Elevator Talks

Danny Yeung's $0 to $120M ARR Playbook (IM8)

• Elevator Goods • Episode 3

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0:00 | 1:10:11

Danny Yeung turned a dinner with David Beckham into the fastest-growing supplement brand on record. In 12 months. We break down exactly how - the product, the partnerships, the unit economics, and what most DTC brands get completely wrong.

—
0:00 Intro
0:03 The David Beckham dinner
3:31 Building the formula
13:53 Month one: $581K
15:46 Why 98% D2C
20:38 Paid ads at scale
25:18 The unit economics
34:54 Operations at hypergrowth
42:13 Running a public company
45:36 Stock drop from $1B to $50M
53:37 Eating problems for breakfast
58:00 The moment that stands out
1:02:13 Advice for founders

About Elevator Goods:
Elevator Goods is the home for modern DTC. We build brands, back creators, and bring founders together through capital, free education, and community.

Learn More: https://links.elevatorgoods.com/

About the Moderator:
Monish Sabnani is a Managing Partner at Elevator Goods. 

X: https://x.com/msabnani93
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/monishsabnani/

SPEAKER_00

But let's say this year I just want to build a 100 million annual business. It's very easy. I can probably do that in my sleep, right?

SPEAKER_01

I think it's official that you're the fastest growing supplement brand.

SPEAKER_00

This type of growth typically takes about, you know, four to five years to hit about 100 million ARR. Our goal originally was like 20 to 25 million USD, and we ended December last month at 10 million monthly revenue, right? Which puts us at already 120 million AR runway after 12 months.

SPEAKER_01

Danny Young is the CEO and founder of Prenetics, the company behind IM8, a supplement brand that has honestly taken the DC market by storm, going from zero to 120 million ARR in its first year.

SPEAKER_00

I think one of the key metrics that we looked at early on was the period of time it takes for us to recoup that customer acquisition cost. And because that then allows us to either dial back on scaling or scale faster and et cetera. So we specifically price our product higher on Amazon than our own website. We really wanted to own that customer journey. We felt that was really, really important. If there's an issue with shipping or whatever, you're limited to what you can actually control. Yeah, thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_01

So Danny Young is the CEO and founder of Prenetics, the company behind IM8, a supplement brand that has honestly taken the DC market by storm, going from zero to 120 million ARR in its first year. IM8 is known for its daily powder, which is sold in subscription, and also for its powerhouse celebrity endorsements with David Beckham and Ariana Sablanka. Danny, thank you for being here. Yeah. Thank you for having me. So I want to start just we'll get into IMAT very detailed, but I do want to start with high-level product idea inception. How did you get here? What was that first conversation with David Beckham like?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so you know, to be fair, this conversation happened in the summer of 23. Um, of course, as you mentioned, yeah, I run a public company called Prenetics. We're listed on the Nasdaq. Right at that time wise, you know, we were looking for a new growth engine. Yeah, because previously we did really well during COVID. We had pivoted to doing like 800 million revenue over the course of three-year period of time. But of course, that went away post-COVID. And just through my business network, I had a very good friend, you know, Michelle Lamanier. Uh, he works closely and is a friend of David's. And then he actually, we're here in Hong Kong. And Michelle, I was having dinner with Michelle. He's like, hey, you know, what are you doing in the coming weeks? He's like, uh, he's gonna fly over to London to meet with David Beckham. He asked me, you know, do I want to join him? Right? Literally, like very casual. Can't say no to that. Yeah. I was like, you know, I'm like, are you sure I can go? Right? Yeah. Normally you're like, hey, you're not sure if he's joking or kidding or not, right? Yeah, because it's like, yeah, David's not just gonna meet with anyone, correct?

SPEAKER_01

Amazing.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and I was like, yeah, if if that's okay, yeah, happy to go, right? Um, so two weeks later, I was in London, we met, we had a great conversation, and I think he was just very intrigued uh about my background. Again, I had the e-commerce consumer background, as well as the last 10 years of having a life sciences background. And that was very important because for David, you know, he we never at one moment talked about financial, monetary, or anything like that. I think his main question was like, yeah, if we did something together, you know, can we make it the best? And can we put real science in this? And that was kind of his key thing. See, I'm gonna guess for him for the last 30 years, you know, many big brands, individuals, very influential people have reached out to him saying, you know, David, let's go into this category, right? Since he was 20 years old, right? So he's like 50 now. Um, and he's rejected all of those times. And he's even told me, he's like, hey, you know, Danny, if we did something good, why should I work with you? And I gave him my background and starting. I also told him, you know, Dave, if we did this, this brand has to survive even beyond you. And I think that really resonated with him too, because a lot of people or brands that have went approached him before, they were like, hey, you know, this brand is all gonna be about you, right? And he actually doesn't like that. Yeah, right. Because it's like, you know, too much on him. And he also believes that it won't survive, right? If it's just too focused on that.

SPEAKER_01

Was it always daily powders? Did you guys brainstorm other ideas? Like, how did you get to the final product?

SPEAKER_00

I I think again, we wanted to number one, solve problem, right? Because I think ultimately what was the problem that we wanted to solve? And even for you know, David, you know, we were talking about you know his daily supplement regime over the years and even his current regime, and he had a big, yeah, uh, he had a big, yeah, I would say he had a big issue in terms of consistently taking his supplements because he had like a stack of 12, 13, 14 supplements on a daily basis. Yeah, exactly, right? And then especially when you're traveling, then it becomes very, very difficult to maintain that routine. Yeah, him and Victoria both, right? And then so we started looking at that again. There must be a better way.

SPEAKER_01

So an all-in-one solution was kind of always the talking point.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that was kind of like the initial talking point. Again, you know, there we knew there was a market demand already, given AG1 was already kind of like you know the big gorilla in the house, right?

SPEAKER_01

Is it safe to say it was kind of gut-based, or did you guys do a lot of research? Like, you know, a lot of e-com brands, they do smoke testing, they do tests online, or you guys kind of just had a gut feeling. What was that process like?

SPEAKER_00

You know, I think this speaks to more about my own beliefs, right? Yeah. So I think um, you know, as my past friend, you I think you have to have a strong belief, and that you know, your idea, yeah, based upon your own research, right? I mean your gut feeling is correct. Um, and to be fair, we did not do any market research in terms of this product. Yeah, we just kind of say, you know what, if we did this, in a way we knew we needed to create something unique, something different. Uh, because it could have been, you know, very easy for us just to create another greens powder, which we knew the market already accepted, right? Well we went into okay, no, I don't want to just be another greens powder. All right. So I was like, right, how do we do that? Uh so that's where you can see everything about the product, the brand, the name, the colors was also very unique. Uh, because at the end of the day, we're not just selling a product, but we're selling a lifestyle and a community and a commitment to living healthier.

SPEAKER_01

So you get the idea, you align with David Beckham. Super exciting. Yeah. Let's get into supply chain. Like what comes next? How did you go about building a supply chain, picking countries, ingredients, partners, all that?

SPEAKER_00

So I would say even before the supply chain piece, right? In terms of, of course, you know, talk yeah, it wasn't an easy conversation to get David on board because it was multiple conversations with him and his team. They had to do lots of vetting. I'm sure, you know, they checked out my whole background, yeah, my whole team's background, you know, because again, yeah, when you're working with someone that is you know so iconic, uh, everything has to be very clean. Of course. Uh, and the good thing that you also we had we were already a public listed company, so our financials, everything is public in the public domain, right? So there was a lot of that aspect. Yeah, but I think once we confirm a let's do this together, you know, that took about you know a good three to four months, uh, lots of back and forth dialogue, of course. Um, and then we're like, hey, how do we actually recruit the best scientific advisory team members on board? Yeah. Right, because that was very critical, right? Because hey, because proper scientists. Yeah, proper scientists. Yeah. And this is where, again, we wanted to have different experts in different categories. Yeah, because I think some people's like, there's there's just no way one doctor or scientist there like specialized in aerything, right? Um, so we were able very fortunate to get, you know, Dr. Don uh from Mayo Clinic, you know, Suzanne, which is a director of microbiome from Cedar Sinai, uh, you know, even the former chief scientist of NASA, James Green, came on board. So we brought along about you know eight scientific advisory board members, which has specialties in each of their own fields. And that was very important because you know that's how I got all these guys on board, you know, to create the formulation as known as daily ultimate essentials, right?

