← Problems to Profit
Problems to Profit
How Brandon Poulin Built, Lost, Rebuilt, and Found Freedom in Business & Life
01:03:46
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- [00:00]
Preston Brown
Are you tired of complicated business advice that rarely delivers any real results? I'm Preston Brown and I've built a nine figure portfolio by following simple business formulas that anyone can use. In my new book, you, First Million made Easy, I reveal the exact system that I've used to generate hundreds of millions in revenue. And it's frankly a system that works in any industry, with any business, and yes, in any market. The good news, it's not about hustle, it's about. It's not about running or working or struggling and what it is about creating money instead of just earning it. Because earning money is slavery while creating is freedom. It's about stopping the cycle of managing by crisis and building a business that doesn't depend on you. Transforming your business from a high paying job to an asset that generates money even when you're not there. Whether you're a startup or an established company, this formula will transform your business into a profit driven machine that gives you the time and freedom to focus on what truly matters. Grab your first million Made easy now and let's start the journey of financial freedom together. I look forward to being a part of your story. Hello and welcome back to Problems to Profit. Guys. Today I'm honored to have a friend, a brother, a guy that actually like. And I can say this about you, Brandon, you're one of the few guests that's. Come on. That has changed my life. Like, no, changed my life.
- [01:28]
Brandon Poulin
Hopefully for the better.
- [01:29]
Preston Brown
That's not why you're gonna love him, but I'll tell you the story in a sec. I have never, ever found a joy center the way this guy showed it to me. One day he invites me to this mastermind on this yacht, on this lake. And I go out and I pay some money and I'm like, all right, cool. Let's go hang out with these people that we barely know. I mean, they seem cool. We're in a mastermind together. And now we're gonna hang out basically at their house. It's a floating house on Lake Powell and we're sleeping in this tiny little room. We're hanging out with our kids and like, I don't even know how many other families, like lots of other families. And we're getting to know them and that was all beautiful. And I was really having fun with the networking, the connection. Like there wasn't as much masterminding and business talk as I thought there was gonna be when it was called a mastermind. But then they're like, let's go surfing. I'm an El Paso guy. I mean, we have water. It's in bathtubs and sinks. And, like, Lake Powell was, like, maybe the most water I've ever seen outside of an ocean. And if I ever go to a beach, I'm, like, hanging out on the beach. I've never surfed. And, like, they give me a little coaching, give me a little guidance. I've never skateboarded. I've never skied. I've never done any of this. I've never surfed. And I, like, pop up onto the board, and for the first time in my life without drugs, my brain turns off. I'm like. It was like God and angels just singing into my ears, and my brain shut the up for, like. I mean, I don't even think I was up that long. It was like two minutes. But it might have been the longest time that my brain stopped talking in, like, ever. You know, unmedicated. Like, alcohol works too, but, like, it was beautiful. And after that, like, I think you guys surfed me so hard, like, my legs and back went out on that trip because I just didn't want to stop. It was perfect. I left that trip, obviously, having new friends, obviously having fun, but I went and bought a lake house, and I went and bought a surfboat, and I've since upgraded the surfboat. And, like, look, you've changed my life. Like, you found me, like, true, beautiful joy and peace in surfing, dude. So, like, that is not why they're gonna love you, but you totally are one of the ones that's changed my life, bro. And I think you're the first guy I've been able to say that about on this podcast. But Brandon is a young entrepreneur. Brandon is a wildly successful entrepreneur. Brandon is a faithful entrepreneur. He's happily married. He's done the big brand social media stuff. He's done the optimization stuff. He's a guy that, when he talks, you may not know anything about him. You sit there listening for three to five minutes and you want to know more. He's a guy that, like, if you don't learn something from him in the first five minutes, it's because you closed your ears, you had your AirPods in, you weren't listening, or you're stupid. And, dude, it's just. It's an honor to have you on the show. I'm so excited for what you're going to give our viewers and typical problem to profit fashion, I'd love to not just hear about the end of the story, but after you give us a few of your resume Bullets and who you are now and what you guys are doing. I'd love you to take us through some of the journey and tell us about some of the struggles that made.
- [04:40]
Brandon Poulin
You who you are. I know. Maybe we just need to do this interview on a boat and just give a surf lesson while we're at it.
- [04:44]
Preston Brown
Oh, that.
- [04:47]
Brandon Poulin
I love it.
- [04:47]
Preston Brown
You just made this harder for me, bro. Like, I want to leave.
- [04:50]
Brandon Poulin
We gotta go again. I want to see where you're at. Like, you've progressed, you know, you learned. That's good. No, I'm pumped, man, to be on here and I guess, like, my journey, really, as an entrepreneur.
- [05:02]
Preston Brown
Well, let's start at the end.
- [05:02]
Brandon Poulin
You wanna start at the end? Oh, you wanna start at the end?
- [05:04]
Preston Brown
Because when we start at the end, so many people see the. They see the entrepreneur at the end. Like, I remember when I was a kid and you've heard this too, you didn't come from money. You always looked at those wealthy people, those rich assholes, and you're like, oh, he's lucky. Oh, I hate him. And so I always like to give them a little bit of a dose of. I've done this. I exited this big company. This is the company I had. And they see you and they're like. It's almost like this natural effect for anybody that's not there. It's not at that level to be, like, a little bit of judgmental. And then they hear the rapport story that they can relate to, and they start finding out, oh, wow, I can do that too. And so let's go end first and then dive into the beginning. Give us your resume now. Like, who are you?
- [05:43]
Brandon Poulin
Just. Just humble. Brag for a second.
- [05:45]
Preston Brown
Humble brag. Don't. Don't be humble.
- [05:47]
Brandon Poulin
Oh, I mean, first and foremost, you know, I've been a. A Christian since I was 19, and that's really what planted my entrepreneurial journey. And giving like, that unlocked everything for me. Like, I didn't make any money until I started giving money away. I've been married for almost 10 years. I'm 31. I got three kids, three beautiful daughters. All holsters, no pistols, man. No boys yet. We might go for the fourth. We'll see. I feel like the odds are stacked against me on the boy, but can.
- [06:18]
Preston Brown
I ask you a question on that? As you add children, are you increasing the size of the boats?
- [06:24]
Brandon Poulin
I mean, I already have the biggest one you can get.
- [06:26]
Preston Brown
Okay, okay, Fair.
- [06:27]
Brandon Poulin
Nobody ever said I should have bought a smaller boat. Nobody ever said that. Maybe a smaller house. You know, people are too far away. But boats, it's like, no, I want room. Yeah. And then, you know, on the. Okay, if I was just gonna humble brag myself here, I would just say what's cool about where I'm at now is I've had several different businesses. I've sold two businesses. The main one, the biggest one that I sold at one point had about 180 employees. And I think financially the coolest flex is just being able to know that your passive income exceeds your lifestyle expenses. Right. Cause honestly, everything else above that, it's really irrelevant. It's more just like your own ego or a scoreboard. But I think for me now, I'm driven by being able to make money, to be able to give money away. Like I love. You know, as an entrepreneur, I think your goal financially should get to that point where like, you don't have to work. You get to work and you get to choose what you want to do. And so I think that's the coolest flex, if you will, of like, hey, my wife stays at home and she homeschools our kids and you know, money's not an issue and we can do whatever we want, go wherever we want. And so I think that's like the coolest thing from a financial standpoint. So yeah, I think that's the end point.
