No Experience Necessary: Why Your 20s are for Taking Risks

Summary

Podcast Summary: The GaryVee Audio Experience
Episode: No Experience Necessary: Why Your 20s are for Taking Risks
Date: June 16, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Gary Vaynerchuk sits down for a heartfelt and practical conversation with his friend and celebrated entrepreneur, Ronen Harari, cofounder of Spin Master and author of "No Experience Necessary." The discussion centers on why your 20s are the prime time for calculated risk-taking, the value of creativity, harnessing agency over your life, luck, and lessons from building one of the world’s leading toy and entertainment companies from the ground up. The episode offers hard-won advice and inspiration for young people, their parents, and anyone who wants to reframe their relationship with risk and opportunity.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Origin Story: Spin Master & Early Entrepreneurship

[06:00–15:00]

• Ronen’s Background: Grew up with dysgraphia, a writing disability; poured heart and soul into his book to give others agency in life ([02:59]).
• Spin Master Beginnings: Launched first business at age 23 with friends, but entrepreneurial journey started even before graduating university by identifying opportunities and taking unconventional risks (selling fertilizer, then campus posters) ([06:00]).
• First Big Opportunity: Inspired by an Israeli invention (Earth Buddy), doubled down on making their own rather than licensing, highlighting the importance of control in entrepreneurship ([07:07], [08:12]).
  • Quote: “It’s too risky to do what you’re describing, because then... I don’t have control. I’m in their hands.” – Ronen ([08:27])
• Rallying Family and Community: Shared profits with family to help scale without cash, demonstrating creative business structuring ([08:45]).
• Bootstrapped Hustle: Sold Earth Buddies on the streets, ultimately scaling to a million units and landing a transformative Kmart deal by sheer tenacity and not taking “no” for an answer ([15:39]–[17:00]).

2. The Power of Taking Risks in Your 20s

[23:28–27:51]

• Reframing Risk: The biggest risk is not pursuing your passion or “internal knowing”; the unseen opportunity cost may be missing out on the true trajectory of your life ([23:40]).
  • Quote: “If I don’t do what I’m super passionate about, if I don’t follow my internal knowing, you may be missing out on the screenplay of your life.” – Ronen ([23:52])
• Equity & Agency: Starting anything, in whatever form, gives you ownership, and your energetic 20s are an ideal time to bet on yourself ([24:43]).
  • Quote: “Are you renting your time, or are you owning your time?” – Ronen ([25:36])
• Self-Awareness Caveat: Not everyone should become an entrepreneur, but everyone should pursue risk and growth in the direction that matches their disposition—startup, creative, operator, etc. ([26:39]–[27:51]).

3. Navigating Generational Expectations & Family Dynamics

[27:51–30:17]

• Role of Parents and Grandparents: The book serves as a conversation starter across generations, challenging conventional advice and helping families address “the unsaids” that often suppress risk-taking and new paths.
• Discussion Tool: Ronen is developing a companion card game for families to facilitate these important dialogues ([28:47]).
  • Quote: “There’s not a family on Earth that doesn’t have a lot of unsaid.” – Gary ([29:41])

4. The Power of Not Knowing & Fresh Eyes

[30:33–35:28]

• Innovation from Ignorance: Many breakthrough products (like Air Hogs) came from not knowing industry limitations, allowing for bold action and creative solutions ([34:38]).
  • Gary’s Framework: “Fresh eyes are dangerous eyes because they don’t know what’s wrong.” ([34:22])
• Prototype Success: Despite industry skepticism, trusting childlike enthusiasm guided the creation and runaway success of Air Hogs ([32:54]–[35:28]).

5. Creating Your Own Luck & the “Maybe” Mindset

[36:44–39:48]

• Luck in Motion: Luck favors those in motion and willing to say “maybe” instead of “no” to new opportunities, which widens the funnel for serendipity and breakthroughs ([38:51]–[39:27]).
  • Quote: “Luck starts in the doing and being in momentum and being in movement.” – Ronen ([36:47])
  • Gary on the Maybe Mindset: “Almost everything that comes my way is a maybe. There is no starting point with no... it gets trumped by the five times I said maybe that became a yes that changed the course of everything.” ([39:27])

6. Behind the Book: Process, Challenges, and Unexpected Impact

[40:19–44:07]

• Publishing Hurdles: Major publishers turned Ronen down due to his lack of social media presence ([40:41]), but perseverance and finding the right champion led to a top publisher.
• Marketing Realities: The hardest part was putting himself out there—media training was essential ([41:39]–[42:05]).
• Touching Feedback: Readers in their 30s wished the book existed a decade prior. A moving moment: a PR worker’s young, learning-disabled son was so inspired, he tried reading the book himself ([42:48]–[44:02]).
  • Quote: “A lady that works for a PR company... decided to read him some chapters and... he said, I could be like the Paw Patrol guy... That night, she said to him, Mom, I want to try reading from the book myself.” – Ronen ([44:02])

7. Building Paw Patrol: Innovation from Adversity

[45:05–52:13]

• From Rock Bottom to Global Hit: Paw Patrol was born during Spin Master’s lowest financial period. Inspired by Japanese toy/media synergy, they blended toy design and animation collaboratively with Keith Chapman, leading to an iconic global franchise ([45:05]–[52:07]).
  • Quote: “It was a real mash up of the arts... we added, we said it’d be super cool if there’s backpacks and the pups and the backpacks transformed... The toy designers were drawing over the animators’ designs...” – Ronen ([50:41])
• Measuring Cultural Impact: Success was clear when kids’ birthday cakes started featuring Paw Patrol characters on Instagram ([52:13]).

8. Final Thoughts: The Long View on Life and Risk

[53:15–54:03]

• Ronen’s Parting Wisdom: Enjoy the journey. Life is both short and long—there’s more time than you think, and not achieving everything right away is okay. Keep moving and stay in momentum.
  • Quote: “The most important thing is just momentum and just keep on moving.” – Ronen ([54:03])

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Notable Quotes & Moments with Timestamps

• On pouring your heart into a project:
  "This really fucking matters to him... I knew it was going to matter for a lot of people." – Gary ([01:32])
• On getting control as an entrepreneur:
  "It's too risky to do what you're describing because then... I don't have control. I'm in their hands." – Ronen ([08:27])
• On embracing luck and opportunity:
  "I do believe we have the ability to create our own luck, but the luck starts in the doing and being in momentum and being in movement." – Ronen ([36:47])
• On not knowing as an advantage:
  "Fresh eyes are dangerous eyes because they don't know what's wrong." – Gary ([34:22])
• On the power of maybe:
  "Almost everything that comes my way is a maybe... it gets trumped by the five times I said maybe that became a yes that changed the course of everything." – Gary ([39:27])
• On launching Paw Patrol in adversity:
  "We were like, should we continue? What should we do? ...We were going to see more products, more opportunities, and really give it the attention, time and focus." – Ronen ([46:52])

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Important Timestamps for Reference

• 02:29 – Ronen introduces himself and the motivation for the book.
• 06:00–09:22 – Early entrepreneurship stories, first ventures, and risk decisions.
• 15:39–18:35 – Landing the breakthrough Kmart deal through relentless pitching.
• 23:28–27:51 – The philosophy of risk in your 20s, equity, and self-awareness.
• 28:47–30:17 – Using conversation tools to cross intergenerational divides about risk.
• 30:44–35:28 – How “not knowing” led to major innovations at Spin Master.
• 36:44–39:48 – Creating luck by saying “maybe” and building momentum.
• 45:05–52:13 – The birth of Paw Patrol out of Spin Master’s worst period.

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Episode Takeaways

• Your 20s are an unparalleled window to take risks.
• Creativity and curiosity are assets—often underestimated.
• Momentum (the “doing”) creates luck and opportunities.
• Conversations about risk-taking should happen across generations.
• Not everyone is an entrepreneur, but everyone benefits from self-awareness and pursuing their “internal knowing.”
• Great companies and ideas are built on resilience, collaboration, and a willingness to see possibility where others see risk or failure.

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Recommendation:
Pick up "No Experience Necessary" for yourself, or as a gift for any young person (or parent of a young person) navigating the pivotal decade of their 20s. And, as Gary quips, if this podcast or his work has ever brought you value—this book is your way to give back.

Transcript

[A]

All right, Vaynernation, this is very exciting to me. I know all of you are very aware of this. The days of me doing original content in the audio experience are far and few between. Usually I just like to take it from CNBC or keynotes or vlogs, but occasionally there's something compelling enough for me to kind of sit down and allocate actual time to the actual podcast. And you can hear the giggles on the other side of the mic here. This gentleman has become a real friend and I'm really excited about the book he wrote for a trillion different reasons. And we're going to go into that. And so before anything else, like immediately, I need you to go to Amazon or your book choice and put no experience necessary into the search or use an AI bot or however you do it these days. I'm just going to make this very clear. I know I do this once or twice every two years if I've brought you any value ever in the history of my career. You picking up this small token in support of a gentleman who I think really let me. I'll give you right to the punchline of why I'm saying what I'm saying. I know a million authors. I am one. Not, not only, not everyone, almost no one actually pours their heart into the project. For a lot of people, it's a piece of the pie when it's in the context of business. There's a lot of authors, I think, actually, who. Who do pour their heart into something and have something meaningful to say, but in the business world, it's a little bit more part of the pie, not the pie. And when Ronen was explaining this project to me, and we'll get into a minute of our relationship from the first time, and then the second time really is when I remember feeling it, I'm like, oh, okay, this is like, this really fucking matters to him. And then once I understood the context of the book and you'll understand why we're gonna get into it here, I knew that it was gonna matter for a lot of people. So for a lot of parents that are listening right now, I think this book is gonna matter quite a bit. And for a lot of you 20 to 30 year olds that I know consume this podcast at scale, it matters. And so please, please, please pick up this book. And now I'm gonna let my esteemed guest introduce himself and give you a little context of one or two minutes of who he is, and then we'll go into the book. This is the GaryVee audio experience.

[B]

Thanks, Gary. That was a very warm introduction.

[A]

It was real for me.

[B]

Thank you. It's very generous. Yes. My name is Renan Harari and I've known Gary now for about a year, which is a privilege and an honor.

[A]

More because the courting of the board seat. So I'm on the board. Some of you know this. I'm on the board of Spin Master. This is one of the iconic co founders of the company. The process. I've been on the board for over a year.

[B]

It was like dating.

[A]

Yes. A year and a half now, brother. But I'm glad you feel like it feels like a year. It means I'm not overstaying my welcome.

[B]

First of all, as you guys will pick up, Gary and I are complete opposites. Complete opposites, but similar. Yes. But thank you for having me on and thanks for the kind words about the book. And yeah, for me, this book's been a journey. It took me four years to write and I grew up with a learning disability. So it's quite a learning disability called dysgraphia. So it's quite ironic that I wrote a book when dysgraphia is about writing or writing is very difficult. But it's been such a pleasure to actually put my thoughts into a physical book and bring it out into the world. And you know, for me, the importance of this book is to help people have agency in their life. And I wrote it as if it's a supportive parent because I had one parent that was super supportive to me in my 20s. And I know what that feels like to just have all the wind in your sails and no one doubting what you want to do in your life. And so I wanted to actually put something, my shared experience, experiences in terms of what are the benefits that accrue to you when you start something in your 20s and how to make the case to yourself or how to make the case to your parents. Because there's so many pressures when you grow up, you know, in terms of what your parents want you to do or what society wants you to do. But only you really know what you want to do in your life. You have your own internal knowing. And I really want the book to help create discussion around that internal knowing, whether or not you should go forward or not go forward, but at least talk about it and have the conversation.

[A]

I think that's right. If you were at a dinner party right now and everyone's going around and saying who they are in the cliche of like name and what they do for a living, taking the authorship out. How would you introduce yourself?

[B]

I would say I'm a creator. I birth and bring things into the world that never existed before. And we've done it in the whole toy realm. We were a toy company for the first 16 years of our existence. Then we started producing TV shows, then we started producing movies, Then we started doing digital games, and we brought things into the world that never existed before.

[A]

And to that point, just to anchor it, because I have such an entrepreneurial crowd, and I think people will enjoy this from a professional career standpoint. At what age did Spin start? You had two partners. I believe you'll correct me if I messed that up. But, you know, and then I want to go into your part, because I do think I like how you just answered that, Because I did want to touch on your creativity and curiosity, which I think is a superpower of yours, and I think could help a lot of people who I think underestimate curiosity and creativity as a. I think people understand it's a strength. I don't think people understand how much of a strength it is. And I think a lot of people suppress it because they live in black and white environments. So just a little origin story of your actual entrepreneurial career for five seconds.

[B]

Sure. So we started the business when we were 23, right out of university, and we actually started pre graduating. So Anton, my first business partner, there's three of us. My other business partner's name is Ben. We needed to pay for university, so we were selling fertilizer door to door. That's our first job. And then we were like, this is really difficult when you knock on someone's door. Knocking on people's doors to ask them to fertilize their lawn. It's not an easy gig.

[A]

No.

[B]

And then we noticed the kids, they were seniors in our university that were doing this thing called campus faces. And so they would take pictures of kids during frosh week, create this collage, sell advertising around the perimeter, and then they distribute 9,000 posters for free. And this is pre Internet. And they graduated, and they weren't doing it. So I said to Anton, let's just do it ourselves. And then we did. And by the end of the third year university, we were doing it at five universities, grossing $100,000 a year.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

And we graduated with no debt, and we had $10,000 in our bank account, and we paid for all school.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

And then the most magical thing happened. My mom sat me down, and she said, renan, I got to translate this article that was in the Israeli Newspaper. And it was an article about these six people that were making this product called an Earth Body. The small little Chia Pet. It was made out of grass seed, nylon, sawdust. And you put it in water and grew grass for hair. It's kind of like the new version of Chia pet in the 90s. And in this article it talked about how they had sold 300,000 pieces in Israel.

[A]

Jesus.

[B]

And for a country of 10 million people, I figured in North America it could be like millions. So I said to Anton, why don't we do this? And he thought I was crazy. Took me two weeks to convince him. And then the light bulb went off in his head and he said, yes. And next thing I know, we're in Kmart. We're buying pantyhose and we're sourcing sawdust. And I'm getting my brother in law to help us manufacture the product. And we said, let's make 5,000 pieces for mother's Day.

[A]

Got it. Your track then wasn't let's. It probably didn't even cross your mind. Let's go to Israel, make a deal with them and be exclusive in North America. You're like, we're gonna replicate something similar.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

Understood.

[B]

Can I tell you, it's amazing that you pick up on that. Cause I had one discussion with my mother and my late grandmother and it was about risk. And they said, you know, it's too risky for you to make it yourself. Why don't you do exactly what you described? And I said, well, it's too risky to do what you're describing because then we're in.

[A]

I have control.

[B]

I don't have control. I'm in their hands.

[A]

I get it.

[B]

And I made the decision.

[A]

And we're literally sitting in the veefriend studio where the only thing I've licensed out is the trading cards only. Cause I love Rub and Topps does have a lot of leverage, but boy do I agree with you with control. So go ahead.

[B]

So I got my brother in law, we gave him a 5% profit sharing on the product. Okay, what's up?

[A]

Well, I love the way you delivered it. You want to make sure the audience knows, like we were smart about how we thought about business.

[B]

No, I want people to understand that you can share profits, you can scale your business. When you don't have money, bring in human capital.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Okay. And you can share the profits. You don't have to share on the gestalt of the whole business.

[A]

That's right. That's a Very important point.

[B]

But on that specific product itself.

[A]

So he was pumped. How old was he at the time?

[B]

He was 26.

[A]

He was the elder statesman.

[B]

Yeah, he's 26.

[A]

Right.

[B]

He's an autodeck. He's incredible. And then I got my sister, she did the packaging. We gave her 5% profit sharing.

[A]

Incredible.

[B]

They actually took. They probably made a few hundred thousand dollars in total. And they took the money and my sister started a business with that money.

[A]

Unbelievable.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So you guys, you obviously gave us the punchline. I didn't know how much it did or didn't work. Clearly, I'm doing the math. It worked well.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. If you do that backwards. Correct. So we did 5,000 pieces for mother's Day. We started selling them in the streets of Toronto.

[A]

Literally on the street.

[B]

Streets of Toronto.

[A]

When you say the streets. Going door to door to small shops and saying, will you buy this? Or you stood out there like a

[B]

lemonade stand and sold them like a lemonade stand.

[A]

Get the fuck out of here.

[B]

We had seven tables, okay. We had seven tables set up. Okay. Across the city. This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome, that's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50 page restoration block. Or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it, ready to make anything online make sense. There's no place like Chrome. Check responses.

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

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[B]

And I get emotional because even my late grandmother manned a table.

[A]

She sure did.

[B]

Yeah. With my sister. And we got friends to do it. We sold 700 pieces, came back into the office on Monday and we're like, oh, we got 4,300 pieces. Let's get moving. And we started working with like floor shops. We found a distributor. Then we got super lucky. I went to a closeout toy company, okay. Based on a recommendation from my mother. And I pitched them the idea.

[A]

By the way, your mother sounds like a genius. So far, I'VE heard. My mother gave me this article. My mother told me about this. Then I got lucky. My mother told me to go to this. You know, I think. I mean, she's really the architect of this company. Yeah.

[B]

You've never met my mother before. You guys would be like. You're like kindred spirits. Yeah.

[A]

I can't wait.

[B]

Two people in the quad.

[A]

Go ahead. No wonder you like that.

[B]

She would be the king of social media today. I believe that she'd have as many followers as me.

[A]

I love her.

[B]

Go ahead. Anyway, so I go to this meeting at this closeout company. They say, yeah, we'll represent you. We don't hear anything from them. Two weeks later, they call us. They said, no. They said, when can you deliver us 26,000 pieces? And then I said to them, we can, but we were short on capital. Yeah, we're short on capital. And they were so nice. Okay. And they were rooting for us.

[A]

They announced it?

[B]

No, they just said, we'll pay you COD cash on delivery. Okay. So the whole journey of Earth buddies, our receivables were probably net 20, and our payables were net 75. They ended up being net 90. I pushed it. Got it. So we had this free cash flow.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And then the most magical thing happened two months later. So Anton, which, you know, he was traveling in Europe the summer before, and he met this guy by the name of Aaron Hermelin, and he lived in Detroit, and his uncle owned the palace where the Detroit Pistons played. So he called him up and he said, do you have any connections to Kmart? And back in the 90s, Kmart was like Amazon.

[A]

Correct. They were massive. They were truly Walmart.

[B]

They were the Walmart. They were the Walmart Truly. And Aaron said, yeah, I can get you an appointment with a buyer for the product. I'm gonna charge you 10%. Which was not right. Okay.

[A]

No, old school.

[B]

Old school should be in 5%. But anyways, we were just like, let's keep the momentum going.

[A]

I mean, now, kids, if you're listening now, you could just DM or hit some. The whole world used to literally like, la, especially and la. In the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, if someone introduced you to someone, they were getting a piece of the action. That's how much access was worth something. This is why when you kids are like, I can't do it and I know you can DM someone on Instagram or LinkedIn and your whole life changes. Like, this is how it worked back then. Keep going.

[B]

Yeah. So it was 10% for us. And so we took the. We said great. And for some reason I took the appointment. Okay. I don't know why. Anton. Anton's done more sales than I have. But I went down to do this.

[A]

Serendipity. Or you wanted to, or you just don't even remember why.

[B]

I don't remember why.

[A]

Keep going.

[B]

So I wake up at 3:30 in the morning.

[A]

Where was Kmart?

[B]

It was in Detroit, Michigan.

[A]

That was. Oh, that's why he asked him. Because that was their hq.

[B]

I don't know that they're based in Troy, Michigan. Got it. So I woke up at 3:30 in the morning, okay. Drove down to Detroit. I didn't even think about going there the night before and waking up fresh. Because we were saving money, right? Didn't want to pay for the hotel. So I get there 9:30 in the morning. We're in the room, it's myself, it's the rep, and Aaron and I pitched the buyer for 30 minutes. And after 30 minutes, the buyer says, I'm not the buyer for this product. And then I look at him and I'm thinking to myself, he's lying to me.

[A]

You thought he was joking?

[B]

No, I thought he was turning you down. Turning me down.

[A]

Got it.

[B]

By not telling me the truth.

[A]

Understood.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I love that about you. That's good cynicism.

[B]

Slightly paranoid back in the day, clearly.

[A]

What do you mean back in the day?

[B]

So I pitched him again for another 15 minutes. And he was the nicest guy. He didn't interrupt me at all. 15 minutes. Takes, listens to me. He says, I'm not the buyer for this product. So I said to him, well, who is? No, I said, I still didn't believe. I said, we'll give you the product on consigned sales.

[A]

Oh, you're still selling?

[B]

I'm still selling. We'll give you the product on consigned sales. If you sell it, you'll pay us. And he said to me, I'm not the buyer for this product. So I figured when I'm giving him the product for free, he's really not the buyer. So I said to him, well, who is the buyer? So he got up, left the room, came back and he gave me a piece of paper and written on it was the words Adrian Zaks. I shook his hands, I said, thank you very much. And I start walking around the offices in Troy, Michigan. Start walking around the office.

[A]

I want to stop for a second. Everyone, a lot of you know this. One of my favorite V friends is tenacious termite tenacity continues to be underestimated. This is not where I thought the story is going. This is pure tenacity. Go ahead.

[B]

So I start walking around Cameron Corporation looking for the buyer. And I got so lucky that she was sitting at her desk. And I pitched her right there on the spot. 30 seconds. And she said, okay, I'll see you at 3:30. I go downstairs. Erin and the rep are downstairs. They're like, let's go for lunch. I said, I'm not going anywhere. Yeah. I thought they wouldn't let me in the building. Okay. Or she canceled. She may call me early or something like this. So I sat there for five hours. Okay. And waited till 3:30. I get up there at 3:30, I walk in. And I didn't notice this before because my adrenaline was going. And as I walk in, there's seven other competing products. Okay. On the left side of her shelf. So then I'm like, okay, I know I'm in the right office. And then I made a quick calculus in my mind. I'm like, I'm up against seven other people. I gotta drop my price. So I dropped my price from 265 to 165. It was costing us about 70 cents to make it back in the day. Anyway, I sit down, I do the whole pitch. 15 minutes. She doesn't say anything. And then she does the most magical thing. She turns around and she grabs this big book and gives it to me, which was the vendor book to become a supplier of Kmart. And she says to me, I'm going to order 48,000 pieces from you, and if it goes well, I'm ordering half a million for Christmas. And I was just, like, in complete shock. And then we talked about a bunch of things. And then I did the stranger thing, Gary. I asked her because she was the buyer for Horticulture because it was like a plant, right? And I asked her for her garden gnome.

[A]

Hey, everybody. Hope you're enjoying the podcast right now. Make sure you follow the podcast. That's why I'm interrupting. Let's keep going on this show, but follow the podcast. It'll make my mom super happy.

[B]

Do you ever have a garden gnome?

[A]

I didn't have one, but of course I know what it is.

[B]

I didn't believe the whole thing was real, so I wanted some tangible object. So I saw this garden gnome sitting up on her shelf, and I'm like, can I have your garden gnome?

[A]

What did she say?

[B]

She said, yes. How can you say no to someone asking for a garden Gnome.

[A]

What is it, like, seven years of bad luck or something? It is. It feels like it, right?

[B]

All right.

[A]

If someone asks you for a garden gnome, if you don't give it to them, the gnome spell puts a spell on you. Like, I'm trying to figure out, oh,

[B]

no, I didn't know anything.

[A]

I mean, she very much could have been like, that's a strange request. Please leave my office. She's clearly a wonderful lady.

[B]

No, she's a wonderful lady. And I can just tell you this much, is that. That I write about in the book, a chapter called Everybody is rooting for you.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And I believe when you're young, everybody wants you to succeed and everybody wants to give you their. Their time. They are rooting for you. Plus, they love being around young people. They love the energy of the young people. And I am 100% convinced she had seven other options of places where she'd buy this. But I'm convinced that she bought it a. Because I was in the room. I got in the room. I didn't. I didn't send it to you, who

[A]

you are at that moment.

[B]

And she felt the passion in the moment.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And it was confirmed to me because four years later, she asked me to come to Detroit and speak to some inner city youth and tell my story about the Earth.

[A]

Buddy, I love it. That's an incredible story, brother. And that was it, right, that purchase order.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So we kind of.

[B]

We ended up at the end of that year, we produced a million pieces. We had a factory in Toronto. We had 200 workers in our factory, produced 17,500 a day. And it just set the company fully in motion.

[A]

And that's that. I mean, obviously there's a million things, but that was. That's the origin story.

[B]

That was the liftoff for the company

[A]

and for context for everybody, because now we've just given them a lot of stories currently today. Tell people some of the. A lot of times people don't know the corporate name Spin Master. What are some of the brands? IPs, toys within the Spin Spin portfolio.

[B]

So, you know, the most famous one is Paw Patrol, Bakugan, Hatchmoles, Air Hogs, Melissa and Doug, Rubik's Cube.

[A]

And what about mobile gaming?

[B]

Mobile gaming is interesting. We tried. It's wild. We tried in 2010, okay. We set up our own studio. Saw it early in Los Angeles. We built it from scratch. We had 100 people. We were $10 million in, and we were doing a virtual world under our Tech Deck brand, Pre Pre Roblox. Okay. And I'll never forget. I took two months off, I went to Israel, took a break, came back, and everybody was just like, we need to close this down. We're spending too much money. It's not working. We're too deep. It's just not going to work. And it was a weak moment. We just shut down the studio before we did. Yeah, yeah. And it could have been the Roblox of today. And then six years later, we had an opportunity to buy a company called Toca Boca. And for the listeners, it's, it's, it's an amazing.

[A]

Oh, they know.

[B]

Okay. And. Yeah. And the crazy. And then we. So we, we were able to acquire our way into digital. Digital gaming. But the.

[A]

Please.

[B]

The crazy thing about Tokaboka is that Toca Boca got turned down by everybody. Everybody turned it down. Disney turned down.

[A]

It was being shopped.

[B]

It got shopped for. It got shopped for a year before it came to Spin Master.

[A]

People thought it was overpriced.

[B]

Too small.

[A]

Too small, too small. I see.

[B]

Interesting.

[A]

Because they were being shopped at places like Disney and others and just too small. Got it to the book. Let's start with the opening question. Why did you decide to write it for real? What's the mix? Because it can't be just one thing. What's the mix of things that were going on in your life when you decided, yes, I want to do this first?

[B]

Well, I stepped down from being co CEO of the company and I took a sabbatical for a year and a half.

[A]

Yep. Let's time this for everybody. You stepped down as co CEO of the company?

[B]

20. 21. Okay. At around 50. So from 23 to 50, I was going full out. And then I was pretty intuitively I knew that I was burnt out. I didn't know how burnt out I was till I was actually on six months into my sabbatical. But because I'm a workaholic, I needed another project. So I put the book into my sabbatical and I wrote it over a three month period of time, the core part of the book. But it was the idea of being able to look back and see the magical things that happen in your 20s. And I wanted to write about it. It was just something. It was like a product that wanted to come out of me. It was an idea that I want. That wanted to come out and that I just wanted to share. So that was one.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Two is the time. Three is. I love books. So just the whole thought, like, I love reading and just.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So.

[A]

Oh, My God, I'll have one. That's so cool.

[B]

Yeah, I'll have one. So cool. And be able to. And also I was like, I better write it down before my memory goes. I love it.

[A]

So there's a lot of people listening, and a lot of people listen to this over the course of a year. And what's great about books, I feel it every day. I mean, somebody emailed me today. They're like, I just read Crush It. I wrote it in 2009. And I write books that are different than this. You're writing a book? I have one or two that are kind of evergreen. A lot of my books are timely. They're like, do this in the next 36 months. I've rewritten crush it two times. One's called Crushing it and one's called day Trading Attention. And still the person's like, I got so much value. And it's so interesting. How long? So this podcast, the Way the World Works, like, obviously we're gonna push this hard. I want everybody to buy the book. I really think it's valuable. But this is gonna last a long time and have a long tail. If someone's listening right now and they're intrigued, they're compelled to my opening rant and wanna support it. What do you want someone to get or not? Just someone. Give me different groups of people and what your hopes they'll get out of the book if they read it.

[B]

Well, I'd love for the book to be a reframe on multiple topics. So first one is Risk. So I write a chapter called the Inverse Risk, which I actually wanted the book to be called the Inverse Risk.

[A]

Oh, interesting. Yeah, I understand where you're going.

[B]

And so the whole notion of risk, it's so easy to game out the downsides. We always know what is going to happen. The bad things can happen. We never know the magical things that can happen once we start.

[A]

Correct.

[B]

Right. We can't. We can't visualize it. And so I want to encourage people to reframe their thoughts and say to themselves, if I don't do what I'm super passionate about, if I don't follow my internal knowing, you may be missing out on the screenplay of your life. Right.

[A]

Real quick, before I interrupt, as I often do in these things, because it's so important that last minute, I think a lot of you have consumed content from me. And I talk about 22 to 30 is when you should be all out Risk. The world tells you, like, now, grow up now. Take a job. Like everything is in your favor to dream it out, to scratch the itch. And most of all, for me personally, it's because I fear regret so much. And you know, it just feels so nice to hear you talking about this because I don't think this is talked about enough.

[B]

Yeah, I agree. I agree. I'm also passionate. I write about equity. Okay. Talking about taking the risk. It's like, what do you. What is. How does equity work? Right. And equity is actually not very complicated. How do you get equity? You just get equity by starting something. The moment you start something, you own it. The moment you make a decision. I want to go into business for myself. You may not have the idea. Okay. But you want to do something for yourself. Whatever you're going to do, you own it 100%. How you want to share it, okay. Is your decision how you want to get profit, sharing how much equity you want to give away. Okay. It's all up to you. The culture that you want it, that you want to build, how you want to operate in that environment, it's all up to you. And then the question is, especially in your 20s, like it's a time of so much energy, you have like 3x the amount of energy forex. So do you want that forex energy to accrue to someone else or do you want to accrue to you?

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Are you going to. Are you renting your time?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. Or you. Are you owning your time?

[A]

Where do you sit? So I'm the biggest. I mean, I was just read the subtitle.

[B]

Oh. No experience necessary. Why? Betting on yourself in your 20s is the best decision you'll ever make.

[A]

So I've talked on this platform of the same thesis for a very long time. Talk to me about where self awareness comes in. So you're talking about betting on yourself now? I'm actually not going to lead the witness. What about somebody who's listening right now is 24 years old and has been gifted the blessing of really solid self awareness and she or he knows that they do not have the stomach, the temperament, or the skill set to be entrepreneurial that they see themselves as. I'd rather be the number seven at Spin Master and that could be a very good career. I'm sure the number seven at Spin Master did quite well versus where? I just know myself. I don't want that. That won't work for me. What's your thought about that then?

[B]

It's not for them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Then it's just not for them.

[A]

What about the idea of like, fine, what about that middle that I just painted which is like instead of going to Coca Cola, try to find your spin master.

[B]

What do you mean?

[A]

Think that's a version of that? Well, so I think what I'm saying and I think we're agreeing, I was curious where we're gonna go is I do think high risk, high reward in your 20s over everything. What I don't believe is that everyone's an entrepreneur. Some people are a content creator, a musician, and some people actually know they're a coo, project manager type. I to those people say your version of risk is go to a startup company and be number seven versus Coca Cola. You might lose because most startups go out of business. Most companies are not Spin master or Facebook. Just your overall thoughts, do you agree with that?

[B]

I totally agree. I think the most important thing is to listen and follow your own internal knowing and what you're passionate about. And there is no right or wrong. There is zero right or wrong. And I think that certain people are born entrepreneurs. I think other people can become entrepreneurs. I think that you can contribute in so many different ways. It's more about just how you're spending your time to make sure that it's aligned with what is giving you energy in life.

[A]

So there's a 20 year old, there's the 15 year old, there's the 60 year old with the 50 year old, with the 20 year old, there's an 80 year old with a grandchild that's in their 20s. The coolest part about this podcast is we have them all listening, which is really neat. Thoughts on intervention on this. Right. So there's the human that you're trying to talk to here. It's an intervention within themselves. You're challenging them through this book, through this podcast, through all the press you're gonna do to say, hey man, listen to me, the 20s is like go, go. What about for the 50? Now let's talk to the 50 and 80 year old. You know, for the grandparent, the parent. Thoughts. Let's start with a weird one. Any thoughts on a grandparent that sees this in their 26 year old granddaughter? But their parents are potentially the issue because they're pushing don't take risk and all this. Like, how do you think about interpersonal relationships in supporting risk? Because oftentimes that's the issue.

[B]

Correct. Well, I hope the book actually creates the discussion. And we're actually, we're actually creating a card game. Okay. It's going to be 120 cards, 20 cards. Are called foundation cards, which is for you to get to know the other person that you're sitting with. And the other 10 cards are questions based on the chapters of the book. And so you could actually read the book or play the game. Play the game.

[A]

When does the game come out?

[B]

It's going to come out in a month, so it's more for promotional purposes.

[A]

That's clever. We go into a strength of yours. This is what you do.

[B]

I guess so. But it's all there to just create the conversation of dialogue so you can sit down with your grandparents and your parents and you and you guys can talk it out. Because I think in so many families, I know in my family, there's a lot of unsaids. Right. And there's not a family on Earth

[A]

that doesn't have a lot of unsaid. Different topics that are unsaid. But everyone who's behind the scenes right now is shaking their head adamantly, like, every family has unsaids. Every family's unsaids sit in different categories.

[B]

Correct. So I wanted to just create the dialogue and discussion. And I think it's so healthy when people talk about it. Then you'll be able to. You can work it out. And then your parents understand where you're coming from and your grandparents. It's just through the discussion. And I really encourage people to find what's right for them at the end of the day. And sometimes starting a business is not right.

[A]

Yeah, I think that's right. Talk to me about. Here we are. We're looking at the contents. Dig into one of these chapters or parts for me. Give me an anecdote, a story like, I see luck in here, which I'm fascinated by. Give me something that stands out for you.

[B]

Well, let's. We can talk about the power of not knowing. So I think the greatest thing.

[A]

So this is in part two, Build Chapter five, the Power of Not Knowing. Go into it.

