Pivot - Bob Iger exits — what’s going on at Disney? The stock market takes a coronavirus hit. PLUS Is “coffee” a disruptable industry?
Episode Date: February 28, 2020Kara and Scott speculate about what is happening at Disney following Bob Iger's abrupt exit. They talk about the stock market's tumble in reaction to coronavirus. Scott breaks down which companies sho...uld be on the offense and which ones should be on the defense... and why he thinks Peleton may be one of the companies that see a spike during the coronavirus scare. In wins and fails, Kara thinks Harvey Weinstein's rape conviction is a win (but should have happened far sooner). "Rundles" are back in wins as Panera begins offering monthly coffee memberships. In predictions, Scott thinks Pence will fail at his job to control the coronavirus pandemic in the US and that Nikki Haley joins the Trump ticket. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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Hi, everyone.
This is Pivot from the Vox Media Podcast Network.
I'm Kara Swisher, live from San Francisco. I'm sorry.
I was just finishing, Scott.
Go ahead.
Move along.
I was so excited.
I just feel so much safer now that Vice President Pence is in charge of our efforts against the coronavirus.
Oh, man.
He just literally handed him a bag of shit and Vice President Pence said thank you.
It was like the most obsequious acceptance of the worst job in the world where everything can go wrong.
Yeah, it's literally – it's tantamount to Gorbachev looking around and saying this Chernobyl thing.
You're in charge of that.
Oh, God.
What a mess.
That press conference was disturbing on every level and just –
It really was.
The whole obsession with himself getting sick and everything.
Just the whole thing. Just the entire thing in the stock market.
It's very disturbing.
I just hope they put Betsy DeVos and Ben Carson in charge just to really set a panic off.
If young people want an opportunity to— Guys, the stock market went down after the press conference, which it usually does not do.
But there you have it.
does not do. But there you have it. Yeah, it's Josh from Ritholtz Management,
downtown Josh Brown, just this incredibly smart guy. He pointed out something that was genius and how obvious it was, and that is the big health scare in 2009. Was that SARS?
SARS. No, MERS. Go ahead, MERS. SARS was 2003.
MERS, SARS, M&Ms. So I think about 8,000 people died, but the markets didn't feel it because the markets didn't respond because the markets were already off 50%.
And his viewpoint is the reason the markets are off now is because essentially they're looking for an excuse to be off because 80% of them are near their two-year highs.
I mean, the market just got very frothy.
Especially at the beginning of the year. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. So this might just be – and you know what? This has nothing to do with,
and actually I just want to acknowledge, someone wrote me a very thoughtful email saying,
you know, making light of the coronavirus and talking about stocks. She goes, just keep in
mind there's a lot of human pain. And she's a Chinese national. She was talking about how her
friend of hers had to fly home to take care of her very sick mother. But anyways, the,
She was talking about how her friend of hers had to fly home to take care of her very sick mother.
But anyways, you know who benefits from the stock market going down?
Anyone who owns stock is like, oh, no.
But anyone who doesn't own stock, i.e. the majority of people under the age of 35, you know, it's time for them to have the opportunity to buy into some good companies at a little bit lower price.
It's a buying opportunity, as they say on Wall Street, correct?
I saw it.
Well, yeah. It's just the narrative is immediately like, okay, wouldn't it be – all right.
Oh, no.
If the species are wiped out, it might take the NASDAQ down.
Everything is like immediately let's jump to the markets.
Well, that's because people have been so oriented toward the stock market as what the economy is, and it's not.
It's just not, as you have said many times.
All right.
So I was just in Miami this week.
I interviewed Jorge Ramos, who's a possible replacement for you, obviously. Jorge Ramos is amazing. It was a great talk.
But, but one of the things we talked about was sort of where journalism is. And it was very,
it was a very high minded conversation of what to do. And one of the things he said is you,
you speak the truth. And so let me just – this is going to seem like a strange stretch. But actually, you predicted – because you were so mad that they played a correct prediction by me.
You predicted we'd be hearing a lot more about Sanders' opinions on the history of communist leaders.
And lo and behold, he had some pretty controversial comments on Fidel Castro.
And Jorge Ramos discussed this in this interview I did with him at the Night Media Forum.
Let me just say clearly, Cuba is a dictatorship.
It's been a dictatorship since 1959.
Venezuela is a dictatorship.
Nicaragua is a dictatorship.
That's where you have to start.
You cannot start by saying, well, maybe they have a great health program, or maybe they
have an equation.
If they kill thousands of people in Cuba, if they have political prisoners,
if they don't have opposition parties, that cannot be a democracy. And you cannot tell that to people who personally suffered from dictatorships. So it's going to be incredibly difficult.
Yeah, what a shocker. It happens. If you make enough predictions occasionally,
just through probability, you get them right. But it's only just begun. You're going to see, I mean, he has a colored past,
and you're going to see just all kinds of videos.
And unfortunately, everything's now on our permanent record.
There's no way to live a life without making a lot of mistakes.
And front-runner status means that you are wildly vetted,
and they go to every dark corner because the media has a profit motive
in highlighting things that are embarrassing because they're clickbait. Everybody clicks on
them. But Senator Sanders has a lot of them. And here's the... Yeah, he has not been vetted
properly. You're correct. Well, here's the problem. How does he win Florida? How does he win Florida?
Well, that's what Jorge talked about. He said it's impossible. We've never had a Democratic
president win an election without winning Florida.
And if you know people in Florida, they understandably have very, very emotional reaction to Southern – South American socialists and autocratic leadership.
And he has a lot – he's on record as being quite benign and cozying up to them.
And Fidel is just literally the tip of the iceberg. There's going to be a lot more here. But yeah, he I see what he's doing. He's so stubborn.
I can watch him do it. It's like there's nothing wrong with saying it's like saying, oh, Russia
does some great things like nice vodka or something like that. And it's like that's not really he
should just stop me. He's trying to make a point like that he should be able to say there's some
good things and and and say there's great
things about them.
And so, you know, and criticize them at the same time.
And obviously, Trump does this with Saudi Arabia, Russia or whatever.
But it just looks it's a bad look for him.
And it takes away the ability to insult Trump about his relationships with Saudi Arabia
or Russia or things like that.
I think it's a big mistake.
And Ramos was noting that a lot of Latinos support Trump, and now Fine was saying it. And so it's not this monolithic body, but this is
not a good thing. Well, it's not. I've watched a lot of these videos. They're not balanced
arguments like, okay, in the context of evaluating Russia, we have to remember they have a great
scientific community. They've always placed an emphasis on education. It's not attempting to be a balanced argument. He comes across,
if you watch the whole thing, as an apologist and, quite frankly, as someone who endorses
a movement away from the full body contact approach or gestalt of capitalism, which has
its flaws, towards a more socialist and even
maybe a communist ideology.
