Kristin Borland (4:30)

Ahead of your time.

Gary Vaynerchuk (4:31)

So I'm rich and

Kristin Borland (4:34)

start taking notes.

Gary Vaynerchuk (4:38)

And then. And then I got really passionate about building an infrastructure, what I would call an operating system. Some of you that really know me know I run a compa. I'm not actually a, you know, motivational speaker or creator. I run a company called VaynerX VaynerMedia. We are almost 3,000 people globally. One of the largest independent, if not the largest independent advertising agency in the world. That is social, live shopping, experiential first, then media, creative strategy and building that business from zero to $400 million a year in revenue. Not $400 million valuation, not $400 million exit $400 million a year in revenue. On the back of what Vincent just said, being a good person, caring about your people, you Know Nick Dio. He's out here. I have hundreds of employees that have been with me for over 10 of the 14 years. So much of what's going to play out for everyone in this room is who they are as a human leader. Not on how they cack or ltv. Thank you. Not on how they cack or ltv or roas on meta or bytedance or figure out live shopping or how they 3pl on Walmart or Amazon or all the other things. So much of what's going to happen in your life is who you show up as a human. And Vayner has been really fun for me to build because we have lots and lots of employees and HR is probably what I do first.

Kristin Borland (6:10)

Yeah, I think it's really important to build that culture around you and surrounding yourself with the right people. I mean, can you speak to that a little bit? It's about showing up for the company, the brand, your customers. But how do you find the right people to surround yourself with?

Gary Vaynerchuk (6:25)

Well, first, I think we talk about culture. Whatever we talk. I mean, people just talk. There's just a whole lot of fucking talking going on. Right. And you know, even for example, something my wife. One of the reasons I'm here is I have another business I'm building, which is a Pokemon marvel like business called Veefriends, which is in digital and physical collectibles. We're here with a booth set up. We're launching a collectible fruit snack. And it's fruit snacks, but there's collectibles in it. I think collectibles for a lot of you is something you should be paying attention to, allows you to get a higher aov, creates trial and sampling. We can go into that. And I will answer your question, Kristin, but I want to say this, like a lot of talk, like for the people here who really live a clean ingredients life, when you come to the Veefriends booth and look at our very lucky gummies, it's 100% clean. The amount of people posturing here that they have a clean product and have fucking natural flavors in their shit. Oh, we're starting to touch on some real shit now. But I'm using ingredients. There's so much positioning out there of healthy. And if you're really in it, by the way, I'm not. My wife is. I don't know what the fuck she's talking about 90% of the time. But I know that it cost us more to make what we made. But I know we didn't cut any corners on the Three ingredients to shit that I don't even know. Kristen. Like, to compound the shit so it doesn't break apart. And like all the stuff that you all fucking know. But it reminds me of how I want to answer your question.

Kristin Borland (8:06)

Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk (8:10)

Which is culture and having the right people around you or having an actual clean product instead of using your packaging to posture that it's clean.

Kristin Borland (8:25)

So are you talking about.

Gary Vaynerchuk (8:27)

I'm getting. It's coming. It's coming. I'm talking about not compromising. I'm talking about not being half pregnant. I'm talking about not looking the other way when your best salesperson that's driving your short term P and L is also a piece of crap and making everyone's life miserable. And you not looking the other way because currently she or he is driving your short term economics, but you're destroying your culture because you're allowing cancer to spread.

Kristin Borland (9:00)

That's great.

Gary Vaynerchuk (9:02)

And I will say this, and I appreciate the standing room only. I will say this. I am not sitting on a high horse right now. I know it's hard. I've built businesses my whole life, since I was 18 years old and I'm now 50, which is crazy. For 32 years, I have had to make payroll every single week. I have been the leading financial driver of my family and my life for the last 32 years, every single minute. And my father was an immigrant, so not only did we not raise capital, we didn't have a credit line. And so I know the pressures of staying alive. But I promise you, whether it's your ingredients or whether it's your culture or whether it's your marketing, something even less important. But I'm incredibly passionate about every inch you give. And compromise becomes the vulnerability of the loss. And now if you don't care about culture, I mean, there are. Do you know any? I mean, Chris, you've lived. There are many people who've made a lot of money and built businesses who are straight pieces of crap.

Kristin Borland (10:00)

Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk (10:01)

They're allowed.

Kristin Borland (10:02)

I hope that we don't come across many of them, not in this room.

Gary Vaynerchuk (10:05)

All of us know many of them. Like, and that might be good for you. Like, you might be sitting here being like, I'm pumped to be a piece of crap, but I'm going somewhere with this. Like, you're allowed. Whether it's culture, whether. By the way, my wife is psychotic about how clean every. I don't have wifi in my fucking apartment. I don't have a scented item in my home. Like, she's there right I'm willing to eat natural flavors. Extract of beaver anus doesn't bother me. By the way, making Expo west jokes is really working for me. What I'm saying is don't talk about culture if you're compromising. Don't talk about being fully clean if you're not. Don't talk about being pop committed to marketing if you're not. There are a lot of things I talk a lot for the last 20 years. There are many things that you don't hear me talking about because I'm not about that life. So my big point is just don't be a hypocrite. It's a waste of energy and it is a vulnerability for what you're trying to build. You're allowed, just like in politics and in life, you're allowed to make your subjective opinion decisions about what you think you're about to. I think where a lot of us get hurt is when we fake it. Authenticity gets thrown around a lot. It's easy to be authentic. Don't compromise and don't talk about things you're not. That will help your business, your brand and you as a leader. Thank you.