- [07:50]
Preston Brown
I just want to frame in on. Like that's an end point that you're already at. Like you've hit that. Everything you do in life from this point forward is bonus. And you're a super motivated guy. So you're not gonna be retired. I'm super excited to know you for the next 20 years. Cause the story's gonna be fun to keep up with as well. But you're like covered in tattoos. You're 31 years old. Like, you know, I mean, I'm not that old, but I'm 42. So like in the entrepreneur space, you're wet behind the ears, age wise. Like you're, you're. But you're wildly successful dude. And you're already in this how much can I give role, how much can I serve role, how much like it's, I love that because how many people need to see that? How many people have kind of that imposter syndrome when they're walking in and they see a guy like you and they're like, oh, what if I could?
- [08:36]
Brandon Poulin
I dealt with that early on. It was like, I think I started in network marketing when I was 17. I signed up illegally. Like, you're supposed to be 18, you know, like, where you. One of those pyramid things where you, like, sell all your friends, you know what I'm talking about? And I had it there for sure. Like, I'm too young. Nobody'll listen. But what was cool is the founders of that company, it was called Visalis Body by Vi, and they exploded. Amazing story. But Nick, Blake, and Ryan, they were all pretty young. You know, they were all like, late 30s, early 40s, and slaying it. And so I just. I related a lot to them, and they. They beat that out of me. Like, not in a harsh way, but just, like, it didn't take very long for me to realize it didn't really matter how old I was if I had a customer sitting in front of me and I could help solve their problems, right? And I had a solution and I could communicate clearly like, it didn't matter how old I was. And I event. I. Eventually, it didn't take long to get over that, you know? But in the beginning, I dealt with it. So I think if you're young, just get over it. Like, it doesn't matter at all. Right.
- [09:41]
Preston Brown
Well, iron sharpens. Ironic. You said they didn't do it harshly. Iron sharpens. Iron doesn't have to be harsh. Sometimes it can just be an example.
- [09:47]
Brandon Poulin
Get over it. Yeah, that's really it. Like, honestly, if you're thinking about it, then it's going to manifest. If you're not, no one will pay mind. Right? Like, nobody ever said, oh, I'm not going to buy from you because you're young or you have tattoos. It's like, no, I have a problem. And if you can solve it and you can communicate well, like, it doesn't matter.
- [10:07]
Preston Brown
I love that. And, like, if you're waiting to start, like, what, later you're gonna be healthier. Later you're gonna be more youthful. Later you're gonna be more energetic. I mean, it doesn't get better as you go. Like, it gets a little harder. You have to be more intentional about your health as you age if you want to keep it than less. When did you start? How young were you when you started the entrepreneur journey?
- [10:27]
Brandon Poulin
I literally remember waking up one day and being like, oh, wow, I have a lot of employees that are a lot older than me. And then I was like, huh? And then that was it. Like, it just. I don't know. Like, I got rid of it and it was gone. And then I just. It never mattered. Like, people are always like, wow, you're so young, or whatever, but it never. You Know when you have confidence and presence and it doesn't matter at all.
- [10:50]
Preston Brown
And 180 employees. We'll get into that after the story. But like, I want to frame, like, I've never had 180 employees.
- [10:56]
Brandon Poulin
I don't know if I'd recommend it, but. No, I'm just kidding. No, it's fine. It's good. You don't have more than you need, I think so you, you could bra. It's a humble brag. It's just like, okay, like I've managed, I've managed a company. It's a decent size. Right. You know, it's, it's small for some people, but it's, you know, it shows that it's maybe worth listening to something I say. You know what I mean? But yeah, I think people can brag about how many employees they have and that's not necessarily a good thing. Right. You could have a bunch of team members and no profit.
- [11:30]
Preston Brown
Well, you had 180. Yeah. And it's not a brag. There's a difference between a brag and a flex. I mean, a flex is something you're doing for a reason. To make an impact, hopefully.
- [11:38]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, right.
- [11:39]
Preston Brown
A brag is just arrogance. But you had 180 employees on a company you exited and you exited wildly, successfully. So I don't consider that a brag. I consider that a reason. Everybody should be listening.
- [11:51]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [11:52]
Preston Brown
You know, I haven't had 180 employees. I do significant revenue. I don't know that I hope to get to 180 employees either. But like, I still admire it. Cause if you can manage that, like, I mean, I think we've peaked around 100, 120. And I don't know that we're more efficient with more. We might be more efficient with like 80 or 90 now than we were with 120.
- [12:11]
Brandon Poulin
It's interesting too. Cause with like AI, like the business I'm building now and AI, it's like I already know if I would have went back to that organization, you know, five years ago, we'd probably 80 of those people would be gone, like, just because of AI alone.
- [12:28]
Preston Brown
I hope they're not listening now.
- [12:30]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, yeah.
- [12:33]
Preston Brown
Just kidding. I hope they are. Maybe they'll start using ChatGPT. So give us a little bit of the beginning. Like, where did you start? Where did you grow up? Like, you had a million dollars given to you by your family. And like, everything was easy. You started rich, you stayed rich, you ended. That's the story.
- [12:47]
Brandon Poulin
The closest I got to the Silver spoon was. My dad was like, if you get straight A's, I'll buy you a car. And I got one B. And I didn't get a car. And I was like, dude, come on. Not even, like, you know, half a car. Like, just a cheap one, you know? No, but I was 17. I got home from the gym. My dad opened the door, and he was standing there with a shake in his hand, like a protein shake. And he was like, hey, I made you a shake. And I was like, you don't ever make me anything. Like, why? What do you. What is this? You know? And so he sat me down, and I watched this video, and it was like, three becomes nine becomes 27. And it was like the whole pyramid thing, right? Like, network marketing. And I was like, before that, I was trying to figure out how many hours I had to work to buy a motorcycle. Cause all I wanted was a street bike, right? Like, that's all I care. I was just like, I need to get a street bike, because then I'll be cool, right? And so I signed up for that company. Kind of dilly dallyed around with it. But eventually I got serious because I was just tired of what I was doing. And at the time, I was in community college. I got a GED and started community college early. And I was sitting in class, and everyone there. Community colleges are weird, man. It's like, you have. They have such a broad range of people. Like, you got people that are, like, 50 that are, like, coming back to school. And like, half my class was, like, three times as old as I was. And everyone's like, I want to have. It was like, business classes, and everyone's like, I want to have a business one day.
- [14:10]
Preston Brown
That's got to be super encouraging. You're like, okay, so you've all failed this long. What the am I doing here?
- [14:17]
Brandon Poulin
Something like that.
- [14:17]
Preston Brown
Yeah.
- [14:19]
Brandon Poulin
And sorry.
- [14:21]
Preston Brown
Community colleges.