SPEAKER_01

Because so formulation first, before you even get to supply chain, you're you're kind of testing what's the perfect blend of what's a perfect ingredient set?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. What's the current perfect ingredient set? What are clinical dosages, how much you think you should have, uh, et cetera, et cetera, right? Yeah. And then again, that was a lot of back and forth, but to be fair.

SPEAKER_01

Are we talking like again, since the lunch with David Beckmore, is it plus one year or six months? Um in terms of like getting to the final set of ingredients.

SPEAKER_00

Uh, getting these final set of ingredients, right? So it was at least, you know, about six months period of time, right? Okay. So it's fast. Yeah. And but the key thing is that we had so many the experts. Yeah. Right. So they already had collectively like you know, 100 plus years of experience, right?

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So yeah, we're not starting from scratch. Yeah. And then the great thing about this too is that yeah, a lot of experts you see if you know, front and center on our website, this is the first time they've ever worked with a supplement brand. Right. And the reason for that is that you know from day one, we was like, hey, you know, is about transparency. We're really holding on the science piece. Again, the background for my last 10 years at prenatics, because to be fair, prenatics-wise, where we're doing diagnostic testing, PCR testing, genetic testing, the science and rigorous aspects that we had uh is significantly higher when you compare it to the supplement industry, right? So we wanted to have a very high bar when it came to the science and translating that to the consumer.

SPEAKER_01

It was almost easier to kind of back your way into supplements after you had established.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, exactly, right? Because many people actually they told me, hey, Danny, uh, I was like even explaining, you know, we want to get into the supplement space. Everyone's uh, Dan, don't get into the supplement space. It's too competitive, there's no guardrails, there's it's not unregulated, and there's a lot of bad apples, et cetera. But when I hear that, there means hey, you know what? That means there's actually a big opportunity if we create a science-backed, third-party testing, uh, clinical trial product.

SPEAKER_01

So, okay, so you get your scientific board, you get your ingredients, the formulations ready to go. Talk supply chain. I mean, yeah, how do you establish that? Where are you making the product? How did you go about that process?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, so of course, I mean, going that processing, and you just have to talk to lots of different manufacturers and the great, I mean, there's like tons, thousands of contract manufacturers when you think about the supplement space, right? But of course, very few are good in what they do. And I think you just have to do go through a vetting process, yeah. Uh, and you know, so the manufacturer we chose is based in New Jersey in the US. Uh, they had a 30-year track record, and again, things that we looked at. I mean, it wasn't yeah, the cheapest manufacturer, because at the end of the day, you also don't want the cheapest, right? Yeah, you want someone that actually has a track record, they've been around business, yeah, 30 years, and opportunity for us to we want and we set out, it's like, yeah, can this factory also scale with us? Yeah, do they have the right expertise? Do they have the right insights? Um, and certainly we went into it with someone that we can trust for the long term.

SPEAKER_01

And we haven't changed uh yeah, our manufacturer from and you think that supplier could ride with you all the way up into you keep scaling?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah. I mean, of course, you know, just from a company perspective, you know, you also want to be ensure that you have backup just in case something happens, right? So we've also added a new supplier last year or new manufacturer last year, also in the US, uh, but we're still mainly going with our current one.

SPEAKER_01

How important to you was the made in America tag on the product? I mean, you could have made it in the UK. Obviously, David's from UK, you could have made it in many places. Obviously, the biggest consumer market, of course, the US. But how important was that to you?

SPEAKER_00

Um, that was very important for us, right? Um, and again, there's a few many different reasons. Again, if we made it in China or wherever, it would have been significantly less expensive. Uh, yeah, but again, we weren't going for you know that market, right? We're going for uh high-end premium market. I think the US piece was very important. Uh, other aspect was because we wanted to get this uh you know dirt party tested and also uh by EuroFens as well as NSF certified for sport. So what that means is that you know NSF actually has to go to the manufacturer and you're not gonna go to China, right? You're not gonna go to UK, et cetera. And NSF is the organization that vets uh the drug testing for the professional athletes in NBA, MLB, et cetera, et cetera. So that if you're a professional athlete, you know it's free from 280 band contaminants tested for heavy metals, and we publish these reports right on our website from day one. And people can download it, right? Which is really rare. When I again, this is something that's of course standard when we're doing diagnostic testing, everything has you have to have the backup.

SPEAKER_01

No, you really, you really, it's very holistic, everything from the certifications to the scientific board. It's clear it's incredibly professionally done.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

There's no doubt about that. So that was that was the goal.

SPEAKER_00

That was the goal, right? And it was much more expensive in the US. Uh again, but you know, we wanted to, this is a premium product for individuals that really want the best.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. What about pricing strategy? You know, in in supplements, there's such a big variety, uh, there's such a big range. Um is pricing strategy for you really just a mechanism of like cogs times a multiple, or is it based on brand positioning, you know, positioning against competitors, or is it just, you know, obviously I made it a premium price. How did you think about the price positioning?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, great question, right? I think it's a price position wise. Again, we set again, we set out to create a premium product, right? Because again, we're working with yeah, David Beckham, right? It's like, hey, he wants to make sure this is the best product in the market. So even from a colx perspective, I would believe, you know, we're definitely by far the most expensive. Yeah. If you think about cogs, right? Um, so and then naturally, of course, then you know that would translate into the price that we sell to consumers, right? Um, because if you look, but if you look at everything that you're actually able to get into IM8, so if you look at the price point, you know, people on the surface, they'll say, you know what, um paying you know 90 bucks USD for 30-day supply of supplements, right? But if you actually look into the details in terms of what you're getting, you get you know all of your multi-bomes, ADZ, your adaptogens, yeah, your probiotics, pre-biotics, postbiotics, you get coQ10, yeah, 100 milligrams, a thousand milligrams or MSM. I mean, just coq10 alone is 30 bucks a month.

SPEAKER_01

So you're not worried about other supplements or daily powders that are lower, more entry level, because for you, you're just so convicted about the value and the quality that you're selling.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, value and quality, and ultimately, you know, people will pay certain prices or a premium price as long as they feel they're getting their values worth.

SPEAKER_02

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Right. And we feel that and it's resonated with our audience and consumers is that you know, some individuals they take it, you know, they feel yeah, very, very good after two days, three days, one week, two weeks, three weeks, four weeks, right? And then that makes them yeah, sticky and continue on with their subscription.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So what was the exact launch month?

SPEAKER_00

Uh December 2024.

SPEAKER_01

So December 2024, and now you're at, if I'm not mistaken, 120 million.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we are. To be fair, I mean we we launched December 24. Um, our in our first month revenue was you know 581,000 USD, right? Um, we had our goal set up for 25, and our goal originally was like 20 to 25 million USD, which was still decent. Yeah, for the first year in a competitive market. Um, and yeah, just kind of you know, once we started uh rolling out, it's you know, the growth continued on a month-to-month basis, and we ended December last month um at you know 10 million uh monthly revenue, right? Which puts us at already 120 million AR run rate after 12 months.

