.4% and Cost Per Click is in the $8-12 range. That's why getting a CTR that was 14 times higher than average is excellent. With a CTR that is 14X the average, paying by CPM, Zoltan found himself paying a tiny fraction of what competitors would be paying. It's targeted to an audience who had already been really responsive on a past campaign, so he knew he was setting the company up for success. It's an organic company Page post that he boosted, so it had good social proof from the start, which helps. It also leads to an article on Forbes Hungary, which helps increase trust. Not only did he find that the article was getting tons of cheap traffic, but he also noticed ~35 new followers from the effort over a short period of time.  Well done Zoltan!   Winner #2: Highest Landing Page Conversion Rate Alex Panchuk from Reply.io Conversion Rate: 62.14% Why so Amazing? We call any offer on LinkedIn that gets over a 15% conversion rate a "Rockstar Offer." Alex ran this video creative(traditionally harder to get good performance from) to a cold audience, with an external landing page (think of how much higher the conversion rate would have been if it were a Lead Gen Form Ad), and on top of that, they required a Business Email, and it still got a 62% conversion rate! It pushed 65 unique downloads, plus a couple of view-through conversions for good measure. Obviously the high conversion rate has so much to do with the offer and the landing page, so check that out here: https://reply.io/cold-email-handbook/ Nice Work Alex!   WINNER #3: HIGHEST CONVERSION RATE Eric Southwell from SupremeOpti Conversion Rate: 65.40%   Why so Amazing? We would have guessed that the highest-converting winner would be through a LinkedIn Lead Gen Form ad (On average, they convert 10-50% better than landing pages) but this blew us away. This is a 65% conversion rate, on an ad and offer that has been running for 7 MONTHS now to a cold audience! Most ads on LinkedIn wear out their audience after ~1 month, but this ad/offer is like a fine wine and performance has actually continued to improve over time. UNHEARD OF! On top of the leads it generated, it also drove 9 CONVERSIONS, which is likely from viral signups that wouldn't have been served the Lead Gen Form. Eric, you slayed it!   Honorable Mention: Highest Conversion Rate Lindsay Beaulieu from Worcester Polytechnic Institute Conversion Rate 325%! When we saw Lindsay's submissions, we had to take a double-take. It's ultra-rare (I dare say, impossible) to get a conversion rate over 100%. When we looked into it, we found it was a Text Ad, and the vast majority of the conversions were view-through conversions. Ok, so you might say "LinkedIn wasn't responsible for those conversions since they were view-through," but this is a testament to me that Lindsay's team is targeting the right audience across multiple channels. The huge amount of view-through conversions on Text Ads (which show a ton of impressions) is proof that her other channels are targeting excellently and we see those reflected in LinkedIn's metrics. Thanks for teaching us Lindsay!   Show Resources Here were the resources we covered in the episode: DRIVE Sales: The 5 Secrets to Increase Your Sales by 400% by Woody Woodward   LinkedIn Learning course about LinkedIn Ads by AJ Wilcox: LinkedIn Advertising Course Contact us at Podcast@B2Linked.com with ideas for what you'd like AJ to cover. Show Transcript: We've created the formula for the perfect LinkedIn Ad. And of course, we're going to share it with you because we're not the type to hold back. This is the LinkedIn Ads Show. Welcome to the LinkedIn Ads Show. Here's your host, AJ Wilcox. Hey there LinkedIn Ads fanatics. So writing ads is an incredibly involved task, it doesn't seem overly difficult because you have some characters that you have to stay within. And then you kind of get to write or put whatever you want. But then, of course, you have to keep in mind who your audience is. And then what's interesting to them. And of course, you have to communicate what you have to offer them. But without asking too much, so they get overwhelmed, and you have to stay within the character limits. That's a lot to keep balanced. So today, I'm going to walk you through our ad creation process, and let you in on a little bit of the B2Linked secret sauce for how we create high performing ads. First of all, I'm sure many of you notice that this is our first episode in a couple months. And thank you to so many of you who emailed and messaged asking if I'm doing okay. That means a ton to me. So what originally happened is around the holiday of Thanksgiving here in the US, I ended up getting knee surgery. Right near the beginning of COVID, I ended up having a lot of knee pain after some hiking. And I love hiking, I do a lot of it. But that pain didn't go away for a long time. So I finally went to go see a doctor. We did everything we could and eventually we decided it had to be surgery. Without getting too graphic here. My meniscus, which is like the padding in between my knees, what takes all the impact as I'm running downhill, it was torn into places, my cartilage was messed up and needed to be kind of burred down. And my knee cap was too far over to one side, so they released it so it would go more in track. I expected this to be something very simple and I would be just back at work the next day. But boy, it it really sidelined me. For like a week I was on medication and laying down in bed just trying to get work done. So podcast had to go on hold. Plus, around that time we had the holidays, which present their own little bits of complication, as we have family all around and you know, four kids and all that. Plus, I worked on two giant audits for Fortune 500 companies. And as a company, we just moved into bigger offices, we just hired six new people, and now we're training them. And then something I think you might find really exciting. I'm in the process of working with LinkedIn Learning to update our LinkedIn Learning course that I talked about every episode. So with all of that going on, basically this is the first episode in a little while. Where we left off, there was a contest running for a LinkedIn Ads performance contest. And I'm so excited to announce the winners and tell you what they did that was so amazing, and how you can replicate it to get better performance for your own ads. I wanted to give a quick shout out to any of you who are listening from the Instazone site. We were recently featured on there so thanks so much for those of you who are joining us potentially for the first time here. So getting here into the contest, thank you to everyone who submitted. There were so many entries. We had some amazing entries and it took a lot of work by me and my team, but we did go through and select three winners. For those of you who aren't up to speed, in November, I announced a LinkedIn Ads performance contest. And I promised that the prize would be awesome and super unique, but I couldn't share with you what it was. Well, the time has come, I finally get to share with you what the prize is. Because LinkedIn doesn't have hourly reporting, we know that there are certain times of the day where performance is going to be better than others, but we can't prove it because there's no hourly reporting. Well, what we've figured out is we can go into an account, and we can have our team go in and take all of the performance every hour, and then just subtract it from the total. So we're getting only the performance during that hour. This is of course a lot of work. But we've put together a really cool dashboard, where you can look at it in your own time zone, you can see what times of day, and which days of the week perform better than others. So for you three winners, congratulations! You're about to get something that we've been really excited about internally. And it will give you insights like what time of day your audience wakes up, and when they go to lunch, and all of that good stuff. Okay, so how we selected the winners. It was a contest to see who could show us what gets the best click through rates, the lowest costs per click, and then the highest conversion rates, which of course leads to the lowest cost per conversion. We selected the winners by analyzing all of the top submissions, and then we reached out and actually verified, we got account access, we verified that all the metrics were what they looked like. We took into account the competitiveness of the geographies that were targeted, and the strategy being used. And then more than anything, I wanted to just highlight these amazing marketers and what they're doing so that you can learn from them and improve your own strategies. So without further ado, here are the three winners in no particular order. We have Alex Panchuk from Reply.io, who he happens to live in the Ukraine and I lived in the Ukraine for a couple years. So it's very near and dear to my heart, Alex, congratulations. Then we have Zoltan Kozma, from CBRE Hungary in Hungary. And then finally, we have Eric Southwell is the Chief Marketing Officer of Supreme Optimization and he's a total globetrotter. I love following everything he's doing. And I do have one honorable mention, I couldn't make this a fourth winner, but Lindsay Beaulieu, who's the Digital Marketing Specialist at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Massachusetts. She did something amazing that I think is really good for us to hear about. So we'll highlight a little bit of her strategy here, as well, all four of you, thank you for being loyal listeners. Thank you for just being rockstars and showing the rest of us marketers how to do what we do better. Alex PanchukSo starting with Alex Panchuk from Reply.io. His entry had a conversion rate of 62.14%, which is amazing. Candidly, the highest conversion rates that we've ever seen have been 59%. So he absolutely blew even my records away, which I'm ecstatic about. And of course, you'll be able to go down into the show notes and take a look at the ads themselves, like a screenshot, you can see the landing pages that were really high converting where applicable. So go and check these out and learn from them. Some things that Alex did really well, as well as some of the things that made this truly impressive. First, he required business emails, and we know that when you make it a little bit more difficult for people, then we see conversion rates come down. So this is an amazing conversion rate of 62%, when they're still requiring business email. Plus, there was an additional question in there. And this was right when square video on LinkedIn Ads came out and so very few did it. And I think that helped it stand out quite a bit. So Alex, congratulations, everyone, go check out his ad and his landing page, so you can learn more about it. 7:29 Zoltan Kozma And next, Zoltan Kozma. And I'm so sorry for anyone that I'm butchering your name, he won for having both the highest click through rate and because of that the lowest cost per click is click through rate was 5.6%. And his cost per click came out to 14 cents. What was so amazing about this is that it was created to look native. It goes to an external site and so there's there's nothing gated. This was pure value to create awareness. And it was an interview article. And one that actually started out as an organic post from the company page and then it was boosted once it had 122 likes and some comments. What Zoltan did to get this is he went and found an audience that he'd already targeted earlier who happened to be really responsive. He released this content that was really easy to consume, there wasn't any jargon. And it sure doesn't hurt that the page that it's going to was actually Forbes. And then with click through rates that were so high, you know, over 5%, my recommendation would be to use either auto bidding, or bid CPM really high to make sure you're always showing up in the top position. But this blew me away. It was a manual CPM bid, but it was bidding below the recommendation. Which generally produces pretty poor results, but in this case, it rocked. So in addition to getting really good ad performance, they also got 30 to 40 new followers. So that was a happy byproduct of these ads. It was created in the engagement objective. So I wanted to look in and see okay, you know, which were actual clicks on the article, and then which ones were engaging with the ad like, likes, comments, visiting the company page, following the company page, etc. And 3% click through rate was actual clicking through to the article, so that's amazing. And then the rest were followers and likes and comments, therefore helping it go out viral. Zoltan, nice work. I'm super excited for you. It was really impressive. Even though it was outside the US where it's quite a bit less competitive, this was still amazing, and I had to give it to you. 9:43 Eric Southwell Next is Eric Southwell from Supreme Optimization. Eric's team absolutely destroyed with a 65% conversion rate. So that's even higher than Reply.os', but what's even more impressive to me is that these ads have been running for six plus months, they still have a 65% conversion rate, even after six months of running the same offer. That was totally legit, I loved it. And as I looked over time, cost per lead has actually been going down over time. Now, this was 65% conversion rate on native lead gen forms, which makes sense. I totally thought the conversion rate winners would be using lead gen forms, but what I also liked is that not only did they have leads from the lead gen form, they also had conversions coming through so that was people who weren't even part of the target audience who were seeing the post and going and actually completing the form on the site. It averaged $5.18 cost per click. And they were not bidding the absolute minimum cost per click here. And the vast majority of that traffic, those conversions were coming from the US. Eric, super impressive. Congratulations, got to hand it to you. 10:58 Lindsay Beaulieu And then we had Lindsay Beaulieu, who is our honorable mention. Now, when she submitted, it was an over 100% conversion rate. And so I got really excited, like, what in the world would cause an over 100% conversion rate. When I dug into the account, I saw that it was a text ad. And I know that text ads get shown to a lot of people, a lot of times at high frequency. So immediately, I went to go look at the conversions. And the vast majority of conversions were coming through as view through conversions. And so for purposes of this contest, I wasn't counting view through conversions as being like real conversions here. But I wanted to use this as an example, because all of us could and should be using text ads to just very expensively cover your audience, your ideal target audience. So they're seeing your ads, they're seeing your brand. And then of course, when they're converting on other channels, we can see that yes, LinkedIn is contributing here. So Lindsay, nice work. Thanks so much for sharing such an awesome example with us. 12:04 Reviews HighlightsA quick highlight on reviews that we've gotten on the podcast. Lea Pica shares, "Where deep passion, expertise, and value divinely connect. AJ is one of the digital marketing industry's best love speakers for good reason. His massive knowledge base in a platform that is otherwise to disdain allows him to deliver insane value in a truly actionable way. Don't walk away from getting started with LinkedIn Ads without giving him a good listen." Lea, thank you so much for leaving that you are awesome. For those of you who don't know, Lea Pica is the host of the Present Beyond Measure podcast and she is absolutely amazing. If you want to learn anything about data storytelling, or data visualization, you have to check out what she does, and her show, of course. And then Dan Marzullo, from Marzullo Associates, he shared, "Highly recommended. If you're getting started with LinkedIn Ads, AJ is your guy." Dan, thanks so much. Dan is the founder of Podcast Bloggers, so he knows a thing or two about podcasts. So a huge thanks to you for being a listener of ours. And of course, everyone who's listening, I want to feature you. So definitely, wherever you're able to review, and I totally want to feature you. Okay, with that being said, let's hit it. 13:15 LinkedIn Users Are In a Hurry Some things that you definitely want to keep in mind about writing ad copy, and creating ads on LinkedIn is that in general, LinkedIn users are in a hurry. It means you've got to cut right to the chase, and front load everything with value. When I know that people are in a hurry, and I need to catch their attention in just a split second, I'm probably going to lead the ad was something like, Hey, did you know that x&y, or people like you are losing out. The really attention grabbing statements right at the beginning are the best thing to do. You don't want to lead with our brand name does such and such in the industry, that will just get ignored. Imagery And then of course, you have a visual component to your ads as well. Most of the time, we're using static ads. But of course, you can use video as well. The rules that you want to follow with imagery is realize that LinkedIn, when you look at the whole color palette, when someone's there, they see a lot of blues, grays and whites. And so if you ask a designer, what do you need in order to stand out from blues, grays and whites, they'll point you towards the color wheel, and they'll say, go and find whatever is opposite of blue on that color wheel. And of course, that takes us to orange. So one of the best tips I can give you is use lots of orange, reds, greens in your ads, because that will stand out from the rest of the fluff that's on LinkedIn. I also follow the billboard rule. Those of you who are Facebook, advertisers will probably know the 20% rule that I've heard isn't getting anyone punished anymore. But it used to be that on Facebook, you couldn't show an ad that had more than 20% I have the image as being text, and then for a long while, you could put it in the image, but then it would stunt the performance of your ads. LinkedIn has never had anything like the 20% rule, which is fantastic. We've always been able to put as much text in an image as we want. But we've also found that the more text in an image, the less likely people are to read it. It looks like a giant wall of text to them and so they're disincentivized, from even starting to read. So because of that, we follow the billboard rule. So don't try to sell with copy in your image. That's not the images job, the job of the image is just to be a thumb stopper, it's just to get them to stop scrolling, so that they'll read your ad copy. So the billboard rule for those of you who don't know, is use seven or fewer words, because that's all the time that you're going to get from someone as they pass by your billboard on the freeway is get a good six or seven words in. Video Video is a little bit different. So with video, depending on their connection speed, there's going to be just a split second, or maybe even several seconds while your video is starting to load. And that's really important time because that's time where people are scrolling past, and they may not get a chance to see what it is that you're showing. So with video, I like to make sure that within the first two seconds, there is some kind of action happening. So don't start with a black screen fading to your logo and waste several seconds, you'll lose your entire audience with that, you need to show them something that's exciting, interesting, and worth their time. And then also make sure that you put a thumbnail in there because the thumbnail is what's going to show up in the videos place while it's loading on their screen. So have a really cool visual, something that gets their attention. And then of course, LinkedIn video, it's the same as all the other social video, it's going to play autoplay, but muted. And so you need to make sure that you have subtitles on that video so that 80 plus percent of people who are going to watch it without sound can still get drawn in and follow along. I like to suggest keeping videos really short, like 15 to 25 seconds short. But of course, depending on your video creative, you could probably make a 10 minute long video work really well, just depending on how creative and how attention grabbing it is. 17:20 Alright, here's a quick sponsor break. And then we'll dive into some of the secret sauce, along with our formula on how you create the perfect ad. The LinkedIn Ads Show is proudly brought to you by B2Linked.com, the LinkedIn Ads experts. If the performance of your LinkedIn Ads is important to you B2Linked is the agency you'll want to work with. We've spent over $135 million on LinkedIn Ads, and no one outperforms us on getting you the lowest cost per lead. We're official LinkedIn partners, and you deal only with LinkedIn experts from day one. So fill out the contact form on any page of B2Linked.com. to chat about your campaigns. We'd love to work with you. 18:03 DRIVE All right, let's jump into creating the perfect ad. What we've learned over time is that your motivation to convert or engage is incredibly important. It's one of the most important things there is. And so one of our secret sauces as an agency is writing compelling ad copy. And the reason that we're so good at this is because of the book and teachings by someone by the name of Woody Woodward. And his book is called Drive Sales Secrets. I've put links to the book and links to his website down below in the show notes. But the gist is that the entire population breaks down into five different kinds of motivations. And the first letter actually spells out the word drive. DRIVE. The D stands for director. And this is someone who cares about freedom and creativity. Then the R in DRIVE is a relator. Someone who cares about relationships. The I is for intellectual. This is someone who cares about systems and processes and blueprints. The V stands for validator, this is someone who cares about recognition and appreciation. And then finally, the E is for executive. And this is someone who cares about proof and crushing the competition and winning. So the concept in the way that we use this is that people have a natural inclination towards a certain type of motivation. And there are some professions where people have similar drives tend to aggregate. For instance, the majority of the CEOs of the Fortune 500 are executives. They are win at all costs, crush the competition. Proof is what wins. And then when you look at the accounting industry, the majority of accountants are intellectuals. They love systems processes. That's what convinces them. So if you know what's likely to drive your ideal persona, you can start to write really compelling ad copy that caters to them. I know this is very high level. This is hard to follow on a podcast. But I'll share just a brief example of how I might customize ad copy to each of these drives. 20:09 So if I were writing ads to directors, and let's say we're trying to sell some kind of software, remember that directors are those who are really excited by freedom and creativity, I might say something like, "This will help free up time to give you freedom." With relators, who again, are super interested in their relationships, I might say something like, "It will strengthen your relationship with your CFO to have this software" or to be on top of this processs. With intellectuals, those who are really interested in systems and processes and blueprints. I might say, "This software contains the complete blueprint on how to drive your goals." With validators, those who are really interested in recognition and appreciation and praise, I might say, "This software will make you the hero." And with executives, again, those are those who care about proof and crushing the competition, I might say, "This software will get you out in front of your competition, you'll be on the bleeding edge, check out these ratings and testimonials." In so many of our tests around different drives. What we do is we come up with a hypothesis of which drive or drives are likely found in this target audience and then we run some ad copy tests to see what the lift in click through rate looks like. And that gives us how effective this drive ad copy is. And this has been fantastic for us, so I highly recommend, go get Woody's book, find out what drive you are, and find out what drives you're trying to cater to. 21:39 Anatomy of the Perfect Ad So the next bit of secret sauce here, we have what we call the anatomy of the perfect ad. And we're going to use sponsored content as our example here, because it's the most common ad format. What we have in a sponsored content ad, we have an intro, it's the text that comes above the image or video. Then we have the headline, which is the text that goes below the image or the video. And then of course, we have the image or the video, we'll pretend this is a static image, and that you've already followed my rules from the previous section where the image has seven or fewer words, and relies a lot on the oranges, reds, greens, purples to help it stand out. So then we go to the most important part of this ad, which is the intro. In all of our testing, we have found that changes to the intro sway ad performance the most. More than image changes, more than headline changes. The intro is super valuable. We try to keep this under 135 characters because the shorter the better here. And we like to include two different pieces. The first thing that all of our sponsored content ads contain is why you should pay attention some kind of pain point or benefit. Remember, this is what we're using to get their attention. So if they're scrolling and you say, hey, do you have this pain point, they're likely to read on and say, ooh, does this person have a solution for me. That's going to make up the majority of that 135 characters. And then what comes after is the second piece that's required here is the call to action. So this is where we will include a succinct short call to action that strong. So it might be download our FREE eBook today, or join the webinar to learn how to do this yourself, something like that. So intros, keep them short. The two pieces you want are number one, why you should pay attention and number two, your call to action. Then we get down to the headlines and headlines we found to make the next most biggest difference. So if you're testing things, I would test intro first and then headline second. Try to keep your headline under about 55 characters if you can. And the two pieces that we like to include here are number one, and we do this in square brackets, which many of you may have already seen something like within square brackets. We tell them what to expect what the asset type is. So if I'm doing a webinar in square brackets at the beginning of the headline, I might say free webinar or free guide, something like that. And then the second piece you want to include here is actually the title of the asset. So I'm sure you and your marketing team worked really hard to come up with a great title for this asset. This is where you get to show it off. And as you're writing ad copy, and this applies to every network out there. But remember, you're not writing ad copy for yourself based off of the benefit that it brings you. You're writing to the benefit of someone else. So I keep in mind the acronym WIIFM, I call it everyone's favorite radio station. It stands for what's in it for me. As you're writing ad copy, make sure you are crystal clear about what's in it for the prospect. In order for them to want to see it, click on it, and then convert. All right here come the episode resources, so stick around. 25:08 ResourcesThank you for listening to the LinkedIn Ads Show. Hungry for more? AJ Wilcox, take it away. In the shownotes, you'll see the winners of the contest their ads, their landing pages, where applicable, definitely go and check those out and learn from them. I also have the links to Woody Woodward's book and the drivesalesbook.com website where you can learn more about the drive sales process. And if you're just getting started with LinkedIn Ads, or maybe you have a colleague who is let them know about the course, the LinkedIn Ads course on LinkedIn Learning. The link is right down below. And also, if you watch over the next couple months, you'll see that we're in the middle of updating that so there should be a new version of the course to get excited about so keep an eye on that. If you're not already subscribed, look at your podcast player right now and hit that subscribe button. We'd love to have you listening on future episodes. And please do rate and review the podcast. It really helps other LinkedIn Ads marketers find us and want to listen and share with us. If you have any tips, questions, or anything you'd love to see featured on the show, reach out to us at Podcast@B2Linked.com. And with that being said, we'll see you back here next week, cheering you on in your LinkedIn Ads initiatives.

Skip the Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. Your host is  Kelly Molson, MD of Rubber Cheese.Download our free ebook The Ultimate Guide to Doubling Your Visitor NumbersIf you like what you hear, you can subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and all the usual channels by searching Skip the Queue or visit our website rubbercheese.com/podcastIf you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five star review, it really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned in this episode.Competition ends March 31st 2021. The winner will be contacted via Twitter. Show references:Alex Robertson leads global advocacy for the Scotch whisky portfolio and a team of 60 international and graduate ambassadors.www.linkedin.com/in/alexrrobertsonScotch Watch on YouTubeScotch Watch uncovering whisky one story and one dram at a time.To register for future Scotch Watch live shows,  follow Alex on Instagram at @dramgoodlifewww.chivasbrothers.comwww.chivasgraduates.comNow accepting applications for roles starting in Summer 2021.  Transcription:Kelly Molson: Welcome to Skip the Queue, a podcast for people working in or working with visitor attractions. I'm your host, Kelly Molson. Each episode, I speak with industry experts from the attractions world. In today's episode, I speak with Alex Robertson, Head of Heritage and Education and International Graduate Programme and Archives at Chivas Brothers. Alex leads global advocacy for the Scotch whisky portfolio and a team of 60 international and graduate ambassadors. We discuss the superb program of digital audience engagement that Chivas Brothers developed during lockdown, and how that's gained them a global audience with viewers from over 30 different countries every episode.  If you like what you hear, you can subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, and all the YouTube channels by searching Skip the Queue. Kelly Molson: Alex, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. I'm super excited that you've come on because we actually know each other. But that does not mean that Alex gets away without doing the icebreaker questions. So my first icebreaker question. What is top of your bucket list? Alex Robertson: That's an outstanding question because part of the reason that I took this job is because I had such a passion for travel. And since taking it more than a decade ago, I've visited more than 60 countries around the world. 60 countries. I guess it's something that would really challenge me. I guess it's something that I feel that would conquer a fear. And I have an astonishing fear of heights because as a child I was repeatedly rescued from the school roof, from the local university crossed the roof of my house. Alex Robertson: So I think it would need to be something that challenged that like skydiving or climbing Mount Everest, something really off the scale because I've certainly got a job that allows me to address those bucket list challenges of visiting places you would never go for your two-week break in the summer. Kelly Molson: You chose a really good profession for travel to combine your passions. Alex Robertson: Yes, it was part of the motivation, Kelly. I love travel. And a journalist had the opportunity to travel, albeit under very different circumstances, whether that was to Sri Lanka after the tsunami or whether it was to Italy to cover the G8 summit. And part of the motivation, in addition to a real passion for Scotch, was to see the world and to travel to wonderful places, from Serbia to India to Kazakhstan and Ukraine. And do you know? The one lesson I take away is that you can see these wonderful places but what makes a country is its people. And that's what you remember most of all. Wonderful. Kelly Molson: Yeah. I completely agree with you. It's all about when you travel, it's about immersing yourself into the culture and the people that are there, not just the place that you're at. I just want to go back to your fear, because... So you have a fear of heights. What on Earth were you doing on your school roof if you have a fear of heights? Alex Robertson: I loved climbing. I absolutely loved climbing. So I specifically remember, as a child, one of my earliest memories, was climbing up the drainpipe of my school roof, an old-style school just outside Glasgow, and then getting to the top and thinking, what am I going to do now? And that happened repeatedly. So that's what's informed the fear of heights today. So for example, I can't even go up the Arc de Triomphe. At all. So I need to stay below while my family enjoys the views from above. Kelly Molson: Okay. Now I know, Alex, that you're a really big music fan. You might not have ever thought about the answer to this question, though. So if you were a WWF wrestler, what would be your entrance song? Alex Robertson: Oh, that's superb, I love it. I love a deadline. I oversee deadlines the same day. And I remember a colleague of mine saying, "We need to have Europe played through the tannoy when a deadline's coming, Final Countdown, to pump everyone up." Or I think it would need to be Eye of the Tiger, you know? Kelly Molson: Yeah. Yeah. Alex Robertson: Do you remember that? That was in Rocky, I think. Kelly Molson: Yeah. Brilliant. Alex Robertson: Something old school that really gets us going. Kelly Molson: I like that. Eye of the Tiger was my running song. And it was always my five-mile song. Because if I could get past five miles, I knew that I was going to get back home, which was the eight-mile loop that I was doing. So that's a good song. Alex Robertson: That's a great... Do you know my running song is Gorillaz, which is Melancholy Hill. Kelly Molson: Oh, nice. Alex Robertson: It just really keeps you driving, and it gives you a little bit of push when you need it. Kelly Molson: I like it. That's a good song, as well. This is my last icebreaker question before I do the unpopular opinion, which I love. So what is your weakest claim to fame? Alex Robertson: Oh, goodness. Well, you know what? I'm a huge fan of Six Music, BBC Six Music. And Shaun Keaveny has a great slot in that which is called the Small Claims Court. And I was actually on that. And I've called in before. So my small claim was that at some point, it would have probably been the late 90s, and I was interviewing on Rudolph Giuliani's broken window theory in Glasgow. You know, that if you tackle vandalism and that type of thing, then that prevents more serious crimes. And I was walking through Glasgow and a limousine pulled up, and Cher was inside it. And they sort of spoke to me and said hello. And my claim to fame is that actually, Cher was trying to pick me up at that point. Alex Robertson: And I'm not sure if that's a direct link. Another minor one is that I once shared a jacuzzi with Brian Gecksa at a family holiday park in the north of England. Kelly Molson: Wow. That's so impressive. The Cher one has blown my mind. Wow. Alex Robertson: Yeah. Yeah. I remember saying to Shaun Keaveny, and it wasn't my joke, actually, it was his producer's, but I said, "If you could turn back time, what would you do?" I think I ran away. I was terrified. Kelly Molson: That's a terrible, terrible dad joke. Alex Robertson: It is. It is. Kelly Molson: Awful, that joke. Okay. Thank you for sharing, that was awesome. Tell me your unpopular opinion. So something that you believe to be true that hardly anyone agrees with you on. Alex Robertson: Actually, one that my wife permanently disagrees with me on is I believe if you add vinegar to chips it reduces the fat because you're adding acid, therefore if makes them healthy. Kelly Molson: Hmm. Alex Robertson: But no one's bought into it. No one. Kelly Molson: I'm not sure about that one, but I'm going to try it the next time I want chips. My partner is on a super, super health kick at the moment. So chips, they're not in our house. Maybe I could convince him with the vinegar trick. Alex Robertson: I think that science proves it. I think it's that acid breaks down fat. I'm sure of it. Kelly Molson: Absolutely. Alex Robertson: I'm absolutely sure of it. In fact, I should have Googled it beforehand to at least support my argument. Same as I should have Googled was Cher actually in Glasgow in the late 90s, or was I just imagining it? You can't tell. We'll never know. Kelly Molson: It's a mystery, and it should stay a mystery, I think, Alex. Alex Robertson: Yeah. Kelly Molson: Amazing, thank you. So Alex and I, just as a caveat, we do know each other. We have worked on a number of projects together for Chivas. But I had a little look back over your career and, oh my gosh, it's really impressive. And I actually didn't know this about you. That Alex has been a crime reporter, a BBC journalist, an international brand ambassador, and now he's Head of Heritage and Education and the International Grads Programme and Archives at Chivas Brothers. Kelly Molson: Honestly, Alex, if at some point someone says to me, "You know that Alex Roberts? He's only an international spy," I would believe it. Alex Robertson: I'm going to tell you something really interesting. So I studied European politics. I went to university to study English and become an English teacher. That was my plan. And I studied European politics because it was a huge passion of mine. I think it was the time of the Maastricht Treaty in the early 90s, a really important time for European politics. And I can't believe 30 years later how much that's changed. 30 years, Kelly, can you believe it? That sounds bizarre to speak in those terms. And I believe in following our passions. And I do follow my passions from journalism to Scotch whisky. I was a journalist for ten years. Alex Robertson: But I have an uncle who is absolutely convinced that I work in the international stage for a government agency of one type or another. Absolutely convinced. Kelly Molson: I can see that. I can see why, though. You're like a man of travel, slightly mysterious, with a journalistic background. I can see that. Alex Robertson: Well, he mentions it every time we see him. He's deadly serious. He sort of just nods a wink and says, "I know what you're up to.", you know? Kelly Molson: Oh, I love it. Well, tell him that I agree with him now. He'll probably go [inaudible 00:08:43] at you next time. Alex Robertson: Yep. Kelly Molson: I want to know, this transition from crime reporter, journalist to brand ambassador, what was it that made you make that switch? Because it's incredibly different.Alex Robertson: Yeah. There were a couple of reasons, and also, they're very alike in many ways. I'd spent nearly a decade as a journalist, and much of that on radio. I absolutely adore radio and congratulations on the podcast, this is just superb. I love the spoken word, without sounding ridiculous. And I'd worked freelance for a long time with The Big Issue. Which you know, and was lucky enough there to win The Amnesty International Prize for Human Rights Reporting. I was passionate about asylum seekers and refugees relocating in Glasgow. Alex Robertson: I worked for the Scotland Sunday and Sport because I loved football, without sounding like an absolute cliché. And I used to work the crime beat in Glasgow, too and then moved to the BBC which, to use a football analogy, if you're a journalist, it's the only team that you ever want to play for. And I spent a couple of very happy years at the BBC working on website reporting, working on the radio bulletins and, occasionally, on television. And do you know what? Journalism was changing. I could see the writing on the wall for journalism. Alex Robertson: The opportunity to travel, which I'd done previously, I earlier mentioned going to Sri Lanka to cover the tsunami. I mentioned going to Genoa to cover the G8 summit. The real passion for travel and getting out and really identifying stories on the ground and working on stories, that opportunity was diminishing. And many more stories were being written from press copy or agency copy at your desk. And I could really see the writing on the wall for the future of journalism. I'm delighted to see that, actually, there still are tons of them. Many fine journalists out there today in Glasgow, in the UK, and internationally, especially at these crucial times of whether it's Brexit, COVID, or the US elections. Alex Robertson: And there are people doing a great job. And I wanted something else. I felt I'd taken that as far as I could. I had a huge passion for Scotch, I had a huge passion for travel, and the international brand ambassador role just seemed absolutely perfect. And I joined that 2008, I think. And I think my first trip was to China. Never been to Shanghai before. And traveled throughout China, and then moved to India and never looked back. As I say, that's more than 60 countries since. Alex Robertson: I also had a very small whisky club in Glasgow that... It's a feminist theory that when men get together they form clubs. And that's certainly what happened. But it was a very diverse club. And I remember walking into the Pot Still bar in Glasgow, I don't know if you've been there, Kelly...Kelly Molson: No. Alex Robertson: But it's an amazing bar. You walk in, there's about 500 whiskies on the wall. And I thought, how do I begin to understand that? But given the similarities, it's still about presentation, it's just still about structure, it's about engaging people, it's about inspiring people, all of which you also did as a journalist. Kelly Molson: Yeah. Absolutely. And actually, it's the engaging of people that I want to talk a little bit more about. But there's something that I kind of need to talk about, the visitor centres that you've been part of, initially. Because obviously this podcast is for people that work in the visitor attraction world, or work with the visitor attraction world. But I think from some of the things that Chivas have been bringing out during the pandemic, there's some really key learnings that we can take from that that translate across.Kelly Molson: But I want to talk a little bit about the Malt Whisky Distilleries. So Aberlour, Scapa, Strathisla, and The Glenlivet. They have been closed at certain points during the pandemic because, of course, they haven't been able to have visitors into the centres. How were you able to adapt the centres during the COVID pandemic? What happened there? Alex Robertson: You know, I see visitor centres as the beating heart of communities, you know? And Scotch whisky is not only a passion for what I do, it's a pride in what we do, because we've got 10,000 jobs directly employed by the Scotch whisky industry here, and 40,000 indirectly. There's an incredible impact on communities. And, as all your listeners will know, the visitor centre is where your story comes alive. Sometimes I used to say, "If you enter The Glenlivet, just being there was enough.", you know? The sounds, the sights, the smells. It made the hairs on your neck stand up. It's an amazing experience. Alex Robertson: And then comes along COVID, and all of that closes. And this is where you experience our Scotch whiskies. This is where you understand their heritage, their craftsmanship, their flavour. And now the priority, of course, was making sure the stills continued to run. That was number one. And Chivas Brothers implemented an industry-leading safe system of work to ensure that that could continue to happen in the most extreme circumstances, at the height of this pandemic. And also came to the aid of communities. It produced, I think, 160,000 litres of hand sanitiser and made 300 contact-free deliveries. Becoming social care providers to charities. Alex Robertson: In May, Chivas Brothers became the NHS Scotland's first pro bono hand sanitiser supplier. So a great effort. It was all about protecting our communities and ensuring the stills continued to run. So that was number one. And then you're absolutely right. As Head of Heritage and Education, I had to look at this and say, okay, we bring in tens of thousands of people a year. My specific role is to bring in our trade guests from all over the world and take them to a beautiful house, which you've been to, and...Kelly Molson: Yes, it is very beautiful. Alex Robertson: Show them around the distilleries. And I think it demonstrated that there was an opportunity. Suddenly we realised there was an opportunity to reach people through digital advocacy. And very quickly, I turned around a digital plan which would centre on Scotch whisky education in the Scotch Whisky Academy. This would address a thirst for knowledge, but within our business, because that was important. We also want employees to be engaged during this, Kelly, it wasn't just about the visitors. And then engage a global audience. Alex Robertson: And I would say the key learning is that we've actually extended our reach beyond those numbers that we would normally engage. We've got a much greater footprint, albeit digitally. And looking to the future, I would say that we will always place physical activations hand in hand with digital activations. And they will always go together from here on in once we can open again. And, of course, the distilleries are, the brand homes are open. I can tell you more about that. Kelly Molson: Yeah. I think you're absolutely right. And that's something that I have been thinking more and more of over the past few months, about at some point we will go back to normal. A version of normality. But all of these incredible things that have happened means that our reach for visitors and our reach for people that we can educate and get our brand in front of, has just expanded. And I don't want people to kind of go back to the old ways. I think like you say, it has to work really hand in hand. One of the things I really want to talk about it, Scotch Watch. Kelly Molson: So this is one of the things that has come out of the pandemic, in terms of your digital plan. And I think it's wonderful. I want you to explain what Scotch Watch is for us. And how did you come up with the idea? How did this happen?Alex Robertson: I think Scotch Watch was important because there were a couple of drivers, I think. And it's amazing how we were able to learn from others, too, and see how others were prepared for digital in terms of offering virtual tours and so on. Scotch Watch had a couple objectives. The first was actually to meet the makers, the people behind our Scotch whiskies, in a very informal setting. And second, on digital, we know that seven percent of a presentation is what we say. The other 93 percent is our body language, it's how we interact, it's our tone, it's how we look, it's how we shape our conversation. But all of that vanishes on digital. Kelly Molson: Yeah.Alex Robertson: So I wanted to create something that was much more informal in nature, that took us away from the traditional pillars of heritage, craftsmanship, and flavor, and actually brought through the personalities of those involved. That gave an opportunity to meet the people who have decades of experience and real passion for Scotch whisky, and also showcase some great new whiskies and demonstrate that the work of Scotch whisky, the work of Chivas Brothers, The Glenlivet, Chivas Regal, Aberlour is very much still going on. Alex Robertson: Now, the idea wasn't mine. Although I'm perfectly happy to claim it. And the idea was our master blender, our director of blending, Sandy Hyslop, my co-host on the show. So he approached me and said, "Listen, what can we do here? We're doing the Academy, we know that we know we're supporting, mentoring globally. We've reached 3,000 people in three months. Incredible reach. What else can we do?" He said, "I want it on a show, on Zoom, weekly, or on other platforms, where we just informally have a chat." Alex Robertson: Sandy's a huge antiques collector, he's a watch collector. He wanted to talk about watches, he wanted to talk about... I'm a huge music fan, I wanted to get music in there. And then we would have a studio guest and we would just talk about whisky. And we had a great session recently where we went live to an ambassador of Poland, Anna. We had our brand manager Hannah in the Ballantine's team in London. And just the dynamic shows a real passion behind Scotch. We moved to a monthly show, and do you know what? We've already reached more than 30 countries. Kelly Molson: Wow. Alex Robertson: In that time. And more than 500 people. And this is just the start for Scotch Watch. I want to... We've now got it on YouTube, we'll have events every Thursday, they can just find out more on Instagram, my handle is at DramGoodLife. But I want to take it further and have Instagram lives. But really, it's an informal look at Scotch whisky, Kelly, so that's a very long-winded answer for you. Kelly Molson: I loved it. So I watched the last episode, I watched the October edition. And I think it's where you unveiled the new Ballantine's 7 Bourbon Finish. Now, I'm very appreciative of whisky, but I wouldn't call myself a whisky connoisseur. I've got a gin bar in my house, not a whisky bar. Sorry. But what I found really engaging, and it goes back to what you were saying earlier about being a storyteller and having that kind of connection with brands. I loved how each person on the webinar spoke really passionately about not only the whisky but something that was personal to them that was connected to the whisky. Kelly Molson: So, for instance, you mentioned Sandy being a big vintage collector. Now he took the whisky, and he associated the whisky with an item. He had a stopwatch. A beautiful, beautiful vintage pocket watch, sorry, a pocket watch. And he talked about it in terms of how that connected with the whisky itself, and then you spoke about a song, a record, that you connected with the whisky. And I loved that. Even for someone that's not a huge, huge lover of whisky, I really related to those things, because actually, I'm a big music fan, and actually, I really love vintage pieces. Kelly Molson: And then your, I think it was Hannah, the brand ambassador, brand manager, sorry. She spoke about a book that connected with it as well. And I thought, "I love all of these things." And it really made me feel a connection to the brand that I probably wouldn't have got previously if I'd have just seen it on a shelf or if you'd talked about it in some way. It felt very, very personal. Alex Robertson: I think that's a great observation, thank you. Because, again, it's how do you establish an emotional connection online? That's the challenge we're all facing. How do we bring to life these great distilleries and these great whiskies when, actually, we're on the celebrity squares of Zoom? And people are at home. And you've got to make that emotional connection because we all have it. And the second point is that, actually, whisky is accessible, you know? The most significant change I've seen in the past decade is the emergence and the rise of whisky cocktails. Superb. I love it. Alex Robertson: And I believe if you're going to make whisky accessible, then you can pair it with music. Because you can follow the rhythm of music in the high flavour notes and the low flavor notes of whisky. You can pair it with your favourite pocket watch, you can pair it with dinner. It's so accessible. And if we're doing that, if we're making whisky accessible, and someone sitting at home's saying... Actually, it was interesting, we had Jenna Mariwan who was a The Glenlivet ambassador on the previous episode, The Glenlivet is number one in the US. And I said, "Listen, what is it that makes The Glenlivet unique? What is it makes people in the US passionate about it?" And she said, "Because it's for people like me." Alex Robertson: And that's what I want the emotional connection to be when they watch, just as you said, Kelly. If you watch Scotch Watch and you go, "You know what? This is for me. I don't feel excluded from this, I feel part of this."Kelly Molson: Yeah. That's exactly the feeling that I got from it. When I started watching it I thought, "Is this for me? Yes, I appreciate whisky, yes I work in a whisky world, but is this really for me?" And within ten minutes I thought, "This is absolutely for me." It really got me right here. And I really enjoyed that, at the end, it was Anna who took us through making an old fashioned. I was like, "Great, I could do this." And, again, it felt really easy, it felt really accessible. And that, for me, is the biggest part of building that audience engagement, is that you're making it for that person. Kelly Molson: I felt like you and Sandy were talking directly to me that evening. And there was a lot of people on that call. You were getting a lot of questions. But it really felt like you were connecting with me individually, and that is what's so important about the engagement level. It's really...Alex Robertson: Yeah, that's wonderful, thank you. And I think that's the challenge, because for all of us, because people are at a laptop all day now, at home, too. And we're calling on them to then join us on the laptops again. There's no change of scenery. And that's a real challenge. How do we work against, shall we say, online fatigue? Is that a risk? Because I guess none of us predicted this still to be running. This started in March, you know? It's now December. Kelly Molson: What was nice, and obviously I didn't have the ingredients to do it, but I thought what would be nice is that actually, I could make that cocktail while you were doing it. So there's maybe that level of interaction is what differentiates it from your day. Where you've spent all day on Zoom calls. Actually, when you're doing something as well, it doesn't then feel like just another Zoom call. You've got that level of interactivity. Which I guess, is that something else that Chivas are now doing? Your virtual tastings, for example. That's something quite new. Alex Robertson: Yeah. We had to try this carefully. So the other brand homes, they did a great job of opening up safely to allow people to come in and taste whisky. And given the current restrictions, that's now been moved outdoors, though Speyside can be lovely in winter. If you come and visit. Kelly Molson: It's beautiful, but a tad chilly. Alex Robertson: So we had to move very, very quickly to an online advocacy strategy. And I built that, essentially, on three pillars. And one beauty was that you could get to meet people that you wouldn't normally get to. Or makers could, instead of having to travel across the globe and spend a week, all I needed of their time was an hour. Which is a complete game-changer. Our distiller's Alan Winchester, our blender's Sandy Hyslop. Alex Robertson: So the first thing we launched was our Scotch Whisky Academy, to address a real thirst for knowledge internationally. And that's been a huge success. It's now running every single week. And you can come on, you can attend three sessions, and you can learn all about Scotch whisky. Heritage, craftsmanship, flavour. What makes it unique. And that has been an enormous success. And that's largely been to an internal audience and customers. Our challenge now in 2021 is how do we take that, in partnership with our visitor centres, to the public? Because we know people want to engage. Alex Robertson: And then the second part is we've had a great amount of activity. We've launched Ballantine's 7 Bourbon Finish, as you said. We've launched The Glenlivet Spectra and Caribbean Cask. We have a new Chivas Regal 13 range, extra. And we've been supporting that internationally. And the team are working incredibly hard every single week, hosting sessions from the US to Canada to South America, all across Europe, as far afield as Australia. And we are doing that every single week to customers and consumers. We're reaching a much broader audience. Alex Robertson: And in addition to that, I have a team of about 50 graduate ambassadors in 27 countries, each and every country at a different stage of this pandemic. And they have responded just quite brilliantly to this. And my recommendation to everyone, bring energy to it. Bring creativity to it. Create dynamic content. And have people who understand the medium. Which is a challenge, because this is a brave new world for us all. Kelly Molson: Yeah. It absolutely is. And just touching on the graduates that you spoke about, for them and the world that they live in, this has not been as challenging for them. They live their lives relatively digitally, so for some people, this has been a huge, huge, huge change, but for them, actually, the assumption is that they've dealt pretty well with this. Alex Robertson: Yes. Yes. Superbly well. I can't praise them highly enough. Of course, they're a digital generation. They don't know a time where they didn't have that access to social and digital. So they're able to drive content. But what they've managed to do is create engaging content and have actually been creative in the process. They've brought energy to this for us. And actually, at a very difficult time for them. The majority are far from home during a pandemic. And often in a lockdown. Then have been creating cocktails online, have a look at Chivas graduates on Instagram, you'll see them. We've been engaging local bartenders, have been supporting their own trade. They have the consumers, they've been doing really creative videos online. Really, really proud of them, an incredible effort. Alex Robertson: But the lesson for us all is how do we bring creativity and energy? And for us, it was also how do we get the glass in hand? How to look definitely at e-commerce, too. Kelly Molson: Yeah, that's right, actually. Chivas has been through... There was a lot of e-commerce stores that have launched through the lockdown, which is actually, it's quite a new thing, isn't it? There's not been a real focus on direct sales through the brands. Alex Robertson: You know, Kelly, it's really interesting, I don't know what you think yourself, but people really had to rethink this. And I don't want to say that I don't know if we were all well-prepared for digital advocacy because you place such value on physical interaction, and rightly so. But I think it had to make us think differently. You know, if someone came to a whisky tasting that I was hosting in Mumbai, we knew the whisky was there on the table. If we were launching an international Scotch Watch from Scotland, how are we going to get that whisky into their hand? Alex Robertson: And that became the challenge, you're right. We had to link it, because, let's be honest, we have to build a benefit to all of this. And the way to do that is through e-commerce. Kelly Molson: Yeah. And I think it's worked beautifully. And, actually, the speed and the turnaround that things have been able to happen and to launch during this time is testament to the people that you've got in your team, as well. Coming to the end of the podcast interview, I've got a couple of extra questions I'd like to ask you. I think, really, it's what's next. You've done an incredible job. Scotch Watch I genuinely think is just such a fantastic thing. And I really, really hope that it continues. But what can you see that's coming next for the brands? Alex Robertson: Yeah. I had almost planned to first of January. And what we need to do is get back to physical activations when it's safe to do so. That's engaging people face to face, inspiring them on our Scotch whiskies. The Glenlivet, Chivas, Aberlour, Ballantine's, and Royal Salute. But I still think that is some way off. Great news that a vaccine appears to be in the pipeline for the spring. So in the meantime, we need to look at how we raise to another level. I've almost seen this, that we established the base with our Scotch Whisky Academy, we created another level with Scotch Watch and the renovation support, looking at the new whiskies we were launching. Alex Robertson: But I think the challenge for 2021 is really how do we continue to impact globally with Scotch whisky aficionados and Scotch whisky novices? And we really engage them, both with our Scotch Academy, linking in our Scotch Whisky Academy to our brand homes. The Glenlivet Academy. There's a great prospect. Kelly Molson: Wow. Yeah. It is. Alex Robertson: What a great prospect. How do we continue to excite, inspire, engage people creatively? And I'm going to be honest, that's a job I'm doing now. It's really a bit... We're almost planning day by day, week by week at the moment. But I'm excited we can respond, we're about to recruit 20 new Scotch whisky ambassadors for 2021, which is amazing news...Kelly Molson: Fabulous.Alex Robertson: It shows you the confidence that Chivas Brothers has in Scotch whisky in the future. Our markets are confident. Our countries, I deal with about 30 countries around the world. They are confident, they have strong rebound plans, and we know that advocacy, ambassadorial work, both physically and digitally, will absolutely be at the heart of it. I'm optimistic about 2021. Kelly Molson: This is a lovely, positive way to end the podcast, Alex. Thank you. I have to say, the grad scheme that Chivas have, it's phenomenal. And I know that every year, you are completely overwhelmed with applicants for it. So we've got a little bit of a scoop there, that that's coming out soon. But you've got a really hard task ahead of you, I'm sure, because this year I'm positive that you'll be completely inundated when those come out. What we'll do is all of the things that we've discussed today and all of the links to everything that we've talked about will be in the show notes. So we'll have links to Scotch Watch, we'll have links to the Ambassadors website. We'll have links to everything that you can go and look at. Kelly Molson: We always end the podcast by asking our guests if they have a book that they would recommend? Something that they love or something that has helped shape their career in some way over the years? Have you got one you can share with us? Alex Robertson: Wow. I read a lot and lost track as I get old. Which I've touched on a few times, the passage of time. As he buys time to answer. I actually, in a professional sense, I listen to podcasts as often as possible. I'm a huge fan of Dr. Rangan Chatterjee, I don't know if you...Kelly Molson: Okay. Alex Robertson: He wrote The Four Pillars of Health. And I listen to that a lot because I really believe it's important to bring balance to our lives in everything that we do, whether that's in diet, sleep, exercise, and digital. In fact, really fascinated by the impact of digital technology on our experiences at the moment, too. I guess the book that's always had a lasting impact on me is East of Eden by John Steinbeck. Kelly Molson: Great. Alex Robertson: Is number one. The sheer scale of it, the sheer drama, the way he paints colour throughout it. The emotion contained in the book. The generations which it spans. It's incredible, and I'd recommend it to everyone. Kelly Molson: Oh, wow. That is a superb book. Now, as ever, we offer your book as a prize to our guests. So if you'd like to win a copy of this book, then if you head over to our Twitter account, it's just Skip the Queue. And if you retweet this episode announcement saying, "I want Alex's book," then you will be in a chance of winning it. Kelly Molson: Alex, it's been an absolute pleasure to have you on today. Thank you so much for your time. Now, it's just after 11 in the morning, but I think the only way to end this podcast, unfortunately with my cup of tea, is to say Slange Var.Alex Robertson: Yes, Slange Var. Thank you, it's been an absolute pleasure. Kelly Molson: Thanks for listening to Skip the Queue. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please leave us a five-star review. It really helps others find us. And remember to follow us on Twitter for your chance to win the books that have been mentioned. Skip the Queue is brought to you by Rubber Cheese, a digital agency that builds remarkable systems and websites for attractions that helps them increase their visitor numbers. You can find show notes and transcriptions from this episode, and more, over on our website rubbercheese.com/podcast. 

