February 22, 2024 • 58 mins
#20: Join us as we sit down with Matthew Iommi, the dynamic CEO of Fetii, a ride-sharing startup revolutionizing urban mobility. From humble beginnings to leading a party bus empire, Matthew shares his entrepreneurial journey, filled with grit, creativity, and the power of strategic partnerships.
In this episode, we dive into the challenges of starting a business from scratch, including navigating cash transactions and breakdowns, and how Matthew turned these hurdles into stepping stones for success. Hear how Fetii, backed by research from the University of Texas, is not only connecting people but also reducing traffic congestion in cities.
Matthew also gets personal, discussing how youthful energy and a supportive network helped him overcome industry skepticism and thrive in the competitive startup landscape. This conversation is packed with inspiration, practical advice, and a sneak peek at what’s next for Fetii.
If you’re passionate about innovation, entrepreneurship, and making a meaningful impact, this episode is a must-listen!
You can follow Matthew Iommi:
@matthewiommi
@fetii
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
You can follow Pain In My Cass Podcast: @paininmycasspod
You can follow Cassandra Jean:
@paininmycass_
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey guys, welcome to In the Lobby podcast.
Our guest celebrated his 27thbirthday yesterday.
Happy, belated, yeah, happybirthday.
We have Matthew Iomi, the CEOof FETI, in the lobby with us
today.
Did you do anything fun foryour birthday yesterday?
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Yeah.
So a couple days prior, me andthe team and some friends went
out.
We went to Electric Shuffle.
If you've ever been, I have notit's a do you know what shuffle
?
I think it's calledshuffleboard, but it's where,
like, the pucks slide on the fan.
So it's essentially this.
You know, bar slash restaurant.
I'm not like, yes, manning youto death, like I actually do
know this, yeah, yeah okay, it'sactually like a bar restaurant,
(00:43):
but it's themed around these,those games that are just all
over the place and they're, youknow, digitally tracked so you
can keep score and split intoteams.
So it was super fun First timeI've been.
Did you win, our team lost?
Okay, we did the FETI teamagainst the plus ones and the
plus ones beat us.
Geez, oh yeah.
So that's sad to say.
(01:03):
And then everyone went homehappy, at least I know, yeah for
sure.
And then yesterday we went, mygirlfriend and I went to ATX
Casino Love.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
It was my first time there.
Very good it was good.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It was good.
We got like the octopus andshrimp and then carne, asada and
a few other dishes, but it's areally solid place.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
Did you get any drinks there?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I was going to say their margaritas are really good
, are they?
Good yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
They gave us a complimentary champagne for the
birthday, so that was nice ofthem.
So shout out to them.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Yeah, actually, one of the owners, I think, lives in
my building.
Shout out to the Sienna again,really yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Yeah, but it was a nice, I enjoyed it Turn 27.
So some people say it's young,Some people say it's old.
I feel like I you know I'mgetting older.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
It is insane to think , like this guy, like you're 27.
And I mean, if my researchserves me correctly, you're
ranked on the Forbes 30 under 30.
Uh-huh, correct, I mean onekudos to you, Congratulations,
that's quite the accomplishment.
I appreciate it If you wouldhave met me at 27,.
I was not doing what you weredoing, so it's like it's a huge
(02:16):
compliment, but like, maybe youcould dive into a little bit of
how did you get to the point orstage where you said Fetty's an
idea that you want to take, takeon.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
Yeah, I'm going to.
I'm going to jump in there,cause I feel like we have to
take it a step back, because I'ma Fetty fan, I know Roger's a.
Fetty fan but like some peoplelistening are probably like what
are they talking about?
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Yeah, so.
So for those who don't know uh,the unfortunate though, uh
people who don't know yet whatFetty is, um, it's essentially a
group ride share, which we kindof coined that phrase for the
first time because it reallyhasn't been done.
What group ride share means istaking ride share technology.
Right, you're familiar withUber, lyft.
You can call a vehicle with thetouch of a button, on demand or
(02:59):
pre scheduled.
But what's new with us is thatwe utilize high capacity
vehicles, primarily 15 passengerpassenger Sprinter vans, so
that groups or businesses canget one of these vehicles on
demand with a click of a button,with the same accessibility,
affordability and convenience ofride share Um, and everyone
gets to ride together, right, soit's just a better experience
(03:22):
than taking multiple cars,whether it's personal vehicles
or ride share Um, and it'sobviously helping the
environment where we're removingunnecessary vehicles off of the
road.
We just have a story, uh, utAustin just did a study on that
actually of the impact thatwe're having in Austin with the
congestion issue.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I actually saw your post on LinkedIn, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
So that was really exciting and and and awesome to
see Um.
But yeah, the base basically,you know, groups and businesses
prior to Fetty either had tosplit up the group or reserve a
party bus or a charter vehicledays or weeks in advance, pay a
three hour minimum for maybejust a 10 minute ride downtown,
right, Um, and have no paymentflexibility where one person has
to put a down deposit, pay anarm and a leg and hope that
(04:06):
everyone pays them back, Whereaswith Fetty now, click of a
button, this uh 15 passengerSprinter van comes to you,
Everyone gets in, Everyone canpay separately by scanning a QR
code.
We like to say you, you book itlike Uber and Lyft, but you pay
like Lyman bird, the scooterswith the QR codes, Um, and we've
just created this reallyawesome service that people have
grown to love and just a greatcommunity that centered around
(04:29):
bringing people together.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Sure, sure, and I mean Cass, maybe if you want to
dive into any other part of it.
I kind of want to ask aquestion, but I wonder did you
go to UT or I went to A&M.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Okay, yeah, so I went to A&M, so I feel that the
article came from UT.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
I know right, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Well, yeah, I know, seriously, Um, and I love UT
just because the school and andjust Austin in general supported
us so much we're based out ofhere, absolutely, um, but, yeah,
you know, the biggest thingwith with UT and Austin is just
Austin, because it's the firstMetro we launched in A&M.
If you have, if you're notfamiliar, it's in college
(05:08):
station, which is, you know,basically in the middle of
nowhere.
Yeah, Like, once collegestudents leave, uh, whether it's
for the summer or winter break,yeah, city dries out, city
dries out.
I know business, I rememberbusinesses, would you know,
change their operating hours,sometimes not even open, on, you
know, just cause, I mean, thecity just dries up, um, so, you
know what, how much of a realimpact can you have?
(05:29):
On, you know, they don't reallyhave a congestion issue at the
moment, whereas with Austin, um,we've been here for four years
now, um, and we've been a realasset to the community and just
with how many vehicles we havehere and how many groups and
passengers were transporting, um, the impact is real and
obviously, uh, ut Austinrecognized that and so that's
(05:50):
why they came out with thatstudy, which, yeah, it was
awesome.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Selfishly.
I want to know like do Aggiescome party in in Austin?
Yeah, yeah, they definitely do,Okay.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, get out of this small town, I know.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
I know no, but the coolest thing with what we've
done in terms of our marketingor expansion strategy, you know,
for those who don't know theFETI markets, I'll try and list
them off, all the you know, offthe top of my head.
It's college station, uh, thenit's Austin, it's Dallas, fort
Worth, lubbock, um, houston, uh,tuscaloosa, alabama and Baton
(06:25):
Rouge, louisiana.
And what's really cool with youknow how we've spread out, is
that we get a lot of um, youknow, feti users who utilize the
service at A&M, let's say, andthen they go visit their friends
at UT and they can also useFETI there.
Or, you know, during the summerthey go back to their hometown
in Houston and they can use FETIthere.
(06:46):
And so we're trying to get youknow this network effect where,
no matter where our users go, wewant to be there so that we can
continue giving them that FETIexperience.
Wow.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Yeah, I mean it's kind of crazy to me that such a
big idea like FETI came out ofcollege station, because I mean
college station.
I'm trying to think what's thelittle party, the square?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
or something Northgate yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, northgate.
So I'm just assuming you knowthat's where FETI you take a
FETI to Northgate in A&M.
Yeah, probably, probably thatwas I'm not going to lie maybe
85.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Do you walk around?
Yeah, no, that was probably 85,90% of where our trips were
going when we launched there.
Other times it was to dinnersor venues for, you know,
sorority or fraternity events or, um, you know, a few businesses
would use us for co-workingevents, but primarily it was to
Northgate.
Um, and that's another thingabout Austin and kind of these
metro areas like Dallas, fortWorth and Houston that we're
(07:41):
seeing the usage, you know theuse case for FETI dramatically
increase.
So, for example, not only arepeople in Austin taking it to
6th Street but they're alsotaking it to Moody Center for
concerts, they're taking it toAustin FC for, uh, for soccer
games, they're taking it to LakeTravis for party barges, um, in
(08:02):
metro areas there's just a lot,you know, a lot more use cases
which makes just the frequencyof trips and, um, the frequency
of times where you can think, oh, let's take a Feddy, just that
much more.
So we're super excited aboutthe growth we've seen,
especially in these metro areas,got it?
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Yeah, I mean that's crazy to think that you kind of
started this out of A&M and whenyou started it you were going
to school there, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
it was my senior year .
I like to say that the onlything better to come out of, the
only better business to comeout of A&M is Buckeys.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
I don't know from you , but the Buckeys, huge Buckeys,
the Buckeys founder went to A&MGot it.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I have another one.
Do you know, like the ringwraps on the Aggie rings that
all the girls have?
Uh-huh, it's like the diamonds,uh-huh.
That's a pretty good businessmodel that came out of A&M.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
Did this get started by a?
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah, it was started by a Aggie, a girl, Emily, who
started putting like diamondsaround the Aggie rings.
Wow, I didn't know this oh yeah, my little sister when she
graduated that's all she wantedwas like this $3,000 of diamond
wrap around her.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Yeah, they get hefty those rings.
Yeah, I've got mine on righthere.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Yeah, they're nice.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
They're nice.
Yeah, but shout out to Emilythen.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
I think we gotta get you with like a nice like.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
I know I'm like I wonder if we should maybe like
get Matt's blinged out.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I don't know if that'd be a good look, if you're
just diamond wrapped, yeah,necklaces everywhere.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
So you're a co-founder.
Did you all both go to A&M?
Speaker 2 (09:27):
No.
So Justin went to UTD, okay,and then after that he went to
California and he had a webdevelopment kind of agency he
was running.
But I had known him since highschool.
How'd you know?
Yeah, I had known him sincehigh school and since high
school we always had kind ofthis same idea of kind of like,
(09:48):
oh, what's creative that wecould do.
Sure, you know so, whenever hehad an idea he'd reach out to me
.
Whenever I had an idea, I'dreach out to him.
So that kind of kept thatcommunication open and that line
.
And ultimately it led to hey,there's these two students at
A&M who want to sell a party buscompany.
(10:09):
What do you think about gettinginvolved in the rest of history
?
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Okay, yeah, and then I would probably want to dive a
bit further into that, since Iwent to the same high school.
Where is high school Like?
Where are you from?
Speaker 2 (10:20):
originally Coppell, so it's a suburb outside of
Dallas, sure.
But yeah, elementary throughhigh school I went there, which
very blessed to go there, supernice place to grow up.
That led to a lot ofopportunities, is that?
Speaker 3 (10:35):
closer, just for the audience.
Is that closer to Dallas?
Houston, Austin Close, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Oh wait, what is closer?
Coppell, yeah, Coppell.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
It's a.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Dallas suburb Okay got it yeah.
So it's a suburb outside ofDallas.
It's close for those that knowthe area Greatvine, denton,
carrollton, colleyville, overthere.
Got it yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
And then maybe I'll dive into just another part of
the business for FETI Is it, hasit always been, multiple
vehicles or like?
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Well, it started out with one bus, really Started out
with one bus, and I was drivingit.
Oh, no way.
Yeah, so every weekend and it'sfunny because I think that's
one of the because I've heardpeople say oh, I had that same
idea in college, or I had asimilar idea that I was gonna do
.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Who's willing to drive the bus?
Well, exactly.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Who's willing to drive the bus, but every weekend
too.
So, like, while my friends andclassmates were going out, I had
to get in the bus, drive itThursday, friday, Saturday and
deal with all the issues thatcome with that, taking it to the
mechanic during the week.
These were old buses that,because we couldn't afford much,
right, yeah.
(11:44):
So it would break down almostevery week.
Something would happen AC orradiator or something so it was
in and out of there, but, yeah,I mean just driving people
around to and from Northgate,different places around college
station and ultimately we got tothe point where demand was good
enough where we bought anotherbus.
So then I hired a driver whowas driving the other bus and I
(12:09):
was driving the second bus, andthen just rinse and repeat.
We got to five buses.
I had delegated everything to amanager and the drivers were
driving, and that's kind of oneof the coolest things about this
process is that I kind of wentthrough all the stages and I
think that's something that'simportant to where.
(12:29):
If you think, let's say,someone wants to do a ride share
company, if you want to do aride share company, I think the
most valuable thing you could dois have driven a lot for a ride
share or something that'scomparable like that.
That gave us a lot of insightinto what the obstacles and
(12:51):
hurdles of the traditionalcharter bus and party bus
industry had, which opened manyavenues for us to say, hey.
One thing that could be betteris that these groups, they don't
necessarily know when they wantto head out, so let's make it
on demand so that they can headout when they're ready.
(13:11):
What's?
that typical wait time.
Typical wait time.
Obviously it depends duringsurge whether it's on a weekend
night during prime time, but onaverage I would say it's about
10 minutes.
