How Marcus Lemonis Builds Billion Dollar Businesses

there's a common trend normally in successful people and businesses and also companies that struggle. - Most business owners that do not succeed have no comprehension of their numbers and how money moves in and out of their business.

And two tactically, they don't have a plan. Why am I here? Why did I start my business? Where do I want it to go? And where do I see myself in the future?

- I think the next thing is... - Marcus Limonus is a visionary entrepreneur, a business leader and the co-owner of Camping World and Executive Chairman of Bed Bath and Beyond. Drawing from decades of building, investing in,

and transforming businesses, he empowers entrepreneurs to scale with purpose

through his people first philosophy,

centered on people, process, and product. - I'm only selling things to people, along their journey of that first purchase, the extensions of that, that add value to their life, not add value to mine.

If we're not thinking about the lifetime journey, we should not be in this business. This idea around, I've met a lot of business owners who have said to me, "I don't need AI yet." Or AI is going to wipe out labor in the world.

I'm here to tell you something different. Well, most people are using it as a Google alternative. I need them to use it as an enhancement to their brain. If I'm going to buy a business, I want to give you this real life thing,

and that is really important. I will spend time asking... - My name is Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life Podcast, and I'm here to change the way you see your life. In your earpiece, every single week,

if you're ready to start living the red life, ditch the blue pill, take the red pill, join me in one of the land, and change your life. - Hello and welcome back to another episode. I know if you're watching this, you like the word "profit."

You're an entrepreneur, probably,

and you're always looking at that.

- That would be money by the way. - No, no, it does not, but we all love that word, and I am sad. With the profit guy himself, Mark, as welcome, it's great to have you here.

- So you're obviously known for the profit. You have this new show now, which I won't spoil, we'll talk about it in a bit. But also, what I think less people know is you've been a CEO of a massive company,

which, well, two massive companies, sorry. - I was about to get to that. But two massive companies, and I've ran a company of 300 staff, and that was crazy enough, and a wide experience.

So I always love to speak to people that ran public companies, as you said, it's a whole other level. So excited to dive into all these things, but let's maybe just start, like I know you've got this fascinating,

actually a very ident, almost mirrored childhood to me.

“- But can you still run this thing, don't we look at the same?”

- Yeah, can you summarize it, 'cause it's a great story. - You know what, I was born in a foreign country, born in Lebanon, adopted by a family in Miami, Florida, grew up, ran nightclubs in South Beach, and in Coconut Grove, had a candy business,

moved to Milwaukee, because I didn't like the weather, or how beautiful people were in Miami. I moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, went to college, came back to Miami, ran for office. My office was in the grove and Lincoln Road,

decided to, I lost, clearly, got into the RV business. As I sit here today, the business I founded, Camping World sells one out of every three RVs in America. I'm now in the bedbath in beyond business.

I happen to have a television show, which you mentioned, and I don't have a lot of free time. - Yeah, well, and the only difference I mean, mostly in our childhood is, I move to a nice hot climate from a cold miserable climate.

- You just did the opposite of the opposite, but, you know, there's a good story behind that too, which we can get to. So let's dive in, this is a show where a lot of entrepreneurs, I talk more tactics, that's kind of what I'm known for.

“So, one thing I think everyone loves to ask, I'm sure,”

is you've seen so many businesses, there's a common trend normally in successful people businesses, and also companies that struggle. - Can you stop maybe that?

- Well, I want to break it down to the tactical first,

and then we'll go to some of the philosophical, the tactical first is most business owners that do not succeed have no comprehension of their numbers and how money moves in and out of their business. And, you know, even if you're thinking about

how to manage it at your house, we have cash flow coming in and cash flow coming out. So that's an understanding of that would be one. Two tactically, they don't have a plan. Why am I here? Why did I start my business?

Where do I want it to go? And where do I see myself in the future? Which is the same as saying, what's my one, three, five year plan? Not just in my head, not just with good logos and graphics,

but what are the numbers behind it? And how much cash are you gonna burn of your own? And how much cash are you gonna burn of somebody else's? And what are the consequences of all of that?

“I think the next thing is this lack of understanding”

of the importance of people, and how business is really function. I could take a crappy idea with a crappy process with an unbelievable person and we can get that business to go.

So not great people, not great business, not great product. And if you could transform the person or transform yourself, those things can be reimagined.

tactically, great person, wake up early, go to bed late, super disciplined, love their employees, love their customers, respect money, respect their investors. But don't have the financial literacy, the process literacy, the product sophistication,

and just need subject matter experts to come in and fix all of that. That's the sweet spot for me, because by nature, by definition, we wanna do business, all of us wanna do business with people that we like,

whether we're consumers or whether investors. So it does start with good people. - Yeah, I'll touch on that because it's fascinating because I've not done as many partnerships, but like, even on the employee side,

I think a lot of some years say that, you know, you'll trade maybe the experience for the person of the core values and the soft skills and that's something I'm big on. And I've done some partnerships in the past where

fascinatingly I like four or five X, the company, but then the CEO where I came in and took equity wasn't the right, but you know, wasn't ready for that growth or ready to run a business of that side and then the business fell upon.

I stepped back out. - Yeah, and it's kind of interesting because you know, you figure that out. So you're really looking at the person now, not just the business model.

- Well, that's what the investment is. - Yeah. - And whether you're seeking investment in or you're looking to put investment out,

“it really does matter like, do we wanna do business together?”

Do are we aligned spiritually? And I know that may be too much for people, but are we aligned with how we think about the world? - Yeah. - How we think about people, and how we think about our costs.

- And energetically, right? - Yeah, for sure. And do we, would we willing to have a coffee con leche with them across the street? - Yeah.

- Would we willing to introduce them to our family?

And if the answer is no to both of those,

they probably shouldn't be in employee, and they definitely shouldn't be somebody you invest in. - Yeah, that's great. And then what about like the, you know, more on the actual marketing and business side,

like, I've worked with thousands of people and like, I personally teach so much like, most people don't know how to acquire customers and build the marketing systems. That's my bread and butter.

What do you see there? - I have spent my life understanding how to build notes around specific industries. And understanding how to aggregate that industry, consolidate it as fast as I can through shock and awe,

literally doing as many deals in as many parts of it building a big, as big of a mode around the castle that I'm trying to build as deep as I can build it. And then understand that all I'm trying to fill that remote with is data, true customer data, and I don't please

don't tell me, like some people have, so you just want to collect a bunch of email addresses. No, what I want to understand is I want to understand people's motivation to want to be near my brand. Understand where they want to live inside of that ecosystem,

how many things they want to touch, and how much information I need from them. And then what sort of analysis am I doing to understand the predictive logic around what a decision today

“is telling me about what they really are ultimately going to do?”

So I'm trying to build lifetime value. I spend money to bring them in, but I really need to understand if they buy product X for me, how are they going to use it? One of they going to use it, why are they going to use it? And what are all the things along the journey?

From the time they come to me to the time they exit, and how long can I keep them, and how many things can I sell them along that journey that build value in their life, not build value in my life? I want to make sure I say that one more time.

I'm only selling things to people along their journey

of that first purchase, the extensions of that,

that add value to their life, not add value to mine, because the byproduct of adding value to their life is they'll do business with me, and they'll add commerce. Have I'm only doing it to benefit me? I'll get a quick hit, and a quick drop.

And so I spend a lot of time talking to the 14,000 people that have been part of my organization saying, if we're not thinking about the lifetime journey, we should not be in this business. - Yeah, I think it's so good, like,

you know, I was speaking to you about a business I was running for a while, big brand,

“and one of the, I had no understanding of this business, right?”

I wasn't there, avatar, but the first thing I did, one of the first things I did when I came in is I did a survey to everyone, and as a marketer, I added a coupon, where if they did it, they got a coupon, and we generated like $50,000 in sales

from this coupon, if they did the survey, so it created cash for the business and marketing, but we got to learn so much about historic customers that especially me and other people that were new to the brand had no clue about,

and what resonates with people. And I think so many entrepreneurs, like you think you know, but it is an everending thing, right?

Like you never, your customers are always teaching you more

and more and more. - Well, your customers are teaching you, but I want to challenge one part of that.

- Yeah.

“- And a lot of people, including myself from the past,”

have been lazy, and we make this assumption that because the customer gives us money, and they're transacting with us that they're gonna stay there. And for me, it's transaction in, what could I do better?

Transaction, what could I do better, what could I do better, what could I do better? And tell them why you're asking that, if you don't want to know how to improve your business. - Fine, just don't ask anybody any questions.

- Yeah, no, I love that. - Including your vendors. - Vendus, do you have very important? - Yeah. - I think with entrepreneurs, I've saw this,

like the first few million, you're so focused

on cutting new customer acquisition, and then you realize to go to tens, millions and beyond, it's about lifetime value. And this product suite that I call an ecosystem, like I teach a lot on stage about Apple,

like they've created an ecosystem where you buy a product, then you buy more of those, and then they make it sticky with the software, and your family and all those things.

“And but they do it in a way where your life is better for it, right?”

Like it has your iPhone sings to your cloud. So how do you kind of do that with the brands that you're working in now, if you're allowed to share that. - That's right. - Yeah, so historically have not been historically in the past,

have not thought about data the way I need to today. And aggregating data is about how,

what the intake is and what fields are you collecting that matter?

How are you segmenting and augmenting that data to really understand how to deanonymize it in some cases, build personas in some cases and build garages? I think about data like in a garage, and how are you using systems like snowflake?

Has an example, use whatever you want, to understand who that customer is and how are gonna interact with them. In the old days, you'd have other data companies at what city, we could slice and dice,

and we could tell you like there's zip code. I don't wanna know any of that. I wanna know ultimately what I want the consumer to do for me and what do I wanna do for them? Where are we going to engage in that process?

How does that customer wanna communicate with me? Do are they more traditional? Are they a little older? Are they young? How do they wanna communicate?

And what information do I need to gather from them or around them with either data partners or themselves to be able to effectively meet them where they wanna be met, communicate with them, the way they wanna be communicated to?

And I think that's an art and a science because people would say,

well I can't have 37 million records

and 37 million different ways to communicate with people and I would say, sure you can. With artificial intelligence, you can actually build all these multiple personas and understand if this then that in the simplest form.

It's the one time where the calculus formula that you studied in the 11th grade that you got an F on matters. Because if this then that is really how AI is essentially built. Yeah, yeah.

It's the logic. And this idea around I've met a lot of business owners who have said to me, I don't need AI yet or AI is going to wipe out labor in the world. I'm here to tell you something different.

Data will be materially enhanced by the application of AI. And AI is nothing more than our brain, on steroids and the ability for it to learn at a speed matters. But it only is as good of a tool as you know how to use it.

Just like your body is only a good of a tool if you know how to use it. And this idea that people could just like download it on their phone and all the sudden tell people that they use it.

Well, most people are using it as a Google alternative. I need them to use it as an enhancement to their brain. So if I'm going to buy a business, I want to give you this real life thing. And data is really important to what I'm trying to do

for my ecosystem. I will spend time asking AI in whatever platform I choose. I choose to use Gemini for some copilot for others. It just depends on what I'm trying to do. And ask them to do an analysis of the business

by scraping data from all sorts of places. Tell me where their stores are, where their services are provided, build ring fences around those areas, tell me the average home, the average income, the average credit score, see if there's a trend,

see if there's a trend by the products that they buy, see if there's gaps where I'm not meeting certain people, understand who the competitors are in that area, understand, what kind of home they live in, what their mortgage is, what kind of insurance they have, how many cars they have,

how many rooms they have, do they have a pool,

“do they have kids, how do they think about their life?”

And then I want to understand how they live a life, do they travel, do they take airplanes, do they take RVs or boats, and understanding all of that, makes me warmer, smarter to the kind of business

And if that business can add value to my life,

and if what I have can add value to the customers that that business serves. Yeah, I think we know that was a lot. No, that was great, because we back when I was doing more course in education, we taught about 100,000 entrepreneurs AI.

And I said, guys, to summarize everything, and why I'm good with AI is I'm just very creative.

“And that's what I just think of when you say that.”

You have the creative mind of like, okay, I want to learn all these things and understand these things. And then you put AI to work to do that, right? And I'll show people how to build a landing page and all the emails and ads and socials from this few bits.

And I'm like, I'm not a prom master. I'm just creative in speaking to it. And I think more business owners need to just be more creative with how they use AI on a daily basis. There should be a truth serum, class.

Like I've been thinking jokingly about, you've seen hot ones, right? Like people sort of like-- Yeah, they're for the more they say. There should be like a drinking game of CEOs

who have to acknowledge all the times they use AI to run their business. Because CEOs are trying to convince the world that they don't know if they're actually that smart. The real ones are saying, I understand what I want to accomplish.

I understand my competitive landscape and where I'm trying to take the business strategically. But I need to be able to take the ideas in my head, voice them

“in somewhere, have them organized by thoughts,”

do the analysis against my competition? Tell me what the speed to market is. Tell me what the tools I need that are. And be able to put a dossier together that you could say to people in my own voice,

yep, I put all these ideas into the machine and this is what it gave me. And own the fact that you're using it, like the Madman episode where the head of the agency would say to his shorthand secretary

write all these things down and they would build the ad campaign. It's a personal brain to borrow to make you look better if you actually put the time and energy into it. - Yeah, and I'm being on top of that, the evolution for me,

once I'm kind of not mastered it, but got comfortable with it on a daily basis. It's then like we built a system internally where every employee had to use it once a day and do a log every night of how they used it.

So it was a way to-- - How did you see them? You had an enterprise solution? - It was in Slack, we built a bot where they triggered at 5 p.m.

and they had to write bullet points of how they used AI that day in their business. - It could lie, but they had to use it. - Can I have to pay for that idea? - No, no, it was for the ones on the past.

- I would need you credit for it.

- Yeah, because I've always, you know,

like, if you can roll it out to 100 of your staff using AI, then the next-- - Yeah, and then the next thing is adherence. How do you actually make sure they do it? Sure, some can lie, but adherence goes up drastically

when they have to physically write it every day 'cause now they're thinking every day or crap, I got a tell Rudy tonight, how I used AI. And then they get comfortable with it. And then they start going, even like my HR person was like,

there's no way out, and now she'd use it for everything, or my finance guy. - You can check everything. - Every labor law. - Everything, different states.

- Everything, yeah, everything. So it's like, really, really cool. So anyway, back to you, and a second quote, well, next question that I had is, you've kind of had this 10 year with the profit

and now the fixer, and you said something that's really like that, our member is like,

“you're doing it because someone believed in you, right?”

And you know, it's not about the money, or all these cool being on TV, even though that's cool. - Well, we are good enough. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - But like, let's talk about that, like the why, right?

- I felt like putting myself out there on television was an opportunity to not only get my voice out there, but it was an opportunity to democratize information and to democratize the idea that everybody deserves a shot. You know, if I ever meet people on the street

that say to me, oh, I saw the episode where you were

at this crazy business owner, I always stop him.

And I say, first of all, every business owner that ever came on the show should be given a lot of credit. You sign up for reality show to put your business, your family, and your good and bad choices on full display while some guy comes in

to tell you how wrong you are about everything. Takes a lot of courage. It takes a lot of courage. - And we're all crazy as entrepreneurs anyway, right? - And we're all, like I'm the leader of the crazy thing.

But part of the reason why I've also felt like it needed to be done is that I wanted society to recognize the importance of giving people a chance where other people would not. And small business owners usually get one Saturday year,

where small business Saturday, where big banks and credit card companies like to sprinkle fairy dust on your local town business, which is insulting. And I've been asked to be part of that for 15 years

because every day is business day, big medium or small business. I decided to make the show because I wanted to give people a shot that other people wouldn't because people had given me a shot. And that the recognition that every successful person

or not successful person was brought to today through other people's actions. And whether that was our parents, our faith, our teachers, our neighbors, our peers, our friends, whoever it may be, yes, I know you did the work.

And yes, you did it by yourself

“and all the things that you need to tell yourself.”

But if you like close your eyes at night and you let your head down on the pillow and you really are honest with yourself, you did the work. And I'm cool with that. But somebody gave you a shot.

Somebody opened up a door. Somebody gave you five bucks. Somebody taught you something. Somebody introduced you to somebody. In the greatest thing that you could do for yourself,

for your employees, for people that are studying you as a successful person, is it just all in that? There's no such thing as self-made. You could be homemade. Yeah, but you didn't do it by yourself.

Yeah, I remember a small person on day that I really respected, it's kind of summarized. It really well, he says like, you saw at the top of a tree. And then as you go down, there's all these branches of the tree.

And that's kind of shapes your life and your entrepreneur career. And I really like that. Every person you meet in that decision tree of life is in going to be great. But there's going to be a hell of a lot of good ones.

“And you should pay attention to those people who”

are trying to guide you to pick the right branch to go to next.

And not always assume, this is, if I have a fatal flaw

and my family and friends would tell you this. But if I have a fatal flaw, I'd lead with trust. And I lead with the belief that everybody is good. I think you have to, right? Like, it's actually in the ass, but I'm the same.

I have to, yeah, yeah, you have to. And I would touch on that, because that tree and those people that guide you, some of my biggest, like, you know, I've had employees steal from me, like, at account, shut down that way.

But my point is, it's like, at the time, they feel like the end of the world. But for me, actually, they've been, like, the catalyst for my best things. So it's not just in my opinion, about the great things

and the guides and the people that help you. But sometimes, you know, if you listen to this, it's the biggest struggles, and they're like, oh, what am I going to do now that actually creates something awesome for you?

I agree with that. We live in a world where I think AI and fake news, or real news, or however you consume information has created a lot of skepticism. And it's hard to believe in certain things.

And the one thing that I'm struggling with the most is starting to see people, not necessarily believe in themselves. And I do want, I do want to bring that back to center as one of the singular traits that is required

“to have successes, you have to believe in yourself,”

because if you don't, other than your mom. Yeah, no one else will. It's not, there's not going to be a lot of people. Yeah, I didn't come from money, but my parents were very good professional athletes in high up.

And I mean, the reason I became successful

is as a kid, they've always said to the only thing

they wanted is that I could believe I could do anything. And I do, you know, for better or worse, sometimes I do. - Is it always work? - No, no, no, no, no, no, no. But you get used to it not working, you know, times.

But it's like, did it change for you in the beginning to now, like, did not working in your reaction, and it not working in your reaction today? - Yeah, I think definitely, like, yeah, but I've always been like, okay, with quote-unquote failure

at not working out, 'cause I think I've just seen it's part of the journey. And I always, 'cause I came from a family of pro sport, I always imagine the Olympian trains for four years to get food poisoning the night before.

And that's like, wow, four years gone, right? Whereas in business, you fail at the next week, something works out, right, all the next year. So I've really became good of just learning and that's part of the process and not letting it affect me.

Over the, and that's a scale I've always tried to work

on, like, build in a muscle in the last 10 years. - It's easier said than done. - Of course, yeah, for sure. - For me, it's gotten harder, okay? - Because the more public I was about what I did

and the more on display, whether you're running a public company or doing it on television, the risk for embarrassment. And I'll use that word, I don't know a better word. - It's higher.

- Yeah, especially, I mean, totally come on as well. As you say, you're reporting to everyone. I still have all private companies, no investors, so I'm fortunate, I guess, in that sense.

- No, you're reporting to in that moment? - Well, everyone, my customer's my staff, my everyone, yeah, still. - And so, for anybody, and I used to think the same thing

well, I own 100% of my business, okay?

We understand the economics.

“- It's strata, but every decision that you make”

impacts potentially, one of your employees being able to pay their mortgage payment, or other tuition for their kids. - Yeah, I said this last night, so one of my senior people passed and I was like,

we got to fix a department, and I had to do some things they didn't like, and I said to the head of that department, I said, Luke, my job as CEO isn't sadly for everyone to like me, it's to keep everyone in a job and to keep the company successful,

and sometimes that means I'll make decisions they won't always like. - Yeah, I said that the earlier the week got a Christmas party and everybody said to me, why did the Christmas party?

- Did you have to do that? I said, because at the end of the year, and you guys decided to make it a Christmas party? - Yeah, and you can't say the entrepreneur out of the entrepreneur. - Yeah, I feel like busking, yeah.

- So, so, last question, right? I have an American flag behind, if you're watching on video, I know you're a fan of American flags and keeping them in their places, right, for places. Do you mind tell it, some rise in that story?

- So, the business that I founded, the camping world that we sell RVs in America, to see America and all the great things that go with it. And when I came over to this country from Lebanon, my family owned a card dealership

on Southwest A Street in Ligion, which is by the Miami International Airport, and my family had a big flag, and it was big. And it also felt big 'cause I was small, and I used to say to my family all the time,

well, I'm really the only one that's in immigrant, and I'm really the American dream, it's like as a seven-year-old smart-ass kid. And I said, and when I own a business one day, I'm gonna have a flag, my flag's gonna be bigger than your flag,

'cause I'm better than enough. And so, I started putting up flags over a decade ago, at my camping world business. You could Google it, like Marcus Flag.

