Today’s episode is a podcast with Mick Hunt from @mickunplugged, and we go all-in on why people are stuck, how “interest media” has changed the entire game, and why your niche is YOU. We talk entitlement, fear, content strategy, negativity, family energy, and why accountability is the cheat code most people refuse to use. Hope you enjoy!
00:00 – “The only niche is you”
02:15 – Interest media vs social media (the game changed)
04:30 – Why random honest content still wins
06:50 – Followers don’t matter anymore
13:20 – Money, materialism, and living outside your means
16:05 – Blame vs accountability
19:00 – Cutting negative energy (even family)
24:10 – Why intent is everything
26:40 – Being original vs copying the culture
29:00 – Garage sale flips and $19 to $59k
34:50 – Collectibles as the next cultural pillar
36:30 – How authenticity turns into impact
#garyvee #mindset #entrepreneurship #motivation #selfawareness #accountability #contentstrategy #interestmedia #veefriends #mickunplugged
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Gary Vaynerchuk is a serial entrepreneur and serves as the Chairman of VaynerX, the CEO of VaynerMedia, and the CEO and creator of VeeFriends. Gary is considered one of the leading global minds on what's next in culture, business, and the internet.
Known as "GaryVee," he is described as one of the most forward thinkers in business. He acutely recognizes trends and patterns early to help others understand how shifts in consumer attention impact the realities of the business world today. Gary's approach sits at the intersection of business and pop culture. He keenly understands how to bring brand relevance to the forefront. He is a prolific angel investor with early investments in companies like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Venmo, Snapchat, Coinbase, and Uber.
Gary is an entrepreneur at heart – he builds businesses. Today, he helps Fortune 1000 brands leverage consumer attention through his full-service advertising agency, VaynerMedia, which has offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, Toronto, Mexico City, London, Amsterdam, Sydney, Singapore, Tokyo, Bangkok, Delhi, and Kuala Lumpur. VaynerMedia is part of the VaynerX holding company, which also includes Eva Nosidam Productions, Gallery Media Group, The Sasha Group, VaynerSpeakers, VaynerCommerce, and Tingley Lane Trading. Gary is the Co-Founder of VaynerSports, VCR Group, VaynerWatt, ArtOfficial, Resy, and Empathy Wines. He guided Resy and Empathy to successful exits -- which he later sold to American Express and Constellation Brands, respectively. He also owns a Major League Pickleball team called the 5s, is part owner of a Big3 basketball team, and is an investor in the revival of the SlamBall League.
In 2021, Gary created VeeFriends, an entertainment company that has become a rising powerhouse in modern entertainment and collectibles. Often described as Pokemon meets Sesame Street, the company leverages stories, games, events, collectibles, and technology to scale its character universe. Vaynerchuk also has negotiated partnerships with brand powerhouses such as Crocs, Fanatics, Macy’s/Toys “R” Us, Mattel’s UNO, Mattel’s Masters of the Universe, Moonbug Entertainment, Reebok, Squishmallows, Topps, and more.
Gary is also the founder and creator of VeeCon – a contemporary super conference that converges business and pop culture with innovation and technology. He is a six-time New York Times bestselling author, with titles including Crush It!, Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook, Twelve and a Half and Day Trading Attention. In addition to running multiple businesses, Gary documents his daily life as a CEO through his social media channels, which have more than 45 million followers and garner more than 300 million monthly impressions/views across all platforms. His podcast, "The GaryVee Audio Experience," ranks among the top podcasts globally.
Gary serves on the board of MikMak, Bojangles Restaurants, Global Citizen Forum, The Paley Center, and Pencils of Promise. He is also a longtime Well Member of charity: water.
Gary's life ambition is to buy the New York Jets.