Got it.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Yeah.
So when you first started outyou were driving, which I'm
really impressed by.
I did not know that, but I'mlike how are people getting the
FedE?
Because I can't think at thatpoint you had an app.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, no, no.
Everything was so archaic whenwe first bought the bus from the
two students.
They didn't have a website oranything, they just had a work
phone and they had a number andan Instagram and if you wanted
the bus you would text thenumber.
You'd have to text it maybe aday in advance, and then the bus
(13:57):
would show up at that time andthe people got onto the bus and
would pay $5 per person cash.
Yeah, that's huge, yeah.
And so I remember the earlydays after a weekend on my
living room table in my collegestation apartment.
Got a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
You would think I was a drug dealer.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Because it was the stacks of cash.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
I'm like all right, there's no way the company can
scale like this.
And we were having issues too.
We were finding out some of thedrivers were skimping out and
saying, hey, 10 people got ontomy bus when really maybe 15 got
on For sure.
And so it's like any businesslike that if you want to scale
it, you can't be operating withcash like that.
Did you keep any?
Speaker 3 (14:38):
of those drivers like around till present day, like,
have any of them lasted?
Speaker 2 (14:42):
In college station there might be one or two, ok,
but whenever we first launchedin Austin, there's a couple that
have been with us for a long,long time.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
You know that's a sign of the fruits of your labor
.
Oh for sure, like people stillwant to stick around.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Oh for sure, the turnover on FETI, the driver
turnover on FETI is very, veryrare.
Most drivers prefer to use ourapp for income opportunities
because they just get paid somuch better than other ride
share companies.
If you think about it, you know, a driver with one trip is
(15:20):
generating three to four timesthe revenue of an Uber or a Lyft
trip because they can fit threeto four times the amount of
people, for sure, whilemaintaining the cost profile of
one vehicle, it's still the costof one driver or one van, so
the margins are just that muchgreater where we can share more
with the driver.
So that's been something thatwe've been really blessed with
(15:42):
where, unlike Uber and Lyft, whoare always spending so much
money competing for driversAbsolutely we don't have, we can
focus more of our capital andresources on improving the app
and marketing and all thisdifferent stuff, because our
drivers just are earning muchmore than any other option.
Speaker 3 (16:03):
Man, you're like the Drake line I heard back in the
day.
It's like Drake.
He had a line that he said Imake all the music that my
friends party to, so it's likethat time that you were taken
away from partying.
You were putting that time inand that sweat equity to the
whole time.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
No, that's true, yeah , and congrats, no, I appreciate
it Cause you're gonna be likewhat, like 21 maybe.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Yeah, 2021.
And honestly, even after Ihired the drivers, I still
didn't go out on weekends.
Because You're still working,man, because something always
would happen A van would breakdown, or they'd have a question
about the app or this and that,and I can't be at the club.
I can't even hear on my phonetrying to answer calls.
(16:46):
So really I didn't go out, andthat's what I talk about.
When people say that they woulddo it, it's like would you
really sacrifice years?
And that's weekends, right, andI don't think most people would
, but fortunately for me, lesscompetition is better.
Oh yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
I love that I always have so much respect for people
that kind of go heads down thoseyounger years and I feel like
those people have very goodroutines.
So I'm kind of wondering whatyour day to day routine looks
like as a 27 year old CEO.
Do you kind of have a morningroutine or an evening routine?
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Yeah, the morning routine.
I just like to wake up and Iknow a lot of people say it's
bad for you, I suppose, but I gostraight to my phone and check
emails and reply to the quickemails that I can before doing
anything.
Big zero inbox guy.
Yeah yeah, yeah, if it's spam,delete it.
If I need to respond, respond.
If it's something that reallyneeds a lot of my time, I'll
(17:47):
wait till I'm out of bed gettinggotten ready, everything like
that.
I've got a dog so that healways keeps me disciplined.
Take him out, give him a quickwalk.
I'm obsessed with my dog.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
I gotta ask what kind of?
Yeah, I've got a.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Husky.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
That's amazing.
He or she is a talker.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah for sure, I already know when I get back
home he's gonna have a lot tosay.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
I got a black lab.
I'm like obsessed man, I'mobsessed.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Yeah, and he was my first.
I got him the first year ofwhen we bought the party bus
company, so he's been a day onefor sure.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
He's a chief dog officer.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Yeah, yeah, he's in a few of the Instagram reels.
Yeah, in pictures he's anofficial Fetty dog.
We like to say Love that, yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
I mean, I guess I'll turn some of those questions to
you a bit about the business andlike getting funding, because
you talk about being 21 andreally putting in that sweat
equity to get some of that jobdone and build it and scale it
appropriately.
How do you have time to findinvestors and pass your classes?
Speaker 2 (18:53):
Yeah, well, the first one reason why we've been so
successful is that we've neverbuilt the business around other
people's money.
So from the get go I'll giveyou an example Just to buy the
party bus business, people thinklike, oh well, you must have a
lot of money, like, I can neverdo that.
Sure, we had saved up somemoney.
(19:15):
It wasn't a lot, but wenegotiated with the two people
who were selling it to do apayment plan, got it, so it was
just a little bit down and thenpaying it off each month.
And what were we doing to payit off each month?
It was the money that wascoming in from the you were
collecting fives, man, exactly,yeah.
And so that's one thing toowhere a lot of people think
(19:39):
there's no way for them.
Business is fun because you canget creative.
As long as the person sittingopposite the table is it I don't
know, is it thinking clearly orwhatnot, you can come up with
some creative solutions to makeeverybody win.
And so, yeah, I mean we reliedon the business to grow.
(20:02):
It Obviously use some creditcards.
And then, once it kind of proveditself and people were using
the service more and more and wegrew to other cities.
People naturally wanted to getinvolved, so fortunately, we
brought on some great partners.
One of those is a venture firmcalled Y Combinator.
(20:25):
Yeah, and Y Combinator were thefirst investors in a lot of
good companies.
They're based out of San Fran.
They were the first investorsin Cruz, dordat although Cruz is
having issues right now butDordash, instacart, airbnb,
coinbase, dropbox, a lot ofothers.
But we've been very fortunatebecause they've given us great
(20:47):
resources on top of the money,and so just different partners
like that have allowed us togrow well.
But that all came after we hadkind of made it.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
So at this point you've graduated.
Then yeah, From there okay.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
So we graduated, we had launched in Austin, because
whenever we made our firstrounds with investors, they were
like hey, this is a coolbusiness, but will it work in a
metro?
For sure it works in a collegetown.
Will it work in?
Speaker 1 (21:11):
a metro.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
To the test.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
Yeah, exactly, and so a lot of things we had to go
out and prove without muchoutside capital assistance, and
I think that's the best way togrow a business, because if
you're dependent on outsidecapital, at some point, no
matter what those opportunitiesare gonna dry up.
And if you're left with abusiness that's just burning a
(21:34):
lot of capital and not able tobe self-sustainable, you're
either gonna end up bankrupt oryou're gonna end up selling a
lot of the company more than youneed to, where it's not even
worth it at that point For sure.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
I feel like when you bring in that investment or when
you started trying to grow tolike metro cities, did you ever
like have a moment where youwere like what the fuck is going
on?
And like I don't know if I wassitting in your shoes, I would
feel like a great sense ofoverwhelm, like this is a lot at
a really young age, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
The thing is it happened.
I guess it happened quickly,but to me it happened slowly, so
it wasn't just oh, I'm drivinga party bus and then all of a
sudden Fetiz is, you know, inthree states he was successful.
Right, it started with twobuses, then we got to five buses
, then we tried launching inAustin, and so you know it's
(22:28):
because it was a gradual process, you know it doesn't feel too
overwhelming or surprising inthat sense, but certainly, you
know, it's always good to take astep back and acknowledge that
wow, we've come a long way thatentrepreneurial mindset, like it
comes from somewhere.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Like is this mom, dad ?
That's an age old question,relatives, right.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Did you see?
Speaker 3 (22:50):
somebody else do this .
You know what motivated you tobecome an entrepreneur?
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Yeah, I still ask that question every day, sure,
and my answer now is differentthan my answer was five years
ago, and my answer today willprobably be different than it
was, than it is five years fromnow, sure, but growing up, I
always liked reading fantasybooks, so Fellow nerd here.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Yeah, that's right, chrissy Jackson, here we're
going.
Oh, lightning Thief, yeah, yeah, that was the first book that
got me into reading Really, yeah, like.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Harry Potter guy over here.
Harry Potter, I read a lot StarWars, I loved comic books and
maybe that has to do with it,where, you know, it's kind of a
mindset of, hey, we're writingour book, you know we're writing
our comic and you know, if youcan, you know you want to be the
(23:47):
main character in your book,yeah, the protagonist.
And what does that mean?
It means, you know, creatingsomething or doing something
impactful for others.
Right, that, you know,hopefully, is remembered after
your time and it's somethingbigger than you, which you know.
I think we're on the righttrack.
(24:08):
But yeah, I mean, I'm surethere's also plenty of other
variables that have to do withmy childhood.
Who knows?
My parents are divorced, so youknow We'd have to go do a
therapy session and do thatquestion.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Yeah, why do we think or why are we the way we are so
well, yeah, I love that becauseMatthew's like saying like main
character moment over here andI also think there's something
to reading and people reading alot Like I think that just means
you're okay sitting alone withyourself.
Yeah, sure, and to grow abusiness, I feel like you have
(24:43):
to be uncomfortable being alone,Cause while everyone else was,
like you know, out drinkingtrying to get girls, you had to
be a little bit more heads down,focused on studies.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
No, no, no, I agree.
And thinking back just incollege prior, I was very
comfortable.
I took a lot of time kind ofjust obviously taking care of my
studies, but also just kind ofasking questions of you know
what's going on, whether it'sphilosophical or religious or or
(25:13):
economical, and trying to learna lot about that and trying to
understand just kind of what isa?
What is this world that we'rekind of born into, what's the
history of it, and and how canyou, if you view life as a game,
you know how can you do well init?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Yeah, when we say that life's like a video game.
Yeah you really can wake up anddecide to be like a different
version of yourself.
Certainly yeah, I do it everyday.
I'm like what do I want to wear?
What do I want to look?
Speaker 3 (25:41):
like what do I want?
Speaker 1 (25:42):
to be today.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
I mean somebody else, you are a celebrity.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I called Roger.
I was like Roger.
Someone asked me today when Iwas getting a smoothie if I'm a
celebrity and I was like it mustbe the energy, yeah, yeah well,
that's a whole simulationtheory, right.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
I don't know who knows, maybe this is just a TV
show and they're looking.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
Yeah, I mean give me this then, like, what chapter
are you in right now for yourown book?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And this game.
It's hard to tell.
Yeah, you know, if you had a,you had a pinpoint where you are
at the moment.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Well, it's like man I .
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Drink some raw water real quick.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
Oh, that's a path.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Yeah, electrolytes, right right, um, you have to be
so careful when, whenever you'redoing this type of stuff,
because things can change soquickly.
For sure, I never take it forgranted, and, and While the
company is in a great positionright now, and and we've always
had obstacles and we've alsoover overcame them, like there's
(26:43):
always ups and downs.
Oh yeah, I'd like to think thisis the beginning, you know, of
FETI.
That's what I do believe, butyou always have to be kind of
that.
Not a pessimist, but I guess arealist that you know things can
change very quickly.
But let's say everything goeswell, this is the beginning.
(27:04):
We scale this to every majormetro in the country, for sure,
hopefully get internationallyand let's be getting into
existence, yeah, yeah, and, andat that point we've created such
a valuable service thatspecifically, you know, with,
with college-age students andand what's really cool is that,
as, as this business continuesto flourish, those college
(27:27):
students that breathe and loveFETI, the FETI experience, they
graduate, right, yeah, so all ofa sudden we're gonna have all
the mid-20s and and and late 20sgreat marketing plan, yeah.
And then it goes to what?
Then we'll have all the 30s,yeah, to the point where, if we
can make this a lasting business, we can have.
It's kind of how Apple did it.
(27:48):
They started really young,absolutely.
You know a lot of the earlyadopters of the iPhone or the
iPad, the eye touch, all thosewere young people.
They grow up and they stickwith it.
They stick with I can't gowithout mine, man.
No, you're telling me theystick with Apple, and that's
kind of the thing that we wantto do.
And so you know I've touched alittle bit about on the past,
(28:08):
that that, as we kind of youknow, grow with our users we
want to begin offering themother services and and I think
that's that's a big thing and abig vision of the FETI ecosystem
Is providing them with otherservices, whether it's content,
podcast, apparel.
Obviously it just information,different rideshare options.
(28:35):
Maybe we go towards, you know,providing.
No, I don't know.
I don't know but kind of the the.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I'm just thinking off the top of my head, yeah, yeah,
I mean, it seems like you havereally big goals, which is
really inspiring, absolutely.
Um, have you had a moment whereyou were kind of like, oh, I've
made it a little bit like oneof those moments, or bought
yourself Something like a car?
(29:04):
Made it purchase or somethinglike exciting that you celebrate
.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
No, I mean Me and Justin, my co-founder.
We don't even we.
We don't pay ourselves a lot.
That's what I was gonna, and forthe first Probably like two to
probably like the first year anda half we didn't pay ourselves
anything, yeah, and then afterthat it was literally something
super small, so that foraccounting it shows that we're
employees of the company, yeah,and and I think the biggest you
(29:30):
know achievement was what?