- [14:23]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. So. So I have a ged. I never graduated from the school because I was taking calls and selling product for this network marketing company. Walking out of class, and my teacher got mad, and she's like, like, you can't just be believing. I'm like, I'm already doing this. And so I just decided, like, I'm already doing this. I don't need to learn. Like, let me. I'm already in the marketplace, you know? So let me just get out of the classroom and go in the marketplace. So took that. Took that opportunity, and I got to, like, six figures within, like, a year. I was, like, 19, driving a black BMW I thought I was so cool, had a house, was on stage, speaking, training. You know, my ego was massive. And so that was, like, my first kind of success. And then it all, like, completely plummeted. Like, I'm talking, like, the whole company kind of crash as a whole. There's a few reasons for that, but so from there, it was like kind of a business rock bottom, you know, like my first, like, cycle. And so, you know, if you've ever heard the term cycle, like, you've built something and then it's kind of crashed. Right. Most entrepreneurs hopefully have, but things are different after you do that. Like, if you're on something and you haven't really failed yet, like, you think you're so good, like, your success will just breed ignorance. And I'm a. Make you think you're better. Yeah. Make you think you're way better than you are.
- [15:43]
Preston Brown
Oh, gosh, I love geniuses.
- [15:48]
Brandon Poulin
So the more times that you cycle, the more humble you get and realize that luck and timing and there's factors that have a lot more to do with it than you probably some God. Oh, yeah. Well. And really, that was it, man. I made a deal with God. I was like, if you're real, I believe, but I don't really follow. And so I heard God speak to me very clearly, like, you haven't given me your heart. And giving and money was my thing. I didn't want to give any money. I was just like, I want to make it and earn it and keep it and multiply it and hoard it. And so I started giving. And that was when I was at a place, literally, I remember I was in my bedroom. My bed was over here. This, like, rental house that we were in. And my now wife was, like, about to leave me. Our relationship was, like, on a thread. She was, like, gallivanting around in Puerto Rico with this other MLM company with this guy trying to recruit her in more ways than one. Right. And so while the business is failing. Yeah. I'm literally fixing windshields at gas stations to, like, pay the bills. Like, I'm like. I'm like. I'm like, hey, like, hey, ma', am, how you doing today? It's Customer Appreciation Day here at Chevron. We were, go ahead and just clean your windshield for free. Is that all right? And then I find the chip in their windshield, and then. And then pitch them on their insurance to fix it for free. So, like, that's what I was doing to, like, fill the gap. Right. And so.
- [17:09]
Preston Brown
And this is how old. How old are you now?
- [17:10]
Brandon Poulin
I was like 19.
- [17:12]
Preston Brown
Oh, so you've made it in business like A what, like 17 to 19? Two years.
- [17:16]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. Wow. Yeah.
- [17:18]
Preston Brown
And then already at rock bottom, you got a cycle early.
- [17:20]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, I guess. Right.
- [17:21]
Preston Brown
Wow.
- [17:23]
Brandon Poulin
Like, it was really. It was really good for like a year and a half.
- [17:25]
Preston Brown
Like, most people get to go through that, like, big ego, douchebag mode for at least three to five years. Like, you just ended it quick.
- [17:32]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, I mean, I don't want to stay there. Right. And so I got humbled and then really started giving. And then it came full circle. Like, my wife came back, we reconciled, and the business that we grew, that we were talking about, ladyboss, that had 180 employees. We did over $200 million in revenue in that company. We spawned that out of this time frame. Right. It was like she got back and we spent two months and like whiteboarded and we basically took the concept, a health challenge that the MLM had and we did it direct to consumer using social media and digital. Right. And so that's kind of like. So. So that rocket ship was. Was crazy, right? Like, I never intended for it. I just kept doing stuff and learning and growing and executing and hiring and kind of looked down. I was like, oh, wow, like we've got something pretty awesome here. You know, we did live events. Kaelin wrote a best selling book, we launched a coaching program, we formulated dozens of supplements. We launched a clothing line. We were sourcing, like our own custom made clothing from overseas. We. We did all kinds of stuff, man. It was a. It was a fun season. We ended up like, I think we were. Yeah, we were number four on the Inc 5000 in growth. And I think it was 2019 was that year that we did that. And so it was just a rocket ship, man. It was like we just kept going. We kept grinding it out.
- [19:00]
Preston Brown
Okay. Do you want to hear a funny story?
- [19:03]
Brandon Poulin
Yes.
- [19:04]
Preston Brown
I'm this El Paso guy. Like, I don't really know anyone. I don't pay much attention. I don't spend a lot of time on social media at this point. We meet at a Mastermind. You seemed really cool. Like, you're a very friendly guy. You were obviously very well known in this Mastermind. I was fairly new and, you know, I think we'd said hi or something, right? And somebody's like, oh, yeah, did you talk to Brandon? And I was like, yeah, he's a really nice guy. Do you know who he is? I'm like, no, who is he? He's lady boss, bro. Now I'D never heard of lady boss. I don't know what lady boss is. I'll tell you later. But, like, I mean, this is like, through the whole, like, you know, Biden's in office, gender's in question, and he's lady boss. And I, like, the look on my face was like, as a guy that just doesn't know lady boss, I'm like, huh? And they're telling me, like, it's amazing. And like, after, like that, like, they explained it. Thank God. Like, because I was really confused. I didn't know what lady boss was.
- [20:05]
Brandon Poulin
She's lady boss. You're like, I don't see a wig. He's not wearing lipstick. What's happening?
- [20:10]
Preston Brown
I was a little unsure of what to expect and. Have I told you this story?
- [20:15]
Brandon Poulin
No. But.
- [20:18]
Preston Brown
Anyway, after it was explained, I go back to my office later, talk about how I met you. You were really cool. You shared some cool stuff. And everyone knew about lady boss. I felt kind of stupid. You guys had a huge brand. It was massive. You were doing a ton of volume. You were ladyboss.
- [20:38]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. It took me a while to get used to that. I would go and buy something somewhere, and they'd be like, what's your email? And I was like, Brandonadyboss.com and then I was like, that sounds kind of weird. And I just got used to.
- [20:49]
Preston Brown
Was an awesome moment for me.
- [20:51]
Brandon Poulin
Who's this guy? Is he a pimp or what is happening?
- [20:55]
Preston Brown
But it was a huge brand. And that's the brand you exited, correct? That's the one that had the 180 employees that you later exited.
- [21:00]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [21:01]
Preston Brown
What was kind of the life cycle of ladyboss? Cause it sounds like you started, you modeled something that you'd had success in for a while. You came at it differently with, like, the ego or the ability to compromise the ego. Like, still some of the drive from the ego.
- [21:16]
Brandon Poulin
Oh, I had tons of ego during that time, dude.
- [21:18]
Preston Brown
Okay.
- [21:18]
Brandon Poulin
Still. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.
- [21:22]
Preston Brown
But you modeled well and you showed up to work.
- [21:24]
Brandon Poulin
Maybe not as bad, but you just.
- [21:25]
Preston Brown
Showed up to work.
- [21:26]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, I grinded hard, dude. I worked seven days a week, like 12 hour days. Like, more than that. I mean, it was like I had no boundaries in my life.
- [21:37]
Preston Brown
But at that age. Yeah, it's the right time.