This week on Lawfare's Arbiters of Truth series on disinformation, Evelyn Douek and Quinta Jurecic are bringing you a conversation with Alex Stamos, the director of the Stanford Internet Observatory. Alex was last on the show in August to talk about the newly established Election Integrity Partnership, which he helped set up to focus on detecting and mitigating disinformation around the U.S. 2020 election. Well, the election is over! So Alex is back to talk about what the partnership saw, how well the information ecosystem held up and what the landscape looks like as the dust begins to settle.

Finn is sick! So Alex, Rabbit, and Benjamin sit and talk about how they balance the agency of their players with their own desire to "tell a story" as the DM. It's a loose discussion that drifts between table reminiscences and philosophical musing that might serve as a good primer when thinking about the relationship between the DM, the Players, and "The Story".If you have an idea for Thoughtful Great Adventures, hit us up on Twitter @great_lawful or facebook!

“It is dull, Son of Adam, to drink without eating,” said the Queen presently. “What would you like best to eat?” “The roasted corpse of my enemies. Or, failing that, Turkish Delight, please, your Majesty,” said Chimera.             -From C.S. Lewis' lesser known novel 'The Lion, the Goat and the Dragon'   The Chimera is one of the most famous monsters from Greek mythology and that means Alex recognized it right away.  So this week, instead of diving straight into the D&D lore, Alex gives us a little lesson in mythology. Then, get this: it turns out chimeras are a real actual thing that exists in the world. Our world. Like, the world that you're sitting and reading this sentence in. So Alex tells us a little bit about the science behind real life chimeras. After that, Kyle talks about the D&D version of the creature, which is pretty cool. But after learning about the real life chimera, it honestly seems a little silly. Anyway, check out the episode and help us decide if it's a friend or a fiend.   Other things Don’t miss out on all the action of our main podcast. You can find all the adventure episodes of We Have Darkvision here. We’ve also started to upload our back catalogue of episodes and theme music over on youtube as well. Also, why not check out Kyle and Colin’s new play through of Divinity 2: Original Sin in their new series ‘Original Sinners‘.

So Alex was unable to be on this week as some genius plowed into a power pole outside her apartment and knocked out…well…everything. But no worries! Bill McMorris of the Washington Free Beacon stepped up. Brent and Bill discuss warlords, … Continue reading →

What does it take to build a bourbon brand from the ground up? In this podcast, you get to hear our story of building Pursuit Spirits. We discuss how we source barrels, design packaging, and navigate the law. Fred interviews Ryan and Kenny on motivation, risks, and how to secure your future with contract distillation. Show Partners: You can now buy Barrell Craft Spirits products online and have them shipped right to your door. Visit BarrellBourbon.com and click Buy Now. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about Rum. How did you all meet? How did you all decide to start the podcast? Talk about starting your own brand. How did you finance the project? Who came up with the idea to call the releases episodes? After creating this brand, do you have more appreciation for distillers being less transparent? What was the most annoying thing about starting the brand? Do you ever get nervous that your model might come crashing down? How have you been able to meet the demand of your audience? Has launching the brand helped you understand the distillers more? How much time went into the packaging? Talk about the cork. Why is there so much variance in TN barrels? How have you reacted to negative criticism? What distilleries have you partnered with? Do all of the episodes sell out? Any thoughts about doing a batching process? Would you consider outside investment? Any plans for contracting distilling? How do you not oversaturate the promotion of Pursuit Series? Favorite episode? What distillery would you want to partner with if you could? If you had to pick between Bourbon Pursuit and Pursuit Series, which would you pick? If you could buy all the bourbon you wanted from OZ Tyler, would you? Where would you want to spend marketing dollars? Support this Podcast on Patreon 0:00 When we can put it into a single bear offering a cash ranked like, this is what we've tried. Like, I guarantee you, you're gonna love this because we're not going to put it sound like a men's wearhouse commercial. But if it did I love the way you look. 0:25 This is Episode 255 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your host Kenny, and I hope you've had an enjoyable week in this podcast finds you well. So let's get on to some bourbon news. We missed the deadline for putting this in the podcast last week. So unless you've been staying away from social media, then you probably already know about the new Weller single barrel orange label that will be coming to market soon. The new Weller will be bottled at 97 proof which is a middle point between the traditional Green Label special reserve at 90 and the Red Label antique at 107 will also have a suggested retail price of $50 1:00 You can also check out Fred Minix YouTube channel where he was the first person to review it. So make sure you go subscribe and check that out. There's also a new whiskey coming to market. It's a Tennessee whiskey, and it combines golf, Marion eaves and the Mannings. It's sweetens Cove. The investors behind it have some major name power, including the likes, of course, Peyton Manning, tennis legend Andy Roddick, sports caster gymnasts, singer songwriter drew Holcomb, among others. The story behind sweetens Cove is that it started somewhat off with like an off the grid, nine hole golf course at the end of a gravel road in Tennessee. It was described by some because of its breathtaking views as doffs Field of Dreams. So a group of friends, including some of the previously ones mentioned, bought sweetens Cove back in 2019. With no clubhouse, no plumbing, or really anything else to offer. It has a tradition of a celebratory shot of whiskey for first timers on the first tee. This will be a 13 year old Tennessee bourbon with multiple batches that have been blended by Marion Eve's will continue 2:00 Around 14,000 bottles and have an MSRP of around $200. 2:05 In distillery news, the governor of Kentucky has said that distilleries can reopen for visitors starting on June 8. But please make sure that you put in your phone calls to any distilleries that you plan on visiting because it's up to their discretion on how they're going to reopen. So please make sure that you do that before making any plans to go to visit any. 2:26 Now for today's podcast, many folks have asked us before, what does it take to actually start a bourbon brand. And today, you get to hear our story. We switch things up a little bit. And Fred interviews us on the brand, how we got started our process for selecting barrels for pursuit series and what our future plans entail. We can't say thank you enough to everyone out there who has purchased that bottle of pursuit series and been a steward of the brand because of you are able to help continue and grow this into something even more amazing down the line. We've even got more plans to release something awesome in the fourth quarter of this year. So 3:00 Tune for more details. We've got three barrels that are available today on seal box comm along with less than 65 bottles remaining across specs in the Dallas and Texas and Fort Worth and Austin area so make sure you can go and get all the details on pursuit spirits.com because we have one barrel that is in the Texas market. And if you got a friend or a relative that found bourbon is something that they enjoy while at guarantee, make sure you tell them about the podcast help spread the good word of bourbon and Joe from barrel bourbon wants you to know that it's gotten a whole lot easier to get their unique cash drinks whiskies from around the world, including their rums, malt, and many others. Just visit barrel bourbon calm and click the Buy Now button today. You can get bourbon to your door. Alright, enjoy today's episode. Here's Fred minich with above the char 3:54 I'm Fred MiniK. And this is above the chart. Whoo. It's becoming a little warmer. It's coming soon. 4:00 summertime. I'm seeing the blooms the flowers. Oh, the sun's out more and maybe you can get a little bit of tan I'm grilling every night. It's just Oh, it's so exciting. I can't wait to hang out. Oh wait, yeah, there's that whole damn pandemic thing, man, but you know what the other thing that summertime does for me, rum cocktails. Rum, cocktails rum punches. I'm constantly experimenting with different rums Listen, I know bourbon bourbon, bourbon bourbon. We talk about bourbon all the time is bourbon pursuit. But ROM is my you know it's my it's my second love all the spirits I love rum so much and I it is so much with fruits. So listen, everybody I'm just telling you right now, get on the rum kick this summer and let's start making some rum punches together. Go get go get go to the liquor store or get online at drizzly or go wherever it is you shop right now in the middle of this pandemic, and look for the different rooms. Okay, here 5:00 a shopping list or these are the rums that I'm telling you right now will make you excited as a bourbon fan. Total wine has a brand that's called a doorless. d'Orleans is made only for, for total wine in the United States. It's made by Foursquare, which in my opinion is the best distillery in all of ROM it's in Barbados. And that ROM d'Orleans whether it's the 12 year old or it's the basic one, it is beautiful. Start out making cocktails with that or drink it neat. Go over to Jamaica, get a little Appleton get a little bit that Jamaican funk on up in there and use that for punches. So get you some orange juice, get some limes and lemons and just squeeze them all in together and throw in some, some sugar and maybe like a look sardo stir that thing up and you got yourself punch, head on over to America and get a little bit of privateer out of Boston, the Boston area. That privateer is absolutely fantastic. Now the three thing that all three of these 6:00 rums have in common. They don't add sugar. That's right. A lot of rums actually add sugar after they have 6:08 dumped in so they'll add up to like 50 milligrams per liter in sugar. Now a lot of people like that a lot of people like that, but hey, I'm a straight bourbon guy. I love my bourbon neat. I love it with just a piece of ice sometimes. And if you are like me, then you probably gonna want something that isn't adulterated with a sweetness, and so privateer Appleton and Foursquare or door Lee's made by Foursquare, take a look at those three things and get back to me at Fred MiniK on whichever social media platform you like. And for a moment, let's talk some rum because it's summertime. And that's this week's above the char. Hey, if you have an idea for above the char hit me up on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook And oh, by the way, I got a YouTube channel. Go check it out. We have a membership area where there's a lot of exclusive content 7:00 Until next week, cheers. 7:06 Welcome back to bourbon pursuit. This is going to be a fun episode in which we discuss the pursuit series something that I am not a part of. But Kenny and Ryan of bourbon pursuit are so I get to turn the tables on them a little bit and ask them some questions about how they got where they are. And I kind of want to start this off, gentlemen. Oh, no, I'm sweating. 7:28 Well, given given what you told us told me off air you should be. Okay. Yeah. Well, we'll hit me up on on social media. I'll tell you what, read what this is really about later, feed you all the dirty secrets and that's 7:43 got another nod. So Alex at the party stories this this episode is about. This is about the pursuit series in the building of it. But of course, you cannot talk about the whiskey that you all own together without talking about this podcast. So I want to go over 8:00 From the very beginning, how did you to actually meet your need? Yeah, you know, it's like we're awkward school, Utah. 8:11 So, I had been listening to podcasts, with my current business, my real paying business. I'd listen to podcasts and in my truck a lot and at the time, I was going to start a lawn care business. Well, I've quickly learned that there's not going to be many listeners or follow on your podcast. I don't think we'd have a Patreon community. Yeah, donate. I'll send you some fertilizer or something. I don't know. But uh, anywho I was really into bourbon. And my brother in law kind of said, Why don't you do a podcast about bourbon? And because you know, so many people you're from Bardstown, as always say, and so 8:47 I was like, Yeah, that'd be cool. But I didn't know how to execute it. Kenny and I had become friends. How did you guys become friends? What where was that moment of where you all became friends because we're in target and we were walking 9:00 past the pop tart aisle we locked eyes and I don't remember that now that now our y's are mutual Kenny. Is that how you wanted the meeting to go? Or I mean, you know, you ever you ever look back and you think like, I wish I could do something over? You know, that might be one of those times but yeah, exactly. Yeah, so our wives were mutual friends and I had a derby party every year. And Kenny would come and bring his mid juillet mix and bring several different bottles. And so we kind of started and he actually liked electronic dance music, and I did too. And so we kind of had it similar, similar interest. And so I knew what he did it and his job was a lot of tech and presentations public speaking, which I had no experience in. Still, to this day, I kind of dread to getting in front of microphone people. But uh, so I needed somebody to call Kenny or I emailed him and said, Hey, what do you think about this? And he's like, Yeah, let's do it. But he was like, we gotta need to come come from this angle. And so we met in my basement for the first time. 10:00 One and we had a laptop and a USB microphone and we just kind of sat around and talked about bourbon and whatnot. And while we were doing this and then I think we recorded it and then we listened to her like we got delete that That's terrible. This was bad. And then for really, and then I still have that recording. I don't know. Gosh, I might actually on my old I would love to my old mic. Actually I put that out for like a bond like GarageBand I need to look that up. That's a good that would be cool to me on fun episode to do. Yeah, it's just one of those things where, you know, when you start anything, you fumble your way through it. Yeah. And, you know, we've we've both gotten much better at the podcast execution, interviewing style, everything throughout the years. It's just been a repetition and you just, you know, you start working at something and you you get better at it as the years go along. Yeah, it's it's kind of a testament to like the theory that like, you know, the the 11:00 10,000 hour rule or something like that, if you want to do something like just because you suck at it first, like, you can become good, just got to do it. So don't let like, perfection stop you from doing something because we've had a lot of imperfections along the way. And it's taken us a long journey to get here, but it's been a cool journey and how when, when did it start getting serious for you in the podcasting space? I would say it, I mean, I'll kind of I'll kind of take that one a little bit, you know, for us it was it was one of those things where, you know, Ryan had he's a very good idea person, he's very driven by it and he's, he's very creative when it comes to it. And then it comes to the execution stage and making sure that it stays consistent and it stays on schedule and it stays like that. And so there was there was kind of like a turning within the responsibilities where you know, he really wanted to run with this and go with it and I said, Sure, like all you know, I've got I've got my own work stuff going on like I'm okay like all kind of just be the the extra voice of reason if you need it and he was taking care of all the editing and stuff like that. 12:00 And then, you know, it got to the point where, you know, I kind of took over a little bit the editing, making sure that we had, you know, the right kind of sound quality and all this other kind of stuff over the years. And there was a point as well where, you know, during that process, you know, when I was picking up and doing a lot of this and putting in tons and tons of hours a week into it. I mean, most people don't understand that, what goes into a one hour podcast, there's at least 20 to 40, even sometimes 60 hours of work that just goes into that one hour. Correct. And so when you when you get to that point, you're spending that much time plus you've got your other 40 hours a week day job, you get burnout pretty quickly. And so it got to the point where we I just said, you know, like we're gonna let it lapse a little bit and we let it lapse, and then all of a sudden, you had people on Twitter saying like, Hey, guys, when's the new episode gonna come out? Yeah, I'm like, oh, people listen, yeah, what year was that? I mean, this was probably 2016 timeframe, had been somewhere during that timeframe. And then there was a 13:00 So I think it was like December of like 2016 as well, actually, it's probably 2015 timeframe when that tweets happened. And then it was 2016 when it was a lot of the work that was really going into it. And I was feeling the burnout. I mean, I was really feeling the burnout from it. And I just said, He's like, I don't really know if their ROI is here. Like, I'll have to go ahead and reevaluate, like, what is this really gonna be worth the time? You know, and I put that tweet out there, there was a lot of good positive responses, Mark Gillespie from whiskey cast saying, like, hey, like, I know, a lot of stuff goes into it. Like he said, Keep at it and stuff like that, too. So even even like competitors in the space were like saying, you know, like, the water a lot of just good, you know, patting on the back and stuff like that. And then there was somebody else that said, Hey, like, why don't you all start a Patreon I'd be happy to support you. And I was like, What the hell's Patreon? And so you go in, you start reading about it, and you're like, hell let's, let's run with it. And then from there, it's just been that's been kind of the the growth and medium that we've needed to help support and sustain this place. 14:00 podcast because it's it's one of those things that you know, this is this is a new medium, it's hard to find advertisers in this new medium. Because there's a lot of companies that I mean, mindset it before it's like it's whiskey, it's distillation, you haven't changed anything in 200 years, probably not gonna change a whole lot of things. And it comes to the marketing aspect of it as well. Right? So it's one of those things that we're waiting for them to kind of catch up with it. So it's, you know, we go and we try to sell we try to talk these people but you know, a lot of times that they'd rather buy a billboard or a bus stop, right, whatever it for you magazine ads, yes. And they love magazine ads still, that's just great. But I mean, like I said, this is just one of those things that we saw Patreon as really our catalyst to really support and grow the show. And that's really what it's been now for the past few years. And it's awesome, too, because we, I mean, we have a great partner with barrel but they've been great and, you know, let us be us but we don't have to like answer, you know, we can kind of be us. We're not like on anyone's agenda or anything. So we could just be true to ourselves and we do what the community wants. We really rely on them to kind of give us ideas and 15:00 What the what interests them and feedback from them. It's been great having that support and you know, ideas bouncing off of them and stuff. So it's, and I remember when you all reached out to me for an interview, 15:14 there were a couple different times you all reach out to me, I helped you get into the legend series. And then when it when you all reached out to me to be an interview about about bourbon. I remember, at the time, there were so many podcasts coming on and you know, there are people trying to do stuff. And you guys kind of had a different feel, you know, and it was just, it was like, he was like, I could be friends with these guys. You know, he, even though I think that was, that's the one of the interviews was where the marzipan thing came from. It's like, yeah, you were like what it was. 15:51 I'd never heard of that. I'm sorry. We never had marzipan and gardening. But it was it was very clear early on that there was some spark there and that you guys were 16:00 trying to do something in this space in a in a medium that I think was 16:06 you know, filled with people who really couldn't, you know, contribute to to the community in some way and I you guys came out and you did it and and the one thing that you know obviously I came on last year I guess a year and a half ago now, you know I came on because I respected what you guys built in and then when you all came out with with your own bourbon that that threw me off so I was like I wasn't expecting that as like that's the kind of move that you don't see media people make. Yeah, I remember off to the result too because I remember we were kind of in like negotiations of 16:46 our partnership or whatnot and the ironing out the details and we were at like an old forest or event I think it was like the President's choice or whatever. But we had just kind of like confirmed that we were going to start this brand and I was like what is friggin and think of this because these are 17:00 reviewer you know, is this gonna throw the deal off? we you know, we set you aside and you're like, we need to talk about this and you went about the bourbon but about our deal and then we told you we're like we're starting our own bourbon brand. You know, you don't we don't want to be involved. We know it will let you to be 17:15 out in the sense that we don't want you involved but we don't want to, you know, implicated Okay, anything for your reviews and whatnot. So, and you're like, Yeah, I don't care if it's totally fine. I was like, Whoa, monkey off my back. Yeah, that was gonna be a total deal breaker. But anyways, well, it's there have been some, some history there of like, 17:36 whiskey, whiskey media. You know, starting a brand there. Whiskey magazine actually had had its own label for a bit in Scotland. So it's not unprecedented. It's just not popular. You know, people tend to to frown upon it. Did you all have any concerns that you know, you would, you would piss off like, you know, the distiller. 18:00 That now you're competing with them. Jimmy concerns like that when you guys were thinking about this? No, not really. I mean, when we, when we look at what we're trying to build, and what we're trying to do, it's we're boutique, I mean, we are not going to be kind of kind of person that we're not going to have to to $20 million to dump into a distillery and build one. We're not gonna be one of those people that are trying I mean, it'd be amazing to get bought out by somebody that's not on the radar, it's probably never gonna happen. Because we're not at we're not that kind of level, right? We're not at a level where we're sourcing hundreds and hundreds of barrels and then creating these crazy single barrel programs and then aging stuff and then trying to release to mass market. Like that's really not what we're trying to do. Yeah. And not only that is you know, we took this as an opportunity to kind of divert it in a in two different ways. So first and foremost, yes, we sourced like, that was the kind of the way that it was all built off of. But when we started this, even to how it all even began was the idea that, you know, we talked about a brand on the podcast, and then a few weeks later, I get this phone call from a guy 19:00 He's like, Hey, I helped build that brand. Would you be interested in doing your own? Like, never, never even crossed our mind, right? The time we were doing, we just kind of start doing single barrels for the Patreon community. We're done. And then they were selling out really fast. And so I was just thrilled doing like single barrels for from other distilleries. And I was totally content with that, you know, at the time. And so like, yeah, our broker called us and he got the idea. And Kenny called me and he was like, Are you interested? And I was like, not really. 19:32 You know, and then he's like, Okay, and then like, two weeks later passed, and he's like, well, I'm going to meet that guy that has let you know this. And I was like, Alright, I guess I'll go you know, it's like, Monday night, how we met it like hell or high water and I never been there like, Oh, go check it out. Go get a cocktail. Yeah. And so we we sat with them, and they were, to our surprise, they were like, I thought they were gonna be like two older guys, like, you know, just kind of real sharp, like, businessman like, you know, kind of like 20:00 Don't know, there's intimidating for some, but like we met them, they're really cool. They like had really great ideas. And the whiskey they had was really good. And I was like, You know what, I think we can make this work. And at the time, I think Kenny just thought, you know, we were gonna do like, a barrel picker too with it. And I was like, No, no, no, Kenny, we need to start our own brand. And like, we could make something much more bigger than just one or two barrels from that. So I immediately left that meeting and I could not sleep for like two nights. I was so excited about the opportunity. Like I told my wife I came home and I'm like, this is this is something I've been dreaming of my whole life. This is opportunity. Like you always wanted to own Well, no, I never did but like that. You know, I've grown up around this my whole life. And I've always been enjoyed bourbon and I love being around the community and just even the opportunity to have my own brand like was like, just shocking to me and like I was so excited about it. I couldn't even put into words. I just bet 21:00 All my attention went to for like, four months. And so Kenny and I gone, you know, got on. I was like, I know a designer, let's get call him get a bottle design made up. Let's go. And then the broker sent us some samples, you know, to kind of pick our first barrel to see if we're still interested in tell him about, you know what we did up here? Yeah, I mean it was it was we had three barrel samples. And we all kind of know that it was coming from Tennessee. We knew that and that was one of the things that we thought ourselves. So we had we had we go into it with the same exact mindset that every other whiskey geek goes out there and they're like, I don't drink Tennessee whiskey. Yeah. And basically in like, no way. We're like, we're like we're from Louisville Bardstown. Kentucky is in our blood. Like, why would we ever do this? And so I said, Alright, you know what, like, let's give it a try. I said, Let's take these three barrel samples. I'll grab a bottle of Henry McKenna. And I said, if it's better than hundred McKenna, this was right after you'd like named whiskey. 21:57 When I say better, like better did our palates, right? 22:00 That day at that time, whatever it is, yeah. And so we sat outside or barrel proof versions of it, you know, we're just sitting there and we're drinking of it, and we're drinking it and home behold, like the first barrel that we lost that we liked. I was I, we loved it. We said, this is it. This is the winner. And that ended up being Episode 001 the first barrel release that we ever did. Yeah, so we went down there. 22:23 I think the first one we went on, they rolled out like 10 barrels that and our intentions were to just buy one barrel, and you know, and we get down there and we taste it. They're like, I don't know. 10 or 12 I can't remember exactly. And we found three that were like really good. And I was like, man, we got about three of them and I'm freaking out. Like how much is this gonna cost? How do we ship them? How do we do all this like there's like, you know, all this anxiety but I was excited because I knew the whiskey was good and I thought that people would enjoy it if they would just, you know, drop the stigma of Tennessee but if they open up the bottle and try it I was like I would because we taste 23:00 A lot of good stuff. I mean, not to say that we're gifted or our palates are better, but we, I mean, we're whiskey geeks like everyone else. And we've tasted pretty much anything and everything. And we thought that this was in that realm of really high quality product. And so I was like, Yes, I'm, I'll put my name on it. And let's get it to market. How did you all get the money to start this to just come from your own financing? Yeah, I mean, this is all completely bootstrapped by what we put into it and everything like that, we've got a pretty good deal that we cut out with our distributor, or our distributor, I'm sorry, our broker where our deal is basically says that we and this is this is also kind of the way that we built this as well. pursuit series is nothing like anything else that you can get in the bulk market because we've talked about the bullet market on the podcast before you want to start a brand. You need 50 barrels, here's your check for whatever 80,000 $90,000 maybe even probably $250,000 whatever it is. 24:00 Few trucks show up, your barrels roll off, you get what you get, right? Where to be empty, some can be half full, some could be full and some good taste like hell, some good, you know, it's just you don't know, it's a huge gamble. And so what we get the opportunity to do is actually go to the broker, and during the day two to 5000, barrels and inventory, he'll roll out what he can for us, and we'll sample through and we will select every single barrel we get to choose from, from the broker. So it's unlike everything else where it's actually a true single barrel that we are choosing out of amongst a lot of these. And when we're looking at a lot of the Tennessee stock, we reject about 80% of the barrels that we go through, right, so we're looking for really the best of the best when we go through this, that those guys that we work with, I won't name names, because you don't want to give them right. Well, no, I want to help them any way I can. 24:48 Because he's been instrumental to our success, and we wouldn't be here without him. But yeah, I mean, from the initial meeting, he was like, he's like, I know, you know, we have you 25:00 are not like typical people we sell to, you know, you're going to buy a barrel here, a barrel there. That's not what we typically do typically, like Kenny said they move 500,000 barrels at a time. And so he was very creative and like, how we could finance it, how we could make this work, he was very interested in making us succeed. And so that was one thing that, you know, is really helped us, you know, be able to cash flow this and kind of get to where it is. Otherwise we, I mean, we put up a lot of money upfront initially, but we were able to kind of recoup that pretty fast with the the financing terms He's given us. Yeah, and those financing terms may not last forever, because I know because like I said, we go and we select barrels now like now when we go when we select barrels, like I said, the first time we went we had 12 or 14 to select from. Now when we go it's anywhere between 30 to 60 barrels, and we do it over the span of two days. And we're slapping stickers left and right. And we're taking like, you know, maybe 1010 to 12 barrels when we do this. And he does the bottling too. Yes. Yes. So that's that's the great thing. 26:00 That's kind of like a one stop shop operation for us they'll do bottling they do labeling so we're able to source our glass source our tops, get our labels created, local design agency that we have and everything like that have them shipped down there. Yeah, you need if you're a bourbon brand out there you want some repackaging, or when to start relay design. They're incredible. Yep, here in local relay design as the one who actually helped build our, our label and everything like that. So um, so I was curious. The who came up with the idea of calling, you know, first of all the pursuit series, that makes sense, you know, but who came up with the idea to call each one of them in episode that was me. Really, just a brilliant idea I loved it was like each barrels, you know, a single barrel, so they're all unique, and I was like, we're really trying to 26:49 play off the podcast keys and that's where we were successful. And so I was in, you know, most bourbon bottles when we were doing the packaging and design. Most of bourbon balls are really masculine and they're very light 27:00 Serious, you know, they're dark, they're, you know really kind of like leather manly kind of and I wanted to brighten it up kind of make it fresh and fun and playful and our designer had the same kind of vision too. So he kind of, you know, if you'd look at a bottle, you know, it looks like you know, an iTunes 27:19 podcast player. So there's a play button, you know, there's the show notes and so I kind of came up with the episode and then I think you might have came up with the show notes I can't remember but we just wanted to play off the podcast as much as possible because you can do that with single barrels because they're all unique and they're all individual and they have their own different things that we like about them so I thought it made sense. We also stand on the shoulders of giants at the end of the day, right? I mean, we look at we a lot of this inspiration came from the brands that we already like and we cherish I mean when we look at what you can do from will it family estate, which you get with old forester birthday bourbon, when you look at that we took a lot of those cues and put them into there. You know with Will it family stay 28:00 Having a single barrel offering and knowing that like when that bottle is gone that's it when people are out there and they're like I've got to have barrel c nine D like gotta have it and then you know if that translate to the same thing as somebody says like oh I need Episode Five from you know procedures whatever it is they kind of translate that and we we try to be as transparent as we can on the label like that's one thing that we come from a whiskey background is like as much as we can put out there from you know, the proof the age everything like we want to make sure everything is ha did as much as possible. Not only that, as you know if we can 28:33 divulge the distillery we will we do that again with some of the craft offerings that will do yeah, and with the art labels are paying the s and are the most inefficient thing ever and it's my fault because of the episode and also, I did steal from birthday bourbon when I was looking at bottles on the shelf. I thought I liked how birthday bourbon had a different color of each one. And so when you look at a shelf, and you look at the different colors, you can say oh I have that particular 29:00 year two particular so I wanted that each episode to have their own color. So you look when you have them lined up, you're like you know which episode you have. Yeah, so both of you have been a part of the narrative of trying to get whiskey distillers to be more transparent. Now that you're on the other side a little bit. Do you understand? Do you have a little bit more appreciation for those distillers who may not be as transparent as they should be? Well, I can see in some instances, yes, I can see it because they've worked hard to build that brand recognition build that they, you know, they spent a lot of money to trademark you know, and protect that name so I can understand that they don't want some like piggybacking off that and kind of in particular, like we're talking about someone who may, like source their whiskey out or sell it at like Barton wood or decal, or even in some circumstances at once upon a time brown Forman or for Rosa heaven hills sourced a lot. Yeah, yeah. So I can understand why they don't end there. You know, at a time there were so many 30:00 People source and they still are, but there's so many different brands sourcing so I could see it, you know, just being confusing and 30:08 but at the same time too, it's like, it also helps them because it's like, you know how many like Lux ro s or Brooks seven or you know that you know, it's heaven Hill juice and you're like, Damn, that's good. It just elevates the heaven Hill brand even more in my opinion. But what I find fascinating is when one of them when a when one of them win an award, they're like, Well, you know, whose whiskey that really is? I was like, Yeah, I know. It's brown Forman. Why don't you let the world know? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, and that was one of the things that we try to do is we try to take a lot of the things that the whiskey geek would find appreciative, right, and we try to divulge as much information as we can. And at the same exact time, I think that we've had a lot of good success and a lot of good feedback on the show notes portion as well. Because if there's somebody that says 30:54 I don't feel like taking a risk and a gamble on an on a 75 or $115 bottle, like I don't want to do that. Well. 31:00 What we do is we try to put our show notes like we try to find a prominent flavor or a little spin on it, that is a way that you can kind of get an indication of like, this is the flavor that we are getting inside this bottle, right? So you have a little bit of a better estimation of what you're getting yourself into that you're just not blindly throwing money at it as well. Let's go on to take it back to like the starting of the brand. I want to ask both of you this question, what was the most annoying thing at the very beginning about starting a brand? The government like paperwork, the paperwork is so annoying and so slow and so cumbersome? It's, I mean, they they really like they want you to quit, like they don't want you because the amount of paperwork and the waiting and all the stuff you have to fill out the trademarks, all this stuff. It's I mean, it's a lot of legwork and upfront costs just to even like get a label approved. And that that was the most annoying for me. Oh no, I agree with you because 32:00 Even going in navigating the process of figuring out like, okay, like what kind of license can we get? Like, we can't get a DSP because we don't own a distillery. We don't own a warehouse. We don't own these things. What kind of license do you get? And you look around, you're like, Well, I know this company x and this company, why like they don't own a distillery, like, how are they doing this? So there's this whole world of these even navigate to figure out like, Oh, that's what it means. We had to get our wholesalers license, and then we got our wholesalers license, and then we're like, Okay, well, let's go ahead and we'll start navigating this path. And then even trying to like we don't we haven't released anything from GP we have a bottom in GP, but we said, there's some good stuff from a GP, like, let's go ahead and get samples. And we talked to them and they're like, hey, okay, we need your DSP. Like, we don't have a DSP. Here's a wholesale license. They're like, What the hell's a wholesalers list? So it's like, you know, there's this whole world that it's just like, it's It's so confusing, that's underneath the covers, and even the people and they're like, we don't even know what you need sometimes, like, like, you fall with the Kentucky ABC. And they're like, we don't even know what you need. Like, let me try to get my supervisor well. 33:00 call you back in like four months. 33:03 That's a true story. Maybe not four months, but it was at least a few weeks. And yeah, there, we try to get registered with the state of Kentucky when we're trying to trying to least open up distribution in the state. And it was kind of like, well, what papers do you need? Well, I don't know. What do you have? Yeah. And then like you're you're buying and then you're buying whiskey and trying to transfer pause, the government's on shut down and you can't, so then they they're not doing anything. And then they have a backlog. So it takes even longer and you're like, you know, I own several businesses. And it's like, I like to move at a fast pace. I like to get things done. And Kenny's the same way in tech. And it's like when you try to do anything is you have to plan at least eight months in advance because it just takes that much in paperwork, shipping distribution and all this stuff. It's so slow. Wow. Yeah. I mean, our first bottles we were supposed to release of november of 2018. Right now they're supposed to be in September, and 33:57 they didn't Yeah, they didn't release till what December. 34:00 Yeah, late December. Yeah. All right. So you guys, it takes a little while to get some approvals. But you get it you get, you get your look of the bottle and everything ready to go and then you get your first release out. And it's a pretty successful release. It's sold out quickly. Within a within a day. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's who I mean, what new brand can say they sold out their first release in a day. Well, to be fair, it's only it's a single barrel. So it's only 100 fake. You know, that shit, guys, it is. It was surreal. I you know, I thought it I thought it'd be quick, but not that quick. And so it was very, it was very cool. But with that, you know, is new to us and new with our our distributors toolbox. They were just kind of up and running. And so there were a lot of just roadblocks from both ends, like we didn't know how to do customer service or some shippings didn't get, you know, correct, you know, not their fault. Just 35:00 Just things happen, you know, when you're shipping things and you're like, from now on, we got to hold back so many bottles so we can make sure we can cover you know, all the, you know, anything have any things happen because we, we literally need to sell out everything to like recoup our money like so we didn't, you know, keep a bunch of bottles, you know, so we're just like, we need to sell it. And so we definitely learned that aspect. We need to hold back some to 35:24 Yeah, fix any errors. Any you know, on that note, you know, you know, big shout out to Blake. Yeah. What didn't mean what he wasn't trying to talk? No, no, absolutely. But I'm just saying like this. This is only successful because of him so far, right? I mean, yeah, Blake has been a great part. It was it was one of those things when we were I remember being there at our broker. And you know, we had to take a break because there's another person there doing a barrel pick. And we go we're in the break room, and I'm on the phone with Blake because Blake was just like just getting steel blocks off the ground, just like kind of like an idea. And I said like, Alright, man, you got to tell me how this works. 36:00 Because we have a national audience, we're not going to sit there and try to cover the entire US and try to get distribution in all these different states. Like, tell me how it works, right. And so that has been instrumental in being able to get this in the hands of our followers and listeners across the nation. And this is kind of why we are also a big supporter of breaking down the, you know, the Commerce Clause and the opening up shipping between states and everything like that. And, you know, we've we've seen the power of what, not having a distributor can actually give you Yeah, I mean, that's that's really what we've ultimately found at this at the end of the so one of the one of the things that 36:42 what how it's being operated is a threat to the three tier system. And there's so much money behind that and there's so many people out there trying to defend it right now. Do you ever get nervous that this model might come crashing down at any time 37:00 Any minute when we we bring a day. Yeah. And we branched out because that there, there was a time last year. 37:08 In the summer I kind of was like, Alright, we need to kind of diversify how we're going to get this into people's hands. And so we've, we looked at our biggest states and where we have the most listeners or who who have 37:24 followers who's purchased things from us. And so I was like, Alright, let's look at those states. So it was Kentucky, Texas, Georgia. And so I was like, we need to get some distribution, traditional distribution set up in those states, because we want to be able to get just in case something we want to be able to get the product to where we have the most fans. Well, you have you have that's twofold, right? I mean, you have one where you have stores that want their own exclusive single barrels, like they want to be able to have that for their customers. And then second, you can't get away from the eyes that you get just eyeballs Right. I mean, when somebody just goes into a liquor store and they start looking and 38:00 What's on the shelf? What's behind the glass case? Blah, blah, blah, blah. It's a lot easier to get eyeballs on your brand doing that than it is to say, hey, go visit this website. Yeah, right. I was amazed like, when we when our list our audiences found but when you tried it like we did a friends and family barrel where we were like selling just to our friends and family to say thank you for the support, you know, and you know, a lot of my family members are like, like, what do you mean I can't go get on the shelf like I can't go to liquor barn again. I was like, No, you gotta go this website and like ordering like, that sounds like too much work. I was like, really? You'd be on every day. Like while I was gonna say when Bart did they just get internet or 38:38 I've got dollop now, you know, thanks a bit, you got mail. But even just like everyday consumer, you know, people that are whiskey geeks like you tell them they're like, Where can I go get on the shelves. There's still this mindset of in which I like it to like go on the store, talking to people seeing it on the shelf and see what it looks like holding it and so there's definitely that you 39:00 kinda have to like change people's mindset that you can get online order and it'll show up. Yeah. Because there is something about the experience of going to the store. And having that built in audience to it. You want to you want to be able to supply 39:15 you know, meet the demand of this audience, this podcast audience, and how have you all been able to do that aside from silver box? So I mean, that's it's see boxes, it's the main driver, right? I mean, going online was the main driver. And that's only because that is the best mechanism to get it in the most hands across the US. We can't get into everybody's hands because of certain states. But that's why we said traditional distribution. Yeah, I mean, those states and that was one of the things I think I think Ryan had that that lightbulb moment when he had to actually go to Texas for for an event. And he realized Houston alone has more population, the entire state of Kentucky and what just I was in Dallas, but yeah, Dallas has like 7 million people. He says like 11 you're like Kentucky has like 40:00 Three or 4 million people, you know, there's a ton of people here. There's more barrels of bourbon here, then then people as Yeah, like to say so Exactly. We're a small state. But yeah, that's one of the main drivers when we look at population that's and that's one of the things when now we start connecting those dots when we start talking. And you start hearing about other distilleries, and they're like, Oh, I'm sorry, this brand is not going to launch in Kentucky. And people are like, oh, like, you're not gonna launch in your own backyard. And it's like, no, Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Hello Lad n' Ladies, Welcome back to The Timeless Podcast with Alex, Callum and George.Callum is away on this show! So Alex and George discuss the debut story for one of the biggest villains in Doctor Who history!Follow Alex on Twitter: @AlexKing_DomFollow George on Twitter: @untemperedprodFollow Callum on Twitter: CallumMcarthur_Follow The Podcast on Twitter @TheTimelessPodSee you soonAlex, Callum & George!