Kristin Borland (11:36)

These are all really great points. And I've heard you speak about brand building versus selling.

Gary Vaynerchuk (11:42)

Yes.

Kristin Borland (11:42)

And how important it is to have that brand built up so that you don't have to sell. Right. It's better to be that that vision of what you are versus trying to convince someone to buy something. Right.

Gary Vaynerchuk (11:55)

Yeah. It's better for them to come to you.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (11:57)

Right.

Gary Vaynerchuk (11:57)

Because they feel something than you constantly having to push through.

Kristin Borland (12:01)

So how do you. What would you suggest for brands in the CPG space that are looking to stand out in their brand building? Where should they start?

Gary Vaynerchuk (12:10)

Social.

Kristin Borland (12:11)

Social.

Gary Vaynerchuk (12:12)

I'm just so tired of this conversation. I mean, I do. Thank you. Like, it's fun to be here because obviously a lot with Vayner is in Fortune 500 land where for some unknown reason they still think an atrocious 30 second video run on television is gonna do it. This room does not think that. What I would tell this room is even more extremities on what I call the mid funnel, which is organic social. Organic social is disproportionately the opportunity for everyone in this room and is clearly for anyone who's been paying attention, been the model that the brands that many of you aspire to be have executed over the last five years to go from 0 to 50 or 100 or 250 million in revenue. Understanding that social media doesn't exist. Anymore and that we're now in interest media where content is finding its audience. Not all of us are getting people that we follow content. All of you know this. When you woke up this morning, your feeds were littered with the things you're currently into, not your cousin or somebody you went to high school with that you follow. This interest media thing has been a massive opportunity for the room in here that's trying to go from zero to the next level. So more financial and emotional and strategic investment to posting organically across seven platforms, not just Instagram and TikTok. YouTube Shorts has never been more important to this room because the content you put out on YouTube shorts is feeding the Gemini LLM which is gonna allow your product to show up when people type in, I need a healthy beef jerky or I want a healthy, you know, think LinkedIn for B2B content. Snapchat Spotlight if you're trying to reach 15 to 35, nobody's marketing in there because Snapchat's doing a terrible job promoting that they have a TikTok and Instagram. Even the most savvy in this room are not attacking there the written word. Substack, beehive x longform. LinkedIn has never been more opportunistic, especially for people here that do go deep into their product and resourcing and ingredients. So I believe that every single company represented here should spend 20% of their entire marketing budget just on organic social production. And at the size and scale that a lot of brands are here under 100 million, I could argue a lot more. I know that a lot of brands were built in the last generation of social which was AB testing, Meta, Rosac, LTV. But the biggest opportunity to build massive brand is to go organic social. And when something, when you normally get 800 views, when something gets 57,000 views, 570,000 views, 5.7 million views. Knowing what to do with that creative sending it down. This is why I call it the mid funnel. Sending it down to the lower funnel and making that a performance ad set. Sending it up if you've got the budgets to see TV or making it the campaign or even the commercial. Mary Roots Organics, Poppy Liquid Death. Many others in this room represented at this incredible event are playing with versions of this. I would just say more. My ambition for my personal brand GaryVee is we have an internal goal right now that on May 1st that I will be posting organically on nine platforms, 57 different handles. So like Aryveesports or Uncle V for like the kids on TikTok or Garyaragesales for that content. Nine platforms, 55 handles or more and posting over 400 pieces of organic content a day.

Kristin Borland (16:03)

So it sounds overwhelming to someone who is not the greatest on social media. So to scale it back just a little bit, let's just say you're starting today, budget is an issue, time is an issue. You're saying to check out the top seven platforms, post organic content. How many times a day is going to be enough? And I think what you brought up as well after the post is there's still follow up that has to happen happen, right? You don't just post something. It's not Field of Dreams. If you build it, they will come. You have to wait, send that content out and follow up in different ways. So if you're starting today, what is your simplest advice for someone who's looking to become the next Gary Vee?

Gary Vaynerchuk (16:50)

Very few want to be Gary Vee in this room. But a lot of people want to sell their brand to a food holding company or go coast to coast and build something meaningful, go IPO or have a nice side business. It really doesn't matter what your ambition is in what I assume most of you are doing at this event. I would tell you that the first thing you have to do strategically is understand that every one of your companies are a media company that happens to be selling a food product. That's number one. And when that becomes the case, you know, people always like, oh, Gary, easy for you. Oh, you know, especially when I say something like I just said, oh, easy for you. Like you have a full team. I'm like, fuck you. And the reason I say that is I made my own content for eight and a half years before I hired my first person. Like, they're all the receipts are out there. February 21, 2006. Wine library, TV, no lighting, no mic. I look like I'm a hostage in Afghanistan and I'm just reviewing wine from the bottom of my little heart in a world that nobody was watching, Nobody was on YouTube. You guys are so fortunate. The world's attention is on that phone and you can post for free. So no money, respect. But again, no one here is actually at $0000. They're not in their kitchen, they're somewhere. Where do they spend their money for what? 2. I don't want to hear time. Because if you have the audacity that you're trying to build something and you're going to tell me that you do not have time to create content to build brand and to grow your business. I don't even know what you're doing. Doing. What are you doing? What could you possibly be doing that's more important than letting the world know why they should buy your thing? What could you possibly be doing? There are people here who talk about enormous ambitions and what they're gonna do. And Kristen, they take two hour lunches.