SPEAKER_01

Okay, so 12 months in, you're growing insanely quick. I think it's official that you're the fastest growing supplement brand.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, on record. Yeah, on record. I mean, there just there may have been some private private, et cetera, that didn't, but at least from what we've seen, and when we talk to, of course, we're a public company as well, right? Yeah. That industry analysts, research coverage, et cetera, they haven't seen this type of growth in the consumer supplement space. Because this type of growth typically takes about you know four to five years to hit about 100 million ARR.

SPEAKER_01

I want to get into marketing channel distribution. Um, how do you how do you guys look at that? I mean, obviously you can buy it on IM8's website, but there's so many other channels, whether it be Amazon, Marketplace, retail, how have you guys made a strategy around distribution?

SPEAKER_00

Um, distribution from day one, we really wanted to own that customer journey. We felt that was really, really important um to us, especially as a premium brand, right? Because once you host it on other people's websites, et cetera, et cetera, if there's an issue with shipping or whatever, yeah, you're limited to what you can actually control, right? So by us having right now, for example, yeah, 98% of all of our transactions are conducted on iMateHealth.com. Yeah. And even for Amazon, you know, to fair, we don't really focus that on it. And we specifically price our product higher on Amazon than our own website.

SPEAKER_01

So the 2% is Amazon.

SPEAKER_00

Yes, correct. But you can see it on Amazon, yeah. But at the end of the day, we actually want people to transact on our own website. So that's why we price it higher.

SPEAKER_01

I'm surprised that it's only 2% because a lot of I what I see is people go to Amazon and they'll pay uh even a small premium because it's obviously Amazon, it's yeah, the prime shipping, it's prime shipping, the return policy, it's totally protected if you're the consumer. So it's honestly quite impressive 98%. Do you have plans to go? I mean, at a certain point in the life cycle, to go into other channels.

SPEAKER_00

Um not immediately, yeah. Uh, because again, I want to ensure, and this is this is still a very new brand, right? We're like 13 months in.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, it feels like it's been in the market forever, but it's so new.

SPEAKER_00

It's so new. Uh, and then we just want to maintain that customer relationship and providing value. Um, and again, we've had actually, you know, some very, very big household name retailers in the US reach out to us and like, hey, you know, can we get you guys in? And we've actually been in a very fortunate position that you know, we've actually rejected them.

SPEAKER_04

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

Um, because I want to maintain this customer journey and that we own that customer experience. And then one key thing about distribution is that you know, we're truly global. And I think that's also set us apart from day one, is that from day one, again, my my team probably called me like really crazy, but we set out to ship to 31 countries.

SPEAKER_01

I was gonna ask you about that. I think we kind of skip international and talking about supply chain, but also obviously regulation and supplements. Uh, FDA comes to mind in the US, but there's so many individual countries that you need to be aware of as far as what you can sell and call it a supplement. Yes. How did you tackle that? Yeah. And so quickly.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And we did it from day one, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and that a basically, again, we we knew this is like we knew the product was good, right? Correct. Again, because you know, Dave has taken it. A lot of people have already taken it myself. It's like everyone feels amazing. So we wanted to actually reach as many consumers as possible. And again, the part of the formulation process is also ensuring that you know this product can you know work in a major significant majority of the world, right? So, because again, there's certain uh countries, et cetera, that have restrictions on the levels of certain ingredients. And then so we've really formulated that with in mind that we would you know ship to live countries.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Is that is that just a subset of the supplier that they've already sort of certified in these countries and they know um regulation, or is that something you gotta go country by country and invest to get individual um sort of like certificates?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I think as a combination, you know, some of the I mean the manufacturers will, of course, they'll have some certain experience, and then a lot of it is that you just have to you know look into it right yourself.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Okay. Um all right, so we were talking about distribution. Uh eventually, could you say at some point you could see IMA being in retail channels?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, at one point. Yeah, because then at one at one point, but I think we're no rush. Yeah, no rush, right? Because we're still seeing great metrics, uniconomics, online, etc. wise. And then again, I think even though there's so much, there's a lot of demand, I would see, from retailers reaching out to us, but you always want to be like the hot girl in the room, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, all right. Totally. You gotta play cool.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, you gotta play cool. So I think we're we're fortunate we're in a very fortunate position uh to be able to do this. And again, there's so much opportunity still that we see with the metrics that we're seeing online, uh, that you know, we're probably yeah, three years away and really making um push into retail.

SPEAKER_01

Hey, I'm Anish. And I just want to quickly give you more context on the world of Elevator. I'm one of the managing partners. Elevator is broken out into several groups. We've got Elevator Goods, our very own in-house brands and agencies that we're currently building every single day. Brands like Fluffco and Jiggies. Elevator Capital is where we invest in other brands. Young founders who we believe are on the come up. If you're one of those people and you're looking for either capital or mentorship or strategic connections, please get in touch with us. The studio is our physical space. Our first location is in Hong Kong, and there are many more coming soon. This is a D2C membership club. If you're in Hong Kong anytime soon, please come check us out. Think founders, amazing conversations, and just learnings left, right, and center. Lastly, Elevator Talks, our newest show where we'll be interviewing the biggest and brightest names in e-commerce is not a show for service level. This is a show for tactics and systems where we get super, super detailed. So last but not least, thank you so much. Please subscribe because that will help us a ton in getting you better guess and more wisdom and more value. We really appreciate it. And back to the show. So you brought up metrics, and this is something I really have been excited to talk to you about, especially in the supplement business. It really is a metrics game. So just let's talk gross marketing in general. Um of the things I think you do best with iMate, and um it's it's not the norm, it's actually rare. When you scale typically in in D2C with pumping paid ads, you lose a lot of brand value. You dilute your brand and the quality of your ads and and sort of the messaging. But you guys have really found a way, it seems like to maintain that quality, scientific, like level brand while still pumping ads, you know, in Facebook and in all these different distribution channels. Is there a secret sauce? Like, I you know, how do you guys look at that?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, um, great question. I think you you're spot on it, right? Because I think this goes also, you know, from the selection of ambassadors that we have.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Right? Because I think partnerships is a big strategy, I can tell.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, partnerships, our ambassadors, our scientific advisory board, doctors, nutritionalists. And again, that's I think that's why you know you because you won't see like random people like UGC videos, that you don't know who these guys are, right? Yeah. Then that's where it dilutes the brand. So I think we've been very specific in terms of okay, having really credible individuals that genuinely take the product on a daily basis, right? That creates a lot of this brand value.

SPEAKER_01

I'm sure you've created at this point a flywheel where these people are now seeking you out. Maybe in the beginning you were seeking them out, but now they must be knocking on your door, wanting to be ambassadors.

SPEAKER_00

Yes.

SPEAKER_01

Does that happen immediately?

SPEAKER_00

Um, no. I mean, I think I think once you I mean with everything, right? Any business or et cetera, once you have success, there's a lot of people they want to come through the door and et cetera, right? So same thing here is that, you know, you know, to be fair, having that association with David Beckham definitely helped early on. Yeah. Right. Because then a lot of times, you know, it you know if you David's working as an again, he's not just an ambassador, right? He's he's a co-founder of the brand. So that already helps very significantly to break through a lot of barriers or trust and credibility aspects. And then again, I think the other pivotal moment last year from that perspective was the addition of Arena Sabalenka.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh again, you know, world number one tennis player, right? And the great thing about athletes and having them as ambassadors, especially for your nutrition and health, is that yeah, these guys, these yeah, they have so many options. Every single brand is knocking down, knocking on their door to get them to endorse something, right? Yeah, because they're always on TV, you know, now Australian Open with Sublink. And the crazy thing about this story was this speaks to the product, is that it was fully organic, in which you know, share the story is that um Jason Stacy, you know, Arena's nutrition coach, um, they were seeking out a new supplement because their supplement regime, which you know, he wasn't, they weren't very happy with their current one. Um, and it was a green one, right? And then uh, you know, Jason, I think it was early last year, he started taking it um and he was like felt nosely better. Uh, and then he's like, hey, yeah, to Arena, hey, why don't you try this? Uh she tried it for three months. And I'm sure you know, at that level of number one tennis player, and they're constantly getting drug tested, et cetera, and they're monitoring every change in the diet, how she's feeling in terms of energy level recovery. They're marking all of this data down. So after three months, yeah, she notice we felt much better energy and their recovery speed was much greater. And then she then had her team, yeah. Andre, the manager, is like, yeah, uh, Andre, get in touch with these guys. I want to partner with them. So it was 100% organic. Yes, they reached out to you. Yeah, they go on an email. They reached out. So I was like, you know, it was like very amazing. Uh so that was like one of the best emails I got last year, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, yeah. I'm sure. So, you know, I think one of the you spoke about this, but the competition in supplements. I was watching a YouTube video the other day of Bry's superfoods and everyday dose, incident hydration, a lot of the like Darling D2C supplement brands, a little bit lower entry point. But they were talking about how these guys are scaling at you know 0.1, 0.2 return on ad spend. They're effectively taking huge losses up front just to get you on the subscription. And they they move. Really?