[B]

After we did Earth Buddies, we did a product called Devil Sticks. Then we did a couple mediocre products to pay the bills. And then we came across this product called Air Hogs Airplane that ran off compressed air for 45 seconds. And if you remember back in the 90s, all we had to play with were the rubber band planes or the Cox planes that basically would get one flight. They break or they take your finger off.

[A]

That's right. When the second part happened more often than you think, kids, shit was crazy back in the day.

[B]

Yeah, it's like. Yeah, it's like the fact you give your kids A gas powered plane back in the day.

[A]

Do you know that there's a million dollar Boba Fett action figure? Because it was the one that the missile actually shot out of his backpack. But a kid swallowed it and they had to stop making it. So there's only like a dozen in the world.

[B]

I didn't know about that.

[A]

Yeah, kids, everything was dangerous back in the day. The, the lead that was in the toys alone, you know. And by the way, we're all like still alive. That's just a conversation.

[B]

The fact we're still standing.

[A]

I need to make Mona listen to this part. We're still alive. All right, go ahead. So you come across this thing. So what year was that? Do you remember?

[B]

Yes. 1996. So Ben's role was to go out and look for.

[A]

Yeah, let's talk about Ben. He was the third partner, Right?

[B]

So Ben's our third partner.

[A]

When did he come along?

[B]

He came in when we started producing Earth Buddies.

[A]

So pretty quickly.

[B]

Pretty quickly. I had not even known him and he went to school with Anton University. I met him for 45 minutes. Loved him straight away. He knew, just knew.

[A]

This is the third amigo?

[B]

Yes. Correct.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

So Ben's role was to go out there and actually meet with inventors. And in the toy industry, there's 200 inventors. They come up with ideas, they never commercialize them, but if, if you take one from them, they will get a royalty. They get a 5% royalty in perpetuity.

[A]

Right. So there's a lot of toy just for everybody. This could be what you do for a living. You invent toys and you hope one of the companies, you guys, the other two big ones, the others come along and say, I like it and you get a 5% big. And then they go do all the hard work, make it, sell it, manufacture it, all that.

[B]

And you just sparked my thought. It's Bakugan was actually created by a 23 year old inventor. First time inventor.

[A]

No shit.

[B]

The first product he ever invented. The last one he ever invented. Okay.

[A]

By the way, if everybody's not sharp enough to follow along. He made so much fucking money, he never had to do it again. He didn't die, just so you know.

[B]

He did not die.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

Okay. So we go back to Air Hogs. So Ben was going out meeting with all these inventors and he met with these two British inventors, John Dixon, Peter Manning, two British guys in their 50s. And they came to show us this toy that went on to become Air Hogs. And we go to the park and we fly the airplane and it's just like magic. And I just run, pick it up, I fly it, Ben runs, picks it up. We just want to do it over and over again. Then they're like, okay, hold on. It's a prototype, just, it might break, it's gonna break. But literally I felt like a 7 year old kid and I was 25 at the time.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Yeah, it was just, it was so much fun. So we ended up giving a $50,000 option. We took all the money from Air hogs, sorry, from Earth Buddies, from Devil Sticks. And we spent two years designing and developing this airplane. About a year and a half in, we realized we found out that Hasbro had passed on the product, Mattel had passed on the product. Every toy company had passed on it. And we thought we were the first to see it. We thought we were the first to see it. And at the time, okay, we realized, like, it's an airplane, it's going to come down, it's going to break. Okay, it's a spinning propeller, it's not so safe. So we were like cognitive of all those things, but they didn't sit in our brain too long. We were like, we'll figure it out. But we didn't know enough of what we didn't know. And that led us, all we knew was that we loved it. And if we loved it, a seven year old was going to love it. So let's go ahead and do it

[A]

real quick to jump in. This is the framework I always talk about, which is A, intuition, but B, I always say fresh eyes are dangerous eyes because they don't know what's wrong. And the other competitors, often much bigger, do know what's wrong. And they talk themselves out of it, missing out on the magic.

[B]

Correct. And it's that combination of like when you're young, you're so close to the zeitgeist, you see the world so differently, you see the opportunities, and for some reason we hold ourselves back from going in. But if you went forward, you would bring what you see differently into the world and you'll overcome the obstacles. So we overcame the obstacles. We put on a beautiful foam nose cone, we put on plastic tips on the ends of the propellers. Our wings popped off on impact and then you put them back on again. So that's how we solved that problem. And it went on to redefine the whole flying category. We did $35 million in 2008 on it. And over the course of 10 years, we probably did over billion in sales in flying Toys. We were the kings of flying toys. Wow. And it's all a result of not knowing. Power of not knowing just for nerdum.

[A]

And there's just a lot of business people who was. Was the company at a place with a couple of wins. You had good distribution at that point. Like, everyone took it in. Did buyers like it? Like, just a little nerdum there?

[B]

Sure. Listen, if you want to, we. Anton was doing sales. He sold it in pretty much to every single retailer.

[A]

Everybody wanted it.

[B]

Every retailer wanted it. They loved the innovation. They saw the uniqueness in it. And it was shipping May 2008, and I was in China, okay, Doing the debug. We shipped it in, committed. And the retailers, as you know, Gary, it's like the retailers allocate the space. If you don't fill the space, it's a huge sin.

[A]

Oh, it's. I mean, it could be a death blow.

[B]

Right. So we took a risk of selling

[A]

it in at that time when it wasn't 100% ready.

[B]

When it wasn't, we were getting a 10% ready, but we didn't know 100% if we'd be able to do it. But we got it done.

[A]

Those were sleepless nights for you in China.

[B]

They were sleepless nights for other reasons, which I give more details.

[A]

You want to give some scoops?

[B]

No, no, we're going to save that.

[A]

All right.

[B]

All right, I'll save that.

[A]

Something important to me during this interview right now. You know what. What have we not talked about yet from the book or the thesis or what you want to get out there that we should?

[B]

Well, I think. I think luck.

[A]

Okay, let's talk about it.

[B]

It's a big, big one for me. It's like, I. I do believe that we have the ability to create our own luck. But the luck starts in the doing and being in momentum and being in movement. And so I share a story in the book about how I was going to Chicago when I was working on the development for the Air Hogs. And I got lucky on one of my trips, totally unexpected. I went there. I was basically going back and forth all the time, working on the development. And on one trip, I go and Jeff Ray Camper, who is one of the owners that I was working with, he says, renan, I got this product to show you. And so the one thing to know is, like, toy inventors are like kids. Whenever they invent something, it's the next greatest thing, Right? It's the next greatest thing.

[A]

It's distracting.

[B]

No, they want to show You.

[A]

You have a clue what's they want

[B]

to show whoever's coming in the door.

[A]

We say yes.

[B]

Right, Sorry.

[A]

You got to always say yes to the inventors, right? You never know.

[B]

Listen, our whole philosophy at Spin Master is we're open to ideas wherever they come from. We'll take a meeting whenever it's available. Okay. We will ask questions. So.