Kristin Borland (19:03)

That's fair.

Gary Vaynerchuk (19:05)

That sucks.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (19:06)

Yeah.

Audience Member 1 (19:07)

Right.

Gary Vaynerchuk (19:07)

So. So to me, like, time is just, just not something I'm willing to accept from anyone based on what you signed up for. If you're worried about time, you should be an employee.

Kristin Borland (19:19)

Okay, I can see that. I think It's. We've got 24 hours in a day, right? All of us have the same amount of time. And you're right. It's how you use it, it's how you approach it. You wake up with the mentality of, I'm going to do this today versus I'm not feeling motivated. And we have those days, right?

Gary Vaynerchuk (19:38)

All of us. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I want to say this because I think a lot of people get my messaging confused. I sleep seven or eight or nine hours a day. This is not about like being a psycho and like running yourself into anxiety Bill and going out of business. This is about being efficient. That's all. Like you're trying to do something remarkable when you have a business. Almost every business goes out of business. We forget that because we read the headlines. Almost everyone goes out of business. I just think it's about effectiveness and efficiency. Like to me, I'll give you an example. So many people in this room could have so much more happen that they want to happen if they stopped making 15 minute meetings, one hour. The reason that happened just now is so many people right now are sitting there like, yeah, like humans. Fill the time that has been allocated. I have 2015 minute meetings every day. All of those are always 45, 1 hour, 1 hour and 30 minute meetings of a lot of my contemporaries and a lot of employees that work for me. Start to figure it out. That is what I'm trying to push entrepreneurs and operators in this room to. Not the anxiety filled, like, I'm so tired, I can't. The reason I sleep 7, 8, 9 is because I go so hard. I need that energy, right? Like it's not about all those like cliche things. It's about impact, effectiveness, strategy, being thoughtful and most of all being accountable. Right? Like we just have to be accountable. And I know the meetings, the lack of meaningful meetings that this room by the way, me included, like I'm a psycho for this one. And like I look at my meetings for the week ahead with my admin team every Thursday and I look back on them, you know, when I fly, just to look back and like it's hard. Cause we're making human subjective decisions. It's hard. But when it becomes important to this room, you get better at it. Content creation and being effective and efficient with your time are like literally two of the four most important things for 90% of this room that are trying to build something where 99% of things fail.

Kristin Borland (21:57)

I think time savings brings another conversation. AI.

Gary Vaynerchuk (22:03)

Okay.

Kristin Borland (22:04)

I think people are really interested to hear how AI is shifting the social media landscape. I think there's a little bit of fear in it. I think there's that thought if I, if I don't catch up, I'm never going to be able to do it or I'm too far behind. What do you see AI doing for cpg, space and social in the future?

Gary Vaynerchuk (22:23)

AI is one of the most profound inventions of the human race. It will be up there with like electricity and the Internet and good news, no one here is behind. AI is one of those things similar to social media or the Internet or mobile or any technology you could be behind. But if you just get good at it tomorrow, you've caught up. It's really fun to know that truth. It's incredibly encouraging versus discouraging to many in this room to just know if they're willing to put in the time to get educated and to start using the tools. Whether It's Claude or OpenAI or Perplexity or whatever it might be. It's incredibly nano banano. It's intoxicating to me to know that somebody in this room has been putting their head in the sand for the last 18 months and this has been their AI strategy and that if tomorrow this answer motivated them to take a different turn on this, that tomorrow starts the process of them catching up pretty quickly too, by the way, which is wild. So what will it do? It's gonna change our entire world. It is going to make a lot of repetitive non thinking jobs obsolete. That is a challenge we are going to have to go through as a society. We've gone through that challenge before. Nobody cried for the yellow page salesman when Google fucking wiped them off the face of the earth.

Kristin Borland (23:55)

I will say I did cry because I did one of my first jobs selling ad space in yellow pages.

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (24:01)

That's awesome.

Kristin Borland (24:02)

I do remember that transition and they did not keep up.

Gary Vaynerchuk (24:06)

No.

Josephine Musco (24:06)

So

Gary Vaynerchuk (24:08)

look, here's my point of view on this. 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. Hoping and dreaming and praying that technology stops while you're alive is the single worst strategy of all time. And on the record, did everybody just hear what I told you about email open rates and Google AdWords? I wish the world stopped. Then I had it figured out. The shit that I do for a living is exhausting. You think I was excited 24 months ago to spend 50 hours learning substack? I sure wasn't. But I'm signed up for. For. I'm gonna live in the world. And I just will tell you that if you think what AI is doing right now is like, wow, we haven't even started. You think that you're struggling, that you're a designer, or you have a designer, what do you do with that? Or an admin or a project manager who just takes notes can be replaced by audio AI. That's nothing. Chris, do you know that, like, 30% of this room's grandchildren are going to marry an AI robot?