Оглавление (11 сегментов)
“The only niche is you”
Two people today in my office asked me, "How do I find my niche? Everything feels overcrowded. " I'm like, "Everything is overcrowded. " I'm like, "The only niche you have is you. " I made a video years ago that still gets brought up all the time of me talking about how much I love blueberries and that I can eat blueberries better than anyone. — And that video got 5 million views at the time when most of my stuff was getting 500,000. If you make content that is random, that is true and honest or passionate to you, it will find audience. If you do a hundred of them, I have a funny feeling on your road to 100, something good's about to happen. — Big topic. I'm just gonna say the two words. Interest media, — my man. You're listening. — Because you and I are on the same vibe there. I've been telling people for the past six months, it's not social anymore. — Like there's nothing social about anything you're doing on Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, or X, whatever they call it now. Like there's nothing social about that. Nope. — It's interest. — Yeah, it's interest media. You know, there is something social. The comments are still an incredible opportunity that people are missing out on. Mick, — huge missed opportunity. Actually reply to every comment on every Instagram post. You would grow a lot. — Um, so social still is out there. Now, what you and I are referring to and what I've been yelling about for about three years and I kind of like got this term down now because it makes it very easy to understand is the algorithm doesn't work the same way. Social media for 15 years, as you know, I've said this a bunch, used to work like email marketing. Get as many followers as you can, and a certain percentage of them will see it. Now, literally, me and you were cooking. We're growing. There's somebody listening right now who's never posted once, but they own three dry cleaners. And you know what? They're like, you know, I want to be like Mick and Gary, too. And they're literally going to be inspired by this little rant. And they're about to make a video. Literally, they're on their way to work right now. Literally, they're going to make their first video telling the story of how they built these three dry cleaners, and they're going to post it on TikTok, and it might get 90 views, but they might get a message that kind of gives them a little more juice. And their ninth video they make is going to get 1 million views, lead to more business, and they're going to be on their way to be us. And that excites me. And that's not how it was from 06 to call it 21. But that is how it is now. followers are diminishing in your
Interest media vs social media (the game changed)
guaranteed to get views and awareness. — The content now is finding their audience. Let me give you a four instance. If I make a video ah we talked about it I think before. Yeah, we didn't talk about spades here. We were talking about it before we went on. You and I are both passionate about spades. If I make a video right now about spades. Okay. Like I love spades. Like I know how to sneak it in. You're never going to catch me. I you know I know what to do. I've got hand signals with my partner. like we know what to do. If I did that in 2017 to the audience I had, it would be a low performing piece of content because people are like they're yeah occasionally they want a little randomness from me but they want their business stuff, their motivation stuff. Today if I posted that on Tik Tok especially, but more and more every other platform too that is literally going to show up in the feeds of people who don't even know who I am that [ __ ] with spades. — Yeah. — Now it's going to show up to 12 or 15 people. and if none of them react that it'll probably die pretty quickly and it will low perform. But I made a video years ago that still gets brought up all the time of me talking about how much I love blueberries and that I can eat blueberries better than anyone. — And that video got 5 million views at the time when most of my stuff was getting 500,000. — And so that one just hit and that goes back to you are the niche. talk about what you love or you know and that is the truth of interest media. out. If you make content that is random, that is true and honest or passionate to you, it will find audience versus not. Now, again, don't get discouraged. Let's say someone got excited about what I just said and they made a post tomorrow about Strateggo, the board game, and the following day about Lasagna and the next day about Run DMC, and all three did way worse than the stuff they normally do. I don't need a DM from y'all saying, "Gary B, you're wrong. You lost it. You're the worst. You just did three. If you do a hundred of them, then I'm about that life. Then you can come and yell at me. But I have a funny feeling on your road to 100, something good's about to happen. — Damn right. Damn right it is. You know, Gary, I tell all my friends, you're you personally are like my brother from another mother. About a month ago, we're on a live on whatnot, right? And a
Why random honest content still wins
