He built Thrillist. He bet on media. Now Ben Lerer is navigating a world obsessed with AI.
In this episode, Jason sits down with Ben Lerer, co-founder of Thrillist, creator of Group Nine Media, and now Managing Partner at Lerer Hippeau. They talk about the shifting tides of media, tech, and early-stage investing. From building one of the first great digital brands to navigating the rise of creators, platforms, and AI, Ben shares hard-earned insights on what it takes to survive—and thrive—through disruption.
Key Takeaways:
✅ Media brands chased scale, but the platforms took the audience (and the money)
✅ In today’s startup world, no AI in the pitch means something’s off
✅ Cost-cutting kills companies; real growth comes from bold bets
✅ Great founders—not trends—should guide where you invest
Memorable Moments:
💡 “The winners weren’t the publishers—it was the pipes.”
💡 “We almost named it Ape Alert. That would’ve been a disaster.”
💡 “If I need a calendar reminder to make a decision, it’s a no.”
💡 “We believe founders are smarter than us. If we’re around great talent, we’ll end up in interesting markets.”
Brought to you by Mekanism.
In this episode, Jason sits down with Ben Lerer, co-founder of Thrillist, creator of Group Nine Media, and now Managing Partner at Lerer Hippeau. They talk about the shifting tides of media, tech, and early-stage investing. From building one of the first great digital brands to navigating the rise of creators, platforms, and AI, Ben shares hard-earned insights on what it takes to survive—and thrive—through disruption.
Key Takeaways:
✅ Media brands chased scale, but the platforms took the audience (and the money)
✅ In today’s startup world, no AI in the pitch means something’s off
✅ Cost-cutting kills companies; real growth comes from bold bets
✅ Great founders—not trends—should guide where you invest
Memorable Moments:
💡 “The winners weren’t the publishers—it was the pipes.”
💡 “We almost named it Ape Alert. That would’ve been a disaster.”
💡 “If I need a calendar reminder to make a decision, it’s a no.”
💡 “We believe founders are smarter than us. If we’re around great talent, we’ll end up in interesting markets.”
Brought to you by Mekanism.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Sometimes it means investing in categories that actually are totally
out of favor and get no attention now because everyone
is so AI obsessed that there is value in being
willing to do things that others are not. Because the
lemmings move together, sometimes we look like the lemmings, sometimes
we look like the rebel, but the idea remains. Be
unafraid of having a very diverse portfolio. But also, if
(00:25):
we have a conversation with a founder in AI is
not a major part of the conversation, something is probably.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Often in today's world, how does a brand break through
the noise and become iconic? Join me Jason Harris as
I speak with the world's leading marketing experts about how
they use sole in science to build an iconic brand.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Think of it as EQ meeting IQ.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
So let's lock in and together fast forward our marketing
minds on the Soul in Science Podcast. Welcome to another
edition of the Soul and Science Podcast. Today's episode is
all about the past present future of media, tech and investing,
(01:10):
and I'm here with Ben.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Ben what is up? Say hi?
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Hi?
Speaker 4 (01:14):
Thanks for having me dude.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Of course, man, I've known Ben for I don't know years,
different incarnations kind of around the New York metropolitan area.
I'd love to start if you can give our listeners
with what is your origin story? Obviously, like I know
you from starting way back in the Thrillest days, but
(01:36):
like I don't know how did you start into media?
Tell me how it all happened for you and how
you got start.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
First of all, I remember when I was building thrillists
and I was out like selling ads and trying to
get in front of brands.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
I was like, how do I get to.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
This guy Jason Harris, who's running Mechanism.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
This guy is going to.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Unlock the world for me, hunting my way to you,
And it's fun, you know, probably twenty years later to
be friends after we're still here here we are. Well, well,
I'll do a quick and dirty background. So I grew
up in New York and I went to school in
Philly and came back to New York now, I guess
(02:18):
twenty one years ago. And when I got when I
got back to New York, I started a company. I
started Thrillist, which was you know, sort of like a
nights and weekends hobby, like a newsletter for guys to
figure out what to do in New York. Through that,
I sort of found myself in the midst of this
very very small, early budding New York tech scene where
there was so few people building anything that even smelled
(02:39):
like potentially it was a tech company. And because I
was building digital media, even though it was really not
particularly tech first, I got to know the folks who
were building in New York. And while I was sort
of coming up and learning from those folks, realized that
a bunch of them were doing really cool stuff and
that I sort of deal flow. I didn't know what
(03:00):
deal flow was, but I had access to these people
who were trying to raise money to sort of get
their businesses off the ground, and started making tiny, little
haphazard investments and on the back of that raised a
little bit of money in like a real fund. I
started with my dad, who it was sort of like
he had access to capital, and I had access to
some founders, and timing was lucky in New York became
(03:24):
a place that people wanted to build tech companies, at
first mostly in the consumer space, and eventually in every market,
and so really have spent my whole career both investing
in founders at the earliest stages and have been the
beneficiary of just being a part of an ecosystem that's
grown enormously.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
And then also along the.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Way, got to build my media company and so sat
on the other side of the table raising money and
sort of learned what it was like to experience the
venture market as a founder, and you know, through the
trials and tribulations of like digital media being this enormous
growth market, in this super hot category and raising tons
and tons of cash from vcs and strategics to it
(04:07):
falling very much out of favor. And I'd say sort of,
you know, having good lucky timing in terms of selling
the business sort of at the height of the post
covid AD market and now I'm full time investing. But
you know, did almost fifteen years in an operating seat
as well.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
That was acquired in.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Twenty two, twenty one, end of twenty one. I think
we closed early twenty two. I actually know we closed
early twenty two because we closed the same week that
Russia invaded Ukraine and the venture market and like much
of the economy started to get shaky real fast.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
So it was very good timing.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
It was very good time.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I missed my window eleven times over the previous decades.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
So Group nine was acquired by vox.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
YEP, which I remained on the board of.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Which you're still working on.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
The absolutely and you know, I think voxes as you
think about the sort of what happened to the darlings
of digital media, vox really has been is like I
don't want to say the last man standing, but.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
One of the last men's standing for sure, Yeah, I mean,
and I would say standing tall.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
I mean Vox.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
I continue to be incredibly impressed with Jim and the
team there and the quality of those brands and the
diversification of revenue. But you know, in a space that has,
you know, sort of can't catch a break.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Digital media was so hot, it was so popular, and
it seemed to almost fall out of favor really quick,
almost crashing burn. Obviously, there's still like I know, Vox
does a lot of podcasts.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
They got they have a lot going.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
On, a lot going on, really truly a lot going on,
an unbelievable number of places where they you know, engage
audiences and make money, like it really is a beautifully
diversified business.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
What happened when that police in ceration of digital media
outlets grew so fast and then you know, so many
of them went under.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Look, there's actually a pretty short answer to this, which
is what happened with social media. The promise was you
have all these audiences that are reading traditional newspapers and
traditional magazines and watching traditional TV, and they're going to
move online and with large audience with lots of eyeballs,
there's going to be opportunities to sell them stuff, and
(06:28):
there's going to be a huge ad business that moves online.