Kristin Borland (25:27)

That's a hard concept to grasp. It really is.

Gary Vaynerchuk (25:30)

Yeah. I mean, we're struggling enough with simple little things like religion and race and gender when it comes to marriage. Wait till your grandkid comes home with a fucking robot.

Kristin Borland (25:42)

Therapy will be much cheaper, for sure.

Gary Vaynerchuk (25:47)

Half the room in here that uses AI uses it for therapy.

Kristin Borland (25:50)

I've done it. Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk (25:52)

So, yeah. I mean, what do I think? I think it's gonna change the entire world. I don't think that's some profound statement. I think anybody who's halfway paying attention knows that to be true. It really does for me personally. Cause I lived through it. Feel like Internet. 96, 97. You're like, wait a minute. This is like, wait a minute. I mean, it changed my life. I thought I was going to open 100 liquor stores. I was going to build the Toys R Us of wine stores. That was my whole childhood dream. And then in five seconds, in a dorm room in 1995, I heard coo. Cooc went on it for 15 minutes and realized my whole life has changed. And the day my brother called me about OpenAI a couple years ago, that first, first day when that hit and I got home to my hotel room and I played with it, that I'm like, oh, fuck, this is one of those moments the iPhone day one, iPhone, Internet, Cuckoo, Chew Cuckoo and OpenAI two, three years ago, whatever. That was day one. Those are the three profound moments where I'm like, fuck, this is landscape changing. This is wildly changing. And so I really highly recommend all of you that if you've been kind of heading the ground and this is very important, a lot of you use geopolitics to be your excuse of why you don't do things. You've decided because you don't want to put the work and effort to keep up with AI. From a business lens, you'll say things like, this is bad for society or I'm worried about the children. Watch out for you doing that. We love to go high fidelity, theoretical when we do not want to put in the work. Right?

Josephine Musco (27:31)

Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk (27:34)

And I get that. I don't do that in business, but I do it in health and wellness. I try to come up with unlimited reasons why I don't go to the gym. If I skip a day or if I eat some crap, you know, I'm like, you know, they're gonna figure something out, GLP1s or whatever the fuck, you know. So we're very excuse oriented when we don't want to put in the work.

Kristin Borland (27:56)

You know, I am curious. We are here for a health and nutrition expo conference. We're talking about natural and organic foods. When did that start popping up in your life and start making changes to live a healthier lifestyle?

Gary Vaynerchuk (28:12)

Twelve years ago, I was flying from Houston, back home from a keynote speech and I was just like, head on the window. And I was like, I really need to just was talking to myself. I'm like, it's time for me to get healthier, right? I'd never. I mean, I started working at my dad's liquor store at 14, so like, even high school sports were kind of off the table for me. So like I just never. And it's not in my family's DNA, so I never worked out. I didn't have a fucking muscle in my body. Like, I wish my trainer was here. Those first sessions, if I filmed that, they would have a trillion views. It was a shit show. So first I started working on my actual physical. I had a lot of back issues from the liquor store, my Ql, all that stuff. I worked through a lot of soft tissue, I gained a lot more muscle, I lost a lot of fat. That was good. Six years ago when Mona really started. My wife is very deep in clean life and she really started to put the thumb on the scale of my life. And you know, I still this goes back to why I'm so passionate about business discipline. Because I am not health and wellness discipline. Every day is a battle for me. Every day is a battle. Every day. Going to the gym, like, I do not want to do it. And I have a full time babysitter to make me do it, you know, every time. Like a week ago I got to my hotel room at like one in the morning and like those fucking gummy bears in the hotel room, you know, And I'm looking at them and my brain, what's amazing about where I am with health and wellness now is my brain is like, that is poison. Chemicals. I like, you know, that's not how I used to think about it, but I look at it now, I'm like, oh, hi, poison, you know, chemicals in the shape of cute little bears. And ladies, thank you for clapping, but I have bad news. I ate the fuck out of those bears. But my percentage, my percentage of eating those bears is now offset with psycho life. Like my cream cheese in my fridge right now is fermented part parsnips. So like, I'm hanging with Mona sometimes, like way off the reservation, soon to be mainstream, hence this incredible world. And then there's other times where I slip up. But like, I've made some profound health changes. Like, I can tell you, like, I rarely eat food out at this point because of cooking oils. Like, it is insane how scared I am of seed oils in high heat. I'm like more scared of seed oils at high heat than like terrorism. And so my education on like, again, back to the point I was making here. Like even watching the videos yesterday on my flight about the show. There's, you know, there's levels to the game. And again, everyone here is allowed to decide what they think is right for them. But for me, I just am so grateful for my wife to know that my brain understands what's happening. And every day I try to get more disciplined of making the right choice versus the wrong choice. But that journey's been very healthy. Forget about physically. If you look at videos from me 10 years ago, you can see transformation. It's more in my blood work, my cholesterol levels. I'm a healthier person. I'm grateful for that. And I'm aware that a tree might fall on me in an hour and I will die. And I get all that. But putting yourself in a position to be healthier, I think a lot about strength though. Like I would say, a lot of people eat healthy but don't work on their lower body. Leg strength, I think the data around, like longevity, around how strong your legs and glutes are because of Falling in your 70s and 80s is something I'm very passionate about. And so it's, I mean, if 35, if 38 year old me just watched what came out of my mouth for the last two minutes, he'd be like, dude, what the fuck happened to you? But I'm grateful for what happened to me and just like education, like anything in life, like for example, back to something less important. I'm so happy I got to say, please make YouTube shorts for Gemini's AEO Geo, because I know 11 of you are gonna do that and that's gonna be good for your business. No different than me telling somebody like, don't eat products with natural flavors on the packaging might change someone's course on that. They're all kind of the same, similar to what Vincent said. The most important thing that I talk about for me is kindness and humanity. Like I. One of the. When I die. I kind of decided recently that I want to know I'm dying, not a sudden one, because I want to like think those, like those last several months. And I have a feeling if I'm lucky enough to have that, I know already, even at the halfway point, teaching the world that nice guys finish first, nice people finish first is definitely a big agenda of mine. I want to continue to pound that message.