  The GenderGP Podcast: Facial Feminisation Surgery Special As work continues on the updated WPATH Standards of Care, it is anticipated that the transformative role that Facial Feminisation Surgery can play in the lives of trans feminine individuals, will be given more prominence than ever before. This is largely thanks to the groundbreaking work being carried out by experts in the field, including the specialist surgeons at FacialTeam in Malaga, Spain. In this three-part special, we explore all things FFS; from the theory, with Alexandra Hamer, to the practice with Dr Raul Bellinga and finally the impact, with radio and TV presenter, Stephanie Hirst and her surgeon, Dr Simon. Part 1. Alexandra Hamer - The Principals of Facial Feminisation Surgery Alexandra Hamer has been studying facial gender differences for 18 years. She specialises in understanding what makes a face look feminine or masculine. In this episode she talks to Dr Helen and Marianne about her work in facial feminisation simulation. Using photoshop, Alex helps individuals considering surgery to understand the impact which FFS might have and how to use the minimum number of surgical techniques, to achieve the maximum feminising results. If you have been affected by any of the topics discussed in our podcast, and would like to get in touch, please drop us a line at info@GenderGP.com. You can also contact us on social media where you will find us at @GenderGP on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. We are always happy to accept ideas for future shows, so if there is something in particular you would like us to discuss, or a specific guest you would love to hear from, let us know. Your feedback is really important to us. If you could take a minute or two to leave us a review and rating for the podcast on your favourite podcast app, it will help others to discover us. Links http://www.virtualffs.co.uk Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VirtualFFS https://facialteam.eu/ffs-cost-consultations/virtual-ffs/   The GenderGP Podcast What is Facial Feminisation Surgery? The GenderGP Podcast S5 E4   Hello, this is Dr Helen Webberley. Welcome to our GenderGP Podcast, where we will be discussing some of the issues affecting the trans and non-binary community in the world today, together with my co-host Marianne Oakes, a trans woman herself, and our head of therapy.   Dr Helen Webberley: Welcome, everybody, to this edition of our podcast. I am here with Marianne as usual, and we have a lovely guest today as well. I'd like to welcome Alex, who I think is very exciting because her specialty is virtual facial feminisation. I love the fact that it's facial feminisation because this is going to help a lot of people, but also the fact that this virtual thing is very much what GenderGP is all about. So Alex, let me allow you to introduce yourself and tell us all that you do. Take the floor. Alexandra Hamer: Right. Do you know what I feel? It's really difficult because I have one of those jobs that doesn't have a proper name. People say what do you do? And depending on how much time I've got, the answer can be very long or very short. Anyway, I am Alexandra Hamer, and, so, essentially, I advise people on facial feminisation surgery. I am not a surgeon, I am not a doctor, so it's not that I advise them on the surgery, but I explain what makes their face masculine, and what techniques there are available that can feminise it. And I also simulate the changes in photoshop so that they can get a sense of how those different procedures will look in real life. By doing that, they get a sense of what's important and what isn't important. The thing is, if you go to a surgeon, they will often give you a very long shopping list of procedures, and a lot of those often will make very little difference but will cost you thousands and thousands of pounds. And so I can show people, I can say, look,

For this episode of Breaking Banks, Brett King and long time contributor Alex Jiménez are joined by Lee Wetherington and Benjamin Metz of Jack Henry Digital. They dive into the evolution of digital banking and discuss how Jack Henry Digital has helped community financial institutions stay competitive in this rapidly changing landscape. Join us to hear where customer expectations are headed and what steps financial institutions will need to take in order to meet the growing demand in digital advancement. TOPICS DISCUSSED: [1:00] Brett King and Alex Jimenez talk about current events and the future of banking after COVID-19. [6:58] Ben Metz discusses the importance of community financial institutions and the vitality of remaining competitive.  [9:51] Brett King asks the guests about the human factor of banking versus the digital aspect. [14:10] Extractable has seen a huge spike in customers logging into digital banking during the COVID-19 pandemic. [15:15] Jack Henry & Associates have designed a first of its kind conversational channel feature for Banno digital banking.  [17:30] Community financial institutions are working diligently to remotely service both customers and employees. [21:41] Jack Henry Digital worked with Simmons Bank to roll out a successful digital-first experience.  [35:03] The guests talk data and segmentation. [41:00] What conversation relating to digital banking should be taking place right now in the boardrooms of financial institutions? [49:00] Jack Henry is seeing an increase in digital spend by financial institutions. HOSTS: Brett King Alex Jimenez GUESTS: Lee Wetherington Benjamin Metz RESOURCES MENTIONED: Jack Henry Banking- https://www.jackhenry.com/ Extractable- https://www.extractable.com/ Simmons Bank- https://simmonsbank.com/ Breaking Banks is the #1 global fintech radio show and podcast, created by Brett King. Tune in for a look at how technology and customer behavior will bring about more changes in banking in the next 10 years, than in the last 200 years. Listen every Thursday at 3pm eastern time, noon pacific on the VoiceAmerica Business Channel. Subscribe at Provoke.fm to hear the show nearly 2 million listeners from 72 countries are raving about. FULL TRANSCRIPTION HOSTS: Brett King Alex Jimenez GUESTS: Lee Wetherington Benjamin Metz [Intro] Financial technology or fintech is one of the fastest growing industries in the world today with New York, London, Tel Aviv, Edinburgh, Singapore, Moscow, and other major cities all buy in for a piece of the action. Welcome to Breaking Banks. The first dedicated radio show that focuses on how this new boom is changing everything from the way we bank to the very concept of money itself. Now here’s your host, Brett King. 
Brett King: Welcome to Breaking Banks. We are live from New York city and around the country today with the number one global fintech radio show and podcast. I’m really glad that you guys could join us this week. I am of course I’m your host, Brett King. And joining me to cohost today is Alex Jimenez, chief strategy officer at extractable and longtime fintech mafia pal, Alex, welcome to the show.
Alex Jimenez: Thanks for having me. It’s been many years coming. 
Brett King: Yeah, it has. So actually we’re just about to come into ourSeventh year, right? Cause May is the anniversary. I have to check on that what the anniversary date is, but we probably need to do a birthday anniversary show. That’ll be fun. So Alex, before I introduce our guests how have you and your team been coping during the coronavirus crisis? 
Alex Jimenez: Well, there’s a few of us to work remotely, so we’re nothing really has changed for us, but the majority of our team sits in San Francisco and certainly they have been working out of their homes for the past several weeks now. And seems to live in san Francisco, they live in very small apartments. So they’re all going stir crazy. 
Brett King: But you guys are well equipped to do it remotely,

How do we look? Time flies fast and we've aged to 30 episodes! We think 30 is where you hit your stride, where you're free to do whatever you want! So Alex finished FF7 Remake (no spoilers), Adrian finished Ori and the Blind Forest, and in between it all we threw an online party to celebrate! We love talking games, Japan life, and podcasting! Thanks for being with us, and we hope to continue making more and more fun episodes for you to enjoy! 1. Intro 2. The Games We Play: Final Fantasy VII: Remake, Persona 5: Scramble, Ori and the Blind Forest 3. News: FF7R sales, Japan game sales, PS5 woes, Cyberpunk + Xbox One X 4. Closing Announcements Send us a voice message or give us a shout on Twitter @UGP_cast! Remember to subscribe and leave a review on iTunes^^ UGP Streams: Now Playing Nioh, DJ Max -> twitch.tv/ninjatrix YouTube, Instagram and other SNS links: Unknown Games Podcast Music Credits from OC Remix: Opening: Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars "Super Mega Ultra Pipe House" by DDRKirby(ISQ) Ending: Pokémon Diamond Version "Knowing Your Roots" by Arceace --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ugpcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ugpcast/support

Time to talk about books! Since Mike and Alex have been staying indoors for a while, they thought they should read a little! So Alex gave Mike a book, and vice versa. How did that go? Listen to find out! / Have questions or suggestions for The Weekly Undertaking? Visit our website at weeklyundertaking.fun / Post-Fun, our podcast network is here for you! Visit postfun.info to learn more and to see how you can get involved! / Illustrations by Winston De Jesus, if you like his beautiful creations, check out his Facebook page at @wdejesusart / Music by Adam Rudy, if you like the sweet tunes, find him on all social media at @TVsAdamRudy / Twitter: @TWUpodcast / Instagram: @weeklyundertaking / Episode 87

We started off the year talking about Scotch… and now…we’re talking Irish Whiskey? It’s not another April Fool’s joke. We had the opportunity to sit down and capture one of the most interesting stories in Irish Whiskey with Alex Conyngham, co-founder of Slane Irish Whiskey. We talk castles and rock concerts because that’s one big aspect of his history. Then we get into the dynamics of Irish whiskey and if there are commonalities between bourbon like sourcing, regulation, and financing a distillery. Then we discuss the role Brown-Forman plays and how they are trying to appeal to both bourbon and Irish Whiskey consumers. Show Partners: The University of Louisville has an online Distilled Spirits Business Certificate that focuses on the business side of the spirits industry. Learn more at uofl.me/bourbonpursuit. Barrell Craft Spirits is always trying to push the envelope of blending whiskey in America. Learn more at BarrellBourbon.com. Receive $25 off your first order at RackHouse Whiskey Club with code "Pursuit". Visit RackhouseWhiskeyClub.com. Show Notes: DISCUS hand sanitizer portal: https://www.distilledspirits.org/distillers-responding-to-covid-19/distilleries-producing-hand-sanitizer/ Less than 100 bottles left from 3 different barrels of Pursuit Series left on Seelbachs: https://seelbachs.com/search?q=pursuit This week’s Above the Char with Fred Minnick talks about drinking bourbon during the COVID-19 pandemic. Where did you grow up and how did you get into whiskey? Tell us about your rock concerts. How did you decide to do the concerts? What is a good Irish cocktail? Where is Slane? What makes Irish whiskey unique? Do people source Irish whiskey? What is the process? How did you decide to start the distillery? Did you use a consultant to get started? What's glamping? Tell us about your dad. How did you finance the distillery? What was it like to work with Brown-Forman? How big is the distillery? What age can you sell Irish whiskey? Tell us about the whiskey? Do you have your own yeast? What's the typical Irish whiskey proof? How long are you aging? Tell us about your packaging. Would bourbon drinkers like Slane Irish whiskey? Tell us about the ultra premium Irish whiskey category. What is the price point? 0:00 Have you held a bottle of bourbon in your hand and wondered, how is this made? Sure, there's the grains and the barrels and all that science that goes into it. But what about the package design, class manufacturing, shipping logistics, or purchase orders for thousands of cork stoppers. These are only a handful of things that you need to know. But with the University of Louisville online distilled spirits business certificate, you're only a few clicks away from learning from industry experts from renowned spirits businesses like brown Forman, jack daniels, and more. Learn more about this online six course certificate at U of l.me. Slash bourbon pursuit. 0:37 Well, listen, I always love drinking Irish whiskey in the heart of bourbon country. 0:53 Hale you cool cats and kittens out there. It's Episode 247 of bourbon pursuit. I'm one of your hosts Kenny. 1:00 I hope you're hanging in there because I'm trying to hang in there. We're all watching Tiger came together to try to get through this. But in the midst of all what's going on, not much has been happening with actual bourbon. And the industry has kind of been shifting focus to figure out how it can help the situation. So we've got some more updates there for you on that. And as you know by now with our reports last week that many facilities have turned overproduction to begin making hand sanitizer. Last week reported that discuss or better known as the distilled spirits Council of the United States was working with the federal government on including distilleries into the Cova 19 relief plan, and they were successful. As a part of the economic relief package. Congress has eased tax regulations so that distillers producing desperately needed hand sanitizer to address the nationwide shortfall would not have to pay a federal excise tax on the alcohol use. This package also includes measures to help small business loans and small business operating costs, that many smaller distilleries around the nation are going to need 2:00 While their doors are closed for visitors, and if you're in the medical field and you're looking for sanitization supplies, or need some for your local community, discus has created a portal that lists every distillery in the US making hand sanitizer. The portal also lists distillers who need supplies, and those who need help distributing, you can get this with the link in our show notes. We've also been seeing more control states getting tighter, Alabama has closed down several locations, but Pennsylvania still remains the only state that has all 600 of its brick and mortar stores currently closed. This has led to other opportunities for distilleries in Pennsylvania to begin shipping directly to Pennsylvania residents as well as doing curbside pickup. While discus has also been urging the government officials to reopen their doors immediately. Some Pennsylvania residents are even going to extreme measures of driving to places like Delaware, New Jersey and New York to stock up and the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board is now discussing 3:00 The possibility of reopening online ordering during this time. And two weeks ago, we reported on Kentucky House Bill 415. And what that could mean for interstate commerce. A version of the bill has passed that allows distilleries to ship bourbon and other spirits directly to consumers. Now, here's what it means for shipments coming into the state of Kentucky. So out of state distilleries and retailers can purchase a shipping permit for shipping distilled spirits, wine and malt beverages into the state of Kentucky. shipment details need to be submitted to the Department of Revenue every month or a 15% tax on the grocery receipt must be paid. Now here's what it means for shipments going out of state. In state holders of these permits that allow the sale of alcohol by the package will be able to ship to consumers outside of reciprocal states but also following state and local laws of that particular consumer. Now it's important to note that this bill would only affect shipping 4:00 In other spirits from the top of Kentucky's three tier system, that means it's the producer, leaving out the distributors and the retailers now giving consumers the option to purchase direct from the distillery. This is only available so far in Kentucky but serves as a benchmark and a template that other states could soon follow. So it's a huge win for consumers out there. House Bill 415 will head to the full Kentucky house for a vote relatively soon. As this pandemic continues, we've seen an explosion in e commerce. Many platforms like drizzly and thirsty are going to beat their annual projections by five or six x. It's finally a revolution into the digital age for spirits because it's an industry that's been lacking for far too long. And next week's podcast is featuring Corey rellis, the CEO of drizzly, so make sure you tune in and don't miss that. And as a small plug, we've got less than 100 bottles left from three different barrels of pursuit series. 5:00 left on seal box comm we know it sucks being stuck at home. But hopefully you can do it just a little bit more with some hand selected barrels from the bourbon pursuit team. Are you really bored at home? Like so bored that you would even have a conversation with Alexa? Well, the team over at go bourbon calm decided to put it to the test. And they asked Alexa, what's your favorite bourbon? And she replied, definitely bullet. They even quizzed Alexa on bourbon by asking, what's the difference between bourbon and scotch? So if you're looking to sit there and put Alexa to the test, go on, give it a try. See what you come up with. We started off the year in 2020, talking about scotch and now we're talking about Irish whiskey, who would have thought, but we had the opportunity to sit down and capture one of the most interesting stories in Irish whiskey. Alex Cunningham is one of the founders of slain Irish whiskey. We talked about way more than just whiskey though. First, we talk about castles and rock concerts, because that's 6:00 One big aspect of his history. Then we get into the dynamics of Irish whiskey. And if there's some commonalities between it and bourbon, such as sourcing regulation, and how do you go about financing a distillery in say, Ireland, then we discuss the role of brown Forman and what they are doing and trying to make bourbon and Irish Whiskey consumers happy at the end of the day. If you're a part of the bourbon pursuit Patreon community, make sure you're joining john and the other folks over the discord server where there's a virtual happy hour happening almost every single day and zoom. I think by now many of us are becoming experts in zoom. So come in and join in the fun. All right, let's get on with the show. Here's Joe from barrel bourbon. And then you've got Fred minich, with above the char 6:46 I'm Joe Beatrice, founder of barrel craft spirits, we're always trying to push the envelope of blending whiskey in America. Find out more at barrel bourbon calm. 6:56 I'm Fred medic, and this is above the char as well. 7:00 All isolated and supposed to stay six feet away from one another one very odd and very good consequences came up from this for me personally, and that is my TV bourbon is going dry. If you've listened to this podcast before, you would have heard me complain at one point or another about my TV bourbon and how that's the one vise that I have when it comes to sipping a little too much. That's right my TV bourbon as I'm watching the Vikings are justified or Better Call Saul or reruns of Breaking Bad or the wire. I find myself having one bourbon two Bourbons. Whoa, boy, let me have a third and hey, after that, let's go ahead and have a nightcap of a fourth. It's happened met sometimes twice in a week and you know what? That whiskey goes straight to my hips and my belly and I tell you what, it's the one thing that I cannot shake when I'm in the gym but 8:00 For whatever reason, I just don't want to sit on the couch and watch TV as we're isolated. You know what I'm doing. I'm cleaning stuff, organizing things. I'm doing all the things that I was supposed to do you know, when I first got married, and I just kept putting them off and putting them off and putting them off. This past week, I taught my son how to use a drill and we fix the fence and fix the door and I cleaned the garage and I'm like, holy cow, Who's this guy? Where's he been the last 15 years. This isolation business has made me productive, more clean. And I'm actually on a really good schedule with my tastings. The one thing that I have given up, it seems, is my TV bourbon. I learned long ago to look on the bright side. So I hope you're able to find some comfort and find some things right now that helps you get through this time of isolation. And hey, maybe it's a bourbon. Maybe it's two, but I do recommend not doing it while you're watching TV because 9:00 that could lead to four or five. And that's this week's above the char Hey, you heard me mentioned all this stuff that I'm doing with my tastings. I'm doing nightly live tastings every day at nine o'clock on my YouTube. I'm doing a face off of something in my office. Never know what that's going to be. So make sure you go to my YouTube and click that subscribe button and notifications. So you can check it out. Until next week. Cheers. 9:30 Welcome back to the episode of bourbon pursuit the official podcast of bourbon. But you know, we might be branching out every once in a while and trying new things. And in today's episode, we are again branching out from bourbon trying something different. Because you know, we get we get kind of stuck in our hole in Kentucky and we think that you know, bourbon is the all be all and there's this whole other world of whiskey out there. You know, you've got sir Yeah, exactly. 9:58 I mean, we forget that 10:00 bourbon is just such a small segment of the whiskey category in itself, you know, you've got scotch and today we're gonna be looking at Irish whiskey. You know, we've I've been to Ireland, I've been to Dublin I've, I've, I've had a few of them over there. And I've, I've enjoyed them. I really know the powers of the world and stuff like that. And I'm excited about our guests being able to to try something that's new. That's, you know, that they're building and everything out of there, too. Yeah, and I'm ready to start this Irish Whiskey pursuit podcast. You know, what we should we should licenses what we need to do now. With everything proceed. 10:35 Now I know we talked about scotch and rums and Irish Whiskey is one of the few things I have had and like, kinda really enjoyed because it kind of reminds me a lot of similarities of bourbon not so much but it's just, it's more approachable I guess from a bourbon standpoint to make the transition to it. So, but the thing is, I know nothing about it as usual other than Ireland. It comes from Ireland. 11:00 It's Irish. And yeah, so I'm excited to meet our guests. And this is a beautiful looking product and excited to hear what is Irish whiskey and about this product and let's taste it. Yeah, absolutely. So today on the show, we have Alex Cunningham. Alex is the co founder of slean Irish whiskey. So Alex, welcome to the show. Thank you very much. Now, we had talked about this before because I thought I was gonna butcher your name. incredibly bad because it is spelled This is Cunningham, by the way, and you know where we come from around here. It's like see you and and I am his his CEO in y in gh am so I thought it was gonna be something that can be like, how can I say this? He's like, he's like cutting him. And I was like, that's awesome. We just like to confuse people. Yeah. But you'd mentioned that really hadn't been somebody eons ago. They just changed it. Yeah, we put the wire in there and actually the wire ties in with our with our family Christ, I guess. So. That goes all the way back to the 1100s and it's in it's on the bottle of slains that was 12:00 Before the See you in and I am so I think that's probably where the posers I think that's probably when everybody came over and they had to change their names that probably had something to do with that. Yeah, my family history had that same exact thing happened to them as well. So, but anyway, I kind of want to talk and let's start a little bit from the beginning about you, you know talk about where you kind of grew up assuming it's Ireland because you you know, you're definitely not from like, East Texas is what it sounds like, you know, kind of talked about where you grew up and kind of how you got into whiskey. Sure. slain is the place that's where I call home and we named the whiskey after that. It's a stunning little village about 45 minutes north of Dublin, in an area called the Boyne Valley. And believe it or not Irish Whiskey was bigger than scotch back in the 1800s. And there were a lot of distilleries in the boiling Valley because we are on limestone bedrock there. So we've got great water. Same is here. Yeah, exactly. There's a reason though. scotch and Irish like 13:00 Kentucky because they were off to that water for making whiskey. 13:04 Earlier today, yeah, good horses, Motherland, but it's hotter and hill here. Exactly. He's patenaude. He goes a little bit. It's okay. So yeah, the water quality's really important. That's why a lot of the distilleries were there. And also we got some of the best farmland in the country. And so I farm as well. My family's been farming and slain for generations, and we grow barley. And we weren't growing that historically to give it to capital for feed. But we love our Irish whiskey. So we said Why the hell are we giving it to the cattle wouldn't be a lot more fun to turn it into whiskey. So they set out to do your crop rotate. Yes, are really Yeah, really important. It didn't actually used to happen too much, but monoculture and continuous is not a continuous crop cultivation ain't good for the ground. So what we do now is we introduce rotation crops, we plant Hydros every year to boost the biodiversity. So after a crop of volume I put in beans it'll put the nitrogen back in the soil. It'll again 14:00 Putting nitrogen eggs. And I think you're talking right my alley over my knees like, let's talk coding. 14:07 It's a big part of it right you've got a good whiskey comes from good ingredients. Sure we take that very seriously, but we're the only Irish distillery that would be surrounded by its own land bank. So we've got 1500 acres surrounding the distillery. I grew up about 2000 tons of barley, and you can make a lot of whiskey from that. So that was one of the reasons we got into the business in the first place. My Irish Whiskey journey, I guess, started I was a brand ambassador back in 1999, working on the leading Irish whiskey in the category, so that was where my journey started. But it wasn't until the Reddit is a Jamison Bernie che was okay, just a guess. Yeah. And you know, and that that brand has opened up the category for Irish. And now I think people are looking for a little bit more choice, but 14:52 we started our own journey with the whiskey app slain, really back in around 2009. So slightly 15:00 At that time, the family home is called slaying castles. So that's where I grew up big old rambling place pretty cold, but wonderful. Hide and Seek was good. And this is this is like real castles not like Walt Disney kind of castles is real. It's a real kitty castle. Yeah, and this is a real one. But there's a big responsibility to a place like that going. So we have survived by diversifying and back in the early 80s. My dad Henry, who I started this brand with decided he was going to turn the front garden into a rock music venue. And so we started doing rock concerts in 81. With a you to the opening act at first show. 15:42 Yeah, so that was good. And the gate you do? Well, they were just starting out everybody, somewhere. And then since then we've had everyone from the stones, Bowie Springsteen, and on three weeks time, we're gonna be having Metallica arriving and we just went to Metallica city. 16:00 It's awesome. Yeah, it's really good. He's had the chance to meet all those people. But now he gets the idea. It's like that 16:07 level, right? This is the real highlight. Yeah, we're the A plus plus. Yeah, totally. So that's gonna be a good show, and we'll be selling, slain to that crowd. So we're gonna have a bit of fun. So we came out of rock and roll and capitalized on the awareness of slain. By adding value to the barley, we grow ourselves and turning into whiskey, which is something that we love drinking. But learning how to make it was a whole different journey. I want to hit on this rock and roll part a little bit more. So kind of like why why did the idea of saying like, let's just turn the front garden into a concert venue, like a field of dreams, we'll build it and they will come? Yeah, well, slightly. So Ireland was a pretty tough place in the late 70s, early 80s. We had some difficult times in the country and dad loved his rock and roll. And he had to find ways to bring extra income in in that climate. And he just said, let's give a chance for everyone to forget about the troubles for a day and come together through music and practice. 17:00 approached him from Belfast, and they didn't have any money to put the gig on so a guy from the east on the lending who became known as Mr. Everything, because everything's gonna be alright and 17:12 he put up the money and they managed to put that first gig on and then you know we're now Ireland's leading outdoor music. How many people are we talking about? 80,000 Wow, wow. Okay, so it's a big garden so it's like Nokes, or I forget, I forget it's like a castle like I got to keep that in my head here like it's pretty massive. Yeah, not for castle. Yeah, but yeah, an actual castle. Yeah, so lots of people have made that journey to slain and I know they get the chance to try the whiskey while sir or while so there as well. So we're going to be smashing it. Some slang cocktails on the day for Metallica. So should be good fun. You gotta get a particular cocktail you go to because around here it's it's old fashions Manhattan's you know that's that's kind of the go twos and you can mix it with a rye or bourbon, but kind of talk about like a an Irish type of cocktail. It's used with Irish whiskey. Yeah, well, funny. There's there's a good amount of 18:00 American influence in slain and actually makes a surprisingly good old fashioned no that's maybe a little controversial as we're hearing a lot about okay, but we've got our readers off some really nice heavy brown sugar notes in the liquid and I think that works very well for an old fashioned in fact the bath one of the better ones I've tasted had no sugar syrup a little huh no it's that's the way to do it. I mean, you know, no flavor additives or anything like that. The D model the cherries or do you kind of like I love a bit of modeling you know? Yeah. 18:31 No muddler no muddler for you? Yeah, but you got you got to do the look sardos yeah they're like oh my god I'll delicious if there's there's no like sorrows and like send it back. Now getting so geographically where where is slain? So you're talking in between Dublin and Belfast on the East Coast were a few miles inland, as I said in the boiling Valley. So if you're heading straight up from Dublin about 45 minute journey 18:58 and we literally have the room 19:00 Boyne which is our water supply for the distillery flows right through the farm. Okay, well with the rock who's the you met some cool people I know obviously us but who are some of the most memorable or do you have any stories like of festivals like that? You know Come on. Yeah, well when I when it comes to what happens with artists what what what happens in slain stays and slay it's like Vegas, but Nivea. I have been lucky enough to to to meet some and and 19:28 Dave Grohl springs to mind when the Foo Fighters played. He was an absolute gentle learner in here he performed in the pouring rain and did an outstandingly good gig. Total gentleman. So yeah, I think they love coming to slain because it's a very special place. There's a benefit of the Irish crowd. We got the backdrop of the castle and the river and then of course the whiskey added bonus. So talk about Irish whiskey. What makes obviously being from Ireland, but what what goes into an Irish was good and makes it you know, unique. 20:00 So I think Irish is a category is seeing some really strong growth in this country and it's doing doing pretty well in Kentucky for us. I think it's a very approachable category. So in terms of the definitions, we got a pretty extensive technical file that governs the rules are making Irish whiskey and I won't go into too much detail but what's different about slain I suppose the distillery is we actually make three different types of whiskey at the whim of distillery. So across the water in Scotland, you typically have a malt distillery or you have a grain distillery. slains actually got pots and columns. So we got three parts deals, because we believe in triple distillation. And then we got six column stills, because we're a protected heritage site. So we can build two tall columns, which would be what you normally do, we have to split the two into three and six columns. That allows us to make three different types of Irish whiskey. So you've got grain whiskey, which is a little similar 21:00 To I guess American as in its column distilled can be a mash bill of malt and other cereals. Then we make triple cereals that's that's when we don't hear too often. You know, most people will talk about different grains, you know, early cereals too often Yeah. Is that an Irish thing? Or just I guess is that is that analogous to a? No, that's probably maybe a bit of an Alex thing. I am a farmer. So I guess we grow different cereals on the farm, primarily barley, though. But the pot stills that we have, we make two different types of whiskey out of that we do a triple still malt whiskey, which is from 100% malted barley, so that's kind of similar to scotch. But then we do something called parts still, which is only made in Ireland. And you take a malted and unmalted, barley and the mash bill and you run it through the pot stills, and that leads to some really big charactered kind of quite oily, delicious whiskies that develop dried fruit nuts, they get older, and we are making that claim now but it's going to take a bit of time for those to be ready. So that's a few years away. What we're focusing 22:00 on now is our slain blend. And I think you asked what makes Irish whiskey. Not all Irish Whiskey is triple distill, but a lot of it is and we believe in that too. And that delivers a really lovely, smooth, accessible character. But what we've done on top of that is we've developed a triple cast maturation. So that adds character. So triple the steel for smoothness, triple cost for character. What do you mean by triple cast? So like, is it honoring? Sure, sure. It says it right here in the label. Let me see. So we've got a, I see virgin, Virgin season and Sherry. Okay, so it is right there in the label. Yeah, so three very different animals. So as they go through each cask in separately or as a like a blend of the three different guests know, so it's a little bit like when you're mixing your music, we like to do them separately so that you get a lot more control, because then when it comes to the blending of the three, you can actually fully dial in to the impact of the one barrel. So this is not a sequential, we're not taking the same batch and running. 23:00 Through a library. So effectively what we what we did is so the distillery went into production about a year and a half ago. So fairly recently now anyone who knows anything about whiskey is you don't make whiskey that quick. So to get ourselves started, we actually bought malt and grain whiskey from other distilleries in Ireland, between three and about 10 years. And it was good juice. But we wanted to try and create our own flavor profiles. So we actually took that liquid, we blended it in different proportions and split it between three different barrels for roughly two more years, and that secondary maturation are owned. So let's we'll feed through the same violin program, but it's those three different barrels that give you the unique kind of rich, robust character slang. So is that pretty is that common and are like this, so for sourcing to start out, because it's pretty common here? Yeah. So we're up to, we're up to about a, I think, close to 20 distilleries, okay, and come from a base of only three 24:00 So this has all happened in the last five years or so. So Irish Whiskey just like it is happening here a lot of distilleries are springing up and yeah to get themselves started. They are they are sourcing from others and we did that too. And we're we're perfectly honest about that. I guess the difference is we didn't just buy what we bought and create a plan and put it out to market we actually spent two years doing our own maturation at slain to try and build our own flavor profile. Is it so like here when we source was I don't we source our own? Do you have to go like through brokers and like or can you just go straight to the story? What's the process like over there? To buy the whiskey? Yeah, to that whiskey. Yeah, I mean, at one time Irish Whiskey because of the growth that was going on, it was pretty hard to get supply. But we were lucky enough that we did get some good juice and some of it was quite old as well, which wasn't wasn't easy, and we probably paid a pretty penny for it. But again, we wanted to deliver one slain launch, we wanted the best possible liquid and that's why we bought good whiskey to start 25:00 With and did spend an extra two years staying out of the market to add that triple cast character. So it came with a cost but I think it was worth it for sure in this was 2009 timeframe is when this started. And then I started out small reasons. So the 2009 we originally myself and dad, we played in the whiskey sector and slightly different brand attached to slain initially. So we worked with other distilleries at that time. And then there was big changes in the industry and about 2012 big acquisitions happened. And we actually lost our supply at that stage. And then we did what I had always wanted to do, which was to build our own distillery, because ultimately, the only way to have full control and credibility, I think, is to build your own distillery and it was a bit of a crazy journey to get there. But But we did. So when you're you approached your dad, you're like, we're gonna start a whiskey company, her words, you know, what was his initial reaction? Yeah, I mean, look, if you 26:00 grow up in a place like slain. Dad always taught me you know you are, you're never going to own this place. You're just protecting it for the next generation. So that that that long term vision, you need that in the whiskey business. So nothing happens in a day. So people thought were a bit crazy was actually dad's idea to start it and dad as a maverick. I mean, he was the guy who opened the front garden and invited them Lizzie to come stomp around so he what he wasn't fitting was another good banner. Yeah, well, one of the great tracks whiskey in the jar, you know, which dad used to love playing in the nightclub, which we also haven't had in the castle back in the day. So whiskey. 26:38 Whiskey was always a global bag with you. 26:42 I got a big suitcase. 26:44 But, uh, No dad, it was dad's idea to start the whiskey because he he puts laying on the map through the gigs and we wanted to find a way to I guess capitalize on that. Plus, you know, he and I love drinking whiskey and we're already 27:00 growing the raw materials so that the kind of the stars aligned. And to see these buildings which are right next to the castle, they're the old 18th century stables. And ultimately they were linked to the farm. So they had grain stores, for example, they now they are now home to the distillery. So we're kind of its history repeating a few like, we're adding the value on site, creating local employment and making some great whiskey. So like, we're when you're starting a whiskey company over there, like are you like, because I'm assuming you didn't know how to make whiskey if I didn't. So is there like consultants and experts kind of like your you know, their, you know, the late day pick roll a lot of people use to kind of, you know, help get them started getting the recipes figured out? How did y'all go about that? So I would have to say the Irish Whiskey industry is very collaborative, and I got a lot of good support from other people in the industry. I asked a hell of a lot of people a lot of questions and I kind of learned as I as I went along. I learned a little bit of I guess, from my 28:00 Ambassador is a little bit about selling whiskey but didn't know much about making it. Now I don't profess to be a master distiller and master blender. But if we were going to build a distillery, I needed to know what we were doing and where we were putting our money. So I visited distilleries in Ireland, Scotland over here in America probably annoyed a lot of people a lot of questions. But we built up what I would call a old school distillery in terms of how we make the whiskey. So we got wooden wash backs, we got a hand beaten, copper pot stills, three of them. But when it comes to how we kind of make it, there's a lot of state of the art stuff there as well. So sustainability is something that's really important to me. And so we have a lot of energy recovery built in. So whenever we're heating something up, we're cooling something down. And we've even invested in an anaerobic digester on site which will take those what some people call waste. After distillation. We'll be feeding that to microorganisms. 29:00 They create by gas and when we burned by gas to heat stills, so that's going to reduce our carbon footprint by about 25 to 30%. So everything was slain is built to last and I hope that was slain. You know, it's not just about protecting for the next generation, it's actually leaving at that and when you start it, that's all right. Where did you get that from? Was that, you know, was that ingrained in your family? Or is that yes, I think ingrained in family and it's just it's, I guess, my own personal belief. 29:28 My wife Kareena, who? Who runs an amazing glamping site, and other reason comes slain on long like glamping Yeah, that's been a thing. I'm sorry. It's glamping be right up your alley. It's like camping for for techies. Oh, exactly. I'm, I'm on board. Yeah. So so we have an organic farm and we grow veggies and we rare animals and we obviously produce barley. But the glamping allows people to kind of stay in immerse themselves in the landscape. So that kind of lower footprint style of living is just hi myself in Korean. I like to live our lives. If we 30:00 Can and the lessons that we've learned that we apply to how we make our whiskey. Talk about your dad, kind of like what those lessons that he put on you or like. He said he was a maverick, but he is kind of talking about more about him. So he's a maverick, but he's got great intent. And, you know, he has done, you know, I wouldn't be sitting here and we wouldn't be involved in slaying if he hadn't kept the show on the road by by putting those gigs on back in the day. And he's a very resilient, determined individual. He's also one of my best friends. And we've had a lot of fun working together. I think what he taught me is you, you need to be prepared to take risks in life. 30:41 But just don't hurt anybody along the way. 30:44 And do things as as best you can. And I think that's how we've tried to approach the whiskey and that's why we ultimately stayed out of the market a little bit longer to spend those two extra years and proven the whiskey. So I think he's he's taught me to 31:00 I guess the other big lesson is do what you love but make sure you have fun doing it. So kind of talk about his his growth path because was was he ever involved in the whiskey industry he just like drinking was, again joy drinking that he didn't have any connection to to to whiskey in the past. So it's a new thing for us as a family. Bryce's closest connection was you working working? Yeah, well, it's I guess, yeah. And maybe I guess that's where, you know, when he had that lightning bolt of let's get into the whiskey business. I just as soon as he sat at all the pennies dropped. I was like, You are so right. This is something we need to do. And people thought we were crazy to do it at the time because it's a good few years ago, and I've been at this for 10 years. But look at where Irish Whiskey is now and where it's going. You know, it's really growing as a category in this country. And this is the number one market in the world for Irish Whiskey America. So it's important not in Ireland. No art DPR 31:59 the Irish had gotten behind. 32:00 You know, we were down to very few brands a few years ago and, and it's great to see all these distilleries springing up and more and more people are coming to Ireland for Irish whiskey, you know, you've got the Kentucky bourbon trail here, which is amazing. But the Irish Whiskey trail is getting going as well. So I would encourage anybody who does want to come to Ireland to make sure they get on that trail and, you know, short come to slain but there's lots of other good distilleries as well, to kind of talk about the bootstrapping process you know, you want to go and you want to start creating a distillery you know, Ryan already talked about the, you know, finding the right people and figuring that out. But like, monetarily, like you've gotta you got to figure out like, how far in debt Do we have to go to figure this out are quite fun. Yeah. 32:50 What do you get if you mix Seattle craft, Texas heritage, and Scottish know how that's to bar spirits to bar spirits traces its roots to a ranch in rural Texas, running 33:00 By the founder, Nathan Kaiser his family for six generations, Nathan grew up on the ranch with stories of relatives bootlegging moonshine. And after moving into Seattle, he wanted to keep the family tradition alive. And he opened to bar spirits in 2012. They're very traditional distillery making everything from scratch and each day starts by milling 1000 pounds of grain. Their entire product lineup consists of only two whiskies, their moonshine and the only bourbon made in Seattle. 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We had designed the entire distillery and that meant our own efforts, but we did bring in some very talented people. We had a scotch stellar on board. We had one of the people who originally designed the Middleton distillery, which is down in County Cork, so we had a good team on board. And one of the proudest moments actually was when brown Forman came on board. And we shared that our technical designs we kind of expected, you know, hey, we know what we're doing making whiskey. We'll do it our own way, but actually they took the designers read and made a couple of 35:00 modifications on energy recovery that I hadn't spotted, but generally they took it as read. But financing it was was tough up until that point and we had to pay the deposit on all of the stills. Our sales come from Macmillan and Scotland. There's only two makers. There's an unsightly left and Ireland but there's four sides to Macmillan, we went with Macmillan. And that was a pretty penny to pay that deposit. And had we not done that we would have lost our place in the queue because there's such demand for stills. So I had a few sleepless nights over that one. But I was lucky enough to meet Gavin Brown, who's one of the brown family members. And we had an amazing lunch where we spoke about the potential for Irish Whiskey but actually more about what it means to be a family business and thinking about next generation. And ultimately, that led further down the road to getting the deal done. And we got that done in 2015. And pretty much as soon as we signed that deal. We started building the distillery who made that initial call or new 36:00 Meaning, like really seeking you an Irish Whiskey coming out? Or were you like looking for investors to kind of help get you past that dip? You know, is this that I call? Yeah, Brian foam was a company audit mode for for a long time. And they I knew they had publicly stated they wanted to get into the Irish category. So I guess we both had something the other party wanted but ultimately, you're like I got exactly what you're looking for. Yeah, but that's not the way it comes down to the people. And, and ultimately, it's about relationships and myself and dad felt comfortable working with what is essentially another family business. And not only that, they know how to make great whiskey. And what's really exciting about what's happened with slain or bland is actually the barrels that they bring to the table as well, because we have, I guess an advantage over some of the other brands in terms of those barrels that we can access. Mm hmm. You have an endless supply. I've seen it. Yeah, we do. We have an endless supply, but it's not just the 37:00 It's not just the level of supply, it's the quality that goes with us. Sure. So we've been able to tap into some barrels that others just can't, I'm always interested in, because I'm an entrepreneur, but not nearly on your own scale. But like, when you get absorbed by, you know, not absorbed or purchased by another company. What's it like, like, because you're when you're, you're doing everything you can to hustle and mostly make it work and do everything. And then every decision goes through you, but now you have like, you know, a parent company to kind of like, guide you and teach you like, how's that? Like, like, because you're like, Well, I know what I'm doing. But they're like, No, we know what we're doing. So what's that relationship? Why Yeah, it's a it's a transition. I guess. It's an intriguing question. I think a good one. You know, when you've I remember in the early days when the phone rang, and be like, you know, hello, welcome slaying whiskey and they're like, Can I can I speak to a marketing department? It's like, Yeah, sure. 37:52 Hello. 37:54 So you get the dollar. So 37:57 yeah, let me check to see if the rain yeah 38:00 I completely that's how it works, right and, and you're fighting as a small and then suddenly you got all of these resources and additional people. 38:09 For me, it's worked really well, because they have been incredibly inclusive, I'm still very involved in everything from liquid decisions to how we communicate about brand and how we behave. So I think the key to success is making sure that you respect and include what you started with, and it's gone better than expected. They're really good people to work with. So they're going to help embrace your core principles. Absolutely. Yeah. But they bring so much to the table. It's not just the barrels, you know, they got they got great technical expertise. So when we were when we were putting the blend together that involved it was a collaborative approach between Ireland and and some of the expertise over here, you know, and, and that worked really, really well. So I think it's a it's, I'm happy with where it's landed, for sure. So how big is the operation now? 39:00 That's over and slain. So the distillery can produce roughly we're not up to that yet, but if it could probably about the equivalent of about 600,000 cases of whiskey a year, but we're, you know, we're we're warming up slowly. young age. Yeah, you got age. So there's one thing you need in this business, it's patience. Yeah. But you know, because we make three different types of whiskey and we're planning for the future, as well as supplying stuff that will feed into the blend, where we're pretty busy. We're not up to capacity, but production certainly ramping up. So bourbon like typical as you know, alright, before we can start selling it was it with Irish as though the rules are kind of three years in a day, okay. But, you know, I would never want us to release anything until it's ready. And that's kind of the key is just give it the time it needs. Having tastes a lot of Irish I think, certainly over for the minimum for the grain. 40:00 Then malt is going to take longer. And then pot still actually takes the longest. So that's why our launches will come over, you know, give me 20 years, we'll have a lot of rain. And I'm looking forward to that. But we just focus on the blend for now. Very cool. Well, let's try it. Yeah, let's let's actually right. We've done a lot of talk him and he's, yeah, Do y'all have like a jeers thing in Irish last what was what was the scotch one? I guess? So it's similar. It's all derived from Gaelic, okay, so scotch Gaelic and Irish Gaelic? reasonably similar. But in Ireland, it's a little different. So it's launcher. launcher. launcher in a second. Okay, okay. I don't think it's actually a word, but I just made it one. So kind of kind of talk about the whiskey a little Sure. Okay, so firstly, it's an Irish Whiskey blend. So blends account for a good a good proportion of Irish Whiskey volume that is sold. 40:53 Blend means you're putting two different whiskey types in this case together. So you put malt whiskey and grain whiskey. 41:00 In the same in the same blend. However, what we did was the whiskey that that we originally purchased would have all been in American whiskey barrels, which 41:11 the vast majority of Irish and scotch is matured in American whiskey barrels because you guys can only use them once here and we are very grateful thanks very not very sustainable. Well, you know it Do you know what, it's fine because those barrels do not go to waste very, we say thanks a million we'll have those so they come over to Ireland. So that had all been an American whiskey barrels. But as I said, we then spent two years doing a secondary maturation which is which is the triple cost it brings all this lovely character. So when we're tasting slain probably makes sense to talk about these vowels individually and we can try and pick up some of that some of the notes that are there. So I just threw this will do so. Start on the nose. Now probably one of the things is going to hit you strongly as this lovely vanilla hit. Nice rich have even Yeah, for me. It's like 42:00 boozy banana foster like, bananas false now you're talking my language. Yeah, it's like, yeah, real boozy with the we talked about the caramelized sugars. You know, the torch just got off of it. Yeah, no, I like that. Actually, that delves into the second barrel. I'll focus on the first one. Sorry. No, no, no, you're totally right because a banana foster now is absolutely where we're at. And I'm delighted to pick that up. The vanilla head that comes first is really coming from that first barrel, which is a virgin American oak. made right here in Kentucky at Brown Forman cooperage. Now what's special about this barrel is it's customized specifically for slain. So all of the research and development of brown Forman have been able to do on different levels of toasting and charring is fed into this barrel. So it's like a, it's a heavy toast, medium char. And that toast is really what makes the difference because it helps to draw out the van islands that then become vanilla. 43:00 So using virgin oak for an Irish Whiskey blenders is pretty unusual as what the SEC is most probably aren't united that not they're not. But what is unique is this barrel was made specifically for us for slain and it does deliver that really lovely kind of aromatic vanilla hit nose. Now you will mention that banana Foster and that kind of moves really neatly into the second barrel. So our second barrel we call seasoned seasoned, as you probably know, that's just a term that means someone was living in that barrel before. 43:33 And it's an old veteran. Yeah, exactly. 43:37 In this case. 43:40 So it is American whiskey. Most American whiskey barrels, a lot of them end up in Ireland. However, the challenge with that is if you're an Irish distillery, you're typically going to be buying a barrels maybe through a dealer say say Calvin cooperage, for example, or you might have a relationship with another distillery like order stellar say, Heaven, Hell or an artist. 44:00 Brown Forman, but the challenges that they actually make lots of different whiskies and the rain, really any track or trace. So when those barrels arrive in Ireland, you don't know exactly it's labeled as murder and completely so the way the industry deals with it is by blending it all together. However, because of our relationship with brown Forman, we're able to focus in on particular barrels. So we're primarily using as our season we're primarily using a Tennessee whiskey barrel or a jack daniels barrel. And that delivers very particular flavor notes. 44:32 Also, those barrels have to be shipped wet because otherwise they're going to dry out and live on their island Island. So there's a little bit of liquid in there and we are not throwing that away. We're just pouring our whiskey in on top. So the net result is you're picking up some of those lovely flavors. So ripe banana is absolutely coming from that barrel. And then Irish whiskeys tend to be blends tend to be nice and sweet. But that sweetness can go from like a nice, light clear honey to a much heavier dark branch. 45:00 Nothing that comes out of slain is light or fluffy. We're in the business of kind of rich and complex. So I wanted us to get to a heavier sugar note and that's where that second barrel the season barrel really comes in. So you actually you're right on the money with a banana sauce. Yeah, I mean, yeah, the torch came in. I mean, it's, it's basically like we're two bourbon casks already. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's, for us. It's an easy transition. Yeah. And I think that that's a good point. You know, some people have described this as an as an Irish whiskey, a good Irish Whiskey for bourbon drinkers. Because I think there are some familiar familiarities and similarities there, for sure that American influences is definitely there. Do they hook you up on the yeast do here or do you have to use your own power there? So at the moment, we're just using standard distillers used to have our distillery however, brown Forman are one of the few companies that do cultivate their own yeast strains. So I think that's maybe something to look out for the future for sure, because I always get like brown sugar notes out of the old forester yeast. Yeah. 46:00 Whatever but yeah anywho but I'll quit talking let you know 46:05 why we're drinking whiskey. This is good. So I think if we had just finished with those two barrels, we would have ended up with an Irish Whiskey that probably just tasted a little too like an American whiskey. So we needed we needed something to kind of balance that influence. Now. The person who got me drinking Irish Whiskey was was my grandpa way back in the day probably before he should have but that's a whole nother story. A common theme. 46:32 Yeah, but he was a lovely man, but he loved his Irish whiskies that had a Sherry cask influence. Now quite a lot of Irish Whiskey does have a Sherry cask influence. And that really stems from our history where before American whiskey took off, and all of those lovely barrels became available, we would have used what was coming into the country, which was wine, port and Sherry. And so out of those ones, the Sherry ones were the ones that really captured my imagination. 47:00 In the early days of drinking whiskey, and that's kind of stayed as a theme. So, at the time brown Forman didn't know I guess too much about the Sherry side of things. They have their scotch brands now. So that's that's changed but at the time, I had to convince them the importance of what a Sherry barrel could do. So we actually we went out to her wrath in Spain, and we taste a lot of sherry there was a lot of fun amazing food out there. But what's been yeah are fantastic. But what a Sherry barrel does for for Irish Whiskey as it It adds this fantastic body and depth and lots of color. So we're talking about an Allah Rosso Sherry cask. It's been seasoned with Allah Rosso for a full two years before we even look at it. It's then shipped wet, over to slain and again we pour our whiskey in on top, and very quickly, it starts to take on lots of lovely color and these characteristics so 48:00 So going back on the nose, behind your banana Foster and the vanilla and those lovely sugar notes you may pick up a little bit of a almost like a raisin or a kind of date note maybe even a little bit of fig so you're kind of getting into dried fruit territory and that's the primary influence that Sherry cask and also get like a graham cracker kind of yeah smell on it. That's probably from the barley that I'll dig out what a graham cracker was until, like two states but I get you Yeah, I'm the I'm the I'm sorry I don't know commentary. 48:36 No, I I totally get you but on the pilot. 48:40 So I find it's as easy as easy to gravitate towards Yeah, so IRA dangerous, delicious. Good. dangerously delicious. Oh, yeah. That Yeah, so welcome. If you're if it's smooth, right and Irish is generally has that lovely smoothness but it is full body on the palate. 49:00 Like I said, it's got a lot of depth at the end like Nevada's smooth products, they kind of the finished falls flat, whereas this one's still kind of building a little bit on Yeah, I guess it's, it's a nice linger. I think where the Sherry cast comes in is there's this lovely little brain or kind of baking spice note right at the end. 49:19 And it kind of it's not, it's not Bice by any means, but it's a nice little kind of spice at the end. And that's really coming from that Sherry cask. And it's kind of like, nutty or creamy, like peanut buttery. Yeah, at the end. I don't know. I'm pulling all the stops today. 49:36 But so this is I was looking at the bottle. So this is 40%. So 80 proof, correct. kind of talk about the reason of going to 80 and not 9095 whatever it is, I don't really know honestly because us we don't know the Irish Whiskey industry that well so I don't know if like if that's a common thing. Generally most Irish Whiskey blends will be at proof. That's fairly standard for 50:00 For a blend, if you start getting into your, into your single malt or certainly a single pot stills, you know, that can get a bit of variation, sometimes a little bit higher. We settled at 80 proof, which again, is fairly standard because we just felt it worked really well at that level. Now, it is strong enough to hold up, you know, one of my favorite ways to drink and slaying would be on the rocks. So in that way, it behaves a little bit like a bourbon. 50:27 And it needs it. 50:30 I guess. Yeah, I mean, nothing wrong with it neat. And you have this with a banana pudding or something like that. It's fantastic. But put it on the rocks and it holds up, it doesn't wash out. And that was really important when we put this together. So it is designed to be a whiskey that's good on its own, but it's not going to get lost in a cocktail or get washed out when you throw some ice at it. What's the typical proof when you're dumping these before you cut it? So typically, well we put it into the barrel at about 62 and a half 51:00 alcohol. So that's what 120 and doing my mask in my head, yeah, I'm terrible around 120 proof we use Excel a little a little lighter. 51:08 And depending on what style of whiskey you're making, so our malt would be, we'd be taking off a pretty high proof around 160 or so. And then we're going to reduce that down. The grain whiskey element is very high. I mean, grain whiskey is not far off of what you'd be doing grain usual. So you're talking about 96 97% alcohol. So it's, it's very strong. So you got to reduce that down again to around 62 and a half percent alcohol before you put it in the barrel. And then what's the what's the kind of aging that you're looking to do? Or what's in this bottle today? I mean, we, we already learned that it's gotta be, what, three years and three years at a day or three years and three days, two years, three years and three years in a day, so? Yeah. 51:54 So in terms of maturation, the key to this product is is that triple cast for extra characters. 52:00 So it started out living in an American barrel for a good number of years. So the malt and the grain, they were all the stock we bought was different ages, some of it was up to 10 years old. And then we're adding extra time on that with a triple cast, which is roughly two years. So that gives you an idea of how old some of the whiskey isn't that blend. And then we'll be phasing in our own juice, you know, hasn't when it's ready, but it all goes through the same barreling program. And that's, that's how we get the consistent try to keep it consistent throughout the time. Yeah, stuff like that, too. Yeah. talks about the packaging who's Yeah, a little different. No, yeah. It's a bit different. And then you've got it got this. Is this the crest that we're talking about that? Yeah. So you asked why the why was in the cutting of name and it kind of it's tied to this, this sort of hay fork that is at the center of the crest. And that's so that goes back to my family's time in the 1100s. At that stage, we're in Scotland, we landed in Ireland and 1605. But there was a rebel Prince Malcolm, who was on the run from 53:00 Macbeth of the Shakespearean origin of Macbeth wasn't a particularly nice dude. So 53:06 Malcolm was on the run, he came to Cunningham's farm and cutting could have surrendered the fugitive or he could stand up for what he believed in which was a rebellion. He hid Malcolm Malcolm survived as a result, defeat him at birth and became king Malcolm the second and he went back and rewarded Cunningham with a bit of land and an arboreal to celebrate the occasion and he chose the hay fork that he had used to hide Malcolm in the hay and hay loft. It's a it's a symbol of rebellion, perseverance, determination, and that's what it took to get the slain whiskey project done and that's why we put it on the bottle. And then it is a black glass bottle so it's a little different. black and red have been our family colors for centuries. And I guess it was a little bit more rock and roll. So we just felt it. It set the right tone for for the whiskey 53:58 and you 54:00 We have a lot of fun putting that together. And actually, when we did the excavations around the distillery because it's all on the national list of protected structures, we found some really, really old bottles. None intact. Unfortunately, they were black glass. So that kind of confirmed that sticking with black made sense. Nice, as I say, so I'm a I'm a product of the 80s. I don't know if you were big into like, 80s movie culture, but I saw that and I was like, it's a, it's the flux capacitor. It's right there on the bottle. Nice. Okay, I hadn't seen that. But there you go. There you go. Actually, I think it might be upside down. But it's a dolly. But you know, really the whiskies really good. I think, you know, this is our first really good introduction, at least for the podcast due to Irish whiskey and knowing more about it, and knowing more about the history and sort of, really where it's stemming from as well. You know, if you were to like, give our listeners like a good reason, like, you know, they're bourbon drinkers right there. They're real bourbon drinkers or bourbon nerds. Like what's what's the 55:00 Selling pitch that you would give to a bourbon drinker to say, go out and try this. I think if you enjoy bourbon you're going to enjoy trying slain because Bourbons generally are very much flavor forward. Okay? And in the Irish category, that's what slain is all about, you know, and people are moving between brands and between categories a bit more. If you want to step outside of bourbon and get something that has an element of familiarity, but it's going to give you something a little bit different and slains a good a good call. So those heavy brown sugar notes, the hits of vanilla, those are going to be familiar, but you add in that heavy dried fruit notes, little bit of spice, it's coming from the Sherry. That's gonna be a nice, I guess, step away without having to jump too far. 55:46 Yeah, it's one of the richer kind of Irish whiskeys I've ever had. I've had powers and I've had dabbled into like Red Berets and you know stuff, but it's definitely got more than more depth than I remember of other Irish Whiskey products. So very impressed. 56:00 Well done. Thank you very much Well, we had a lot of fun not meant to get knocked out Shakespeare got to now you've knocked out a whiskey brand so we're really Wait How can you even top this? Good question I think by focusing on our on our ultra premiums further down the road so give me a decade I'll have more to talk about. Yeah. 56:21 So with the ultra premium category because we don't really know the Scott or sorry, the the Irish kind of ultra premium category, like what's that look like in in your vision? What would that entail as well? So I think in 20 years time, we're gonna be all talking about the Irish answer to scotch single malt which is pot still. So single pot still whiskies which bring that on malted barley into the mash bill, create this really lovely, rich, complex, quite oily, characterful whiskey and we are making that at slain. So we just made our first batches not too long ago, the new makers fantastic. So when that hits the word, it's going to lead some great whiskey 57:00 So it's a fairly small category within Irish at the moment, but I think it's going to be where the real kind of high end higher end of the market growth is going to happen over the next 20 years. So watch this space. Stay tuned. So what's what's the price point for a product like this? For slain yellow for the current bland depending on which market you're in for a 750? You're talking in and around 30 bucks a bottle? Oh, wow. Yeah. So yeah, so we when we won the gold medal at the Irish whisky awards, one of the really nice positive feedbacks was that we kind of over delivered on flavor for that price point because we were competing with more expensive whiskies. So that only up for a case. Yeah. 57:43 That was always the aim. We wanted to make something that was smooth, approachable, full flavored, and affordable. Yeah, we hit all three. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, like for us, I think this was a valuable lesson and getting schooled and Irish whiskey. And, you know, Alex, thank you so much for coming on the show today because 58:00 It was it was a pleasure to not only meet you and hear your story, you know Yeah, I know You came all the way from Ireland for us and so we really appreciate that you know, it's a it's a badge of honor for us to have you on the show. Thank you. Well listen, I always love drinking Irish whiskey in the heart of bourbon country 58:16 like this Yeah. Trading traders. Traders for an hour. Yeah, sorry Chris Morris. 58:23 Now appreciate Alex very cool story and ton of history of your family. That's incredible. What I'd love to come over there and party party for a week Come on. We should do burn get with Fred and do burn beyond like we can do bourbon workshops are Irish Whiskey workshops over there, you know? Yeah. and beyond. Yeah, slightly beyond Irish Whiskey pursuit, watch. Go watch that trademark. Be gone tomorrow. 58:47 Another question before we go or another opportunity for you to tell our audience how they can learn more about slain. If you're any kind of social media or slain. How can they find out more about that? Yeah, sure. So 59:00 The website slain Irish whiskey.com that's a good place to start. Obviously if you are lucky enough to get to Ireland come and see the distillery because that really brings it to life. 59:11 You can find this on Instagram, slain Irish Whiskey as well. My own Instagram presence is Alex Cunningham with the Y co n y n th. Yeah, listen to the front. Yeah, remember how to spell you can find me on there. And yeah, that's a good good place to learn. I'd say you got a good man of information from the websites best place to start. What if we want to go glamping where do we go? So that is rock farm slain.ie for all and my wife loves glamping so there you go. Listen, you've got more and more reasons. My guests will be seeing you pretty soon I get there is home renovation first. there that's awesome. So again, Alex, thank you so much for coming on the show today and you know make sure you follow explain as well as him on all those social media channels. You can follow us bourbon pursuit, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and if you'd like 1:00:00 Like what you hear also make sure that you take a minute and just check out our Patreon page. It's a way that we help build and grow and fund the podcast day after day. Yep, I think you nailed it. So we'll see you next time. Cheers. Cheers. Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Another episode of highlights from the Social Media Influencer Summit makes this episode of Winning With Shopify jam-packed full of knowledge from our friend of the show, Alexandra Jimenez. She joins us again this year to talk about both sides of the story, being a social media influencer and owning a Shopify store as a merchant.Alexandra Jimenez is the editor-in-chief of Travel Fashion Girl, where she teaches an audience of 900,000+ monthly readers to pack in a light, stylish, and efficient way. After quitting her corporate job in 2008, she spent almost a decade on the road all while traveling carry-on only. She now has a new travel brand called Compass Rose Travel Accessories that is quickly making its way up the best-selling list on Amazon. So Alex is going to give you lots of great advice in this session. These are just the highlights of the interview. Please go and listen to the full thing over at www.winningwithshopify.com/summit. It's 100% free to sign up. You get access for three days and you get to listen to Alex's full interview and her interview from last year, which is still completely relevant. There are 30 other interviews you can listen to as well. So it is crammed full of great information. If you're still wondering whether to get into influencer marketing or if you've tried it and you haven't succeeded yet, then I’ve created this summit for you. This summit has been put together for anyone who wants to understand influencer marketing. Check it out for free today! Questions I covered:Asking Alex about her journey in detail and how she started out as an influencer.Does she promote anything unless she truly believes in it?What is Alex doing now? Coming into 2020, what is she doing now when it comes to influencer marketing and how she presents herself?How she makes money with particular strategies.Asking her what she does when she receives products that I she does and doesn’t love, and whether or not she stays away from unrelated products altogether.Does she do any traditional advertising?Topics:Building a relationship when working with influencers is important. This can happen smoothly when you find an influencer in your niche. Relationship building comes easily when you have a common ground.A social influencer can best build loyalty from fans that appreciate your content. As an influencer, it is important you find common ground that meets the needs of your audience. This will make your audience more drawn to you. Quotes:“We talk about how much money we get paid for things. And I was really surprised to find out how many people, Instagramers, and bloggers don't charge for a lot of stuff…So go to your biggest unicorn of a person and reach out and say, “Hey, what are your ad rates?”. So that you know the top of the line… and then you can work back from there based on somebody's audience who's your second and third choice [to] you know your 34th and whatnot.’“Majority of my traffic is coming from Google or it's coming from Pinterest. With regards to the influencers that I would then want to choose to work with, I actually wouldn't, I really haven't worked prioritize Instagram because personally as an influencer, I don't see any ROI when I promote products on my, on my Instagram, so I can see what's selling and what's not selling.”Resources: travelfashiongirl.compinterest.com/travlfashngirlinstagram.com/travelfashiongirlMaSupport the show (https://www.facebook.com/groups/WinningWithShopify/)