SPEAKER_00

0.1, 0.2. That's very low.

SPEAKER_01

That was my exact reaction.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, correct. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Um, but it's because obviously Facebook's an auction, right? Like the the the the the biggest, you know, the biggest payer wins at a certain point, right? And so these supplement brands all across the internet are competing by just floating their balance sheet, losing money, obviously betting that they'll make it back six months later. I think the a huge part of the supplement game is you know, your metrics. What are you willing to lose on your first purchase? Yeah, or are you first purchase break-even? After how many months are you comfortable breaking even and then so forth? What's the churn? I would love to hear your PO on this. Obviously, whatever you're willing to share. Of course. And and whatever is not proprietary in that sense. But it it really is the sort of like the devil in the details with subscription D to C.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, 100%. And again, yeah, just because you know we're a public listed company, yeah. I'll just share what we've already shared publicly, yeah, but which is you know quite a lot already. Okay. Um yeah, so uh great point. Yeah. So I think one of the key metrics that we looked at early on was how much, I mean how the lot the period of time it takes for us to recoup that customer acquisition costs, right? Um, because that then allows us to either dial back on scaling or scale faster and et cetera. So I think yeah, before October, our payback period for you know full year of 25 was approximately like 3.9 months. Um, which is, I think if you think about DTC, it's a very good metric, right? So that may basically whatever we spend on customer acquisition costs, we get that back in 3.9 months, right? Um and after October, you know, since the introduction, then we launch our longevity product um as well as last month we introduced a 90-day subscription. Now our payback period is under three months, yeah, which is huge, really, really impactful from both a cash flow perspective as well as you know from a retention perspective, right? Because again, we were we were thinking that you know maybe 25% of people will choose the three-month option because again, this it's not like 20 bucks, right? So just give me away. So we had our one time purchase $112, one month is $89. Uh, three months is $235, but which equals to $78 on a monthly basis. Yeah. So we have more than 50% of individuals offered in three days. I mean three months.

SPEAKER_01

So you're getting cash up front, basically.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we're getting cash up front. And everyone wins, right? The consumer, yeah.

SPEAKER_01

You ship three at up front at a time.

SPEAKER_00

Or do you guys three at a time?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Which then helps with logistics as well, right? Perfect. Yeah. And consumers they get more product, they can share it with their friends and family.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Right?

SPEAKER_01

Amazing. So right now you look at the metrics and you are happy. I mean, what what are your things?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, well, we're happy for we're happy with the metrics. And that actually, because again, with with our three-month payback period, just means like we can actually even go more aggressive if we wanted to. And yeah, which right now we're doing a lot of testing. So that means we can go to like three to six months. Our average order value is over $200 today.

SPEAKER_01

But if you buy the if you buy the one pack on subscription, then you're on the subscription, right? Monthly subscription, correct. If you're on the three month up front, are you getting another three months? Yes. Okay. So you're it's three at a time, it's not three at a time. Okay. Right? Yeah. And have you identified a difference in LTV or churn based on where you like if you're entering on a one pack versus a three pack?

SPEAKER_00

Um I don't have that data to be able to quantify that yet. Yeah. Because basically we just we just introduced 90 days in this early December. Yeah. But in dairy, yeah, your retention should be higher on the three month compared to the one month, just because yeah, people have a longer time to test out the problem and use it on a routine basis, right? Yeah. So if you're taking something for on a daily basis for 90 days straight, that becomes part of your daily habits. And at the same time, you'll feel the difference in terms of energy, gut, sleep quality, yeah, as well as cognitive abilities.

SPEAKER_01

I'm so curious because again, I'm referencing a podcast by these other D2C sub uh supplement darlings, but um, they were talking about how once you get someone on subscription, don't say anything. Uh-huh. Like the less you email, the better. Okay. The less you put your name in there in your inbox, the better, because they're not remembering to unsubscribe. How do you guys, as far as like retention, nurturing, upsells? I mean, is it a fluid process? Do you feel like you've nailed it? How do you guys look at all that?

SPEAKER_00

No, I definitely don't think we've nailed it. Yeah, because I think especially in this industry, I mean, you have especially with AI, there's so many different changes on a daily, weekly basis, right? So I think we're consistently trying to optimize and do better. Yeah, because certainly we haven't made all the right decisions, a lot of mistakes have we've made in the past year. Uh, yeah, but at the end of the day, again, you have to constantly learn what the new tools are. Um, and and going back to your, I sorry why for your question. Yeah, just talking about nurturing. Uh nurturing, yeah. So we definitely, I mean, I I think for the brand that we're setting out as a premium brand that's very transparent, and we want to provide that great customer experience. We definitely don't take that approach of not emailing them, right? Uh in fact, we want to make it as easy as possible for them to cancel, pause, or their subscription with their with their subscription portal, right?

SPEAKER_01

What I love about what you guys have done is you've you've basically there's there's two pathways in DSC. It's like super authentic, completely 100% legit, which is the path you've taken, investing in brand, investing in quality, scientific advisory versus there's this whole huge subsect of the market that's kind of just using black or gray hat tactics, however you want to coin it. And they're still winning as far as revenue growth, but ultimately customer satisfaction, I have to imagine, is not nearly as high, but it's it's sort of like the easy choice. It's the choice that most, especially younger entrepreneurs, maybe first-time or second-time founders, they're going down. But you had the experience and the wisdom to say, hey, no, we're going for the best of the best from the get-go. We're going to invest into that. Is that just like your natural strategy in general?

SPEAKER_00

And I I think yeah, even from my own experience with again, I uh again, a lot of the uh my thought process also for I mean, I had a lot of experience uh with consumer with my time at Groupon after they acquired my company in 2010, 2014, right? So we were able to scale that to the largest e-commerce company in the region at the time. So I already had a lot of learnings and experience in that aspect, right? And at the end of the day, you know, I think supplements industry, there's a lot of younger founders and et cetera, they're really just looking for a quick exit. Yeah, they're and to be fair, there's there's nothing wrong with that, right? Because everyone has to kind of you know have their experience, make their way, right? Yeah. Uh yeah, but I think for us, yeah, again, working with David, working Verena, yeah, we're not no one is looking for a quick exit. We're thinking about this from a five, 10, 15, 20 year horizon, and reputational risks is very, very important. And so we want to make sure that everything that we do, we do at a very, very high bar.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So I mean, it seems like you guys have a, you know, obvious, obviously your celebrity and partnerships, both macro and micro, really dialed in. Seems like you've got your growth marketing KPIs and metrics really dialed in as far as break-even and you know, churn and LTV. Where else, um, if at all, you know, in marketing are you investing out? I mean, are you looking at TikTok? Are you looking at PR? Are you looking at like what other sort of like subsects or other channels?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. So I think other aspect that we're also investing is actually the community side of things, right? So when I mean community, again, going back to you know what I mentioned earlier, is like I always thinking about even when I when we think about partnerships or whatever, even my own personal uh styles, I'm almost thinking, how can I bring more value to the customer?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I noticed, you know, us events at the Australian Open. Yeah. You you guys put on production, right? You get people together.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we get people together. I mean, again, uh I just came back from Melbourne from the Australian Open. You know, right before it opened, you know, Arena came. We had about 100 individuals, influencers, media, uh, you know, friends of the brand that attended because I think this is also very important because they see everything online, yeah, but there's no face to that product, right? So yeah, every few months we'll do an event. Uh, we've done it around the world already in New York, Miami, uh, you know, London, Melbourne. You know, we're gonna do one in Montana next week, right, in the US. And it also is ultimately about providing value and a local presence at the same time about the value piece, you know, just I mentioned terms of the 90-day subscription. One thing that we've also added to the 90-day subscription is access to our scientific advisory board.