Kristin Borland (33:26)

I think it's really important to leave kindness everywhere you are, and I've experienced that with you and your team. Last year, you came to Expo west in 2025, was it the first time you'd been here, and I had the opportunity to meet you and some of the people. Nick on your team. And the kindness and experience that I had inspired me to continue that. And Nick is out here somewhere. But I wanted to thank you for that because. Because it made a difference for me in my career and the way I approach people. And I think that kindness creates gratitude, creates abundance, and creates all these different opportunities to meet people that we wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity to. So I think there's something to be said about paying it forward and remembering that we're all humans, right? We all have one chance to make a first impression and people are relying on us for certain things. And it's important to continue with that positivity. And maybe you can meet your neighbor here today, help support their business in some way. What can they do today for one another to support the CPG industry right now?

Gary Vaynerchuk (34:39)

Yeah, I mean, I think you. Yes, I Think you touched on it for years, the last 20 years of going to events disparate, disproportionately what's happening in the hallways and the park. Like, the content's important. Hopefully I take it very serious. As I was walking on stage here, I'm like, okay, let's make sure we hit on four to seven things that can really bring value. But disproportionately, what you just said is the reason to come to something like Expo West. Having the courage to say hello to someone that's a stranger in the hallway or outside is everything. That human connection will always be the dividends. Karma is truly the most practical energy in the world. When people think it's foofy. I'm empathetic that a lot of you are scared to go up to someone you know, I understand what insecurity is. It's one of the great energies that I'm trying to fight against in the world. I believe it is the seed of all the pain in our society. And so I get it. But if I could leave you with something that's very third to seventh grade, like you going up to someone because maybe they're wearing a hat of their brand and you're a fan of it and you say hello, and maybe they don't deliver in kindness or reciprocation. There's multiple things I need you to think about. This is very important. Number one, and this is like something we've as humans gotten really bad at. Everything that someone else is doing has nothing to do with you. Someone shitting on you doesn't mean you're shit. It means they're in a shit place. We have to get better at this. Friends, this crew is not in high school and middle school anymore. Someone not being kind to you, not reciprocating, not bringing the right energy, literally has 0.0 to do with you. Number two, we do not have empathy for people who do not reciprocate kindly. When someone. Even to this day, I know where I'm at in my career and all of that and notoriety. There are plenty of moments in my life as I navigate where I'm not reciprocated with kindness. And definitely long before I was Gary V. It was obviously because I know how the world works. More common. There was never a time where I was upset for me, for sure. Back to point one. But more importantly, there was never a time that I was mad at the other person. Not once. If you go out there and you say, what's up? And somebody snickers you off because they look at your badge and you're not at a big company or they don't think you're cool or pretty or charismatic or whatever's running through your mind. My reaction to that is feeling bad for them. We also don't have empathy that something might have happened. You might go up to your favorite CEO of a brand today, right, Say hello and she's. Or he unable to reciprocate because they just got a phone call 40 minutes ago saying their grandma was terminally ill or the factory burned down or their purchase order was canceled at 11:59.59. I do not understand why we do not have empathy, compassion and sympathy for someone who reciprocates with bad behavior. We've become so delusionally focused on it's about me that we do not have the capacity to think it might be about them. And by the way, it's an incredible protective mechanism for your life. Because that has been my default. Because I'm remarkably well parented and very lucky with DNA and circumstance. My life is light. Someone shits on me. It's a 1300th of a second event. Someone shits on my dad. It's a 47 year conversation. I'm serious. I got very fortunate that I have two very opposite parents. And like they're only 20 years older than me. Cause that's how we did in the old country in Russia. I was actually born nine months to the day. My parents wedding night. Wow. So they're my homies. Not only my parents and my best friends. And I've just watched two people live life completely differently. And I promise you optimism and empathy is much better than cynicism and anger.