person, I'm not going to say their name, in the comments was trying to go for sympathy and it went something like this. Gary, my company is ending remote work in the next nine months. I don't think this is a great place because we can continue to work from home. We are just ineligible for raises. In order to get a raise, you're gonna have to come back into the office. No, by the way, — the company, just to add color, cuz I went crazy on this one, too. I'm glad you brought this up. The company is moving to Florida from wherever they were. Obviously, they're doing that because of the taxes and all the things happened, but also we're living in this AI world. The fact that this company said, "We're moving to Florida, but all of you get to keep your jobs and we're giving you a year's notice that we're moving and you get to keep your jobs and can be 100% remote. But as you can imagine, because HQ is in Florida, the promotion cycles and the rising will be a little bit different and they're clowning on that. I lost my [ __ ] — dude. I was writing down because if you didn't say anything, I was literally going to go do an Instagram post about that because how freaking — entitled, — bougie of yourself. How entitled for you to be upset. And I'm sure it's a six-f figureure job that person was complaining about. Like — even if it's a five figure job, the here's where we're at and you know this big and boy do I have a funny feeling knowing your audience and what you talk about like [ __ ] got soft out here, right? — And like do you understand what our grandmas would think about the work ethic of our children? Our great grandmothers would be rolling in their goddamn graves if they understood what these kids' expectations and entitlement was. We got soft. And that's what empires do. We need to be real with ourselves in America. And I'm not even talking about rich people. Like I'm not like I'm talking the a Let me go this route. The average person that makes 60,000 a year right now, which is not an extraordinary amount of money, but way closer to the average of what Americans make than people realize. Everybody thinks everyone makes a million dollars now. When people live, when pe when I was
Followers don’t matter anymore
growing up and I was poor, very poor, like poor, then it was lower middle class, then it lower, then it was middle class. When I was coming up in my life, all the way to high school, and then I went to college where literally, and this is where I got my spades skills from, I went to a school where 90% of the kids that I went to school with were on financial aid. I grew up humbly. These kids were from hood culture. Okay? When we all grew up, when you had humble stuff, you didn't buy 30 pairs of sneakers. You weren't buying Starbucks. You weren't ordering Uber. You weren't [ __ ] What has happened is, yes, there's a separation of wealth issue, which I fully believe it. — Yeah. But you're not allowed to complain when you're buying a $36 cocktail on a Thursday night happy hour when your money's tight. You're not allowed to complain when you've got Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and [ __ ] Paramount Plus. When your money's tight, you're not allowed to complain when you've got eight different Kith and essential hoodies when your money's tight. When I was growing up and money was tight, we looked poor, — right? My homies had one pair of sneakers. So did I for [ __ ] three years. — Yep. — So what's happened is a combination of things. We've become unfortunately too materialistic. Again, [ __ ] had banged up used cars when our money was tight when I was growing up. — Mick, everybody's leasing new cars now. — Yeah. — Everybody's credit is all [ __ ] up. Everyone's in huge debt. People lived within their means in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s. We've lost our way. — People are buying dumb [ __ ] when they don't have money to impress people that they don't even like. We've become insecure. We've become way too nosy. We keep up with the Joneses, let alone the Kardashians. And we're [ __ ] lost out here. And we need to get back to humility, to family, to [ __ ] simplicity. — Yeah. — We need to be hungry and ambitious. Look, I'm about that life. I'm trying to get every [ __ ] person that's listening to this podcast to a different plane financially. And I will tell them how to do that. Social media content, live social shopping. Like, I'll put it out every [ __ ] day. The problem is when your mindset is complaining and blaming, Mick, I made [ __ ] money with Bush. I made money with Obama. Trump. I made money with Biden. I'm not [ __ ] blaming my pro, by the way. I had problems with Bush. Obama. Not them. I had problems during their reigns. I'm not pointing [ __ ] fingers at a politician. I'm not even blaming my mama and my daddy. Like, why are we blaming everyone? Everyone's pointing [ __ ] fingers. Why don't you point thumbs at yourself if you are upset right now? If you don't have the paper you want. relationship you want, — become accountable. — Yep. — You will win. And I'm not trying to give hard love here. I'm trying to get you out of your place of unhappiness. Blaming's clearly not working for y'all. — Yeah. — So why don't you try blaming yourself? You're in bad relationships. Stop [ __ ] hooking up with [ __ ] boys. — I love it, dude. Literally just had that conversation and I said it a different way. Like I have this thing about being present and always being where your feet are at. Right. Well, sometimes you need to just move your freaking feet, right? Like if you don't like where you're at, you can move. you can change. And I don't mean physically moving, but like sometimes it's a mental move. — I mean physically. — Yeah. — When I get into deep political conversations