Alex and Chris talk about giving thanks during a time of division, about being dedicated to gratitude in a time where for some gratitude is difficult, and for others it may be cause for stress, and/or rebellion. Our co-hosts go deep as they discuss how creatives must overcome these and so many other challenges to get the word out on their creative output. Especially when that could include being surprise blocked from posting Facebook ads due to alleged racial insensitivity when none exists in their ads! So Alex and Chris discuss all sorts of algorithm shenanigans that creatives have to deal with to tell their damn story! And please let us know your thoughts on this hot topic by leaving your questions or comments in our Comments Section below. Or write us at: TTDSOnAir@gmail.com * During the episode we mentioned a free Blackjack novel. Click here for your free copy of "Blackjack: Rise of the Red Star." Or copy and past this link: http://bit.ly/JoinArronAdventures

LIVE on the Sport Physiotherapy Canada Facebook Page, I welcome Alex Hutchinson on the show to discuss sports journalism.  Alex Hutchinson is National Magazine Award-winning journalist who writes about the science of endurance for Runner’s World and Outside, and frequently contributes to other publications such as the New York Times and the New Yorker. A former long-distance runner for the Canadian national team, he holds a master’s in journalism from Columbia and a Ph.D. in physics from Cambridge, and he did his post-doctoral research with the National Security Agency. In this episode, we discuss: -How to disseminate findings from complex research studies to a layman audience -Attention grabbing headlines that commit to a point of view -Endure: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance -What Alex is looking forward to from the Third World Congress of Sports Physical Therapy -And so much more! Resources: Third World Congress of Sports Physical Therapy Alex Hutchinson Twitter Endure Range Alex Hutchinson Website   For more information on Alex: I’m an author and journalist in Toronto. My primary focus these days is the science of endurance and fitness, which I cover for Outside (where I’m a contributing editor and write the Sweat Science column), The Globe and Mail (where I write the Jockology column), and Canadian Running magazine. I’ve also covered technology for Popular Mechanics (where I earned a National Magazine Award for my energy reporting) and adventure travel for the New York Times, and was a Runner’s World columnist from 2012 to 2017. My latest book, published in February 2018, is an exploration of the science (and mysteries) of endurance. It’s called ENDURE: Mind, Body, and the Curiously Elastic Limits of Human Performance. Before that, I wrote a practical guide to the science of fitness, called Which Comes First, Cardio or Weights? Fitness Myths, Training Truths, and Other Surprising Discoveries from the Science of Exercise, which was published in 2011. I also wrote Big Ideas: 100 Modern Inventions That Have Transformed Our World, in 2009. I actually started out as a physicist, with a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge then a few years as a postdoctoral researcher with the U.S. National Security Agency, working on quantum computing and nanomechanics. During that time, I competed as a middle- and long-distance runner for the Canadian national team, mostly as a miler but also dabbling in cross-country and even a bit of mountain running. I still run most days, enjoy the rigors of hard training, and occasionally race. But I hate to think how I’d do on an undergraduate physics exam.   Read the full transcript below: Karen Litzy:                   00:00                Hey everybody. Welcome to the Third World Congress of sports physical therapy Facebook page. And I am your host, Karen Litzy. And we have been doing several of these interviews over the past couple of months in support of the Third World Congress of sports physical therapy. And today we have writer, journalist, author, athlete, Alex Hutchinson who is part of the Third World Congress. He's going to be a part of an informal Q and A and also doing a talk with Greg Lehman, who's already been on. So Alex, welcome to Facebook live. Alex Hutchinson:           00:37                Thanks very much, Karen. It's great to be here. Karen Litzy:                   00:39                All right, so for those people who maybe aren't as familiar with you, can you tell us a little bit more about yourself? Alex Hutchinson:           00:46                Yeah, I mean, I guess when people ask what I do, I say I'm a freelance journalist, but if you kind of drill down a little bit, my subspecialty is like, I'm a sports science journalist or even an endurance sports science journalist, which isn't really a job, but it's effectively what I do. So I write for, for outside magazine and a few other places. There's Canadian running magazine and a newspaper in Canada called the globe and Mail, but mainly outside magazine about the science of Endurance sports, sports more generally, adventure, fitness, health, all those sorts of things. A fairly, fairly broad stuff that interests me, I try and look at the science angle of it. And so that means talking to a lot of athletes and sometimes I talk to coaches, but mostly I talk to researchers who are trying to use, you know, research studies, peer reviewed, you know, placebo-controlled, blinded studies to answer questions that a lot of us have when we exercise, you know, what workout should I do or how should I refuel or these sorts of things. Karen Litzy:                   01:48                Alright, so you're taking, which I think is great. You're taking the research and you're able to disseminate that out into, if you will, the layman's audience. Alex Hutchinson:           01:57                Yeah, that's the goal. Yeah. And, it's interesting cause I come from a running background. I was a competitive runner. And I was a, a guy interested in science, but there wasn't no, when I was competing in the sort of nineties and early two thousands, it to me at least, it seemed, it wasn't very easy, I didn't even know that there were, you know, thousands of researchers around the world trying to answer these sorts of questions. And I think for me it was in the middle two thousands I started seeing some columns in the New York Times from Gina Kolata. And then from Gretchen Reynolds.  Gina Kolata had a column called personal best where she was like looking into the myth that lactic acid causes fatigue. And this was maybe around 2005 and I was like, Holy Mackerel. Alex Hutchinson:           02:37                And she was interviewing scientists who are asking these questions. And I thought there are scientists who care about lactic acid so that kind of started me on the path of thinking that, realizing there's a body of research out there that wasn't reaching interested lay people like myself. So I started pursuing that. And I think today there's a lot more. Like there were a lot of avenues through which exercise science reaches the lay people. I feel like I'm one of those channels, but it's definitely, there's a lot more options for people now, including directly from scientists themselves in places like Twitter. Karen Litzy:                   03:13                Exactly. And I think that's where I, you know, in the late nineties, mid two thousands, social media certainly wasn't as robust as it is now. And now you have scientists and researchers being encouraged to get onto these platforms and disseminate some of their information, whether it be through tweets or infographics, podcasts, Facebook lives, things like this. So I think the leap from relatively nothing, you know, meaning researchers kind of doing their research but not having perhaps the means to get it out to a wider audience outside of a journal that not every lay person who reads, you know, having such great avenues to disseminate this information. Do you feel like it's made a difference in the general public? Alex Hutchinson:           04:00                I think it has. It's hard to really evaluate this stuff, but my sense is there's a higher level of literacy or sort of awareness of issues, you know, things like how to fuel that's maybe not just drawn from, I heard it from a guy at the gym or I heard it from my coach who heard it from his coach who is taught by, you know, some guy in 1830 that this is how it works. I mean, I would almost say that we've gone from a place of scarcity to a place of excess that now it's not like you can't find information. Now there's these fire hoses of information just drenching you with 20 different theories. All of which seemed to be supported by scientists about how you should eat, how you should exercise, how you should move, and all these sorts of things. Alex Hutchinson:           04:45                So I started writing about sports science, let's say 15 years ago or a little less than that. And at that point it was like, let's get the information out there. People don't realize that there's information now. It's like there's all this information, let's curate the information. Let's try and provide people with some judgements about what's reliable and what's not. Why we think that some sources of information are better than others. How each person can evaluate for themselves, whether this is trustworthy. You know, and this is obviously not an easy or there's not like one answer to this study's right and this study's wrong, but, yeah, I feel like my role has shifted a little bit from get the information out there to, okay, maybe I can be a trustworthy source of curation where I'm giving people the information, not necessarily telling them what to think, but saying, here's the evidence. Now you may choose to think this evidence isn't convincing enough for you to switch to the, you know, the Aldana Diet or you may not, but here's, here's what the evidence says it exists. Karen Litzy:                   05:45                Yeah, and that's a great lead into my next question is when we look at quote unquote fake news and we can categorize that as misinformation or disinformation. So misinformation being like you're putting something out there and you think it's good, but you just don't know that the information is bad versus disinformation, which is, I guess we can categorize more as propaganda. So you know, the information's not correct, but you're pushing it out there anyway. So I think it's important to me. Both of those are fake news, but it's important to make that distinction. So as a journalist, how do you navigate this and how important is it for you to get that right? Alex Hutchinson:           06:27                Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, getting it right is important to me and I'm glad you made that distinction because I think that's an important one because you know, fake news in the politicized sense is another way of saying propaganda. And I think that's mostly not what we're dealing with in the exercise or the health space. I mean there, there is actually, I mean, you know, let me take that back a little bit there. There are people who are just selling things to make money who are just, they don't really care whether it's true. They're putting steroids into their stimulants, into their strength supplements because they just want people to feel a boost and they're just flat out lying so those people are bad and they're also not that hard to spot if truth be told, if you're critical, what's tougher is the, you know, what you call misinformation rather than disinformation, which is people honestly believe this. Alex Hutchinson:           07:20                Like, I tried this diet, it works for me, and therefore everyone should be doing it. And I read this study that shows that people who do this diet, you know, increase their levels of some inflammatory marker and that proves, that confirms my belief. And therefore I'm going to become an evangelist for this. And I'm going to say that everyone who disagrees with me has been paid off by big industry and blah, blah, blah. And sometimes it's not quite that. I mean, I'm caricaturing it, but people don't have strong beliefs that don't have as strong beliefs about, you know, controversies in particle physics cause we don't have personal experience in particle physics when you're talking about health and exercise and eating and things like that. We all have our, we have our experiences. And so we map that on top of whatever evidence we're experiencing, and I include myself in this, you know, my experiences play into what science, scientific research finds plausible. Alex Hutchinson:           08:12                So that creates a different dynamic. So to answer your actual question, how do I navigate this? Imperfectly like every other human, but my goal in what I write, what I try and do is if I'm writing about a study, this article from my perspective as the one in which I'm able to serve, take the key graph from that study, cut and paste it into my article and then describe what the study was. Here's what they did, here's what they found. Alex Hutchinson:           08:46                I'll take it a step further than that because my role is to interpret. I'll say, here's what I think this means, but I want to make sure I can give enough information to someone who doesn't think that's what it means is also can also see, well that's what the evidence was. And it's like, well no, I don't agree that that should change my behavior or whatever, but I'm giving them, I want to give people enough information so they understand what the study did and what it found. And then the meaning, if I've given people enough information, they don't have to rely on me telling them that this is what it means even though I am going to tell them what I think it means. Karen Litzy:                   09:16                If you were to give tips to let's say the layman person, say it's like my mom or you know, your friend who knows nothing about science, he doesn't have a phd in physics, and we'll get back to that with you in a second. But what tips can you give to the lay person on how to spot this misinformation, because the thing is when you look at a lot of articles, they're always citing this study, that study, this study. Alex Hutchinson:           09:47                Yeah. It used to be like, show me the peer reviewed evidence. But yeah, I've slowly realized, you know, and understood that there is a peer reviewed study for everything. And you know, 10 years ago I used to get, I'd see a study saying, you know, hey the, you know, the fruit of this plant, if you take it's going to increase your endurance by 2%. It's like, well if they have a placebo controlled, double blinded study published in a peer reviewed journal, it must be true. I'll write about it. And then, you know, I never did hear about that extractive of such and such a plant. Again, like no one, it never turned out to be a thing. And I sort of finally understand, you know, started to understood the bigger systemic problems, which is that if you have, you know, thousands of Grad students across the country looking for a master's thesis that can be done in six months or an experiment, they can be done in six months. Alex Hutchinson:           10:33                They're testing all sorts of things. And if it's not interesting, they don't publish it. And if it happens by chance to produce a positive result, then they publish it in a journal. So we get this sort of, there's always public positive studies about everything. What I was saying, which is that just the mere presence of a study isn't enough. So there is no simple template. But I would say there are some guidelines like follow the money. If someone's trying to sell you something, it’s obvious, but it's surprising what a good rule of thumb that is. And it's why we see so much information about pills and technology. Alex Hutchinson:           11:20                And so little information about, you know, another study showing that sleep is good for you, getting some exercise is good for you because it's very hard to monetize that. And so there's lessons. I don't mean to sound like a patsy or like someone who's, you know, pump promoting my own way of seeing things. But I think there are some sources that are more sort of authoritative than others. And frankly, the mainstream media still does a pretty good job relative to the average blog. Now there are some great blogs out there and you know, and I will say, I started out in this, I set up my own blog on wordpress and I blogged there for five years, just analyzing studies. And then runner's world asked me to bring the blog onto their site and then it got moved outside. Alex Hutchinson:           12:08                So it's not that there aren't good blogs and you can maybe get a sense of what people's agendas are and what their backgrounds are. But, you know, if I knew that, I know in this highly politicized world, I know that this may be a controversial thing to say, but if I see something in New York Times, I'm more likely to believe it than if I see it on, you know, Joe's whole health blog and I read the New York Times and I get frustrated frequently and I say that now they're getting this wrong. And this is not a full picture of this. Nobody's perfect. But I think that people with credentials and getting through some of those gatekeepers is one way of filtering out some of the absolute crap that you see out there. Karen Litzy:                   12:53                Perfect. Yeah, I think those are very easy tips that people can kind of follow. So sort of follow the money, see who's commissioned said RCT, systematic review. And, oftentimes, especially on blogs, it can be a little tricky because some of them may write a blog and be like, oh, this is really good. But then when you look down, it's like the blog is sponsored by so-and-so, Alex Hutchinson:           13:18                And that's the reputable people who are acknowledging who's sponsoring them. Then there's the people who are getting free gear, free product or money straight up, but they're not, you know, like there's levels of influence and the people who are disclosing that at least they're disclosing it. But nonetheless, it's, you know, one of the things that I think people often kind of misjudge is when, when someone says that follow, you know, follow the money and the financial influences, finances can influence someone. That doesn't mean that the people who are passing on this message or corrupted or that it's disinformation as you would say that they're deliberately, yeah. I mean, lots of researchers who I really highly respect do excellent research funded by industry. And I think that there's any important information that comes from that research, but I also think that the questions that get asked in industry funded research are different than the questions that you might ask if you just had you know, a free pot of money that wasn't tied to any strings. Alex Hutchinson:           14:16                If you want to, you know, not to pick on anybody, but if you want to know which proteins are best for building strength and if the dairy industry is going to fund a whole bunch of studies on dairy protein, then you're going to have this excellent body of research that shows that dairy protein is good for building muscle. That doesn't mean it's wrong, it just means that we haven't studied what, you know, vegetable proteins or other forms of meat. There's been less emphasis on those proteins so you get a distorted view of what's good or bad without anybody doing anything wrong. It's just that money does influence the way we ask questions and the answers we get. Karen Litzy:                   14:53                Great. Thank you. Now I had just mentioned about having a phd in physics. That is obviously not me. How did you end up doing your phd in physics and how does this help you when it comes to writing your articles or writing these reviews of RCTs or systematic reviews? Alex Hutchinson:           15:14                Well, I should first say that if anyone's interested in becoming a science journalist, I wouldn't necessarily recommend doing a phd in physics. It's not the linear path or you know, the path of least resistance. I honestly didn't know what I wanted to do when I grew up. Some advice I got, which I think was good advice to some extent was, you know, if you don't know what you want to do, do something hard because at least you'll prove to people that you can, you know, solve problems and there'll be some transferability of that training. And I think that was true to some extent. And I, you know, so I did physics in Undergrad. I still didn't know what the heck I wanted to do. And I had an opportunity to go do a phd in England, which seemed like a big adventure. Alex Hutchinson:           15:50                So I went and did a phd there, PhDs there are actually a lot shorter than they are in North America. It's just over three years for my phd. So it wasn't, it wasn't like this sort of, you know, spent my entire twenties on this. Physics was fun, but it just, I could see that the other people in my lab were more passionate about it than I was, that they were, they were just interested. They were passionate about it. And I thought, man, I want to, I want to find something that I'm passionate about. So I ended up in my late twenties saying, okay, well it's been a slice, but I'm going to try something else. And, you know, fortunately I guessed right. And journalism turned out to be fun. Fun for me. I don't write, you know, especially these days if I'm writing about exercise and it's not like I need to know Newton's laws or anything like that or you know, apply the principle of general relativity to exercise. Alex Hutchinson:           16:35                So there's not a lot of like direct pay off. But I would say that having a scientific training has helped me be willing to speak to scientists and not be intimidated by paper. You know, Journal articles that look very complex and you know, I have the confidence to know that, okay, I don't have a clue what this journal article is saying, but I know if I slow down, if I read it a few times and if I call it the scientist and say, can you explain this to me? I'm not worried. Well, I mean, I don't like looking stupid, but I'm over the idea is like, it's okay. I can call up the scientist. I know enough about scientific papers to know that probably the guy in the office next door to whoever wrote this paper doesn't understand this paper. You know, science is very specialized and so it's okay to just say, explain to me, explain it to me again. Okay. This time, pretend I'm, you know, your 90 year old grandfather and explain it again. And so that allows me, or has helped me write about areas even when I'm not familiar with them and not be intimidated by numbers and graphs and things like that. Karen Litzy:                   17:36                All right. And I would also imagine that going through Phd training yourself, you understand how articles are written, you kind of can look at the design, and you can look at the methods and have a little bit more, I guess confidence in how this study was maybe put together. Versus no training at all. Alex Hutchinson:           18:03                You've seen how the sausage is made and so you understand the compromise that get made. I will say that it was surprising to me how different the physics processes to the sort of the sports science world in terms of just the factors that are there that are relevant in physics. You’re never dealing with people. And with the sample recruitment and things like that. An Electron is an electron, you know, for the most part. You know, and this is an important to understand is physics aside by looking a lot of studies, I started to see the patterns and started to understand what the functions were, started to understand how to read a paper relatively quickly. How did you know it? For me to find stories, I ended up looking at a lot of journal articles and I can't read every one of them in depth in order to find the ones I wanna write about. Alex Hutchinson:           18:52                So I have to find ways of, you know, everyone knows you. Yeah, you can read the abstract, but you're not going to get the full picture. You know, you start to learn just by experience, by doing it. That, okay, if I read the introduction, that's where the first three paragraphs are where they're going to give me the context. Because often a study seems very specific and you're like, I don't know what you're talking about. And then they'll give two paragraphs where they're just like, since the 1950s, scientists have been wondering about x, Y, and zed. And then you can go to the conclusions and then, you know, depending on how deep you want to get, you understand where, which part of every paper is written with a specific format and you can figure out where to go with a little experience. And it doesn't require a physics phd or it requires just getting, getting familiar with that particular, you know, subject area. Karen Litzy:                   19:35                Nice. And now, you know, we talked earlier about how, you know, information from researchers went from like a little drip to a fire hose and as far as getting information out to the general public, so because there is so much information available, how do you approach designing your article titles and headlines to ensure you grab attention for the reader. So I think that's a great question directed at the researchers who are maybe thinking of doing a press release or things like that to help promote their article. Alex Hutchinson:           20:10                Yeah. This is a really interesting question. This isn't one where my thinking has shifted over the last, let's say, decade. So I started out, you know, in print journalism, writing for newspapers and magazines. I still do that, but one of the things in from when you're writing for a newspaper magazine is you don't have control over your headlines. You write the article, the editor writes the headline. And so my experience in that world was always one of frustration being like, I wrote this very carefully nuanced, balanced article. And then the headline is, you know, do this and you'll live till you're a hundred or whatever. It's like, no, that's not what I was saying. It's terrible. And so I got into this sort of reflects of habit you know, just apologizing for the headlines. Like, Oh, you know, when I talked to researchers, I'm so sorry about the headline. Alex Hutchinson:           20:59                You know, I'm very sophisticated, but you know, that this silly editor wrote the headline and a couple of things help to sort of shift my views a little bit on that. One is the shift to online meant that newspapers and journalists now have a very, very clear idea of who clicks on what. So you understand what it is that gets people's attention. And the second thing is that, you know, when I started my own blog, and then even now, when I blog, I don't have full control of my headlines, but when I was on wordpress, I wrote my own headlines. And when I now as a blogger, I suggest headlines. And so I don't have control, but I am given more input than I used to be on how this article should be conveyed. Alex Hutchinson:           21:40                And one thing that's really clear is that, what people say they want and what people will do is different. And so I remember looking at when the global mail is the Big News newspaper in Canada. I remember when it first started showing its top 10 most clicked articles. You know, in the transition to digital on its website. And of course, everyone says, I hate clickbait. I want to have sophisticated, nuanced conversations. And then the top 10 articles clicked would all be something to do with Brittany Spears or whatever. You know, this was 10 years ago. And it's like, so people click on, people do respond to clickbait and click bait it's bad. But you know, I sometimes I want like sometimes give talks to scientists about science communication and I'll give some contrast between here's the journal article, you know, here's my headline and the journal article will be something that's so careful that you're not even, it definitely doesn't tell you what the article's going to say. Alex Hutchinson:           22:36                You're not even entirely sure what the subject is. You know, like an investigation of factors contributing to potentially mitigating the effects of certain exercise modalities. And you're like, I don't know. I don't know what that's about. No one clicks on it. And so it's like that sort of, if a tree falls in the forest, if you write a perfectly balanced nuanced article and nobody reads it, have you actually contributed to science communication? And so one of the things that I found in with headlines that I'd complain about is I would complain about a headline that someone had written for my article and then, and I try to think why am I complaining about this? And it's like, well it's sort of coming out and saying what I was hinting at, I was hinting at, I didn't want to come out and say, you know, overweight people should exercise more or whatever. Alex Hutchinson:           23:22                Cause that's horrible. No one would say that. But if you sort of read what the evidence that I was shaping my article to be, it'd be like, if you're not getting results from your exercise, maybe you're just not exercising hard enough. I was like, well maybe I need to own the messages. You know, if the headlines to me seems objectionable, maybe it's my article is objectionable and I've tiptoed around it, but I need to think carefully. And if someone reads my article, you know, an intelligent person reads my article and says this in sum it up in seven words, this is what it is, then I need to maybe be comfortable with having that as the headline, even if it's an oversimplification, because the headline is never going to convey everything, all the nuances. There's always caveats, there's always subtleties. Alex Hutchinson:           24:04                You can't convey those in seven words. That's what the article is for. So I've become much more of a defender, not of clickbait, not of like leading people in with misleading things. But if ultimately the bottom line of your article is whether it's a academic article or a press article is, you know, this kind of weight workout doesn't work and you should be okay with a headline that says that. And yes, people will say, but you forgot this. And then you can say, well, no, that's in the article, but I can't convey all the caveats in the headline. So anyway, that's my, that's my sort of halfhearted defense of attention grabbing headlines in a way. Karen Litzy:                   24:37                Yeah. And if you don't have the attention grabbing headline, like you said, then people aren't going to want to dive into the article. So I was, you know, looking up some of the headlines from outsideonline.com and the first one that pops up is how heat therapy could boost your performance. And you read that and you're like I would want to find out what that means. Alex Hutchinson:           25:02                And they put some weasel words in there. It's not like heat therapy will change your life. It's how it could boost your performance. And so, and I'm there, it's interesting, I've got conversations with my editor and they, you know, they don't like question headlines. They don't want to be as like, is this the next, you know, a miracle drugs? And then it turns out the answer is no. It's like they feel that's deceptive to the reader. They want declarative headlines that say something. It’s an interesting balance but outside has been, they've had some headlines which were a little, you know, there was one a while ago about trail maintenance and it was like the headline was trail runners are lazy parasites or something like that. And that was basically, that was what the article said. It was an opinion piece by a mountain biker. They got a ton of flack for that and they got a bunch of people who are very, very, you know, I'm never gonna read outside again. It's like, dude, relax. But I understand, but I understand, you know, cause it is a balance there. They want to be noticed and I want my articles to be noticed, but I don't want to do it in a deceptive way. Karen Litzy:                   26:07                Yeah. And I think that headline, how heat therapy could boost. It's the could. Alex Hutchinson:           26:12                Exactly the weasel word that it's like, it's, I'm not saying it will, but there's certainly some evidence that I described in the article, but it's possible this is something that people are paying or researching and that athletes are trying, so it's, you know, check it out if you're interested. Karen Litzy:                   26:25                Yeah, I mean, I think it's hard to write those attention grabbing headlines because like you said, you can have the best article giving great information, but if it's not enough in the headline for the average person to say, hmm, Nah, Nah, nevermind, or Ooh, I really want to read this now the, I think when you're talking about an online publication, like you said, you now have a very good idea as to who is reading by going into the analytics of your website. So I think that must make it a little bit easier, particularly on things that they're going to catch attention. Alex Hutchinson:           26:59                And so since I'm working for outside, I don't have access to their analytics though. I can ask them what my top articles were or whatever. And I actually am careful not to ask too much because I think there's a risk of you start writing to the algorithm. I start with, you know, you're like, oh, so if people like clicking on this, I'm going to write another article that has a very similar headlines. So, when I had my wordpress site, I had much more direct access to the analytics and it's a bit of a path to, it forces you to start asking yourself, what am I writing for? Am I writing to try and get the most clicks possible or to do the best article possible? So I actually tell him when I talked to my editor, I'm like I don't want too much information. Alex Hutchinson:           27:43                I want to know. Sometimes I kind of want to get a sense of what people are reacting to and what aren't. And I can see it on Twitter, which things get more response. But I don't want that to be foremost in my mind because otherwise you end up writing you know, if not clickbait headlines, you write clickbait stories, you know, cause you do get the most attention. Yeah. So I try not to follow it too much and let someone else do that worrying for me. Karen Litzy:                   28:09                Yeah. So instead, I think that's a great tip for anyone who is putting out content and who's disseminating content, whether it be a blog or a podcast, that you want to kind of stay true to the story and not try and manipulate the story. Whether that be consciously or maybe sometimes subconsciously manipulating the story to fit who you think the person who's going to be digesting that information wants. Alex Hutchinson:           28:34                Yeah. And I know that happens to me subconsciously. You know, it's unavoidable. You're thinking, well, if I write it this way, I bet more people are going to be interested, it happens a little bit, but you want to be aware of it. And especially, I guess if you're, let's say you're someone who's, you know, starting a blog or starting some form of podcast or whatever it is, clicks aren't the only relevant metric and you can get a lot of people to click on something, but if they're left feeling that it wasn't all that great, then you're not gonna, you know, it's better to have half as many people all read something and think that was really substantive and thoughtful and useful than to get a bunch of clicks. But no one had any particular desire to come back to your site. Karen Litzy:                   29:15                Like you don't want to leave people feeling unfulfilled. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not Good. Well great information for both the researchers and for clinicians who are maybe trying to get some of that research out there. So great tips. Now, we talked a little bit about this before we went on air, but in 2018 you've published your book, endure mind body and the curiously elastic limits of human performance. So talk a little bit about the book, if you will, and what inspired you to write it? Alex Hutchinson:           29:50                Sure. The book is basically, it tries to answer the question, what defines our limits. Like when you push as hard as you can, whether you know you're on the treadmill or out for a run or in, in other contexts, what defines that moment when you're like, ah, I can't maintain, I have to slow down. I have to stop. I have reached my absolute limit. And it's a direct, you know, it's easy to understand where the book came from. I was a runner and so every race I ran, I was like, why didn't I run faster? Like I'm still alive. I crossed the finish line. I've got energy left. Why didn't I, why surely I could have run a little bit faster. And so basically I, you know, I started out with an understanding of a basic understanding of exercise physiology. Alex Hutchinson:           30:32                And, you know, 15 years ago I thought if I can learn more about VO2 Max and lactate threshold and all these sorts of things, I'll understand the nature of limits and maybe what I could have done to push them back. And about 10 years ago, I started to realize that there was this whole bunch of research on the brain's role in limits. And there've been a whole bunch of different theories and actually some very vigorous arguments about this idea. But this idea that when you reach your limits is not that your legs can't go anymore. It's that in a sense, your brain thinks you shouldn't go anymore than that. Your limits are self-protective rather than reflecting that you're actually out of gas, like a car runs out of gas. And so then I thought I was gonna write a book about how your brain limits you. Alex Hutchinson:           31:12                And in the end, as you can probably guess, it ended up being a sort of combination of these sorts of things. Like there's the brain, there's the body, they interact in different ways, in different contexts. So I ended up exploring like, you know, we were talking about this before, what is it that limits you when you're free diving? If you're trying to hold your breath for as long as possible, is it that you run out of oxygen after a minute and then how come some people hold their breaths for 11 minutes? And how does that translate to mountain climbing or to running or to riding a bike or to being in a really hot environment or all these sorts of things. So that is what the book is about is, is where are your limits? And the final simple answer is, man, it's complicated and you have to read the whole book. Karen Litzy:                   31:51                Yeah. And we were talking beforehand and I said, I listened to the book as I was, you know, commuting around New York City, which one it would got me really motivated and to want to learn more. And then it also, I'm like, man, I am lazy. There are so many different parts of the book from the breath holding, like we were talking about. And things that I was always interested me are altitude trainings and the how that makes a difference, whether you're training up in the mountains or sea level or in those kind of altitude chambers. Which is wild stuff. And is that, I don't know, is that why people break more records now versus where they were before? Is it a result of the training? Is it, and then, like you said, the brain is involved and so are you just by pushing the limits of yourself physically, but then does the brain adapt to that and say, okay, well we did this, so I'm pretty sure, and we lived, so can we do it again? Alex Hutchinson:           33:08                And that's actually a pretty good segway to the World Congress of sports therapy. Because the session that I'm talking about it that I'm talking with Greg Leyman is on pain. And, one of the things that I find a topic that I find really interesting is pain tolerance. Do we learn to tolerate more. And so, you know, one of the classic questions that people argue about on long runs is like who suffers more during a marathon, you know, a two and a half hour marathoner or a three and a half hour marathoner. It's like, one school of thought is like, well, it's a three and a half hour marathoner is out there pushing to the same degree as the two and a half hour marathoner, but is out there for longer for almost 50% longer so that that person is suffering longer. Alex Hutchinson:           33:56                And the counter point, which sounds a little bit maybe elitist or something to say on average, the two and a half marathoner has learned two and half hour marathoner has learned to suffer more as his learning to push closer to his or her limits. Now that's a total generalization because it's not really about how fast you are. It's about how well you've trained, how long you've trained. So there are four marathoners who are pushing absolutely as hard as any two and half hour marathoner. And there are some very lucky two and a half hour marathoners who aren't pushing particularly hard because they were capable of doing it, you know, at two 20 marathon or something. But the general point that I would make and that I think that the reason that I think the research makes is that one of the things that happens when you train, so we all know that you go for that first run and it feels terrible, Eh, you feel like you're gonna die when you keep training, all sorts of changes happen. Alex Hutchinson:           34:52                Your heart gets stronger. You build new Capillaries, your muscles get stronger. Of course, that's super important. It's dominant. But I think another factor that's on pretend times under appreciated is you learned to tolerate discomfort. You learn to suffer. You learn that feeling when your lungs are bursting and you're panting and your legs are burning, that doesn't mean you're gonna die. It just means you can't sustain that forever, but you can sustain it for a little bit longer. You can choose to keep holding your finger in that candle flame for a little longer. And there's actually quite a bit of evidence showing that as training progresses, you learn not just in the context of whatever exercise you're doing, but in the context of totally unrelated pain challenges like dipping your hand in an ice bucket or having a blood pressure cuff squeezed around your arm. Alex Hutchinson:           35:35                You learn to tolerate more pain by going through the process of training. And I think it's an interesting area of, I think it tells us something interesting about physical limits cause it tells us that part of the process of pushing back physical limits is pushing back mental limits. But it also tells us something about how we cope with pain and why. For example, why exercise training might be helpful for people dealing with chronic pain, for example, that it's not just endorphins block the pain, it's that you learn psychological coping strategies for reframing the pain and for dealing with it. Karen Litzy:                   36:10                Yeah. As a quick example, two and a half weeks ago, I tore my calf muscle the medial gastric tear, nothing crazy. It was a small tear and it happens to middle age people. Normally the ultimate insult or worse, at any rate, you know, very painful. I was on crutches for a week. I had to use a cane for a little while, but I was being so protective around it. And then I read, I got a great email from NOI group from David Butler and they were talking about kind of babying your injury and trying to take a step back and looking at it, looking at the bigger picture. And I thought to myself, well, this was the perfect time to actually get this email because I was like afraid to put my heel down. I was afraid to kind of go into Dorsiflexion and once I saw that, I was like, oh, for God's sakes. And that moment I was able to kind of put the heel down to do a little stretching. And, so it wasn't that all of a sudden my physicality changed so much, but it was, I felt from a brain perspective, from a mental perspective that I could push my limits more than I was without injuring. Alex Hutchinson:           37:35                Absolutely. And it's all a question of how we have the mistaken assumption that pain is some objective thing that there's, you know, you have it damaged somewhere and that's giving you a seven out of 10 pain. But it's all about how you frame it and if you were interpreting that pain as a sign that you weren't fully healed and therefore you're going to delay your recovery, if you're feeling that pain, then you're going to shy away from it. And if you're just interpreting it, if you read that email and it reframes it as this pain is a part of healing, it's a part of the process of, and it's like, oh well I can tolerate that. If it's not doing damage, then I don't mind the pain and all of a sudden it's become something that's a signal rather than a sort of terrible, it's just information. Karen Litzy:                   38:15                Yeah. Information versus danger, danger, danger. I just reflected on that and thought, yeah, this is pain. It's being protected at the moment. It doesn't mean I'm going to go run a marathon given my injury but it certainly means I can put my heel down and start equalizing my gait pattern and things like that. And so it's been a real learning experience to say the least. And the other thing I wanted to touch on was that idea of pain and suffering. And I know this can probably be out for debate, but that because you have pain, does it mean you're suffering? So if you have a two hour 30 versus a three hour 30 or whatever, the person who runs it in six hours, right? Because you have pain, are you suffering through it or are you just moving through the pain without the suffering attached to it? And I don't know the answer to that, but I think it opens up to an interesting, to a wider discussion on does pain equals suffering? Alex Hutchinson:           39:20                Now we're getting philosophical, but I think it's an interesting one cause I mean I've heard a number of sports scientists make the argument that one of the sort of underappreciated keys for success in endurance sports is basically benign masochism that on some level you kind of enjoy pushing yourself into discomfort. And I think there's some truth to that. And I think it's an entirely open question. Like are people just born, some people just born liking to hurt or is it something in their upbringing? Moving outside of a competitive context and just talking about health, it's like what a gift it is to enjoy going out and pushing your body in some way because that makes it easy to exercise. And so I think one, you know, this is changing topic a little bit, but one of the big challenges in the sort of health information space is that a large fraction of the people who write about it are people like me who come from a sports background that on some level enjoy, I go out and do interval workouts. Alex Hutchinson:           40:16                Not because I'm worried about my insulin, but because I like it. I like pushing, finding out where my limits are on being on that red line. And so when I'm like, come on, just go out and do the workout, then others and some people find it very, very, very unpleasant to be near that line. And so I think we have to be respectful of differences in outlook. But I also think that’s what the evidence shows is you can learn to, you know, like fine line or whatever. You can learn to appreciate some of what seems bitter initially. And if you can then it totally changes then that pain is no longer suffering. Then it’s the pain of like eating an old cheese or whatever. It's like oh that's a rich flavor of pain I'm getting today in my workout as opposed to this sucks and I want to stop. Karen Litzy:                   41:06                Yeah. So again, I guess it goes back to is there danger, is there not danger? And if he can reach that point of feeling pain or discomfort or whatever within your workouts and then you make it through the workout and you're like, I can't believe I did that. And all of a sudden next time it's easier. You pushed the bar. Yeah. You've pushed them further to the peak a little bit. So I think it's fun when that happens. Alex Hutchinson:           41:35                And I think it's important what you said, a understanding the difference between pain as a danger signal. Cause I mean as an endurance athlete I may glorify the pushing through the pain. Well that's stupid if you have Shin splints or you know, if you have Achilles tendon problems or whatever. Yeah. You have to understand that some pain really is a signal to stop or at least to understand where that pain is coming from and to do something to address it. There are different contexts in which it's appropriate or inappropriate to push through pain. Karen Litzy:                   42:03                Yeah. And I would assume for everyone watching or listening, if you go to the Third World Congress of sports physical therapy, there will be discussion on those topics. Given the list of people there, there will be discussions on those topics. There are panels on those topics. Alex Hutchinson:           42:22                Yeah, I was gonna say, like Greg and I are talking about pain, but looking at the list of speakers, there's a bunch of people who have expertise in this understanding of the different forms of pain, trying to find that line, understanding the brain's role in creating what feels like physical pain. So I think there's gonna be a ton of great discussion on that. Karen Litzy:                   42:39                Yeah. All right, so we're going to start wrapping things up. So if you could recommend one must read book or article aside from your own which would it be? Alex Hutchinson:           42:50                I'll go with my present bias, which is so, you know, casting my mind all the way back over the past like two months or whatever. The book that I've been most interested in lately is a book called range. I think the subtitle is why generalists triumphant a specialist world by David Epstein. So David Epstein, his previous book was like six years ago, he wrote the sports gene, which I consider basically the best sports spine science book that I've read. And so it was kind of what I modeled my book endure on, but his most recent book just came out a couple months ago at the end of May. And it's a broader look at this whole role of expertise and practice, a sort of counterpoint to the idea that you need 10,000 hours of practice if you want to be any good at anything. Alex Hutchinson:           43:33                So as soon as you're out of the crib, you should be practicing your jump shot or whatever it is. And instead, marshaling the arguments that actually having breadth of experience, is good for a variety of reasons, including that you have a better chance of finding a good match for your talents. So for someone like me had, I just had too much quote unquote grit and decided that I needed to stick with physics cause that's what I started with. And I'm not a quitter. I’d be a physicist and I might be an okay physicist, but I'm positive that I wouldn't be as happy as I am now having been willing to sort of switch career tracks. And so it has a lot of sort of relevance for personal development, for parenting and for understanding expertise also in a sports realm as well. So range by David epstein is my pick on that front. Karen Litzy:                   44:22                Great. And we already spoke about what you're going to be talking about at the Sports congress, but are there any things that you're particularly looking forward to? Alex Hutchinson:           44:29                Yeah, there's a whole bunch of speakers, but I guess the one that caught my eye that I would definitely not sleep through is, I saw that Keith Barr is speaking on a panel and that over the last three, four years, maybe, maybe more than that, I've just been really blown away by the work that he's been doing on understanding the differences between what it takes to train for, you know, your strength, your muscles or your heart versus what it takes to train tendons and ligaments. And so I'm really looking forward to seeing what the latest updates are from his lab and from his results. Karen Litzy:                   45:04                Yeah. He gave the opening talk at Sports Congress, not 2019 but 2018. And he was just so good. I mean, I was just trying to live tweet and take some notes. I'm really looking forward to that as well. I feel great. Yeah, absolutely. All right, so is there anything that we missed? Anything that you want the viewers or listeners to know? Oh wait, where can they get your book from? Alex Hutchinson:           45:35                Fine booksellers everywhere. I mean include Amazon but it's definitely put it in a plug for your local independent bookstore. It should be, it should be available anywhere. And if you can find my latest stuff on Twitter @sweatscience, all one word and there might be a link to the book that there, but yeah, really, if you Google Hutchinson and endure for any bookseller, they should be able to get a copy of it. Karen Litzy:                   45:59                Perfect. And anything we missed? Anything that we want to hit on that maybe we didn't get to? I feel like we got a good amount. Alex Hutchinson:           46:06                I think we covered some good basis. I guess the only thing is, you know, for anyone listening, I hope I'll see you in Vancouver and cause I think there's all of these things are ongoing discussions and there's lots more to learn. So I'm looking forward to the conference Karen Litzy:                   46:20                As am I. Everyone. Thanks so much for tuning in. Thanks so much for listening again, the third world congress of sports physical therapy will take place in Vancouver, Canada, British Columbia, October 4th through the fifth of 2019 and so we hope to see you all there.   Thanks for listening and subscribing to the podcast! Make sure to connect with me on twitter, instagram  and facebook to stay updated on all of the latest!  Show your support for the show by leaving a rating and review on iTunes!