It's not a balanced argument that he's making.
What he's implicitly doing is endorsing a different social and political construct.
And that's the problem.
And of 100 senators, of 100 senators, America has decided to elect one socialist.
So the election comes down to this.
If I were Trump, I would just make the entire election if it looks like it's going to be Sanders and Trump.
And you know what?
Right now, right now, it kind of looks that way.
I would just be socialism versus capitalism.
That's it.
Just make the whole thing socialism versus capitalism.
There you go.
Well, speaking of capitalism, we're going to go to big stories now.
Bob Iger stepping down from CEO of Disney.
What the WTF?
You know him.
I don't.
I do.
Did you reach out to Bob?
Do you call him Bobby?
What does he call you?
I call him Bob.
You call him Bob?
I did reach out to him.
I'm not going to discuss my discussions with him.
Well, what's the point?
What's the point of listening to this pod if we don't get some insight from you?
As you know, one of my predictions was that he was going to leave after announcing streaming, which I did.
I think it was the suddenness of it.
He's been – nothing has come out since, right, that there is some – they asked about health issues, any other controversial issues.
He had been wanting to leave.
I think the surprise was who he picked because they thought they were going to pick the guy who ran streaming, Kevin.
I'm blanking on his name.
streaming, Kevin, I'm blanking on his name.
And they picked this other Bob, this other Bob Chapik,
who is the chairman of Disney Parks, which is a really big job.
It used to be run by a guy named Tom Staggs,
who everybody thought was who kind of looked like Bob Iger.
He had kind of that look.
And then Staggs left under really, just left, and Iger was not ready to leave at that time,
even though he had thought he did.
And so I think what's interesting is he's leaving, but he's not leaving.
Right. He's going to stay there to through 2021 as executive chairman.
This Bob, this other Bob, the new Bob, this we all say old Bob, old Bob and new Bob is reporting to him.
And he's still earning this massive salary.
is reporting to him and he's still earning this massive salary.
And he did say he did say it a number of times, even though he had re-signed to a longer term thing.
So I think he's there was all these immediate rumors that he was going to be the is going to be Bloomberg's vice presidential candidate because there had been some he had been thinking about it a little bit running for president.
And so, you know, I don't I'm not sure there's more here. And
again, if something happens, I'll look like an idiot. But I think he was going to leave. And
in this way, he's leaving without leaving, I guess. Something's up here. This is the whole thing.
All right, tell me. Well, the whole thing felt rushed. And also, I mean, there's a couple of
things to unpack here. Typically, the person who becomes CEO of Pepsi comes up through marketing.
The CEO of General Motors usually is a product engineer. And if you think about Disney and where
they are really differentiated and where they are, probably their future lies and their ability to
maintain this unbelievable momentum, it's, in a word, it's content. Their ability to create
$7 billion plus films in one year, to lead the box office three years in a row,
then take that amazing content, put it on Disney+, then create parks centered around those themes,
then sell Mandalorian action figures and the wheel spins.
But the epicenter, if you will, the centrifugal force, the thing that gets
the merry-go-round or the wheel flying is content. And it's just interesting that they chose someone
from Parks to run the whole thing. I felt that the whole thing seemed so rushed that there was
some sort of... I feel like there's another shoe to drop here. But to be clear, it's important to shout or just call out under Bob Iger's leadership, profits up 300%,
stock up 400%. That means fivefold. You know, he brought a decent amount of dignity and grace. He
was never mean. He was never flamboyant. He was never in the news. He's been largely scant. He's
been totally scandal free. And also one out of three acquisitions work.
Two out of three fail.
He is arguably the best acquirer in the history of corporate America.
Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm.
I mean, come on.
And he paid reasonable prices for all these things.
And he has a great reputation.
So, you know, Boss, he deserves a victory lap.
He deserves, you know, I hope, you know, I don't know how much money is made, but he deserves it all.
Well, you know, he's coming to code and he hasn't canceled.
And he's still in charge of content.
So I think we'll be asking him these questions.
I don't know if Bob, the other Bob, is coming, J-Pick.
One of the things I think that is unusual is this.
It looks like this guy's – look, the park's job is critically – Tom Staggs was in the park job.
Hugely profitable.
Hugely profitable and very important part of Disney.
And it really – you put someone in there and they succeed.
You do – you know, that's a great executive, essentially, a great operational executive.
Yeah.
Compared to any of the others, that's the most difficult job at Disney from what I'm told.
Yeah.
Because there's so much going on.
There's so much – and analog and all kinds of stuff.
People and everything.
And, of course, he's dealing with coronavirus now,
and both in Chile, big exposure in China with their parks there
and largely their parks, which are super popular there.
And so, you know, he would be among those big,
but I think what it was is they didn't pick the content people,
Kevin and others. And so I think what it was is they didn't pick the content people, Kevin and others.
And so I think that was surprising.
The other is it looks like this guy is getting on-the-job training by Bob Iger, right?
So that's another odd thing.
And I think if someone is not ready to be that, one of the – I think the more smart analysis –
and I don't know if you agree with this.
This is a company too big to run by one person.
There's very few people that can sing, dance, and act like Bob Iger.
And also look good doing it.
One of the things that I bring down in a column, I call them the cashmere prince all the time because he has these beautiful cashmere sweaters.
And I try not to touch people I interview, but they're so beautiful.
They're so beautiful.
I'm always like I want to touch his sweater, just his arm, that's all.
It's good that you clarified that.
I know.
Thank you.
But the cashmere prince idea is like he's just – he moves through life in that way and he has that effect.
But he's also quite approachable.
He's not a snob or anything like that.
And so I think having this guy train you is great.
But at the same time, why do you need a CEO that's training? Or is there a CEO
that can run such a multifaceted company like this? Because now there's so many moving parts,
digital content, parks, you know, commerce, everything else. I don't know. What do you think?
Is it impossible to run Disney? No. Conglomerates oftentimes have, you know, you need a CEO who at
the end of the day makes decisions, communicates to the investment community and set strategy.
And quite frankly, is probably the most important job is finding and retaining the best CEOs of smaller companies to run the parks, to run the movie division, to run Disney TV Plus.
At the end of the day, at an organization like that, it's the boring stuff that increases shareholder value.
You know, the most difficult thing is it's the boring stuff that increases shareholder value. You know what the most difficult thing is? It's compensation.
And that is figuring out a way to align each of the heads of those divisions, their financial interests with the success of the company that accretes to the whole thing.