with people, I'm like move, — right? — Like like you're allowed like — if you know some of my friends are like Sweden. I'm like move to Sweden. Move to [ __ ] Stockholm, [ __ ] Move. Like and I'm not saying like you don't love America, get out. America is in has plenty of flaws. — Yeah. — News alert. So does everybody else. — Yep. — You know, when people like Sweden, like what's Sweden's suicide rate if it's so [ __ ] great. — Oh, Canada's healthcare. Why do [ __ ] that need real surgeries come to America? Like what are we talking about? — Yeah. — So again, it all sits under one genre, which is when you go simple. — And let me give a big breakthrough. And this is why I'm so motivated to be on this podcast because I know you're speaking that truth which makes me believe that the people that are listening right now like have the capacity to do it. For example, one of the biggest things that's screwing everybody up is they're just consuming too much negativity. — Like that's why I'm so that's why I'm doing this podcast with you. This is double positivity, right? Like you want to know why you're not winning? You're hanging out with losing energy. That could be your sister. auntie. That could be CNN. That could be Fox News cuz both of them sell fear. You're listening to negativity. Like get your game up. Like change it up. Like you can't Listen, I'm not a big proponent of fully cutting family because family's blood, right? — But if your dad is the most negative person on earth, maybe you don't need to talk to him two times a day. maybe once a week or twice a week will be okay. — Or if you're like me, once every 30 years. But that's a different story. — Yeah. And that and by the way, like you know, again, like nobody want nobody I don't want that for you, — right? My hope is that — when you cut to once a month, once a week versus three times a day, you reset your energy. You're now stronger and now you have the ability to go back into the lion's den and try to pull dad out. Yeah, — you see where I'm going? The reason I I and I've seen this, I've done this. — The reason I like to teach people to limit time with their negative family members is because if they're the positive one and they're being affected, dragged down. If they limit it, they build back up their juices, their cup fills back up, and then they can go back into the lion's den and try to pull those people out. And it's hard to change people, and they got to do it for themselves and all that stuff. But what ends up happening is if you don't step out and limit, you finally, it sounds like potentially what happened to you and it's happened to me in different situations. You get to a tipping point and then you're fully done. You know, people like, Gary Vee, I can't cut my mom out. I'm like, I'm not saying
Money, materialism, and living outside your means
cut your mom out. In fact, the more you eat her negative toxic [ __ ] the more likely you're going to find judgment day and you're going to actually cut her out. If you limit, you can reset at times and one day you might be able to last man in Saigon kind of [ __ ] and pull him out of the [ __ ] fire, right? So, and then [ __ ] that's family. Now, let's move it. Co-workers, other influencers, homies, um, acquaintances, random people, people in the comments, people in [ __ ] Reddit, cut that negativity out. — And you want to know the fastest way to find out who those people are in your so-called circle? Start winning. start winning and then see who really is there with you because for me that gave me so much perspective and you told me it was going to happen. Like I'm not saying something that Mick just made up. Gary Vee has been saying that for a long time. Start winning and you'll really see the people that were rooting for you and those that held you back. — And let me give you a real deep 301 [ __ ] good energy lesson on that one. Let me tell y'all what I do when I'm winning, when I was winning, when I'm currently winning, what ends up happening. I'm sure all of you thought when Mick said that, he said, "Mhm. " You said, "Damn, I thought I didn't realize I had so many haters around me. " Let me tell you something about the people that boo you. They're just hurt. When you start winning, and I have a feeling a lot of people are going to start winning off this podcast. I could smell it. Once in a blue moon this happens. I can smell it. When those people start booing you that you most thought were going to cheer for you and you're shook. Just remember this part of the podcast and remember don't be mad at them. Feel sad for them and be the bigger person and try to be compassionate and help them too because we're so quick to be like, "Oh, [ __ ] hater. [ __ ] I [ __ ] should have knew it. [ __ ] you, Sally. I'm never talking to you again. I thought you were going to be my number one cheerleader. You're my number one hater. It's cuz Sally's scared. You were her misery loves company buddy and now you're about to change and now she's lonely. The [ __ ] she going to do? Oh [ __ ] A scared dog bites. — Yes, — she's biting. Don't be mad at her. Don't put her to sleep. Rebuild her. Bring her along. The thing I'm most proud of is the people I've brought along the most were the people that did the most wrong to me at first. — Mhm. — That's real strength. That's real love. That's real winner [ __ ] — Speaking of your parents and your journey and all the generosity that you do, man. Like you do so much for free.