And all of that was true. But what ended up
happening is the winners weren't the publishers. It was the pipes,
Like the pipes always win, and Facebook and TikTok and
Google and all the pipes that interconnected all these different
(06:49):
audiences are where the money ended up going.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
And media in.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
A search for more eyeballs. And I was like one
of the poster children of the decision to try and
product partner with the facebooks and the twitters of the world.
And by the way, I think that they have lots
of wonderful people at those companies that like care about
media and care about content and really did want to
see publishers thrive. Ultimately, what happened was those platforms took
(07:19):
a lot of the money. Those platforms disintermediated media brands
from their audiences, and then they also created an environment
where individual creators could go and and like fight on
the same level as brands that had all.
Speaker 4 (07:38):
This infrastructure and saw.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
And so, by the way, like that's not Facebook's fault
or any of those platforms fault, Like, nor is it
creator's fault. Like creators figured out how to create content
that consumers loved and that engaged them, and that built
trust with them and built relationships. But a combination of
social and the creator economy was made it very difficult
(08:02):
for I think, like individual publications to thrive in.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
The market.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
So rolling back the clock a little bit, First of all,
how did you think of the name thrillist?
Speaker 3 (08:16):
This is such a fucking good name.
Speaker 4 (08:18):
You know. I appreciate you saying that.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
It was a really pathetic story where we wrote down
a lot of beginnings of words and suffixes and put
them in a pile and moved them around and then
saw if the URL was available, and we avoided the
name ape Alert by a centimeter. God, I mean it
(08:45):
was a dark time and yeah, that was it.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
I have no great backstory.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
It was literally a thrill list. I was twenty one
and even stupider than I know it's And then, how
did you think, how did you think of making it
kind of hyper local?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Because that's interesting when you think about a digital media offering,
but then making it hyper local.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
We copied Daily Candy. Daily Candy had had built a
really great roadmap for us.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
They started in New York.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
They built this community of women that obsessed about the recommendations,
did everything they suggested. A year or two later, they
launched LA. They did the same thing. They created a
playbook for how to launch new local markets. When we started,
we were deeply inspired by what they had built, so
much so that we actually went to their investors and said,
we want to build the same thing for guys, and
(09:41):
their investors took a frankly like made an angel investment
in us, the same way that you know, I've sort
of tried to make a career of making early investments
and other young talent. And they made a bet on us.
And we had the benefit not only by the way
of having the same investors, but honestly, the you know,
Danny Levy and Pete Shinbaum who built Daily Candy and Pavia,
(10:04):
and like the early team there were really generous in
sort of mentoring us and advising us, which was incredibly
instrumental in us, you know, being able to follow their
playbook and not stumble too hard. And by the way,
they were so early that they created the market for
(10:24):
sort of the fortune five hundred to think about email marketing.
Email marketing wasn't really a big thing or it was
like like buying lists, but the idea of like sponsoring
dedicated emails was really a Daily Candy innovation, and we
took something that they did well and we just you know,
we sort of turbo charged it with venture capital and
moved a little faster than they did.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
And tell me about Group nine Media and how that
came about as like the kind of holding company.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Group nine was actually called in my brain and actually
my father's brain, because he was somebody who had, like
I was not working in digital media, but had been
the co founder of the Huffington Post and was a
student of media and was around the early cable business
and saw the consolidation of the cable business and how
much value that created with when you saw it when
(11:14):
you had like individual channels joined forces with others and
create the big media holding companies, and so he sort
of encouraged me, you know, and I remember a conversation
I had with him where he said to me, I
was around at the consolidation moment of cable and I
wasn't in a I didn't have a position where I
(11:35):
was able to take a leadership role in it. But
it was so obvious that it was going to happen.
And you're sitting in a position owning a leading digital
media brand with a lot of investor appetite and interest
and like a real understanding of the space. You could
play a more important role in the consolidation of digital
media than I was able to play in the consolidation
(11:56):
of the cable business thirty years earlier.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
And that's sort of stuck with me.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
And so in the back of my head was playing
with this idea of what would digital media consolidation look like.
And it was really a conversation or a series of
conversations that we had with that I had with Discovery,
And you know, one of the things I did do
a pretty good job of was I knew I knew
the traditional strategics in the space and BuzzFeed had NBC
(12:24):
as their sort of like strategic partner, and Vice had
the Murdochs, and like a lot of the big traditional
media companies had their sort of like digital roll up
bet and I you know, went to David Zaslov and
(12:44):
Bruce Campbell and the Discovery team and basically, over time,
you know, got them to believe what I believed, which
was that digital media was going to have consolidation and
that they should have a bet in the space. And
so they made a significant investment into the creation of
Group nine. And while we're doing silly names Group nine,
(13:07):
one of the reasons for not the Group nine nine
was how many letters are in Discovery.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
That's kind of cool. I never knew that wanted.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
To sort of like pay for helping put us in business,
and and they did, and they were they were really
great partners, and you know by the way they went
on their own consolidation tear and you know, when we
did the deal with Discovery, they didn't yet own scripts
or and they didn't yet own you know, Warner Brothers.
(13:37):
I mean, and think about all that, all the assets
that that David accumulated following, you know, in investing in
US but you know, sorry, long story short, but we
we decided we wanted to go own some other companies,
and so we bought some assets and we launched some assets,
and we created.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
A holding company.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
And again I had specifically Vox and BuzzFeed and Vice
as the three sort of horsemen of scale digital media.
And I knew those folks well, and I was able
to look at what they did well and where I
thought that there were opportunities to sort of do things
differently or categories I could go into that they weren't
strong in. And when I when I put my you know,
(14:18):
rosy colored glasses on the on the Group nine experience,
I we went from Thrilliest as an independent business doing
you know, maybe at the time of the merger thirty
million dollars of rev to doing a few hundred million
dollars of profitable revenue and like building like a truly
scaled thing that was working when we when we did
(14:40):
the merger with Vox. That being said, in retrospect, I
think some of the strength of our business was buoyed
by the time by the fact that you had this
like zerp era environment and a lot of advertising getting spent,
and it was just it was a good time for us,
but it was a good time for our heres and
(15:00):
I think that that's what led to a bunch of
consolidation that happened. BuzzFeed bought a bunch of stuff, Box
bought stuff, you know, Penske bought.
Speaker 4 (15:07):
A bunch of stuff. A bunch of people roll stuff up.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
And I think it on the back end, it's proven
for most folks, for everybody hard. I think there are
people who have done it more gracefully than others. And
I would say that, you know, on the margin, you know,
I think that that Vox has done a really good job.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Well, Box has done a good job.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
But when you think about you know, Vice, you think
about what's left standing BuzzFeed, you know, there's not a
lot left standing.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
There's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
There's not a lot, you know, I think, like but
the stuff that is the opportunity sort of the the
liability is the opportunity, which is AI, right, right, So
how do you think of AI as the opportunity? If
you have real IP and a scaled AD business and
(15:55):
a multi channel revenue strategy, and you really figure out
the right flavor embracing AI, it can bring significant efficiency
to your business. It can create new consumer opportunities, and
it's very hard to shift the culture and and sort
of turn these these big battleships. But but it is
(16:15):
a moment that that I think can create a lot
of hope if you get over the idea that it
could also destroy you.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Do you look at it as revenue stays the same
but it drives costs down, or do you look at
it as a way to drive additional revenue in some way.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
It's a really good question, and I don't think there's
a simple answer. I think I think it probably in
the short term revenue goes down and cost better go down.
And I think in the longer term you have to
figure out how this is not a cost savings exercise
(16:53):
but a revenue creation exercise. Otherwise it's a raise to
the bottom. And we've seen what happens by the way
the cable business is, or the print magazine business, or
the newspaper business are the examples of what happens when
you make your business model about cost cutting for a decade,
they all go to shit. You cannot build a business
(17:17):
for the long term where the strategy is just to
figure out where.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
You're going to come.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
You have to figure out where you're going to invest.
And I do think the opportunities for where brands can
invest in AI it is not overwhelmingly obvious today.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
But you know there's something there. You just have to
turn it around and.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Figure it out.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
You can create new you know. I'll give an.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Example right now, which is not I'll sort of sound
weird and like a little bit secretive, but like, we've
recently invested in in a business in the travel space,
an AI company, a consumer business in the travel space.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
And when I think about.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
What this company is doing, and I think about the
assets that Thrillist has had in terms of brand recognition,
advertiser relationships, scaled audience, Thrillist could be going and doing
what this company is doing and could be reinventing itself
(18:17):
and imagining itself as a startup with a really unfair
advantage and leg up. And maybe Thrillist is a good example,
and maybe it's not. Maybe there's one hundred other brands
that you would use as a better example that are
stronger today or that whatever.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
But the point would be there.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Are new companies with a new generation of founders that
are being backed to start denovo consumer businesses in AI
application layer company. You know companies that if that kind
of innovative thinking lived in companies that have large assets
(18:58):
and unfair advantages, you could build some really, really fascinating stuff.
I love that, but but by the way, it takes capital,
it takes courage, and it takes a certain kind of
talent that sometimes is fiercely independent and wants to go
build for themselves and doesn't want to go be a
(19:18):
part of a business. I believe that the talent's there
and it's possible, but it's not. You know, the founding
team that that I backed in the travel space I
don't think is employable at some other at some other
company right now. So that's the that's the sort of
that's the challenge. But the opportunity is there.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Are you looking mainly at AI companies at this point?
Is that where a lot of your investment spending is going.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Our sort of philosophy is we're like highly team and
founder focus. Like what we are in the business of
doing is trying to be around the most interesting tools
of talent and building relationships with folks that we think
are going to be great founders. And we sort of
believe that like founders are smarter than us, and we'll
(20:09):
find the most interesting opportunities. And if we're around great talent,
we're going to find ourselves in interesting markets. And so
fifteen years ago in New York, a lot happening in
D two C commerce, a lot happening in sort of
digital media and ad tech, And so our portfolio looks
a lot like that because that was where the best
talent was building. As time has gone on, and as
Facebook and Google built big offices and real engineering talent
(20:30):
came to New York and the healthcare you sort of
startup ecosystem exploded, and the crypto ecosystem exploded, and the
fintech ecosystem exploded, and you name it. Our portfolio has
sort of bobbed in weave and weaved and moved as
founder talent has been interested and excited by new challenges,
(20:51):
new categories over the last few years. So much of
the energy that the best founders have is direct towards
AI for obvious reasons. And so everything that we are touching,
and I don't want to say the overwhelming majority of
things that we are touching are greatly inspired by an
(21:12):
influenced by AI. Sometimes that means that they are real
AI companies. Sometimes that means that they are companies that
are being created because of problems or changes that will
come to the world because of AI. Sometimes that means
that they are companies that are going to not build AI,
(21:32):
but are going to use AI to do things far
less expensively or replace human labor or sort of service
as software. And sometimes it means investing in categories that
actually are totally out of favor and get no attention
now because everyone is so AI obsessed that there is
(21:53):
value in being willing to do things that others are not.
Because the lemmings move together and so sometimes we look
like the lemmings. Sometimes we look like the rebel, but
the idea remains. Find amazing talent, be unafraid of having
a very diverse portfolio. But also back to your original point, yes,
(22:16):
most of what we do I like. If we have
a conversation with a founder in AI is not a
major part of the conversation, something is probably off.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
When you think of all the things that you've invested,
you guys have invested in, it's typically early stage.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
Right, it's exclusively early staged.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
So it's always early stage.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
And then how long I don't know, at what point
are you like, this has worked, this hasn't worked.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
We're hanging on to this thing, like how do you
make those calls?
Speaker 2 (22:44):
Because you're looking at the entire portfolio all the time,
but you can't just add stuff to it.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
You got a call? Also, how do you do that?
Speaker 4 (22:52):
It's really really hard.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
We're interestingly at sort of a point of maturity now
where we have enough companies that are mature and the
speed at which we make new investments that we almost
have a steady state number of companies that are sort
of active. Because in any given year, let's call it,
twenty companies will sell or frankenstein or or fail.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Yeah, so a lot of it's natural attrition that.
Speaker 4 (23:24):
A lot of it is naturally you don't have to push,
you just go.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
The one caveat to that, which is a big caveat,
is venture has a I think a pretty obvious liquidity
problem right now. And you know, I'm very optimistic about
the current things I'm seeing around the IPO market and
around actually some things in M and A, and I
do think that we may enter a period, who knows
(23:51):
how long, where there will be some look, some old
fashioned liquidity, some companies IPO and or selling, but venture
as a category needs to figure out an off ramp
for LP dollars in good companies through secondary sales and
other types of mechanisms, you know, continuation funds. There's there's
(24:13):
one hundred different mechanisms that people are sort of playing with,
and I do think that we are spending more time
today thinking about ways that we are able to create
liquidity along the way in partnership with founders, but where
we're not putting money in day one, day two, day three,
day four and then saying, hey, call us when you
(24:35):
when you know there's some wonderful, magical event and somebody
drops off a bag of money at your house right
which we know you know you built a business. It's
never a straight line. There's good times, there's bad times,
and the reality is that like very rarely does someone
even really great companies don't just have fairytale existences. And
(24:59):
so we need to we need to make sure that
we're there to sort of like whether it's some of
those storms.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
With our founders. What do you think you're particularly good at?
Speaker 2 (25:08):
I know you're surrounded by a ton of talent, but
what are you particularly good at that maybe other people
are not as good at.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
I've always been pretty mediocre at a lot of things, dude.
That's sort of like a generalist investor for you. I'm like,
I am good at getting people to want to come
along on a journey. Yeah, and that means that that
manifest itself in being able to get founders to want
to work with us. That that's about how to keep
you know, a team of really high performing, ambitious, great
(25:38):
people wanting to work here and build this thing with me.
I think that you know, works in terms of getting
LPs to want to invest in us and trust us
with their money. And so like that's always what I've
been pretty good at is. And then I would say
that there's like, you know, I hope that that I'm
good at the intangible gut thing around reading people and
(25:59):
making decisions on people, and that that plays out in
the people that we hire here, it plays out in
the founders that we you know, picked to back, and
and so that's like a little taste thing that like
you know, time will tell, but like I I hope
that that's something that I'm good at.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Do you have a mantra or quote that you always
come back to or that you live by or that
kind of pushes you.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
I well, I have a few. One of them is
is life is what happens to you while you're busy
making other plans. So true, and that's the like, you know,
the the dad in me and the you know, forty
three year old in me in terms of just like
really be present and enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Which is interesting though on that one, just to you know,
going gone from entrepreneur to investor and your fund, A
lot of it is playing the long game.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
You know.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
You hope this stuff pays off in the future and
it builds, and you're helping these entrepreneurs, et cetera, which
is very opposite of staying grounded and focused on the.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
Present, you know.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
So that's the hardest thing about this job for me
is that I need to be patient.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
The way that I counteract that and the way that
we counteract that is you're only as good as your
next deal. And so, I mean, we had our partner
meeting yesterday and had a conversation about what is staying
sharp in this market? How do we make sure that
the bar only continues to go up in of in
terms of founder quality. How do we not get sucked
(27:30):
into fomo in this overheated, crazy market, how do we
like stick to our first principles and hold ourselves accountable
and ask each other the hard questions and challenge one
another here in terms of how do we do excellent
work every day? And I don't you know, again, I've
never worked in another venture fund, so who am I
(27:50):
to say that, Like, that's not the culture at every
venture fund.
Speaker 4 (27:53):
But I do think that.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Some of the memes about vcs, about like lazy vcs
taking lots of great it for other people's work and
taking August and December and whatever other months of the
year off, like there is a little something too. It's
a slow burn business and you can do well in
(28:15):
this business and not be an animal. And I don't
want to leave that to chance. And I want to
be an animal and I want to build a team
of animals. And I think that we're doing that. And
so like I, you know, that's that's again that comes
from operating and is something that is present in our
culture here.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
And values comes from values absolutely absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
By the way, my other my other mantra and this
is this is my dad's mantra, and he says this
to me He said this to me a lot when
I was growing up, when I would have imposter syndrome,
which is just remember everyone's a fraud.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
Ah. I love that, and it's so true.
Speaker 4 (28:54):
And so and I say that to myself.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
I say that to folks on my team when I
when when someone feels out over their skis or they
feel in sort of you know, unsure about themselves and
their decision making, It's like, listen, no one has the answer.
Speaker 4 (29:08):
Don't forget that.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
When you feel like there's chaos and you're not sure
what to do, are you going to make that investment?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Are you going to cut it off? Are you going
to make that higher?
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Is there a way you solve a problem or a
technique that you do, or a place you go or
a method you have.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
I think I try to figure out how to connect
to my gut, and that's going to take different formats.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
It may be I'll put.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
A reminder in my calendar that I have to make
a decision on something and that if I am not,
if I need the reminder to make the decision, then
it's to know the proverbial like if it's not a hell, yes,
it's a no. But like just figuring I really do
think that, like the end of the day, I want
(29:57):
to trust my gut and figuring out how I don't
at noise or or you know, other people's opinions or
any any externality forced me into a decision.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Is that's that's the goal.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
That's a good, good way to think about it. What
are you most excited about and conversely most anxious about
for the future of your business.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
I'm most excited about the quality of our team here
and and to sort of like a secondary degree, the
quality of our portfolio and the founders that we back,
and really the quality of the founders that we back
and that we're getting access to. And so people, the people,
the people is what makes me excited. The the thing
(30:46):
that keeps me up at night is all the things
I don't have any control over, starting with like the
macro macro of tariffs. I don't have the stomach to
talk about politics right now, but like starting with the
things that like we really have no control over, and
(31:08):
you know up there all the way down to changes
in technology and how fast things are moving. And you know,
anyone who's got all the answers to how AI is
going to change the world, like the only anyone who's
sure they have all the answers should be immediately discounted
and ignored because nobody has them. And and so I'm
(31:31):
you know, I generally speaking like I'm a control freak,
and as I get older, trying to like get comfortable.
Being uncomfortable is something I work hard at. That's always
going to be what keeps me up at night is
the unknown.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
What do you do to stay healthy and sharp and
not get overloaded?
Speaker 1 (31:52):
I mean, first and foremost, like spend time like is
and bam, like really prioritize like relationships that like give
me energy and you know, like family and friends and
making time for that, I would say, trying my best
to disconnect from technology, like I don't sleep with my
(32:12):
phone in.
Speaker 4 (32:13):
My room anymore. I you know, I have a weekend phone.
Speaker 3 (32:17):
Oh wait, tell me about that, on.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
The weekend phone that has text message and like basic services.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
You have like a dumb phone on the weekend.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Yeah, but a dumb phone where where I can be
more present for my kids. And look, sometimes it doesn't work.
Sometimes I'm not able to do it. I'm always reachable,
but I'm not just refreshing, scrolling whatever the whatever all
the habits are and I don't want my kids to
see me being like that, and I know again I
fail at that plenty. And then you know, like the
(32:51):
basic stuff like try to get some sleep, try to
you know, I stay active, I work.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Out, and you know I'm but I'm.
Speaker 1 (32:59):
Not like deeply biohacking or like trying to like you know,
rewrite my DNA, like staying active, high value relationships and
just like whatever. Your version of trying to decrease extreme
stress is probably the best ticket you got.
Speaker 3 (33:15):
Well, Ben, awesome conversation.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Your one thing I've always loved about you is your
successful and grounded and it's so refreshing, even just your mantra,
everyone's a fraud.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
I fucking love so again, don't credit that. That's my dad.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
He deserves full crab. But you know you've you're a
real one. So we appreciate you being on the podcast.
I'm so happy to be here. Great seeing you, and
we gotta we gotta hang in the hut.
Speaker 3 (33:45):
Break bread, let's do it.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Thanks so much for listening to Soul and Science, and
we'll see you next week. Soule in Science is a
mechanism podcast produced by Maggie Bowles, Ryan Tillotson, and Louie Jablonski.
The show is edited by Daniel Ferreira, with theme music
by Kyle Merrick and I'm your host Jason Harris. At Mechanism,
(34:12):
we build iconic brands with soul and science. The soul
is culturally relevant brand building, and the science is the
always on marketing activities that drive the bottom line. Learn
more at mechanism dot com.
Sometimes it means investing in categories that actually are totally
out of favor and get no attention now because everyone
is so AI obsessed that there is value in being
willing to do things that others are not. Because the
lemmings move together, sometimes we look like the lemmings, sometimes
we look like the rebel, but the idea remains. Be
unafraid of having a very diverse portfolio. But also, if
(00:25):
we have a conversation with a founder in AI is
not a major part of the conversation, something is probably.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Often in today's world, how does a brand break through
the noise and become iconic? Join me Jason Harris as
I speak with the world's leading marketing experts about how
they use sole in science to build an iconic brand.
Speaker 3 (00:44):
Think of it as EQ meeting IQ.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
So let's lock in and together fast forward our marketing
minds on the Soul in Science Podcast. Welcome to another
edition of the Soul and Science Podcast. Today's episode is
all about the past present future of media, tech and investing,
(01:10):
and I'm here with Ben.
Speaker 3 (01:12):
Ben what is up? Say hi?
Speaker 1 (01:14):
Hi?
Speaker 4 (01:14):
Thanks for having me dude.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Of course, man, I've known Ben for I don't know years,
different incarnations kind of around the New York metropolitan area.
I'd love to start if you can give our listeners
with what is your origin story? Obviously, like I know
you from starting way back in the Thrillest days, but
(01:36):
like I don't know how did you start into media?
Tell me how it all happened for you and how
you got start.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
First of all, I remember when I was building thrillists
and I was out like selling ads and trying to
get in front of brands.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
I was like, how do I get to.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
This guy Jason Harris, who's running Mechanism.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
This guy is going to.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Unlock the world for me, hunting my way to you,
And it's fun, you know, probably twenty years later to
be friends after we're still here here we are. Well, well,
I'll do a quick and dirty background. So I grew
up in New York and I went to school in
Philly and came back to New York now, I guess
(02:18):
twenty one years ago. And when I got when I
got back to New York, I started a company. I
started Thrillist, which was you know, sort of like a
nights and weekends hobby, like a newsletter for guys to
figure out what to do in New York. Through that,
I sort of found myself in the midst of this
very very small, early budding New York tech scene where
there was so few people building anything that even smelled
(02:39):
like potentially it was a tech company. And because I
was building digital media, even though it was really not
particularly tech first, I got to know the folks who
were building in New York. And while I was sort
of coming up and learning from those folks, realized that
a bunch of them were doing really cool stuff and
that I sort of deal flow. I didn't know what
(03:00):
deal flow was, but I had access to these people
who were trying to raise money to sort of get
their businesses off the ground, and started making tiny, little
haphazard investments and on the back of that raised a
little bit of money in like a real fund. I
started with my dad, who it was sort of like
he had access to capital, and I had access to
some founders, and timing was lucky in New York became
(03:24):
a place that people wanted to build tech companies, at
first mostly in the consumer space, and eventually in every market,
and so really have spent my whole career both investing
in founders at the earliest stages and have been the
beneficiary of just being a part of an ecosystem that's
grown enormously.
Speaker 4 (03:44):
And then also along the.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Way, got to build my media company and so sat
on the other side of the table raising money and
sort of learned what it was like to experience the
venture market as a founder, and you know, through the
trials and tribulations of like digital media being this enormous
growth market, in this super hot category and raising tons
and tons of cash from vcs and strategics to it
(04:07):
falling very much out of favor. And I'd say sort of,
you know, having good lucky timing in terms of selling
the business sort of at the height of the post
covid AD market and now I'm full time investing. But
you know, did almost fifteen years in an operating seat
as well.
Speaker 3 (04:27):
That was acquired in.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Twenty two, twenty one, end of twenty one. I think
we closed early twenty two. I actually know we closed
early twenty two because we closed the same week that
Russia invaded Ukraine and the venture market and like much
of the economy started to get shaky real fast.
Speaker 3 (04:47):
So it was very good timing.
Speaker 4 (04:48):
It was very good time.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
I missed my window eleven times over the previous decades.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
So Group nine was acquired by vox.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
YEP, which I remained on the board of.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Which you're still working on.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
The absolutely and you know, I think voxes as you
think about the sort of what happened to the darlings
of digital media, vox really has been is like I
don't want to say the last man standing, but.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
One of the last men's standing for sure, Yeah, I mean,
and I would say standing tall.
Speaker 4 (05:16):
I mean Vox.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
I continue to be incredibly impressed with Jim and the
team there and the quality of those brands and the
diversification of revenue. But you know, in a space that has,
you know, sort of can't catch a break.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Digital media was so hot, it was so popular, and
it seemed to almost fall out of favor really quick,
almost crashing burn. Obviously, there's still like I know, Vox
does a lot of podcasts.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
They got they have a lot going.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
On, a lot going on, really truly a lot going on,
an unbelievable number of places where they you know, engage
audiences and make money, like it really is a beautifully
diversified business.
Speaker 2 (05:57):
What happened when that police in ceration of digital media
outlets grew so fast and then you know, so many
of them went under.
Speaker 1 (06:07):
Look, there's actually a pretty short answer to this, which
is what happened with social media. The promise was you
have all these audiences that are reading traditional newspapers and
traditional magazines and watching traditional TV, and they're going to
move online and with large audience with lots of eyeballs,
there's going to be opportunities to sell them stuff, and
(06:28):
there's going to be a huge ad business that moves online.
And all of that was true. But what ended up
happening is the winners weren't the publishers. It was the pipes,
Like the pipes always win, and Facebook and TikTok and
Google and all the pipes that interconnected all these different
(06:49):
audiences are where the money ended up going.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
And media in.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
A search for more eyeballs. And I was like one
of the poster children of the decision to try and
product partner with the facebooks and the twitters of the world.
And by the way, I think that they have lots
of wonderful people at those companies that like care about
media and care about content and really did want to
see publishers thrive. Ultimately, what happened was those platforms took
(07:19):
a lot of the money. Those platforms disintermediated media brands
from their audiences, and then they also created an environment
where individual creators could go and and like fight on
the same level as brands that had all.
Speaker 4 (07:38):
This infrastructure and saw.
Speaker 1 (07:40):
And so, by the way, like that's not Facebook's fault
or any of those platforms fault, Like, nor is it
creator's fault. Like creators figured out how to create content
that consumers loved and that engaged them, and that built
trust with them and built relationships. But a combination of
social and the creator economy was made it very difficult
(08:02):
for I think, like individual publications to thrive in.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
The market.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
So rolling back the clock a little bit, First of all,
how did you think of the name thrillist?
Speaker 3 (08:16):
This is such a fucking good name.
Speaker 4 (08:18):
You know. I appreciate you saying that.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
It was a really pathetic story where we wrote down
a lot of beginnings of words and suffixes and put
them in a pile and moved them around and then
saw if the URL was available, and we avoided the
name ape Alert by a centimeter. God, I mean it
(08:45):
was a dark time and yeah, that was it.
Speaker 4 (08:51):
I have no great backstory.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
It was literally a thrill list. I was twenty one
and even stupider than I know it's And then, how
did you think, how did you think of making it
kind of hyper local?
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Because that's interesting when you think about a digital media offering,
but then making it hyper local.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
We copied Daily Candy. Daily Candy had had built a
really great roadmap for us.
Speaker 4 (09:17):
They started in New York.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
They built this community of women that obsessed about the recommendations,
did everything they suggested. A year or two later, they
launched LA. They did the same thing. They created a
playbook for how to launch new local markets. When we started,
we were deeply inspired by what they had built, so
much so that we actually went to their investors and said,
we want to build the same thing for guys, and
(09:41):
their investors took a frankly like made an angel investment
in us, the same way that you know, I've sort
of tried to make a career of making early investments
and other young talent. And they made a bet on us.
And we had the benefit not only by the way
of having the same investors, but honestly, the you know,
Danny Levy and Pete Shinbaum who built Daily Candy and Pavia,
(10:04):
and like the early team there were really generous in
sort of mentoring us and advising us, which was incredibly
instrumental in us, you know, being able to follow their
playbook and not stumble too hard. And by the way,
they were so early that they created the market for
(10:24):
sort of the fortune five hundred to think about email marketing.
Email marketing wasn't really a big thing or it was
like like buying lists, but the idea of like sponsoring
dedicated emails was really a Daily Candy innovation, and we
took something that they did well and we just you know,
we sort of turbo charged it with venture capital and
moved a little faster than they did.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
And tell me about Group nine Media and how that
came about as like the kind of holding company.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
Group nine was actually called in my brain and actually
my father's brain, because he was somebody who had, like
I was not working in digital media, but had been
the co founder of the Huffington Post and was a
student of media and was around the early cable business
and saw the consolidation of the cable business and how
much value that created with when you saw it when
(11:14):
you had like individual channels joined forces with others and
create the big media holding companies, and so he sort
of encouraged me, you know, and I remember a conversation
I had with him where he said to me, I
was around at the consolidation moment of cable and I
wasn't in a I didn't have a position where I
(11:35):
was able to take a leadership role in it. But
it was so obvious that it was going to happen.
And you're sitting in a position owning a leading digital
media brand with a lot of investor appetite and interest
and like a real understanding of the space. You could
play a more important role in the consolidation of digital
media than I was able to play in the consolidation
(11:56):
of the cable business thirty years earlier.
Speaker 4 (11:59):
And that's sort of stuck with me.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
And so in the back of my head was playing
with this idea of what would digital media consolidation look like.
And it was really a conversation or a series of
conversations that we had with that I had with Discovery,
And you know, one of the things I did do
a pretty good job of was I knew I knew
the traditional strategics in the space and BuzzFeed had NBC
(12:24):
as their sort of like strategic partner, and Vice had
the Murdochs, and like a lot of the big traditional
media companies had their sort of like digital roll up
bet and I you know, went to David Zaslov and
(12:44):
Bruce Campbell and the Discovery team and basically, over time,
you know, got them to believe what I believed, which
was that digital media was going to have consolidation and
that they should have a bet in the space. And
so they made a significant investment into the creation of
Group nine. And while we're doing silly names Group nine,
(13:07):
one of the reasons for not the Group nine nine
was how many letters are in Discovery.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
That's kind of cool. I never knew that wanted.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
To sort of like pay for helping put us in business,
and and they did, and they were they were really
great partners, and you know by the way they went
on their own consolidation tear and you know, when we
did the deal with Discovery, they didn't yet own scripts
or and they didn't yet own you know, Warner Brothers.
(13:37):
I mean, and think about all that, all the assets
that that David accumulated following, you know, in investing in
US but you know, sorry, long story short, but we
we decided we wanted to go own some other companies,
and so we bought some assets and we launched some assets,
and we created.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
A holding company.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
And again I had specifically Vox and BuzzFeed and Vice
as the three sort of horsemen of scale digital media.
And I knew those folks well, and I was able
to look at what they did well and where I
thought that there were opportunities to sort of do things
differently or categories I could go into that they weren't
strong in. And when I when I put my you know,
(14:18):
rosy colored glasses on the on the Group nine experience,
I we went from Thrilliest as an independent business doing
you know, maybe at the time of the merger thirty
million dollars of rev to doing a few hundred million
dollars of profitable revenue and like building like a truly
scaled thing that was working when we when we did
(14:40):
the merger with Vox. That being said, in retrospect, I
think some of the strength of our business was buoyed
by the time by the fact that you had this
like zerp era environment and a lot of advertising getting spent,
and it was just it was a good time for us,
but it was a good time for our heres and
(15:00):
I think that that's what led to a bunch of
consolidation that happened. BuzzFeed bought a bunch of stuff, Box
bought stuff, you know, Penske bought.
Speaker 4 (15:07):
A bunch of stuff. A bunch of people roll stuff up.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
And I think it on the back end, it's proven
for most folks, for everybody hard. I think there are
people who have done it more gracefully than others. And
I would say that, you know, on the margin, you know,
I think that that Vox has done a really good job.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Well, Box has done a good job.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
But when you think about you know, Vice, you think
about what's left standing BuzzFeed, you know, there's not a
lot left standing.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
There's not a lot.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
There's not a lot, you know, I think, like but
the stuff that is the opportunity sort of the the
liability is the opportunity, which is AI, right, right, So
how do you think of AI as the opportunity? If
you have real IP and a scaled AD business and
(15:55):
a multi channel revenue strategy, and you really figure out
the right flavor embracing AI, it can bring significant efficiency
to your business. It can create new consumer opportunities, and
it's very hard to shift the culture and and sort
of turn these these big battleships. But but it is
(16:15):
a moment that that I think can create a lot
of hope if you get over the idea that it
could also destroy you.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Do you look at it as revenue stays the same
but it drives costs down, or do you look at
it as a way to drive additional revenue in some way.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
It's a really good question, and I don't think there's
a simple answer. I think I think it probably in
the short term revenue goes down and cost better go down.
And I think in the longer term you have to
figure out how this is not a cost savings exercise
(16:53):
but a revenue creation exercise. Otherwise it's a raise to
the bottom. And we've seen what happens by the way
the cable business is, or the print magazine business, or
the newspaper business are the examples of what happens when
you make your business model about cost cutting for a decade,
they all go to shit. You cannot build a business
(17:17):
for the long term where the strategy is just to
figure out where.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
You're going to come.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
You have to figure out where you're going to invest.
And I do think the opportunities for where brands can
invest in AI it is not overwhelmingly obvious today.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
But you know there's something there. You just have to
turn it around and.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Figure it out.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
You can create new you know. I'll give an.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Example right now, which is not I'll sort of sound
weird and like a little bit secretive, but like, we've
recently invested in in a business in the travel space,
an AI company, a consumer business in the travel space.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
And when I think about.
Speaker 1 (17:55):
What this company is doing, and I think about the
assets that Thrillist has had in terms of brand recognition,
advertiser relationships, scaled audience, Thrillist could be going and doing
what this company is doing and could be reinventing itself
(18:17):
and imagining itself as a startup with a really unfair
advantage and leg up. And maybe Thrillist is a good example,
and maybe it's not. Maybe there's one hundred other brands
that you would use as a better example that are
stronger today or that whatever.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
But the point would be there.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Are new companies with a new generation of founders that
are being backed to start denovo consumer businesses in AI
application layer company. You know companies that if that kind
of innovative thinking lived in companies that have large assets
(18:58):
and unfair advantages, you could build some really, really fascinating stuff.
I love that, but but by the way, it takes capital,
it takes courage, and it takes a certain kind of
talent that sometimes is fiercely independent and wants to go
build for themselves and doesn't want to go be a
(19:18):
part of a business. I believe that the talent's there
and it's possible, but it's not. You know, the founding
team that that I backed in the travel space I
don't think is employable at some other at some other
company right now. So that's the that's the sort of
that's the challenge. But the opportunity is there.
Speaker 2 (19:41):
Are you looking mainly at AI companies at this point?
Is that where a lot of your investment spending is going.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Our sort of philosophy is we're like highly team and
founder focus. Like what we are in the business of
doing is trying to be around the most interesting tools
of talent and building relationships with folks that we think
are going to be great founders. And we sort of
believe that like founders are smarter than us, and we'll
(20:09):
find the most interesting opportunities. And if we're around great talent,
we're going to find ourselves in interesting markets. And so
fifteen years ago in New York, a lot happening in
D two C commerce, a lot happening in sort of
digital media and ad tech, And so our portfolio looks
a lot like that because that was where the best
talent was building. As time has gone on, and as
Facebook and Google built big offices and real engineering talent
(20:30):
came to New York and the healthcare you sort of
startup ecosystem exploded, and the crypto ecosystem exploded, and the
fintech ecosystem exploded, and you name it. Our portfolio has
sort of bobbed in weave and weaved and moved as
founder talent has been interested and excited by new challenges,
(20:51):
new categories over the last few years. So much of
the energy that the best founders have is direct towards
AI for obvious reasons. And so everything that we are touching,
and I don't want to say the overwhelming majority of
things that we are touching are greatly inspired by an
(21:12):
influenced by AI. Sometimes that means that they are real
AI companies. Sometimes that means that they are companies that
are being created because of problems or changes that will
come to the world because of AI. Sometimes that means
that they are companies that are going to not build AI,
(21:32):
but are going to use AI to do things far
less expensively or replace human labor or sort of service
as software. And sometimes it means investing in categories that
actually are totally out of favor and get no attention
now because everyone is so AI obsessed that there is
(21:53):
value in being willing to do things that others are not.
Because the lemmings move together and so sometimes we look
like the lemmings. Sometimes we look like the rebel, but
the idea remains. Find amazing talent, be unafraid of having
a very diverse portfolio. But also back to your original point, yes,
(22:16):
most of what we do I like. If we have
a conversation with a founder in AI is not a
major part of the conversation, something is probably off.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
When you think of all the things that you've invested,
you guys have invested in, it's typically early stage.
Speaker 4 (22:30):
Right, it's exclusively early staged.
Speaker 3 (22:32):
So it's always early stage.
Speaker 2 (22:34):
And then how long I don't know, at what point
are you like, this has worked, this hasn't worked.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
We're hanging on to this thing, like how do you
make those calls?
Speaker 2 (22:44):
Because you're looking at the entire portfolio all the time,
but you can't just add stuff to it.
Speaker 3 (22:50):
You got a call? Also, how do you do that?
Speaker 4 (22:52):
It's really really hard.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
We're interestingly at sort of a point of maturity now
where we have enough companies that are mature and the
speed at which we make new investments that we almost
have a steady state number of companies that are sort
of active. Because in any given year, let's call it,
twenty companies will sell or frankenstein or or fail.
Speaker 3 (23:21):
Yeah, so a lot of it's natural attrition that.
Speaker 4 (23:24):
A lot of it is naturally you don't have to push,
you just go.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
The one caveat to that, which is a big caveat,
is venture has a I think a pretty obvious liquidity
problem right now. And you know, I'm very optimistic about
the current things I'm seeing around the IPO market and
around actually some things in M and A, and I
do think that we may enter a period, who knows
(23:51):
how long, where there will be some look, some old
fashioned liquidity, some companies IPO and or selling, but venture
as a category needs to figure out an off ramp
for LP dollars in good companies through secondary sales and
other types of mechanisms, you know, continuation funds. There's there's
(24:13):
one hundred different mechanisms that people are sort of playing with,
and I do think that we are spending more time
today thinking about ways that we are able to create
liquidity along the way in partnership with founders, but where
we're not putting money in day one, day two, day three,
day four and then saying, hey, call us when you
(24:35):
when you know there's some wonderful, magical event and somebody
drops off a bag of money at your house right
which we know you know you built a business. It's
never a straight line. There's good times, there's bad times,
and the reality is that like very rarely does someone
even really great companies don't just have fairytale existences. And
(24:59):
so we need to we need to make sure that
we're there to sort of like whether it's some of
those storms.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
With our founders. What do you think you're particularly good at?
Speaker 2 (25:08):
I know you're surrounded by a ton of talent, but
what are you particularly good at that maybe other people
are not as good at.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
I've always been pretty mediocre at a lot of things, dude.
That's sort of like a generalist investor for you. I'm like,
I am good at getting people to want to come
along on a journey. Yeah, and that means that that
manifest itself in being able to get founders to want
to work with us. That that's about how to keep
you know, a team of really high performing, ambitious, great
(25:38):
people wanting to work here and build this thing with me.