Kristin Borland (39:07)

Okay, so why are you open to encouraging everyone here to do a small act of kindness?

Gary Vaynerchuk (39:15)

Please.

Kristin Borland (39:16)

Maybe you can support one another's businesses, follow them on social. Meet your neighbor in your chairs, See if you can follow each other.

Gary Vaynerchuk (39:24)

Create a badge. Yeah, everybody's got a badge. Like even the simplest thing. Cause I know it's so hard. Cause the world's changed. But even a photo of each other's badge and follow up later. The ROI of a hello to a stranger is profoundly phenomenal. And yet we've really. And I hate that we're in this place where. Because again I'm 50. Like this whole concept that Gen Z or Gen Alpha is bad at this no eye contact. Like 90% of the people I grew up with were introverted. Like this whole concept, like we've always been like this. It is a human trait. Yes. Technology has taken Our attention away. If you didn't have the option to look at the phone, you were on the bus. Yes, I understand, but we need to level up our conversation on this. So, yes, let's encourage everyone, please, when this is over. I don't know if there's more talks after, but, like, not only in here, but out there. The more you just randomly say hello, the more this is going to be a very fruitful event for you.

Kristin Borland (40:23)

Yeah, I think you guys have a lot of takeaways from today, don't you? Yeah. So I'd like to open the floor or if you're comfortable with it, to some Q and A.

Gary Vaynerchuk (40:34)

If. How do. How do they do that?

Kristin Borland (40:37)

I don't know.

Gary Vaynerchuk (40:37)

Runners?

Kristin Borland (40:39)

Do we have runners?

Gary Vaynerchuk (40:40)

Go ahead, brother, Yell.

Astronaut Product Developer (40:47)

I'm on my way to space. I actually have my meeting as a combat pilot slot this afternoon.

Gary Vaynerchuk (40:52)

Wow.

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (40:54)

Wow.

Astronaut Product Developer (40:57)

I developed a charcoal activated toothpaste tablet and I would love to get you a sample.

Gary Vaynerchuk (41:13)

Pleasure. My man, how are you?

Astronaut Product Developer (41:16)

I appreciate you, man. You've helped us out so much, man.

Gary Vaynerchuk (41:20)

Thank you, brother.

Astronaut Product Developer (41:21)

Thank you so much. This is the first charcoal activated toothpaste tablet for astronauts.

Gary Vaynerchuk (41:26)

I love it.

Astronaut Product Developer (41:26)

I've been working on this for five years. It's done six different analog astronaut missions in Iceland, Poland.

Gary Vaynerchuk (41:32)

It's incredible.

Astronaut Product Developer (41:33)

Cape Canal photo. Yeah, let's do it. I'm with Gary Vee, baby.

Kristin Borland (41:43)

All right. Who else do we have out there that has a question for Gary Vee over here, second row.

Gary Vaynerchuk (41:49)

Yeah, just, you know, you've always been like, getting on Google right away. Oh, sorry. Thanks. Getting on Google right away with the ads and all these things. I'm just curious what your perspective and thoughts are on the metaverse. Is it dead? Is it still to come? Were they too early? Yeah, you know, I'm incredibly bullish. Very, very bullish in this nanosecond. Still on NFTs, I think similar to Web 2000, the greed of the stock market made pets.com and all this stuff for the OGs in here. You might remember April 2000, every Internet stock collapsed. The front page of Wall Street Journal said the Internet was a fad. NFTs are going through the same thing right now. Like last week, $11 million of NFTs sold to collectors. 99.9% of this audience thinks it was a scam and a fad. The metaverse, as you may know, I was never talking about about even in the hype of 2021. In fact, that was where I was trying to send people away from. VR is required for the Metaverse, right? We. We need to live in a virtual reality, or at least minimally AR augmented reality world. Meta, Google, I'm sure a couple of Chinese technology companies I'm unaware of, and I'm sure Microsoft or Apple or others will. Apple for sure. Sure. Everybody right now in big tech is very focused on AI, as they should be, but in a separate department in the biggest tech companies in the world. Everyone is trying to get us off of this. This is the remote control of the world for all of us. This is getting very dangerously close. There's a project called Project Orion at Meta that I really do believe. In six or seven years, how many people here have played with the Meta glasses and wear them at times? Just raise your hands. Not a lot, but please, if you could just raise it high. I just want the room to see it. How many of you that just raised your hands are blown away? How much better the audio is on those glasses than even AirPods right now? Raise your hands. So, like, not a lot of hands. Pretty progressive audience. I do think in six years, seven years, 10, 10 years, we'll see that. But for the Metaverse to be real, I think Metaverse will happen. But I think you're talking ready player one type stuff. I think you're talking 15 to 20 closer than two or three. And so that's kind of where I'm at on that. Awesome. Thanks so much. You got it. I feel like I'm an astronaut, so I'm gonna eat this. Pretty yummy. Who's next? Oh, over here. Oh, friends, if you have a question now they're lined up, so. So just line up to the sides, sir.

Audience Member 1 (44:30)

First of all, I want to thank the fact that Expo allows families here. I think that's an incredibly unique thing. And thank you for your stories about your family. I think that helps resonate.

Gary Vaynerchuk (44:41)

What's your name, friend?

Audience Member 1 (44:42)

So I have a question around percentage of maybe focus for folks in the room around Gen Z and Millennials. I heard you mention funnel and I'm a trained chef who worked on copy college and university campuses for 20 years and now I'm in media and I'm just trying to help companies and brands grow on college campuses.

Gary Vaynerchuk (45:01)

Smart.

Audience Member 1 (45:01)

And it's an incredibly unique and kind of under the current cool opportunity and just wanted to get your take on perhaps the percentage of focus that brands should have around Gen Z, Millennial and driving that future.

Gary Vaynerchuk (45:15)

I think every, you know, it's a great question. Couple things. One, every business has its own addressable markets, focus, opportunity, groups. I agree with you. In fact I actually you just gave me an opportunity, so thank you friend. I think college campuses, this event in general, I'm incredibly bullish, experiential. I actually think the coolest thing going on in our society is this what I'm calling a barbell effect. Extreme technology with AI like extreme technologies coming, but all the way over here. I think one of the biggest opportunities in this room is analog running clubs, yoga, like hiking, experiential pop ups. I'm obsessed with real life and I think college campuses are incredibly important because one of the coolest things that are going on in the world. How many people here over 45. Raise your hands. So a lot of you know this if you have children. We are of the generation where our children are incredibly influential on us. So college marketing 40 years ago was interesting because you wanted the young consumer that was on strategy. It's double interesting now because the 19 year old girl in her home is very impactful on her mother's buying behavior. In fact we tried to sell sell V8 juice to dads. Sorry, this is making me choke. But it's very good. We had a campaign at Vayner where we were trying to sell V8 juice to 55 to 65 year old men and market it on TikTok to teenage girls to influence that behavior. Like this is for your dad and it dismantled anything else we were doing. Right. We all know the 16 year old girl, the 14 year old girl, the 19 year old girl is very influential. So my answer of focus is look, it depends on what everyone's creating but does on campus activations have an incredible opportunity for the brands in this room? Absolutely. Especially if you film those activations and use that creative in your social. Turning every analog event into a production day for content and social doubles up the value of that execution. I think this is very modern contemporary marketing.

Audience Member 1 (47:40)

Thank you.

Gary Vaynerchuk (47:41)

You're welcome brother.

Audience Member 2 (47:42)

How's it going? I'm Jordan C. Lop. I'm with a company called GEARD and we created a technology that launches brands across Target, Walmart, ebay, Amazon, all the major retailers and it doesn't cost you anything from a brand perspective. We do batches of 10 and we're leveraging systems that allow you guys to be able to do scale infinitely without the upfront cost. So that's why we're here. Thanks.

Gary Vaynerchuk (48:11)

So that was an infomercial.

Kristin Borland (48:14)

What is your question?

Gary Vaynerchuk (48:15)

That wasn't a question, that was interrupted commercial. Just curious.

Astronaut Product Developer (48:19)

Yeah, yeah, sorry.

Audience Member 2 (48:20)

Not, not intentional but yeah, go ahead.

Gary Vaynerchuk (48:24)

Yes, ma'. Am.

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (48:25)

Okay, so I have an infomercial, but first I have a question, if that's okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk (48:30)

What?

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (48:30)

I'm sorry I said I do have a little bit of an infomercial. But first I have a question, if that's okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk (48:35)

I would definitely not start with the commercial after what we just saw.

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (48:40)

As somebody that is younger, I'm 24 in Gen Z and I and working for bigger brands that are also in the CPG space, but they don't necessarily have as much of a ESG mindset. Like they're not really wanting to focus as much on environmental sustainability goals as what I feel like Gen Z would be interested in. And I feel like the brand that I'm talking about, they're very into this brand. So how would you recommend for us younger people to try to convince or to advocate for more sustainability actions with the people that are in charge nowadays?

Gary Vaynerchuk (49:18)

It's a great question. It's also a tough answer that I'm going to give you. Which is convincing is the great misstep of society, right? A 24 year old executive in a company convincing the whole company, the board, the CEO that they need to do X, Y and Z is very hard. On the flip side, a 24 year old or all of us about what we care about, what I do for, by the way, everything I talk about, kindness, marketing, all that, I'm trying to convince no one. I just show up every day with conviction. So what? You're not gonna convince anyone? What? You have two options. Save money eventually and start your own company and do what you believe in or start making content or doing things. For example, you making a video with your phone and your friend and going on a college campus and interviewing 197 people and asking them would they spend 50 cents more for this because of this environment aspect and then editing that into a 21 minute video and hoping that video gets traction by putting it out in social is far more likely for you to achieve the goal you have than begging your managers, manager, managers, managers, vp, vp, svp, evp, C suite to make a change. So I would say that for a lot of you, whatever you're passionate about, I'm very passionate about a lot of things. Convincing is impossible in a corporation when you do not have the leverage. But conviction is how the world has changed and continues to change. And now that you have the ability and no excuses, in the 60s, 70s, 80s, you needed ABC or the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times or NPR to help you. I'm sure it's not lost on any of you. Everybody can go direct to the world today. The question is, are you gonna be action oriented or are you gonna talk about it? Awesome.