In my defense, this one wasn't my fault. Y'all can't blame me this time! So Alex is back with tales of hosting a panel at Fanexpo, Chad and Jean-luc talk Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and then the three hit up your favorite comic books, like Middlewest, Batman, Snotgirl, Pretty Violent, Outpost Zero, Excellence, and more! I'd name the rest but I can't remember what they're called. The rest is the rest. I dunno. Peace and love

In my defense, this one wasn't my fault. Y'all can't blame me this time! So Alex is back with tales of hosting a panel at Fanexpo, Chad and Jean-luc talk Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and then the three hit up your favorite comic books, like Middlewest, Batman, Snotgirl, Pretty Violent, Outpost Zero, Excellence, and more! I'd name the rest but I can't remember what they're called. The rest is the rest. I dunno. Peace and love

In my defense, this one wasn't my fault. Y'all can't blame me this time! So Alex is back with tales of hosting a panel at Fanexpo, Chad and Jean-luc talk Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and then the three hit up your favorite comic books, like Middlewest, Batman, Snotgirl, Pretty Violent, Outpost Zero, Excellence, and more! I'd name the rest but I can't remember what they're called. The rest is the rest. I dunno. Peace and love

Holy content warning Batman, this episode is off the stupid rails. So Alex is gone, leaving super adults Chad and Jean-luc to mostly discuss porn, who Goofy should and should not have sex with, erotica, and Taylor Swift's new song, Lover. Which is basically porn. After that it's comic books with White Trees, Unearth, Miles Moralles, X-Men, Batman and the Outsiders, and Collapser. Have fun

Holy content warning Batman, this episode is off the stupid rails. So Alex is gone, leaving super adults Chad and Jean-luc to mostly discuss porn, who Goofy should and should not have sex with, erotica, and Taylor Swift's new song, Lover. Which is basically porn. After that it's comic books with White Trees, Unearth, Miles Moralles, X-Men, Batman and the Outsiders, and Collapser. Have fun

Holy content warning Batman, this episode is off the stupid rails. So Alex is gone, leaving super adults Chad and Jean-luc to mostly discuss porn, who Goofy should and should not have sex with, erotica, and Taylor Swift's new song, Lover. Which is basically porn. After that it's comic books with White Trees, Unearth, Miles Moralles, X-Men, Batman and the Outsiders, and Collapser. Have fun

This week, we don't have a review. So Alex reviews the go-home episode of Raw is War heading into 1997's WWF Summerslam. Review starts at 16:09. Enjoy!

Born and attending high school in France, Alex Bourcier was struggling to find motivation in the subjects he was learning. So Alex decided to come to the United States for a year as an exchange student. One thing that immediately shocked him after arriving, was just how difficult and expensive it was to receive healthcare here compared to France. Alex saw this as an issue, and one he was going to try and solve! Alex returned to the US for college at Penn State, where with his friend Kyle, started a student chapter of Remote Area Medical (RAM), an organization providing free clinics for those who cannot afford healthcare. Since their inception just two years ago, RAM@PSU has seen incredible success. With a group of more than 100 active members, they have gone on multiple volunteer trips providing support to clinics in places of need, traveling as far as West Virginia. They are now partnering with providers in Susquehanna County to host a clinic in PA! Alex’s hard work was rewarded with not only a successful club, but more importantly the knowledge of how to repeat this success. His three key takeaways for leadership were: Have a great team Have a clear vision Leaving your ego at the door (Difficult but Important!) Would you agree? Reach Out: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandre-jos%C3%A9-bourcier-55b600107/

Spring is here! So Alex and Mike decided to celebrate with a week of listening to ASMR. We also review and discuss Captain Marvel in this episode. / Have questions or suggestions for The Weekly Undertaking? Email us at itstheoxymorons@gmail.com / Illustrations by Winston De Jesus, if you like his beautiful creations, check out his Facebook page at @wdejesusart / Music by Adam Rudy, if you like the sweet tunes, find him on all social media at @TVsAdamRudy / YouTube: The Oxy Morons / Facebook: The Oxy Morons / Twitter: @itstheoxymorons / Instagram: @itstheoxymorons / Episode 37

Episode 210 – Tournaments and the Realms Sponsored by 6 Squared Studios and Lindsay’s Gamer Garrison The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex is back and three time Waaaghpaca winner Ryan Nicol is with us...

Episode 209 – The Lonely Airbrush Novice Sponsored by 6 Squared Studios and Lindsay’s Gamer Garrison The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex is on paternity leave and David is obviously feeling the effects. He...

Episode 208 – THW Workbook Sponsored by 6 Squared Studios and Lindsay’s Gamer Garrison The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex is on paternity leave and, rather than go it alone (well, with Lindsay) I...

Why Dave Decided to talk to Alex: Alex Charfen is co-founder and CEO of CHARFEN, a training, education and membership organization for entrepreneurs and small businesses. Alex has dedicated his life to answering the question, How do you make business grow? which evolved into a larger calling to understand How do you help people grow? Listen to Alex and Dave talk about Alex’s Billionaire Code and the 4 Rs of organizations to figure out exactly where you business currently stands and how to excel to the next level.  Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business: Why you can’t sell your way out (3:00) The Billionaire Code (9:00) The 1,3,7,1 Levels (14:00) Time Inventory (22:00) The 4 R’s (24:00) Quotable Moments: "When you make that transition from me to we, you have to change who you are as an entrepreneur." "There is a difference between having a product and having a business." "Your success is the sum of what you focus on." "Your business is broken and if things go well, it always will be." Other Tidbits: No business is perfect,  you want a system and team that is adaptable. Embrass issues in your business and that’s how you grow. Links: FunnelHackerRadio.com FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar ---Transcript--- Speaker 1:     00:00       Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast, where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets, and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody. Welcome back. Speaker 2:     00:18       You guys. I seriously. I'm so excited for you guys to hear this podcast. This is a guy I have the hardest time getting. I see them all the time. We talk all the time, but to actually get enough time to have a focus for a podcast is next to impossible because he's literally building million and billion dollar brands. And with that I want to introduce and welcome back to the show Mr Alex Charfen. Alex, welcome. Thanks Dave. Great to be here with Humana. For those of you guys who don't know, Alex, it is. You're the honesty. I, I haven't. Rustled hasn't even been on more than once. So it actually, you're my first third time one. Actually, this is really cool and honestly I, for those of you guys don't know Alex, first of all, I'd recommend you go listen to the momentum podcast. I actually, the first time I met Alex was at genius network and I was so mad because he was giving out a limited supply of 500, literally numbered 500 of his entrepreneurial personality type books and it gave one to Russel and I'm like, dude, I am never going to get that. Speaker 2:     01:17       Russell doesn't give out his books, so that was like a gone deal and unfortunately been able to get a copy, but this is a guy who is literally helped thousands of entrepreneurs and a ton of my personal dear friends get over some of the struggles they have is as an entrepreneur to actually build a business and I think the key here is helping people really understand what it means to really build a business instead of just having a product. Now I know I've been to a ton of talking, but one of the things we're going to dive right into it, I am so excited about and that is this whole concept of why, in fact, first of all, before we dive in, anything else you want to say about how amazing you are, Alex? No, Dave, I just, Speaker 3:     01:51       I really appreciate you having me back on. You and I always have a lot of fun and I love the clickfunnels audience. It's like it's my favorite podcast audience if besides my own, and it's absolutely my favorite live audience, so I can't wait to speak in funnel hacking live this year. Speaker 2:     02:06       I am so excited about tickets. You should buy tickets. Seriously. If you haven't bought a ticket, go to funnel hacking live right now and go buy your ticket. You should be there because if you're not, you're going to Miss Alex and this is. This is your third time. It's my third time, but I want everybody to understand. I've been to have been to three funnel hacking lives. I missed one because the tickets sold out, so don't be like me like I, you know, I spoke three years ago. I missed the next one because there were no tickets left. We always sell out. So get your tickets. Go to funnel hacking, live back on right now and get you buy your ticket. I'm one of the topics. Alto, the great thing that Alex, so you could literally talk about a ton of different things. He's one of our two comma club x coaches and people absolutely love everything he does. Speaker 2:     02:51       He's a systems guy and understands people and more importantly what it takes to really build a business. And I think that's why I wanted to make sure I them on this time is we want to talk to you about this topic that has come up quite a bit recently and this whole idea as far as why you can't sell your way out. And with that I'm let Alex kind of talk a little about it and I'm going to come back and tell you a personal story here. But Alex, let's kind of. Let's dive more into this as far as why is it that you feel you can't sell your way out? Speaker 3:     03:20       So Dave, I want to give a little background to this. So I, you know, I've been a part of a lot of different groups in masterminds and one of the groups that I was in awhile ago used to have this same like you can sell your or market your way out of any problem and every time they would say that to the people in the room, I'd get a pit in my stomach. I get physically uncomfortable because I know that that's absolutely not true. Now you can of a lot of problems, but if you have a delivery issue and you sell more, you're going to have a bigger problem. If you have a ton of leads and you don't have a good sales team, you're going to have an even bigger problem. And so there gets to this point where you have sales and marketing or how you launched the business. Speaker 3:     04:01       Operations and processes and systems and putting the right people in the right place. The right communication in place and the right systems in place is how you really grow a company. And I think that's something that nobody really talks about because it's a lot of fun to talk about sales and marketing. But one of the reasons that I have so much respect for Russell is that he's building a real organization, a real team, and it's growing like crazy. And the reason is there's like 200 of you who are making click funnels grow and you know, if Russell early on had said, I'm just going to focus on nothing but marketing and not build the team, not build the organization to be anywhere near where you are today. Speaker 2:     04:36       I appreciate that. I can say that is a lesson I had to learn the hard way. Uh, I've had a ton of different businesses over the years and, uh, one of those businesses I, I really thought because I had heard that saying that from the exact group that you mentioned, and I thought, you know what? I don't have a problem. As long as I can sell my way out, there's an I know I can market, I can sell, I will just, I'll just, I'll just put so much more massive action into this thing and I will solve every problem just by selling more and marketing more. And that in of itself will take care of everything. And what it ended up doing basically was land in the almost on the streets of the bankruptcy court because I had sold a whole bunch of stuff that I then couldn't fulfill on or I couldn't fulfill fast enough. Speaker 2:     05:20       And then all of a sudden I started getting refund requests. I'm like, no, you can't read. You can't know that. Okay, if I'm going to get a refund, that means I've got to sell even more. I got to sell to replace the one I just lost plus get more money in. And it literally just became this downward spiral, which I know is kind of a weird topic for us to be talking about here when we're talking about funnels and everything else. But what I really want to make sure you guys understand is how important these systems really are. We were wrestling with in a couple of weeks ago, we were joking around about we sold our way real fast to 10 million. I mean, it was real quick and we actually did a pretty good job of even selling in the first two by the time we hit our end of our second year, our third year, we're at over $30 million and that was where we started realizing, you know, and we fortunately had, we had people in place but we didn't have systems and that was one of the big differences. Speaker 2:     06:11       There's a huge difference between routine and having people in place and we were fortunate we have a very, very strong culture inside of our organization as well as a long with our customers. But the biggest problem we found is we didn't have the systems for those people. And again, we had always focused on hiring a players and we'd always focused on making sure that we had great people around us but the systems was, was our downfall. And that's again, when things you've talked so much about. So with that Alex, I want to kind of dive in more and help people understand what exactly. I mean this whole billionaire code you talked about. I remember the first time you laid this out to me, I just freaked out. I was like, oh my gosh, where's Alex? Ben? For the last 50 years in my life, I only heard about this and seen this because it, it literally applied specifically to every time I looked at all the business I've done over the years, every time I had one that didn't go well or had a problem with a partner, it was because of every single thing that was in your, in your code. Speaker 2:     07:08       I mean, it literally. It was like crap if I'd only known that. So I had learned through the school of hard knocks. So in the next 15, 20 minutes I'm going to have alex as he poured his heart and soul out to you and basically give you as much as he can. Speaker 3:     07:20       Yeah. And so, and here's, here's here. So first the billionaire code, the billionaire code is, is a matrix that shows the nine levels that it takes to go from zero to $100,000,000 and exactly what you should be focused on along the way. And today, you know when, when, if anybody who wants to can go to the billionaire code.com and you can download that Matrix, it'll show you exactly what it is. In fact, you can go to my podcast episode 180. There's 20 episodes, did spell out the entire billionaire code. And if you went to funnel hacking live, you can go watch the presentation from last year because I did. And what we all need to understand though, is as you ascend as an entrepreneur, once you get to around a million dollars, and this is why it's so important for this audience because right when you're hitting the two comma club, you make this massive transition as an entrepreneur from me to we like a lot of entrepreneurs can, can overclock it. Speaker 3:     08:15       They can push themselves up to 2 million, 3 million, 4 million without a team. But it's tenuous and it's hard and it's difficult and it feels really precarious. And when you make that transition for me to change who you are as an entrepreneur, you know, I tell people that in order to grow the business you want, you have to become the person who can run it and if you don't have the business you want, you haven't become the person who can run it yet. And the major change there is making this transition from being an entrepreneur centric you, to actually building the team, building the organization. And for us, the way we coach it goes in three different places. It's putting the right people around you, doing the right things, recruiting the right members. It's using the right processes so that there's a process for everything in your business, including how you communicate and focusing on the right projects. Speaker 3:     09:04       And the billionaire code gives you exactly what projects you should be focused on each level of development, but then you have these two levels level. Putting the right people in place and the right processes in place. And the biggest deficit in most entrepreneurial businesses is in the people department with process. Because here's what most people say when they work in an entrepreneurial business, we don't know where we're going. The strategy changes way too often and nobody communicates with us. So if you can solve that, your team knows where they're going and there's consistent communication. Your Business will explode. And like you've said, you know, we've taken even some members of like the inner circle who have had really fast growth businesses, but we add those things, three things, the right people, the right process, the right projects, and all of a sudden you've got a $10,000,000 business that goes to 50 million within like 10 months. So it's been cool. I honestly, I think one I can, we can talk about just recently I was literally just within the other day was and Ryan. Yeah, what an incredible difference. So I'll let you tell their story. You know that an ideal even. Well. So Brad and Brad and Ryan at Atlas. Well financial. So it's um. Oh Man. I always say I'm Brad's last name wrong. It's Brad and Ryan Lee. Speaker 3:     10:20       Crap. I always want to say Brad Cobb, because I grew up with a kid named Brad cops. So anyway, right. And he noticed like, I've told him this every time I say your name, I say it wrong, but um, but they're phenomenal entrepreneurs. I love the two of them. And we started working with them about nine and a half months ago and when we first started talking they were considering doing something else. Getting out of the atlas was walking away from it because they couldn't figure out how to make it work. And we sat down, we structured a structure to a plan where they were going to put the right person in place. So they got, they went out and got an executive assistant and then we started really planning around how they were going to both act in the business, what they were going to do in the business. Speaker 3:     10:58       And we created a forward looking strategy and they took that strategy and they went from about a $1,000,000 business to in about a nine and a half month period, a $3,000,000 business. Now they're well over $3 million. And they have some months where they're run rates over $4 million and I just had a call with those guys this week. They went from a two person team to a six person team there now in and now they're in the place where they're doing everything. They're now getting back out of the strategy there. They're moving, they're ascending again, going from one to three now they're going to go in and go from three to 10. But here's what's so important about this. The business that they had had that potential, it's just they didn't have the right people in the seats, the right processes in place, and they weren't focused on the right projects. We flipped that and immediately they go from one to 3 million and anybody who's listening who's in that two comma club range, it's crazy. If you've gotten there, you'd be blown away. What happens when you the right systems in place? Speaker 2:     11:55       It's an honest. It's one of the things I've loved the most. I'm joking around just before he did the recording as far as an email, we had to send out some of our subcontractors and it was kind of funny just because, uh, I've looked at that, the success of, you know, one of the great things about our inner circle is russell is a genius when it comes to the sales and marketing piece and I've seen a lot of our inner circle members of that, a lot of success in doing that. And it's been interesting as they've worked with us as well to then see the system to get in place and it's. And it just takes it to the next level. And I think the best part, the part I like the most is once you have the system in place, that's when you can go back to the sales and marketing and you can totally pour the gas on it. Speaker 2:     12:34       You know, when you do that, you. That's where you see that astronomical growth. And the hardest part for most of us as entrepreneurs is we get so focused just whatever our skill set is. And for me I'm a driver. I'm just always going to drive. I'm just going to push. I'm gonna push. I just believe I'll make something happen and I know even for Brad and Ryan, they were sales guys and financial services. You may have always in the financial service industries think I'm just going to sell, sell, sell, and they just get burned out. After awhile. You're like, I've been just busted my button and yeah, and money's coming in, but it's not growing. I think that's the part I want to make sure people, you guys are listening to this, understand there's a difference between having a product and having a business. You can start off selling a product which is great and it's one of the great things about click funnels is you can take that product and all of a sudden that product you can turn that. Speaker 2:     13:22       I look at Natalie Hodson. I mean natalie had this crazy, crazy product that I hit the two comma club selling a $37 Ebook, which is just astronomical. I mean you got to be, you don't have it upsale, you don't just have a $37 ebook but you did it. But again, the cool thing for me is I take a look at where she's at now. It's because of the people she's brought in. It's because of the system against you could sell and she could mark it and she did an amazing job and she got to that level. But to get to that next level it requires the things you're talking about. And so Alex, if you don't mind, if you could help people. Let's take a step back. There's a lot of, you and I have talked a lot about this whole idea as far as one, three, seven, one meaning $100,000, 300,000, $70,000, million, $3 million, 7 million, 10 million, 30 million, 70 million, 100 million. And at each of those tiers it kind of fits it a little bit. Kind of along the lines of your billionaire code. Yeah. And as people are in those different levels, what if you could kind of target those people who right now are under 100,000 and tell them what they should focus on and then from those people who are in that $3 million and then the million above, you don't mind. Speaker 3:     14:27       So if you're under 100,000, here's the biggest issue for most people that are under 100,000, you haven't decided who you're working with yet. You haven't gotten really clear on your market. I mean if you're just starting out, there's two things. It's one personal. Your personal skill sets, your habits, your routines, like are you as a human being ready to own a business? And for most people the answer is no, they're not doing the things that they need to do. They're not forward planning, they're not strategic planning, they're not clear on what really want. And then second, are you clear on who you want to serve? Once you get that covered from 100 to 300, it's how many leads can you generate? And can you lock in lead generation? Can you get that population coming towards you? Then from 300 to a million, it's building the system so that you can deliver and making sure you can deliver consistently and convert sales consistently and then from a million to three you have to not only build systems around what you do well, but then you have to build a team around what you do well and then now it gets interesting when you get to 3 million and you're going above three. Speaker 3:     15:23       That's a transition where your ability to lead a team is almost exclusively what is going to help you move forward. For most entrepreneurs, and I think what happens is a lot of entrepreneurs get there and they don't realize you have to make a full transition from doing everything yourself to having the team do it with you and it's not just having the team do the things you don't want to do anymore. It's having a team do most of what you do well and that's why I gave the numbers don't lie. The numbers of the United States are crazy. Check this out. There's 29 million businesses in the United States under a 100,000, $22 million under a million 25 million. So when you are. Sorry, 26 million. So when you look at the population of businesses in the United States, 26 million are under $1,000,000 out of 29 million and so the numbers don't lie. Most entrepreneurs never get there. If you get over a million dollars, you're part of the three percent club. Three percent of businesses overall that are ever started getting to a million dollars or more. That's why clickfunnels is so crazy because the fact that click funnels isn't just like the fastest growing business I've ever observed and one of the craziest Unicorns that's ever out there, but it's a million dollar business factory. I don't think that's ever existed in the history of the world before. Speaker 2:     16:41       No, we've again, it's because of people like you. It's because of a lot of. We have over right now. We were, in fact when you were in her office, we were kind of counting and as far as on the walls, the different plaques. So we're now just cross over 373, two comma club award winners and we just got our 27th application for eight figure awards and so you started adding all this up and I forget what the actual number was you and I came up with when you're in the office, but I mean it's literally billions of dollars a business that's been created and I think the part that I loved the most, especially as you take a look at your billionaire code, is the ability for a person who wants to move. And again, not all entrepreneurs do. They you get comfortable and there's nothing wrong with that. Speaker 2:     17:25       But for a person who really wants to get to that next level, whether it's from 300,000 to $700 from a million to three or from 3 million to 10, for those who really want to do it, there are people like you who can help you actually make that kind of thing happen. And I think the part I'm most excited about as far as clickfunnels is we've been fortunate to attract people like you and others and who it. Because they're here, it's becoming this magnet magnetism of others who all of a sudden come to clickfunnels. And I was literally just buying a domain and the company I was buying the domain from my. Anytime I buy a domain, I never tell them who I am. Speaker 2:     18:04       I've learned that you could ever get an email from j Levi Parker, that's kind of mine. Chris Brown. So it was funny because, um, we finally negotiated the terms and then his secretary was a big financial service company and they own this domain that we really wanted. And she finally says, now what's the email? And I told her the email. She goes, what's your name? I said, oh Dave. She goes, why is it j? Levi Parker? I'm like, Oh crap, I totally screwed that up. My name, here's my real name. And she goes, wait a second, hold on. And she puts me on the phone with the CEO who were buying the domain from. He goes, is this Dave Woodward from clickfunnels? I said, yeah. He goes, we love click funnels. And I'm like, Oh my God, I'm glad to know that now. But you'd probably charge more if you. Speaker 2:     18:54       He asked me and I'm glad that we didn't find that out up front and they actually did ask for a free click funnel hacking live ticket and the negotiation. But uh, no. My only reason I'm saying that is I think it's interesting as you take a look, this was a financial services company and I never would've thought click on those would apply to them. But again, these guys they're doing that this year it'll be about 12 to $15 million and they're using a product and yet at the same time what has got them there is people and systems. And I think it's one of the greatest skill sets that you've offered to so many other people. And I want to make sure that people who are listening, you've mentioned already the billionaire code. So if you want to go to the billionaire code.com and download that, highly highly recommend it. Speaker 2:     19:35       It's one of the greatest things out there as far as really the part I love most. Alex is in one sheet of seeing from zero to $100, million and little. You can find out where you're at and the part I like most about it is you could be, even though it's all columns, rows and columns, but all of a sudden you might be in one column but in a different role and you go, wait a second, I'm behind in these areas and you see where your weaknesses are and because that you're able to make those changes super fast. The other thing is if you didn't, if you haven't heard Alex's billionaire code, if you get a ticket funnel hacking live, you actually, we will send you the recordings from last year and I. It's one of my favorite presentations to be honest with you. I love anytime you speak, you have this unbelieve seeing you on stage. Speaker 2:     20:18       As much as it's cool watching you here and we're doing this podcast, but seeing you on stage, it's a totally different element. You are. You just come alive and it's the coolest thing for me to see because you pour so much into the audience. I mean, you're, you were born to be on stage. It's the coolest thing ever because of the way in which you give and you care so much because you connect so much better with the people as you see them. It's just you have this personal relationship with them. It's really a neat thing. For me. I'm, I'm, I'm a, I'm a complete introvert, like in real life. But um, I learned very young how to speak Speaker 3:     20:48       it. I love public speaking. It's one of my favorite things in the world. This is what you and Russell at the same, same exact way. Total introverts. You put you on stage and oh my gosh. It's like nobody believes I'm an introvert, but you know, I, I used to have a debilitating stutter. I had. So for anybody listening who's like, oh, I don't think I could ever speak on stage a lot. Younger English was my second language. So I had a crazy accent that I used to get made fun of for in school. I used to stutter because I was really, I had a hard time talking in front of people. I'm dyslexic, so if I ever had to read in public, it was really hard. It sounded like I didn't know how to read, but it was just the words were moving around on the page and um, you know, I, I learned how to speak in high school with my speech coach and getting the opportunity to speak on a stage like click funnels, funnel hacking live. Speaker 3:     21:38       It's crazy. There's so much energy in that room when you say you build a relationship with the audience in that room, they build a relationship with you. Well, thank you. Love 5,000 people that are dying to have a relationship with you, Alex. so one thing I'd want to make sure we touch on, and I think because it applies to anybody, no matter where they are in your billionaire code and that is your time study. Yeah. Kind of going into that real quick. Only because I was the worst person in the world on that and I hate this, but it's a life changer. So this is, you know, I've been a consultant for over 20 years and I use strategies that work and it doesn't matter how difficult they are, it doesn't matter how confronting they are. To me, it's how do we get the biggest result with the least amount of time and one of the things that we, we inventory as entrepreneurs is money. Speaker 3:     22:22       We all like we look at how much money we're making but we don't really look at what we're doing with our time. And so how do you inventory your time, take that data and improve what you're doing with your time. Because at the end of the day, your success is the sum of what you focus on. And until you can inventory where your focus is, you don't know what's really going on. So what we have people do in our programs and in our company like Haley right now, my assistant is doing it, two wait time study. She writes everything down that she's doing in 15 minutes and then commence. And anybody can do this. You write it down in 15 minute increments for two weeks. And what will happen is in the first couple of days, you'll already start modifying your behavior, but at the end of two weeks, right at the end of two weeks, you'll have a full inventory of where you spent your time for a two week period. Speaker 3:     23:07       And then here's what we have people do. Go through that inventory and mark, was it strategic or tactical? And as an entrepreneur, the more time you spend in strategy versus tactics, the more you're going to grow your business. And most entrepreneurs are over 90 percent tactical in any given week. And for me like this podcast with you, this is strategy. This is strategic. I'm the only one in the business that I would want to have do this. But setting up the time for the podcast, setting up the appointment, put it into the calendar, all those things. Somebody else did all of that for me. I just showed up and click the button. And so at the end of a two week time study, you really know where you are. And I think, you know, I, I often share with people your story that we were talking and you were asking me for strategies and then I shared the time studying and you're like, okay, I'm going to do that. And then two days later I get a voicemail where you're like, I just want you to know I kind of hate you. Speaker 2:     23:58       I totally, I really do that. Oh yeah. And I think the other part I do want you to talk about, and that's the four rs I'm going through right now and I'm creating for ours, for my, my role here at click funnels. And it's been fascinating for me as I've been doing this. As I look at the four rs with my time study, it totally changing the game because I'm like, oh my gosh. Even though that is what I'm classified with, strategy, I don't need to be the person doing that strategic thing and I can have someone else do it. Which was kind of, it was mine. Again, I'm still struck. I haven't completed my forearms right now. I'll have it done by tomorrow, but it's been fascinating for me to see that a lot of things that I thought I still needed to be doing, I don't. So if you don't mind, can you explain what the four r's are? Absolutely days. So, um, you know, Speaker 3:     24:49       in most positions in the world do you have a job description and a job description is usually like one or two paragraphs describing what somebody does in a role in our organization and the organizations we coach, we found one or two paragraphs woefully inadequate. And what we want to be able to do is give somebody a very clear idea of exactly what we want from the person. So whether you're recruiting or managing a team member, we use what we call a four r document, its role. That's where most job descriptions start. Stop. So we have a paragraph about the role, then we have responsibilities. What are the exact responsibilities that that person has? Then the results, what results is that person driving? And then the last thing is the requirements. And so for example, for a salesperson, you might have a rule that says, you know, this is an inside salesperson, they're going to be available full time, remote remotely located, they're going to call it on high ticket clients, and then in the responsibilities it's making 100 calls a week, having this level of conversions, this is how many actual live calls they have to have, and then in results it's driving x number of dollars in business a week and then you know exactly what the results that they should have the right client bringing in the right Avatar, making sure that there's not a high return rates, high retention rate, and then the last thing in requirements for sales might be excellent phone communication skills, excellent written skills. Speaker 3:     26:10       And so once you have that all built out, if you're recruiting, you are so likely to find the right person because it's very clear. And then this is the only document that we know of that you can take from recruiting right into the position. Speaker 2:     26:24       So it becomes a tool you find them with and you lead them with. I think that's the part you just said there. I for me has been the part I've enjoyed the most because I'm actually the people who work for me now I'm asking them to create their four r document and it has been so mind opening for not only for me because they're doing some things on there that that's not part of their role or the responsibilities and and other things that I thought they knew where their responsibilities don't even show up anywhere on, on the document. Speaker 2:     26:56       So again, anyone who's listening, if you have somebody who is works for you, and again, I think even if it's you're an assistant, it doesn't matter who it is. Impact. Yeah. I think you're crazy. These days. I, I fight all structure. I just innate in me to fight it. I just ate it, but it's been for me. The thing that has helped me the most is working with people like yourself, Alex. I'm like, okay, I gotta get into this thing and I have to realize that the structure actually is what's going to help me get to the next level. I mean, we'll do $100 million this year and you and I had the conversation earlier as far as, you know, Dave, who do you want to be and where do you want to lead? And for me, I know there's no way I can lead or be involved in a company that had $100,000,000 level unless I change who I am. And it kind of goes back to the, you know, the proverbial thing people have got you here will never get you there or at least the situations you're in, you have to change. And for me the best way of changing has been this for our document. It's been a great, great opportunity. Do you have any resources where people can go to get that or understand a better? Um, you know, Speaker 3:     28:02       we, we teach that in all of our programs. So if you go to a billionaire code.com or if you download the entrepreneurial, not download, sorry, if you buy a free plus shipping copy of the entrepreneurial personality type book, um, we will, we'll, we'll give you in our follow up sequence. We talk about where the for our documents are, where, where we, where we have all these resources. In fact if somebody wants to, they can go to free momentum book dot Com and get that. And by the way, I now have a funnel there that were, that I'm willing to share on funnel hacker radio because last year when I spoke at funnel hacking live, real funnels weren't quite there yet, but now we're very proud of the funnels were putting out. Um, we've got some pretty incredible click funnels now. Speaker 2:     28:43       Well, I think the coolest thing is the fact that, uh, if you haven't listened to Alex's podcast, a highly, highly recommend that you do as far as the momentum podcast, he actually, I have to give Kudos to him. He hit the, he got to the million dollar or the million downloads level faster than I have. I'm not there yet, so please support me and get me to the millions so I can come back and to be like, one point three, one, I'm, I think I'm around 900,000 and you started six months after me on a podcast and you're doing it like every day though. I mean I've got like 300, 85, 400. It's crazy. So it's just sheer volume. Speaker 2:     29:20       That's a lot of content, but the coolest thing honestly is I highly recommend you guys go check out the momentum podcast. It's what Alex contributes and gives is just amazing things for any entrepreneur to really help. And what I love is they're short the quick and it's stuff that people can implement that day and I think that's the, that's the secret. Does fast implementation. So again, we've talked about the whole idea as far as why you cannot, why can't sell your way out of your problems. Talk About for our document talking about time studies. Anything else you want to make sure we cover here in a few minutes before I let you get back to your day? Speaker 3:     29:55       Uh, you know, Dave, I think, I think we've pretty much covered it. You know, I have this saying that I share with business owners, your business is broken and if things go well, it always will be. And here's what I mean by that. You know, volume creates complexity and success creates deficits. And so as a business owner, you don't want a perfect business. What you want is you want a system and a team and a structure that is adaptable and can cover complexity and filling deficits. And I think that there's far too many business owners today, they think that some day they're not gonna have any problems. I would look at it differently. I wouldn't tell you all embrace the issues in your business, chase them down, hunt them down, solve them. And that's how you really grow a company by pretending like there aren't issues by, by wanting to perfect business, by trying to drive the problems out of your business, you're actually creating the biggest constraint you possibly can. So just remember, success creates deficits and volume creates complexity. What you want a team is a team and an organization that can cover both and you'll get to the level you want to as an entrepreneur. Speaker 2:     30:58       I love it. So everyone check out billionaire code.com. Make sure you follow Alex on his momentum podcast and by all means, if you have not bought a ticket to funnel hacking live, go there right now. Buy Your ticket. You do not want to Miss Alex on stage. This guy literally gives his whole heart and soul to anybody he comes in contact with. So the great thing about actually being with Alex at funnel hacking live is you're one of the most approachable people in the world, which is just, I mean, it's such an amazing thing for me to see how willing you are to give and share during the full three days, not just the time you're on stage, but as people I've seen you in the hall talking to people and you just give and give and you give and you give. So the only way you get that is by going to funnel hacking live.com. Spend time with Alex. it will literally bless your life. He's always blessed mine and it's been an honor to spend time with he and his wife and his two daughters. It's always fun. So Alex, Ian, thank you a ton. Any parting words here before we go Speaker 3:     31:49       now just say how your family for me, you're a constant source of inspiration and I love you man and I appreciate you having me on three. Pete. Now Speaker 2:     31:59       one. Thanks so much. I think so. I think someone trademark that. It's A. I probably owe some money on three people. We'll talk to you. Bye. Speaker 4:     32:12       Hey everybody. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. If you don't mind, could you please share this with others, rate and review this podcast on itunes. It means the world to me. We're trying to get to as a million downloads here in the next few months and just crush through over $650,000 and I just want to get the next few 100,000 so we can get to a million downloads and see really what I can do to help improve and and get this out to more people. At the same time, if there's a topic there's you'd like me to share or someone you'd like me to interview, by all means just reach out to me on facebook. You can pm me and I'm more than happy to take any of your feedback as well as if people would like me to interview. I'm more than happy to reach out and have that conversation with you. So again, go to Itunes, rate and review this, share this podcast with others and let me know how else I can improve this or what I can do to make this better for you guys. Thanks.