Finally, when we feltcomfortable, say, hey, let's
give us a, an appropriate salaryto where we're not, we're not
struggling yeah, I think that'sreally cool.
To where, you know, essentially, we created this Job
opportunity in this salaryourselves.
Yeah, right, you're not justgoing out and trying to get
(29:52):
someone else to give it to you.
We kind of went out and and putin the time and effort and the
pain and the joys to Now be atthis position where, all right,
you know, you know I can, I cansave some, I don't have to worry
about rent, I don't have toworry about yeah.
Zeus is my Huskies food, youknow all that stuff, so I think
(30:12):
that's really cool.
Zeus, I love that my Dog.
He looks like a Zeus.
He's got a nice coat.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
I got King, yeah, oh yeah, yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
I think Zeus would would be the king, though.
Oh.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
I'm kidding, I promise you my dog is like he'll
.
He could get beat up by thewall Like he's just a big big.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
No Zeus is sweet too.
Yeah, I mean, I think you know,especially in this game, the
biggest, the biggest, you know Imade it, I know I.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
I feel like that salary is a big one.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
It's nice and it's not a big salary, no no, no, I,
we're one of the on our team.
We actually get paid.
One of the least, yeah, butit's the fact that we're able to
, I think, is super interesting,because I know my mom.
Whenever I told her, whenever Itold her oh yeah, you don't
have to worry anymore, we'repaying ourselves.
Now it was like oh, from where?
(31:08):
He said, from where, how areyou doing it?
I'm like from the business,it's making money.
And I was like she was like, oh, okay, nice cuz, she's an
immigrant, she's from Mexico andand and she she was very
supported but didn't really, youknow, understand Much of what
was going on, and she's neverdownloaded the uber app or
anything like that.
So, rideshare, she didn't knowanything about that, but so that
(31:31):
was a cool time.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
So culturally year, are you?
Speaker 2 (31:33):
100% Mexican.
No, my mom's Mexican, my dad'sBritish love.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Yeah so.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Yeah, my dad was working on a on a cruise ship.
He went to go work on a cruiseship when he was 18, after that
settled in California and thenmy mom my mom got introduced to
him from her sister Okay, whoher sister was married to a man
who worked with my dad on thecruise ships Got it, yeah.
(32:02):
But that's another thing toothat that I've always enjoyed is
having kind of that, um,diverse viewpoint and
perspective, culturallyabsolutely, and I've traveled a
lot and I think one thing thatthat's been really nice is
seeing how different people areand the same in some ways for
sure.
You know, definitely differentcultures are different, but
within that same culture you seea lot of similarities.
(32:24):
Yeah, and I think that's helpedme deal with a lot of different
type of people, and More sothan that, understanding Kind of
what type of, what type ofperson they are and how they
grew up and how it mold, youknow, affects them.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Yeah, I love that.
I think I'm kind of like you,like I love understanding things
and especially understandingpeople, like I'm always asking
Roger questions, like trying tolike decipher people.
Oh yeah, want to understandthem at a deeper level.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
You have a great sense of intuition too.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, like intuition.
But Roger and I keep talkingabout Misconceptions and so I
feel like there has to be somemisconceptions, not only about
you, but maybe the FETI brand aswell.
So I wanted to see, like whatwould you say, or like the
biggest misconceptions about you, what's the biggest man?
Speaker 3 (33:10):
This is your one-liner.
Speaker 1 (33:12):
I feel like you've had to have gotten some shade,
like maybe even from people youwent to school with, like I mean
, I feel like you've precededyour peers in a lot of ways by
having this business at 27 yearsold.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Yeah, I mean Misconceptions.
I mean, I guess the age is abig one.
Obviously, when you're tryingto do these big deals, you know
they're going to be lesstrusting.
If it's a young person, likewhat does he know?
Yeah, what does he know is abusiness legit, and that's
(33:46):
something that COVID actuallyhelped with, because everything
started turning towards emailand Zoom, which it's not as
apparent.
That certainly helps.
You know you have a goodsignature pick and you know the
sky's the limit, right, yeah,corporate on the top, pajamas on
the bottom, exactly.
(34:07):
But yeah, I mean I'd probablysay the age thing is a
misconception.
You know I'm trying to thinkwhat else?
Speaker 3 (34:19):
I mean, that's fair.
Let that be it Like you'redefeating it daily, and I mean
you have two people here in thisroom.
I think very highly of you andI'm sure there's a large
audience out here in Austin, notonly in your hometown but in
other areas for instance as well.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Yeah, and it's not like it's.
The misconception has alwaysled to negative things, like
with me.
Being young, that's also led toa lot of opportunities, for
sure, because when you'reyounger, more people want to
help you out because you'retrying to make it right.
So whether it's press coverageor media or this, and that if
you're an older fellow trying todo it, it's kind of like oh,
(34:58):
you know he's trying to do itwith, whereas with a young
person maybe they're like oh,look, how inspiring, you know
different stuff.
Speaker 3 (35:05):
Like that, they really remember that day when
they were you, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Yeah, exactly.
So I wouldn't say it's bad orgood, just you know the way
things are.
But, fortunately, how Justinand I have built the business,
our actions do the talking.
Yeah, you know it's now.
Now we can walk in and it'shard for them to be biased
(35:29):
against our age, because theythemselves have written in a
fetish and used our service Forsure, you know.
So it's like, hey, you canthink I'm young, but you know
you're sending us.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
You used it before, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Exactly so.
Fortunately, we've gotten overthat hump and that's kind of how
it kind of really led on andwent to where, if you've got a
good business and you've got agood service, it really does
speak for itself For sure.
And we're fortunate to whereyeah, we do some great.
We didn't do marketing for thelongest time.
It just naturally spread like awildfire because of word of
(36:00):
mouth, right.
We like to say whenever youconvert one FETI customer,
you're converting 9, 10, 11, 12,who also utilize the same
service, right?
So that that week over weekgrowth is exponential.
And so for the longest time wedidn't put much, much money into
marketing because the productwould just grow and speak for
itself.
And it's kind of one of thosethings.
(36:20):
Look, if you're not going toFETI, what are you going to do?
Speaker 3 (36:23):
You're going to split up the group and you don't know
who you're going to get back.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
So that's been something that'sbeen really nice, Just letting
our work speak for itself and bea damned how old we are.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Well, I got to ask, man, it's like you talk about
your birthday, you being able toenjoy a nice meal with your
partner.
Yeah, I'm sure, and I don'twant to assume.
Maybe you can answer thisbefore I get into my question.
Were you even able to celebratethat famous kiss under the tree
at A&M?
No no, the century tree?
No no, I never did that.
(37:00):
I mean, you were working yourbutt off.
It's your senior year.
No, no, but I had a girlfriendwhile I was working, and yeah.
No, it's a good thing you didn'thave that kiss.
Oh, I guess.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Because I think if you kiss, I think the thing is
you're going to get married orsomething like that.
I forget, I forget what thetradition is, but no, I've been
super blessed with my previousrelationships and my current
relationship.
I've been really blessed withthe partners that I've had.
Good for you, yeah, nothing badto say about any of them.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
How the heck did you find time to find a partner?
You know I mean.
This is something.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
She's amazing because the last event we had, I
dragged you here to come checkout the podcast video and you
guys showed up to pouch six.
Yeah, at like 7pm or somethingon a Wednesday night and she
came with you and I could justtell from her energy like what a
supportive partner she is Forsure.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
She's got boss energy .
And she's killing it herself inher own domain as well.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Yeah, I just feel like, as an entrepreneur and
we've talked about this like itcould be lonely right and then
going home and having someone tolike bounce ideas off of, I
feel like it just makes you apoint and even better, leader.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Yeah certainly, I mean I'm super blessed with
everything that's happened withme.
Yeah, I mean, you go home, thecycle that these kind of
startups go through is just upsand downs.
You think everything's goingwell, until you get one text or
(38:35):
email.
Having someone there that'ssupportive, just for you to just
talk about what's happening,yeah, I think it's huge.
And that goes the same thingwith having a co-founder, for
sure.
Right, having someone who youcan talk about, kind of what's
important to you or as a friendor even a partner, might need
(38:57):
that space where, hey, noteverything can be about business
.
So just having that supportsystem, for sure I don't think
no.
I couldn't have done it bymyself.
I would not be here where I amby myself.
It's important to acknowledgethat, but I've been super
blessed in that domain for sure.
Speaker 3 (39:15):
Is she blocking off all the I'm sure women throwing
themselves at you?
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Oh yeah no, no, no, no, she's great.
I know no other people arecatching my eye.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Well, that's what I was telling Roger, because I
look at the FETI Instagram andyou guys do have a young
demographic.
Yeah, I was like, damn, thesegirls are gorgeous on the FETI
page.
And these college students.
I was like I wonder if Matthewgets the brunt of any of that,
like these girls trying to throwthemselves at him.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
Yeah, they go for the hug and you're like handshake.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Well, she's going to hate me for saying that I love
her, but she slid in my DMs.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
I love that yeah yeah , this is how you met.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
We love that she took things into her own hands.
She's a true boss man, for sure, for sure.
Yeah, there's a funny saying.
It's like, no matter howsuccessful a B2B founder is, he
could have exited for millionsof dollars or IPO'd, he'll never
(40:21):
be.
The saying is, no matter howsuccessful a B2B founder is, the
wife's going to have an affairwith a B2C founder.
And it's funny because just theB2C founders, the ones who like
their service, their service,their service is being used by
the masses, Just for what I mean.
Obviously there's a reason, butthey just get so much more
(40:44):
attention than the one who builtsome, you know, not boring, but
built some software that's, youknow, being sold to some execs
and they make a whole bunch ofmoney that way.
So I always think that's funny.
But I mean certainly, certainly, you know it happens, but yeah,
that's how it goes.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
What was that first date like?
I mean?
Speaker 1 (41:05):
I mean in the DMs first of all, I have mad respect
for her as a woman Lighting inthe yeah because I call that
like the handkerchief.
Speaker 3 (41:14):
Oh, tell me, what is this.
Speaker 1 (41:15):
Yeah, like if I'm a girl and I'm interested in a guy
, I'll drop my handkerchiefright so I'll slide in the DMs.
Yeah, and then he can choose topick it up or not.
No, but I think a lot of guysare scared to make the first
move, for sure.
So sometimes you have to go getwhat you want, and that's for
sure.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
No, certainly, yeah, it was.
It was right after we hadlaunched In Lubbock at Texas
Tech, and so I was super busy,and so we were chatting it up a
little bit and she kept onasking hey, are you free this
and this?
I'm like I'm gonna be inLubbock, I'm not gonna be
available.
And so she ended up she's likeokay, putting your calendar this
(41:53):
date and and let's, let's go ona date.
I was like all right, that'llwork.
And it was like it was likefour weeks and in the future.
I was like all right, I can'tsay no to that, sure.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
And and so we went on that first date, kicked it off,
and, and the rest is historyand there's still such a drive
of that in-person experience,because I'm sure like having
that message or thatconversation via DM.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
You don't know for sure, yeah, for sure.
No, I mean, I went into it with, you know, reasonable
expectations.
Sure, um, as I'm sure she did,but no, we kicked it off and
reasonable expectations.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
What a CEO.
Speaker 2 (42:32):
No, but uh, but we kicked it off.
She's great, super smart,driven, kind, beautiful.
So that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (42:40):
Shout out to to Ariel hey, I wish you all the the
prosperity.
Honestly, you deserve it.
Thank you, yeah, yeah, so whatabout you guys?
Speaker 2 (42:48):
What's the love life looking like?
Speaker 1 (42:49):
I'm single, I'm single All right you know any
guys that are over like six two.
Speaker 2 (42:55):
Well, look, every all the female co-workers I have
all say that Austin is not theplace to date.
Oh sorry, Roger, I don't knowit's what's to me I mean yeah,
it's been a wild ride, but Ithink when you meet the right
person you'll know for sure, andit's just it takes time.
Speaker 3 (43:11):
Are you single as well?
I've put myself out there andI've actually been lucky enough
to find somebody that keeps myattention.
Okay, nice, you see away fromall right outside world, but I,
it took a long time to get there, man.
Honestly, it's been some, somedifferent experiences.
Yeah, it takes time, right,like you know what you know and
you don't know what you don'tknow for sure before I.
I'm actually from New York,okay.
(43:32):
I moved to Austin.
Yeah, the 70 relationship, soreally.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Yeah, so I had no idea how to date, and that was
your first relationship.
Speaker 3 (43:40):
You could say I've been here on that long.
It was the first long-termrelationship.
I had, some before that.
Yeah, it was like it was theimpactful one, for sure.
Yeah, we all have that oneimpactful one, and then I had no
idea how to be single like I.
Just I was learning, yeah, andAustin was a stopping ground,
but a learning lesson as well.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
Oh yeah so.
Well.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
I'm taking foot and spoken for now.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
Yeah, nice See, I have a similar approach to your
girlfriend.
When I want something, I justgo after it.
It doesn't always work out forme, but I always kind of know
yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:13):
And that I mean it shouldn't even be just in terms
of relationships, right.
Right, there's been so many andI still try and work on this
all the time but there's been somany emails I've sent out where
any normal person would be like, oh, this person's not gonna
reply back, yeah, and we'll geta reply back and it'll lead to
something and and I'll look backwith, with, with Justin, or
(44:35):
with the team, and and we'relike, hey, look, a lot of this.