Blame vs accountability
Like so much just here's some tips, here's how you can do it. I've always wanted to ask you like what's your because what's your purpose? that thing that's deeper than your why for doing the things that you do — because I'm good. You know, it's, you know, when you're full, you're not really eating everyone's food. You're not, you know, like when you're full, you're handing out food. You know, the that's the real answer. I talk about this concept of gratitude and guilt sometimes to that question because I do feel unbelievably grateful for again I started with it impromptu the parents I had especially my mom the way she raised me um being born in the Soviet Union coming to America living in a household full of love with no money so by the time I was 10 it was ingrained in me that money had no impact on happiness I'm so happy I grew up in the early 80s 90s in Edison Jersey. I'm happy I went to Martin Luther King Elementary School. I'm sure for everyone listening knows that means I knew how to scrap. play spades and ceil like I grew up with such humble beginnings and such diversity. Back to MLK. MLK was not just black kids, black, white, Indian, Asian. I just I have so much love in my heart. I grew up with all kinds of people. You know, I've now that I'm 49, I've lived and been in the muck when I first came to America in a studio apartment in Queens. — I've been poor. I've been in the poor rooms. I've been rich. I'm in the richest rooms. And when you live a coast to coast life, whether you go from rich to poor, which is obviously incredibly challenging, or from poor to rich, when you've seen happiness and you've seen despair, you know, when you've seen light and you've seen darkness, you have clarity. And I do the things I do because when I started giving away all my information, my wisdom, my hope, my happiness, and my best practices, um, I was already good, my man. You know, I was financially less successful than I am today at 31, 32 when this started happening, but I was equally happy. — Yeah. — You know, and I was equally gracious humble and I was equally hopeful. And the truth is the last 10 years of the world, you know this given those beautiful words and I'm thankful for them. I have stayed me through every twist and turn in my own life. But then even more hard when I look at public figures, the culture, and I don't mean black culture, which is actually the culture. I mean popular culture, political culture, the atmosphere in our society has changed a lot in the last 15 years. — Yeah. And a lot of people talked about
Cutting negative energy (even family)
optimism and loved and now pontificate hate in disguise of political views or strategy or [ __ ] So thing I'm most proud of is I'm consistent. I haven't been caught up when the left wanted me to left and when the right wanted me to right. I'm just right here in the [ __ ] middle. I got love for everyone. Life is complicated. I don't have the audacity to think that everyone should see the world the way I think. I'm blown away by people's audacity to think that everyone should see the world the way they see the world. — Yeah. — So, I'm staying kind of in my pocket. I'm in my studio. Even though I have no music skills, I think of it as like I'm in my studio. I'm working. I'm writing. I'm making beats. I'm putting out music. I just do that in a different way. But I'm not trying to go to the red carpet. Abiza and party. I'm a true musician and uh without a musical bone in my body. I'm just in my [ __ ] cocoon spitting my words, building my businesses because I think that's important. If I'm going to pontificate about what to do, I don't want to be a professor. — Yeah. — You know, when I say do this, I did it. When I'm out there today, my morning post, everybody should do social shopping, live shopping. Social media is about to be QVC. Well, I'm doing a h 100red,000 a night selling [ __ ] on whatnot. Yeah. — You know what I mean? So, I think that's something else I'm proud of. And you know, now you're running these circles. What's cool for me is before we started, we talked a little bit about Damon. What I like about my life is I'm so fortunate that I have men like you saying what you just said. But what I know is that Damon knows me more and he likes me even more than that because he knows the [ __ ] I do behind the camera, — right? There's so many people that are their best selves in front of the camera and they [ __ ] disappoint you off camera. My best work is done when y'all don't see me. — Yep. Absolutely, man. You know, it's the same thing. I was just telling you, Robert Irvine and I talked about you for a couple of hours, not even trying to talk about you. You were just a part of the conversation and we both said the most consistent, authentic