And then getting them to play nice with each other, figuring out a way that, okay, if we give people discounts at the park in exchange for signing or we give them a free Apple TV Plus, does the guy at the park get the
right compensation for that? So it's, you need a guy to run the aircraft carrier squadron. And
even if you have incredibly adept people running each of the carriers themselves.
Yeah. So I think what's interesting is that, is Kevin Mayer is the person I'm thinking about who
runs, you know, a lot of their consumer stuff and has been in charge of this rollout of Disney+,
which has been its direct-to-consumer and international division,
which it'll be interesting how Bob interacts with Kevin
because he was sort of the one everyone thought.
And that doesn't always turn out just because the reporters are saying
this is the one that it happens.
And that's happened a zillion times, including at Disney under Mr. Staggs.
And so I think that's the difficult part is that people thought one thing, how do you keep these people in these jobs?
Now, they're incredibly powerful jobs.
And someone like Jeff Bezos has managed to keep a lot of people in these.
I mean, they're quasi CEOs, right, within each of these divisions.
Oh, 100 percent.
Your guy, Richard Plepler, reported up to Jeff Bukes. And Bukes' key, you know, one of his things is I set strategy, but then I find incredibly talented people who are willing to stick around even though they're not number one.
And anywhere they go, they would be number one.
At any great company, a big sign of a great company is that you look around and there's three or four people that could be the CEO of another company.
Absolutely.
And that was GE.
That was the GE thing, right?
A hundred percent.
That's the whole GE model.
And Amazon has that.
The great firms.
Apple.
Yeah, Apple has probably three or four CEOs in there.
So you're, again, at the end of the day, the CEO's job,
make sure they don't run out of money,
manage in the investment community, be a spokesperson for the company,
and really the gangster move, what you've got do is you got to be able to attract and retain a bunch of number ones and keep them happy and ensure they all.
And then the hard part is figuring out a way for them all to play nice together.
Because, again, that Rundle flywheel at Disney, it's starting to spin.
And occasionally one group is going to have to take a back seat or give away their product or upgrade people who are a member of Disney Plus.
And it's going to hit their earnings in the short term.
But they're all going to have to figure out a way to say, OK, how do we create a –
Is this second Bob good enough to do that?
That's, I think, the big –
Yeah, we'll see.
Those are big shoes to fill.
This probably are the biggest shoes to fill since Steve Jobs appointed Tim Cook.
This will be everyone's eyes.
Everyone's eyes will be on this guy, Bob, because because Iger is arguably he's going to go down as the best media CEO probably the last five years.
Let me just tell you something.
What was really interesting.
And when he was picked there, you know, Iger sort of ate through Eisner, excuse me, Michael Eis Eisner before him who sort of went out on a bad note I would say.
He was – he like ate through a bunch of CEO candidates, you know, and sort of killed them off.
And one of the things about Bob Iger was that he was thought to be sort of the one who just sat around and took it from Eisner and didn't really push back and everyone thought he was going to –
He was Steve Young in the 49ers with Joe Montana.
Remember that?
Well, no.
No?
But go ahead.
Sure.
Well, so the 49ers, I think it was in the—
Oh, you're going to explain sports to me.
Go ahead.
In the early 90s.
I know almost nothing about sports.
But Steve Young was probably the best quarterback in the league,
maybe the second best.
But unfortunately, the best quarterback in the league, Joe Montana,
started before him.
So you had a guy who was one of the best quarterbacks in the league
sitting on the bench, and he was patient, and then he got his turn.
But I remember some of that bullshit.
Like, Eisner kept saying, I'm leaving.
Wait, no, I'm not.
I'm leaving.
Wait, no, I'm not.
And he didn't seem to want to give Bob the keys to the car.
No, and he kind of was.
Like, he was also, you know, lots of books I've written.
I've read all the books about Disney because it's a really interesting company.
You know, he was rude to the other ones.
He was just like, it was just really interesting.
And it was like Bob's the one that outlasted him.
And it was really interesting.
When I first interviewed him and I've interviewed him about a half a dozen times at least on stages and different places and spent a lot of time with him was that he was the first person of just only a couple of media executives very early in the internet game.
I'll never forget.
We were talking about why he was going to push really hard.
And I just, in fact,
wrote a column about this.
They had so many disasters
in the internet,
many of them Michael Eisner born.
But they kept pushing forward.
And I remember they had
another disaster or something else.
I can't remember.
There's like at least
a dozen disasters.
Was it Go?
What did they do?
Oh, there's InfoSeek.
Go, there was a lot
of bad stuff that happened.
And he said, if someone's going to eat our lunch, it might as well be us.
And I thought, good for him.
He wasn't scared of the internet, which I really appreciated because a lot of the media executives at the time, whether it was Philip Dauman or any others at Viacom or wherever you met them, the only two people
that ever talked about the internet as an opportunity in those early days instead of
a nuisance was Bob Iger and Barry Diller, which I thought was interesting.
So one key question you have to ask Bob at Code.
Yeah.
Okay.
Just very simple.
What is Epcot?
What is Epcot?
I don't get it.
What is – it's like I go have sushi there and I go to Japan Land, then I go to a giant golf ball, then they talk about space.
Like, what is Epcot?
You know something?
What is Epcot?
Whatever.
I will ask him that.
But one of the things that he did – the reason I like him so much is I hate Disney.
Like, I hate going to Disney.
I hate theme parks and I really don't like it.
And my brother is one of those crazy Disney lovers.
And so he made me –
Dr. Swisher likes Disney?
No, not that one.
No, my other brother, my Trumpy brother.
And so he made me go to the park
or he wouldn't come to All Things D one year.
He's like, you have to go.
And then he had a film crew there
every time I got off a ride saying,
Kara, how'd you like it?
And I was like, you know, I said, you know—
Yeah, Kara Swisher at Disneyland,
that just doesn't feel right.
Yeah, I used to call it the unhappiest place on earth.
Then we'd go back and forth and stuff.
So he's a really interesting character.
I'm excited to talk to him.
I hope he doesn't bag out at the last minute and I get Other Bob.
Although I'm happy to meet Other Bob, but I want.
Other Bob.
That's what you should call him.
Hey, you're.
Welcome Other Bob.
That'll warm you.
Yeah, that'll get you into the good graces. I know. I have never met this guy. I've met Kevin warm you. I know.
I have never met this guy.
I've met Kevin Mayer.
I've met the others.
Anyway, we'll see what happens.
And we'll go from there.
Speaking of another big company, Tim Cook, we just mentioned him.
He was talking about coronavirus as a challenge.
He said the company said it wouldn't meet its revenue forecast for the quarter, citing iPhone supply constraints so obvious and lost retail sales in China where they have a lot of exposure.