[A]

So everybody, if you're an inventor of toys, good news, I'm now on the board. I actually have say so if you want to just message me on LinkedIn, like I'm going to leave it at that because he can't figure out how to message me on LinkedIn, then we don't want to take the meeting anyway. I. But if you got a crazy toy invention, I would love the output of this is to sell a lot of books and to get the next big colossal toy product into spin that we could so that him and I at the board meetings would be like, we fucking did this during the podcast.

[B]

It would be great to have another Bakugan story from a 23 year old for damn sure. Incredible.

[A]

So go ahead.

[B]

So anyway, so.

[A]

So you say yes, he shows you something. No.

[B]

So, Jeff, so he shows me this miniature BMX bike, okay. Which is a rep. Okay, you know where this is going? This miniature BMX bike with real working brakes and a chain and everything. And it turned into flick tricks, which turned into licensing. Mongoose, Hoffman, Redline, all these great BMX companies and turning them into real die cast replicas. And it turned into $100 million business for us. And it was only. Only as a result of being there at that moment in time, because I was in the momentum of the doing.

[A]

Do you think luck has a lot to do with the framework of maybe versus the framework of no that most people live in? So let me break it down for you. Cause I can see your face. Back to your point. There's like, for example, there's just a lot of people. I know that when that inventor came, because you're working on this thing and maybe other things are going on, you'd be like, hey, we've got to stay focused, you know, and they don't even go to. And to me, so much of my luck is that almost everything that comes my way is a maybe. There is no starting point with no. And I've observed that almost all my contemporaries are obsessed with no.

[B]

Right. Interesting.

[A]

And so for me it's maybe. And then I'll wait. This is what they're scared of. I'll waste the 30 minutes to say no most of the time, but I think it gets trumped by the five times I said maybe that became a yes. That changed the course of everything. And they overvalue this efficiency in the short term on something that does not have home run power.

[B]

No, it's a great point I think about. In our business, for us to be successful, we need to have the widest funnel at the top. We need to be looking at the greatest amount of products so that we're very judicious on what we're allocating capital to. So the same thing applies with your maybe. Yeah, same thing. Being open to ideas wherever they come from. But I do think that the luck is a. The universe will beat you halfway and give you the opportunities. Then you have to be like uber luck to recognize the opportunities that are in front of you.

[A]

Sure. What's been the most surprising. Lot of authors, wannabe authors listening right now. A lot of people curious about process. In my. In my community, what has been the most surprising things about writing a book?

[B]

Well, commercially content, all of it. It's more about the marketing of the book. Marketing a book today is very difficult. So I've never done any social media. I have no Instagram, I have no Facebook, I have no LinkedIn. And I actually, I got turned down by 19 out of 20 publishers because of those variables. Because of those variables. Because I had no social media. So today they want you to have a. They want you to be a known entity and then write a book. Right, okay. Versus writing a book and then becoming a known entity.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

So that was.

[A]

They want to de Risk.

[B]

They want to de risk it. So for me, it was fortunate it wasn't a hindrance because I found a great agent and he. He got it done for me and I ended up at the top publisher. So it's being published by Crown, so owned by Penguin Random House. And then I'd say the marketing. So being able to put yourself out there, sit on a show like yourselves, feel comfortable in front of. We've got like 17 cameras here. Like, feel comfortable in front of a camera being able to like, talk and feel natural. It's all foreign stuff to me.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

How's it been? I would say the first. The first few podcasts I did were terrible. They were very rough. Very rough. They were rough. They were rough. I did get some media training.

[A]

How was that?

[B]

Amazing.

[A]

Yeah. You recommend it for people that it

[B]

doesn't come natural 100%, especially for authors. And I found it from. From the person who gave me the media training that Writing and speaking is two different things.

[A]

You're speaking to someone who's incapable of writing or reading.

[B]

It's two different things. So we all talk all the time, so we think we can do it naturally, but it's a learned skill, and it's good to get advice. I would say do not start this process without getting a little bit of media training and understanding how to share what's. What's important to the audience?

[A]

That's right. That's. That's very well said. Early reactions, friends that read it first. Consumer, give me an anecdote, a story, something that kind of touched you, something that, even if it's frivolous, like, oh, that was rad. Somebody out of left field, something random.

[B]

It's a great question. I could give you two.

[A]

Please.

[B]

I have a lot of friends of mine in their 30s that they got upset with me after they read the book.

[A]

They're like, why didn't you fucking write this 10 years ago?

[B]

Correct. Yes. It sounded kind of a gut punch for them, and it made them rethink their life for, like, the time they were reading it, and maybe that was a little unpleasant for them. So that was an interesting. I never expected.

[A]

Did you send them a Gary Vee piece of content that told them, when you're 70, you're still a child and 30 is a fetus?

[B]

You know it's true. Yeah. I say that. You're so long. Yeah, you're so right. The average age for an entrepreneur is 38. Yeah, 38.

[A]

That's not what it feels like to people out there.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

I agree.

[B]

So that was one. The other one that was really touching, which I would have never expected. A lady that works for a PR company that I hired, her son got a concussion. He's nine years old. Okay. He's got a learning disability. Sorry. He's got a learning disability. He's behind on his reading. He had a concussion. He was staying home that day, and she needed to read the book for work, so she decided to read him some chapters and some parts from the book because he was a big Paw Patrol fan. And she. She read him the book, and he said, I could be like the Paw Patrol guy. And then that night, she said to him, mom, I want to try reading from the book myself. Wow. Yeah.

[A]

That's awesome, bro.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah, that's really, like, who. Who would ever. Who would have ever thought?

[A]

Well, that's the best part of content, right? You're just impacting someone. Actually, let's use that emotional thing to go to something Very fun. You are the Paw Patrol guy. You know, obviously it was actually. I'm gonna actually, actually wanna hear it. This is selfish. Now, origin. Real life origin story of one of the most beloved intellectual properties in the world. How did Paw Patrol happen?

[B]

You have one new message.

[A]

Ring, ring, ring.

[B]

Translating. Disney and Pixar's Hotel Hoppers is now available on Disney.

[A]

You could say that again. Critics are calling it Pixar's funniest movie

[B]

ever and a wildly entertaining ride. Blizzard. Potato. It's certified fresh and verified hot. Now we party. This is incredible. Wow.

[A]

I am clearing the rest of the day.

[B]

Disney and Pixar's Hoppers now available on Disney. Rated pg. It actually happened in the lowest point of Spin Master history.

[A]

Take us there.

[B]

So basically, after Bakugan, Bakugan took us from $450 million in sales to billion dollars in sales. And three years later, we went from a billion dollars in sales back to $450 million.

[A]

Yeah. Real quick. If you guys don't. And gals don't know. What's interesting about the toys business is it's kind of like the hits business. Meaning, you know, in a lot of businesses, it kind of gradually goes one way or gradually goes the other way. Obviously, there could be random stuff, but when you're in the hits business, when you're hot, it's like being an artist. When you've got two albums in a row that are ripping, you're at the top, you have three albums that come out that are donkeys. After that, you're in trouble. Like, this is why you guys could bounce up and down like that.

[B]

Yes, yes. But the. But the problem was that you don't want to bounce up. You want to be cognitive of the fact that it can actually go down and you want to have good products that are coming afterwards. And you don't want to believe your own bs.