person we know is Gary Vee, right? And I call you, and Robert was laughing, but he goes, "You're right. " I said, "What I call Gary Vee is the inconvenient truth, right? He is always going to be consistent. He's going to tell you like it is, and you're going to learn on everything that he says, whether you agree with it or not, which is I don't know why you would not agree, but you are the inconvenient truth, brother. " — You know what's funny? It comes from an interesting place, and I hope you know when I do something like this, I want people to get value. So, let me tell y'all where that comes from, that compliment. It comes from two very, very interesting things. One, it comes from intent. Mick, what makes me super different in hindsight. I knew it was happening along the way, and now it is just on wax, as they say, is I've never thought about anything I've done publicly from any other lens than the intent of why would this be good for Mick? I believe most of the content we consume in our streams, the person that's making it is making it for their best interest. — Yep. — Buy my course, make me famous. I want your follow. — I want to make money, so make me famous or buy my thing. Like, you can smell the intent. My intent has been I'm going to give y'all everything I got. The [ __ ] I can charge unlimited amounts of money for if I had a master class, if I had courses, if I had mentorship programs, inner circles. I'm going to give you all better [ __ ] than the people at the top of the game that do that [ __ ] And yes, occasionally I'm going to be like, "Yo, you want to buy my dad's wine? collectibles at B? " Like, I'm going to have things. I'm a businessman, — right? But I have no expectations of anyone that extracts unbelievable value for my free [ __ ] I do not expect them to buy a Vfriend's trading card or a wine. I don't expect anyone who's listening right now to sign up for wineex. com. But I said wineex. com because I'd love for them to do it because it's my dad's business and I want to help him always. And if they buy wine, don't buy it on [ __ ] wine. com. Buy it on wineex. com if I've brought you value. But nothing I do is to then later get the thing, — right? — And that's why I'm who I am. And I think people forget that humans are animals. I think y'all can smell it. — Mhm. — If I'm out here trying to fake it, if I'm here out fronting cuz I really deeply just want you to buy X, I think most of us know it. — Yep. Even the ones that are not that in tune, eventually they're going to know it. The other shoe always drops, my man. — Always. — And so, a why am I an inconvenient truth? Why am I consistent? Cuz my intent is consistent. The other reason I
Why intent is everything
think I'm consistent or have inconvenience truths is I'm about that life. Meaning, when I say I'm in my studio, I often cocoon. What's wild about me is I'm such a talker and I'm so out there, but the reality is almost all of my time is spent listening, not talking. When I come up for air and do this podcast, it's on the back of [ __ ] the last 8,000 hours I've spent this year studying live social shopping, studying uh Sabrina Carpenter versus Netflix versus Andrew Schultz and Shane Gillis versus LeooBoos versus Baggie Jeans versus Poppy Soda versus Netflix versus Hulu versus UFC. I'm a culture savant, — right? — So, I'm consistent because I don't talk. You know how they say there's that old saying that I like a lot like measure twice, cut once. — Mhm. — I'm so petrified to be wrong and lose equity, I'm out here measuring 45 times, cutting once. — Yes, sir. — By the time I'm going to talk about something, that [ __ ] has been [ __ ] quadruple checked. It's real. It happened. I'm not guessing out here. I get a lot of extra credit for he sees around corners, he predicts the future. I'm like, nah, I'm just in it daytoday and I'm willing to talk about it faster than most people because I'm in it dayto-day. I don't need nobody else is Gary being me. Y'all are Gary being me. I'm telling people things and then people are moving. The way I'm learning is not from Johnny or Sally or some other person. I'm in the trenches with all eight billion of you. — Yep. And then I'm creating observations which I think makes me unique, fresh because I'm not paring someone else. I'm in my own feelings. — Y — when I know Substack's going to be big a year ago, I'm not going to see who's already talking about Substack, if there's anyone talking about Substack. I'm living Substack and then I'll talk about Substack, which then makes my point of view original. — Correct. I'm using music for some weird reason a lot in this interview. — The people that blew us away, Lauren Hill, Tyler the Creator, like whoever, right? I believe that they're influenced by people before them, but what they did well was they stayed in their own pocket