Kristin Borland (51:21)

Okay, we have time for one more.

Audience Member 2 (51:23)

I To want.

Kristin Borland (51:23)

I want to make sure we're being.

Josephine Musco (51:24)

Hi, my name is Josephine Musco. Twelve years ago, I found out that teabags are leaching billions of microplastics in our cups.

Gary Vaynerchuk (51:32)

Oh, I invented. I'm very aware.

Josephine Musco (51:35)

I invented the first truly microplastic free tea alternative to the teabag. It's a tea strip. It fully dissolves in your cup. There's nothing to throw away. There's no microplastics or toxins. I'm not only saving our health, but I'm also saving the environment because there's over 100 billion tea bags is carted off every year in the landfills globally. So I would like to give you some of my product and connect with you later if possible.

Gary Vaynerchuk (51:56)

You got it? I'll grab it as I walk off now. Oh, I'll take one. I'll take it now. Do we have time for one more?

Kristin Borland (52:01)

We have time for one more question.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:03)

I'm sorry.

Young Audience Member (Gen Z) (52:05)

I'm so sorry. I didn't get to finish.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:08)

Is this card.

Kristin Borland (52:08)

Do you want to just wait? We'll catch you at the end. Okay, Go ahead.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:12)

You're welcome.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:15)

Hey, Gary.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:16)

Hi.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:16)

Nice to see you.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:17)

Great to see you.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:19)

So my name is Cynthia and I'm the founder of Zynca Foods. We make Salvadoran frozen food. And I know that you know this, but I used to be your intern.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:30)

Well, I'm sorry, I didn't hear.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:33)

I used to be your intern.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:34)

Yes. Oh, I know. Yes, I see you. That's great. Oh, my God. I couldn't see. It is so good to see you. How are you? You well? Great to see you. You good?

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:45)

Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk (52:45)

It's so good to see you. That's so awesome.

Former Intern (Cynthia) (52:49)

Yes. But, you know, I will never talk about how we met right now, but my question is because I understand, you know, Vaynerx, when you are looking for investments, what you're looking for, you know, I don't think you touched on that. So that's what I'm.

Gary Vaynerchuk (53:03)

Yeah, that's a great question. You know, amazing. I think you were around me, so you know this, like, it's a very gray and black and white framework for me. Right. I'm always looking for my intuition. You know, how you were hired. Like, you know, I'm very intuitive. I'm willing to be wrong on my intuition at this point in my career. This might help some of you. Let me be very vulnerable. I went through a really interesting thing the last five years where I realized more than half of my investing was me doing charity work, not investing you like that. It was a realization. I realized that I would write checks often because I just wanted that person to win. It was a bleeding heart syndrome, which I'm incredibly proud of, but as you might imagine, was very ineffective early in my career. Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Uber snap. It was like, what's the business today? What I look for is still that human spirit that I'm looking for, but I'm trying to detach from the charitable work versus, like, do I believe that person has the emotional intelligence and is a kind person and has the stomach for the game? And what do I believe in the business thesis? So it's always been jockey and horse. Jockey is the operator, horse is the idea and the business. And now I'm getting better at dissecting, you know, a little bit of that human intuitive part. And so obviously, of course, I'm happy to look at yours and others. And I'm also going to be walking around, where is my boot for lucky gummies? Nick? Yep. No.

Kristin Borland (54:57)

Well, why? We find that it's downstairs in the basement.

Gary Vaynerchuk (55:01)

Nice.

Kristin Borland (55:04)

It's downstairs in the expo hall. We're not putting anybody in the basement. Okay, well, one last piece of advice for everyone to take with them before the very short snippet. But what else do you have to share? One last thought.

Gary Vaynerchuk (55:21)

A couple things. I'm so sorry that so many of you are in line. I'm Gary at VaynerMedia. If you want to send an email. I have a long flight to Miami tonight. I'm sure I can answer some. My last piece of advice is that self awareness is the punchline if you're gonna be successful. Way too many people I come across in companies and in things of that nature are in the business of wishing they were someone versus realizing who they are. As operators, as executives, as founders, as people living in society, the quicker you can get comfortable with what you're actually good at and what you actually like and not beat yourself up who you're not, but get really good about being like, but I'm this and I'm this and I'm this. And then you do that. And then if you're an owner, operator, founder, surrounding yourself with people that can do the things that you're not naturally good at, self awareness is an incredibly powerful trait. Often, as I think we know, you're all living life rarely talked about, definitely not talked about from the lens of business. And I will tell you unequivocally, it has been foundational to my success and to the success of many of the companies that I'm on the board of, investor of, or have been close enough to to watch, navigate. And I wish you the process of self awareness, because it's also a cousin to self love, which I promise you, all of you can use a little bit of more of. And once you get there, it gets really fucking good and you become really good. And then you can be a contributor to more good. And I wish only health more than that for you. And I appreciate being with you this morning. Thank you, everyone. 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.