I think that you know, works in terms of getting
LPs to want to invest in us and trust us
with their money. And so like that's always what I've
been pretty good at is. And then I would say
that there's like, you know, I hope that that I'm
good at the intangible gut thing around reading people and
(25:59):
making decisions on people, and that that plays out in
the people that we hire here, it plays out in
the founders that we you know, picked to back, and
and so that's like a little taste thing that like
you know, time will tell, but like I I hope
that that's something that I'm good at.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Do you have a mantra or quote that you always
come back to or that you live by or that
kind of pushes you.
Speaker 1 (26:24):
I well, I have a few. One of them is
is life is what happens to you while you're busy
making other plans. So true, and that's the like, you know,
the the dad in me and the you know, forty
three year old in me in terms of just like
really be present and enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
Which is interesting though on that one, just to you know,
going gone from entrepreneur to investor and your fund, A
lot of it is playing the long game.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
You know.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
You hope this stuff pays off in the future and
it builds, and you're helping these entrepreneurs, et cetera, which
is very opposite of staying grounded and focused on the.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
Present, you know.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
So that's the hardest thing about this job for me
is that I need to be patient.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
The way that I counteract that and the way that
we counteract that is you're only as good as your
next deal. And so, I mean, we had our partner
meeting yesterday and had a conversation about what is staying
sharp in this market? How do we make sure that
the bar only continues to go up in of in
terms of founder quality. How do we not get sucked
(27:30):
into fomo in this overheated, crazy market, how do we
like stick to our first principles and hold ourselves accountable
and ask each other the hard questions and challenge one
another here in terms of how do we do excellent
work every day? And I don't you know, again, I've
never worked in another venture fund, so who am I
(27:50):
to say that, Like, that's not the culture at every
venture fund.
Speaker 4 (27:53):
But I do think that.
Speaker 1 (27:54):
Some of the memes about vcs, about like lazy vcs
taking lots of great it for other people's work and
taking August and December and whatever other months of the
year off, like there is a little something too. It's
a slow burn business and you can do well in
(28:15):
this business and not be an animal. And I don't
want to leave that to chance. And I want to
be an animal and I want to build a team
of animals. And I think that we're doing that. And
so like I, you know, that's that's again that comes
from operating and is something that is present in our
culture here.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
And values comes from values absolutely absolutely.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
By the way, my other my other mantra and this
is this is my dad's mantra, and he says this
to me He said this to me a lot when
I was growing up, when I would have imposter syndrome,
which is just remember everyone's a fraud.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
Ah. I love that, and it's so true.
Speaker 4 (28:54):
And so and I say that to myself.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
I say that to folks on my team when I
when when someone feels out over their skis or they
feel in sort of you know, unsure about themselves and
their decision making, It's like, listen, no one has the answer.
Speaker 4 (29:08):
Don't forget that.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
When you feel like there's chaos and you're not sure
what to do, are you going to make that investment?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Are you going to cut it off? Are you going
to make that higher?
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Is there a way you solve a problem or a
technique that you do, or a place you go or
a method you have.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
I think I try to figure out how to connect
to my gut, and that's going to take different formats.
Speaker 4 (29:34):
It may be I'll put.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
A reminder in my calendar that I have to make
a decision on something and that if I am not,
if I need the reminder to make the decision, then
it's to know the proverbial like if it's not a hell, yes,
it's a no. But like just figuring I really do
think that, like the end of the day, I want
(29:57):
to trust my gut and figuring out how I don't
at noise or or you know, other people's opinions or
any any externality forced me into a decision.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
Is that's that's the goal.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
That's a good, good way to think about it. What
are you most excited about and conversely most anxious about
for the future of your business.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
I'm most excited about the quality of our team here
and and to sort of like a secondary degree, the
quality of our portfolio and the founders that we back,
and really the quality of the founders that we back
and that we're getting access to. And so people, the people,
the people is what makes me excited. The the thing
(30:46):
that keeps me up at night is all the things
I don't have any control over, starting with like the
macro macro of tariffs. I don't have the stomach to
talk about politics right now, but like starting with the
things that like we really have no control over, and
(31:08):
you know up there all the way down to changes
in technology and how fast things are moving. And you know,
anyone who's got all the answers to how AI is
going to change the world, like the only anyone who's
sure they have all the answers should be immediately discounted
and ignored because nobody has them. And and so I'm
(31:31):
you know, I generally speaking like I'm a control freak,
and as I get older, trying to like get comfortable.
Being uncomfortable is something I work hard at. That's always
going to be what keeps me up at night is
the unknown.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
What do you do to stay healthy and sharp and
not get overloaded?
Speaker 1 (31:52):
I mean, first and foremost, like spend time like is
and bam, like really prioritize like relationships that like give
me energy and you know, like family and friends and
making time for that, I would say, trying my best
to disconnect from technology, like I don't sleep with my
(32:12):
phone in.
Speaker 4 (32:13):
My room anymore. I you know, I have a weekend phone.
Speaker 3 (32:17):
Oh wait, tell me about that, on.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
The weekend phone that has text message and like basic services.
Speaker 3 (32:26):
You have like a dumb phone on the weekend.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
Yeah, but a dumb phone where where I can be
more present for my kids. And look, sometimes it doesn't work.
Sometimes I'm not able to do it. I'm always reachable,
but I'm not just refreshing, scrolling whatever the whatever all
the habits are and I don't want my kids to
see me being like that, and I know again I
fail at that plenty. And then you know, like the
(32:51):
basic stuff like try to get some sleep, try to
you know, I stay active, I work.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Out, and you know I'm but I'm.
Speaker 1 (32:59):
Not like deeply biohacking or like trying to like you know,
rewrite my DNA, like staying active, high value relationships and
just like whatever. Your version of trying to decrease extreme
stress is probably the best ticket you got.
Speaker 3 (33:15):
Well, Ben, awesome conversation.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Your one thing I've always loved about you is your
successful and grounded and it's so refreshing, even just your mantra,
everyone's a fraud.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
I fucking love so again, don't credit that. That's my dad.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
He deserves full crab. But you know you've you're a
real one. So we appreciate you being on the podcast.
I'm so happy to be here. Great seeing you, and
we gotta we gotta hang in the hut.
Speaker 3 (33:45):
Break bread, let's do it.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
Thanks so much for listening to Soul and Science, and
we'll see you next week. Soule in Science is a
mechanism podcast produced by Maggie Bowles, Ryan Tillotson, and Louie Jablonski.
The show is edited by Daniel Ferreira, with theme music
by Kyle Merrick and I'm your host Jason Harris. At Mechanism,
(34:12):
we build iconic brands with soul and science. The soul
is culturally relevant brand building, and the science is the
always on marketing activities that drive the bottom line. Learn
more at mechanism dot com.
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