From a boy with a stutter to popular fraternity brother and top drug dealer in the city - Alex's first “entrepreneurial gig” came to an abrupt halt the morning the DEA shattered his bedroom window and arrested him. But for Alex, even that “business” was never for the money. It was to fulfill something much deeper. Plagued with such heavy self-doubt from a stutter that made him the laughing target of his kindergarten class, Alex grew up doing everything he could to get people to like him - including selling drugs. He's no stranger to the game we play with ourselves as we put up facades thinking that's what will sell. Thinking that's how to succeed. Until it all came crashing down, literally. So Alex committed to break down his bullshit stories so he could build a life of truth, congruence and abundance by simply being, himself. And it's worked. Alex is his own best case study. From jail cell to integrity based sales expert, Alex transitioned into the coaching space at just 21 helping Ted McGrath build a multi-million dollar coaching and seminar organization, from the ground up, in just four years. Now with one of the highest client success rates in the industry having personally led over 2000 enrollment conversations and helped influencers all over the world collectively sell 8-figures+, Alex teaches his clients how to sell with truth instead of tactics, and build businesses that fuel them, so they can live as the most authentic, expressed version of themselves. Website: alexjmoscow.com

On today’s episode of Just the Tips, we have a bit of a wildcard, who jumped into the show before I could introduce him, and then served as a Don King-style hype man for Dean and myself. But that’s Alex Dee, a man who brings enormous energy to everything he does. The origins of this episode may have come from an evening in a hot tub, but Alex actually has an amazing story of triumphing over adversity as he came to America, triumphing again when his life hit the skids, and then turning everything around to help entrepreneurs with his Success Hacks program. You need to listen to the whole episode to hear all about Alex’s online entrepreneur academy. Alex is the real deal, and as you can tell Dean and I have a lot of respect for and fun with this guy. Hired and fired within a week Alex moved from Iran with his family when he was 8 to escape fighting in the country, and moved into an apartment right next to one of the most prestigious high schools in the U.S. So right from the start, his parents valued and emphasized education and bettering yourself, a theme Alex would return to again and again. One of the funniest things that happened to him, though, was his first job straight out of college. He was hired and then fired by a major telecom company within one week. Of course Alex tells that story first, but we got him to tell the story about traveling 20 miles through the desert as his family smuggled him out of the country. As you can tell, Alex is a straight shooter, and this is just the beginning of his journey as an entrepreneur. Are you going to crumble, or climb back up? Like many entrepreneurs, Alex has had his ups and downs. But one down period in particular was rough for him. In 2008 when the financial crisis hit, he lost almost his entire net worth, and he and his wife got divorced. But his lawyer actually had some really great advice for him about how to turn his life around. So Alex started reading every book about entrepreneurship that he could get his hands on, and implementing every solid piece of advice he could grab. And that mindset is what allowed him to turn things around, and then begin to share what he learned with others. This is a really honest story on this week’s Just the Tips that you just have to hear. Don’t be a donkey Alex’s story is amazing, but we have him here on Just the Tips to provide one thing: Tips. And the first he serves up is a parable about a donkey that an entrepreneur once told Alex. We won’t try to recreate it here, but the thrust of it is that we all want to do everything, but we can’t. So we need to focus on one thing at a time and knock each of those out sequentially. This is truly a clinic in how to adopt a successful mindset, and one every entrepreneur needs to hear. How to be happy Read any book, ask any person, and you will get a billion different answers to the question: “How can you become happy?” Alex, though, breaks it down in a very simple and amazing idea: creation. Being able to wake up every morning and being able to create something that you really care about, whether it’s actually making something with your hands, or creating moments with your friends and family. Alex may be my partner in crime when it comes to pranking Dean, but he’s a seriously great guy, who has used all of his life experiences to really make an incredible life for himself. If you’re in a rut, you have to listen to Alex on this week’s episode of Just the Tips. Outline of This Episode [4:34] Alex’s incredible story [12:00] How perspective is important [14:25] How Alex’s gratitude helped him weather tough times [19:00] The donkey parable [24:58] How to be happy [34:42] My epiphany at the racetrack [42:02] Alex’s online entrepreneurial academy Resources mentioned Success Hacks on Facebook Success Hack Nation on Instagram Online Entrepreneur Academy Music for “Just The Tips” is titled, “Happy Happy Game Show” by Kevin MacLeod (http://incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License Connect With James and Dean James P. Friel: AutoPilot Entrepreneur Program: www.jamespfriel.com/autopilot Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/autopilotentrepreneur Site: www.jamespfriel.com Dean Holland: Blog: www.DeanHolland.com FB Page: https://www.facebook.com/DeanHollandHQ Digital Business Entrepreneurs: https://www.facebook.com/groups/DigitalBusinessEntrepreneurs/  

"If we don't start doing things differently, there won't be agriculture to pass down." Climate change is a hot-button political issue, but in the Western U.S., no one can deny that the drought and above average temperatures are real. Mike Nolan, a young farmer in Mancos, Colorado, gives an insider perspective on farming in extreme weather conditions, building resilience, and shares how an innovative conservation policy idea that started over beers and ended up in the Senate farm bill. What is the path forward for farmers in the arid West? Mountain Roots Produce: https://mountainrootsproduce.com/aboutus/ U.S. Drought Monitor: https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/ Rocky Mountain Farmers Union Drought Diaries: https://www.rmfu.org/homepage-2/latest-news/happening-now/the-drought-diaries/ Episode Transcript This is the Young Farmers Podcast. I’m Lindsey Lusher Shute. Today I’m speaking with Mike Nolan, a farmer at Mountain Roots Produce, and chapter leader at the Four Corners Farmers and Ranchers Coalition that’s based near Mancos, Colorado. Mike is already growing in a dry climate, but this year has been especially tough. He explains the challenges brought by drought and severe weather and how he is cop ing with it all. He also tells us how micro-equip, an idea he had over some beers, made it all the way to the Senate version of the farm bill. I’m Julia Sherman, farmer at Rag and Frass Farm in Jeffersonville, Georgia, and a leader of the Middle Georgia Young Farmers Coalition. I’m a member of the National Young Farmers Coalition because it’s so important for young farmers to work together to create change. For $35 a year, you can join too. In addition to being part of a bright and just future for agriculture in the United States, you’ll also get discounts like 40 percent off Filson and 25 percent off farm to feed socks. To join, go to youngfarmers.org. Mike: You know, you guys had that at your place. You had that massive hail storm. Lindsey: Yep. Mmhmm. Mike: You know, we’ve had like kind of like one of those events or something like that, like every 10 to 14 days where it’s like— Lindsey: Woah Woah Woah… Mike: We’re like really? It’s either hail or bug infestations or water issues or smoke or fire or something. Lindsey: Ah wow, you’ve had it all. So can you just, you know, even now when I talk about the water situation, particularly to really new farmers where you are, who are east coast farmers, it’s just so different. I mean you’ve farmed on this side of the country for a while so you can understand the contrast. Could you just very briefly describe how your farm gets water? Mike: Yes, definitely. Um, basically our water rights go back to the late 1800’s. They’re some of the oldest in the state, so a lot of the farms and ranches here have adjudicated water rights. So they’re water rights that kind of stay with the ground. Like ours come off river. So we have river water rights and then we also have storage water rights. So we have storage water out of our lake, which serves to make this valley, and that deeds us an acre foot of water per acre on an annual basis. And then we have– Lindsey: And that’s not water that you have on your farm–that’s in the reservoir. Mike: Yeah, that’s in a reservoir. And that reservoir also serves Mancos role water, which is our domestic water. It serves the town of Mancos and it also serves to Mesa Verde National Park. And that reservoir is small compared to a lot of place s. It’s only 10,000 acre feet when it gets full. And right now after this summer, I think it’s sitting at about 1400 acre feet going into the winter with the 2 municipalities or municipal water. Mancos and Mesa Verde will be continuously using it all winter. Lindsey: Okay. So over 10 percent full. Uh, how does that compare with a normal August? Like where should the reservoir be at this time of year? Mike: You know, normally the reservoir would be 30 to 40 percent full, possibly higher. The tricky part this year, Lindsey, was that in a normal year we get to run off our adjudicated water, our priority water, and in the past five years on this place we can run off river water until about, you know, fourth of July, sometimes early August, and this year we didn’t get a single day of river water. And then our storage water was limited to 60 percent of our total allotment. So this is really abnormal. And the hardest part about it honestly was we didn’t get any precipitation all winter, so the ground was so dry. So even hay guys around here, they could grow two to three inches of water in 24 hours on hay grounds and it would just drop right into the water table. Like you’d come back seven days later and it’d be bone dry. Lindsey: If you have senior rights, then there’s a lot of other people who clearly didn’t get water either. Lindsey: Yeah. Some folks, I mean, some folks still have river water. Um, so here’s kind of an interesting thing. The town of Mancos is priority 3, but the priority is sitting at two right now. Um, so the town of Mancos is actually using their storage water and there’s two irrigators in the valleys that are priority one and two that are using water right now to irrigate hay. So the town has actually fallen out of priority, which rarely happens. Lindsey: So the town has fallen out of priority for its river water? Mike: Yeah. So the town usually is able to pull off the Mancos River for their domestic water use. Um, but right now they’re just pulling off the lake Lindsey: And so they’re further depleting the reservoir? Mike: Yeah. And I don’t totally know what their usage is. It’s a small town so I can’t imagine it’s more than an acre foot or two. So yeah, they were using their lake water. Everyone’s on storage water right now and it’s scary out there. Speaker 2: Yeah. So you have received 60 percent of your total allotment this season for storage water. How is that impacting the farm? Mike: So we, this winter by farm partner and girlfriend Mindy Perkovich and I kind of sat down and we knew it was going to be tight, so we wanted to, we knew we needed to do the CSA crops and we can kick that on domestic water. Then we kind of had tears of like, okay, storage, beets, potatoes, winter squash. You know, last year we did about seven acres in production. This year I think we did about 1.7 or 2 acres of production. So we’re super limited. Our water came on about four weeks later than it should and we’ve been out of water for I think two and a half weeks now. And we’ve had like barely any rain. We’ve been running off our Mancos role water just to ease things along, and we’ve just taken crops that we would like to finish out, like the cabbage and the beans. And we’ve either just mowed them and decked them or picked them early. We could afford the water with rural water. Lindsey: That’s like from the town? Mike: It’s our domestic water for the valley. So it, you know, we don’t like to use too much of that stuff because the Ph is a little bit off. It’s a little bit higher in salt, it’s chlorinated. Lindsey: It’s treated water. Mike: It’s treated water and I hate using treated water for vegetable production personally. Lindsey: And it’s expensive I imagine. Lindsey: Oh yeah. You know, we budgeted about a thousand dollars for the last six weeks of the season to be able to tide us through. Speaker 2: Wow. So what, so what is next for you guys for next season? Doesn’t seem like it’s expected to get much better next year and the reservoirs are lower than in previous seasons. What are you thinking about for the 2019 season? Mike: We’re thinking a lot of stuff. It’s, you know, with all the workers in NYC, you know, we are always talking about resiliency, right? Resiliency and drought. And what I’ve realized this year is that I can totally figure out how to be resilient, resilient with my markets and crop production. What I’m having a hard time with is being resilient in relationships and with mental health. And I don’t think that Mindy and I could do this again next year. I think it would crush us. So if things don’t get better, we’re just going to get jobs for a year. Um, we’ll have some water. We’ll be able to cover crop things great for some rain. Um, in the meantime, financially we’re okay. Like we’d have enough to start up again next year. Um, but if we don’t farm, we won’t have enough to do it again in 2020. We’re being, we’re trying to be really pragmatic about it and not take it too close to heart personally if we can’t farm next year, because fighting it is not..you can’t fight this. In order for us to be looking good next year. Um, and these are things I think folks out of the Mountain West don’t totally understand about water is that, you know, we need some good fall rains to wet the mountains so that the snow, and then we need a good snow pack and then we need a good slow melt. And the reason why we want mountains to go in wet is that if the mountains go in dry, which is what happened last year, the little bit of snow there, you know, for every 10 inches of moisture up there, you can lose 40 to 60 percent of it to the ground and we want that to run into the rivers. So we need to kind of have like a very normal fall, winter, spring, um, in order to kind of pull ourselves out of this. Lindsey: If there are those conditions possibly in the fall, then you and Mindy might consider making a go of it for 2019. Mike: The plan will be to farm next year until we really get those clear signals that it’s not a good idea basically. Every year is a gamble that, you know, I have this silly analogy when it comes to this water stuff that helps me understand it, is that it’s all this stuff. It’s kind of like a GPA. So it’s like you do all this. It’s good, good, good, good, good. And then you have one year or one bad grade and it totally screws you up. And then it can take years to get back to that place that you were prior. And that’s kind of where we’re at now is that one winter is not going to save us. We probably will have a limited year next year. It’s going to take a couple of good winters and some good summer rain to pull us out of this. Lindsey: And what are you hearing from folks who give technical support and are making projections on the weather? Lindsey: You know, all spring they were like “this is going to be one of the best months and years on record” and we have gotten about an inch of moisture or less than that all summer. And so it’s like they’re predicting for a wet fall. But I, I honestly have no idea like what to expect. We’re just grateful that it’s cooled off a little bit because the other thing is that, um, our nighttime and daytime temperatures are five to 10 degrees above average for most of the summer as well. It was, it was a very bizarre summer here. But you know, some of my 80 year old neighbors are like, they’ve never seen this before. So we have some CSA members that do, you know, there’s a lot of folks that work for the FEDS around here, a federal government, whether it’s BLM, Forest– Lindsey: On federal lands? Lindsey: Yeah, national parks, I mean they employ so many people in our region because we’re surrounded by every form of public lands. Um, so there’s lots of scientists and biologists and we have a woman who is a CSA member and she does lizard studies and she was telling us that she’s seeing Pine, Pinyone and Juniper trees that are 80 to 90, 100 years old, just completely dying in front of her plot that she’s researching. Lindsey: Because, because of the weather, because of lack of rainfall. Mike: 2018 is one for the books is the most quiet way I can say it. Lindsey: And then on top of that there was, was the 416 fire, is that the one that has impacted you as well? I know there have there been quite a few in the region. Mike: The big impact of the fires is that, um, it just, it hit the economy super hard. Everybody’s numbers are down. I mean, wholesale numbers are down across the board for farmers. People weren’t eating out as much. Tourism kind of dropped off. Honna and Daniel, who are NYFC members, um, they’re about 45 minutes away from us. They were saying that there was a four or five week period where their wholesale numbers were down about 60 percent or more. Locals were leaving town, so they weren’t buying the local restaurants and tourists weren’t coming and it was just this really weird—. Like one restaurant we sell to was closed for three weeks because the fire, because they couldn’t access it, um, they’ve pulled them out of there on opening night. So we’d lost that account for about three, four weeks. And then you first smoke on top of that and you know, that kind of messes with the plants, we would call it. It was causing all of our head-lettuce successions to bolt, because I think it was messing with their, with their daylight requirements. You’d have multiple times where our visibility was like a mile and a half, two miles and the sun was red. Kind of like the eclipse last summer. And we would plant these head-lettuce successions and they would just barely grow and then bolt. It was usually a couple days after you’d have one of those kinds of smoke events. So yeah, that’s another, another crazy thing about the fires, but the economy hit was the really big one. Um, and I will give props to everyone, like being really resilient about it and also to our elected officials on both sides of the aisle that showed up. I mean we had our congressional rep, both senators, governor, um, everyone in the State House, State Senate, county commissioners. Everyone’s really pushing for people to like come back to our area because we’re such a tourist economy. Lindsey: Just by, just by promoting it and saying it’s still safe. You should come. It’s beautiful. Mike: We’re still open for business. Lindsey: I mean, I guess that sort of brings me to another question. How does policy relate to any of this and what do you want elected officials to do to help farmers in your region? Mike: Havin g direct assistance payment is I think what they really need. There’s so many cattle producers, hay producers, you know, producers that are just on the verge of bankruptcy. The last thing they need is a loan. Lindsey: And you’re talking about like an emergency loan offered by a farm service agency? Mike: Yeah, and those, you know, I appreciate those and I think they work for some people, but we’re down here with our state representative, Marc Catlin, and that’s what all, I mean these are guys and girls that do not want to ask the government for everything. And they were like, we need something. Otherwise, you know, our centennial farms are going to be filing for bankruptcy and we’re done. And there’s no reason for the next generation to come in if it’s not economically viable in any way, shape, or form. Lindsey: I don’t disagree with you at all. But I wonder what is the strategy to keep those farms viable if these conditions continue? Like I think they do need, you know, more than a loan potentially. But like for how, I mean no one knows for how long. What we’re seeing with global warming is only going to make these conditions potentially even worse than they are now. So what are people talking about just like the future of agriculture in the region? Like is there a path forward? Mike: Yeah. So I would, I think that’s a great question. I don’t think it’s smart for anybody to prop up types of agriculture that are long-term unsustainable. Stewardship-wise, but also economically. I think a couple of steps would be to like prop things up now and get it so you know, these families aren’t dipping into all their savings and their kids are going to be left with nothing. Just prop them up for a minute so we can all sit down and figure it out. There are a lot of families in this region who are coming to. I’m on the Mancos Conservation District Board as well. And we have multi-generational families and cattle families that are coming to our offices being like, “what can we do that’s different? Like what crops can we grow that are more profitable, what’s up with all this market gardening stuff? What’s up with this root crop vegetable stuff? Like what can we change to be more economically versatile and resilient?” Lindsey: And what are they growing right now? Mike: I mean in this valley like hay and cattle. There’s no real crop production in Mancos per se. Lindsey: So one of the things that I’ve heard you talk about that I appreciate is this need for young farmers to really stand with multigenerational farmers. Some farmers who are doing things very differently at a much different scale. You describe culturally like the importance of having this farm community intact. Can you just speak to that for a minute? Like why do you think it’s so important to have these larger farms in your region? Mike: Farmers make up two percent or less of the population and whether somebody is raising commodities or you know, these hay guys are raising hundreds of acres of yay, you know, and hundreds of heads of cattle, and I’m over here doing an acre or two of potatoes. We’re all on the same boat. We’re all in that small number of people. So, inadvertently creating divisions, being like we’re really different and better or worse than or any of those kinds of things. I don’t think that’s helpful because you sit down with a lot of these farmers and ranchers and you know, I understand there’s a unique set of struggles that NYFC is addressing really well when it comes to young and beginning farmers and ranchers, but they’re not too dissimilar to some of the things that these farmers or older farmers or ranchers have gone through and also are kind of struggling with too. I mean it’s still hard to make a living whether you’re starting out or three, four or five generations in. It can be really challenging. You know, there’s just such a wealth of knowledge there. And so like that kind of cohabitation is really important to me. Lindsey: We’ve definitely had a similar experience in New York. Just really needing those farmers to be there for so many reasons because they’re the reason we have a tractor dealership and a market, you know, and availability of, you know, mechanics and even if we’re doing things totally differently and even if they think we’re crazy on some level, you know, they still, there’s still like this mutual respect and understanding about the life we live and the hours we work and the seasonality and the risk and that sort of thing that is just like so, so vital for farmers to do well. I think it’s just too hard to be out there by yourself. Mike: It’s pretty awesome to have those kinds of connections. Lindsey: So, you know, on the federal level, I think people are looking at conservation programs. Do you think conservation programs can help them in a moment like this? Mike: Oh yeah. I mean, I don’t have any ground and obviously in CRP. And there’s a lot of ground in our region that’s in those conservation programs, and on a year like this that ground has become really vital. A lot of folks up in the Duck Creek area and some of these other places in Montezuma county and Dolores County, the state has allowed them to graze their CRP ground, which has been in literally a lifesaver for some of their herds. Lindsey: So you guys in the Southwest are really feeling the brunt of climate change. And I think people are, seems like with, with rising temperatures and extended drought, folks are more comfortable pointing to your farm and saying, Oh yeah, that’s climate change. So do you feel, how do you feel about the government’s response on climate and to what extent do you feel like there should be greater action taken on it? Or do you feel like it’s just so slow moving? It’s not really gonna make a difference? Mike: That’s a loaded question. Lindsey: Like, if anyone should be complaining, it’s you and you’ve got a pretty strong case to make that climate is having a major impact on your farm, on the local economy, on food security. I mean, I feel frustrated about some events that I associate with climate change in New York, but we’re not having to cut our production by more than half. Do you feel like, um, we should be taking more action on climate? Do you feel like the farmers in your region are feeling more passionate about climate issues as well? Mike: To be totally frank on a federal level, with the Paris accords and all those other things, I honestly don’t know what the Feds can do. The western slope for the most part is pretty conservative. Folks don’t want government help for the most part. What I see is that that’s changing a little bit. So people want pipelines put in, they want dams and storage upgraded. Um, but what I see is people aren’t really on the ground talking about climate change. What they’re talking about is that water is scarce and water is rare, and we need to adapt our farming models and we need to do all this kind of stuff. So it’s kind of funny. Like I don’t, we don’t actually have the climate change conversation around here all that much, so I don’t know how much whatever the Feds are going to do is really going to change that? There’s a lot of people, the majority of folks around here understand that something is changing and that if we don’t start doing things differently, there won’t be agriculture to pass it down to the next generation. Lindsey: So when they’re thinking of doing things differently, that’s we need to farm differently, we need to manage water differently. It’s not we need to stop emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Mike: Yes, exactly. Lindsey: And uh, and I guess it’s like we have to bring these communities together at some point, right? Because you guys are feeling that you are, you’re in it, right? You have the stories to tell that I think can really move people to take action, broader action on climate change. Obviously taking care of this season and next season and keeping a family and business needs to be priority one. But clearly to achieve climate mitigation, to lessen the longterm impacts for, you know, for 100 years from now, we all sort of have to have that recognition of how the United States and globally we’re impacting this situation. Mike: Yeah, I totally agree. Mindy and I were having a conversation about this maybe yesterday, the day before. You know, a lot of the old timers that we know, like they just don’t believe in climate change. And I said, well, what I’ve kind of realized is that when you tell somebody who’s in their sixties or seventies that climate change is going on, I don’t know if it’s not that they don’t believe it, but I think their perspective is that they’ve been farming for 60 years. Every year is completely different. They see what they think is climate changing all the time. So telling them like we need to do something. They were like what are you talking about? Like we’ve kind of realized that kind of stuff and I think that’s like, you know, a lot of the others, like the things you’re talking about, I agree with. And I think for me, doing what we can here when it comes to management practices in water efficiency, I think that’s really huge. Lindsey: When President Trump withdrew the US from the Paris Accord, was there any reaction from the farm community? Mike: No. Lindsey: No. Yeah. Mike: Not really. But also, you know, we live in the wild west, like, you know, I grew up in California and living here now the political landscape is, I find it super intriguing. It’s like you can throw yourself into a ditch in the middle of winter and anybody’s going to come by and pull you out, like people get along really well here and you know, you just don’t talk politics. Speaker 2: It’s like we have, we have to maintain these strong and positive relationships that are really driven by being neighbors and being fellow farmers and community members, but also figure out some way to recognize and take action on these global issues because they are also impacting us locally too. Mike: I think the other thing, you know, with doing all the advocacy within NYFC and locking down Farmers Union and the conservation district and all this kind of stuff, is there are people in our region doing that thing you’re talking about. And I just realized my role is to not do that. I’m going to sit on my four wheeler on the fence line and talk to my neighbor about, you know, whatever. You know about the boxes and chickens and like what’s wrong with this chapter and all this kind of stuff. And that’s kind of my end. Lindsey: Yeah, I mean it’s all gotta sort of start at the fence line anyways. Right. It’s has to be like a personal trust and communication. Mike: Yeah. Lindsey: So my last thing, I just wanted to congratulate you on micro-equip and getting that into the Senate version of the farm bill. And I wanted to ask you just to, if you could describe sort of the process of making that happen. Mike: Yeah, thanks. You know, it’s funny. So Alex funk, who used to be the western policy director, so we we’re at convergence two years ago in San Diego. Lindsey: And I’ll say, convergence is National Young Farmers Coalition’s gathering of chapter leaders from all across the country. And Mike is the chapter leader of Four Corners. Mike: Basically, we were sitting around one evening after everything having some beers and what I realized about this, it’s very hard to get anything new into the farm bill, and so if you do want to make changes or want something new, to me the smartest way to go about it is taking an existing program and make an adjustment. And part of the inspiration was what you did and what NYFC did in its early days with the micro loan. Lindsey: Microloans. Sure. Mike: Yeah. So you were taking something that’s there and you’re like well let’s just tweak it and see if we can get more people in the door and more people accessing it. So that’s kinda the idea between for micro-equip. There’s lots of programs that small scale growers can access, but there are certain aspects of it that’s really challenging, but the hope is to change the equip program a little bit. So we just have more young beginning and small scale growers walking through the doors in our CRS offices. That alone to me is super beneficial because if we don’t have that generation of folks coming through the door, what’s the point of those offices being there in 20 years? Lindsey: And it’s like the identifiable product for I think a lot of young farmers, the micro loan has been. So, like they know, “oh yeah, farm service agency through USDA. They have those microloans. I should go check that out.” Now that so many new farmers have gotten microloans, it’s like it seems like a place to start for a lot of people, which is great. So and micro equip– so environmental quality incentives program, which is how we’ve used it on our farm for instance, to do high tunnels, to build greenhouses for season extension. Was there a project on your farm that you sort of had in mind when you were thinking about this concept? Mike: I had looking at the cover crop payments. We do a lot of cover cropping here and the payments didn’t make sense for me to access them, both for my agent to deal with the paperwork and also for me to make the trip over the Cortez to kind of deal with it. A lot of the payments for some of these programs… they’re scaled out so big. So the payments per acre are actually really low. So how do you incentivize somebody who’s doing say three acres or two acres of market grabbing crop who’s contributing to the local economy? How do you incentivize them to go and access something for subsurface drip or some sort of other aspect of an equip program where the payments are really low? And I think if there was a micro equip where paper work was kind of streamlined and we could kind of trial out some of these programs to see if they can be scaled differently or the payments could kind of be different, I think that’d be really great. Lindsey: All these programs and why the micro lending program was necessary, all of the paperwork is pretty intense. I mean it’s a lot because it’s written and designed for oftentimes a much larger system, a much larger farm and much more scaled farm than what many of the projects that beginning farmers are bringing to the table. Like that’s, that’s why we just need to have, you know, different, a more flexible system that can make it easy for agents to say, of course. Yeah, let’s, let’s work with you. I have this program that was designed for this case. Mike: Yeah, exactly, and that’s the thing. I will say, I’ll give a shout out to Julie, our NRCS agent over there in Cortez. This program wasn’t coming out of him not being able to do anything or that office not being able to do anything. It’s more that with the hiring freezes and everything going on, these offices are stretched so thin there. So part of the idea of micro equip is to obviously incentivize young beginning and small acreage growers that need to instill, like you’re saying, we need to incentivize the agents. They do so much work and there’s just so much paperwork and bureaucracy to be able to access these things. So if this program can alleviate even a little bit of that, I think they’d be much more amenable and available to work with young, small beginning producers. Lindsey: So the idea for this started with you and Alex having beers at convergence and then like what was the, what was the next step? Mike: Well it’s funny like when we had the idea we weren’t expecting it to go anywhere, to be quite honest. Like, you know, we were just like, we both thought it was a good idea. So then like, you know, Kate Greenberg, who’s western program director, you know, I told her about it and she talked to people about it. I talked to Andrew in DC about it and it just kinda kept on getting kicked around. It was like kick the can to be quite honest. It was just kinda like, oh, this got mentioned here, it got mentioned here, it got mentioned at Bennett staff or it got mentioned to Tifton and it got mentioned blah blah blah. And you know, I think it’s serendipitous to a certain degree. I think we’re lucky because there’s all this awesome NYFC infrastructure. For some silly reason, I love policy. And also, our state Senator Michael Bennett is also on the Senate Ag Committee. So there’s these little things that part of it’s luck, part of it’s hard work. Yeah. And I think eventually it just kind of got picked up like when all that went down and I was like, okay, this is, this is crazy. All of a sudden, you know, there’s like a signed thing with Michael Bennett’s signature being like, you know, “this is going into the farm bill” and he’s like saying my name on the Senate floor and I’m like “okay,” so at least you know, my mom’s proud now. Lindsey: Well, she should be. Mike: Yeah, so it was kinda good. I mean the thing that, you know, if I want to communicate to those listening to the podcast, NYCF members or not, is that those crazy ideas, you know, those late night ideas, early morning ideas like if you think it’s a good idea, try kickin it up the chain. Email your congressional staffer, email your senator. Like if you think you have a good idea, like see if they can go up the chain Speaker 2: I mean the best ideas definitely come from real life experience in the field and interaction with federal programs. We need that as Young Farmers Coalition to know what ideas need to be moved up to Congress. And frankly not everything needs to be in the farm bill. Right? A lot of the micro equip program, or excuse me, the micro loan program was piloted by USDA, by farm service agency, before it was put in the last farm bill. So there are things that can change, you know, just through a conversation with folks at USDA. We can make a lot of change by just as you said, like thinking about how this might be different or how it might be better and with the knowledge that indeed we can be quite powerful in this and really help to make those changes become reality. Mike: Yeah. And I think another big thing for me is like thinking about changes in programs and adjustments that aren’t super major but benefit, you know, your neighbors too, or even just benefit your neighbors. Because what I realized around here is if my neighbors are happy and healthy, that has a direct effect on what’s going on with me. I hope, hopefully we’ll access micro-equip. Um, you know, it’s my plan that if I don’t, that’s okay. I just hope that for a whole bunch of other people, that it benefits them. Lindsey: Well, we’re going to be fighting for it in the House version of the farm bill and the final conference version. Of course, if you know we don’t have a farm bill this year, we will look to your administrative changes or if it’s not put in the farm bill this year, I mean that, that won’t be the end of it. Uh, so thank you so much for your leadership with your chapter, with, with Four Corners and thanks for speaking to me today and man, I really hope that you guys have a good fall because I know you need it. I hope you’re going to be farming in 2019. Mike: Well, I appreciate you giving me the opportunity. Lindsey: All right, Mike, thanks so much. Next week, the farm bill is back. Andrew is going to tell us all about what’s going on in conference committee as they try to get a farm bill done by the end of this month. Thank you to Mike Nolan for being on today’s show. This show can be found wherever you get your podcasts. If you like us, please take a second to both rate and review us on iTunes and tell somebody else about what you learned on the show today. Thanks to Radio Kingston. Thanks to the National Young Farmers Coalition, the whole team for being there, to Hannah Beal for editing and to you for listening. Thanks so much.