It's reopened 30 of its 42 stores in China.
It closed many of them down.
What do you think of this?
What's going on?
Because now it's still – it's becoming plateauing in China from what I understand.
But at the same time, it affects these.
Where would you – away from Apple, where would you invest right now?
Yeah.
How do they get it if these – once coronavirus does get under control?
What happens?
What do you do now as an investor?
So I think there's two ways.
Like Apple.
Would you buy Apple into Apple right now?
Well, I own Apple.
And again, my investment philosophy is straightforward.
Monopolies that are unregulated. And Apple checks both those boxes. And I think Apple, again, is putting in all the places for the ultimate recurring revenue bundle, but I won't go into it. By the way, Urban Dictionary has Rundle, and I got all excited, and I thought it was going to be me, and I immediately went on because I'm a narcissist. It's a type of dog. Anyways, Rundle.
We're going to call them because you've already gotten one in. That's right. Who do we, I want to speak to management. Who's the manager at Urban
Dictionary? So anyways. It might be a new job for Bob Iger. How to play coronavirus. There's two
ways to think about it, I think. The first is defense. And that is there are certain industries
where they will be recast as a negative in light of the virus, and they'll never recover.
So I think you could argue movie theaters were already on their way down.
This just makes things worse.
People go to the movies less and find they don't miss it.
But are there other companies that have been hit really hard?
We're likely, yeah, they'll take a big hit in the short run, but at the end of the day, it's not going to change the underlying fundamentals and attraction of the business.
So, for example, Carnival Cruise Lines.
And that is the company has been obviously ground zero for this.
A lot of horror stories coming out of cruise ships.
The stock's off about 50%, I think, in the last three years.
And while revenues are growing, it's now got a price-to-earnings ratio of 7, a dividend of 6%.
Very well-run company.
I just met the CMO.
He's a very thoughtful guy.
One out of two people who are on a cruise right now are on a Carnival Cruise brand.
So they've got scale.
They've got a great loyalty program.
And I don't believe that once this thing is over, people are going to be any less fond of taking cruises. And what we also have in our society
is we have the full employment Carnival Cruise Act in the form of Social Security, because while
Social Security takes seniors, 29 percent of them who would be in poverty without it, down to 9
percent, we spend a trillion dollars on it. So $200 billion of
Social Security or one-fifth is an effective social program. The other $800 billion is such
that a couple can upgrade from Carnival to Princess, also owned by Carnival. So you have
a trillion-dollar subsidy, a lot of which I would bet, I'd love to see this math, I bet $20 to $30
billion of that trillion goes right to cruises in the form of upgrades.
So Carnival Cruises, that's playing what I'd call defense.
And that is what industries have been or companies have been hit really, really hard.
So, for example, American Airlines is now below its IPO price, but also their largest cost input has fallen in price.
So if you think people are going to continue to fly once the
virus is over, American Airlines has been hit really hard. But my favorite on the defensive
side is Carnival, something I wrote about today playing offense. How interesting. I'm going to
ask you what is an offensive side, because I actually, my column about to appear in the Times
is about these work-from-home companies like Zoom, which is up 50 percent. And this work-from-home
movement, even though it's been going on and growing, it really hasn't.
And the last time we had SARS where people were more nervous about going out and stuff like that, we didn't have Facebook.
We didn't have social media.
We didn't have Slack.
We didn't have iPhones.
And so now all the pieces in place for work at home are there.
Are there any ones – that's a defensive stock carnival. What
is an offensive stock? Right. So how do we play offense? What might, so there's defense and that
is they recover. And then there's offense and that is it accelerates the momentum of a company
because work from home is a great idea. So what else might people do from home? So my stock pick,
if you will, because right now the work from home, we talked
about Zoom a couple of weeks ago. It's up about 15% since we talked about that. The one I think
has a big opportunity because it brings not only tailwinds from the coronavirus is Peloton. And
that is, I think that people are perhaps going to work, do an additional workout at home. I think
people are going to decide,
well, maybe I won't go to crowded places and I've been thinking about buying a Peloton or I have one and this is my excuse to use it. If you look at their vertical, they have Apple-like margins.
They have a recurring revenue stream in the app, about 20%. That's interesting.
They have outrageous loyalty in terms of their community.
Their NPS scores, their NPR scores are off the hook.
And you know what they should do?
You know what they should do, Cara?
They could create, right now it's about $7 billion in market cap growing 50% of year.
Although Apple doesn't like to acquire firms, I've never seen a better brand fit with any company with Apple than Peloton.
I have such envy to buy the track.
I'm going to buy the rowing machine.
And the community, they're coming out with a rowing machine later in the year.
I would totally buy that.
I almost bought one on Instagram the other day.
$7 billion.
They'll do $2 billion in revenues, about three and a half to four times revenues, which is expensive, but it's growing at 50% a year.
And you know what these guys could do? They would add two to $3 billion in market cap.
They should start, and you're going to laugh at this, they should start a dating site
of like-minded people into fitness. Their community is so strong. They're so passionate.
There's this underlying assumption that most of the people on Pelotons are hot,
which is what drives any dating site. They could create a community and they could call it something else such that it didn't feel like a dating site. But the Peloton community
is, in my opinion, one of the largest unmonetized assets in America.
I have to say, I really do like this. Work at home is now really very convenient. I'm going
to have a mirror put in just to test it because I'm going to write about it a little bit. But
you're right. You're 100% right. All right. We're going to move to one more thing. And work from
home is a really interesting thing. And not just that, but
tele-education. Really interesting to see if people start to test this out, if this gets worse.
And let's hope it doesn't get worse. But a lot of these stocks are very poised for these. And if you
look at any of them in that area, because it's a very different world than the last time this
happened. But last one, Uber Eats updates. Jason Droege, who I've interviewed before with Jason Del Rey on stage, is leaving the company. Uber has not given comment as to why.
Last month, you predicted that Uber Eats would be spun off, but they've been actually pulling back.
Dara Khosrowshahi is pulling Eats out of the market where it's not among the top two food
delivery services. I just interviewed a chef yesterday here in San Francisco who was talking
about how it kills the restaurant business, but you have to be in it, all these different delivery services.
It's a cutthroat thing.
And he was talking about restaurants getting together and not letting them have 30 percent.
Like they've got to start getting together.
It's a really tough business.
Uber agreed to sell its Indian food delivery service to a local driver.
It discontinued food delivery operations in Vienna and pulled out of South Korea.
So what do you think this – Jason is a really interesting character, very – he was sort
of – ate Uber Eats.
I don't know.
He was like super – like this was a big opportunity.
And at a code two years ago, Dara talked about it being a really critical part of their business.
So what up, Scott?
Well, no CEO ever says this is a shitty part of our business.
I don't care about it.
I'm trying to unload.
He went on and on two years ago.
I'm just saying.
24 months ago, that was before they were public.
That was before the shit show that it is the Uber company.
It was a public company.
Uber is making the transition they need to make,
and that is they're going from growth to margin.
And even if you look in, I haven't seen the analysis, but just anecdotal pulse marketing,
I noticed Uber costs are going up in Manhattan, and that's exactly the right thing, which means
they'll take their growth down. Uber Eats is a terrible business, and when the CEO of that
company leaves, it's one of two things, or it's one of three things. For personal reasons, which
is why they always say, you know, I want to spend more time with their family. None of these guys want to spend more
time with their family. And then two, it's a change. They have disagreements over strategy.
And in this instance, I would imagine that Dara said, you need to clean this thing up because
we're packaging it and selling it. And you need to take growth down, figure out a way to get it
more profitable. Basically, he's shown up and said, everything we've been planning for, everything
you've been hiring for, everything you've been trying to figure out
as the person running this decision, just kidding, go the other way.
And start firing people, start pulling out of markets,
and start putting lipstick on this pig because we've got to dress this thing up
and get it to market.
And my guess is the CEO is like, boss, I've been working my ass off around this strategy.
Just no, find another guy or gal to do your dirty work here. I'm done. Or he's trying to sell it. But the two
have had a parting of ways because they're obviously both talented executives. There's
been a shift in strategy. And this just buttresses, and again, it might be confirmation bias.
But again, my prediction with this other shitty company, DoorDash, trying to figure out a way to
go public, there's going to be consolidation here. And, trying to figure out a way to go public.
There's going to be consolidation here. And the time to go to the time to merge would be while DoorDash is private. So who's going to prevail here? Because restaurant, I can tell you, every
restaurant person hates this and has to be part of it. It's literally, they hate it and they can't
not use it. It's critical because of the trends among especially young people liking delivery.
My kids, that's all they do is use Uber Eats or Grubhub or whatever, whichever ones.
But this is what you're going to see that's going to even beat up these guys more, kick these dead horses or near lame horses while they're down, is that the biggest and most successful QSR companies, Chick-fil-A and Chipotle, are going to go even more vertical, which again is the key to massive shareholder growth. And they're going to launch, put in place their own
delivery and they're going to hire their own people. They're going to pay them,
you know, pay them well. They're going to, and they'll come up with
controlling the person or your interface with that brand has value. Apple, the biggest unlock
in shareholder history over the last 20 years, other than Prime, was Apple saying, we want to control your interaction with our brand at the
point of purchase. So when Chipotle or Chick-fil-A put people in a uniform and they're smart and
they're nice and they're high EQ, and maybe they give them a certain verbiage, a certain eye
contact, whatever it might be, they're trained to be Chipotle ambassadors.
That will positively impact the brand and will warrant the investment as opposed to,
I mean, I literally have a guy who's just come out of the rain when, you know, with whatever it is, these Uber.
And they, I mean, they're good guys.
They're trying to do their best and they're always guys.
But it's not what I call a highly branded experience.
No, not at all.
They throw a plastic bag at you.
I'm sorry, go ahead.
Yeah, they come and run. They run. Yeah. And there's been some incidents and things like that.
You know, it's sort of remember Cosmo.com. It's just not, it's not, it's a race to the bottom
and especially when Amazon, to me, Amazon will be the player here eventually because you do trust
Amazon with your delivery and they have been trying to professionalize. You think they're
going to get into food delivery? Yeah, because they've been professionalizing delivery.
They start with the trucks and everything else, and they have to deal with these safety issues that plague them as usual at Amazon.
But to me, it's a really tough business away from their core business, which is driving. And we've got to go to break in a second, but I have to say today in San Francisco, because of all these laws, AB5 and things like that, I went to get an Uber because I was running late. And it was $50.
$50.
It was crazy.
That's what they need to do.
My house downtown.
They're going to margin.
It was crazy.
But then I was like, I'm not paying $50 for a ride to work.
I walked down to the metro and took it.
And, you know, I would have taken a scooter if I didn't.
I'd have a helmet with me.
But it was really interesting.
And I remember I would keep talking about they've got to bring prices up.
And I have to say it made me not use it.
I was like, that is too much money.
That is too much money.
Well, it's margin of growth.
They're moving to a margin story.
It's the right thing.
It's going to hurt the stock, but it's the right thing to do long term.
All right.
Okay.
We'll see how long that lasts though because now it's way too – it's now a product I don't like that much because it's so expensive.
And I'd rather try –
Jungle Cat is on a scooter.
On a scooter.
I didn't – I don't have my helmet here, so I'm not going to use a scooter, but I would. You have a helmet. It's called that hair.
Literally, your head is safer. I'm so sorry you're not a hair. There is no helmet that can protect.
I'm sorry you're a hairless cat, but the fact of the matter is I have fantastic hair.
I'd go right down to my waist. But one of the things that's interesting is that I am using
their jump bikes quite a bit. I love them. I think they're great. Same here.
I don't know much about that.
They're bikes.
They're electric bikes, and they give you a little boost.
You bike, but at the same time, especially in San Francisco,
if there's a little bit of a hill, it takes you right up it.
And so I've been using those in Washington quite a lot over scooters.
They have baskets.
They feel slightly safer and more solid, and they give you a boost.
I think the electric bike, I'm even thinking of buying an electric bike,
but I think the rental electric bike market is amazing, and that's run by Uber has the biggest one with Jump.
Anyway, let's get to a break.
We'll be right back with wins and fails and predictions. Fox Creative. This is advertiser content from Zelle.
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I just don't get it.
Just wish someone could do the research on it.
Can we figure this out?
Hey, y'all.
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So follow Explain It To Me, presented by Klaviyo.
Okay, we're back with Scott.
Scott, there's so many wins and fails this week.
Why don't you begin?
Why don't you begin?
Okay, so my win is Panera that is going to a recurring revenue bundle, if you will, or just recurring revenue.
It's a restaurant?
Yeah, Panera.
Okay.
$8.99 for unlimited coffee.
All right.
And it's really interesting because if you think about it, it's kind of a genius move because A, coffee prices. A year? $8.99 a month or a year? It's $8.99 a month. All right. And it's really interesting because if you think about it, it's kind of a genius move because A, coffee prices... A year?
$8.99 a month or a year?
It's $8.99 a month.
All right.
Okay.
Why do you think that's great?
Well, look, people...
Do you realize on average
people spend $1,100 a year on coffee?