You know, if you go down thepath of action, where it came
from, it came from a randomemail or application or phone
call or text that you thoughtprobably won't work, but it's
like what you know?
What's the harm?
What harm?
Speaker 1 (44:53):
can I lose?
Hey, that's what happened whenI reached out to you that you
were like getting involved withpodcast.
Yeah, I was like I'm gonnashoot my shot.
Speaker 3 (45:02):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Exactly so.
I think that does lead.
It's a good sign for successGoing out and trying to get it,
because at the end of the day,no one's gonna no one's gonna do
a war, you at all.
You know.
So you've got a big you.
You've got to be your biggestadvocate and you've got to be
like I said, you've got to bethe superhero of your story.
Yeah, you know, no matter howkind people are they're not a
(45:27):
pawn.
No matter how kind people are,it just doesn't make sense for
them to Throw their whole lifeaway to make sure your life is
good, unless it's like a parentor something for sure, right?
So you've got to be yourbiggest Influencer and your
biggest motivator and yourbiggest support system.
(45:48):
So that's another thing.
Like you were talking aboutsupport systems, yeah, it's
great to have this supportsystem, but at the end of the
day, it's it's up to you, yourown advocate.
You know so.
So I think that is a big thingto take note of, and whether
it's relationships or businessor friendships, or, or you know,
with anything, the familymembers or anything, you taking
(46:08):
the initiative, reaching out Ithink is is always gonna play
well in your favor.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
For sure.
I feel like a lot of peoplehave like task paralysis almost
was like their goal, their goals.
You know, like I've done thismyself where I'm like, oh you
know, I'll do the podcast whenthe time's right, but the time's
never gonna be right, right nowalways gonna get in the way
Mm-hmm and I'm sure you'veexperienced that, like as a CEO.
(46:34):
Like life's always happening,what do you do when, like,
something comes up and you'rereally overwhelmed by it?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Those are the toughest, the toughest
Situations, because those arethe ones that I really do feel
like Take time away from my lifein terms of the stress, yeah,
and and.
It's just fight or flight modeeither sit down, give up and let
something happen, or you've gotto come up with different ideas
.
And that's why having aco-founder is great, because
(47:05):
we'll, when something happens,we'll be on hour-long calls just
brainstorming what course ofaction do we take?
Yeah, and, and, and.
That's kind of how I view.
You know those, those obstaclesas they come, I get super
stressed out, but we've managedto get over each one and
hopefully there's not a Momentthat comes that we can't get
(47:26):
over.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Well, yeah, you know, I feel like that's kind of like
the hero's journey, you know,maybe from like reading some of
those books, because I see youactually probably Functioning
really well in fight or flightmode, which is gotta poise man
to you.
Yeah, like you're, like I'meither gonna make this, like
you're not gonna drop the ball,that's what I get.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
Well, I get so there.
There are people that I've comeacross that are a lot more
calmer in situations, sure, butI think that's one reason why we
can get over these hurdles isbecause it stresses me out and
it's gives me so much anxietythat I'm not thinking about
anything else.
Yeah, and, and I hate it.
(48:08):
I hate.
I mean it's aerial consensusand and, and you know, people
can sense it where you know, I'msorry, I'm thinking about this
like, yeah, you know, my, mymood is, is serious.
You know, I can't even talkabout anything else and it might
be like that for a couple daysuntil I figure it out, but I
think that's one reason why I'vebeen effective in those
(48:31):
situations and I, and I don'tlike it, but I don't think about
anything else.
Yeah, you're problem-solver.
Speaker 3 (48:37):
Yeah, so I guess you being a problem-solver and you
having a marketing plan, that'svery different, right?
Mm-hmm, I gotta ask was it youwas an aerial, your partner, or
was it your co-founder that cameup with this famous FETI
question Calling your ex?
That was me, that was you.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
Yeah, okay, yeah, maybe for for the audience Last
time he was in here because wedid a little mock interview with
you.
Matthew said he would not callhis ex.
Speaker 3 (49:05):
Okay, so, and for the audience, out of our spec,
let's tell the audience thefamous FETI question.
Speaker 2 (49:10):
Yeah, so.
So we did kind of the.
We have some ambassadors, orCallie, who does marketing for
us go out to campus and ask youknow random students or people
that are FETI users?
If you call your ex, yeah, andthey pass the vibe check, we'll
give you a month or more of freeFETI rides, yeah, and passing
(49:30):
the vibe check means you have toask them hey, do you know what
FETI is?
Okay, they say yes, then theyget the free rides, and so we
would go out and ask people anda lot of those videos blew up
Because you're just socaptivated.
Absolutely.
Imagine if I had to do that,and I remember One of the women
who did it.
(49:50):
I mean she was shaking, she waslike, alright, he's not gonna
pick up.
I think I'm blocked.
And he ends up picking up what,and?
And she has to explain thequestion and she's just like,
okay, thanks bye, and andeverything was was good after
that.
But, um, but yeah, I mean I'vebeen looking for more ideas like
that.
Yeah, are just captivating thatpeople would want to see.
(50:11):
It's, it's a good one.
It's a good one, but it's, it'srun its course.
We've done a lot of them.
We got to come up withsomething new, I like it.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
You guys are so creative though, because even I
watched one of the reels you did.
It's like the Love Island play.
Oh yeah, when you got a newcastmate.
Yeah, team member really yeah,that was Callie.
Speaker 2 (50:27):
No, Uh, the one one reason why we've built such a
great brand is because youngpeople are working on this
company.
Yeah, you know, it's not abunch of suits and ties.
You know, thinking hey, whatare the kids like?
Now?
Speaker 3 (50:40):
That's a bit of a risk to right like, yeah, taking
a risk, but you're reallybuilding on people's potential
for sure, and so yeah, no thanks, and to the whole team.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
We're all pretty young.
I think the youngest person ismaybe like lower 30s, wow, um.
But but we've all got that kindof perspective of our users.
So it's it's kind of like, youknow, we don't have to really
ask the question oh, what wouldour users like?
Well, we can ask the questionof what do we like?
Yeah, and a lot of the timethat's gonna be Similar to our
(51:11):
users, if not the same.
Speaker 3 (51:12):
For sure, that's a it's very smart and, I would say
, for your ecosystem is forevergrowing.
Is there versions of, maybeAccess points that are set to
come like?
Do you see a Fetty house thatyou want people to know about?
Do you have something that's inthe works that you could kind
of give a little Jewel away?
Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah, I mean that that's kind of the name of the
game.
One thing that I found,especially, for example, with
the X question that we asked onsocial media, is that a lot of
and those got millions of viewsfor sure that type of those type
of avenues Kind of supersedethe growth that Fetty as a ride
share company can do.
For example, I mean people inin Los Angeles, where we're not
(51:54):
launched yet, if it's just aride share company, they're not
gonna hear a Fetty, maybe theyhear it through some of their
friends, but they're not gonnaget any use out of it.
Sure, with kind of this mediacomponent that we're kind of
working on and being createdwith our marketing and social
content, it provides value,right, it's entertaining content
for people who don't even haveaccess to the ride share process
(52:14):
, to the ride share product yet.
Yeah, and that's something thatI've I've fell in love with
because it's you know, hey, youknow, yeah, we haven't launched
here yet, but we still gotsomething for you.
So that's something that Ialways keep at top of mind.
Obviously, the main Driver andthe main goal is to get the
Fetty service in front ofeveryone.
(52:35):
Yeah, I mean that's why we arewho we are Because of the great
service we can provide forgroups with the ride share
product, um I.
But that doesn't mean we stillcan't, you know, work on
different avenues to supersedethat growth, yeah, and get
people exposed to the FETI brandprior, I mean.
Speaker 3 (52:52):
I saw the video and I was captivated by it right yeah
, to know you have more of thatcontent coming out and that's
like what are those jewels?
Were you saying like hey, likebe on the lookout for that.
Yeah, I think I'm even excited.
Yeah, it was the first time Isaw it.
I was like, sending it to catslike this is absolutely
hilarious, yeah, and I don'tthink, I don't.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
I don't know if any other creator, content creator
has done that question.
Speaker 1 (53:15):
No, I have not seen it.
No, it's genius, though it putsyou in fight-or-flight.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
I remember I, yeah, I know literally.
I remember I think I got theinspiration I'd seen somewhere
they had to call their dad ormom and and say something like
like a prank or something sure,and and I thought to my head,
I'm like my parents would notappreciate that.
Oh I would say, like, what, what, what, what can I think of?
Like, what else can they do?
I was like, oh, imagine if theyhave to call their ex, yeah.
(53:42):
And of course you run into like, oh, maybe it's not their ex or
whatnot, but you know, it'sstill worth the play.
Yeah, yeah and so I'm trying tothink of other stuff like that.
It's tougher than it might.
It might seem, yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:53):
I have to ask you, though, since we can't call your
ex, what's like the worst thingthat your ex could say about
you?
The worst?
Speaker 2 (54:00):
in your perspective.
Oh, my goodness, I Mean.
I'm sure if they listen to,they might say something else.
Maybe, I don't know, I havegood standing, I feel like, with
all, all of them, maybe that Ican be too logical at times.
If a problem arises, sure nothaving to do with the business,
let's just say it's something inlife.
Maybe they just want to talkabout it.
(54:23):
It'd be emotional and and andkind of just have someone to
hear whereas I'm like, alright,this is what we're gonna do,
this is and they're gonna solvethe problem.
Yeah, exactly.
They're like no, no, no, yeah,listen, yeah, exactly.
So I'd probably say that's thebiggest thing.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
I mean, I would say, not only is that fair I think a
lot of guys have that problemlike, I don't think that, yeah,
that's something that's too farstretch, right, understand, but
it points us in anotherdirection, towards your, your
current lifestyle and how you'reliving it.
Do you see ways in which Fettyis going to change the dating
(54:59):
world right, like, is there waysin which Fetty can offer an
additional benefit that maybeyou feel would be impactful for
the world to know?
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Yeah, I mean what?
What are you thinking like aFetty dating app?
Hey, I mean, we're giving youthe stage.
Yeah, yeah, I mean you neverknow, never say never.
It's interesting to think about.
I mean Fetty itself with therideshare product.
One big thing that we're allabout is bringing people
together.
Yeah, you know, and and Ialready know from stories when
they'll say, oh yeah, I, we hadour first kiss in the back of a
(55:31):
feather.
You know, oh yeah, I met him ona Fetty, or I met him at a
pregame and we took a Fettytogether With the group or
whatnot.
And so, naturally, you know,whether it's indirectly or
directly, I'm sure Fetty ishaving an influence on
relationships out there.
So if I've matched Withoutunknowingly, if I've matched you
(55:51):
and your boyfriend andgirlfriend together, yeah, let
me know, that'll be awesome.
Speaker 3 (55:56):
And then we gotta ask , like you, we want you to leave
a question for our next guest.
We're not gonna tell you whothe guest is.
Okay, I want you to have aquestion that you asked them
about their love.
Speaker 2 (56:06):
Okay, give me a second to think about it, about
their love life, yeah love, lifeand or love, relationships,
anything dating, all right.
What's the freakiest thingthey've done?
Let's see they might give you amedia trained question then.
Media trained questionfreakiest thing we've done is
kiss with her eyes.
(56:26):
Freakiest thing, maybe, maybe,but if they go viral, oh yeah,
yeah, we'll see well, that's nota bad idea.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
That is gonna be our question that we hold on to.
Speaker 2 (56:44):
Yeah, I cannot wait to our next guest answer it.
I'm gonna be listening to seewhat they say.
Speaker 3 (56:51):
I know we appreciate that.
I mean cast has this greatsaying where can everyone stalk
you?
Yeah yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2 (56:58):
Instagram is good, linkedin's good for for my
fellow corporate people outthere, and just keeping up with
Fetty on Instagram, a lot ofwhat I do has to do is pushed on
to Fetty so file.
Following the Fetty Instagramis always great and you'll get
exposed to a lot of good contentthere.
Speaker 1 (57:14):
Yeah, the Fetty ticktocks awesome.
Like I'm not a huge tick tock,I'm obsessed.
But even like CFOs, likethey're watching tick tock every
once, fucking on tick tock.
So that is true?
Speaker 2 (57:26):
No, callie, who does all the tick tock?
She's been doing a great jobwith that.
Speaker 1 (57:29):
Yeah, they're amazing .
So kudos to her because theyare awesome.
Yeah, well, thank you so much,matthew.
Speaker 2 (57:36):
You're awesome.
Speaker 3 (57:37):
I don't it.
We appreciate it.
We really appreciate you.
There's a lot you can be doing.
Like to give us some no, no, nogood combo.
Speaker 2 (57:42):
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
I didn't even realize , like yesterday was your
birthday.
So that's you know, if I wereyou, I'd be like hungover.
Speaker 2 (57:50):
Yeah, no, but it was a, it was a good time and thank
you guys for having me.
Yeah, conversations, nice, Ilove, loved coming on here.
Podcast is obviously beautiful.
Yeah, yeah, two great hosts,yeah, we appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (58:02):
What do we always say about in the lobby?
Speaker 3 (58:04):
We like to close out the lobby in one way.
Okay, so let everybody knowcome back next week because it's
going down.
Oh, love it.
Speaker 2 (58:12):
See you guys.
Speaker 1 (58:16):
It's so funny.