Alex Lyon from Avask Tax Advisors works with over 2,000 eCommerce and FBA clients. Her role is to help them understand, register for, manage and comply with VAT registrations and payments. Did you know that when selling online in Europe the taxes (VAT) are included in the purchase price? Did you know if you don't increase your list price your margins shrink by the VAT amount? Did you know that if you have a UK company there is a minimum total revenue threshold amount you can reach before you have to collect VAT? Did you know the biggest mistake made by US companies is not registering for VAT, but that you can sell on Amazon prior to having the registration number? If you answered “no” to at least one of the above questions…and plan to expand to Europe, hearing Alex's explanation of the VAT process could be critical to your expansion success.   Episode Highlights: The biggest mistake Alex sees is not registering for VAT, and it is costly! You can sell before being registered, but it'll cost you if you don't increase your prices to account for VAT. You do not have to set up a foreign corporation to sell in Europe, regardless of your overseas location: i.e. US, Singapore, etc. You only collect in countries you are shipping from (there is a caveat). Amazon does not show VAT charges separately in your seller account. The PanEU program makes sense for some, most only register in the UK and Germany. If you don't pay VAT…your Amazon account will be suspended and/or closed (eventually). “Import VAT” is charged on the inventory shipped into the country and paid immediately. “Sales VAT” is charged on the retail price of your goods, and paid quarterly. The UK and Germany are the two largest markets for selling online in the EU. The UK is the easiest to expand to from the US because of language and the challenges of shipping to Germany. Wiring VAT payments can take 4-5 days and a currency account in Europe shortens the wire times. Using an intermediary bank, or currency account, can save 1-3% in exchange rate fees. With Avask, the costs to register for VAT in the UK is about $200 USD, and then about $1200 USD per year. Caveat to costs: “Distance Selling Thresholds”, if met, require more than $1200 per year because VAT is required in countries you do not store inventory in. Transcription: Mark: Good morning Joe. How are you? Joe: I'm good Mark. How are you? Mark: I'm hanging in there. I'm enjoying the weather lately and getting outdoors a little bit not working as hard but we're still recording podcasts. And you recorded one on an interesting topic and something that I think more and more people are having to face that have Amazon businesses and that's some of the tax implications going overseas. Joe: Yes. Actually, anybody who has a physical products business that wants to sell in Europe and it's on value added taxes, oh my God not exciting at all. But did you know real quickly that you know obviously here in the States you buy something and then the tax is added? When you buy something online, or in Europe, UK, Germany, France, Italy, etcetera the price is built into…I'm sorry the taxes are built into the price. So if it's 120$ the item might be 100 but the taxes are 20. And a lot of buyers that ex…by sellers that expand overseas don't quite understand that concept initially and they could immediately start losing margin by not increasing the prices for the value added taxes. A great conversation it was with Alex Lyon from AVASK Tax Advisors they have over 2,000 FBA clients and e-commerce clients throughout the world that sell and need value added tax compliance so really informative stuff. And anybody that's considering expanding overseas should absolutely listen to this because it's not that complicated once you listen to what she says. Mark: What are the consequences if somebody is not taking care of the value added tax? Do you know by any chance? Joe: Yeah absolutely. So they're very-very compliant over there. It's not gray like it is here in the States, its black and white. So the problem is that if you sell in let's say the UK and you're not registered, you're going to be determined. Amazon has to share the information with I think it's the HMRC. They have to by law; they share the details of everybody that sells on Amazon. So the HMRC has access to your sales information and therefore can force you to pay the value added taxes that you should have collected. If you didn't collect it you're going to pay for that out of your pocket simple as that. So you've got two choices: pay for it out of your pocket and lose that 15 to 20% margin and probably make no money at all or walk away and be banned from selling in in Europe on Amazon. Mark: That's significant. I think moving across the ocean to selling in different countries is a huge opportunity for anyone. Buying an e-commerce business that wants to ship overseas that you need to start taking advantage of that opportunity but you also have to go through some of the understanding of what sort of regulations are in play. I think this you know isn't…this is not exactly an exciting topic but you know and I think it's a really important topic for anyone to listen to, to possibly unlock an opportunity that your competitors are not taking advantage of. Joe: Yeah and before we say let's jump into it let me just say this that I've seen explosive growth with people moving and expanding their products to the EEO, explosive growth in particular France. I mean the UK and Germany. And the cost associated with it using someone like AVASK and they're not the only ones who do it, it's not all that expensive. You're looking at maybe 1500 $ to get the ball rolling and get it done right. And you can you can start selling immediately as long as you're registering and then you pay from the date you started selling. It's really not that complicated. There's a lot to it but it's really-really important that if you're going to sell overseas which I think everybody should if they have real growth plans that they listen to the whole podcast. Mark: All right with that I will say let's jump into it. Joe: Hey folks it's Joe from Quiet Light Brokerage and today I've got to Alex Lyon from AVASK Tax Advisors with me. She's an expert on VAT which I believe is value added tax. Something a lot of folks trying to expand their e-commerce businesses over to the UK and beyond really need some help on. So Alex welcome to the Quiet Light Podcast. Alex: Thank you. Thank you, Joe. Hi everyone. Yeah as Joe has mentioned my name is Alex. I am Indirect Tax Client Manager of AVASK. So I've been working here for three years now just helping e-commerce sellers expand over into Europe. So we've got over 2,000 Amazon sellers that we work with. UK companies also companies based all over the world as well. So yeah that's been us. Joe: That's fantastic. Are they all FBA clients (Fulfilled By Amazon) or do they you know sell off FBA as well (off Amazon) with their own e-commerce businesses? Alex: It varies so a high majority of people are FBA sellers just because it's a lot easier to hand everything over to Amazon and kind of let them do fulfillment. But there are quite a large number of Amazon Sellers as well such as shipment from your own country which obviously makes a lot of things easier in terms of the VAT because you don't have to actually declare the sales in Europe because you're not fulfilling from his countries. So yeah it's kind of a majority FBA but we do have MFM sellers as well. Joe: Okay, good. Good. Good. So let's talk about the basics, get things straight here for our listeners because a lot of people here in the states are expanding their Amazon.com accounts beyond Amazon into the European countries and seeing explosive growth. But the big mystery is how to set up the VAT's and how to find an agency like yours to handle it most of the costs associated with it are. So you can start am I getting it right is it Value Added Tax and tell us how it works? Alex: Correct. Yes, it's value added tax. It's the same principle across the European countries but they have different rights and different filing frequencies. The easiest way to explain it would be that it's similar to the sales tax you have in the US. But the main difference would be the way which you include it within the price of your product. So this is kind of the biggest hurdle where people fall over on where they don't actually include the VAT amount within the price of the product which means that you're not actually collecting the VAT from your customer but you still have to pay it to the revenue. So you're essentially paying it out from your pocket if you don't include it. So in the US for someone like myself when I come over I don't realize it works like this when I go to the checkout in sell sites because I didn't know and I'm kind of how…where is this amount coming from. Whereas in the UK you don't know that it's already there in the price of the product so yes its essentially the same as the sales tax but it's more hidden. Joe: So Amazon is collecting that 20% for units built into the purchase price of the product. So if it's 100 $ if the VAT is 20% for instance, 20% is something set aside to pay your VAT…your taxes? Alex: Yes. Joe: Okay. Alex: So you need to list in on Amazon for the straight 120. Amazon won't do that for you. Joe: Okay and do a lot of people make that mistake where they just list their business without bumping it for the value added tax? Alex: Yeah there's a large number of that do. Without getting kind of proper advice on how VAT actually works. So it is…see it's hard enough to in taxes in your own country let alone I'm kind of working out how to do it in a foreign country. So yeah that's a big hurdle where quite a lot of people fall over on. Joe: Okay. So you're located in the UK. AVASK is located in the UK. But I think I saw offices around in different parts of the world, is that right? Alex: Yes that's right. So we've got an office in London and I'm on based on in Winchester which is about an hour south of London. And then we've also got offices in Shenzhen and LA. We try to come over to the US as much as possible as well just because oversea it's kind of US sellers that we've [inaudible 00:08:19.0] work with. So yeah we try and get over to the events as much as possible as well and get that travelling. Joe: So the vast majority of clients as you said are US based clients and they start selling and Amazon.com and then expanded to the European countries? Alex: Yeah, definitely. Amazon is oversea, it's huge in America and it's just kind of been taking off here in Europe as well. So it's a massive market in Europe and I think if you're product is successful and you've been able to make it successive there in the US then there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't also be able to do in Europe. Joe: Okay. So let's say I own an Amazon.com account, I want to reach out to you what…and I want to sell in the European countries, step one two three can you walk us through that? Alex: Yup sure. So step one is to work out where you're going to be shipping your products from. So most people go with the UK or Germany just because they're the biggest markets, UK is obviously a lot easier because you don't have to translate any of your products. So whichever country you decide you're going to fulfill from you then have to get a VAT number in that country and also an EORI number for all of your shipments. So those two numbers you have to have those before you make a shipment. If you make a shipment without those numbers you're going to get charged import VAT and then you won't necessarily be able to reclaim that back whereas you would if you have the numbers. So that's very important. In terms of the registration process, engaging a UK agent is really helpful because you've got someone who can communicate with tax authorities on your behalf. And that also means that we know exactly what documents are needed for each of the registration. We'll process all of that for you. Once the application has been submitted and you're waiting for the numbers to come through at that point you should start getting your listings up. Working out some shipping quotes and kind of working out all the details on actually how you're going to get your product there and what the listings are going to look like. Joe: Okay. And I just had a conversation with someone that is buying an Amazon business and they were confused about when the VAT was going to be applied. Is it to the amount of products being shipped into the country or is it the amount that's sold? Alex: It's both. So if you're doing FBA you're making a box shipment to an Amazon warehouse. That box shipment you're going to have to declare at customs. So any shipment that's out into a warehouse is going to have import VAT at UK customs charged on it that's assuming of course that your shipment has come from outside of Europe, so most people ship from China or from the US. So import VAT is going to be charged on the cost of your goods. When you put together a commercial invoice of that shipment, that's the amount of the import fees then we charge on also with freight charges and things. Joe: And then what time do they pay that import VAT, when it arrives? Alex: Yeah correct so usually depending on what shipping company you'll go for usually they'll pay it for you and invoice it back to you. But they still have to do your kind of clearance number to create a shipment. Joe: And then do they have to…then they collect that VAT when it sells and they keep it or is it a different…are we talking about two different things? The import VAT versus the VAT that's charged to the customer on the Amazon account is that two different things or it's the same? Alex: It's the same tax but it's computed in different ways. So import VAT is non-cost whereas VAT on your sales is on the retail price of your goods. And they're also kind of declared differently so with the VAT when you [inaudible 00:11:35.18] you pay that in your VAT within each quarter. You don't pay that immediately when you make the sale. Whereas the import VAT, you pay it immediately at customs. And the way that those kind of…they tie in together although they're separately you…it's within your VAT return. So you do your VAT filing every quarter. So every three months you declare the amount of sales you made and then obviously you're declaring the VAT that's due on your sales and then any import VAT that you pay you can get that refunded and it's used as a credit within your VAT return. Joe: And how easy is it within the Amazon seller account to see that money that you've collected and have it match up against what you're going to owe? Or is it not as black and white as I think it would be or is it really relatively easy? Alex: It's gotten a lot better, to be honest. And so Amazon have got a specific VAT report that you can now download so you can see the breakdown. But in terms of the actual…when your customer purchases an item they won't be able to see the breakdown of VAT and the amount that's going to the amount that's going to the revenue. Another kind of stumbling block where a few Amazon sellers fall over where they don't get the kind of proper…do the proper research before is that's that although Amazon take their fees from the money you receive in terms of your sales, the VAT is [inaudible 00:12:49.6] on the total sales price. You can't deduct Amazon fees and then the amount that you actually receive from Amazon is what you pay VAT on it's the total amount that you're costumer is paying you pay VAT on. Joe: Why is there any calculation at all that the seller does? Doesn't Amazon calculate it for you it seems like they would since they know the exact sales? Alex: Yes so, unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. You have to include it. You have to price your product you have to do your pricing matrix. If you're expecting to move due your pricing and then Amazon add the VAT on it…that's not going to happen. You have to make sure you're including them. Joe: Well then I was thinking in terms of Amazon that in your pricing you would say this is my price and then this is my VAT amount it's not done that way you just simply mark it up to 120$ if it's a 100$ item. Alex: Yeah, exactly. Mark out straight away. And you can tell Amazon with the VAT calculation service you can let them know if you've got any kind of reduce rated or zero rated items which will reflect on the actual sales report. But it's not going to affect what your actual retail price is on Amazon and what it's listed as. Joe: Okay. Let's talk about volume. Here in the States, there's a lot of question about when should I start collecting sales taxes and [inaudible 00:13:58.6] and all these different [inaudible 00:13:59.8] unfortunately not black and white yet. It's still very-very gray. I had a situation where I listed a business for sale and asked about collecting VAT and he said well I'm not…I haven't hit that threshold yet in the UK. And I think it was a UK corporation as well, can you talk about thresholds and when and if you have to collect. In different [inaudible 00:14:21.4] what if you're a UK corporation or a Hong Kong Corporation if you're someone at the LOC or corporation here in the States? Alex: Okay, so if you have a company that's incorporated anywhere apart from the UK then you have to register for VAT immediately so that's sale number one whether it's going to have 1$, 10$, or 100$ it's straight away so no threshold whatsoever, you have to be registered. If however, you have a UK company there's a threshold of 85,000 Pounds and that's in terms of a turnover over a 12 month loaning period. So if you hit that within three months you have to be registered if you hit that in 11 months you have to be registered but that's just for a UK company. So if you've got an overseas entity you have to register straight to it there's no threshold. Joe: As far as buyers go, when you and I talked about this and have conversations with buyers when they buy an Amazon account that has a European component to it there's always questions about TMI not going to be collecting during a certain period of time, how do we sign up, how do we get that registered, what kind of danger I'm going to be in. I think you said the other day in a call separately in preparation for this that you can start pricing your products right away while you register and you're not going to…you're not going to lose any grounds or sales while you're registering and then paying VAT down the road a bit. Can you talk about that again a little bit so that…and talk about it from a buyer for perspective. If say someone is buying an Amazon account and taking it over and would reach out to you to register how do they ensure that they're collecting from day one of ownership and that they're not going to…not get themselves in a little bit of trouble? Alex: Well, first of all, I want to make sure, well check whether the Amazon account has already previously been charging VAT. So what we've discussed in terms of the pricing, obviously if you're taking over an Amazon account you're buying that account. And if they haven't been including VAT in the prices, you obviously then need to…the first kind of goal is to straight away go ahead and increase everything by that 20%. Joe: Let me just jump in here for a sec. So that's a consideration when someone…this is for the buyers that are listening, correct me here Alex if I'm wrong but when someone's buying an account and the owner has UK corporation, if they're below that annual threshold of 85,000 Pounds in revenue they're not charging VAT. But if I buy it and I'm not a UK corporation I immediately have to increase the prices in order to collect VAT or leave it alone and I'm going to lose 20% of my sales to the VAT. Is that correct? Alex: That's correct. Yes, so you because you're an overseas company you have to charge VAT on your sales even though they haven't been charged previously. Joe: Okay really critical for buyers to understand that when it's a UK corporation. Okay sorry to interrupt please continue. Alex: Okay so once you have then kind of taken over the company you can actually back date a registration. So say I'm talking over…I'm buying an Amazon account under my US company from a UK company we'll stick to that example. From the 1st of May you know going through the whole process it's taken a couple weeks to actually get everything set up. When if it got to the 1st of June and you still hadn't registered you can then back date that to the 1st of May. So as soon as you know that you're going to be buying the Amazon Seller Central, I would make sure that you're charging VAT to your customers because although you may not be registered you can backdate the registration. And it means that you have to pay VAT in all sales you make previous even though at that actual moment in time you weren't registered but you're back dating registration. Joe: Okay just to summarize. Don't change a thing in terms of prices assuming it's a…let's go with back to the it's a non UK entity so that they're a US entity buying a US entity but they have a UK account to it. If they're charging 120$ now and they're collecting VAT you don't have to change prices at all. Alex: Correct. Joe: You're going to register with a firm like yours and then when it's time to pay for the first time you're already collecting those and you'll go back dating and calculate what's due. Alex: Yes, exactly. Yeah. Joe: And how often do you pay? I think you said was it quarterly? Alex: Yes quarterly so every three months yeah. Joe: And is it the same every three months? Is it the beginning of the 15th of the next quarter is when you have to pay the taxes or is it depends upon when you register? Alex: So you got one month and seven days to actually do the filing and make the payment. As you can fall into different stagger groups in VAT quarters so it's not necessarily you are January to March you can be February to April or March to May. So there's three kind of different groups of VAT filings you could fall into. Your VAT advisor should obviously let you know and would be contacting you when everything's due. In terms of the frequency yeah it is quarterly. Joe: Listen, Alex, as you can see I'm an old guy, got some gray hair here. I fell asleep in accounting class in college. I honest to God I did fell asleep, the next class came in and I think I've told the story again so I won't go to much detail. I don't like this stuff. I don't like this level of detail because of what I do for a living it's absolutely critical as an entrepreneur and know how important it is. Do I have to really…if I'm the guy that's buying an FBA business and it's got European components to it, how much do I have to really know or can I just rely on you guys to do the work for me? Alex: You can definitely rely on us to kind of advice you and let you know. But it is…I do think it's good to know kind of the basics of what you're doing. In terms of Amazon, you've got two different programs so European Fulfillment Network or Pan-European Program. Pan-European Program is great you get to move your stock around to seven different countries [inaudible 00:20:03.1] you're stock is close that your costumers time are positive reasons to do that. But if you just kind of turn that on on your Amazon Seller Central and you'd haven't done any prior research, you won't know that you then actually have to get [inaudible 00:20:17.6] registered in seven countries. You have to do filings maybe month in more than half of these countries. So everything that you do in terms of where your stock is located, where your sales are going will have an impact on your VAT registration, your VAT applications within Europe. So yes it's good you should have [inaudible 00:20:36.6] in there. We'd let you know but don't be completely ignorant to what you're doing and where your stock is going. Joe: Hey it sounds like you just touched on being able to shift from seven different countries in a penny you…there's a lot of potential savings in terms of the shipping costs and fulfillment costs that you're closer to the customer. But you talked earlier I think that if you've got your inventory in the UK or Germany in the two biggest centers that you register for VAT in those countries what if your inventory is spread around seven different countries so you're closer to the customers do you then have to register in all of those countries? Alex: You do. Yeah, as soon as your stock is in that country and you can sell in from there you have to be VAT registered in that country. So VAT is basically payable to the country and is being done close at supply. So if your stock is in a Czech Republic warehouse the place of supply VAT sale when it's going from the Czech Republic to the customer in Italy is going to be in Czech Republic. So being VAT registered in the UK is completely useless. Joe: Okay. Alex: So yeah- Joe: Very much like nexus here in the States if there's 15 Amazon centers theory is that if you have 15 different locations of inventory you have nexus in those states and that's where you collect sales taxes. Not as formal as where you are. Tell us about the biggest hurdles and biggest mistakes that you've seen people make…well that you have in been bringing people to the European countries and selling an FBA. What things are really obvious? What mistakes are really common that people can avoid? Alex: So first one is to not get registered at all. So with that threshold, quite a few people get confused that the 85,000 threshold is applicable to them; sounds really appealing and really lovely so they just don't register full stop. And then when you do get registered you just do it from today's date because [inaudible 00:22:27.3] realize but now I know that I'm going to do it from today. There's a huge amount of compliant checks going on with the revenue in the UK. They are hurdling through every single Amazon account and doing tax investigations. You know we've had to help clients where we're going all the way back to 2012 when the legislation came in that they have to register. So that's kind of six years of taxes you're going to have to go back and pay and if you don't your Amazon can get shut down. So the first kind of hurdle is actually getting registered. It's kind of what you'd think is the most simplest part just to do the application. Joe: Six years of VAT taxes you've had people in that situation? Alex: Yeah. Joe: I would think that in some situations people will just throw their hands up in the air, close the account, and walk away, and not pay the taxes. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Is that something where if you're a US resident where you're going to be found and have to pay those taxes in some way shape or form? Alex: Well you spent a nice six years building up your Amazon account. You've got all of your reviews you know you've built up that kind of brand in the UK so to kind of just throw your hands up and walk away is a big thing to do in the first place. Because even if you opened up a new Amazon account you're not going to have all of those reviews and obviously the name of you as a director of that company when you do a VAT application in the UK you have to state that information and you have to kind of give all of those details of yourself anyway and yeah so you'll have- Joe: So if you're going to walk away there walk in away forever. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Unless they cheat and get around the system somewhere. Alex: Exactly and unfortunately like in the US…so as not like in the US there's now amnesty in the UK so if you think that you're going to be negotiating and kind of say that oh I'll make sure to pay everything going forward so I'll pay a percentage you wouldn't get that and you also have to pay mass penalty as well so it do not kind of sound all that great if you haven't done the right thing to start with. Joe: Okay. So I've talked to a lot of Amazon sellers. I've seen their financials. Some people tell me you know I've done the analysis Joe and it's just not worth the effort for me to sell in Germany and Italy in France and in the UK. It's just not worth it. And I think they're completely and utterly wrong because I've seen the explosive growth. You've got 2,000 FBA clients. What country are you seeing people get the most bang for their buck? What's growing rapidly over there and what country should they pay attention to the most? Alex: UK and Germany definitely. They're just the two biggest markets. France is…does follow very closely but yeah 100% they're the biggest. Joe: Okay. And the easiest of those two might be the UK because you don't have to do translation? Alex: Yeah, exactly. And I'm shipping direct into the UK is a lot easier than it is shipping to Germany. Joe: Okay. Okay. There are a lot of concerns about money laundering. I've heard people talk about this and how complicated it is and on the German side and German FBA accounts. Am I just hearing people with sort of the chicken little mentality that the sky is falling and being really paranoid or is there something to that? Alex: I think sales in Germany in terms of my money laundering and everything is all going through Amazon. So amazon are collecting the funds and sending it to you. You don't need for some representation in Germany so payments go directly to the tax authorities whereas in France you've got to pay to your French advisor and then it goes to the tax authorities so yeah I'm not sure of what grounds. Joe: Do you even know who Chicken Little is or what that theory…okay, I see you just- Alex: No sorry. Joe: Okay. It's a cartoon character here in the States disguised- Alex: Okay [crosstalk 00:25:55.9] Joe: I used that terminology when there's so many people online talking about all the horrible things that can happen when you're own an Amazon seller account as opposed to the reality of how many great things are happening and it's changing people's lives. Alex: I think that's like when you go to a restaurant or you go anywhere, you're more likely to leave a bad review if you've had a bad experience whereas if you've had agood review you probably leave any review at all. I do notice that happen. Joe: A hundred percent, you're absolutely right. One of the things that I see often and I know you guys are AVASK tax advisor so I want to talk about that advisory part and the tax part. But one of the things that I see happen is that sometimes when sellers expand overseas they just take the easy route and they'd let Amazon handle making deposits directly to their US bank account. Whereas other people that take a little bit of time, do some research, still use World's First Bank or somebody else to be that intermediary and the money will go there at a lower exchange rate saving them tens in…tens of thousands of dollars annually. Do you find that to be the case, do you would advise folks to do that and if so what world banks do you suggest they use or look at or is that a service that you provide as well? Alex: Yeah, definitely. So if you kind of first of all from a VAT paying perspective there's…most people have to pay via wire transfer. And if you're getting kind of close to the payment deadline it can take for to five working days for that payment to clear with HMRC. They then if any payment is received late they will give you a surcharge with subtentiative liability and that can go up to 15 cents. So if you've got a currency account located here in Europe the time that it takes for the funds to actually clear and consider the payment to be made is a lot quicker. So that is a big benefit of getting a bank account over here even just a currency account. Joe: Can you define what a currency account is and how it differentiates from a bank account, please? Alex: So it has kind of all the benefits of a bank account and they're very similar but I don't think I mean don't 100% take my word for this. Obviously, it's better to speak to a currency account provider. But you can't hold large amounts of funds in that account. It's kind of like an intermediary way. You're basically doing a transfer and a transfer to your local account. You can't also do things like direct debits and buy out checks and things like that. Joe: Okay. And as I understand it just for people listening that currency account I think Amazon, for instance, may charge you if you are a…may charge you 4% currency exchange. Whereas the currency account you may only be charged 2%. And so you might be…and these are ballpark numbers so you're saving 2% on whatever amount of money is flowing through that. And if it's a million dollars, you do the math on that. If it's 10,000 $ you do the math on that. So I see a lot of people do that as well. That's what a currency account is right? Alex: Yeah. And especially with kind of making payments in Europe in terms of VAT you're going to be transferring your money from Amazon to the US and then back so the UK again so you're kind of transferring it a couple of times and to make that payment. So if you want to incorporate a UK company [inaudible 00:29:08.3] you could have get an actual high street UK bank account which is obviously a benefit of that UK company. You could just kind of grow the funds and leave it in a high street bank account in UK. Joe: Well, let's talk about that for a minute. Maybe I should have asked this at the very beginning and listeners I apologize because this is a question I get offset. You know I'm expanding to the UK, I'm expanding to Germany do I have to set up a UK business with a UK address or German company? Do I have to set those up or can I simply be a US based company selling products overseas? Can you explain, you've got 2,000 clients what are they doing? What do you recommend? Alex: You do not have to incorporate a UK company. It's the majority of people use their overseas company just because it is a lot easier and has less administration in terms of the accounts that you are drawing up each year. It's all just falling onto one company. You've got your CPA in the US. He's doing everything for you. You don't have to hire a CPA equivalent in the UK so ask accountants to do your [inaudible 00:30:03.9] paying your kind of all those tax due filings. In terms of what's actually best is really hard for me to say because it is on a case by case basis. It's you know do you want to build a brand, do you want a UK bank account, do you want to take advantage of the VAT threshold, there's so many factors. It's not one, it's one size fits all, unfortunately. Joe: Okay but the simple answer is for anybody listening if you're US based with a US bank account a US corporation, you do not have to set up a European company a UK company or in Germany that's misinformation. You don't have to do that. You can register for VAT and start collecting and paying and still have your one CPA here in the US. Is that correct? Alex: Yes. Joe: Good. Of your 2,000 plus or minus clients, what are their sizes? I mean you have you got people that are doing you know a million, two million dollars a month in revenue and those that are just doing five or 10,000 $ a month? How does it range and how does it flash out [inaudible 00:31:01.5] so we just know more about you guys. Alex: Yeah, exactly that range I don't [inaudible 00:31:05.4] information but- Joe: Maybe I should have said a half a million a month. Alex: Yeah there's a huge range there is. And that's for the UK companies and also overseas companies. You know we've got a lot of Chinese clients as well. We've got kind of a whole Chinese department [inaudible 00:31:20.6]. So yeah the range is massive. We can help you whatever size. Joe: Okay. Let's say that I'm doing a quarter of a million dollars a month here in the States and I decide I want to expand overseas and I'm going to start with UK and Germany. Aside from my inventory costs and getting the product there, what are my costs for someone like you in setting up VAT and getting registered and compliant and all that stuff? Alex: Well it depends which country you're going for. If it's just one if it's selling- Joe: Say I'm gonna start with two. I'm going to start with the UK, actually I'm just gonna go with one. Let's go with UK. Alex: Okay 150 Pound registration one up fee and then 870 Pounds a year annual compliance and that doesn't depend on turnover. So whatever your turnover is it's the same. Joe: That's pretty cheap, if I'm doing a quarter million a month, 150 Euros a couple of hundred bucks tops and then maybe a thousand US dollars a year simple as that. Who calculates what my VAT is owed each month? Is it me and my CPA or is that part of your 870 5,000- Alex: Yeah we do that. We calculate everything. And you can give us limited access to your seller central we'll go in and download all the reports directly. You don't have to be a part of that process. Your sole responsibility is to make the payment. Joe: Can I just have you make the payment for me if you have access to funds or you just tell me what to pay and I pay it? Alex: No we don't do that. We will tell you what to pay and then you have to make the payment yeah. Joe: This is…okay I'm a little [inaudible 00:32:47.2] I haven't talked to anybody about pricing but to me, this is so incredibly fair and reasonable. Are you guys…is this the standard fees? I mean this is normal cost or you're really expensive or really cheap? What's the situation? Alex: I think that's about average. We pride ourselves over the service that we give kind of in comparison to the actual fees to other providers and things. We don't get too hung up on what the actual charges are in terms of that. What I would say though, I don't want to be [inaudible 00:33:16.2] in terms of that 870. Because if your turnover was in the millions you will be breaching distance selling thresholds to all of the European countries. Joe: You'll be what? Say that again. Alex: Breaching distance selling thresholds, we haven't spoken about that so- Joe: Distance selling threshold. Alex: We'll go into that really quickly. So if you've got all of your stock in a UK company…country sorry company the UK country, UK warehouse and is going to customers in Germany. So UK from a warehouse going to a customer in Germany, if their sales go over a certain threshold to Germany you then have to register to VAT in Germany even though you're not fulfilling from that country. Joe: Okay. Alex: Makes sense? Joe: Yeah, all right. This is the part where Joe doesn't love this level of detail but thank you for that. Alex: It's just that I don't want to be misleading in terms of 870 Pounds you know whatever your turnover is because that's all UK fee. If your turnover is massive you will have an obligation to register in other countries as well. Joe: And if the turnover is massive to probably going to be shipping from those countries to save that fulfillment cost anyway. Alex: Yeah, yeah. Joe: And that's something that they would do the math on and you guys may help them with. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Okay we're running out of time. We're about 30 minutes in which is actually a bit long but this is a fascinating subject, a critical one, and I'm sure some people just they fell asleep because it's also not their favorite which is a shame. Because the number one thing people can do to make their business more valuable is get the books right. Get the details like this absolutely correct. It's going to help with the transition of the business as well as well as the value. Alex thank you so much. Any last thoughts that you can share with people listening? Whether they're buying and selling in terms of what they should do and how they should do it other than just do it and do it right. Alex: I honestly I would just say to speak to someone you know we do free consultations [inaudible 00:35:07.0] if you just give us a call then we can just run through everything with you. There's you know all though we've covered a lot in half an hour it's a lot of information, there are still some things that haven't been mentioned so yeah I would just speak so when I mention we've got all the information for before you completely just jump start in. Joe: Okay. Well, we'll make sure that all of your contact information is in the show notes. Alex: All right. Joe: But for those listening that can't see them there it's AVASK tax advisors that's A-V-A-S-K tax advisors and they do free consultations. I think it's really important as a buyer or seller if you're planning on selling over in the UK. Alex thanks so much for your time today I really appreciate it. Alex: Okay thanks. Thanks, everyone. Links: Alexandra Lyon Indirect Tax Client Manager Skype: alex.avask Email: alex@avaskgroup.com T: +1.213.330.4904; +1.213.256.0537 https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandragrant4/ https://www.avaskaccounting.co.uk/   James Shayler International VAT Technical Officer Skype: james.shayler16 Email: james@avasktax.com T: +1.213.330.4904; +1.213.256.053

Episode 193 – Deepkin Part Two – Rules Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex is back and tells us about his trip to Warhammer World...

Episode 192 – Barnette Jumps Into AoS Lore Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex is at Warhammer World and then at the South Coast GT....

Today we laid out the path and the process to become a member of the two comma club. On today’s episode Russell recaps day 3 of Funnel Hacking Live, which had a theme of the Two Comma Club. Here are some of the awesome things that happened day 3: Find out how many people received Two Comma Club awards, and the new Two Comma Club X awards. Find out what kind of coaching program Two Comma Club X is, how much it costs, and what the goal of it is. And find out how Russell chooses who speaks at Funnel Hacking Live every year. So listen here to hear a quick recap of all the awesome stuff that happened on day 3 of Funnel Hacking Live. ---Transcript--- What’s up everybody? This is Russell Brunson, welcome to Marketing Secrets podcast. Today I’m going to be covering what happened on day number 3 of the Funnel Hacking Live event. Alright everybody, welcome back. I hope that you’re enjoying this recap. For those of you guys who were at Funnel Hacking Live, you’re like, “Oh yeah, I remember htat.” And those who weren’t, you have massive FOMO, fear of missing out, and you’ll make sure you come next year. If you guys knew what we were planning for next year, I have a couple of tricks up my sleeve. I don’t know if it’s going to happen or not. If it does though, it’ll be insane so do not miss it. Alright so Funnel Hacking Live day number three. So day number one we talked about Impact and Income, day number two the theme was You’re One Funnel Away, day number three was The Two Comma Club. To kind of set this off, we had 91 people this day come on stage and we gave them Two Comma Club awards, but we also had 15 people who got the Two Comma Club X award, which means you made over 8 figures, or 10 million dollars in a funnel, which was really, really cool. And the coolest thing about this is I saw tons and tons of people posting on Instagram and Facebook and everywhere, Funnel Hacking Live has become the Emmy’s or the Grammy’s  of entrepreneurship, and it’s so cool that that’s what this has become. Entrepreneurs there’s not much stuff. You start a business, you make a bunch of money, you buy a nice car, you buy a nice house, you serve a lot of people, you raise money for charities, but there’s never a time to reward entrepreneurs like there are for actors and athletes and everything else. So Funnel Hacking Live has become that, it’s become the Emmy’s and the Grammy’s and it’s been really, really cool. This day was fun because we had the chance to highlight so many amazing entrepreneurs, bring them onstage and give them cool stuff. So that was awesome but, I want to start at the beginning of the day. I wanted this one, because I knew it was going to be a fun day, so I wanted to start with Anthony DiClementi. So Anthony came and taught everyone how entrepreneurs can biohack for more energy. So he came onstage and it was so fun seeing him on stage. He was in a full suit with bare feet, which is totally such a biohacker thing. So he came in and taught people breathing exercises, other ways to get energy and it was really, really fun. It was our only non-internet marketing type of speaker and I think it was a huge, really cool addition. If you guys haven’t read Anthony’s book on biohacking, you should get it. There may or may not be a new book coming out in the near future. Maybe not the near future, but in the future. He’s working on it now, which is also going to be amazing. So that was awesome. After Anthony got off stage, then Alex Charfen came on and talked about the billionaire code. What’s fun is my opening presentation at Funnel Hacking Live is how to go from 0 to a million, a million to ten, and ten to a hundred. Mine was more, your role as an entrepreneur, where do you need to be focusing your creativity at. Alex came back and went through the billionaire code, which is like all the different phases as he sees them, that businesses transform through. I think his had 9 or 10 different phases, and it was really cool because it shows you each phase, here’s what’s happening, here’s how many businesses in the world are actually at this level, here’s the opportunities and the weakness and all that kind of stuff and goes phase by phase by phase. And it was really coo l for you to get a really good map of, oh here’s the direction I’m going. Here’s what’s happening. Things like that. So Alex was awesome. After that then Dana Derricks, our resident goat farmer came on stage and talked about the Dream 100 which was really cool. You know, it’s funny. I’ve been talking about Dream 100 now for like 8 years, ever since I read about it in Chet Holme’s book and I’ve been telling people to do it. I’ve been doing and a few other people have done it, but very few people do, yet it’s the foundation for everything. In fact, I don’t know if I have Dana’s book here, but he ended up writing a book called Dream 100 and he was like, “Hey can you write the forward for it.” I was like, “Yeah.” I’m not going to find it here right when I need it. But the forward of the book was basically, I told them Dream 100 is everything for us. It’s how we decided what we were going to create, what products we were going to serve, the audience, how we were going to get traffic, how we were going to differentiate, everything in our business is based off the Dream 100, yet for some reason people don’t do it. So he came and talked about that and it was awesome. So Dream 100 was really big and he had some amazing images and videos of goats knocking over little kids and things like that. Anyway, Dream 100 was a big thing. And this is where we started kind of diving more into traffic. So Dana talked about Dream 100, how to use it for traffic, how to lever partnerships, joint venture relationships, things like that. After that, then Peng Joon came on stage, Peng Joon is actually the number one affiliate for the Expert Secrets book. A lot of people here don’t know him, he’s awesome. He joined my inner circle a while ago and I had a chance to meet him, and get to know him and he’s just an awesome dude. So he got up and taught this process that he does. He basically spends three days once a quarter and films 100 videos and then he’s done and then from there he’s got a team that breaks it up and they turn it into Instagram posts, and Instagram videos and YouTube and Facebook and he showed this whole process of how everything works and it was amazing. People were like jaw dropping like, holy cow that’s the process. It was cool because Conversation Domination, which I taught about the first day was all about, here’s how you dominate each channel and have a specific type show for each channel. And his was like, how to create content and push it across all these channels you’ve been building up to build reciprocity and build a following and the blend of those two concepts is really, really cool. In fact, for those who joined the Two Comma Club X coaching program we’re going to be giving you our systems that kind of blend both of those two worlds together, but that’s for another day. But the coolest thing about Peng Joon’s presentation outside of him blowing everybody’s mind, was the end of it. He showed a video of him trying to learn public speaking. He was onstage and he was so bad and nervous and awkward, and this coach critiquing him back and forth. He showed kind of where he came from and how bad of a speaker he was, how nervous and how introverted and all these things, and from that how he’s become this huge person now, 3 or 4 million followers on Facebook, makes tens of millions of dollars a year and this whole thing, transformation he went through and how he had to learn it and earn it and become it. That was, I think, one of the coolest things because you see this person who has evolved himself through hard work and I think he gave everybody hope of, “Wow, no matter where I’m at I could become what I want to be. I look at Peng Joon and look who he’s become and I could do that if he can do that.” Which was really, really cool. Then after that, Alex and Layla Harmosi came on the stage, what’s cool about them is that, since I’ve know Alex he’s launched and blown up 3 or 4 businesses and always kind of walks away from them. And in April this year he launched a new company, and from April til now he barely crossed the finish line, it was less than a year, the new company launched and not only did they hit the Two Comma Club, they hit the Two Comma Club X, they made over 10 million dollars in a funnel in less than a year, which was cool. They do it all through high ticket sales, in fact I was showing his value ladder, they don’t even have a full value ladder. They basically have 2 rungs and they just sell really expensive stuff. So they came up and showed how they do their sales and their pitch. And one of the big things they talked about was so cool. It was like, when you’re doing high ticket sales, or any kind of sales, you’re selling the vacation. You don’t sell like, “You’re going on vacation. You’ve got to pack your bags, get your kids in order, get your family packed, find a ride to the airport, get to the airport, go through luggage…” You don’t sell this horrible experience, you sell a vacation. “Who wants to go to Hawaii? We’re going to be at the beach and you’re going to see waterfalls crashing on your back, get massages every night.” That’s what you sell as a vacation. Obviously they got to get to the vacation and stuff happens. It’s kind of the same thing with them. Look, you have to understand yourself high ticket things. You don’t sell the work, you sell the vacation. What’s the vacation you’re going to go on and then reverse engineer that to get somebody to actually buy what you’re selling. It was really, really cool. Their presentation was amazing as well. Then after that we had a lunch break. We came back from lunch and then we did the awards. We had a bunch of awards we gave out. We gave out our dream car winners, I think we’re up to 50 or 60 people that won a car through the Clickfunnels Affiliate Program. So we gave away those awards. Then we had inner circle member of the year, so all the inner circle members who had won member of the month came up and then we awarded the member of the year. Dana Derricks won that, which was cool. Then we did all the Two Comma Club awards. We’ve had over 258 people at the event, but 91 of them weren’t there. So we gave away 91 awards, some people had 2 and one person had 7! 7 Two Comma Club awards, which was awesome. And then we did the 8 figure award, which is the new award this year, and we had 15 people, 17 that have qualified, but 15 were there to receive their award. A big, huge plaque, twice as big as the Two Comma Club one, plus they get a ring that’s like 2 karats of gold and 4 karats of diamond, or 2 ounces of gold and 4 karats of diamond, like a super bowl ring. It was really, really cool. Like I said, we’re making this thing the Emmy’s and the Oscars, and the Grammy’s of our industry. Each of those rings cost us like $10 grand, so we gave away a lot of hardware. Dave was carrying around his luggage the whole trip and hoping he didn’t mugged and get robbed because it was like $100 grand in rings at least. But that’s what we do for our people. So keep on selling and you’ll keep on getting rewarded by us. After that Sunny D came out and did the Sunny D Clickfunnels rap, which is awesome. After that, this I want to talk about for a little bit because this is where I wanted to take a group of people through a process. We just gave everyone awards and it’s like, I honestly think that anybody sitting in the audience could be on this stage in 12 months from now winning a Two Comma Club award. I’ve seen it happen so many times and I don’t think it’s impossible. In fact, I think it’s probable if people follow the process. So I was like, what’s that process look like? If I set a goal between now and next year I had to make a million dollars in a funnel, and my life depended on it, what would I do? So I kind of talked about that during my presentation, it was called the 12 Month Millionaire, how to become a millionaire in the next 12 months so you can get a Two Comma Club award. I didn’t just talk about myself, I had 5 people come up and talk about it. So I had Steven Larsen, if you had to create an offer that was so irresistible that people had to buy it, what would it look like? So he did, it was supposed to be 10 minutes, but he went for 17, but whatever. A 17 minute presentation, here’s how I’d create the irresistible offer. Then after that I had Julie Stoian come up and said, “Julie, we have this offer we just created with Steven, and you have to figure out how to create the right funnel, what would you do?” And she walked through this really cool process of the two types of funnels. There’s a presentation funnel or an unboxing funnel, depending on what the offer was, we would sell it through a presentation, like a video sales letter or a webinar. Or we’d do an unboxing funnel where we unbox the offer and put it in a strategic line and sequence, which is your front end, your upsell, your downsell. So she walked through that, which was so insanely cool. That was number two, then number three John Parkes came up and I said, “Okay, you’ve got this funnel now, you’ve got to make money, how are you going to do it fast?” And he went through this testing process we learned from the Harmon Brothers, how to test a whole bunch of ads, creative videos, in a very short, finite period of time for under $100. So we walked through that whole process, which was cool. It was like now we know exactly what ad is going to be the best. Then we had James P. Friel get up and talk about, “okay now you’ve got this offer, this traffic, things like that, how do you now systemize it so you’re not going to drown like most entrepreneurs do?” So we walked through his Trello process, which was super cool, and the bat meetings and how we do our bat signal meetings here in the office. Then when he got done, Alex Charfen got up and he talked about how he’d actually build the all star team that could actually do this and facilitate and run the whole thing and it was really cool. So they all shared their stuff then afterwards everyone gave them a huge round of applause. We showed an animated video we made called the Justice League, and basically showed, these guys are my Justice League and we brought them together to help my company. Then I had these guys go off stage and I said, “Okay, now how many of you want this Justice League to help you do it?” and we made an offer for our new coaching program called Two Comma Club X. My goal coming into this was to get 250ish people to sign up and to get over a thousand within the next year, so that’s kind of what we structured it as. I made the offer, which was probably the best offer I’ve made in the history of my life, and when the dust cleared we had over 650 people sign up for the Two Comma Club X program at $18000 a year or 1800 a month, so you can do the math on that. But it was insane, and now I’m home in the office, we’re scrambling this whole week to get everything prepared and put together. In fact, today I’m actually giving out the membership site access to everybody to get started, but the program is amazing. Again, they get to work with all 5 of those coaches, depending on where they are in their business, there’s a timeline, they move through that. We’re doing a systems event where we give people all the Trello systems we have. They’re doing another event they don’t even know about, that they’ll find out about in the member’s area, which is super cool.  And then there’s a big cruise. We’re going to do a big party cruise at the beginning of next before Funnel Hacking Live. Everyone will come on and celebrate and network and go on vacation together for a week, and a bunch of other cool things. So it’s really an insane offer, that did 3 times more than I thought it was going to. So it was awesome. And then we broke for dinner, got everybody signed up and when we came back from dinner I had to go work on the OUR funnel because I hadn’t finished it yet, and I was running the event. It was almost done, my team had built it, but there were some things I wanted to add to it. So I actually went up to my room. But before I did, I introduced the 5 coaches again, and Brent Copeiters and they did Hot Seat Coaching, so bunch of people filled out a form asking questions and for the next 2 or 3 hours did coaching one on one with people, which was super, super cool. They were up super late doing that and they all hung out, helped coaching and serving people all night long, which was awesome. So that was day number two, the Two Comma Club. We showed people the path, the process, and then a bunch of them we took outside of the event to now take them and hold their hand and walk them through becoming a Two Comma Club member in the 12 months. Because my goal for all of those people and you is to have you onstage next year, getting your Two Comma Club award. So that was day number three at the event. I know, can it get any better? Three days and we had one more full day coming, and the last day was called, Change the World, how to now change the world. So I’m going to talk about that in tomorrow’s podcast, but that is the next step. I hope you guys enjoyed that. For those who were at Funnel Hacking Live, I hope that gives you a reminder of all the amazingness you experienced. Those who weren’t there, I hope it gives you some ideas, some tips along the way, but hopefully most importantly it helps you understand why it’s so important to be there. I would sell my house if that’s what it took to be there. Because the ability to network with people and go through the system, this process. People always ask how I pick my speakers for Funnel Hacking Live, and honestly the biggest thing is, unlike most events, if you look at most marketing events or probably any event, I don’t know. You come in and there’s a million break out rooms and they try to teach everything and you have pick which track you want and stuff like that. For me, Funnel Hacking Live is really a storyline, it’s like there’s a story I want to take people through and it’s a journey. That’s why we don’t publish schedule’s ahead of time, because I don’t want people like, “I’m coming to this one, but not this one.” It’s like, no you don’t understand. Every one of these speakers was hand crafted to tell part of the story and they all line up in a very systematic order and if you miss one of them, you miss a piece that builds upon the next piece and the next piece. So I pick my speakers on number one, having high energy. I want to keep the energy level high. But number two, it’s like they fit in the storyline of what I’m trying to tell at the event. I feel bad, I’ve had friends who are like, “Why don’t you let me speak? Why couldn’t I speak this year?” or whatever. Your message didn’t fit the storyline, and that’s the most important thing. It’s not any, me or you or anybody as a speaker, it’s the storyline for the audience and the attendees, it’s the most important part. So that’s how I pick my speakers. The story I need everybody to have to break false beliefs so they could actually achieve what they need in their life. So it’s fun. Alright, with that said, I’m going to bounce. Tomorrow I will tell you guys the last day, where we had many amazing things. Tony Robins came on stage, we did something that made an extra $3 million in coaching sales in 30 minutes, I’ll talk about that and a bunch of other things. So make sure you don’t miss tomorrow’s podcast. Thanks everybody, talk to you soon.

One day, Cayden received an email from their internet provider that said "stop pirating TV shows or we'll cut off your internet!" Cayden had no idea what they were talking about. So Alex decided to investigate. Further Reading Vulture's recap of "Old Loves" (Girls Season 5, Episode 4)

So Alex and I are comparing the historical accuracy and inaccuracies of Michal Mann's Public Enemies, in which Johnny Depp plays the dashing John Dillinger, notorious bank robber of the 1930s. You know every bank robbery movie? Well, John Dillinger did it better. Listen and find out what the movie got right and wrong! Follow on twitter! @hownotamoive1 Music can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGF9PxjmWjw

Episode 169 – Competitive Gaming Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I have been getting a bunch of emails and voicemails from...

Episode 168 – NEO, Coalescence and Ming Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I talk to Ming about Coalescence, the upcoming worldwide...

Episode 167 – Another SCE Chamber Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I talk about all the cool new stuff in...

This episode is so bad you shouldn’t even listen to it. Akiva insisted on waiting until the NFL released the 2017 schedule, so that we could predict the Vikings and Jets records 5 months before the season even begins. But then he fell asleep. So Alex had to wake up at 5 AM to record, […]

Episode 166 – Adepticon and Community Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I have on our man Domus. We talk all...

Episode 165 – April News and City of Secrets Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I go through the mailbag and...

Episode 164 – Carl Plays AoS Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I have on Carl from The Independent Characters to...

Episode 163 – Flesh Eater Courts Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I talk about some hobby news before jumping into...

Episode 162 – The Avalanche Continues Sponsored by Unique Gifts & Games and 6 Squared Studios The Garagehammer Toolbox is brought to you by Chaos Orc’s Superstore Please take a look at my Patreon page and consider supporting the show. Just follow this link: patreon.com/garagehammer So Alex and I get all excited about what’s coming down the...

Welcome to Real Estate Investing Profit Masters! I’ve got my twin on the podcast today! At least, people are always saying we look alike. But Alex Joungblood is really killing it on the scene today with his wholesaling and construction projects. The man can balance it all – work, family, and investing – and really just has an amazing and positive approach to life and everything that he does. A mistake landed him in the wholesaling business. Alex messed up his first deal, ended up going to court and lost money, but wholesaling got him out of the deal. He made a $12,000 profit, even after losing money initially, and it’s not just because he has good luck. Alex is an awesome business man with a positive attitude. He’s developed incredible hacks to break out of stagnant investing strategies. He and I actually worked together to bring a few of these hacks to you at WholsalingHousesFullTime.com/Cory. These are very basic hacks you can do without having a whole bunch of robots or virtual assistants. Alex doesn’t even have a virtual assistant at the moment. He’s crushing it all on his own, and he’s been able to create the kind of lifestyle he and his family deserve. What makes Alex so successful? It’s definitely his “no excuses” mentality. You know that nothing is going to happen if you don’t do something first. It’s up to you to turn mistakes into profits, and it’s up to you to take that first step toward success. Even if you try it once, go get a “real job”, and then come back to real estate later (which is exactly what Alex did), all of your success will be because you took the initiative to learn what you needed to in order to get the job done. You’ve gotta take the leap if you want to fly. So Alex and I want to know – what’s YOUR next move? MINUTE MARKERS 4:50 - Meet Mr. Alex Joungblood! 6:00 - Infomercials really got Alex involved in real estate 7:50 - What did Alex learn from his first deal? 11:05 - New construction is Alex’s real estate focus right now 15:18 - Alex’s breaking point was when he got a “real job” 18:25 - How did Alex decide to wholesale houses full time? 20:20 - Alex breaks down his profit master investing strategy 26:10 - We share our marketing hacks from WholsalingHousesFullTime.com/Cory 29:29 - The biggest lesson Alex learned 32:25 - If Alex started over again, he’d approach it from a data-driven standpoint 35:33 - Alex’s favorite motivational quote and books 41:48 - Alex’s favorite work and fitness apps 43:22 - How does Alex get 8 hours of sleep with 4 kids?? 44:58 - Alex is most grateful for his family 45:50 - Alex talks about his different mentors and coaches 46:38 - Alex is motivated by his ability to create his own schedule and lifestyle 48:25 - Who has better taste in Monopoly properties – Cory or Alex? 51:14 - Get in touch with Alex on Facebook @Wholesaling HousesFT   RESOURCES Alex’s Website: http://www.alexjoungblood.com/ Alex’s Facebook: Wholesaling Houses Full Time 17 Wholesaling Hacks Carelton Sheets Russ Whitney The 4-Hour Workweek ListSource Podio Fitness Pal   Ask Cory A Question Want to get in touch with Cory and ask him your most burning Real Estate Investing question?  We’ve made it super easy for you.  Just head over to our Ask Cory A Question page and start recording.  Cory will play your question live on an upcoming show and answer it personally. Who Do You Want To Hear From? Name some folks I should get on the show! Hit me up:support@realestateinvestingprofits.com and I’ll do my best to get them on. Did You Get Your FREE Investing Guide? TEXT the word PROFIT (38470) to immediately sent Your FREE Investing Quick Start Guide! JOIN The Elite Real Estate Investor’s Board of Directors http://JoinMyMastermind.com Connect Here Please check out our website, realestateinvestingprofits.com for the “Down and Dirty” Ultimate Real Estate Investing Quick Start Guide download.   And don’t forget to get involved with the REIP coaching program at realestateinvestingprofits.com/coachingapplication or click on the “Coaching” tab on our website!  