Oh, I'm sure I do.
And what they found is
the people who sign up
come into Panera every 48 hours
and guess what they're doing?
They're not only buying...
getting their coffee,
their free coffee,
they're buying food, right? So this is the idea of a recurring revenue program.
For example, restoration hardware, when you give people 20% off, they not only just buy the couch,
they start buying towels and sheets. And Panera is finding that they're increasing purchases,
increasing loyalty, people back in the store. And coffee became sort of disruptible because
when you really think about how expensive coffee has become.
Coffee is disruptible.
Scott, you are a fun – I'm going to take your picture right now.
Thanks.
Thanks.
Coffee disruptible.
I like that.
You're right.
I do pay too much for coffee.
Yeah.
So Panera is – and you're going to see that across – I mean, here's the thing.
We want simplicity in our lives.
We don't want to pay or we don't want.
I always thought that the thing about Uber that was so wonderful is you just got to bomb out of the backseat as opposed to figuring out. I mean, how many times have you gotten out of a cab
forgetting to pay and someone starts honking at you and he's like, you need to pay. Anyways,
so Panera, but they're finding these recurrent. I think this is where the world is headed. So
I make one decision. I like Panera coffee or it's on my way to work. And what do
you know? Once you get people coming through your establishment every 48 hours, wonderful things
start to happen. They buy those delicious pastries they have there. They have delicious pastries.
So innovation across recurring revenue at Panera, that's my...
Okay. All right.
And by the way, it takes some leadership because someone in the meeting says, well, wait,
Because someone in the meeting says, well, wait.
We're going to lose money from people who spend $4 for our chai latte or whatever the heck it is they sell. So it's any coffee or just coffee?
The honest answer is I don't know.
All right.
Okay.
Well, all right.
Okay.
All right.
Well, that's an interesting thing.
I would possibly pay for that.
But I don't want to call you a parent.
I like to go to a really overpriced San Francisco place that costs.
That's a shocker. That's a shocker.
That's a shocker.
What is your fail?
What is your fail this week?
Oh, my fail is Rajiv Misra.
I don't want to add fuel to these rumors about some of the stuff coming out with him, but distinct of any of these rumors about this game of thrones.
Rajiv Misra supposedly did some very kind of sordid things to kind of kill his competition for the CEO role at the firm.
And all this stuff is coming out.
Explain the firm.
Explain the firm.
Oh, Vision Fund.
SoftBank's Vision Fund.
Yeah.
Anyways, but distinct of all of that, distinct of all of that, let's assume it's all hyperbole and who knows.
Is there anyone who deserves to be fired more than the guy running the Vision Fund right now?
I mean, literally, other than Tom Perez, the head of the DNC, who deserves?
I love the fact that Gina Rometty was fired because the stock was flat.
I mean, she did transition the company to the cloud,
but Rajiv Misra keeps his job at the Vision Fund.
So, look, the fail here is more poor governance from SoftBank and Masayoshi-san.
Well, it's just one person.
Come on.
It's one guy who likes or doesn't like.
He's such an emotional executive, and I don't mean that in a negative way.
He just does things because he feels like.
Like there's not necessarily.
And now he's in love with his geniusness.
There's such a lesson in this, and that is one of the biggest flaws, one of the biggest Achilles heel we all develop is to conflate luck with talent.
And this guy, Masayoshi San, made the best investment in the history of venture investing at $20 million in Alibaba.
It's worth $100 billion.
And now he's under the impression that his gut is some sort of like magic raider of the lost ark, you know, looking scepter.
And you know what, boss?
You're right.
You're probably very talented.
You're also just really, really fucking lucky.
Yeah.
And the notion that he can just like dream up shit.
Welcome to much of Silicon Valley.
Yeah.
Welcome to much of Silicon Valley.
Oh, my gosh.
That is the mother of all.
That is literally the home of third basers.
But anyways, my loser is the poor, my fail is the poor governance at the Vision Fund.
Okay.
And the fact that Rajiv Mishra still has a job.
I have a single win-fail.
Yeah.
The win is the conviction of Harvey Weinstein.
Okay.
Go on.
He is now a convicted rapist.
That is a win for the women who came forward.
Yeah.
Big moment.
It is a big moment. It is a big moment.
And the journalists like Jodi Kantor and Megan Toohey and Ronan Farrow who pushed this story hard and really did do the kind of investigative work that makes you proud to be a journalist.
But the women who came forward, this is a win for them.
And even though some of the counts he didn't get, he's still facing and they're appealing.
I think they are – he is going to be in jail.
And now, of course, he's in Rikers and which, you know, yay.
Like the whole thing is just a complete win.
I think the fail was how long it took in terms of – and the backlash that continues around these topics.
And I get the idea of everyone is not Harvey Weinstein.
Everyone is not.
He is now a convicted rapist, so I can call him a rapist and not an alleged rapist.
And I get that part.
But the idea that this person who was so incredibly guilty the entire time, took so long, And even though Cyrus Vance was the one whose
office did manage to pull off this, these convictions, how slow and how hard it was
to do this. And I just is. And I guess you have to sort of take your wins where you get them. But
the amount of people who had to suffer, I think it was, I think Jody was telling me 90,
90 people were in varying levels of being sexually harassed or raped by this man.
It just was – and I'm sure there's many more than that.
That it went on so long is such a fail to me.
I just don't – and I think it's the failure not just of the authorities but people in the industry who enabled him, even journalists who covered it.
I know a lot of journalists tried to get this story.
I talked to a number of them who were always trying to get it for years.
And so I think what I want to know is where the other stories like this are
and why we need to get to them faster.
So I really thought that was a great moment for a lot of people.
And at the same time, Harvey Weinstein is in jail where he so deserves to be.
So that is my-
But the glass is, to your first half of that, the glass is half full here because your fail
around it taking too long, it's about to take less long because this will establish precedent.
It'll give a lot of district attorney and prosecutors the confidence to go after these
cases, whereas before they would say, these are very hard allegations to prove. And you're going to see a lot of DAs dust off their
desks and their pencils and start revisiting cases. So I have a question for you around win or fail.
Did you hear the NBC interview of Sheryl Sandberg? I did.
Win or fail? I would not say a win. You know, it was fine.
You know, she did her stock answers.
You know, I had a tough interview with Stephen Levy, who wrote the book, and he and I had a—
You know, in a lot of ways—let me go to the book first because that's what it was based around—was a very good book to know things.
You found out things about Mark.
I knew a lot of them, but again, it was full—in any other any other time. It would have been a very nice book about Facebook. Right. Um, but I, he and I
had a back and forth about access journalism and the, and the, and the price you pay for that.
And in terms of, you know, what people at Facebook were like, this is the book we can
give to people to explain what we are. And I'm like, that's a bad thing. You know, you don't
want them to give this book to people. Um, and so – and again, it was – some of the reporting was super interesting and revelatory when Stephen didn't mean it.
And he and I did have an argument about – he said he was showing, not telling.
I'm like, in this case, things have changed.
You have to tell.
He did a good job keeping up with me and me giving him a hard time.
And I think he's a very good journalist.
But journalism has changed.
And again, back to Jorge Ramos.
He was like you can't just be a typer of information or a sayer of information.
You have to really start to come to conclusions and speak truth to power.
And so that backdrop, I don't feel like that interview spoke truth to power.
And I don't know what I would do in an interview with Cheryl right now.
And you know I like Cheryl personally.
But I definitely would have been a lot harder on her and demanded her to get off her talking points.
I don't fault her for staying on her talking points because that's what you do.
But I do – you have to at least go there with these people.
I'm not sure you – I don't know what I would do in that interview.
But it was not – I don't think it was a successful interview. But again, I don't fault Cheryl for doing what she does, which is go to talking points.
What is she going to do? Suddenly break down and say, yes, it was all me. I don't know. was a successful interview. But again, I don't fault Cheryl for doing what she does, which is go to talking points. What is she going to do, suddenly break down and say, yes, it was all me?
You know, I don't know.
What do you think?
So I spoke to John Battelle, who's a friend and teaches a class at the School of Journalism at Columbia.
He does these classes, and I spoke at his class last night.
And I think that interview she did should be a case study in communications
because I think it was access journalism. I just don't think there's any way. I think they basically
said, OK, what's involved here? You want to interview her? It's obviously an incredible get.
And I don't know how this works. Maybe you do. But somebody at Facebook said,
we would like, oh, you want to ask about Cheryl's engagement?
We would like that and we'd like to start with that.
Because they don't do that.
They don't do that.
Well, okay.
Why on earth?
He starts off.
Tell me.
So you're engaged.
Yeah.
Trying to establish a relationship. And then she goes through a series of talking points about how we need to take decision-making on relationships back for young women.
And I decided to ask him and we went
on a mountaintop and I used to play Scrabble with my husband and I was worried and sometimes
sitting at the counter about growing old alone. All this stuff is- It's not the right thing for
right now. It's very poignant. It's very gripping and it's all been tested. What's the opposite of
a trigger, a likability point? And I started listening to this thing, and about 17 minutes in, I just couldn't take it anymore.
And in the mother of all, like, awkward segues, the reporter goes, so, in the book, it says you're a control freak obsessed with your image and that you yell at your direct reports.
And it was sort of this very awkward segue, but it just felt very – I just kept thinking that term access journalism.
And I was curious.
Sometimes you try to establish rapport with someone who you – actually Casey Newton of The Verge had a really good thing.
It's one of the tricks that Cheryl has is saying she's nervous before interviews to the journalist to feel like she's vulnerable, which I thought was interesting.
Again, I don't – I just – it's the journalist's job here to not do that.
I think you try to establish rapport in the beginning.
I have a different thing depending on the person.
Sometimes people are like, oh, you're going to get them, Kara.
Sometimes I don't want to get them.
You feel their sweater.
You feel their sweater.
I just like – I sometimes do things like that. Well, I'll tell you, one of the – you either have to sort of establish dominance right away or you have to sort of push them off their game or ask a very strange question to make them confused.
I have all kinds – it depends on the person.
And sometimes like with this Jorge Ramos, I just like him.
And so I'm not going to – there's no reason to attack him.
But I went right to Trump with him because why else would I talk about anything?
Because he had that back and forth and what was going on.
Why else would I talk about anything?
Like because he had that back and forth and what was going on.
And so I tend to go right for the actual thing, which is my first question to Cheryl would be if she ever did another interview with me again would be when are you leaving Facebook because I think you're leaving Facebook.
And I would state it.
I'd say many – I wouldn't say many people think. I'd say I think you're going to leave Facebook and trying to find a good exit strategy here.
So let's talk about that. And I think I
would just say it out loud. And I think Cheryl could take it. And I think she would actually
give a much better answer. I think by doing this backing into it things that people, the reporters
tend to do in interviews, it never succeeds. And you let them go on. And last thing is sometimes
you do let them go on. I think my interview with Mark was so successful because I let him go on, but I knew what I was doing. I was like, I was letting him further
make a problem for himself around this, in this case was Holocaust deniers.
But I often, I often slap back real hard and then see what they can do. Sometimes I, I say something
just very tough to them and then see what they do. But I don't tend to like to do the, so you're getting married, that kind of personal stuff
up top.
I think that's, and if that case, if I was asking her, and I would like to hear her answer
because I don't agree with you.
I don't think it was as tested as you think it is.
Yeah.
You would know.
I don't.
I don't think it is.
I don't.
I'm pretty, it's not, maybe, maybe not.
I don't know.
But it wasn't as much as you think it is.
And so I would say, look, a lot of people think that was a PR stunt.
Can you – is it?
Like, is it?
Like, let's have your answer to that.
And I think saying what everyone's thinking is – and owning you saying it versus saying many people say and that kind of stuff is what I tend to do.
And in this case, I think right now, Facebook is facing a lot of big issues.
And I think starting with her marriage is not something I would do right now. And I'm very
happy that she's getting married. I'm happy she's found love. But I don't think I would do that.
And again, Cheryl did her job, right? Like, I don't think, I don't fault her for doing her
talking points. No, I thought it was brilliant. It's going to be, there's going to be, not only
there's one case study there, and then there's one case study there and then there's another case study and that is we have these inanimate legal entities called corporations and we like to think they're people.
They're not.
And what the investor relations departments try to do is they try and personify the company because if a company is likable, it gets another one to three times EBITDA.
It is the most accretive thing you can do is to have Tim Cook be likable and talk about Alabama football.
Where did he go? You know, they all have their favorite teams and they talk about, you know,
go hide or whatever. And they, you know, talk about their kayaking and the charity work they
do. Or they talk about Ted Turner's Maverick nature or Richard Branson's just, just incredible
crazy side. And they like put them in a wedding dress. Sheryl Sandberg has taken it to a new
level. The personification, her brand of likability, her discussion of her personal
loss and her viewpoints, important discussions around other issues. We've never seen an executive
personify a brand or at least attempt to personify or it's just gone to an absolutely
different level. And I wonder if it's sort of hit peak personification. I wonder if people are a
little bit. I don't know. It's been going on forever, Steve Jobs. And if you go back to Edison.
Steve Jobs' personal life was kept pretty personal, wasn't it?
Yes, but he sort of, sort of. I mean, I think just you want to link the person to the company. I mean,
I think that's been good. The CEO fandomness has been going on forever.
And Elon Musk, come on, it's all over the place.
No, I'm saying, but has it ever gone to this extent?
I don't think Sheryl's even close. I think Elon would be. I'd pick Elon.
There's lots of people. Or Lee Iacocca or whatever.
You know, I get that. I get the concept.
But in this case, I would have done a different interview.
And when I do
interviews, I tend to try to say the obvious part out loud. And I think that's, reporters have to do
that and not worry about. And one of the, and I'll end on this because we got to go, is Jorge Ramos
again said, one of the things that when I do interviews, he was asking me how I do interviews.
And he said, when I do interviews, I assume I'm never going to talk to them again. That's how I go into the interview, because they are going to be mad at me or whatever.
I just don't assume I want a long-term relationship. And I don't pull back anything because
I don't care if I get thrown out of the room. And I think that's exactly the right way to go,
these days especially. Same thing with that book. He had to come to conclusions that he didn't.
And it was too bad because he had amazing access. And he didn't come to conclusions that he didn't. And it was too bad because he had amazing access and he didn't come to conclusions at
the end of it, really, I found disappointing.
But, you know, whatever.
So that's it.
So do you have a prediction?
No, I don't have a – I don't predict things.
I don't have a prediction.
You should start.
You got to start.
I predict I'm going to – I predict I'm going to buy you a cashmere sweater so we
have a relationship.
Loro Piano is what the big dog likes to roll in.
That's right. Bruno Cuccinelli. Not a Cuccine what the big dog likes to roll in. That's right.
Bruno Cuccinelli?
Not a Cuccinelli?
I had some rich guy go.
That shit is butter.
I was saying I liked someone's outfit, and he's like,
ugh, it's probably Bruno Cuccinelli.
I was like, okay.
Like what?
I didn't know the whole stratosphere of sweater-wearing expense for men.
Loro Piano is sort of your Italian and you've inherited money.
Bruno Cuccinelli is you bought it at an outlet.
Okay.
But it's still amazing.
Anyways, so I have a prediction.
All right, quick.
If over a million people are diagnosed with the coronavirus in the U.S., and I'm praying
that doesn't happen, Nikki Haley is going to be vice president.
Oh, okay.
That's been out there.
Pence is being set up
as the fall guy.
I can't believe
if I had to stack rank them,
I like Pence better.
Versus Nikki Haley?
Oh, God.
She's such a suck-up.
Governor Haley?
She's good.
Governor Haley.
Oh, come on.
She's been saying
the most ridiculous things
in order to suck up to Trump.
It's gross.
And she's smart.
Pence, I think, is just like an empty vessel of nothing and kind of dumb.
And she's not.
And so that pisses me off.
Talk about literally the mother of all no-win jobs.
I mean, it's just like.
He's so dumb.
They just literally handed him.
Here, do this.
How is their upside?
Is he going to get any credit?
Are they going to be like, oh, he.
It's just. Anyways, that is. Okay. It's like Is he going to get any credit? Are they going to be like, oh, he – it's just – anyways, that is just – okay.
It's like, again, it's like – remember those – did you see Chernobyl?
Those firefighters are like, can you go into the mine and get the uranium out?
Anyways, yeah, so I think Nikki Haley, I think she might be on the ticket.
That's a big old rumor running around.
So let's just see.
Anyway, Scott, we have to go.
But I want to do a shout-out to Abby Weiss who wrote us,
I am enriched and challenged by Pivot.
However, since the iPhone episode, my boyfriend calls it the yelling podcast.
I can't listen when he's in the house.
Thank you, Abby.
I have another shout-out.
Okay.
Okay, so winning strategy, just play to the dog's narcissism.
Terry Kawaja created
Prof G Bingo and distributed a bingo card. So let's play Prof G Bingo. We have a gestalt here
of consensual hallucination, despite the fact Kara and her dreamy hair constantly yells, boom.
I weaponize, or I feel with my access to cheap capital, the big dog can get Netflix, Chipotle, and Cialis.
That is prop G bingo.
That's a bingo.
Terry Kawaja, my Twitter profile, sent out a bingo card.
So thank you, Terry.
Oh, my God.
Chipotle, Cialis.
There you go.
There you go.
There's gangster on there?
I have to look.
Are you kidding?
How could it not be?
I was tiny writing.
I haven't been able to pull it up on a regular computer.
I made my day.
That was really nice of them.
Thank you, Terry.
Terry Kawaja does some very funny things.
Anyway, remember, we love your questions.
If you have a question about a story you're hearing in the news, email us at pivot at voxmedia.com to be featured on the show.
Thank you again, Abby Weiss.
And we will continue yelling and keep your boyfriend.
Kara, have a wonderful weekend.
Thank you. You deserve it. I was thinking about what a good person, a good mother boyfriend. Kara, have a wonderful weekend. Thank you.
You deserve it.
I was thinking about what a good person, a good mother you are.
You deserve a wonderful weekend.
I'm going to surround you with white light weekend light.
I'm away from my kids.
I miss them all.
It's terrible.
But I'm going to a creativity conference called the Box Sessions that Laura Holson, a New
York Times reporter, is running.
And I'm actually interviewing Alex Berg from Silicon Valley and a top HBO executive.
What kind of bullshit is that?
I'm taking Erica Anderson.
What are you going to play with?
Let me guess.
You're going to play with Legos.
Erica Anderson and I are going to go and get creative.
That's what we're going to do in the mountains of beauty near Santa Cruz.
It's very exciting.
That sounds nice.
Take your vape.
Did you not get your invitation?
Oh, I'm sorry.
They only had 1,100 people.
I'm 1,101.
That's true.
Listen to me.
Read the credits and we got to go.
Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis.
Our executive producer is Erica Anderson.
And special thanks to Rebecca Castro and Drew Burrows. Do you feel like your leads never lead anywhere?
And you're making content that no one sees?
And it takes forever to build a campaign?
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It's an AI-powered customer platform that builds campaigns for you,
tells you which leads are worth knowing,
and makes writing blogs, creating videos, and posting on social a breeze.
So now, it's easier than ever to be a marketer.
Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers.
Do you feel like your leads never lead anywhere?
And you're making content that no one sees,
and it takes forever to build a campaign?
Well, that's why we built HubSpot.
It's an AI-powered customer platform that builds campaigns for you,
tells you which leads are worth knowing, and makes writing blogs, creating videos,
and posting on social a breeze. So now it's easier than ever to be a marketer.
Get started at HubSpot.com slash marketers.