[A]

Yes. But when you're young and it's early, you can get very vulnerable to your own bs.

[B]

You can get a lot of hubris. You can get a lot of hubris.

[A]

So go ahead. You're at this low point. You guys are feeling it. You guys are feeling stressed.

[B]

Well, not always feel stressed. Well, we lost money, okay. For two years straight, okay? For 16 years in a row.

[A]

We made money.

[B]

We made money. I'd never seen brackets before. I've never seen brackets, okay? When I see brackets, I get hives. And so we lost money for two years in a row. We had to recapitalize, put money back into the business. We had to let go of 350 people in the business. Okay. Which is the worst part? We did it over four restructurings. Okay. Because we weren't cognitive enough to realize. Second worst part, we weren't even cognizant. Like every time we said, oh, we're hit our numbers. We didn't hit our numbers. We didn't hit our numbers for 24 months. Okay.

[A]

That wears on people.

[B]

And so at that moment time, we had this, you know, Anto, myself and Ben, like, our relationship went down and we were like, should we continue? What should we do? Et cetera, et cetera.

[A]

Like contemplating selling to a bigger company.

[B]

Sell. Sell the company, move on, pack it in. Yep. Like, this is too hard. This is 2012.

[A]

Okay. So you're in this moment, we're in

[B]

the lowest moment, and we decide that we're going to get through it. And the way we're going to get through it was we were going to see more products, more opportunities, be more judicious, and whatever we were gonna work on, we were not gonna dial it in. We were really gonna give it the attention, time and focus.

[A]

Right. So instead of going super wide and like all that kind of stuff, like, let's pick our stuff and let's go deep.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

Okay. And keep going. This is interesting.

[B]

And off the heels of success of Bakugan Bakugan, we. We created four seasons, we sold it into Cartoon Network, so it introduces the whole world of tv.

[A]

Right.

[B]

We actually, we actually followed it up with three other shows and the three shows did not do well.

[A]

What were they? Do you remember?

[B]

Yeah, ten Kai nights. Okay, okay.

[A]

Don't know it.

[B]

Don't know it. Because it didn't do too well. Redikai.

[A]

Oh, I remember that.

[B]

Actually it was a. It was a copro with a French. French company and another show and Radekai.

[A]

That was the best part of the whole damn thing. Yes, I remember that. And the third one, another, I can't remember.

[B]

And Redicai and you could not. Redikai and Tenkai Nights. We made product for the shows and you could not take them off the shelf. They were like glued to the shelf.

[A]

Right. They ended up in like dollar stores for 99. Correct, right, correct.

[B]

So here we have this massive success and all the follow on stuff is not doing well, but we're trying. And then we had the idea and said, okay, let's open up our own production company in Toronto. There's incredible talent in Canada when it comes to animation storytelling. There's tax credits and there's a magic in transformation because we Saw the magic in Bakugan in the play pattern. And so we said, what if we can bring that magical play pattern to preschoolers? It had never been done before. And we were looking at the preschool space and we were saying, there hasn't been a new show, anything fresh in like a decade, so there's a white space opportunity here. So we created a brief which said, can you create a preschool, can you come up with an idea for a preschool show for us around transformation? And that was a brief, it was super simple. And we sent it to five creators around the world. And the one that we got back, which actually had nothing to do with transformation, came from a gentleman by the name Keith Chapman. And he's the creator of Bob the Builder. And so I'd wanted to work with Keith for like over 10 years. I love him. He's British, super smart, and he's a lucky guy. Talk about luck. Like, I have a whole theory about, like, you just want to be around lucky people and you want to work with lucky people because then it just, you get part of their shefa, their energy. And he came back with the idea for Paw Patrol, which was originally called Robbie and the Rescue Pups. And it was about this archetype, this 12 year old kid that had these five different puppies and each puppy had an archetype fireman, police dog, et cetera, et cetera. And they would go on rescue missions. And then what we did was something very.

[A]

Did you guys love it right away?

[B]

Yeah, it was, it was like, there's something here. There's something here. Yeah, yeah, there's something. There's something here. And what we did, because we produced our first show in Japan, Japan is they're the kings of mashing up toy play and storytelling together 100%. Right. And so we said, let's apply this and do this in the preschool area. And so we basically took all our knowledge in toy development and we married it together with storytelling and it was a mashup. And basically you had toy designers working with animators. The toy designers were drawing over the animators designs. The animators were drawing over the toy guy's designs. I love it because we understood what was aspirational for kids. So what we did was, so we added, we said it would be super cool if there's backpacks and the pups and the backpacks transformed and it wouldn't be cool if they were all going up into this tower and they'd get their missions and then they ride down on a great slide and then go into the Doghouses that would pop open into vehicles and then they'd go do their rescue missions. So it was a real mash up of the arts. And then we got really lucky. We had incredible director, Jamie Whitney, who had done many, many preschool shows and just loved kids and loved storytelling. And so we got him to work on it. We had two incredible writers and they were great storytellers.

[A]

Where did you premiere?

[B]

We ended up. We did a. A premiere. Nickelodeon. Yeah. And so we did a partnership with them. They really helped with the. Creating the. You know, they helped shape it because they were great storytellers themselves.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

They get full credit for the song, which matters. It's an iconic song. So it was a real collaboration of. I would say it's one of the greatest American Canadian partnerships. That's how I love that. It really is. It really is. Because it's all anime. Yeah.

[A]

It's just crazy. It became such. And right away. Was it a commercial success?

[B]

It was very quick. I can tell you, as the king of social media, you'll appreciate this. I would go to Instagram and I would look at the birthday cakes and when I saw there was a lot of people making birthday cakes, I knew it.

[A]

Yeah. What a great one. How much time do we have? Wrap up. So, so exciting. I want to give you the last word here, by the way. Do not edit out the. How much time do we have left? I just like it. You know how I like it. Real. Whether we didn't get to touch on something that you wanted to. Whether you want to put a bow on it. I want to give you the floor to wrap this up, everybody, please. No experience necessary. Go pick it up. Buy it for that. Especially for if you're fortunate enough to have a 15 to 25 year old, 15 or 30 year old in your life. I think it's a must read. We're going into that fun time of year where people are reading by the pool or on vacation. I couldn't recommend it more. What are your parting shots, my friend?

[B]

Well, first, thank you. That's number one. Number two is, I would say the 20s is such a magical decade and life is short, but at the same time, life is long and you have way more time than you think. And enjoy the journey. Enjoy the journey, enjoy the ride. Because it goes quick. It goes really quick. So. And don't stress. It's just, you will not care about it. It's really not worth it. Don't stress. Everything will happen and everything that didn't happen is meant to happen. And as long as you're in the doing and as long as you're moving and in momentum, the most important thing is just momentum and just keep on moving.

[A]

Thank you, my friend.

[B]

Thanks, Gary.

[A]

Everybody. If you enjoyed this podcast, please go back and look at the prior episodes. They're loaded. I appreciate your attention and thanks for being part of this journey. See you later.