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Happy Saturday Besties,
Since it’s Dr. Seuss Day, we'll sprinkle in some of our go-to *Seussisms as we see fit. This week of pop-biz summed up in a few words…
$5 Outage, Love is Blind, Sam Everywhere, and Dune.
This week’s edition is 40% of the best of the pod and 60% things we had to share off the record.
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Chart of the Day…
A recent Pew Study found that the majority of US TikTokers are actually Millennials. The avg US adult TikTok profile looks something like this…
Chart: Pew Research
📈 Bitcoin has rallied 45% so far in 2024 after more than doubling in 2023. But our Takeaway: This feels like a FOMO rally. And FOMO can quickly become NOMO. As in no more gains, losses instead.
🔻 Weight Watchers: Oprah announced she’s leaving the board and selling all her stock, dropping the stock 27%. O shared that she uses a holistic approach to manage weight, including shame-less weight loss medication.
🚘 Toyota had 4 cars in the Consumer Reports Top 10 Cars of 2024 report. And they are all hybrids. The stock is up 80% in the past year to an all-time-high. Nothing hybrid about that.
🇫🇷 Beyond Meat popped 30% because it’s going French — Plant-based meat sales are down in the US, but they’re jumping in Europe. Turns out Europeans have more of a taste for sustainability.
That made us stand up and sit back down.
2x as profitable as Starbucks, per location: it’s America’s #3 coffee chain, Dutch Bros, with its unique drive-thru-only model. Because why fit in when you were born to stand out?
5’6”, 133 lbs: That’s the build of Figure AI’s humanoid robot with an AI brain. It’s a big deal: Nvidia, OpenAI, Microsoft, and Jeff Bezos (no joke) all just invested $675M into the startup — their robot (short king) will be deployed for “undesirable or unsafe jobs”, like moving heavy boxes. A person's a person no matter how small. Unless they’re not a person.
$2.50 per berry: That’s the price of the most-expensive strawberry ever, and it’s sold by startup Oishii. Consumers literally eat them up because of the Veblen Effect: That’s when the more expensive the product, the higher the demand (contrary to the ol’ laws of economics).
Microsoft Word just changed its default font — no more Calibri. The new font “Aptos” is giving clean skincare vibes.
Pitbull is launching a restaurant…in a Walmart…in Las Vegas. Yes, I meant what I said and I said what I meant. Miami Grill arrives in aisle 6 this spring.
Frosty Happy Hour? Wendy’s announced Uber-style Surge Pricing at all locations by 2025. The chain has gotten major heat from the unpopular update, so the CEO promised never to raise prices during peak hours - only price drops during slow hours.
From last week:
We asked: Would you rather take a $15 ride in a self-driving taxi or a $15 Uber? And you said…
For next week’s edition: Do you turn on airplane mode when you fly? Vote here.
Being nice to chatbots gets rewarded… with better answers. If you had asked me nicely, I would have told you.
#DaveRamseyWouldntApprove is trending on TikTok. Gen Z is pushing back on his “debt-free” mantras, saying self-care like a double-digit daily latte is key for mental health. #Treatyoself
“The Smell Strategy: The way your boss will get you to come into the office is through scents, the sense most tied to emotion. But Cinnabon pioneered the concept.
via Nick’s Apple Notes
Three Three Free: After 3pm, with at least 3 employees, means it's free to expense. This corporate policy encourages co-worker hangouts. Think about the collaboration and ideas that come of it.
👂 The psychology of hoarding by a Wharton School professor — Jack likes to say that Nick is "asset-light" and doesn’t keep much stuff in his home, since he grew up hoarding too much. Jack stayed over this week in SF, so we listened to the hoarding psych pod.
🥤 More like “adding Vybes,” rather. Jack slammed a can of this liquid energy twice before hitting the show this week. One of the ingredients is “Cali Vybes.” We can’t make this up.
The Financial Times: This British source is good for an outside perspective. It’s not free, but it’s a solid pick to subscribe to if you’re a heavy news consumer. Like this article about the US’s productivity boom.
What’s the picture in the background of the TBOY logo? Hint: I’m here to share with you, that starting in August…
The Language Capital of the World is Queens, NY. More than 700 languages are spoken in NYC, but the borough of Queens takes the cake: More languages per square mile than any place in the world. “Ito ay totoo.”
For…voters: This presidential election will be decided in the grocery aisles. This campaign season, everyone is focused on food prices, not foreign policy.
For…when you’re investing: Warren Buffet’s 20-Slot Rule: If ya could only make 20 trades your whole life, would you make this one?
For…negotiating: If you understand what the other side wants, you can get what you want.
Holiday: International Women’s Day (Friday, March 8th)
Entertainment: Dune Part 2 comes out this weekend
Jump in TBOY-style to our daily podcast (we’ve got video)
👂 Monday: NASA was barely involved in last week’s lunar landing, because sometimes ya have to let go.
👂 Tuesday: The way Dutch Bros is beating Starbucks.
👂 Wednesday: How the Presidential Election will be decided in the grocery aisle.
👂 Thursday: Bitcoin’s FOMO rally, could soon be NOMO.
👂 Friday: The world’s most expensive strawberry is more expensive than you think…
👀 Monday: We just pulled off the first-ever podcast recorded in a ________… What do ya think it was? Rhymes with “lamo.”
Answer: This is the reaction when students at Einstein College of Medicine were told that Ruth L. Gottesman donated $1B to cover their tuition — this is the largest gift made to a medical school in history.
And one more thing. If you are in San Francisco, or just want to know our 4-day mini-food guide to SF Vol.1 — just reply EAT SF and we will send it to you. In the meantime, here were some of our SF meal highlights this week 🌉
🤤 😋
—Nick & Jack
Jack’s early birthday cake from SusieCakes. There is no one alive that is you-er than you!
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