“I think you could actually just type in those two things,”

and it'll show you all the craziness. But several years ago, the flags that I put up are 130 foot tall flag poles. You couldn't put one up in South Florida, 'cause the hurricanes would ever allow you, not the Miami hurricanes,

but the actual hurricanes. And it's up 40 by 80, so it's 3200 square feet, so it's massive, like it looks like something you'd see in Texas at a car dealer. And I put them all up, and I put them up wherever I want

when we open up a store. And I had a few cities more now that have taken objection to me putting the flags up, they've sued me, and told me they were gonna take me to jail, if I wouldn't take my flag down,

and over the seven or eight years that I've been fighting this, I've been sued in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 cities.

I've never lost, I've gotten lost, changed in certain states,

because I refuse to not put my flag pull up. For a little disclosure, I never put it up when it's near an airport, so the FAA says you can't do it, I'm like, okay, somebody's gonna get hurt, but absent that, they go up, and cities sort of lose their mind.

And I've had a fun time in the last couple of years where cities in North Carolina, in Tennessee, in California, even Florida, oddly enough, have come after me and said you have violated the ordinance, if you don't take it down, we're gonna find you,

we're gonna send you to jail, we're gonna make you think it down, and my response is, thank you. - Yeah. - No. - And that's normally just that, but I'll just--

- That's it, that's it, that's it. - So I know when I walk the streets, I'm either the prophet or the flag guy. - The flag guy, yeah, that's a mainstream name. - Yeah, okay, got it.

- So the flag guy's actually more fun for me. - Yeah, it's a cool story. - I mean, but it's a, you know, before we went on the air, it's a story of principle, right, like, you know, and I believe system that they have,

that this country did something for me, when nobody else would, it gave me a chance to earn a living, higher people, it's the greatest country in my mind in the world. - Yeah, yeah.

- Because of what it did for me, and it's my love letter. - You know, I mean, we're both from immigrants, and I came here with the American Dream, I left real estate, and everyone in England with one suitcase, and here I am today,

and have an amazing life, and great.

- Could you learn about America,

“that most people would be surprised when I got out?”

- Yeah, I was like, right now, like, what if you learned about being in America, that most people would be surprised to know? - Well, America, when you're overseas, it's like, seen as this almost gimmicky country, but I think it's actually, like in England, at least,

they portray it, right, as this gimmicky country, I saw a real on Instagram the other day of, like, living in America, but actually America, to me, is the best country of core values, which is so big for me, is a business owner too,

like how they treat the military, I love that, and we have a military show, actually, cool. - Well, yeah, operations, CEO, that's the businesses, 'cause we want to highlight that, you know, and I'm from a military background,

but I just, I love that, so, like, how they treat the vests,

but then also within it, the diversity,

“which I think is a really, every stay is like Europe,”

it's like a country, which I love. - I have a question for you, and it's a question that I would ask every viewer. I want you to think about this for just a couple of milliseconds, after I ask you the question.

But I want you to list off three brands in the United States that you believe define America. - Okay. Free brands that define America, I think, gosh, that's a free brand.

- And if you're watching, you can post this answer. - Yeah. - To tell them where to post it. - Yeah, just on social media and Instagram, yeah, Instagram's best.

Yeah, I would say one's got to be like a technology, a company like-- - I don't even name it, yeah, yeah, we brand it. - Okay, Tesla.

- Can't be one of your sponsors.

- Tesla. - Yeah. - Because innovation, cutting edge against the norm, I would say, there's got to be a clothing company of some sort, I'm trying to think what though.

So I'm something to do with sport. Again, I don't know if I can name a brand, but like athletes and success, like I almost feel like the American Olympic team, or if you can class it as a brand.

“But I think, yeah, America is like born on success”

and like chasing that goal and dream. So I would say something related to the American Olympic team or sports team. Yeah, so sorry, I think I got one and a half. - I'm not letting you talk.

- Okay, good news is we can edit it. - Yeah, okay. - We can just let people see this. - Okay, so the fur. - Well, I was gonna say, I'm a fan of monster, right?

- Yes, there. - Yeah, okay, okay, don't have face. - Actually McDonald's. - Okay, you got one of mine. - Maybe Nike, almost kind of, yeah, almost like under Armolo.