Being original vs copying the culture
and they felt unique to us because they are unique to us. They still might have been influenced, right, by Michael Jackson or Artha Franklin or Prince or Pink Floyd. But they're they feel original because they are original. And I think other artists come along and have commercial success, but they listened too much. They copied prior people too much. And so they were just half or 25% original, which was good enough to give them some pop and maybe even a hit record and this and that, but they're not the icons that changed it completely for us. I'm not saying I'm an icon or completely changed it for us, but using your kind opening, I do understand why I've hit. And now, let me bring it for everyone who's listening. The more you're you — I'm going to say it nice and slow for the kids in the back. You can slow down your uh what is that thing you run on your treadmill right now? Or you can let your dog pee real quick. Or you can pull over on the side of the road if you're listening right now. I need you to hear this. the more you're you. And I mean all the way you. I've cursed twice, Mick, in this interview so far. — It is not It's not lost on me that 15 to 5,000 people just decided, "Okay, I'm not with Gary Vee because I don't, you know, especially you grow up in the South, you grow up with that kind of grandma. " Like, I respect that, but I have no other year besides being me. And I grew up in Queens and New Jersey and cursing is every third word in our lives. — Yeah. Yeah, dude. Again, that's who you are. If I got anything from you and Damon John, it was this and it's just what you just said, Mick. You are the brand. — Correct. You're the — And whatever people, I'm sorry to interrupt you. I apologize. It just happened two minutes ago. Two people today in my office asked me, they're young kids who are interning who then going to go back to college and they want to build personal brands because, you know, every kid now wants to be famous, right? Um, and they're like, "How how do I find my niche? Everything feels overcrowded. " I'm like, "Everything is overcrowded. " I'm like, "The only niche you have is you. " We could end right now, but we're not going to because again, you and Damon
Garage sale flips and $19 to $59k
both 18 months ago when I started the podcast and I was like, "All right, I'm going to run it like a business, but I do so many things. How do I figure out what's the angle? What's the lane? " — And Damon goes, "Mick, just be you. Just be the brand. And then the things that you do are the services or products that you provide. " — When I started doing those garage sale videos, trash talk, right? Yeah, — where I go out and spend 113 bucks buying a bunch of trash at garage sales and then show people that it's worth 800 on eBay. I had billionaires, the titans, the most famous people on earth that we all follow and think are the best business men and women literally reach out to me and say, "Why are you doing this? You're belittling yourself. " And I said, "The reason I'm doing it is because when I do podcasts like Mick and I talk about investing $25,000 into Twitter and it changing my life or things of that or Facebook or this, I get a lot of DMs and emails saying," Gary B, I [ __ ] with you, but yo, [ __ ] you, man. I don't have $25,000 to put into Twitter. I got $19 in Wells Fargo. And after reading enough of those, I'm like, "Well, guess what? I had $19 in Chase Bank, too. " One day when I was 20, getting paid nothing, building my dad's business for him, by the way, not for me. — Mhm. on Saturdays or Sundays or Friday afternoons, I had to sometimes step out of the store real quick and go to a estate sale or garage sale and buy something for 18 bucks and then sell it on eBay for 109 because that was money to me. I said, "You know what? I'm going to start making those videos. " So, I'm driving around Jersey in fancy cars or sometimes even with a driver, garage sale it. Why? Back to the beginning because I wanted to make content for people that have $99 to their name cuz I know and it's already happened. I did that in 17, 18, 19 before co. There's not a month that goes by that I don't meet someone in the real world at a restaurant or at an airport where they don't literally Mick literally come up to me, open up their eBay app and show me they have $59,000 in there and they're like, "That's you, bro. I had nine I was making eight bucks an hour at [ __ ] Walmart and you made that video about garage sales and I've been flipping since. And this has made my family be able to go to good vacations. I can take send my sis my kid to private school cuz of you. Like that's why I did. I don't give a [ __ ] if a billionaire