Hey guys, welcome to In the Lobby podcast.
Our guest celebrated his 27thbirthday yesterday.
Happy, belated, yeah, happybirthday.
We have Matthew Iomi, the CEOof FETI, in the lobby with us
today.
Did you do anything fun foryour birthday yesterday?
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Yeah.
So a couple days prior, me andthe team and some friends went
out.
We went to Electric Shuffle.
If you've ever been, I have notit's a do you know what shuffle
?
I think it's calledshuffleboard, but it's where,
like, the pucks slide on the fan.
So it's essentially this.
You know, bar slash restaurant.
I'm not like, yes, manning youto death, like I actually do
know this, yeah, yeah okay, it'sactually like a bar restaurant,
(00:43):
but it's themed around these,those games that are just all
over the place and they're, youknow, digitally tracked so you
can keep score and split intoteams.
So it was super fun First timeI've been.
Did you win, our team lost?
Okay, we did the FETI teamagainst the plus ones and the
plus ones beat us.
Geez, oh yeah.
So that's sad to say.
(01:03):
And then everyone went homehappy, at least I know, yeah for
sure.
And then yesterday we went, mygirlfriend and I went to ATX
Casino Love.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
It was my first time there.
Very good it was good.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
It was good.
We got like the octopus andshrimp and then carne, asada and
a few other dishes, but it's areally solid place.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
Did you get any drinks there?
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I was going to say their margaritas are really good
, are they?
Good yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
They gave us a complimentary champagne for the
birthday, so that was nice ofthem.
So shout out to them.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
Yeah, actually, one of the owners, I think, lives in
my building.
Shout out to the Sienna again,really yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
Yeah, but it was a nice, I enjoyed it Turn 27.
So some people say it's young,Some people say it's old.
I feel like I you know I'mgetting older.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
It is insane to think , like this guy, like you're 27.
And I mean, if my researchserves me correctly, you're
ranked on the Forbes 30 under 30.
Uh-huh, correct, I mean onekudos to you, Congratulations,
that's quite the accomplishment.
I appreciate it If you wouldhave met me at 27,.
I was not doing what you weredoing, so it's like it's a huge
(02:16):
compliment, but like, maybe youcould dive into a little bit of
how did you get to the point orstage where you said Fetty's an
idea that you want to take, takeon.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
Yeah, I'm going to.
I'm going to jump in there,cause I feel like we have to
take it a step back, because I'ma Fetty fan, I know Roger's a.
Fetty fan but like some peoplelistening are probably like what
are they talking about?
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Yeah, so.
So for those who don't know uh,the unfortunate though, uh
people who don't know yet whatFetty is, um, it's essentially a
group ride share, which we kindof coined that phrase for the
first time because it reallyhasn't been done.
What group ride share means istaking ride share technology.
Right, you're familiar withUber, lyft.
You can call a vehicle with thetouch of a button, on demand or
(02:59):
pre scheduled.
But what's new with us is thatwe utilize high capacity
vehicles, primarily 15 passengerpassenger Sprinter vans, so
that groups or businesses canget one of these vehicles on
demand with a click of a button,with the same accessibility,
affordability and convenience ofride share Um, and everyone
gets to ride together, right, soit's just a better experience
(03:22):
than taking multiple cars,whether it's personal vehicles
or ride share Um, and it'sobviously helping the
environment where we're removingunnecessary vehicles off of the
road.
We just have a story, uh, utAustin just did a study on that
actually of the impact thatwe're having in Austin with the
congestion issue.
Speaker 3 (03:39):
I actually saw your post on LinkedIn, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
So that was really exciting and and and awesome to
see Um.
But yeah, the base basically,you know, groups and businesses
prior to Fetty either had tosplit up the group or reserve a
party bus or a charter vehicledays or weeks in advance, pay a
three hour minimum for maybejust a 10 minute ride downtown,
right, Um, and have no paymentflexibility where one person has
to put a down deposit, pay anarm and a leg and hope that
(04:06):
everyone pays them back, Whereaswith Fetty now, click of a
button, this uh 15 passengerSprinter van comes to you,
Everyone gets in, Everyone canpay separately by scanning a QR
code.
We like to say you, you book itlike Uber and Lyft, but you pay
like Lyman bird, the scooterswith the QR codes, Um, and we've
just created this reallyawesome service that people have
grown to love and just a greatcommunity that centered around
(04:29):
bringing people together.
Speaker 3 (04:30):
Sure, sure, and I mean Cass, maybe if you want to
dive into any other part of it.
I kind of want to ask aquestion, but I wonder did you
go to UT or I went to A&M.
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Okay, yeah, so I went to A&M, so I feel that the
article came from UT.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
I know right, yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Well, yeah, I know, seriously, Um, and I love UT
just because the school and andjust Austin in general supported
us so much we're based out ofhere, absolutely, um, but, yeah,
you know, the biggest thingwith with UT and Austin is just
Austin, because it's the firstMetro we launched in A&M.
If you have, if you're notfamiliar, it's in college
(05:08):
station, which is, you know,basically in the middle of
nowhere.
Yeah, Like, once collegestudents leave, uh, whether it's
for the summer or winter break,yeah, city dries out, city
dries out.
I know business, I rememberbusinesses, would you know,
change their operating hours,sometimes not even open, on, you
know, just cause, I mean, thecity just dries up, um, so, you
know what, how much of a realimpact can you have?
(05:29):
On, you know, they don't reallyhave a congestion issue at the
moment, whereas with Austin, um,we've been here for four years
now, um, and we've been a realasset to the community and just
with how many vehicles we havehere and how many groups and
passengers were transporting, um, the impact is real and
obviously, uh, ut Austinrecognized that and so that's
(05:50):
why they came out with thatstudy, which, yeah, it was
awesome.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Selfishly.
I want to know like do Aggiescome party in in Austin?
Yeah, yeah, they definitely do,Okay.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, get out of this small town, I know.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
I know no, but the coolest thing with what we've
done in terms of our marketingor expansion strategy, you know,
for those who don't know theFETI markets, I'll try and list
them off, all the you know, offthe top of my head.
It's college station, uh, thenit's Austin, it's Dallas, fort
Worth, lubbock, um, houston, uh,tuscaloosa, alabama and Baton
(06:25):
Rouge, louisiana.
And what's really cool with youknow how we've spread out, is
that we get a lot of um, youknow, feti users who utilize the
service at A&M, let's say, andthen they go visit their friends
at UT and they can also useFETI there.
Or, you know, during the summerthey go back to their hometown
in Houston and they can use FETIthere.
(06:46):
And so we're trying to get youknow this network effect where,
no matter where our users go, wewant to be there so that we can
continue giving them that FETIexperience.
Wow.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Yeah, I mean it's kind of crazy to me that such a
big idea like FETI came out ofcollege station, because I mean
college station.
I'm trying to think what's thelittle party, the square?
Speaker 2 (07:06):
or something Northgate yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, northgate.
So I'm just assuming you knowthat's where FETI you take a
FETI to Northgate in A&M.
Yeah, probably, probably thatwas I'm not going to lie maybe
85.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Do you walk around?
Yeah, no, that was probably 85,90% of where our trips were
going when we launched there.
Other times it was to dinnersor venues for, you know,
sorority or fraternity events or, um, you know, a few businesses
would use us for co-workingevents, but primarily it was to
Northgate.
Um, and that's another thingabout Austin and kind of these
metro areas like Dallas, fortWorth and Houston that we're
(07:41):
seeing the usage, you know theuse case for FETI dramatically
increase.
So, for example, not only arepeople in Austin taking it to
6th Street but they're alsotaking it to Moody Center for
concerts, they're taking it toAustin FC for, uh, for soccer
games, they're taking it to LakeTravis for party barges, um, in
(08:02):
metro areas there's just a lot,you know, a lot more use cases
which makes just the frequencyof trips and, um, the frequency
of times where you can think, oh, let's take a Feddy, just that
much more.
So we're super excited aboutthe growth we've seen,
especially in these metro areas,got it?
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (08:19):
Yeah, I mean that's crazy to think that you kind of
started this out of A&M and whenyou started it you were going
to school there, right?
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
it was my senior year .
I like to say that the onlything better to come out of, the
only better business to comeout of A&M is Buckeys.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
I don't know from you , but the Buckeys, huge Buckeys,
the Buckeys founder went to A&MGot it.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I have another one.
Do you know, like the ringwraps on the Aggie rings that
all the girls have?
Uh-huh, it's like the diamonds,uh-huh.
That's a pretty good businessmodel that came out of A&M.
Speaker 2 (08:48):
Did this get started by a?
Speaker 1 (08:49):
Yeah, it was started by a Aggie, a girl, Emily, who
started putting like diamondsaround the Aggie rings.
Wow, I didn't know this oh yeah, my little sister when she
graduated that's all she wantedwas like this $3,000 of diamond
wrap around her.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
Yeah, they get hefty those rings.
Yeah, I've got mine on righthere.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Yeah, they're nice.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
They're nice.
Yeah, but shout out to Emilythen.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
I think we gotta get you with like a nice like.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
I know I'm like I wonder if we should maybe like
get Matt's blinged out.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I don't know if that'd be a good look, if you're
just diamond wrapped, yeah,necklaces everywhere.
Speaker 3 (09:23):
So you're a co-founder.
Did you all both go to A&M?
Speaker 2 (09:27):
No.
So Justin went to UTD, okay,and then after that he went to
California and he had a webdevelopment kind of agency he
was running.
But I had known him since highschool.
How'd you know?
Yeah, I had known him sincehigh school and since high
school we always had kind ofthis same idea of kind of like,
(09:48):
oh, what's creative that wecould do.
Sure, you know so, whenever hehad an idea he'd reach out to me
.
Whenever I had an idea, I'dreach out to him.
So that kind of kept thatcommunication open and that line
.
And ultimately it led to hey,there's these two students at
A&M who want to sell a party buscompany.
(10:09):
What do you think about gettinginvolved in the rest of history
?
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Okay, yeah, and then I would probably want to dive a
bit further into that, since Iwent to the same high school.
Where is high school Like?
Where are you from?
Speaker 2 (10:20):
originally Coppell, so it's a suburb outside of
Dallas, sure.
But yeah, elementary throughhigh school I went there, which
very blessed to go there, supernice place to grow up.
That led to a lot ofopportunities, is that?
Speaker 3 (10:35):
closer, just for the audience.
Is that closer to Dallas?
Houston, Austin Close, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Oh wait, what is closer?
Coppell, yeah, Coppell.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
It's a.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Dallas suburb Okay got it yeah.
So it's a suburb outside ofDallas.
It's close for those that knowthe area Greatvine, denton,
carrollton, colleyville, overthere.
Got it yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
And then maybe I'll dive into just another part of
the business for FETI Is it, hasit always been, multiple
vehicles or like?
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Well, it started out with one bus, really Started out
with one bus, and I was drivingit.
Oh, no way.
Yeah, so every weekend and it'sfunny because I think that's
one of the because I've heardpeople say oh, I had that same
idea in college, or I had asimilar idea that I was gonna do
.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
Who's willing to drive the bus?
Well, exactly.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Who's willing to drive the bus, but every weekend
too.
So, like, while my friends andclassmates were going out, I had
to get in the bus, drive itThursday, friday, Saturday and
deal with all the issues thatcome with that, taking it to the
mechanic during the week.
These were old buses that,because we couldn't afford much,
right, yeah.
(11:44):
So it would break down almostevery week.
Something would happen AC orradiator or something so it was
in and out of there, but, yeah,I mean just driving people
around to and from Northgate,different places around college
station and ultimately we got tothe point where demand was good
enough where we bought anotherbus.
So then I hired a driver whowas driving the other bus and I
(12:09):
was driving the second bus, andthen just rinse and repeat.
We got to five buses.
I had delegated everything to amanager and the drivers were
driving, and that's kind of oneof the coolest things about this
process is that I kind of wentthrough all the stages and I
think that's something that'simportant to where.
(12:29):
If you think, let's say,someone wants to do a ride share
company, if you want to do aride share company, I think the
most valuable thing you could dois have driven a lot for a ride
share or something that'scomparable like that.
That gave us a lot of insightinto what the obstacles and
(12:51):
hurdles of the traditionalcharter bus and party bus
industry had, which opened manyavenues for us to say, hey.
One thing that could be betteris that these groups, they don't
necessarily know when they wantto head out, so let's make it
on demand so that they can headout when they're ready.
(13:11):
What's?
that typical wait time.
Typical wait time.
Obviously it depends duringsurge whether it's on a weekend
night during prime time, but onaverage I would say it's about
10 minutes.
Got it.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
Yeah.
So when you first started outyou were driving, which I'm
really impressed by.
I did not know that, but I'mlike how are people getting the
FedE?
Because I can't think at thatpoint you had an app.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Yeah, no, no.
Everything was so archaic whenwe first bought the bus from the
two students.
They didn't have a website oranything, they just had a work
phone and they had a number andan Instagram and if you wanted
the bus you would text thenumber.
You'd have to text it maybe aday in advance, and then the bus
(13:57):
would show up at that time andthe people got onto the bus and
would pay $5 per person cash.
Yeah, that's huge, yeah.
And so I remember the earlydays after a weekend on my
living room table in my collegestation apartment.
Got a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
You would think I was a drug dealer.
Speaker 3 (14:15):
Because it was the stacks of cash.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
I'm like all right, there's no way the company can
scale like this.