SPEAKER_01

Very cool.

SPEAKER_00

Um, which then you don't normally have access to that. Otherwise, you would, you know, for example, what we did is that we have you know six members from our scientific and performance board. Um, these are the likes of Dr. Don, yeah, Bobby Rich, which is David Beckham's trainer, Tavi Castro, he's an amazing free diver. And then on a quarterly basis, we'll provide free access to live QA and Zoom courses with these individuals, which normally you're not going to get access to. Yeah. It's like, hey, you want to understand from Don. She's been at Yale Planet for the last 30 years as an oncologist. What are some of the secrets that you have seen that helps with longevity? Right?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh, or yeah, Bobby Rich. And again, it's like, you know, what uh yeah, how do how do you train Dave and Victoria every day? Right.

SPEAKER_01

So you're getting you, I have to imagine like hundreds or you know, some amount of people on a Zoom call and they're able to just QA with this. Yes, correct. Super cool.

SPEAKER_00

And it's free, right? Yeah. Yeah, it's free. And we move again, it's it's a a lot of work behind the scenes to make it all work, make it all happen.

SPEAKER_01

Tons of value.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, but tons of value, right? Because again, you're not just buying that product, it's bound this community, this lifestyle. And at the end of the day, it's about you know helping that consumer uh with not just nutrition, but uh, this lifestyle of being healthy.

SPEAKER_01

Shifting gears a bit, we spoke about so we spoke about the store, we spoke about product development, supply chain marketing. Want to get into operations a little bit? I'm just curious for you, is operations sort of like a check the box, just make it the best it can be? Or is it an area where you look for an equal amount of innovation in in your in your back end and the way you fulfill? Um I think it was like Stephen Bartlett who said this, but there's there's old problems and there's new problems. Yeah. How do you look at operations?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, operations, again, um, you know, operations is a big part of what we do because again, especially our growth rate, right? Is like you know, a lot of stuff can be broken. Yeah, and to be fair, in the last, you know, I would say 18 months, yeah, we've had yeah uh multiple uh 3POs, right? Right. We even operated and bought our own 3PO in the beginning. Yeah, and to be fair, huh?

SPEAKER_01

You bought your own 3PL?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, we bought our own 3PL before we launched.

SPEAKER_01

Before you launched.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, before we launched IM8 um Europa um in North Carolina. And yeah, that was done to ensure again early on that we can control that experience. Uh, but you know, the reality was that facility and the operations, we outgrew it too fast.

SPEAKER_01

That's a whole other business.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, exactly. That's a whole other business, right? So to be fair, we probably shouldn't have done that.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Right.

SPEAKER_01

Um and wow, you were that confident pre-launch that you physically went and bought a 3PL because you knew that it was going to be successful.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, uh, again, we I knew we had a great product, right? And then we have great product, and again, we knew we had we had you know the celebrity factor, yeah, the science piece, yeah, we had capital as well. Uh, but we recently sold off that you had their 3PL, uh, like a few weeks ago we just announced because our operations, again, we would we would have needed to invest so much more into that infrastructure and would have taken time away from on the daily basis of what I made. And so we just basically partnered with an existing 3PL that can that's already very big that can really scale with us, right?

SPEAKER_01

So is your is your fulfillment all out of the US or have you broken it out?

SPEAKER_00

We've broken it out, right? And again, that's uh uh yeah, we had a lot of learning aspects there as well. So we've broken it out as well. Shipping speed, cost shipping speed, yeah. So early on there was a lot of yeah, some issues with shipping speed, you know, delays, customs, and et cetera. So it was all in the process. Uh so we now have US, Europe, and Asia.

SPEAKER_01

Okay. And are those all have you moved manufacturing regionally or are they all coming from the US?

SPEAKER_00

Oh, they all come from the US. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

So you ship from the US to your 3PL in Asia and then you fulfill. Correct. Okay. I mean, that's a a huge endeavor. I mean, a lot of people would have said, hey, no, let's find a supplier in Asia. Let's find a supplier in Europe.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And because we want to ensure the quality of the product, right? Yeah. So if you have multiple factories, et cetera, et cetera, yeah, you don't you're not going to be able to control that. And that's a greater risk than yeah, saving some money here, right?

SPEAKER_01

How do you look at hiring? I mean, again, it it's so clear, you're uh you think big, you throw resources at big problems, you innovate. Is your hiring philosophy the same, which is like get ahead of it, hire constantly in big numbers, or are you a little bit leaner, a little bit more conservative in that approach? Like, you know, I've seen companies get too big too fast. Yeah, the culture dilutes. How do you approach that?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, I I think you need different people at different times of the organization, right? Um, I think this is you know the same philosophy I've had in all of my entrepreneurial experiences, right? Again, I think uh, especially nowadays with an advancement of AI, and I fully agree, I'd rather have a much smaller team than a bigger team. Yeah. I think maybe you know, five, six, seven, eight years ago was like cool to say, oh, you know what? Uh 100 people, 200 people, 300 people. But now the key thing is they have revenue per employee, right? Yes.

SPEAKER_01

If you can do 200 million with 20 people, that's a very Roman thing. I've talked to him at length about that. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00

So that's kind of how I approach it now. Yeah, in terms of hiring, is that hey, you know, basically, you know, you have to really fight for any head count because a lot of times when you have too many people, it becomes blockers. And I'm constantly, you know, pushing the team or telling the team, hey, you know, cut out people. Don't go direct to the source. If you can do everything by yourself, no need to get other people involved, right? Because that saves so much back and forth and time and meetings as well.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And I'd love to hear more about your philosophy on all of that. Like, are you are you someone that micromanages? Are you someone that's very good at hiring managers to manage sort of like junior staff?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. So I would say, you know, I'm quite involved in airy bits of the bit business. Right. So I've always been very, very hands-on operationally.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh with area, you know, marketing, operations, yeah, finance, a lot of different aspects. So uh and especially at this early stage, right? So I'm giving you an example, right? When I was at yeah, Groupon and this 2010, 2013, right? I was like very hands-on operationally because again, we're scaling very fast. And then, but everything after the three years, we scale very fast. And in 2014, yeah, I was probably working like three days a week, right? So I think early on, the founder must be hands-on in everything uh because the reality is the founder's just has a very different mentality, and the founder can afford to take the risks, where a lot of times the employees, the reality is uh, they cannot afford to take that risk because they don't want to take that risk.

SPEAKER_01

Have you always been programmed this way? Like hands-on, 110%. Is that something you built up over your career?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I've been always very hands-on. Uh, even when I was doing my first business in a restaurant, I was buying like you know mangoes and watermelons and 6 a.m. in the morning, right? I was going to the fruit markets. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

But it doesn't seem like you don't want to be hands-on. Like speaking from my own experience, I'm very hands-on in my business, but I'm dreaming of a day where I don't have to be hands-on.