thinks I'm a schlub cuz I'm going to a garage sale. In fact, I'd prefer them to think I'm a schlub. — Yep. The inconvenient truth every time. Gary, I know you're super busy. I'm honored and humbled that you would take some time with me. Personally, you don't know how much this just makes me feel fulfilled because of you taking this time. I can't leave without talking about Mango Super Stickers though, man. Like you and Steph Curry doing some cool stuff. I'm gonna make sure we've got links to all of that. Like talk to us about that. Yeah. — Audience, Mick's giving me real love right now. He probably more than most of you know. I'm in the throws of doing something big. I'm in my Muhammad Ali moment. I'm calling my shot. I'm telling the world just like Muhammad Ali said, "I'm a bad man. I'm I shook the world like I'm the greatest. " Literally, he said, "I'm the greatest. " After, you know, when he just he had the biggest upset in boxing history at the time with Sunny List, but he still said I'm the greatest. Even though he had to prove it the next 15 years, I am telling the world that I am building the next Marvel, the next Pokemon. It's called Be Friends. I'm doing it in everyone's face. But because so much of the energy of me is about the Gary Vee of it all and because it started as NFTTS which that brand has been hurt but there's still five to 10 of us projects that are cooking and I believe in digital collectibles long-term heavy and the blockchain and crypto and all that people can't see it. And so I'm building this incredible brand called Vfriends vefriends. com. Please go check it. If you have a kid 3 to 10, you got to watch our cartoons. It's back to the throwback of like the 80s. is like it's a good cartoon, but it's teaching kids lessons cuz parenting is a hard out here. So, I want to help. But I'm building this heavy collectible thing. Comic books. If you're into that nerd culture or sports culture, comic books, trading cards, Funko dolls, like action figures. It's fresh. I'm enjoy Squishallow collab, Uno collab, He-Man collab. I'm really enjoying it and I'm doing it. Doing it. This clip will run at my funeral. When I die in 50 years, it will say Gary Vaynerchuk, creator of V Friends, passes at 99. Like, I know it. That's how much I know it, Mick. And so, I'm so excited for the people that are collecting. All those people that are listening right now that threw out their Pokemon, baseball cards, that threw out their comics. Wish they didn't, cuz now collectible is a cultural lifestyle pillar just like sports and music and food and fashion. I think collectibles, leoos, sneakers, watches, trading cards, it's ob cars. It's obvious to me collecting is the genre that's next up like sports and fashion and music were and uh and Vfriend is going to be at the forefront of the next gen like and so I really if you collect things especially if you collect Pokemon or if your kids collect Pokemon go to vefriends. com check it get on board check us out on whatnot. You need to learn about live social shopping anyway. Whatnot's an incredible app. I'm not an investor. Don't have any relationship with it. It's just I'm co-signing it just like Tik Tok. I had no involvement there. I just know it's going to win. It's already won a lot since I've been talking about it the last 18 months. — Um, you should learn about the QBCification of social, but be friends is my jam. — And Mick, honestly, are you a collector by TR? Like, do you have that DNA? — Absolutely. — What did you collect as a kid? — I was baseball, basketball car. I was trying to find those rare. You remember when like tops and genres used to have like the glitch cards? Of course. — Right. Like they have lines through
Collectibles as the next cultural pillar
certain things or they have — Dude, I lived for that moment. I was a Becket collector. Like, yes. — Mick, have you gone to vfriends. com/quiz yet? — Not quiz. No. — Okay. Literally, when you hang up right now, I want you to go to v and I want everybody to do this. vfriends. com/quiz. Do the quiz. And at the end, it will tell you which V friend you are. I want you collecting that character. — Done. Do — and I want you to email me literally in the next three minutes to the email that's on this invite and tell me which I'm dying to see which character you got. — You got it. All right, my man. — Brother, — thank you. — I love you with my soul. I genuinely mean that. — I can't wait to Let's share a meal, brother. I feel your energy exploding through the screen. Let's keep this on the podcast. Let them hear it. Let's do that Spades tournament thing. Like, let's get to know each other. Hit up Damon. Let's get dinner up here in New York. And uh and I can't wait to see you and hug it out. — You got it, brother. I love you so much.