- [21:39]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. You're like early 20s. There's no other time to do that, you know? But I still had fun. You know, we go to the lake. Right. Still did that a little bit. That was probably one of the coolest Moments, though, was being able to buy a boat. Like, when I started making money because my dad had to sell his and, like, to be able to do that, buy that, and have my family come out, like, my extended family and cousins and stuff like that. That was probably one of the coolest, like, moments of your. Like, you know, because you have a. You make money and it sits in a bank account, but it materialized and, like, oh, I can, like, do this for everybody. That was cool. That was a really cool moment, for sure. But, yeah, the life cycle was. It was pretty wild. We did 200K and then 2 million and then 7 and then 30. That was a wild jump. And then 33 and then 45. And so, like, the growth kind of leveling was, you know, it was pretty fast. Like, it was like, I did so much wrong.
- [22:35]
Preston Brown
But you did it wrong quickly.
- [22:36]
Brandon Poulin
I have a podcast called Big Business Mistakes, and I talk about that.
- [22:39]
Preston Brown
So.
- [22:39]
Brandon Poulin
So, you know, all the mistakes that I made, but you could still.
- [22:42]
Preston Brown
Big business mistakes. Yeah.
- [22:43]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [22:44]
Preston Brown
Okay, cool.
- [22:44]
Brandon Poulin
But you can still make a lot of mistakes and win, right? Like, if you're not making mistakes, you're probably not doing much, you know?
- [22:50]
Preston Brown
You know, I was speaking for a group this last week, and one of the guys in the audience, his fear was he needed to make everything. He needed to make all the right decisions. Like, and as we started asking questions, and it was beautiful seeing him kind of come to, like, oh, I only gotta get one right decision. Like, you don't have to make all the right decisions. You have to be willing to learn from the wrong decisions. But, like, going to that, like, one right decision, that one main thing, and kind of building off that, like, there's a lot that can germinate out of that seed.
- [23:21]
Brandon Poulin
A good exercise. And I do this, I try to do this on the regular. Is like, what are three decisions that you've been putting off making? And then just make them. And, like, just do that. And it's amazing what kind of progress will happen because a lot of times we sit. Even now, I do it like, you know, you're an indecision, you want more information, et cetera.
- [23:39]
Preston Brown
And I think, repeat that question, repeat that.
- [23:41]
Brandon Poulin
That's worth reframing just at any given point. Do it once a week, once a month, whatever. Right now is a good time. Pause this. Make three decisions that you've been putting off and just make them.
- [23:51]
Preston Brown
You know what? Make three decisions that you've been putting off, and I will put out a little special award for whoever posts the best three decisions. That they're gonna go make right now that they've been putting off in the comments.
- [24:04]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, like God can't steer a parked car. If you go off and you run in a direction, you can always change direction, but you're not gonna learn anything sitting still. And. But you know, that's the human condition. Right? We don't want to make mistakes. We're afraid. That's why, you know, people get stuck in sales when there's too much information presented because they don't want to make a wrong decision. You know what I mean? So, yeah, tons of lessons learned along the way, you know, and here's something I'll share about it. You know, we decided. We decided that we decided we wanted to move on. My wife really felt like she was like being called to mother our kids in a much deeper way than like nanny and childcare and that kind of thing. And they're pretty young at this point, so it was more like nanny. And she was trying to have that full time role. Like she had a full time role with me the whole time. She was right in the co pilot seat. Right. And so she just felt like, hey, you've been serving these 700,000 women in this company, all the customers we had, but I want you to just serve like the ones in our family. Right. And we had two daughters at that time. So we set out, ran an amazing process with Rothschild, the investment bank to sell the company. And what's crazy is that they were like 80 to 130 million was gonna be the sale price. Right. That was like the range. And I was like, wow, like that'd be insane. You know, I'm just like, I don't believe you, but sure, like that sounds great, you know.
- [25:32]
Preston Brown
Can I have my check?
- [25:33]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, yeah. And dude, literally we're in the middle of like the second round. We had like 78ndAs executed like 20 something strategics and the rest private equity. And we're in the middle of like Jenny Craig weight watchers. Like those are the conversations. And so here's how not in control you are in business. There was a privacy update that happened. You remember when Facebook was going through all the privacy stuff and Mark Zuckerberg was in court and all that.
- [26:02]
Preston Brown
I remember reading about it. I don't know that I was active on it, but I remember reading about it.
- [26:05]
Brandon Poulin
So there was an update to the hardware that impacted the advertising massively when basically half the data that our advertising. So Facebook, Instagram, we were running on Snapchat, TikTok, we were advertising everywhere. There was a hardware update, I think it was iOS 13, I think is what it was. And overnight our customer acquisition engine that we had built over five, six years went to like 30% of what it was during that time. So it was like the biggest gut punch I had ever had in my life. Right. And so we ended up. We ended up going from like 60 grand a day in profitable spend, like at our customer acquisition cost threshold. Right. Our cac. I knew I'd get a smile out of you saying that to like 16 grand a day. And so. And so it was a huge gut punch. So we had to rally and downsize some things. We had some layoffs. And then he's like, man, like, the way we positioned this, like, we got to go back to market in, you know, a year or two, you got to turn it around kind of thing. And so I ended up. I was like, okay, we'll do that. And I just, like, man, I just didn't have the desire to fully redo everything. And it was like I had been running two jobs, one to sell it, one running it as a CEO. Right. And so that's something that when you're trying to sell a company that you don't really think about. And so, yeah, we had to downsize. We had to stabilize profitability, and we did that. And so I ended up taking it back out to market without the big growth and all that ended up selling the company. But it wasn't for $100 million. It was still good. It was good, but it wasn't $100 million. Right. And so that's just like one year. If I would have just done it a year earlier. Right. The result would have been much greater. Right. So it's crazy how you could do everything right as an entrepreneur, but if you're just in the wrong time, I'm talking this update. Like it was. Everybody I knew got obliterated. That was doing what we were doing, like, was in digital advertising, direct to consumer. And so, you know, there's many things that we could have done to pivot it. And I feel confident we could have done that. But the lesson is just like, there's so much that's not in your control. And. And it was hard, man. It was like an identity thing. It was like a, like, oh, man.
- [28:36]
Preston Brown
Like, am I not at this point in time?
- [28:39]
Brandon Poulin
Like, like this was like 2021. So four year. I was like 27.
- [28:47]
Preston Brown
Okay.
- [28:47]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [28:48]
Preston Brown
Okay. So, yeah, I mean, you're. You're literally 10 year entrepreneur journey.
- [28:51]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [28:51]
Preston Brown
And. And by year two at 19, you're getting a gut punch because somebody else's company fails. So, like, you're building your own thing, but like somebody that's kind of attached to it, that's kind of necessary for the business to grow fails. So inadvertently you fail and you get the same story in kind of a different way that you're building your own thing. Now you've removed anybody else that's attached to it, only now there's a social media platform that just changes an algorithm.
- [29:19]
Brandon Poulin
Well, it was literally the iPhone. It was literally the, you know, that little thing that pops up and says ask app not to track.
- [29:25]
Preston Brown
It's that it was. Oh, wow.
- [29:27]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, because when you say no, it cuts about half the data that those advertising, the social media platforms use to serve up your ads to the best audience. Right. So it's like it was a hardware shift because of all this privacy stuff going on. Right. Like, little did I know, seeing Mark Zuckerberg, you know, testifying in front of Congress or whatever. Not Congress, but whatever group, government group he was in front of. So, yeah, man, it's like it wasn't like the Cinderella ending that I wanted, but it was still really good. And I stabilized the company, took it back to market, and then actually a friend ended up buying it. So we had other buyers and then he texted me. It got swooped in at the end. It was pretty wild. So that's kind of the light you asked. The cycle of the business. So that's kind of. That was the cycle.