And we were having issues too.
We were finding out some of thedrivers were skimping out and
saying, hey, 10 people got ontomy bus when really maybe 15 got
on For sure.
And so it's like any businesslike that if you want to scale
it, you can't be operating withcash like that.
Did you keep any?
Speaker 3 (14:38):
of those drivers like around till present day, like,
have any of them lasted?
Speaker 2 (14:42):
In college station there might be one or two, ok,
but whenever we first launchedin Austin, there's a couple that
have been with us for a long,long time.
Speaker 3 (14:53):
You know that's a sign of the fruits of your labor
.
Oh for sure, like people stillwant to stick around.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Oh for sure, the turnover on FETI, the driver
turnover on FETI is very, veryrare.
Most drivers prefer to use ourapp for income opportunities
because they just get paid somuch better than other ride
share companies.
If you think about it, you know, a driver with one trip is
(15:20):
generating three to four timesthe revenue of an Uber or a Lyft
trip because they can fit threeto four times the amount of
people, for sure, whilemaintaining the cost profile of
one vehicle, it's still the costof one driver or one van, so
the margins are just that muchgreater where we can share more
with the driver.
So that's been something thatwe've been really blessed with
(15:42):
where, unlike Uber and Lyft, whoare always spending so much
money competing for driversAbsolutely we don't have, we can
focus more of our capital andresources on improving the app
and marketing and all thisdifferent stuff, because our
drivers just are earning muchmore than any other option.
Speaker 3 (16:03):
Man, you're like the Drake line I heard back in the
day.
It's like Drake.
He had a line that he said Imake all the music that my
friends party to, so it's likethat time that you were taken
away from partying.
You were putting that time inand that sweat equity to the
whole time.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
No, that's true, yeah , and congrats, no, I appreciate
it Cause you're gonna be likewhat, like 21 maybe.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
Yeah, 2021.
And honestly, even after Ihired the drivers, I still
didn't go out on weekends.
Because You're still working,man, because something always
would happen A van would breakdown, or they'd have a question
about the app or this and that,and I can't be at the club.
I can't even hear on my phonetrying to answer calls.
(16:46):
So really I didn't go out, andthat's what I talk about.
When people say that they woulddo it, it's like would you
really sacrifice years?
And that's weekends, right, andI don't think most people would
, but fortunately for me, lesscompetition is better.
Oh yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 1 (17:02):
I love that I always have so much respect for people
that kind of go heads down thoseyounger years and I feel like
those people have very goodroutines.
So I'm kind of wondering whatyour day to day routine looks
like as a 27 year old CEO.
Do you kind of have a morningroutine or an evening routine?
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Yeah, the morning routine.
I just like to wake up and Iknow a lot of people say it's
bad for you, I suppose, but I gostraight to my phone and check
emails and reply to the quickemails that I can before doing
anything.
Big zero inbox guy.
Yeah yeah, yeah, if it's spam,delete it.
If I need to respond, respond.
If it's something that reallyneeds a lot of my time, I'll
(17:47):
wait till I'm out of bed gettinggotten ready, everything like
that.
I've got a dog so that healways keeps me disciplined.
Take him out, give him a quickwalk.
I'm obsessed with my dog.
Speaker 3 (17:58):
I gotta ask what kind of?
Yeah, I've got a.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Husky.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (18:02):
That's amazing.
He or she is a talker.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Yeah for sure, I already know when I get back
home he's gonna have a lot tosay.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
I got a black lab.
I'm like obsessed man, I'mobsessed.
Speaker 2 (18:13):
Yeah, and he was my first.
I got him the first year ofwhen we bought the party bus
company, so he's been a day onefor sure.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
He's a chief dog officer.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
Yeah, yeah, he's in a few of the Instagram reels.
Yeah, in pictures he's anofficial Fetty dog.
We like to say Love that, yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
I mean, I guess I'll turn some of those questions to
you a bit about the business andlike getting funding, because
you talk about being 21 andreally putting in that sweat
equity to get some of that jobdone and build it and scale it
appropriately.
How do you have time to findinvestors and pass your classes?
Speaker 2 (18:53):
Yeah, well, the first one reason why we've been so
successful is that we've neverbuilt the business around other
people's money.
So from the get go I'll giveyou an example Just to buy the
party bus business, people thinklike, oh well, you must have a
lot of money, like, I can neverdo that.
Sure, we had saved up somemoney.
(19:15):
It wasn't a lot, but wenegotiated with the two people
who were selling it to do apayment plan, got it, so it was
just a little bit down and thenpaying it off each month.
And what were we doing to payit off each month?
It was the money that wascoming in from the you were
collecting fives, man, exactly,yeah.
And so that's one thing toowhere a lot of people think
(19:39):
there's no way for them.
Business is fun because you canget creative.
As long as the person sittingopposite the table is it I don't
know, is it thinking clearly orwhatnot, you can come up with
some creative solutions to makeeverybody win.
And so, yeah, I mean we reliedon the business to grow.
(20:02):
It Obviously use some creditcards.
And then, once it kind of proveditself and people were using
the service more and more and wegrew to other cities.
People naturally wanted to getinvolved, so fortunately, we
brought on some great partners.
One of those is a venture firmcalled Y Combinator.
(20:25):
Yeah, and Y Combinator were thefirst investors in a lot of
good companies.
They're based out of San Fran.
They were the first investorsin Cruz, dordat although Cruz is
having issues right now butDordash, instacart, airbnb,
coinbase, dropbox, a lot ofothers.
But we've been very fortunatebecause they've given us great
(20:47):
resources on top of the money,and so just different partners
like that have allowed us togrow well.
But that all came after we hadkind of made it.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
So at this point you've graduated.
Then yeah, From there okay.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
So we graduated, we had launched in Austin, because
whenever we made our firstrounds with investors, they were
like hey, this is a coolbusiness, but will it work in a
metro?
For sure it works in a collegetown.
Will it work in?
Speaker 1 (21:11):
a metro.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
To the test.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
Yeah, exactly, and so a lot of things we had to go
out and prove without muchoutside capital assistance, and
I think that's the best way togrow a business, because if
you're dependent on outsidecapital, at some point, no
matter what those opportunitiesare gonna dry up.
And if you're left with abusiness that's just burning a
(21:34):
lot of capital and not able tobe self-sustainable, you're
either gonna end up bankrupt oryou're gonna end up selling a
lot of the company more than youneed to, where it's not even
worth it at that point For sure.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
I feel like when you bring in that investment or when
you started trying to grow tolike metro cities, did you ever
like have a moment where youwere like what the fuck is going
on?
And like I don't know if I wassitting in your shoes, I would
feel like a great sense ofoverwhelm, like this is a lot at
a really young age, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:06):
The thing is it happened.
I guess it happened quickly,but to me it happened slowly, so
it wasn't just oh, I'm drivinga party bus and then all of a
sudden Fetiz is, you know, inthree states he was successful.
Right, it started with twobuses, then we got to five buses
, then we tried launching inAustin, and so you know it's
(22:28):
because it was a gradual process, you know it doesn't feel too
overwhelming or surprising inthat sense, but certainly, you
know, it's always good to take astep back and acknowledge that
wow, we've come a long way thatentrepreneurial mindset, like it
comes from somewhere.
Speaker 3 (22:44):
Like is this mom, dad ?
That's an age old question,relatives, right.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Did you see?
Speaker 3 (22:50):
somebody else do this .
You know what motivated you tobecome an entrepreneur?
Speaker 2 (22:55):
Yeah, I still ask that question every day, sure,
and my answer now is differentthan my answer was five years
ago, and my answer today willprobably be different than it
was, than it is five years fromnow, sure, but growing up, I
always liked reading fantasybooks, so Fellow nerd here.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Yeah, that's right, chrissy Jackson, here we're
going.
Oh, lightning Thief, yeah, yeah, that was the first book that
got me into reading Really, yeah, like.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
Harry Potter guy over here.
Harry Potter, I read a lot StarWars, I loved comic books and
maybe that has to do with it,where, you know, it's kind of a
mindset of, hey, we're writingour book, you know we're writing
our comic and you know, if youcan, you know you want to be the
(23:47):
main character in your book,yeah, the protagonist.
And what does that mean?
It means, you know, creatingsomething or doing something
impactful for others.
Right, that, you know,hopefully, is remembered after
your time and it's somethingbigger than you, which you know.
I think we're on the righttrack.
(24:08):
But yeah, I mean, I'm surethere's also plenty of other
variables that have to do withmy childhood.
Who knows?
My parents are divorced, so youknow We'd have to go do a
therapy session and do thatquestion.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
Yeah, why do we think or why are we the way we are so
well, yeah, I love that becauseMatthew's like saying like main
character moment over here andI also think there's something
to reading and people reading alot Like I think that just means
you're okay sitting alone withyourself.
Yeah, sure, and to grow abusiness, I feel like you have
(24:43):
to be uncomfortable being alone,Cause while everyone else was,
like you know, out drinkingtrying to get girls, you had to
be a little bit more heads down,focused on studies.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
No, no, no, I agree.
And thinking back just incollege prior, I was very
comfortable.
I took a lot of time kind ofjust obviously taking care of my
studies, but also just kind ofasking questions of you know
what's going on, whether it'sphilosophical or religious or or
(25:13):
economical, and trying to learna lot about that and trying to
understand just kind of what isa?
What is this world that we'rekind of born into, what's the
history of it, and and how canyou, if you view life as a game,
you know how can you do well init?
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Yeah, when we say that life's like a video game.
Yeah you really can wake up anddecide to be like a different
version of yourself.
Certainly yeah, I do it everyday.
I'm like what do I want to wear?
What do I want to look?
Speaker 3 (25:41):
like what do I want?
Speaker 1 (25:42):
to be today.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
I mean somebody else, you are a celebrity.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
I called Roger.
I was like Roger.
Someone asked me today when Iwas getting a smoothie if I'm a
celebrity and I was like it mustbe the energy, yeah, yeah well,
that's a whole simulationtheory, right.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
I don't know who knows, maybe this is just a TV
show and they're looking.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
Yeah, I mean give me this then, like, what chapter
are you in right now for yourown book?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
And this game.
It's hard to tell.
Yeah, you know, if you had a,you had a pinpoint where you are
at the moment.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
Well, it's like man I .
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Drink some raw water real quick.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
Oh, that's a path.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Yeah, electrolytes, right right, um, you have to be
so careful when, whenever you'redoing this type of stuff,
because things can change soquickly.
For sure, I never take it forgranted, and, and While the
company is in a great positionright now, and and we've always
had obstacles and we've alsoover overcame them, like there's
(26:43):
always ups and downs.
Oh yeah, I'd like to think thisis the beginning, you know, of
FETI.
That's what I do believe, butyou always have to be kind of
that.
Not a pessimist, but I guess arealist that you know things can
change very quickly.
But let's say everything goeswell, this is the beginning.
(27:04):
We scale this to every majormetro in the country, for sure,
hopefully get internationallyand let's be getting into
existence, yeah, yeah, and, andat that point we've created such
a valuable service thatspecifically, you know, with,
with college-age students andand what's really cool is that,
as, as this business continuesto flourish, those college
(27:27):
students that breathe and loveFETI, the FETI experience, they
graduate, right, yeah, so all ofa sudden we're gonna have all
the mid-20s and and and late 20sgreat marketing plan, yeah.
And then it goes to what?
Then we'll have all the 30s,yeah, to the point where, if we
can make this a lasting business, we can have.
It's kind of how Apple did it.
(27:48):
They started really young,absolutely.
You know a lot of the earlyadopters of the iPhone or the
iPad, the eye touch, all thosewere young people.
They grow up and they stickwith it.
They stick with I can't gowithout mine, man.
No, you're telling me theystick with Apple, and that's
kind of the thing that we wantto do.
And so you know I've touched alittle bit about on the past,
(28:08):
that that, as we kind of youknow, grow with our users we
want to begin offering themother services and and I think
that's that's a big thing and abig vision of the FETI ecosystem
Is providing them with otherservices, whether it's content,
podcast, apparel.
Obviously it just information,different rideshare options.
(28:35):
Maybe we go towards, you know,providing.
No, I don't know.
I don't know but kind of the the.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I'm just thinking off the top of my head, yeah, yeah,
I mean, it seems like you havereally big goals, which is
really inspiring, absolutely.
Um, have you had a moment whereyou were kind of like, oh, I've
made it a little bit like oneof those moments, or bought
yourself Something like a car?
(29:04):
Made it purchase or somethinglike exciting that you celebrate
.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
No, I mean Me and Justin, my co-founder.
We don't even we.
We don't pay ourselves a lot.
That's what I was gonna, and forthe first Probably like two to
probably like the first year anda half we didn't pay ourselves
anything, yeah, and then afterthat it was literally something
super small, so that foraccounting it shows that we're
employees of the company, yeah,and and I think the biggest you
(29:30):
know achievement was what?
Finally, when we feltcomfortable, say, hey, let's
give us a, an appropriate salaryto where we're not, we're not
struggling yeah, I think that'sreally cool.
To where, you know, essentially, we created this Job
opportunity in this salaryourselves.
Yeah, right, you're not justgoing out and trying to get
(29:52):
someone else to give it to you.
We kind of went out and and putin the time and effort and the
pain and the joys to Now be atthis position where, all right,
you know, you know I can, I cansave some, I don't have to worry
about rent, I don't have toworry about yeah.