SPEAKER_00

Correct. Yes. I I I dream of that too. Yes. But I think uh it depends on what area of the business you are, right? So I as mentioned that in three, four years' time, I shouldn't be, right? But at the early stage, because the brand, the consumers, the team, they'll follow this type of you know, founder led culture. Yeah. And I think that is very important in the early days.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Do you have a very strong philosophy on in person? Obviously, you have an office here in Hong Kong, um, versus remote strong preferences either way.

SPEAKER_00

I I used to have a very strong opinion, uh, but of course. Those things change. I used to have a strong opinion that I should be in office, you know, no remote, etc., etc. Right. But now I've changed uh my thinking because the reality is, you know, you're not going to be always able to get the best people if you have a philosophy about everyone has to be in Hong Kong, right?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Um, and right now, at the end of the day, you know, it's so easy with communications and et cetera, that everyone can be remote as long as you hire the right people that are motivated and constantly want to learn and constantly push themselves.

SPEAKER_01

Last sort of like soft question for you, and then I want to pivot completely into something else. But on a personal level, how much do you sleep? You seem like such a busy guy.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Uh coincidentally, funny thing is uh the other day my four-year-old daughter asked me, it's like, Daddy, do you sleep? Yeah. Because sometimes she'll wake up at like 12:30 a.m. and etc. And then I'm still out in the, you know, she'll still see me awake and yeah, working, right?

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh yeah. So I would say I'm always on, right? But I I sleep like, you know, some days like three, four hours.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

So you can function on three hours.

SPEAKER_00

I can't function on three hours, yeah, because I take double dosage of volume eight.

SPEAKER_01

Good, good. Um, but do you like again? I can speak from my experience. When I sh when I sleep less the next day or very soon I gotta sleep more. I gotta catch that up. How do you like are you just good on three hours? You don't need to recoup that sleep.

SPEAKER_00

No, I definitely I I love sleeping actually, right? Yeah, I I really like sleeping, but yeah, sometimes, especially because I think recently, again, you know, running a public listed company, it there's a lot of evening calls I have to do. So even like last night, my last call ended at 12 30 a.m., right? And the problem with that is then your mind doesn't go to sleep right away. Yeah. And then end up sleeping at like, yeah, then I check my share price, right? Then you end up sleeping at like 3 30, right? So last night I slept at like 3.34, then you wake up at like 8 10.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. So and this isn't like a trick question by any means, but do you think that that level of intensity is required to run a successful startup?

SPEAKER_00

It depends what you want to achieve, right? At the end of the day, what's your goals? I think if you want to build a big global business, you have to have that level of intensity. But some people may not want that, right? So it depends what that what you mean by success. If, you know, for example, let's say this year I just want to build a you know 100 million annual business, very easy. I can probably do that in my sleep, right? Yeah, but what we want to create. I mean, this year we've already probably mentioned, hey, we want to hit 200 million full-year revenue. By the end of the year, we want to hit 25 million monthly uh revenue. So to be able to do that, then it takes another level of intensity uh you gotta push, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Shifting gears completely, you know, one of the most interesting things I think about IM8 is that it's run in a public company, Pernetics. That's obviously totally not the norm in D2C. Most people, if you go to a conference in e-commerce, don't even tell you what their revenue is. Um so I'm just curious, like, how did you accomplish that? And what was the nuance of the public company?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, the public company, again, prenetics-wise, right? Um, we went public back in the middle of 2022. Um, an interesting story. And when we went public, we were Hong Kong's first billion dollar company to list on that Nasdaq. Um, after listing, you know, to be fair, our COVID business yeah, plummeted by 95%. Uh, we then in the last few years, I think our lowest market cap was like 50 million, right? So we went from billion to 50 million market cap. So you really know who your friends are at that time? That's crazy. Because when we're at billion, I had so many friends, yeah. Uh and and then, but of course, you have to have friends that really stuck with you at the time. How quickly did that happen? It was like we went from I think a billion market cap. I think then we probably went to like I don't even remember 200 million within the uh 12 months after, then 24 months after, I think we went to like 50 million. And you know, crazy thing is even yeah, since we launched IMA in this past 12 months, we went from 50 million now our we're all-time highs within the last 12 months. Now we're up to you know 300 million plus market cap.

SPEAKER_01

And what's the dynamic there? I mean, is that a competitive advantage? Or is that I mean, obviously all your competitive advantage in terms of like I mean access to capital.

SPEAKER_00

Oh yeah, I mean, I think that's yeah, so yeah, I mean, I think from a capital position wise, I mean we're in a very unique position uh that we do have access to capital. Um on our balance sheet, you know, we have already 70 million cash, I have another 510 in Bitcoin, I have zero debt. Uh, and again, we've been very capital efficient also in terms of how we spend money. Even last year, you know, our Q1, again, all the all these numbers are public, right? It's like, hey, we lost six six million, Q1, Q2, 4 million, Q3, 2 million. So it's actually, yeah, the burn is getting cut as we scale.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I mean, and I'm I'm talking about sort of competitive advantage in the sense where, again, like you said, all your numbers are public. This is, you know, totally different in the world that I live in, which is sort of people don't even people don't share revenue, people don't want to.

SPEAKER_00

They don't want to give you anything.

SPEAKER_01

Crack out you know, because they're uh not confident necessarily in the business that they built. Maybe someone can dupe it, maybe someone can copy it, copy your funnels, copy your ad creative, whatever. On the other hand, you're just like, here's everything. That level of confidence actually, I think is again one of the most impressive things about you. It's just it's almost like a it's almost like a dare like try and copy me. Like go for it.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, correct. I mean, we actually push even we actually on our website, right, which is also very rare, we actually list our manufacturers online.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

On our website, you find it, and yeah, and then that because at the end of the day, in my entrepreneurial career-wise, I I'm I never I would say when someone copies ice, I actually believe it's a it's a great sign to form of flattery. Yeah, exactly, right? So, but ultimately, even when I did like Young You Buy Buy in in Hong Kong 2010, right? So to show that experience, yeah, there were 57 competitors doing exactly the same thing on group buying.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Right. But we were always the number one in market leader. Uh, and that's why Young Group Bond, when they came internationally, acquired us, because we were the market leader. Because at the end of the day, people can copy key concepts. But I think for us wise, we really thought out the whole customer journey, the experience. I mean, I don't think anyone's gonna get another David Beckham anytime soon, huh? Right.

SPEAKER_01

Is it is it does it limit your ability to pivot? Like let's say tomorrow you want to change, I don't know, the mission or or something. You know, obviously your share price reacts accordingly. Is that a limiting factor for you?

SPEAKER_00

No, I wouldn't say limiting factor, right? Because I think to be fair, right now we've already found our very sweet spot. And even for myself as an entrepreneur, right? Yeah, I really feel this is where I can really excel, just given my consumer background and my last 10 years being in the life sciences background. If I didn't have this last 15 years before launching IMA, IMA, there's no chance IMA could have went in terms of this type of trajectory.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And I mean, again, you you mentioned this, but the Bitcoin strategy, I know you've stopped doing that, but tell me about that. Like, how did that happen? Was it just sort of a conviction on Bitcoin as an investment? I'm asking for some of I'm asking on behalf of maybe more junior, smaller e-commerce brands that do build cash balances, but don't have the courage or the conviction to then take the cash and buy a different asset.

SPEAKER_00

Um, so I think uh when we did that, that was last June, right? Uh when we did that, and that time-wise, again, we had we knew the business was growing, was doing about maybe four or five million on a monthly basis, right? Uh we had excess cash. Again, you know, me maybe in uh yeah, always trying to think outside the box. And yeah, because we're uh constantly doing like fixed deposits at like you know three and a half, four percent. I was like, there must be something better that we can do with our capital. Uh so we decided to you know start buying Bitcoin, right? And we started buying Bitcoin last June. At one point, we're buying one Bitcoin on a daily basis.