- [30:19]
Preston Brown
I love that story. And I know who bought it. I don't want to mention names on the podcast because that's not necessary, but I do think that that's a good thing to tap into without mentioning the name, because it was a friend that bought it. So one thing you're incredible at that I think is a critical lesson for entrepreneurs is relationship development and relationship maintenance. You communicate well. People know you care. Look, it's not easy to sell things to friends. It's not easy to sell things to family. Can we tap in a little bit to like, what's your definition of relationship? How do you look at relationships? Cause it's kind of cool to hear, hey, I was able to sell my company to a friend, and he's still a friend.
- [30:59]
Brandon Poulin
Man, that's cool. That's something that I'm working on. Really? I wouldn't say I'm great at relationships. No, I think I'm good at connecting with people. It's the follow up part that's hard. Cause it's like at any given point in time, you've got yourself, you've got your health, you've got your faith, you've got, you know, for me, my, my wife, I've got kids. So it's like there's already like God and my kids. There's five, there's, there's five persons that I'm like, these are the most important relationships to me. Right. And that's a lot. Like, five is like, to keep that going and then you have like ancillary relationships. Right. Or you want friendships. And so, you know, I have a few of those in my life that I really, you know, do life with or stay connected to and then beyond that. So I think, I think I'm good at connecting with people when I'm at an event or I'm somewhere. But I'm like, I'm bad at the follow up part.
- [31:49]
Preston Brown
Like, yeah, you always respond if I text you.
- [31:52]
Brandon Poulin
But yeah, yeah, yeah, I guess here's.
- [31:55]
Preston Brown
How I mean it. Like, and I actually, we'll jump into perspective on this because I was having a thought because. And my wife and I were having a conversation about men versus women on relationships. And she was like, you know, I think when men hit a certain maturity, like, men don't need more. Like, it's more often than not the woman that's bringing my wife brings more friendships to our life than like, I think a lot of the people that we hang out with are the people that she brings in at this stage in life. Like, not that like, I consider you a friend, I consider the gospel. I mean, I don't think we talk every week or every month even sometimes. But every time we do talk, it's like easy to pick up where we left off. Yeah, but, but it's because, I mean, as a dude, like, I'm focused on productivity. I'm focused on my giving, I'm focused on my impact. I'm focused on the, I care about. And like, when I do have extra time, it's my kids. Like, if we talk, it's like we just got off the boat in Powell.
- [32:50]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [32:51]
Preston Brown
And like, we're like, oh, what happened since then, man? Like, it's just.
- [32:54]
Brandon Poulin
And those are great friends to have, you know, not. You can't have needy friends when you're high performing. Like, you're an entrepreneur, you're doing big. Like, you can't have people that like, need you all the time. For sure. But I do think, like locally, like having relationships, people that you do life with that come over, they have kids, like your, your Kids age, if you have children. Like, I think that's so important, you know, because it's. It's so easy to get isolated, you know, and that's why I think mastermind groups and church community, like, those things are so important. Because if you don't have that, it's like, you know, you're just doing it alone. And especially with men. Like, we're not exactly the feeler types, you know, we're not like, sharing all of our feelings and our issues, and we tend to just, like, really kind of be on an island, you know, Like, I've been there before, for sure. So that's why I like being in groups and saying yes to stuff like this. You know, we get to connect in the hallway and chat a little bit after, you know.
- [33:51]
Preston Brown
Yeah. Hang out a bit, catch up. And, I mean, look, we might see each other again in a month. It could be a year, but I can almost imagine it'll be the exact same thing. We'll see each other in a mastermind or an event, and we're like, oh, my God, what are you doing? It's like immediate bromance back, but to me, and this is actually an interesting thing to talk about because it's probably not talked about much. I mean, I think a lot of people wonder about themselves. I don't mind that. I like your premise of I don't want needy friends. I think as a dude, you know, I got my purpose. I know what I wanna do. Like, if you don't know that as a dude, you should probably go find that right now. Okay. And then I've got my family and my relationship with God. Like, those are the main things. And I don't have enough time for more things. And I'm actually okay with that.
- [34:48]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [34:50]
Preston Brown
I don't look at it as a bad thing. Sure. Like, how many folks out there are sitting there aiming to please somebody, aiming to impress somebody, aiming to be somebody they're not all for the sake of what, being the most popular. And then they miss their purpose. They miss their family. They miss something that's much more critical. I think we're doing it right, honestly, at least in my opinion. I'm not judging anybody else. But you're wrong. You suck. You know? Just kidding, guys. Having fun with it. So, okay, like, there's another area that I kind of want to dive into with you because, like, you said something that I thought was really important. I'd love to dive into it because something changed in you when you said, well, I kind of lost the Desire to do it.
- [35:33]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [35:34]
Preston Brown
I lost the desire to continue.
- [35:35]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [35:37]
Preston Brown
And.
- [35:37]
Brandon Poulin
Oh, like. Yeah. With lady boss. Yeah.
- [35:39]
Preston Brown
Yeah. Well, I mean, you lost the desire to continue. But I know you and anybody that's met you knows that, like, you are very intense. Very intense. In fact, both you and your wife are. You're fascinating human beings. So you didn't lose desire. I would. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I would say it changed.
- [35:59]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, it was just that vehicle. Right. And I think a lot of it was like, we did it together, my wife and I. And so I just. It's a couple things. It's a couple things. It's a good question, is one. It would be just us doing it together. It's like the thing we did. And it was like, you know, I was almost the. She was like, kind of the visionary, like, I want this product or I want to do this. And she was the face and, like the heartbeat of it, all. Right? And then I was like, well, let me figure out how to execute it. Let me hire the team. Let me, you know, help you with the strategy. Like, let me put all the pieces together and make it work. Right. And so I just wasn't super passionate about. About it without her. So that's one. I think the second thing was, you know, when you start in business, a lot of times you'll just start in something that you kind of, like, fumbled into, right? Like, I came home from the gym and my dad had a shake, and that, like, put me into this industry. I fumbled into it, right? Cause I didn't have anything else. And so I kind of had just gone a step away from that and took it out on my own. But I realized once I really, like, took doing business, I understood business and, you know, understanding inventory and the impact of, like, having an inventory type of business, right. I understood, you know, high volume, low ticket, right. Understanding a very competitive marketplace, understanding that I had an offer with, you know, high perceived effort, like changing your whole health and your lifestyle and taking other products and not eating pizza and ice cream every day and like, discipline. That's a high perceived effort product. Right. And then a low likelihood of success because most people have tried a lot in weight loss and failed. And so I over. Ultimately, just from a business standpoint, when you're evaluating different companies and models, I was like, I don't really like this business model anymore. You know what I mean? Like, I think that there's a better one I could take my skills to. So I think it was like both like a. Just Not a desire to grow a company or anything like that. Just, I want to do something different, get in a different vehicle.
- [38:09]
Preston Brown
I wanted people to hear that from you, because as people grow and as people change and as you know, I think as our belief models adjust and as our life changes, our identities almost shift with it. Right?