Zeus is my Huskies food, youknow all that stuff, so I think
(30:12):
that's really cool.
Zeus, I love that my Dog.
He looks like a Zeus.
He's got a nice coat.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
I got King, yeah, oh yeah, yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
I think Zeus would would be the king, though.
Oh.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
I'm kidding, I promise you my dog is like he'll
.
He could get beat up by thewall Like he's just a big big.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
No Zeus is sweet too.
Yeah, I mean, I think you know,especially in this game, the
biggest, the biggest, you know Imade it, I know I.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
I feel like that salary is a big one.
Speaker 2 (30:47):
It's nice and it's not a big salary, no no, no, I,
we're one of the on our team.
We actually get paid.
One of the least, yeah, butit's the fact that we're able to
, I think, is super interesting,because I know my mom.
Whenever I told her, whenever Itold her oh yeah, you don't
have to worry anymore, we'repaying ourselves.
Now it was like oh, from where?
(31:08):
He said, from where, how areyou doing it?
I'm like from the business,it's making money.
And I was like she was like, oh, okay, nice cuz, she's an
immigrant, she's from Mexico andand and she she was very
supported but didn't really, youknow, understand Much of what
was going on, and she's neverdownloaded the uber app or
anything like that.
So, rideshare, she didn't knowanything about that, but so that
(31:31):
was a cool time.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
So culturally year, are you?
Speaker 2 (31:33):
100% Mexican.
No, my mom's Mexican, my dad'sBritish love.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Yeah so.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Yeah, my dad was working on a on a cruise ship.
He went to go work on a cruiseship when he was 18, after that
settled in California and thenmy mom my mom got introduced to
him from her sister Okay, whoher sister was married to a man
who worked with my dad on thecruise ships Got it, yeah.
(32:02):
But that's another thing toothat that I've always enjoyed is
having kind of that, um,diverse viewpoint and
perspective, culturallyabsolutely, and I've traveled a
lot and I think one thing thatthat's been really nice is
seeing how different people areand the same in some ways for
sure.
You know, definitely differentcultures are different, but
within that same culture you seea lot of similarities.
(32:24):
Yeah, and I think that's helpedme deal with a lot of different
type of people, and More sothan that, understanding Kind of
what type of, what type ofperson they are and how they
grew up and how it mold, youknow, affects them.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Yeah, I love that.
I think I'm kind of like you,like I love understanding things
and especially understandingpeople, like I'm always asking
Roger questions, like trying tolike decipher people.
Oh yeah, want to understandthem at a deeper level.
Speaker 3 (32:50):
You have a great sense of intuition too.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, like intuition.
But Roger and I keep talkingabout Misconceptions and so I
feel like there has to be somemisconceptions, not only about
you, but maybe the FETI brand aswell.
So I wanted to see, like whatwould you say, or like the
biggest misconceptions about you, what's the biggest man?
Speaker 3 (33:10):
This is your one-liner.
Speaker 1 (33:12):
I feel like you've had to have gotten some shade,
like maybe even from people youwent to school with, like I mean
, I feel like you've precededyour peers in a lot of ways by
having this business at 27 yearsold.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Yeah, I mean Misconceptions.
I mean, I guess the age is abig one.
Obviously, when you're tryingto do these big deals, you know
they're going to be lesstrusting.
If it's a young person, likewhat does he know?
Yeah, what does he know is abusiness legit, and that's
(33:46):
something that COVID actuallyhelped with, because everything
started turning towards emailand Zoom, which it's not as
apparent.
That certainly helps.
You know you have a goodsignature pick and you know the
sky's the limit, right, yeah,corporate on the top, pajamas on
the bottom, exactly.
(34:07):
But yeah, I mean I'd probablysay the age thing is a
misconception.
You know I'm trying to thinkwhat else?
Speaker 3 (34:19):
I mean, that's fair.
Let that be it Like you'redefeating it daily, and I mean
you have two people here in thisroom.
I think very highly of you andI'm sure there's a large
audience out here in Austin, notonly in your hometown but in
other areas for instance as well.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Yeah, and it's not like it's.
The misconception has alwaysled to negative things, like
with me.
Being young, that's also led toa lot of opportunities, for
sure, because when you'reyounger, more people want to
help you out because you'retrying to make it right.
So whether it's press coverageor media or this, and that if
you're an older fellow trying todo it, it's kind of like oh,
(34:58):
you know he's trying to do itwith, whereas with a young
person maybe they're like oh,look, how inspiring, you know
different stuff.
Speaker 3 (35:05):
Like that, they really remember that day when
they were you, you know.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Yeah, exactly.
So I wouldn't say it's bad orgood, just you know the way
things are.
But, fortunately, how Justinand I have built the business,
our actions do the talking.
Yeah, you know it's now.
Now we can walk in and it'shard for them to be biased
(35:29):
against our age, because theythemselves have written in a
fetish and used our service Forsure, you know.
So it's like, hey, you canthink I'm young, but you know
you're sending us.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
You used it before, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:39):
Exactly so.
Fortunately, we've gotten overthat hump and that's kind of how
it kind of really led on andwent to where, if you've got a
good business and you've got agood service, it really does
speak for itself For sure.
And we're fortunate to whereyeah, we do some great.
We didn't do marketing for thelongest time.
It just naturally spread like awildfire because of word of
(36:00):
mouth, right.
We like to say whenever youconvert one FETI customer,
you're converting 9, 10, 11, 12,who also utilize the same
service, right?
So that that week over weekgrowth is exponential.
And so for the longest time wedidn't put much, much money into
marketing because the productwould just grow and speak for
itself.
And it's kind of one of thosethings.
(36:20):
Look, if you're not going toFETI, what are you going to do?
Speaker 3 (36:23):
You're going to split up the group and you don't know
who you're going to get back.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
So that's been something that'sbeen really nice, Just letting
our work speak for itself and bea damned how old we are.
Speaker 3 (36:40):
Well, I got to ask, man, it's like you talk about
your birthday, you being able toenjoy a nice meal with your
partner.
Yeah, I'm sure, and I don'twant to assume.
Maybe you can answer thisbefore I get into my question.
Were you even able to celebratethat famous kiss under the tree
at A&M?
No no, the century tree?
No no, I never did that.
(37:00):
I mean, you were working yourbutt off.
It's your senior year.
No, no, but I had a girlfriendwhile I was working, and yeah.
No, it's a good thing you didn'thave that kiss.
Oh, I guess.
Speaker 2 (37:12):
Because I think if you kiss, I think the thing is
you're going to get married orsomething like that.
I forget, I forget what thetradition is, but no, I've been
super blessed with my previousrelationships and my current
relationship.
I've been really blessed withthe partners that I've had.
Good for you, yeah, nothing badto say about any of them.
Speaker 3 (37:33):
How the heck did you find time to find a partner?
You know I mean.
This is something.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
She's amazing because the last event we had, I
dragged you here to come checkout the podcast video and you
guys showed up to pouch six.
Yeah, at like 7pm or somethingon a Wednesday night and she
came with you and I could justtell from her energy like what a
supportive partner she is Forsure.
Speaker 2 (37:56):
She's got boss energy .
And she's killing it herself inher own domain as well.
Speaker 1 (38:00):
Yeah, I just feel like, as an entrepreneur and
we've talked about this like itcould be lonely right and then
going home and having someone tolike bounce ideas off of, I
feel like it just makes you apoint and even better, leader.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Yeah certainly, I mean I'm super blessed with
everything that's happened withme.
Yeah, I mean, you go home, thecycle that these kind of
startups go through is just upsand downs.
You think everything's goingwell, until you get one text or
(38:35):
email.
Having someone there that'ssupportive, just for you to just
talk about what's happening,yeah, I think it's huge.
And that goes the same thingwith having a co-founder, for
sure.
Right, having someone who youcan talk about, kind of what's
important to you or as a friendor even a partner, might need
(38:57):
that space where, hey, noteverything can be about business
.
So just having that supportsystem, for sure I don't think
no.
I couldn't have done it bymyself.
I would not be here where I amby myself.
It's important to acknowledgethat, but I've been super
blessed in that domain for sure.
Speaker 3 (39:15):
Is she blocking off all the I'm sure women throwing
themselves at you?
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Oh yeah no, no, no, no, she's great.
I know no other people arecatching my eye.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
Well, that's what I was telling Roger, because I
look at the FETI Instagram andyou guys do have a young
demographic.
Yeah, I was like, damn, thesegirls are gorgeous on the FETI
page.
And these college students.
I was like I wonder if Matthewgets the brunt of any of that,
like these girls trying to throwthemselves at him.
Speaker 3 (39:46):
Yeah, they go for the hug and you're like handshake.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Well, she's going to hate me for saying that I love
her, but she slid in my DMs.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
I love that yeah yeah , this is how you met.
Speaker 2 (39:59):
We love that she took things into her own hands.
She's a true boss man, for sure, for sure.
Yeah, there's a funny saying.
It's like, no matter howsuccessful a B2B founder is, he
could have exited for millionsof dollars or IPO'd, he'll never
(40:21):
be.
The saying is, no matter howsuccessful a B2B founder is, the
wife's going to have an affairwith a B2C founder.
And it's funny because just theB2C founders, the ones who like
their service, their service,their service is being used by
the masses, Just for what I mean.
Obviously there's a reason, butthey just get so much more
(40:44):
attention than the one who builtsome, you know, not boring, but
built some software that's, youknow, being sold to some execs
and they make a whole bunch ofmoney that way.
So I always think that's funny.
But I mean certainly, certainly, you know it happens, but yeah,
that's how it goes.
Speaker 3 (41:04):
What was that first date like?
I mean?
Speaker 1 (41:05):
I mean in the DMs first of all, I have mad respect
for her as a woman Lighting inthe yeah because I call that
like the handkerchief.
Speaker 3 (41:14):
Oh, tell me, what is this.
Speaker 1 (41:15):
Yeah, like if I'm a girl and I'm interested in a guy
, I'll drop my handkerchiefright so I'll slide in the DMs.
Yeah, and then he can choose topick it up or not.
No, but I think a lot of guysare scared to make the first
move, for sure.
So sometimes you have to go getwhat you want, and that's for
sure.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
No, certainly, yeah, it was.
It was right after we hadlaunched In Lubbock at Texas
Tech, and so I was super busy,and so we were chatting it up a
little bit and she kept onasking hey, are you free this
and this?
I'm like I'm gonna be inLubbock, I'm not gonna be
available.
And so she ended up she's likeokay, putting your calendar this
(41:53):
date and and let's, let's go ona date.
I was like all right, that'llwork.
And it was like it was likefour weeks and in the future.
I was like all right, I can'tsay no to that, sure.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
And and so we went on that first date, kicked it off,
and, and the rest is historyand there's still such a drive
of that in-person experience,because I'm sure like having
that message or thatconversation via DM.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
You don't know for sure, yeah, for sure.
No, I mean, I went into it with, you know, reasonable
expectations.
Sure, um, as I'm sure she did,but no, we kicked it off and
reasonable expectations.
Speaker 3 (42:29):
What a CEO.
Speaker 2 (42:32):
No, but uh, but we kicked it off.
She's great, super smart,driven, kind, beautiful.
So that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (42:40):
Shout out to to Ariel hey, I wish you all the the
prosperity.
Honestly, you deserve it.
Thank you, yeah, yeah, so whatabout you guys?
Speaker 2 (42:48):
What's the love life looking like?
Speaker 1 (42:49):
I'm single, I'm single All right you know any
guys that are over like six two.
Speaker 2 (42:55):
Well, look, every all the female co-workers I have
all say that Austin is not theplace to date.
Oh sorry, Roger, I don't knowit's what's to me I mean yeah,
it's been a wild ride, but Ithink when you meet the right
person you'll know for sure, andit's just it takes time.
Speaker 3 (43:11):
Are you single as well?
I've put myself out there andI've actually been lucky enough
to find somebody that keeps myattention.
Okay, nice, you see away fromall right outside world, but I,
it took a long time to get there, man.
Honestly, it's been some, somedifferent experiences.
Yeah, it takes time, right,like you know what you know and
you don't know what you don'tknow for sure before I.
I'm actually from New York,okay.
(43:32):
I moved to Austin.
Yeah, the 70 relationship, soreally.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Yeah, so I had no idea how to date, and that was
your first relationship.
Speaker 3 (43:40):
You could say I've been here on that long.
It was the first long-termrelationship.
I had, some before that.
Yeah, it was like it was theimpactful one, for sure.
Yeah, we all have that oneimpactful one, and then I had no
idea how to be single like I.
Just I was learning, yeah, andAustin was a stopping ground,
but a learning lesson as well.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
Oh yeah so.
Well.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
I'm taking foot and spoken for now.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
Yeah, nice See, I have a similar approach to your
girlfriend.
When I want something, I justgo after it.
It doesn't always work out forme, but I always kind of know
yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:13):
And that I mean it shouldn't even be just in terms
of relationships, right.
Right, there's been so many andI still try and work on this
all the time but there's been somany emails I've sent out where
any normal person would be like, oh, this person's not gonna
reply back, yeah, and we'll geta reply back and it'll lead to
something and and I'll look backwith, with, with Justin, or
(44:35):
with the team, and and we'relike, hey, look, a lot of this.
You know, if you go down thepath of action, where it came
from, it came from a randomemail or application or phone
call or text that you thoughtprobably won't work, but it's
like what you know?