SPEAKER_01

Um and we've actually remembered the price of Bitcoin during this time.

SPEAKER_00

This was, I think when we started, it was probably about 90,000 to even 120,000 at the peak, right? Um, of course, now it's come down a bit. Uh and now we hold 510 Bitcoin on the balance sheet. Uh, but what we've also announced in last month and the before the end of last year was that we've actually stopped buying Bitcoin and we're just gonna keep it on the balance sheet. And the main reason for that is that, you know, with the tremendous growth of IM8, which was also surpassed my own expectations, um, it just complicated our story. Because then when I again asked being a public company CEO, you know, the first question people ask me, or at least institutional investors ask me, retail, they love the story, right? Yeah, but ultimately, you know, you want to get to institutions. Uh, institutional investors, they feel that it complicated our growth story, which to be fear is true.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

And uh, and then so we made the decision, yeah, hey, you know what? Let's just focus on IMA, keep that on the balance sheet, and just yeah, have that core focus.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Because uh, again, with every dollar, it's an opportunity cost, right? You could uh buy Bitcoin, you can invest it into growing the team, yes, product development, new license or certifications. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And so, you know, that that's something you essentially put on pause, and now you're putting all assets all in.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and not just put on pause, just like not doing it, right? Full stop. Yeah, full stop, right? Correct. And just again, just I think it's um with volume eight, even my own entrepreneurial career. My I've invested in multiple companies that have done very well. It's very rare that we have this opportunity where you have amazing product fit. People love the product. We have 10,000 plus five-star reviews. You have amazing scientific, uh, scientific advisory board, uh, the e-commerce piece, the performance piece, uh, the ambassadors, you know, just having you know David with Arena. You know, we've we just signed on a F1 driver as well. Uh, we haven't announced uh we're speaking to a few players in the NBA, MLB, and it's quite crazy just the level of interest because typically at this level, they're not just gonna work with some you know random supplement company, right?

SPEAKER_04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh because a lot of it is is their reputation and just being able to have this global opportunity to make such a big difference in in people's lives is very, very rare.

SPEAKER_01

I want to ask you about, I mean, it's all been so successful, right? Like it's been, it seems like just a soaring rocket ship, and that's so exciting. And um, you know, I can tell you, again, speaking from people in the e-commerce community, it's it's like uh e-com darling. I am eight. But I'd love to hear what's been hard, what's been challenging, whatever you can share, but like what of the moments that have not been just this insane amount of success?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, I mean, I think there's many moments, right? To be fair, right? It's like, yeah, there's there's many moments. Um, I think, of course, you know, the team you meant you mentioned, right? So, you know, last year we had to you know let go of some of our team members, the what doesn't wasn't the right fit. So when you let go of team members, it's always difficult, right? So new team members, replacing team members, I think logistics, customer service, we've had issues, right? Um, yeah. So then they're all all uh to be fair. If at this at this scale in terms of how fast we grow, I think you should expect lots of problems. I think the key thing is how fast do you resolve these problems and ultimately not affecting that customer.

SPEAKER_01

I always say e-commerce is essentially just a test of perseverance. The most successful entrepreneurs are essentially just the best at eating shit for a really long period of time and just taking problems in stride, dealing with it very quickly.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, and you have to learn, you have to learn very quickly, right? Again, it's like, hey, even now from a marketing perspective, right? Again, you know, that's something that we're looking into. Hey, you know, how do we yeah scale out ads, right? How do we think about yeah, uh uh yeah, um how do we think about new channels, right? How do we think about ad creatives, right? Because I think now it's getting more and more difficult because everyone's using AI, right? All the competition is using AI. So I think it's really important to maintain that authenticity in terms of our brand, our product, the stories that we're pushing out. Um so all of these different things are challenges because yeah, we can you know go from zero to 100 in in whatever you know, less than 12 months. But I told the team now, you know, the real challenge begins, right? Because last year we set the foundation, but now we have to prove that we can actually do it at scale and do it again. Because I'm sure there's a lot of people that doubt us, right? Whatever, yeah, you know, you guys did it.

SPEAKER_01

Fluke or something.

SPEAKER_00

Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. David Beckham, whatever, right? Et cetera. So uh, and now it's a opportunity to prove that we can execute at scale and then ultimately, of course, then be profitable as at the same time.

SPEAKER_01

Is the growth strategy um new products at all? Or more geos?

SPEAKER_00

Um, so I would think multiple. So of course, you know, this year, again, we're still seeing strong growth in time in terms of our markets that we operate in. You know, for example, you know, top five markets are US, UK, Canada, Australia, and Hong Kong, and then Singapore and the UAE, right? Top seven markets. So we're still seeing significant growth in each of these markets, which gives us confidence that this can continue to scale, right? Because if you think about US market, right? I mean, yeah, last year we did yeah, 60 million, but only 45, 40% of that's in the US. So, but US can easily do two to 300 million, right? Easy. Yeah. So that means we're still a significant upside in each of these markets. So geography's skills, again, I'm very patient and strategic when we launch new skills because it's not the product, right? It's that how does this product fit into the brand story? And the challenge is sometimes people introduce too many products too soon, and then you lose that edge, right? Because again, right now, it's like even if I had two products tomorrow, I wouldn't push them out. Yeah. Um, but we are gonna have you know two to three skills, late two to three new skills later this year. And I think our philosophy is also for any skill that we push out, it needs to be the best product in the market, right? And what I mean by that is that people need to validate it. They can go into ChatGBT or whatever AI system says, hey, you know, what's the best product? Compare these ingredients side by side. Um, and yeah, is that best?

SPEAKER_01

Again, only feel free to share whatever you can. But are these new products in powders or are you breaking out into new forms?

SPEAKER_00

Um, it would be powders predominantly, right? Uh again, some people have asked me, you know, are you guys going to do RTDs and et cetera, right? Which is a legitimate question, but I think for us is really important to stay focused and continue to doing what we're good at. Yeah. Because even RTDs, you know, ready to do drinks is a completely different business. Totally different, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Totally different.

SPEAKER_01

I think at one point almost as different as running a warehouse.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, exactly, right? It could be very it could be something that we do in the next three to five years, but not anytime soon.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Uh, because again, people don't understand the complexities of operating different businesses.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. I think another trap, so to speak, in D to C supplements is also following trends. You know, for example, protein is seeing a huge moment, creatine is seeing a huge moment, NADs, and so forth. But you seem like you're going really evergreen, all in one, every like solutions that are more everyday, not trend driven. Is that fair to say?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, fair, yeah, fair to say. Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_01

Um I guess last question, and then I want to go into a different sort of like subsection. Um highlight of the last 12 to 14 months or so. When you look at this journey, is there something that stands out? Was it, you know, signing, David, signing with David Beckham or what was it?

SPEAKER_00

I mean, there's been so many, right? There's been so many. I mean, what comes to mind is like getting, you know, when we first launched uh the website online, right? I mean, it was literally like yeah, 2.30 a.m. We pushed a button to go to go online and then we're looking at the orders because the reality is like, you know, you know you launch a group, but you don't really know if people will buy.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, of course.

SPEAKER_00

Right. Um, and then yeah, within like an hour, we had like five people buy, right? So I think that was a high level. We had like a team of like 10 people still in the office at like 2.30 a.m. Right. Um then of course, yeah, those initial periods of time. And again, then once you, I think first moments is yeah, once you start seeing the impact of the product that people have on it, um, then that's kind of like it it feels you. And of course, then as a result, the business uh stays strong, right? I think the moment where again, yeah, arena yeah, coming to me to on the product, that's like amazing. You can't there's there's no better story on that, right? It's just how organic is and how amazing even her whole team uses the product, their f their parents use the product, right? Yeah, and it's crazy that you know if you watch Arena on Australian Open or any of the tennis matches, her whole team is wearing IME caps.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, you didn't ask them to do that.