- [38:19]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [38:20]
Preston Brown
And you didn't lose desire, you changed desire. But especially when we're talking big numbers, like, Hey, 80 to 130 million to much less, which means millions or tens of millions of dollars was the difference. People are like, wait, what, for a year or two, why didn't you do it? And I love the maturity that somebody would have, like, what you're saying and just saying, you know what? There's something more important to me than tens of millions of dollars or whatever the number was. Like, who cares what the number was? You had the maturity to know what you wanted and to act upon it.
- [38:56]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, it was probably a bad financial decision to not go back, reinvest and figure it out. Like, it probably was. Like, if I would have gone that route now versus then, but I don't care. You know what I mean? And that's the cool thing is here's. I was already in a position at that point where, you know, lifestyle expenses are covered by passive income. So, like, when you're in that position, you get to do what you want to do. Right? Like, that's what's so cool about it. And so that's why, to me, that's the goal. Like, you know, that's like the. It might take you 30 years, it might take you 20, it might take you 10, it might take you 5, might take you 2 if you're just insane. Right? But when you're there, all of a sudden, the frame under which you're making decisions, it's not like you're doing it because you have to. And then what's cool is, like, I came out of that and I was like, all right, I have skills, capital, time. And when I started, I had, you know, just time. I didn't have any skills and I didn't have any capital. Right. And I have confidence. Right? So that's what's cool. And it's also hard at the same time, by the way. It took me, like, you know, it hasn't been like a straight journey in the last two years since then, or two and a half years since then. But that's what's cool about. It's a blessing and a curse of having a lot of options.
- [40:15]
Preston Brown
Sure. Yeah.
- [40:15]
Brandon Poulin
But I love that I'LL take it.
- [40:18]
Preston Brown
I love that. A bad financial decision, if you're happy with the outcome, can still be the right decision.
- [40:24]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [40:25]
Preston Brown
Like, you know, a lot of people are looking for this, like, everything's gotta be perfect approach. And sometimes you have to make a choice. You have to cut something off to get something else you want. And, you know, as we were walking in here today, like, we were talking to some other friends in the hallway who were leaving, and they were in a tough deal, which we could share because they talked about it on their podcast, which somebody else will watch. And. And it was funny. You were asking them about a deal that they'd lost several million dollars on. And you were involved in the deal as an investor and actually lost some money as well. There was a con artist. You cheated them. He cheated kind of everyone. It's turning probably to a big lawsuit, I'm sure.
- [41:07]
Brandon Poulin
Oh, there's already like 10.
- [41:09]
Preston Brown
But I was watching you and them out there, and we were all kind of laughing about it.
- [41:18]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [41:18]
Preston Brown
And that's something, even in a situation of loss, that is so admirable because you said, hey, I may have made the wrong financial decision, but I made the right decision. And then even in the hallway, there's a second example of the same thing. Like, maybe you made the wrong decision investing in that. Whatever syndication or whatever it was, that deal. But you can't know. You can't win on everything. Nobody bats a thousand. And if you've positioned yourself properly, you can handle the losses without losing your emotional energy that you want to maintain. Can we kind of dive into that and, like, kind of your philosophies around reinvesting, getting out of the rat race, like, maintaining your emotions, where those priorities lie, because there's so much wisdom in that that I think is more important than just chasing money.
- [42:06]
Brandon Poulin
I think you nailed it ultimately. Right. It's like, if you're doing this just for money, it's gonna disappoint you pretty quickly. You know what I mean? For me now, it's like, it's growth. I wanna, like, see what I'm. I'm capable of. But it's also now of, like, it's a giving game. Like, it's. It's like, how much can I. And it's not how much can I give away when I die? It's like, how much can I give away when I'm alive? You know, like, a lot of guys are like, oh, I'll giving pledge. I'll. We'll give away half of whatever. Like, I wanna be Like, David Green, like, the guy gives away more money than any entrepreneur that I know of. Like, to the tune of $500 million a year.
- [42:44]
Preston Brown
Like, I think when there's that many comics, bro.
- [42:46]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, 500 million. Yeah. That's what he gives away.
- [42:48]
Preston Brown
I was there with you. Like, it was amazing. I think the guy kind of became all of our heroes.
- [42:53]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. Like, he gives the max that. Cause you can only take a charitable deduction for giving to half of your AGI, so he literally gives that max every time.
- [43:03]
Preston Brown
David Green, by the way, is the owner of Hobby Lobby, and he found a way to reduce his debt. And Rob, Hobby Lobby is not a sponsor of this show. We do not advertise for Hobby Lobby. But it is okay to go ahead and advertise that a good man is doing the right thing for his community and society and using a business to make an amazing impact. So just a context, David Green.
- [43:24]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I think that's the game now. And then it's growth. That's why I get excited. I get excited about building teams, about solving problems and growth. Right? And I know my. That's just the process I get excited about. Cause I'll tell you this. Like, I took. I immediately came back after selling the company. I went to Italy with my wife for, like, two weeks, and it was a blast. We went with a couple that were friends of ours, and I'd never gone to Europe before or anything like that because I was just busy working, you know, like, just grinding out kids and grinding out work. And so I came back and started right into the next thing. Right. I started a consulting company. And over the last year and a half, I've helped, like, 30 or 40 different entrepreneurs. Many of those companies doubled, couple of them 10x and, like, that was a blast. Right? But, like, I never really took time off. And so I actually took off most of Q4 last year.
- [44:28]
Preston Brown
We talked about that on the phone. Dive into that. Like.
- [44:31]
Brandon Poulin
Like, yeah, I felt God pretty clearly, like, I want you to take a break. And I just didn't know how. Like, I was like, what do I do with my hands? You know? And that kind of year and a half, while there was a lot of fruit from what I did, and I enjoyed it. It was like a mental grind. Like, it wasn't like, I felt like I was pushing this glass ceiling and I knew what to do, but it just. I couldn't, like. Like, the big steps I needed to take for the vision I had for it, which was blurry at best. It was like I needed to take that time off and so I took off Q4 I took a bit of a sabbatical and it was so good for me. Like I grew spiritually. Personally. It just allowed me to kind of chill out a little bit to be honest with you, where like I put so much pressure on myself to be productive and efficient. Like, like hardcore like all the time, everywhere. And like these are all good things. Like we have to wire ourselves to be different. We need to go into rooms with intention. We need to be prepared, we need to work hard. But I just like I would go so overboard and I think, you know, the world will applaud the fruit of that. They'll see the results in the wealth or whatever, the success, the awards, whatever. But I think if I would go back, I would do things a lot differently. I think I could have treated some people better, I think I could have made some decisions better. I think I wouldn't have taken myself so seriously, you know, like I took it so seriously with my team that like, like it could have been, it could have been more fun, you know what I mean? Like, because it was so intense. So you say like I'm intense, right? Like so, so I just had time to just reflect on all that and kind of like come out of the war for a second and just like work on and understand and have it perspective when I don't have like a million things going on because I just over commit, commit myself. So then now being back in the game, you know, after that three, four months, that was all it took for me. That was hard enough and now it's like having that same energy, passion and drive for the next thing but just not, not just squeezing the life out of it and like putting so much pressure on myself, right? Like, like so, so it was a big growth, a big growth time for me for sure.
- [46:49]
Preston Brown
I want to remind the audience, in case you didn't hear the part where the wisdom you're hearing coming out of his mouth is coming from a 31 year old girl. Grown ass man. But with only 31 years, I mean like bro, I love sitting with you and listening to you and talking to you. And even on that phone call like late last year, I mean I was in the middle of a big lawsuit. I was dealing with this crazy con artist. He cost me millions and millions of dollars. It was like horrible. You didn't know it, but you were actually mentoring me at that point in time, like by the grace of God, miracle. I don't even know how it all happened but it kind of. Everything kind of came together perfectly sort of at the end of the year. 2025 was like a washing away of the sins, or at least that litigation, like bad lawsuits, can be stressful. And this year, I have said no to so much stuff. I am enjoying, just like I'm enjoying launching this podcast, something I've intended to do for many years. I'm enjoying hanging out with my kids. I'm enjoying my wife, I'm enjoying my time. We're taking half a month off and going to Egypt. And a lot of it's because of that call. And I was like, he's crazy. And then I was like, maybe he's smart.
- [48:00]
Brandon Poulin
I felt crazy, but I. Yeah, it worked out.
- [48:02]
Preston Brown
Sometimes crazy is crazy good.
- [48:04]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [48:05]
Preston Brown
Yeah.
- [48:05]
Brandon Poulin
I mean, well, I mean, there's, there's more than one pillar life, right? Like, there's business, there's finance, like, or your wealth, you know, your relationships, your health. Right? There's, there's more. And you know, it's. I've heard this. My story's not unique. I've heard so many successful entrepreneurs that are like, they've been there, kind of done that, had done something big, and they're financially independent and successful, and people know who they are. Like, almost always a part of their story is they wrecked some or all other areas of their life along the way. And it's tough. I don't think there's a perfect answer of like, well, how do you balance or this time? And I think it's a rhythm for everybody. But, but man, it's, it's like, yeah, it's like a dance. And, and no one, no one has the, the answer to it. You know, you could ask 10 different guys, like, how do you do it? Actually, you know what? One of my favorite answers, I, I mentioned him to you earlier. Guy I know named Chris Lee, Incredible Solar Company. He sold it for like 300 million or something. And I asked him this question about time and work and balance. And he's like, he's like, dude, he said this to me. I was like, what? And he goes, man, I don't look at life like pieces of a big pie. He's like, all I do is that each area is its own pie. And when I'm in that area, I'm frickin motorboating that pie. That's what he says. And I was like, oh, wow, okay. Motorboat the pie. All right. I had a different visual in my head, but I'm not gonna go there. And, and, and I love that because at the end of the day, like, you know, it's so easy to work really hard, go home. Yeah, you're there, you're present. You're like, you're there with your kids or your wife or, or your friends or whatever, but, like, you're checking your phone. You're like reading answering emails, messages, chats, and you're not really present. You're not really, like, playing all out, you know. And so it's a great kind of like, you know, you're gonna spend the majority of your time awake working on your business. Cause that's your trade. Like, we're here to work. Like, we're here to create. You know, we're created by a creator to create. And so. And so you're gonna do all those things, but it's like, you know, the times that outside of that, like, are you as locked in on your. With your kids playing on the floor as you are when you're in business in a meeting?
- [50:33]
Preston Brown
Like.
- [50:33]
Brandon Poulin
Like, are you as locked in on your wife and your relationship when you're out on date night? Like, are you. You know what I mean? Are you all in the pie or are you still kind of floating out? And I think that's something that, you know, it's funny, in the last two years, really nailing down what I wanted to do, I really came to the realization that, like, for me, God doesn't really care what I do in the sense of I know I'm called in business. I know that the impact is the money I wanna give, and I know that's the gifts and the skills he's given me, but he's like, here's every tree of the garden, okay? Just don't eat from that one, okay? But there's like an unlimited other amount of other trees and fruit and options, right? So it was like, I think for me, he cares much more about the way I do things than which business or which company or what model I'm doing, right? Because I was like, what is it? What is it? What am I going to do? Right? There's all these options. Is it here? Here? And so, and so that's like, what I'm focused on now is like, the way you do it, right? Like the way you treat people, the way you're operating, you know, on the edges of your time, when you're home or when you're at play. And are you carrying that stress load with you or are you able to, to just be present in those scenarios outside? Because I did a horrible job of that in, like, My first run, if you will, you know.
- [52:01]
Preston Brown
Yeah, you weren't perfect from the get go. What the, bro? Like, geez, at 31. Geez, you're such a failure. My God, you know, why did I have you on here? You know, I love what you were talking like, like there's no balance. There's no work life balance. I love your analogy with the pies too.
- [52:21]
Brandon Poulin
You know, I borrowed it and.
- [52:22]
Preston Brown
Well, it's great. I mean, I heard somebody say actually this last week, like, there's not balance, there's priorities.
- [52:27]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah.
- [52:28]
Preston Brown
And if people aren't happy with their. If people are not happy with their life, they're just not happy with their priorities and they don't have the discipline to make their own. And gosh, I mean, that hit me so hard because it's literally what every young entrepreneur needs. And dude, we've had like so many gold nuggets on this show. Like, it has been amazing. I do kinda wanna circle back to one thing because I wanna point something out to people who are in business today who have not exited. I'm in the process right now of building a tech company and it's going to build a SaaS product and we're gonna be selling to home builders who are radically inefficient with their.
- [53:12]
Brandon Poulin
I mean, I remember you talking about this. It's exciting.
- [53:14]
Preston Brown
They're not. Home builders are not bad. Like, builders are great, but like, there's just too many things to measure, too many things to negotiate, too many ways to negotiate, too many languages they got to learn. Banker, lender, trader. And we've built a tech that's made us much more efficient. It's not sexy. It's not like, you know, all the fancy dashboards, it just works. And so like right now we're kind of putting some of the sexy in some of the dashboards and I think we'll have it ready and fully tested in the next 12 to 24 months. But what I've noticed is as I'm going through and talking to all these tech guys, tech is a weird place to hire people. Yeah, everyone's like a little wannabe entrepreneur, a mini entrepreneur. And they all want to like, piece of the pie, a stake in the deal they want to do, they want to build it and exit it. They want to raise private equity, they want to do this, they want to do like, it's like this race to build, sell, collect, and I'm going to retire and die. I mean, it's like this is the mentality and the modality of all these. And I think that's actually, they express it more because it's a newer industry. But I think that's actually a common theme in a lot of people is I'm build it and I'm going to sell it and I'm going to get rich. But you said something earlier that before the sale, before the big exit turned into a smaller exit, which was still great, but not the 80 to 130 million you said I was already in the position where I was living off residuals and, and so I wasn't worried about it. Can we talk a little bit about while you're in business, the investing that you should be thinking about the philosophies there that you have because I think people need that so they can get good decision making.
- [54:47]
Brandon Poulin
Totally. Well, I mean there's a couple of things. I think one of the biggest ones first is taxes. Like the biggest expense that you have is taxes. Right? And so getting a handle on, on strategies and you know, I'm not going to go deep into that but. But I think that's the biggest thing you gotta first deal with. Cause once I got educated, started getting around, people started understanding there's so much money that I spent that I shouldn't have. And then the second thing is really like where do you put your money? Right? And I spent about four. Well, it's been five years now, almost six. I've been working with a fractional family office and I just made a point not to just hey, yeah, take my money and place it. But like I want to understand, right? I want to understand private credit. I want to, if they're doing a.
- [55:37]
Preston Brown
Good job, we don't market for them, but you're welcome to plug them.
- [55:39]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, yeah.
- [55:39]
Preston Brown
Like I have no problem with.
- [55:40]
Brandon Poulin
Yes. And so it's like, it's like understanding what is irr like, like do you know what that means? Right? Like there's two things that matter, like cash on cash return, irr. Like those are the two biggest things, right? And also like, you know, do you have high cash value, paid up addition, life insurance? Right. It's an amazing vehicle, like some people call infinite banking. That's a great investment, it's a great tool. Do you understand private placement funds in real estate? Right. Do you have money in an index in the stock market? Because 90% of the time the guys that run mutual funds with high front load fees and AUM fees don't ever beat the market. And like so, so educating yourself on investments as you make money, because I had like $5 million. I remember sitting in the bank account and it was doing nothing but losing to inflation. And everyone knows what inflation is now because we just had a lot of it.
- [56:37]
Preston Brown
It's amazing how everybody got educated when the world got shot in the fricking nuts.
- [56:41]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, we printed like two thirds of the money in the supply in like three years. But, but yeah, like, and so I think that most business owners and, and you know, I'm a partner in a mastermind that just sold and one of the number one things that they struggle with is wealth. And like, like entrepreneurs, even successful ones, guys making 10 million in revenue, like they don't understand how to create wealth because making profit is just the first step and then wealth is the next step. Right. And so, and that's kind of what's, what's funny is like my kind of passion for learning. That is what's kind of segued me into what I'm doing now, which is really unlocking, you know, ultra high net worth quality private placement deals for everyday accredited investors. Right. And accredited investor is somebody who's worth a million dollars without their primary residence or makes 200k a year. Right. Household income.
- [57:47]
Preston Brown
Yeah. I mean a good percentage of the population, people that are ready to start investing.
- [57:50]
Brandon Poulin
There's 20 million accredited investor households in America. And so, you know, I'm in the middle of launching a broker dealer and literally what we'll do is make those connections between those great high quality investments with like the everyday investor. Because most like if you go to a Charles Schwab or a Merrill lynch or, or whoever, like you're not most of the time those guys that are going to charge you 1% of your money every year, they like you're paying to place your capital instead of the person raising the issuer is what it's called the fund that you're investing in. They're the ones that need the capital. Right. So they should be paying for it in my opinion, not, not the investor. And most of those guys, it's all just stocks and bonds. It's like that's how most people, their investment exposure is just stocks and bonds.
- [58:44]
Preston Brown
And a lot of guys, those are.
- [58:45]
Brandon Poulin
Great, you should have some of that. But there's a lot more to it.
- [58:48]
Preston Brown
A lot of the guys there learned what they're going to talk to you about from a course, haven't invested their own money. What behind the ears? I mean I'm sure there's some senior advisors that are good, but like if your investment advisor has a lower net worth than you, you probably should have some questions you're asking.
- [59:06]
Brandon Poulin
That's a good point. Yeah, that's a good point. So it's too much to tackle in this episode because my personality wants to get tactical and deep and dive.
- [59:18]
Preston Brown
But we can do an episode too, bro, because this is gold and I do want to have you back. And I love what you're hitting on the taxes. But what are some of the other reasons, like, that you reinvest outside of taxes? What are some of the other reasons that you've built this reinvestment philosophy?
- [59:35]
Brandon Poulin
The number one place you can invest your money is, I think, first in yourself and skills, right? And then the next place that you should invest your money is in your company because you're never. There's no investment out there that's passive, right? When we say investment, we're talking about like you placing money and not doing work to then get a return, right? So the next best place is your business because your business will always have outsized returns of any passive investment you could ever make. But at the same time, I think most entrepreneurs with their one business or their first kind of business that's doing well, pretty much. If you were to lay out your net worth on a pie chart. Now we are talking of one pie chart and pieces of the piece, right? Most of your net worth would probably be in your business, and that is not diversified, right? You. You focus and concentrate to build wealth. You diversify to keep wealth and to multiply it, right? And so I heard this saying, I heard it said this way that kings eat first. So like, if you're not paying yourself and all your money is just constantly going back in your business of growth, then you're not taking any chips off the table along the way. And it's good to invest in growth. It's good to. The stupidest thing that I hear sometimes is like buying stuff to get a tax write off that you don't need. It's just like, like paying taxes means that you're making money, right? And when you, when you take chips off the table, you can begin to diversify, right? And I'm not saying. And I think a lot of people do this, they'll take chips off the table and go buy a rental property and have another business to manage. That's not what I'm saying. Like, I think real estate's great, but operating and being passive are two totally different things, right? And that's why I see all the time, it's like you're like, wait, you have no experience and you, you have no time. And then you're going to go and, like, invest. Right. And then go buy yourself another business to manage. Right.
- [61:37]
Preston Brown
Yourself a new job. Yeah, we invest.
- [61:39]
Brandon Poulin
So that's not. That's. That's not the best way to do it.
- [61:41]
Preston Brown
We invest in great opportunities that are backed by great people and operators.
- [61:45]
Brandon Poulin
That's right. Yep. Absolutely. So I think that paying yourself as much as you can, you don't want to stunt the growth of your business, but at the same time, like, you have so much operational risk in your business. Case in point, the story that I just told about Ladyboss and our advertising and a six year machine that we created, all of a sudden getting completely rewired overnight. Right. Like, you carry so much operational risk in your business, and so taking those chips off the table along the way and starting to diversify is a great idea. Like, King should eat first, bro.
- [62:29]
Preston Brown
If your name was Mike, I would drop you. That was gold. Hey, brother, I would love to keep you on for another eight or 10 hours because I think people actually need this. I will invite you back for my life.
- [62:41]
Brandon Poulin
My wife wants me home for dinner.
- [62:42]
Preston Brown
Yeah, no. And I don't want her to beat me up because I think she can. Hi, Kaylin. But, dude, people are gonna need a little dose of Brandon. People are gonna need more of this between now and our next episode. Where can people find you? Where can people, like, message you and just say, wow, I loved it, or hey, can I ask you a question? Or just follow you for content if you're putting stuff out?
- [63:02]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, just Facebook or Instagram's great. So real Brandon Poulin on Instagram. And then I think it's the same on Facebook.
- [63:09]
Preston Brown
And we will also put that in the show notes.
- [63:11]
Brandon Poulin
Yeah, show notes. There we go.
- [63:13]
Preston Brown
Awesome. Brandon, dude, such an honor.
- [63:16]
Brandon Poulin
Thanks, man.
- [63:16]
Preston Brown
Such gold. Tremendous value. Thank you, bro. I really appre. You are literally, I think maybe the wisest person I know at 31 years old.
- [63:27]
Brandon Poulin
I'll take it.
- [63:29]
Preston Brown
And still wiser than me at 42. So, like, you're a fricking badass, bro. I really appreciate you coming on, guys.
- [63:36]
Brandon Poulin
Loved it, man.
- [63:37]
Preston Brown
You need to watch this. Maybe watch it again, take some notes. So many nuggets. Thank you for watching and have an amazing day on purpose.