It's got this more rugged, like I feel nice a bit kind of polished now, like, is it though? - When you go in, I like the old night when I was a kid 20 years ago now, it's like $200 tracks so it's more fashiony.

- That's the issue. - So I liked how it was more an authentic sports brand 20 years, so in champion music. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, so like, Nike maybe 20 years ago. - Ah, okay, what else?

- Nike. - It's not an easy question. - No, it's not, it's definitely Tesla. So we've gone Tesla. What about Nike 20 years ago, is that fair answer?

- You did to whatever you said. - And then Mac Donald's, okay, so that's much more. - So what I would like you and everybody else to do is pick the things on a piece of paper that caused you to select them

'cause those are things that you admire and make sure that whatever you're doing is actually hitting those things 'cause if it's not, then you aren't even doing the things that you admire. - Yeah, no, I like that.

- Mine is Bucky's. - Bucky's, yeah, I barely know that, Brian. - What? - Yeah, I'm like, do you realize that everybody watching this is gonna, it probably, yeah.

- Mine is Bucky's because they really understand the customer and they've created something that is so different in a very common place which is like gas stations and they've changed the way people think about it and it's destination.

- Sure.

- My second is General Motors, okay.

Because it demonstrated that over the course of time the business world will do this. It's like a microcosm of cyclicality in American business and it's so relevant to how we travel, go to work, do everything else.

And the last one is Disney because it lets people of all ages so we're to see what's possible. - Yeah, I like that. - Disney's a good one. - And so as you're building your own business, right?

“I think you have to think about, am I putting the customer”

at the center of all of it like Bucky's? Am I providing something that can stand the test of time like General Motors? And am I creative enough and innovative enough to keep people's attention for so many years

and so many mediums like Disney? If you can't answer those three things, then I don't know what the hell your business is doing. - Mm, that's good. That's good.

It's going in my small person's quote with the tree. So it's two gems that I actually have changed my answer. - Please go to Bucky's. - No, no, I know what it is. I know what it is.

- Yeah, I don't remember I don't drive. - I don't drive. - I just need you, I don't know what I need to get you in R.B. - I need you to go to see one and show people. - Are there many in Florida?

- You can, yes, I think I know where the closest one is, but it's probably right up, I know it. - The Starbucks, I changed my answer from night to Starbucks. 'Cause it's, they go big. - Yeah.

- People buy the Grande, Americans like it big. And being British, you would see Starbucks in the movies. It's just a very American thing. Hey, let's go grab a coffee.

and anybody picks your company, I need you to tell me the single attribute you admire and whether you want that to be in your business. - Yeah. - So what is Starbucks?

“- Well, I think the attribute there is the community”

and loyalty. - Great. - McDonald's is the branding and standing out like I do. - Over time. - Yeah.

- And legacy, brand that people, I always quote,

"I build actually my whole company on McDonald's, "not for that for systems." - Actually, some change in that, 'cause I reference McDonald's in my company every day. 'Cause they have a system that feeds 1% of the planet

on a daily basis. - Wow. - Yeah, it's a crazy fat, 1% and you think about it. So, systems from McDonald's, but also branding, Starbucks for the tribe community,

that pay $9 for coffee every day. - That's too. - Crazy. - And then, in some cases, dump. 'Cause people, it's been $9 times 30, it's $200,000.

- Yeah, that's about $4,000, yeah. - $4,000 a year. - Yeah, we can afford to, but I don't even want you,

“'cause I think I can be given it to somebody.”

- Yeah, sure.

So, yeah, I think, I think, and then what was my first Tesla

because innovation? - I think it's Tesla because I think you like the fact that it goes against the grain as well. - Yeah, innovation, going different. Being a bit of enough humor.

- That's why I went with red, 'cause that's the story of it. It's favorite, color is a kid. Everyone in Marx didn't say, don't use red. It's too conflicting.

“And I said, "My whole life is a story of doing what others”

said not to do being different." Like I was a different shy or totally different move to America. So, it's like the story in my life. - Love it. - Yeah, thank you.

- Anyway, well, thank you for asking me those questions. It's rare that it's in reverse, but guys, we're out of time. I hope you enjoyed that episode on watching me struggle to answer a question,

which never-- - Thank you.

- We've struggled a bit. - It really happens, but that was me struggling for sure. But also, my episode now, see you guys soon, take care. (upbeat music) (upbeat music)