SPEAKER_00

No, originally I didn't ask them to do it, right? Because they just love the product.

SPEAKER_01

Are you the kind of founder, just out of curiosity, that's checking sales throughout the day, like going into your back end or Shopify or whatever that's like refreshing sales, or are you No, we have we have a system for that.

SPEAKER_00

So we get naturally like you know, a channel uh systems on a daily basis, you know, the the revenue data, uh the ROAS, you know, all the metrics that you would expect to check on, right? Yeah. Break down sales, country sales, sales automate it, right? So I don't have to go in and check anything, but I am the type, okay. If I have a question about something, yeah, I'd rather check the system right and just understand it.

SPEAKER_01

Okay.

SPEAKER_00

You have like access to all the tools.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, makes sense. We've kind of assumed that everyone knows IM8, but for those of you or for those that don't know what IM8 is, can you explain it? Do you want to show the product?

SPEAKER_00

Sure. I mean, to be fair, there's so many people that still don't know what IM8 is, right? Um yeah, but again, you see this the packaging. Um, you guys can see that on the screen. So again, we have yeah, we chose a red color, right? Because we felt it was very iconic. Um, there's a lot of stories behind this color. Um, again, we didn't want to just create a green. There wasn't really any, we wanted to own a color, right? And even the names as you showed it means yeah, I am, and then eight, if you flip it around, is longevity, right? And there's like octagon-shaped dots. So these are not thoughts. So there was a lot being thought out, even from the brand perspective, right? So when you open the box here, you see I am, so you can fill it in your own name. You I am healthy, I am great, I'm powerful, etc. etc., whatever you want it to be. Um, then I think we've you get this very nice pack where you know you you open it, this gives you kind of like an information booklet, and you get some cards of you know, David Beckham, you get Arena, you get Dr. Dawn, you get our other scientific barzi boards, so you get the supplement facts panel, so you can have everything to get started. Because again, we want to give people a journey into you know their health solution, right? And then you have interview this, and this is what you call the Beckham Stack, right? So the Beckham Stack includes our hero product, the daily ultimate essentials, and again, 16 different supplements in one. You have the daily ultimate longevity, so it's 10 key compounds to target slowing down the aging process. And you get a shaker. So I what I do every day is I actually put two shaches into one glass, one uh two shaches into the shaker and just shake it up and just drink it, and then I'm good for the day.

SPEAKER_01

Amazing. It's the packaging is stunning. Yeah. If you could give advice to young founders starting off in e-commerce or in entrepreneurship, broadly speaking, what would that be?

SPEAKER_00

I I would say, you know, whatever industry you you're on, yeah, just talk to people, talk to other experienced founders that have done it, yeah, and basically get advice there because then you'll be able to, you know, limit the amount of mistakes that you make as a young founder, right? And again, from a product perspective, make sure that whatever product you're selling is that it really solves the problem and there's a need and a demand in the market, right? So, what's that USP? There has to be something differentiated about your product. If it's just exactly the same, no one's gonna care, right? I mean, giving examples, even you know, for example, in in uh last year, and yeah, even Lionel Messi launched a uh hydration stream called Mass Plus, right? And it was very similar to Prime, but even though you have Lionel Messi, but it's very similar to Prime, so it wasn't differentiated. No matter that you had 500 million followers on Instagram, right? So it didn't really do well in the marketplace, right? So make sure that you have something highly defensible. And I think from a capital perspective, you have to raise enough capital that you had that you'll be able. Able to uh be able to spend on marketing, right? Because you don't want to be in a situation where, hey, you have great product market fit, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah, but then you don't have enough money on marketing, then you you're gonna be in a very difficult position.

SPEAKER_01

If you're a first-time founder, is there a sweet spot in that capital? Because obviously you don't want to raise too much or too little to your point. Yeah. You know, let's say you're talking to a 25-year-old person that's starting off and you say, hey, raise capital, but what does that like ballpark range look like?

SPEAKER_00

I I would say we're talking, I mean, I think at a minimum these days, you have to have like yeah, 250 to 500,000.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Right? Uh that's the exact range I tell people.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, yeah, yeah. Something that otherwise, if you have like 50 grand, it's like, what can you do with 50 grand LDs? Right? Yeah, we get burned fast and there's a waste of time, right?

SPEAKER_01

Do you think that supplements and sort of like the subscription business is the big leagues? Like, again, you can burn cash really quickly. I always say if you're a first-time founder, subscription is not where you want to start.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, because subscription-wise, again, is a very different aspect too, because you're you're building for the long term, right? And ultimately the product has to work. Yeah. Right. So maybe first-time founders, they may not know so much about the product development or what's the product wise, right?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So subscriptions also it really depends. Yeah, and again, even for us, yeah, it doesn't matter we have David Beckham or Rena or whoever, they're not going to continue to subscribe and pay 200 bucks on a monthly basis is if the product doesn't work. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Right?

SPEAKER_00

It doesn't matter who you have on your team.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. Um, okay. I'm going to ask you a series of rapid fire questions, just quick hits. Would love your POV on these, so I'll have my phone up, but this is all um just fast ones. Uh favorite brand that's not yours?

SPEAKER_00

Uh favorite brand that's, yeah. I mean, I I would say yeah, favorite brand, yeah. In any con any industry. Let's say e-commerce. Yeah. E-commerce. Uh so I would say I I looked up to, yeah, I did a lot of research and studying with on what Audity is doing. Do you guys know Audity? Yeah. Yeah. So they launch Il Kamiya, Ilmaquillage, Spoiler Child. He's just launching a new brand called like Metit as well. So a lot of their things there, they're doing is like you know, really, really good.

SPEAKER_01

Favorite software tool that's changed your business?

SPEAKER_00

Uh, MIS. Yeah, I was a very early adopter of Manus. Nice. And yeah, Manus has been a game changer for me, right? And uh for me and the like every individual employee that, yeah, it's like I use it like two hours a day.

SPEAKER_01

Nice. Favorite operator to learn from?

SPEAKER_00

Favorite operator. Um, I don't I wouldn't say I have a favorite operator, but even for me, I yeah, sometimes I spend a lot of time, uh I wouldn't say a lot of time, but it's just even on LinkedIn or on X, and then I'm just reading a lot of these different threads in terms of new tools that are available. Um, and also the fact I I love there's only one podcast I listen to, and it's the Neil Patel and Eric Seal podcast. Because they're always talking about new tools that they're using. Yeah, because they're like so many, right? Which ones do you actually use? And sometimes uh yeah, they mention these new tools though, which then I test it out and tried, etc. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Uh most underrated founder habit.

SPEAKER_00

Most underrated founder habit? What do you mean?

SPEAKER_01

Things that a founder does that they don't get enough credit for. For example, like checking unit economics or checking with the, you know, visiting the 3PL regularly or whatever.

SPEAKER_00

I I think it's just I mean, though kind of early on, I think you you have to be very hands-on. Yeah. Um I think that of course some people say, Oh, you can say you're you can say you're too hands-on, but I think if a brand is any less than three years old, the founder is so important. And they're going to the ones that are gonna be you know, make or break the business, right?

SPEAKER_01

Yeah. And lastly, favorite city in the world as far as like business community.

SPEAKER_00

Uh that I mean, I I I love Hong Kong, right? So I grew up in the US, uh, but yeah, Hong Kong, I think, is amazing because it had everything, literally, yeah, at your footsteps, right? The food's amazing, the community, the transportation, safety-ness, everything. I think Hong Kong's the best.

SPEAKER_01

Agreed.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

Danny, thank you so much. Uh this was great.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you, Manish.

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Monish Sabnani

Host
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Wojtek Lesinski

Producer