What's the harm?
What harm?
Speaker 1 (44:53):
can I lose?
Hey, that's what happened whenI reached out to you that you
were like getting involved withpodcast.
Yeah, I was like I'm gonnashoot my shot.
Speaker 3 (45:02):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Exactly so.
I think that does lead.
It's a good sign for successGoing out and trying to get it,
because at the end of the day,no one's gonna no one's gonna do
a war, you at all.
You know.
So you've got a big you.
You've got to be your biggestadvocate and you've got to be
like I said, you've got to bethe superhero of your story.
Yeah, you know, no matter howkind people are they're not a
(45:27):
pawn.
No matter how kind people are,it just doesn't make sense for
them to Throw their whole lifeaway to make sure your life is
good, unless it's like a parentor something for sure, right?
So you've got to be yourbiggest Influencer and your
biggest motivator and yourbiggest support system.
(45:48):
So that's another thing.
Like you were talking aboutsupport systems, yeah, it's
great to have this supportsystem, but at the end of the
day, it's it's up to you, yourown advocate.
You know so.
So I think that is a big thingto take note of, and whether
it's relationships or businessor friendships, or, or you know,
with anything, the familymembers or anything, you taking
(46:08):
the initiative, reaching out Ithink is is always gonna play
well in your favor.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
For sure.
I feel like a lot of peoplehave like task paralysis almost
was like their goal, their goals.
You know, like I've done thismyself where I'm like, oh you
know, I'll do the podcast whenthe time's right, but the time's
never gonna be right, right nowalways gonna get in the way
Mm-hmm and I'm sure you'veexperienced that, like as a CEO.
(46:34):
Like life's always happening,what do you do when, like,
something comes up and you'rereally overwhelmed by it?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Those are the toughest, the toughest
Situations, because those arethe ones that I really do feel
like Take time away from my lifein terms of the stress, yeah,
and and.
It's just fight or flight modeeither sit down, give up and let
something happen, or you've gotto come up with different ideas
.
And that's why having aco-founder is great, because
(47:05):
we'll, when something happens,we'll be on hour-long calls just
brainstorming what course ofaction do we take?
Yeah, and, and, and.
That's kind of how I view.
You know those, those obstaclesas they come, I get super
stressed out, but we've managedto get over each one and
hopefully there's not a Momentthat comes that we can't get
(47:26):
over.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Well, yeah, you know, I feel like that's kind of like
the hero's journey, you know,maybe from like reading some of
those books, because I see youactually probably Functioning
really well in fight or flightmode, which is gotta poise man
to you.
Yeah, like you're, like I'meither gonna make this, like
you're not gonna drop the ball,that's what I get.
Speaker 2 (47:48):
Well, I get so there.
There are people that I've comeacross that are a lot more
calmer in situations, sure, butI think that's one reason why we
can get over these hurdles isbecause it stresses me out and
it's gives me so much anxietythat I'm not thinking about
anything else.
Yeah, and, and I hate it.
(48:08):
I hate.
I mean it's aerial consensusand and, and you know, people
can sense it where you know, I'msorry, I'm thinking about this
like, yeah, you know, my, mymood is, is serious.
You know, I can't even talkabout anything else and it might
be like that for a couple daysuntil I figure it out, but I
think that's one reason why I'vebeen effective in those
(48:31):
situations and I, and I don'tlike it, but I don't think about
anything else.
Yeah, you're problem-solver.
Speaker 3 (48:37):
Yeah, so I guess you being a problem-solver and you
having a marketing plan, that'svery different, right?
Mm-hmm, I gotta ask was it youwas an aerial, your partner, or
was it your co-founder that cameup with this famous FETI
question Calling your ex?
That was me, that was you.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
Yeah, okay, yeah, maybe for for the audience Last
time he was in here because wedid a little mock interview with
you.
Matthew said he would not callhis ex.
Speaker 3 (49:05):
Okay, so, and for the audience, out of our spec,
let's tell the audience thefamous FETI question.
Speaker 2 (49:10):
Yeah, so.
So we did kind of the.
We have some ambassadors, orCallie, who does marketing for
us go out to campus and ask youknow random students or people
that are FETI users?
If you call your ex, yeah, andthey pass the vibe check, we'll
give you a month or more of freeFETI rides, yeah, and passing
(49:30):
the vibe check means you have toask them hey, do you know what
FETI is?
Okay, they say yes, then theyget the free rides, and so we
would go out and ask people anda lot of those videos blew up
Because you're just socaptivated.
Absolutely.
Imagine if I had to do that,and I remember One of the women
who did it.
(49:50):
I mean she was shaking, she waslike, alright, he's not gonna
pick up.
I think I'm blocked.
And he ends up picking up what,and?
And she has to explain thequestion and she's just like,
okay, thanks bye, and andeverything was was good after
that.
But, um, but yeah, I mean I'vebeen looking for more ideas like
that.
Yeah, are just captivating thatpeople would want to see.
(50:11):
It's, it's a good one.
It's a good one, but it's, it'srun its course.
We've done a lot of them.
We got to come up withsomething new, I like it.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
You guys are so creative though, because even I
watched one of the reels you did.
It's like the Love Island play.
Oh yeah, when you got a newcastmate.
Yeah, team member really yeah,that was Callie.
Speaker 2 (50:27):
No, Uh, the one one reason why we've built such a
great brand is because youngpeople are working on this
company.
Yeah, you know, it's not abunch of suits and ties.
You know, thinking hey, whatare the kids like?
Now?
Speaker 3 (50:40):
That's a bit of a risk to right like, yeah, taking
a risk, but you're reallybuilding on people's potential
for sure, and so yeah, no thanks, and to the whole team.
Speaker 2 (50:48):
We're all pretty young.
I think the youngest person ismaybe like lower 30s, wow, um.
But but we've all got that kindof perspective of our users.
So it's it's kind of like, youknow, we don't have to really
ask the question oh, what wouldour users like?
Well, we can ask the questionof what do we like?
Yeah, and a lot of the timethat's gonna be Similar to our
(51:11):
users, if not the same.
Speaker 3 (51:12):
For sure, that's a it's very smart and, I would say
, for your ecosystem is forevergrowing.
Is there versions of, maybeAccess points that are set to
come like?
Do you see a Fetty house thatyou want people to know about?
Do you have something that's inthe works that you could kind
of give a little Jewel away?
Speaker 2 (51:31):
Yeah, I mean that that's kind of the name of the
game.
One thing that I found,especially, for example, with
the X question that we asked onsocial media, is that a lot of
and those got millions of viewsfor sure that type of those type
of avenues Kind of supersedethe growth that Fetty as a ride
share company can do.
For example, I mean people inin Los Angeles, where we're not
(51:54):
launched yet, if it's just aride share company, they're not
gonna hear a Fetty, maybe theyhear it through some of their
friends, but they're not gonnaget any use out of it.
Sure, with kind of this mediacomponent that we're kind of
working on and being createdwith our marketing and social
content, it provides value,right, it's entertaining content
for people who don't even haveaccess to the ride share process
(52:14):
, to the ride share product yet.
Yeah, and that's something thatI've I've fell in love with
because it's you know, hey, youknow, yeah, we haven't launched
here yet, but we still gotsomething for you.
So that's something that Ialways keep at top of mind.
Obviously, the main Driver andthe main goal is to get the
Fetty service in front ofeveryone.
(52:35):
Yeah, I mean that's why we arewho we are Because of the great
service we can provide forgroups with the ride share
product, um I.
But that doesn't mean we stillcan't, you know, work on
different avenues to supersedethat growth, yeah, and get
people exposed to the FETI brandprior, I mean.
Speaker 3 (52:52):
I saw the video and I was captivated by it right yeah
, to know you have more of thatcontent coming out and that's
like what are those jewels?
Were you saying like hey, likebe on the lookout for that.
Yeah, I think I'm even excited.
Yeah, it was the first time Isaw it.
I was like, sending it to catslike this is absolutely
hilarious, yeah, and I don'tthink, I don't.
Speaker 2 (53:10):
I don't know if any other creator, content creator
has done that question.
Speaker 1 (53:15):
No, I have not seen it.
No, it's genius, though it putsyou in fight-or-flight.
Speaker 2 (53:21):
I remember I, yeah, I know literally.
I remember I think I got theinspiration I'd seen somewhere
they had to call their dad ormom and and say something like
like a prank or something sure,and and I thought to my head,
I'm like my parents would notappreciate that.
Oh I would say, like, what, what, what, what can I think of?
Like, what else can they do?
I was like, oh, imagine if theyhave to call their ex, yeah.
(53:42):
And of course you run into like, oh, maybe it's not their ex or
whatnot, but you know, it'sstill worth the play.
Yeah, yeah and so I'm trying tothink of other stuff like that.
It's tougher than it might.
It might seem, yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:53):
I have to ask you, though, since we can't call your
ex, what's like the worst thingthat your ex could say about
you?
The worst?
Speaker 2 (54:00):
in your perspective.
Oh, my goodness, I Mean.
I'm sure if they listen to,they might say something else.
Maybe, I don't know, I havegood standing, I feel like, with
all, all of them, maybe that Ican be too logical at times.
If a problem arises, sure nothaving to do with the business,
let's just say it's something inlife.
Maybe they just want to talkabout it.
(54:23):
It'd be emotional and and andkind of just have someone to
hear whereas I'm like, alright,this is what we're gonna do,
this is and they're gonna solvethe problem.
Yeah, exactly.
They're like no, no, no, yeah,listen, yeah, exactly.
So I'd probably say that's thebiggest thing.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (54:39):
I mean, I would say, not only is that fair I think a
lot of guys have that problemlike, I don't think that, yeah,
that's something that's too farstretch, right, understand, but
it points us in anotherdirection, towards your, your
current lifestyle and how you'reliving it.
Do you see ways in which Fettyis going to change the dating
(54:59):
world right, like, is there waysin which Fetty can offer an
additional benefit that maybeyou feel would be impactful for
the world to know?
Speaker 2 (55:08):
Yeah, I mean what?
What are you thinking like aFetty dating app?
Hey, I mean, we're giving youthe stage.
Yeah, yeah, I mean you neverknow, never say never.
It's interesting to think about.
I mean Fetty itself with therideshare product.
One big thing that we're allabout is bringing people
together.
Yeah, you know, and and Ialready know from stories when
they'll say, oh yeah, I, we hadour first kiss in the back of a
(55:31):
feather.
You know, oh yeah, I met him ona Fetty, or I met him at a
pregame and we took a Fettytogether With the group or
whatnot.
And so, naturally, you know,whether it's indirectly or
directly, I'm sure Fetty ishaving an influence on
relationships out there.
So if I've matched Withoutunknowingly, if I've matched you
(55:51):
and your boyfriend andgirlfriend together, yeah, let
me know, that'll be awesome.
Speaker 3 (55:56):
And then we gotta ask , like you, we want you to leave
a question for our next guest.
We're not gonna tell you whothe guest is.
Okay, I want you to have aquestion that you asked them
about their love.
Speaker 2 (56:06):
Okay, give me a second to think about it, about
their love life, yeah love, lifeand or love, relationships,
anything dating, all right.
What's the freakiest thingthey've done?
Let's see they might give you amedia trained question then.
Media trained questionfreakiest thing we've done is
kiss with her eyes.
(56:26):
Freakiest thing, maybe, maybe,but if they go viral, oh yeah,
yeah, we'll see well, that's nota bad idea.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
That is gonna be our question that we hold on to.
Speaker 2 (56:44):
Yeah, I cannot wait to our next guest answer it.
I'm gonna be listening to seewhat they say.
Speaker 3 (56:51):
I know we appreciate that.
I mean cast has this greatsaying where can everyone stalk
you?
Yeah yeah, I mean.
Speaker 2 (56:58):
Instagram is good, linkedin's good for for my
fellow corporate people outthere, and just keeping up with
Fetty on Instagram, a lot ofwhat I do has to do is pushed on
to Fetty so file.
Following the Fetty Instagramis always great and you'll get
exposed to a lot of good contentthere.
Speaker 1 (57:14):
Yeah, the Fetty ticktocks awesome.
Like I'm not a huge tick tock,I'm obsessed.
But even like CFOs, likethey're watching tick tock every
once, fucking on tick tock.
So that is true?
Speaker 2 (57:26):
No, callie, who does all the tick tock?
She's been doing a great jobwith that.
Speaker 1 (57:29):
Yeah, they're amazing .
So kudos to her because theyare awesome.
Yeah, well, thank you so much,matthew.
Speaker 2 (57:36):
You're awesome.
Speaker 3 (57:37):
I don't it.
We appreciate it.
We really appreciate you.
There's a lot you can be doing.
Like to give us some no, no, nogood combo.
Speaker 2 (57:42):
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (57:43):
I didn't even realize , like yesterday was your
birthday.
So that's you know, if I wereyou, I'd be like hungover.
Speaker 2 (57:50):
Yeah, no, but it was a, it was a good time and thank
you guys for having me.
Yeah, conversations, nice, Ilove, loved coming on here.
Podcast is obviously beautiful.
Yeah, yeah, two great hosts,yeah, we appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (58:02):
What do we always say about in the lobby?
Speaker 3 (58:04):
We like to close out the lobby in one way.
Okay, so let everybody knowcome back next week because it's
going down.
Oh, love it.
Speaker 2 (58:12):
See you guys.
Speaker 1 (58:16):
It's so funny.
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