Oh. Dear. God. So Alex and I have been gone for a bit. We took a bit of a break over Christmas/New Year’s. Not just because of the holidays, but to recharge and refuel for the podcast. We explain and … Continue reading →

What follows is an edited transcript of my interview with Alex Salter about the economics of space. The first half deals primarily with the issue of space debris, while the second half deals with the possibility of private governance in space. There's something in this episode for everyone to enjoy, so I hope you'll listen, read, and share it with your friends. Petersen: My guest today is Alex Salter of Texas Tech University. Alex, welcome to Economics Detective Radio. Salter: Thanks very much for having me. Petersen: Our topic today is the economics of space. Alex has written two papers on the subject. The first is entitled, "Space Debris: A Law and Economics Analysis of the Orbital Commons." The second is, "Ordering the Cosmos: Private Law and Celestial Property Rights." So Alex, let's start by talking about space debris. What is it and why does it matter? Salter: So space debris is basically junk in space that no longer serves any useful purpose. So as you can imagine, since the first piece of space debris launched up in 1957---which was the rocket body from Sputnik I---a lot of orbits around the Earth, especially low Earth orbit, have become kind of cluttered with space junk. And the reason it gets cluttered is because no one has an incentive to clean it up. It's a problem because a lot of this stuff is big enough and moving fast enough that if it strikes something like a communications satellite, it can take it out. So the probability of a collision right now that will cause serious damage is currently low, but there are a lot of worries among scientists who study the problem that as debris occasionally collides with more debris, you get a sort of snowballing effect of the clutter. So if we're going to get a handle on it, it needs to be earlier rather than later. Petersen: I think intuitively it seems like the sky is so big and satellites are so small that we'd never have to worry about collisions. So why is that not the case? Salter: So there's obviously quite a bit of room up there, but the problem is that some orbits are more valuable than others. In particular, geosynchronous orbit, which is I think 36 thousand kilometers above the Earth, is a really valuable place for specific satellites. And also low Earth orbit is a valuable place for specific satellites. Now, there's still a lot of room there, but it's significantly restricted. If my communications satellite is taking up a particular orbit, your satellite can't be in the same place. So there's only so much of it to go around, and again, what we're really worried about is debris colliding with something, which creates more debris, which can collide with more stuff. We're really worried that snowball effect, which is sometimes called the Kessler syndrome after the scientist who first wrote about it. Petersen: So the odds of a single collision might be low, but given one collision, it becomes much more likely that we'll have two and three and four---a chain reaction of collisions. Salter: Exactly. So right now the probability of collision is pretty low over the life of a satellite, for example in low Earth orbit, it's no more than one in a thousand. But conditional on getting hit, that can cause a pretty serious business disruption and economic losses, and as you said, given that one increases the likelihood of all future collisions, it's kind of like a positive feedback loop. So that can get pretty nasty pretty quick. Petersen: Have there been any collisions in the past? Salter: There have been many collisions in the past. I think the most notable one was actually intentional. In 2007, China performed an anti-satellite test, where it purposefully took out one of its old satellites that was no longer useful. And it created, I think, about a hundred and fifty thousand new pieces of space debris with that one anti-satellite test. So I'm not aware of any instances of grave, private sector disruptions caused by space debris collisions, but honestly unless there's some means of cleaning this stuff up or it de-orbits on its own, it really is only a matter of time. Petersen: So, you make a distinction in the paper between access to orbit and particular orbits. Can you explain what those are? Salter: Right. So access to orbit is basically getting your payload up into space. If you have a communications satellite, it's getting it to the orbit you want. And economically that has the characteristics of a public good. The standard definition of a public good in economics is anything that we like which is not rivalrous in consumption and non-excludable. So if I consume one more unit of it, that doesn't stop you from consuming more. And also non-excludable, the second part, means it's costly or very difficult for me to stop other people from enjoying that. So both of those characteristics fit getting a satellite into your desired orbit---going through space to get to where you want to go. Once your satellite is in position though, a particular orbit has the properties of what we call a common-pool resource. It's rivalrous---if I have it you can't also have it---but it's also non-excludable. I can't really stop you from using it. As orthodox public finance theory will tell you, sometimes the provision of those goods, public goods and common-pool resources, are difficult because if they're non-excludable you can't stop people from enjoying the benefits and so that limits the incentive for producers to make the stuff in the first place. Petersen: Right, so in order to prevent someone from launching a satellite into your orbit, you'd have to somehow police every potential launch site on the globe, which of course we can't do. And that's what makes it [non-excludable]. Salter: It's incredibly expensive and therefore not really feasible. Petersen: Right, so from reading your paper I know other researchers have looked at this problem and they suggested taxing people who create space debris. So do you want to comment on that suggestion, and maybe what are the pros and cons of taking that approach? Salter: Sure. Let me first start by saying that the case for a corrective tax here stems from the fact that we have a common-pool resources problem, or a public goods problem. Nobody owns orbit, and so nobody really has an incentive to worry about how clean it is. If I'm launching a communications satellite, I don't really worry that I'm also imposing a cost on other potential launchers with my useless rocket body. So if everyone thinks that way, then the debris problem becomes unmanageable. So there is a textbook rationale for some correction to what we call this external cost in economics. Because nobody owns orbit or access to orbit, nobody has an incentive to care for it or clean it up. At least not as much as we would like. So the argument for a corrective tax is basically, we want to bring the private costs of polluting space more in line with the social costs of polluting space. So if you tax a polluter, someone who's contributing to space debris, you raise the expensiveness of creating debris. And as economic theory will tell you, when something gets more expensive, all else being equal, people will do less of it. That's the theoretical argument for what's called a Pigouvian or corrective tax. The problem here---and this is not specific to space debris, this is specific to all taxes correcting external cost problems---is that you don't really know how big to make the tax in order to get to the efficient amount of pollution mitigation. And even if you did, you have to take political economy considerations into concern. Corrective taxes are not run and operated by benevolent social planners. They're typically run and operated by bureaucracies, and bureaucrats have their own incentives to which they respond. And the incentives facing politicians and bureaucrats may not be the same as incentives for contributing to social efficiency or maximal wellbeing. Petersen: Right, so we might worry that the body that determines the tax on potentially space-junk-producing private actors might be less concerned with the externality and more concerned with their own revenue and so set the tax not at the social-welfare-maximizing point but at the revenue-maximizing point. Salter: Right, that's one potential worry with that sort of a solution. Again I want to emphasize, though, that's in the abstract. It's still very very difficult---in fact I would even say impossible---to know what the right size of the tax should be. I think that there is an inherent knowledge problem that sometimes gets overlooked at the expense of the incentive problem that you just talked about. Both are very important, and they're related, and they complement each other in terms of the critique, but they are distinct problems. And public policy has to be able to present credible solutions to both of those problems if we're going to argue that a corrective tax would improve social welfare. Petersen: Right, so you launch a satellite, maybe you leave a piece of large debris like a rocket body, but you also create a risk that the satellite will explode or be hit by something and create a snowball effect of more debris. It's really hard to compute the net cost because you not only need to know how likely is it to create more debris and how likely is that debris to impact something. You also need to know the value of the future satellites the debris might impact, which means forecasting the future of space and the future of the economy and all these things into the deep future. Have other researchers at least tried to tackle this problem? Are there some attempts? Salter: There have been some attempts, and as you noted, any estimate is going to be very imprecise because there's a lot of variables moving in the background. But you could look at scientific studies that estimate the damage to useful communications satellite or other valuable space equipment from a collision can range anywhere from 20 to 200 million. That's a reasonable interval for estimating the damages if you count not just the initial collision but also the potential snowballing which can destroy other things. And you can also look at what private companies are doing right now to get an appreciation of the magnitude of the problem. For example, if you're a communications satellite launcher you can buy insurance for your communications satellite. In 2011, market premiums for these kinds of space risks totalled about 800 million dollars. And also in 2011 there were about 600 million in claimed damages. So private actors are spending a lot to insure themselves against risks such as these and that in combination with some of the scientific studies can help build your intuition for understanding that we're talking about a lot of money here: a stream of valuable services into the future which can be risked by space debris. Petersen: So we do have a ballpark estimate, but nothing so precise that we could set an optimal Pigouvian tax even if we had a government that was benevolent enough to try to reach that optimum. So in your paper you suggest alternatives to the Pigouvian route. In particular you suggest potential private solutions. So what private solutions are there to reduce the creation of space debris? Salter: That's a really interesting question because the standard response that economists would give to externality problems seems impractical here. Usually when you have an externality problem, a public goods problem, the solution is to create property rights. Property rights align incentives so if we create property rights to a common pool resource, that will cause people to take better account of the effects of their behaviour on others. But how do you really create a property right to something like an orbit? Is it a specific volume of space? How big is it? Under what conditions can somebody else move through it when your satellite is not in that orbit? I think in this case we have to take seriously the idea that creating property rights to orbit and to access to orbit is simply too costly. It's not feasible given the costs and benefits of the situation. I think the most promising way forward in this particular issue is using market mechanisms to mitigate the problem. So in order to talk about market mechanisms I need to do a little background on international law. There's this treaty, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which basically says among other things that nations retain jurisdiction over the stuff they put in space. Now that's important because if debris is big enough to be tracked, we can tell more or less who made it. So if you have, for example, a piece of Chinese space debris, it's technically contrary to international law for a US organization to go up there and do anything without the Chinese' permission. So if the US wants to do something it has to take care of its own space debris. If the Chinese want to do something, they have to take care of their space debris. Given that constraint, I think one potential is for the US government to auction off contracts to go and mitigate this stuff. Another potential is instead of auctioning off contracts to go remove it, auctioning off a contract to debris itself. One thing that's not often realized about space debris is that a lot of that stuff is valuable metal, material, that's already in orbit. The most costly part of space commerce is actually getting stuff out of Earth's gravity. So if you have debris that's currently up there that can be re-used, perhaps at a later date for in-situ manufacturing and repairs, then that's a valuable asset. Firms should be willing to pay for that. So I think we need to look at market mechanisms within particular nations to address this problem until and unless we can get a more favourable framework in international law. Petersen: So something big like a rocket body has a lot of scrap metal that you don't have to burn fuel to get it there because it's already there. That's really interesting. So it could be a resource in itself. But then there's the issue of much smaller debris, something that isn't a resource in itself. A paint chip or a little fragment of debris that is not useful and is more of just a pure hazard. How would you deal with that? Salter: That's extremely difficult. I'm not sure that there is a good solution to that right now. My guess is there has to be a technological solution in the sense of just developing thicker plating for spacecraft. Because a lot of that stuff is so small that it can't be tracked, but it's still big enough that if it hits you, you're going to be in trouble. I think that the only way to really be safe against something like that is just to wait for material to get more robust. And that's obviously not going to solve the problem but it's going to mitigate it. Petersen: It's too bad. In science fiction they would just say "raise shields" and it would be dealt with, but I guess we can't do that. Salter: That's another imaginative technological innovation and maybe something like that will be feasible some day. There's an actual technological literature on this, of people thinking up contraptions and devices for going out and removing specifically that kind of debris, but none of them are economically feasible and I think most of them aren't even technologically feasible at this point. We just can't even make the stuff apart from economic considerations. Petersen: So there's a future in building technology to deflect or remove tiny bits of debris from Earth orbit. I don't know if you saw the move Wall-E? It was a Pixar film. Salter: Yeah. Petersen: Yeah, humanity had to leave Earth because it was too full of garbage, and there's the scene where not only is Earth covered in garbage but its orbit is full of old satellites. Salter: Right. Petersen: The ship is just sort of pushing its way through comically. But in real life, it could really happen, but it wouldn't be so easy to just push through it. It would be flying so fast and hit you with such force that it would likely cause serious damage unless you could defend against it somehow. Salter: Right, this stuff is moving fast. In low Earth orbit it's going about seven to eight kilometers per second. And there's about 300 thousand pieces of debris that we know about that can destroy a satellite upon impact. So obviously, even if it's small, the fact that it's moving so fast can cause you some serious problems. If we get to the point where we develop strong enough technological---not like energy shielding---but the strength of metal and the strength of materials to push through that, we're a ways off from that. I don't even think that's on the horizon. Petersen: And of course there's the issue that if it makes the satellite heavier, then it becomes much more costly to launch it. So there's the issue of being able to make something strong enough to withstand an impact while light enough to be able to actually launch it in the first place. Salter: Right. As always there are tradeoffs, which is precisely why economics has a valuable perspective to offer on this problem. Petersen: So let's move on to your other paper which deals with property rights in space. It starts with a discussion of the 2015 SPACE Act, signed into law by President Obama. What can you tell me about that act? Salter: So the SPACE Act is largely intended to guarantee that the US government will do something to protect commercial entities' property rights to celestial resources. Celestial property rights, basically. There's no specific commitment to what that protection will look like, it's more a statement of intent to encourage private sector development and exploration of space by the US government saying, "Look, we know this lack of property rights thing is a problem. We just wanted to let you know that in the event of a dispute, we are going to protect your property rights as governments are supposed to do. The problem with that is that we get into some pretty thorny issues with international law. Again, talking about the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which was signed by all of the current spacefaring nations, Article II of that treaty states that nation states cannot extend their territorial jurisdiction into outer space. And a lot of legal scholars think if a government is protecting private property rights, it's de facto extended its territorial jurisdiction over those rights. So if deep space industries or planetary resources, asteroid mining companies, eventually go out and claim an asteroid, and Uncle Sam says, "Yep, we'll recognize and defend your claim to that asteroid," many legal scholars say that's a de facto extension of territorial sovereignty to that asteroid, which Article II of the space treaty explicitly forbids. So we're in a bit of a sticky situation international-law wise. At best the legal framework is unclear and at worst the 2015 SPACE Act contains provisions that are not compatible with existing international law. Petersen: It seems like the 1967 treaty was a little bit short sighted in blocking people from owning parts of space. I guess it was during the Cold War and you can see why the Americans would not want to Soviets claiming the moon or vice versa. So recently, Elon Musk unveiled a plan to send colonists to Mars some time during this century. And if you literally have a colony there on Mars you're going to need property rights. And to have a treaty that might be a hundred or more years old at that point blocking that, it seems like a hurdle that we'll need to clear. People could potentially just ignore the treaty once they're on Mars. So, what kind of solutions do you see for this problem in the future? Salter: Well I think that international law on this should be expanded and clarified on this just for clarity's sake. I don't think we need to rely on publically protected and enforced property rights to get things like space commerce or Mars colonies or all that cool science fiction stuff that actually now doesn't seem so infeasible. If you look throughout history, there are many, many examples of legal systems that are purely private and voluntary. And they are purely voluntary because the property claims underlying that legal system are self enforcing. We don't need to rely on the state, a monopoly enforcer of social rules. We don't need to rely on the state to enforce our property rights. Given the situation we find ourselves in, I will respect your property rights because it's in my self-interest to do so and you will respect my property rights because it's in your self-interest to do so. And it seems like that's incredible. If there's no monopoly enforcer protecting things, how can we have a viable legal order? But again if we look throughout history we see lots and lots of examples of these private legal regimes. In fact, one of them exists today. International trade law is almost entirely privately produced. International trade is almost entirely privately governed. And it's not hard to see why: there's no international super sovereign that can enforce property rights over disputes if Al is from one country and Bob is from another country. And so given that problem, traders going all the way back to the middle ages had to come up with a body of voluntary and self-enforcing law if they wanted to exchange across political boundaries. And it turns out that this law has worked out very, very well. The basics haven't changed in pretty much a thousand years and while it's being applied in newer and more interesting ways, the foundation is solid. And I think that the situation in which international traders find themselves in today---"international anarchy" because again there is no international super sovereign---closely matches the situation that commercial entities would find themselves in in doing space commerce. So I think that there's a lot of potential for existing international and commercial trade law to provide a governance framework for outer-space commerce going forward. Petersen: Yeah, there's a quote from your paper I wanted to read, that deals with these international frameworks going back to the middle ages. It says: Following the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West, the volume of international trade shrank considerably. The legal infrastructure provided by the Empire no longer stood, and the transition away from this order caused significant commercial disruption. By the ninth and tenth centuries, trade was recovering. Across Europe, a professional merchant class emerged and developed mechanisms to resolve disputes over property rights and contract enforcement, even when subjects were from different polities and thus no national court had jurisdiction. So can you explain more about how that system developed, and how something that we developed here on Earth a millennium ago, how can that apply to space? They would seem to be very different settings. Salter: So they're different settings geographically, but I think the economic and legal problem is the same: facilitating coordination and cooperation among disparate entities when there is no possibility of turning to something like a state to serve as an overarching referee and arbiter. And so the medieval law merchant, called the Lex Mercatoria, was basically a self-enforcing system of property law and the legal rules that went along with it. And what's interesting about that is that when we think of law we normally think of a body of rules and then we talk about applying those rules in specific circumstances. This most closely works the other way. Law is created whenever international traders enter a contract. And provided that commercial instrument became widespread and actually helped traders achieve their goals---and was mutually beneficial of course---then arbitration courts overseeing merchant disputes would come to see that sort of contractual arrangement as valid. And so the arbitrator is less making law than recognizing law---a body of rules for coordinating behaviour---that actually exists. So if I'm a trader form some country in medieval Europe and I'm trading with another guy in another country, obviously I can't turn to my king to enforce my property rights because he doesn't have jurisdiction over your country. You can't turn to your king to enforce jurisdiction. In some situations maybe Church court can act as a venue for arbitration and dispute resolution, but most of the time what they did was---if they had a dispute---they would find some neutral third-party merchant who was an expert in the area and say, "Look, we have this dispute. Here is this contract. I think I was supposed to do X, my trading partner disagrees. He thought I was supposed to do Y. Can you help us sort this out?" The arbitrator, using his expertise, would look at it and come to a decision, and for the most part they were complied with voluntarily. Because if you went to commercial arbitration in the Lex Mercatoria system and then you ignored a ruling, you would become known as a defector, as a cheater, as someone who didn't act or uphold his or her word. And international trade was a relatively small and close-knit community and so that information would get around. You'd be branded as someone as not worthy of doing business with. And so you could cheat and get a payoff now, but you would risk that no one would trade with you in the future. So you'd be losing all future business, which is why most agreements, both for the medieval law merchant and the current law merchant---the current system of international commercial law---are actually complied with and adhered to voluntarily. Petersen: OK, so what kind of legal disputes do you see potentially arising in space? What sort of resources might people come to have conflicts over? Salter: Good question. I think the most obvious one, at least to me, is probably with asteroid mining companies. So if I go land on an asteroid and I want to mine it for valuable minerals, do I own the entire asteroid? Do I own just a portion of its surface? What happens if there's water underneath the asteroid and someone wants to go in and get the water while you're getting the minerals? How deep, literally geographically, down into the center of the asteroid do my property claims go? And water, once you're actually in space, is pretty valuable because it's used for making rocket fuel, essentially. And also, water is very heavy. As we discussed earlier, it's really expensive to get water into orbit. So if there's water already in space, in an asteroid, that's a valuable resource. People are going to want that. What happens if you want the minerals and I want the water? But me going to get the water creates a situation where you can't go and get the minerals. Maybe my mining operation is in the way of yours. Those are very real disputes that there are actually very real analogues of here on Earth that we're going to have to go and settle in space. Petersen: I'm reminded of, during the California gold rush they developed an elaborate set of rules for how large a claim an individual gold miner could mine. And how you would draw the lines between different people's claims, and they established de facto courts to deal with claim jumpers. So we're thinking that California during the gold rush might as well have been outer space, it was so far from the rest of civilization. And so we're more or less thinking that something like that would occur. Salter: Exactly. Economically, I think this situation is very closely analogous. Gold miners in California are outside of the reach of the formal US Government. They're in the metaphorical Hobbesian jungle, a state of nature with respect to each other. Orthodox theories of social cooperation says they shouldn't be able to cooperate and yet they clearly did, historically. The gold rush is a really interesting period of American history to study for that. There's also a book by scholars Anderson and Hill called The Not So Wild, Wild West. We have this impression from Hollywood that the American frontier was a violent and lawless place, when in fact most likely the opposite was true, because people knew that they didn't have access to formal dispute resolution mechanisms offered by the US Government they had to come up with their own. And they worked relatively well. And I think that's the situation we find ourselves in in space. There are governments "nearby" but given current international law they can't actually extend their jurisdiction into space and therefore mediate space-related disputes. Or at lease some disputes. And so we have to have space tourism companies coming to agreements with asteroid mining companies coming into agreements with communication satellite providers. There needs to be a body of voluntary and self-enforcing rules, and again I think that there are numerous historical examples you can point to that should lead us to be actually pretty optimistic about this. Private law is not just feasible but it is also desirable because it has some pretty nice consequences in terms of creating incentives for making and stewarding wealth. Petersen: So, the nice thing about private law, you sort of alluded to it earlier but Hayek makes this distinction between law and legislation, and the nice thing is it's adaptive. When you encounter new issues and new problems you set new precedents that can change and adapt with the circumstances. That's one major advantage of private law, right? Salter: It's important to recognize that that's not unique to private law. That also exists in the common law legal system that exists in the Anglo-American tradition. So the benefits of specifically private law---I think we're talking about private law here as opposed to some sort of common-law extension into space which again, Article II of the space treaty seems to say that's not OK. So given that, are these adaptive features of a purely private legal system good enough to facilitate social cooperation and basically get people to not fight with each other? And I think they are. It's sort of a bottom-up process for discovering rather than creating law. There are many rules that are probably equally feasible. It's a question of finding the rules that best give individuals incentives to act in a socially responsible way. And we also want those rules to provide for orderly, quick, and low-cost dispute resolution. People are going to disagree; it's inevitable. What we want is for a legal system that is sufficiently adaptable so it can tend to specific circumstances, but also sufficiently general that individuals can form reliable expectations of their trading partners' behaviour. And as Hayek pointed out, private law is one kind of law that has that dual feature that we like so much: adaptability yet at the same time predictability. So it's not the case that only private law can have that. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying that private law can have that, and given current international law, that's the only ball game in town. Petersen: So, when you said about clarifying the rules, do you feel that if the governments of the world were to say right now that, "disputes in outer space are not our jurisdiction, you're on your own," and codify that and maybe have another treaty, do you think that would hasten the development of these private mechanisms? strong>Salter: I think it would. The private mechanisms are only going to arise as needed in a private law system. When there's no actual dispute and no actual thing being tested, there doesn't need to be a rule for overcoming one party's disputes or claims against the other. So I personally actually not only think that private law is desirable in space just because of current international law. I would actually like to see space kept "safe" for private law. Because it has all these nice, socially beneficial properties in terms of aligning people's incentives and giving them the information they need to do good things. And if you look at the most likely counterpart---imagine international law were amended---what's likely to happen is there would be some international governance body, a regulatory body that's given authority over space activities. And once we embrace that sort of bureaucratic regulatory solution, that comes with all sorts of political economy and public choice problems. How do the regulators get the information necessary to make good rules? What are the incentives to make good rules? I think that several schools of economics and legal thought have shown that in this case embracing a top-down regulatory solution would actually be pretty dangerous. So I would like to see international law clarified, but I would also like to see private law prevail in space. Petersen: Right, and if we're talking about particularly humans in space, as in the case of a Mars colony, it would seem to be undesirable to bring our baggage and our governance here to a place as distant as Mars. The people there are likely to face all sorts of their own problems. And if there was part of Mars that was governed by, say, the US Government you would almost face the same problems the Thirteen Colonies had being governed by the British. You have this vast gulf between the people who are doing the governing and the people who are being governed. So could a Mars colony function on private law? Salter: Wow, that's a fascinating question and one that I didn't tackle in the paper. That's actually a little beyond my expertise in this area. I don't see any reason why it couldn't, simply because I don't see the economic and legal problems that potential Martian colonists would face are any different than people on the international law merchant scenario would face. Or individuals in medieval Iceland---who had their own body of voluntary and private law---face. I think the best analogy for these sorts of situations is the economic literature for what is sometimes called "analytic anarchy." And people are sometimes scared of it because the word "anarchy" is in there. But all anarchy means in this context is we don't have recourse to a nation state to solve our disputes for us. So if we're going to get governance, we're going to have to find a way to do it ourselves. It has to be voluntary, it has to be agreeable to all parties, and it has to do a good job at facilitating social cooperation. So how do people actually do that when they don't have access to the nation state? Which is again pretty new in human history. So if you're looking at any time prior to 1648, there's got to be some way of generating order. And if you look at history I think you have a lot of examples of proprietary communities and voluntary communities which can be models for a Martian colony. So to make a long point short, I don't see any evidence that a Martian colony cannot be purely privately governed. And I don't think we have any reasons to think so because the problems they're going to face have been faced historically and overcome by people in various times and places. Petersen: Do you have any closing thoughts about the future of space and the role of economics in helping us achieve our goals there? Salter: I think that economics is going to be particularly useful in helping us highlight exactly which potential problems are worth caring about and, of those problems, which ones deserve or merit public policy responses. So, for example, I don't think there's any reason to be afraid of creating a private law governing space. I'm actually encouraged by that prospect. But that doesn't mean that domestic agencies, especially national agencies, don't have a role in making space a formidable and habitable environment. We just spent the first half an hour talking about space debris, right? And there's lots of things that US agencies can do to mitigate space debris for example. Various agencies can have a rule, and there are such rules in place now, saying if you're going to orbit a space craft you’ve got to provide for de-orbiting the debris and also de-orbiting the space craft when it's no longer useful. So economics, and particularly the economic way of thinking, can help us identify, OK this anarchy in space problem is not actually a problem. Private law is viable, so we don't have to worry about that. Oh, space debris is a problem because we have this common pool resources problem, externality problems, and the usual solutions---taxes and or property rights---aren't feasible. So we need to find some other way, maybe harnessing market mechanisms at the margin to address these. And I think the economic perspective is going to do a good job at cautioning us at taking a top-down approach at space governance. The temptation is huge to say, "OK, we're on the verge of major space breakthroughs. Let's sit down and write down a body of rules that's going to govern space." That's really dangerous because there's no way that you and I sitting in our armchairs can see all the eventualities or problems that people will confront in space. And so the rules that we write are almost certainly going to have little to no relationship to those problems, and therefore won't help commercial and or government actors solve those problems. So figuring out what's important and avoiding the temptation to engage in what Hayek called "The Pretense of Knowledge." Thinking that we can learn and know and plan more than we can actually do. Petersen: My guest today has been Alex Salter. Alex, thanks for being part of Economics Detective Radio. Salter: It's been a pleasure. Thanks again for having me.  

All through life, Alex has always felt that other people, schoolmates, friends and later colleagues, seemed to have it easier. Dad was never quite satisfied. It was hard to live up to his standards. Aunts and Uncles always knew a cousin who was better, brighter, richer, faster. Alex, like you and me, would like to earn more, be recognized and respected. To enjoy life and have fun. To simply succeed.  Is it really so difficult? Alex wants to provide for others. Family is very important and the good of society is too, but Alex feels stuck on a hamster wheel, running from paycheck to paycheck with some left over, but it's never enough. And let's face it; the job sucks most of the time. Alex's boss rarely has a good word. Sometimes, when Alex has achieved something out of the ordinary, the boss notices, but most of the time Alex feels like the effort is unnoticed. Alex was in a rut. Where's my MOJO? For the past couple of months, Alex's has been feeling drained, both emotionally and physically. Without that 'get up and go', Alex accepted to sit down and stay. A friend mentioned a wonderful seminar that they had attended. A famous motivational guru was in town and the flyers promised life transformation and heart alignment and immediate recharge and success. So Alex forked out the high price of a ticket and went with great expectations. Oh what a terrific day it was. An atmosphere charged with promise and laughter. Alex returned home with a renewed desire to re-ignite passions and eager to progress with living life to the max.   In the day's ahead motivation surges Alex continues to feel upbeat for several days after the seminar. There's even a framed photo of Alex and the speaker with a motivational quote and signed sitting on the desk. Work seems effortless and progress feels assured until the boss sends the last customer presentation deck back with a note describing it as "unusable". Not quite the type of attention Alex had desired from the boss.   Within moment, all the encouragement and promises of the motivational seminar evaporated like a morning mist The boss referred Alex to HR to get trained in putting presentations together properly. And soon Alex was enjoying a couple of days away from the office in a fun and lively workshop.  In spite of a couple of long interruptions of teleconference calls that "just had to be done", the workshop was very good. Alex learned and had a chance to practise the skills and get feedback from the facilitator. Back in the office, Alex stared disbelievingly at the increased mountain of urgent tasks and slowly worked through them, never quite coming to the end but at least trying to use the newly developed skills. All was well until a curt email described Alex's latest presentation deck for the boss as "utterly unsuitable" and questioning the point of training someone if they weren't going to use the training properly. Alex knew that it would be a waste of time explaining that there had been no opportunity to use the skills What Alex needed now was some clear guidance on what to do next. Alex was stuck again. That encouraging feeling of regaining motivation and purpose from the seminar was gone. Alex had developed skills but with no proper feedback at work and regular guidance even the new skills weren't being used effectively. What to do now? And how do I get unstuck? Alex wanted help, but talking to a family member or the boss felt too difficult and risky. Friends, well they just seem to be caught up in their own successful, busy lives. So Alex looked online and decided to risk everything and speak to a stranger. A coach who seemed to have helped a few people in similar situations get unstuck. Some Alex contacted just tried to sell a solution; a few took the time to listen and genuinely appeared to care. However, what Alex needed was a plan to get from here to… well, somewhere a whole lot better, and someone who would be a guide on the side. After checking out a couple of potentials, Alex chose a coach. It was unnerving at first. It felt like this coach could read minds and understood the real fears Alex faced, and never judged. Somehow, this coach dug down and found little gems of forgotten talents hidden in Alex's past. It felt good to be appreciated. It felt wonderful to know that there is greatness within. It felt wonderful o be unstuck and that the future could really be made better. It wasn't cheap, and it was hard work, and took time to mine all those gems and uncover Alex's true talents, passion and purpose. There were days of sheer joy and days of uncertainty. Together, they developed a plan of action, and the coach continued to guide with useful resources, follow up and measure progress. It felt good to enjoy real progress. It felt great to be choosing to take charge of life. And Alex thrived. This coach kept Alex accountable for promised actions and provided templates and online micro-learning tutorials. Together they measured the key efforts and deliverables and Alex began using the templates at work. Slowly and steadily, Alex's talent was leveraged in new areas and work became more effortless and vastly more fun. Alex became empowered and deliberately focused more on leading up. Helping to lift the boss's load and supporting colleagues in areas where Alex could best lend support. Even whilst less than the best-qualified candidate, Alex was offered a promotion. It was a near ideal position. Alex loves the new job, has a balanced family and social life and is even volunteering in a favoured charity project. Of course, Alex could have gotten there alone. However, not everyone is great at encouraging themselves. Even after a boost from attending one of those Guru style seminars. And it sure helps to develop new skills but you really need to be motivated to use them effectively back at the workplace and guided in their use. It is terrific to work with someone who cares, someone who knows how you can get unstuck and how to find and leverage your real talents and passion, a guide like a coach or mentor. Whether inside your company or someone external. It's even better when you are empowered with easy access to reminders of learning and templates and constantly encouraged to leverage existing talents in new ways so that work becomes effortless and fun. Alex, like you, benefits from being encouraged, developed, guided and empowered to get unstuck and to realise their true potential. We all need an EDGE, and we need someone to help us sharpen it.   It doesn't take talent or luck to succeed; you just need to decide. I'll help you gain your EDGE.

So Alex and I went reeeeeaaaaally long this time around. Partially because I’m drinking heavily and partially because we got REALLY yelly and had things to discuss. I’m warning you right now, the language is pretty heavy even for us. … Continue reading →

Would you like to get CRAZY-PROFITABLE DEALS that NO OTHER INVESTOR is even aware of? Here’s a great and ridiculously easy way to eliminate basically all of your competition in your local market and start raking in money doing easy, EASY real estate deals. I’m Carole Ellis. This is episode 2.------Let’s go ahead and eliminate 80 percent of your competition for awesome, high-profit deals right off the bat, shall we? But before we do that, I want to take 30 seconds to mention something that most investors consider TOTALLY IRRELEVANT that will be scaring off a large portion of your buyers if you don’t adjust your marketing in 2016. According to a new Berkshire Hathaway HomeService survey (that’s Warren Buffet’s company, so we listen when it releases data!), nearly two-thirds of young homebuyers say that rising interest rates are likely to scare them right back off buying, something the housing market – and we as investors – simply can’t afford to let happen. Want to know how to deal with this issue? We’ve got all the details – and more importantly, the solution – in our News and Networking section at REI.today.Now, back to eliminating 80 percent of your competition…One of the biggest stumbling blocks most real estate investors new and old face is competition for the truly great deals in their local markets. Particularly if you are a fan of wholesaling, which is a great way to put money in your pocket in JUST DAYS with real estate (see episode 1 RIGHT NOW if that little nugget tickles your fancy), then you know that it’s tough getting to the good stuff first. Fortunately for my REI Today Listeners, I recently interviewed one of the top guys in the business when it comes to CUTTING OUT THE COMPETITION. His simple secret – and let me tell you folks, it is nearly BRAINLESSLY SIMPLE, enables him to access what he estimates to be the 80 PERCENT of motivated sellers out there that no one else even has the option of speaking to. Here’s who he is and what he does.Our “competition-cutter” is none other than Miami’s Alex Pardo, a former high-powered General Electric guy who got into real estate so that he could backpack around the world and, frankly, make a bit more money than his graduate degree in business was earning him. Back in the early 2000s, Alex spent every dime he owned at the time (997 dollars, to be exact) on a wholesaling course that he took WHILE PARTYING IN IBIZA and never looked back. Now, he’s a wholesaling powerhouse down in Miami and he credits most of his success to one extremely simple followup-technique: I call it 24th time’s a charm meets SILENCE IS GOLDEN.So what do I mean by that? Well, for starters, Alex has learned that roughly 80 percent of all motivated sellers will NOT leave a message when they call in off a postcard, yellow letter, or bandit sign. But let’s face it. You don’t have time to answer the phone every time it rings! The secret is to collect the numbers and call back, even if you don’t know exactly who called in the first place! Alex calls those sellers back and then he follows through with a 24-step follow-up system that is truly remarkable. If you want the details, don’t worry. They’re all in the REI Today vault, of course!So Alex calls these sellers back, and then he keeps calling. But he doesn’t just call to say, “Hi.” He calls and says “Hey, I’m sorry I missed your call. Don’t you have a property you’d like to sell?” “How can I best help you solve YOUR real estate problem?” “What can I do for you?” And here’s the ringer, folks: Alex does this 24 TIMES for each motivated seller who gets in touch with him! Why? Because he just wants to be annoying? No, because he wants those deals, and the results speak for themselves. Alex averages 40 wholesale deals a year.Now, as an aside, let’s talk about the idea of “calling back” for a minute. If you’re like most people, you’re thinking that this is starting to sound like a lot of time on the phone. However, take your cue from Alex (again) and take a few minutes to go high-tech. There is a special, low-cost service that you can use to handle all of your follow-up phone calls that actually sends messages straight to your sellers’ voicemails. This is HUGE, Alex told us, because most people just hang up on broadcast calls. However, because this system goes straight to voicemail, it appears that the seller has simply missed a personal call, and it dramatically ramps up your response rate without you even having to talk to sellers until they’ve already given you their information and you’ve confirmed you’ve got a live one on your hands. Want the name of this system? You know it’s in the REI vault, of course!Think about how it would change your real estate investing business if you were working on deals that no one else in your market even knew about. Think you could use that wholesaling strategy we talked about in episode 1 and make it work? Of course you could! And if you happen to be interested in Florida specifically, I’ve got even better news for you. Alex went ahead and, just for our REI Today listeners, rattled off the “sweet spots” in Florida where the properties are hot and the wholesaling is going strong. That’s in the REI Today Vault as well just waiting for you right along with Alex’s 24-step follow-up flow chart and the service HE USES PERSONALLY to make sure that his sellers never feel like they’re just part of a system and are more likely than most motivated sellers to call him back! So how do you get access to these “Florida sweet spots?” Alex’s HUGE follow-up flow chart, and a transcription of our entire interview wherein Alex not only describes how he gets his deals, but exposes a FIVE-DOLLAR SECRET that enables him to optimize his sales and results every month no matter how to the market changes? You know it: it’s inside the REITODAY Vault, our free resource library for every listener to this show!  If you’re already a member of the REITODAY Vault, download the special resource for today’s show, “24th Time’s a Charm” And if you’re not yet a member, you can get your free membership RIGHT NOW by texting the word REITODAY to 33444 or visit REI.Today/vault and I’ll provide fast, free access to this truly powerful info that will make your real estate wholesale deals safer, faster and more profitable!  So just text the word REITODAY with no spaces or periods to 33444 or visit REI.Today/vault to get access now… but do it now, as it’s available only for a limited time.  When you do that, you’ll also be able to GROW YOUR NETWORK by interacting with me and your fellow listeners to REI Today… so stop by to ask questions, make comments and network with other investors across the country!  Just text the word REITODAY with no spaces or periods to 33444 or visit REI.Today/vault right now for your free membership.Thanks for listening in.  Be sure to listen in to Episode #3, where you’ll learn about something that sounds like science fiction, but can turn your real estate deals into real estate horror.  It’s available right now on iTunes, Stitcher and at REI.Today, so get it right away!REI Nation – always remember this:  Your best investment is YOUR OWN EDUCATION! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Baby it's cold outside! So Alex huddled up in the basement with Charles and Rhett to bring you this riveting roundtable! Regular episodes will resume next week?!

David:    What is Brand Identity Development? How do you tell your brand story? How does that all come together as part of a coherent marketing strategy? Those just really the questions that I intended to ask today’s special guest, Alex Williams. Alex, welcome to DMR! Alex:    Hello David. Thank you for having me on. David:    Welcome. Alex likes to call himself the “Swiss Army Knife” of marketing in creative services. He offer services like logo and identity development as well as marketing strategy; and you can find them at thermalexposure.com. So Alex, you enjoy wearing lots of different hats then? Alex:    Yeah. I guess I have to. I started out as a web developer just in the early days around 1998. That’s make a grandfather in internet years. David:    Before my time. Alex:    Yeah. After doing a little bit of web development, I really got a hankering for getting into design. Once I was into design, I realized I needed to use my own photographs and so I taught myself photography and that transitioned into video and so yes, I wear a lot of hats. I guess you’d say I might attention deficit disorder or something because I jump from thing to thing, but yeah, it keeps me happy. David:    I’ve worn lots of different hands but I try and wear just one hat at the same time. Because I remember back in … I didn’t start getting online in terms of running a business online until about 2000 but it’s still quite a long time ago and I was using Photoshop back the obviously, things have moved on so much really. Really, you focused on Brand Identity Development at the moment and how … Alex:    Yes. That’s correct. David:    How would you describe that? Alex:    I work with a lot of new company startups, nano-technology and the kind of things that we have in the Pacific Northwest. Just lots startups so people come to me and they say, “I need a logo.” Well, what do you do? There’s a lot of questions that goes into the very first elements of creating a brand. Yeah, I find it really useful to interview my clients to find out what it is exactly that they do and how they’re changing the world. You really need to differentiate yourself from other people and you need to think about all those things even before you begin to create a logo.

Built to Play sacrifices the news for another day! We're talking to our guests about Phoenix Wright, ZZT, and the future of E3. If you played something Japanese in the 2000s, chances are Alexander O. Smith translated it. Alex has translated everything from the Final Fantasy series, the novel All You Need is Kill, and the Dr. Slump manga. But here at Built to Play, there's really only one game in his long portfolio that matters: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. The game is a visual novel from Capcom and stars Phoenix Wright, a down on his luck lawyer living in Los Angeles, who has to solve all of his cases in only three days. It's a charming and often funny game that relies on its stellar translation, which is far from literal. Download Here. Subscribe on iTunes. Subscribe on Stitcher Radio.  While the translation stays true to the tone and the overall plot, the dialogue can be completely different. And it kind of has to be. The names are Japanese puns and the dialogue is filled with references to Japanese society. The punchlines often don't make a lick of sense in English. So Alex had a lot of room to write his own jokes, and play with the characters.  Though by changing so much, you often run into issues down the line. Gyakuten Saiban, the japanese name of the series, is set in Tokyo, which causes the brunt of the inconsistencies. A hamburger shop mentioned in the early games has to reappear as a noodle stand later on. That's a small issue, but consider that the designers recently decided that the newest game would star Phoenix's direct ancestor, a samurai living in late 19th century Japan.  **You can hear more from Alexander O. Smith's translation process, the definition of a perfect localization and how Phoenix Wright was almost Roger Wright,  less than a minute into the episode. ** Back in good old North America, we talked to the author of the new book in the Boss Fight Series, ZZT. Anna Anthropy tells us about the history of an internet community and its diversity.  1991's ZZT is a weird game to talk about. It's an adventure game built from ANSI characters, all numbers, letters and symbols. It had a limited color palette, and even more limited story. But that's not that part of ZZT people remember the most. ZZT attracted a large community because it came with a level editor and a simple programming language that let you make your own games out of the ZZT engine. These games would then be shared online on message boards and forums, and covered a wide variety of genres and topics. People continue to make ZZT games to this day, and the most recent copy  of ZZT was ordered from its creator, Tim Sweeney, back in 2013. Anna Anthropy writes about that community and how it inspired her own growth as a designer and a writer. She met people who had the same concerns as her, and just like her, were trans. She says it's like a predecessor to the feminist-minded Twine community, which encourages everyone of every creed to make games.  But ZZT attracted all sorts of people, from teenagers trying to discover their own identity to trolls who attacked other creators. So talking about people who make ZZT game can get a little complicated.  Anna Anthropy tells us all about the history of ZZT, why it matters, and reasons why you should check out ZZT games today starting at 17:00. By the way, Anna gave us a couple recommendations that didn't make it into the episode, but here's a few: Ned the Knight, Kudzu, and Eli's House. For more, she has a whole list of great ZZT games to play onher website. You can pick up her book at Boss Fight Series page.  Last month, no one could stop talking about E3, but that's not necessarily a good thing. Many have questioned whether E3 is lessening in importance, or if its actually bad for the industry as a whole.  We've had 20 Electronic Entertainment Expos since its start, and whether they've been in Las Vegas, Santa Monica or Los Angeles, it's almost always been one of the most anticipated game-related events of the year. But its relevance seems to be changing as the years go by. Most publishers had nothing concrete to announce at E3. Electronic Arts barely had games to show beyond the concept level. The two big press conferences, Sony's and Microsoft's, were milquetoast, especially as they announced the big new games of two years from now. Meanwhile Nintendo didn't have a press conference. They broadcasted Robot Chicken jokes and two new franchises over the internet.  So to check its value, we checked in with Daniel Kaszor, the editor of the Post Arcade at one of Canada's largest newspapers, the National Post. According to him, E3 probably won't be going anywhere, but with fewer big budget games coming out each year, the demographics are shifting. E3 isn't even the biggest show of its kind anymore. That would be Gamescom in Germany, where the public days attract hundreds of thousands. The E3 of five years from now might look very different from how we know it today. Daniel tells us about the Post Arcade's coverage of E3, and whether E3 is even all that beneficial to big publications starting 32:40. You can find the Post Arcade here. We also ran a short rerun of our interview with Nadine Lessio and Kara Stone from the Vector Game Arts Festival back in March. The game they talked about, Sext Adventure, is now out and available to everyone who wants to try it. What did we think about it: "As part of the Feb Fatale game jam, a 48-hour race to finish a game, they created a text adventure based on sexy phone texts. You contact an anonymous android who attempts to satisfy humans sexually, but instead lapses into existential depression. Our sex-positive reporter, Daniel Rosen, dug deep into the jam game, and discussed with Stone and Lessio society's intimate relationship with technology, the eventual disharmony routed in cyborg theory and dildos."  The tomfoolery starts around 44:40.   This week's music comes from the Pheonix Wright: Ace Attorney soundtrack and the Free Music Archive. From the former, we used the song, "Pressing Pursuit -  Cornered Witness." From the Free Music Archive, we used "As Colorful as Ever" by Broke for Free, "Blue" by Podington Bear, "Hallon" by Christian Bjoerklund. **Special thanks to Josh Rosenberg who played Phoenix Wright, and Alexander O Smith who said Objection that one time. Capcom please don't sue us.  ** **As always, this weeks episode was produced and edited by Arman Aghbali and written by Daniel Rosen. **

On this show, Chef Alex will be kick starting the last week of the 2 week cycle! What a week we have in store for you! This week we will have our 175th episode and we also start October this week! This is Alex's favorite show! The Chef Alex speaks show! On this week's episode, Alex is going to predict who wins at this Sunday's WWE Battleground PPV live Sunday October 6, 2013 at 8 PM EST, he is going to recap NFL Week 4, he is going to talk about MLB 2013 Playoffs and predict who is going to the world series,  talk about what I think about doing 170+ shows, and finally what the future holds for Alex. So Alex is going to talk WWE Battleground PPV, NFL week 4 recap, MLB 2013 play offs, have a conversation, and then I will start the show with some important news. Feel free to call in at 646-716-6458 to ask any cooking, baking, or food questions. Call in to tell me how your NFL team did, what you think of the MLB 2013 play offs, WWE Battleground pay per view, and anything pg. 3rd caller gets recipe and show of choice! www.blogtalkradio.com/chefalexcardinale2013 www.blogtalkradio.com/aqua-alex www.gusandpauls.net WE ARE LIVE ON TV AGIAN NEXT MONDAY OCTOBER 7, 2013 AS I WILL BE MAKING CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES AT 4:00 PM EST NEXT MONDAY     http://www.ustream.tv/channel/chef-cardinale-s-cooking-show  

Ooo, Alex wasn't invited to the Gurren Lagann Minor Assault. And Kate's just her usual bitchy self. So Alex made them pay... with their lives. ...And then Alex, Matt and Tony had a completely normal, relatively fatality-free podcast! Alex talks about his newfound love for Naughty Bear, the guys talk about the new Pokemon games, and then... more rare game talk! Ending song is "Wake Up" by DeepNorth!

Alex Al-Kazzaz aka The Bear of Texas is joined by his good friend and fellow U. of North Texas graduate Grant Higbee to discuss Dallas's loss to the Cleveland Browns. Much like Alex, Grant won't hesitate at all. He won't sugarcoat anything. So Alex and Grant will simply do what they're meant to do; tell the truth, the whole truth, AND NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH!