The Best One Yet - 🦺 “How Vests Won Wall St” — Vest Szn. Duolingo’s unhinged mistake. Air Travel’s Expedia moment. +AI Dog Pawdcasters

Episode Date: November 10, 2025

It’s Vest Season… So we tracked the history of Corporate America’s fave fashion to 1666.Duolingo’s stock had its worst day ever… because its Owl Mascot wasn’t unhinged *enough*.Expedia’s stock jumped to an all-time high Friday… changing the narrative on the economy.Plus, the newest trend in Podcasting is Pawdcasting… AI dogs are topping the charts.$SBUX $DUO $GS $EXPENEWSLETTER:https://tboypod.com/newsletter OUR 2ND SHOW:Want more business storytelling from us? Check our weekly deepdive show, The Best Idea Yet: The untold origin story of the products you're obsessed with. Listen for free to The Best Idea Yet: https://wondery.com/links/the-best-idea-yet/NEW LISTENERSFill out our 2 minute survey: https://qualtricsxm88y5r986q.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_dp1FDYiJgt6lHy6GET ON THE POD: Submit a shoutout or fact: https://tboypod.com/shoutouts SOCIALS:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tboypod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tboypodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tboypod Linkedin (Nick): https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolas-martell/Linkedin (Jack): https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-crivici-kramer/Anything else: https://tboypod.com/ About Us: The daily pop-biz news show making today’s top stories your business. Formerly known as Robinhood Snacks, The Best One Yet is hosted by Jack Crivici-Kramer & Nick Martell. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. Welcome back to the Beacon of Business. It is Monday, November 10th, and today's pod is the best one yet. This is a T-boy. The Beacon of Business. We're trying something new on today. But Jack, congratulations on the weekend.

How to go down there, man. So we did our first family trip to New York City, and we all flew down there on Friday for just two nights in the city. Okay, you just do two days Central Park. Honestly, that's an entire trip, man. Here's the itinerary. Saturday morning, we were at the Natural History Museum. As it opened at 10 o'clock. Got to be there.

Amazing time. Perfect. Then we went into the Central Park Boat House for lunch. That was a scene. It's a boozy scene, yeah. Couple cocktails later and like six portions of macaroni and cheese. We just walked around Central Park while the boys fell asleep in the stroller. We hit up three different playgrounds by the end of the day.

Wonderful, wonderful day in the city. Central Park's got to have the highest concentration of playgrounds in the country. I mean, there is nothing like skinning your knee on one of those bricks and concrete structures, Jack. And we closed it all down with a cash-only Italian restaurant on the Upper West Side. If it's cash-only, you know it must be good. Oh, and the black and white cookies, Jack. Well, I'm so glad he had a fantastic time, man. It's just an amazing place for kids, and everyone forgets that.

Yeah, and he's get this. At the hotel, Nick had a gift waiting for me. It was three different children's books all set in New York City. The kids were in the park. They may as well see it in the books, too. I'm going to read them. Eloise goes to New York. night. Eloise and Lyle Crocodile, Jack, they know we got three fantastic stories for today's show.

What do we got on the pod, man? For our first story, we just experienced the worst travel day of the year. 1,100 flights were canceled this weekend. Luckily, neither of mine. But besties, if you really want to understand the travel industry right now, you got to look at Expedia. For our second story, it's finally here. It's officially vest season, because vests are the unofficial uniform of finance and tech. So Jack and I did the research and discovered how the vest has taken over every industry. And our third and final story is Duolingo. Duolingo had its worst day on the stock market ever, plummeting 29% for one wild reason. Duolingo's crazy owl mascot was not unhinged enough.

But before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. Fantastic mix of stories, Jack, love the mix today. But some new competition, Nick, I think you should know about. Yeah, besties, it's not another podcast. Jack and I are facing a podcast. Pod. P-A-W. Oh, it's a podcast. It's a podcast with dogs as the co-hosts. Get this. The fastest growing podcast show right now, it's hosted by dogs, a podcast. The co-hosts are a couple of AI dog podcasters, and apparently they're hilarious. The context to sprinkle on, the name of this podcast is the dog pack.

Dogpack is actually an app that lets dog owners connect with each other. But to get attention, they created a fake podcast with dog hosts. And now this real show, has fake AI dogs talking about their real canine problems. The canine coaster AI, but the human listeners have been real. What kind of stuff are you going to hear on this podcast, Jack? The Spunky Rottweiler's like, Pro Tip, bro. If you beg for your food, they give it to you nine out of ten times. Okay, what is that Chihuahua saying on the five, though?

Get a load of this guy. He recently switched me from wet dog food to dry dog food. Yeah, it's hard to compete with these guys. Now, this dog cast has boosted the app's usage to 2 million users in 20 different countries. And now they're counting their downloads in doggy years. It's so popular, Dog Talk just signed a talent agency deal with WMB to get a bunch of brand deals. If Chewy doesn't buy these guys, they must be cat people over there. But on a serious note, this actually highlights an interesting angle about artificial intelligence.

Yes, it does, Jack, because when AI is replacing a human, many find it problematic. When AI pretends to be a real human, we don't like that at all. But if the AI is being clearly absurd, like it is with these puppies, we actually improve. erase it. Nobody's pretending to be real here. Yeah, as far as we know, there haven't been any podcast hosted by real Rottweilers out there. This is just good, clean, AI, canine

fun. So, besties, smash that subscribe button. We mean lick that subscribe button. And remember, dogs are way more fun than cats. All the one-star reviews on this show, they're left by cats. Can you imagine that the cats were hosting a podcast, Jack? A lot of silence and a lot of judgment.

True. Jack, let's sit down three stores. 15 years before this song Two boys from the Northeast met in the dawn They had an idea to cause a cultural storm It's the best one yet But that's it I don't even think they need to practice

50% that's a fat tip Tea Boy City on your at list If you know you know because we're ready to go We can't wait no more So just start the show First a quick word from our sponsor Our first story Expedia's booking boom is defying

the economic doom. Nick, the entire travel industry is still seeing record high demands because one trip you did looks like five trips to Wall Street. Well, explain. But besties, in the meantime, while you're listening to our show, Google the word travel, and you're going to see headlines about the FAA cut in flights because of the government shutdown. New York to Nashville, never departing. Yeah, delayed forever. But if you do look up travel instead in the Google Finance tab, you're going to see a lot of Because Expedia stock soared by 17% on Friday to an all-time high on news of their best quarterly earnings ever. Now, yet he's this shocked us.

And why is that, Jack? We've covered the weak jobs market in America. We've covered the young people's recession happening in America. Gen Z is basically not even buying Chipotle anymore. Yeah, because the guac and the meat is extra. But the miles are calling and I must go, apparently. And besties, we can see your wild Key West Party weekend in the numbers from Expedia. Expedia's operating profit was the best on record sending the stock to an all-time high.

I'd press that cha-ching button again, Jack. But besties, here's what we find fascinating. Just the sheer scale of this, like $31 billion worth of travel? That was booked across Expedia's three travel brands in just the last three months. It's like five lifts. Expedia, Hotels.com. Verbo, best growth in the U.S. travel demand in three years for all three of them. The CEO said on the earnings call that Americans are staying longer and working further in advance than they usually do.

So basically you spend a couple extra days in the Dolomites and you planned that epic trip a year ago. Which is strange. More travel? It's not what you'd expect from an anxious consumer who's cutting back on Chipotle burritos. And yet these earnings are a data point of consumer confidence at least in the entire travel industry. And Expedia is not just seeing travel growth from medallion travelers, platinum upgrading, they're everything. Yeah, this isn't Amex money we're talking right now, is it Jack? No, they're seeing it across income levels. Yeah, people hate Disney World's price hikes, but you're still hanging out with goofy and having fun while you're there. They're still going.

In fact, the CEO of Expedia is so confident right now. She forecast 6 to 8% revenue growth for the fourth quarter that we're already in. Let's just hope the government shutdown ends so that those bookings can actually happen. So Jack, what's the takeaway for all our buddies looking at the travel industry? You don't just travel from A to B. You travel from A to B to C to D, then back to A. Besties, Jack and I have talked to about the money multiplier effect. Basically, an economic concept that spending multiplies as you spend.

Because when you buy something, that becomes someone else's income. And then they buy something, which is someone else's income, and it goes on and on and on. And you know what? We're seeing it right now in travel. because maybe you booked a flight to Miami on Expedia. You also booked accommodations for that trip. Maybe on Airbnb. They announced record bookings last quarter.

And Jack, you probably booked a Lyft to get from the airport to that Airbnb. And Lyft also just announced record earnings last quarter. But why were you in Miami in the first place? Probably to see Lady Gaga's Mayhem tour. Perfect timing, Jack, because Live Nation, which sold you those tickets, said the word record nine times in their latest earnings. All of these travel earnings bananas. Tell us two things. First, the post-pandemic demand for travel and IRL experiences is still very strong.

And second, that the money multiplier effect is happening in travel. Because you don't just travel from A to B. You travel from A to B to C to D back to A. Taxi! For our second story, Duolingo just had its worst stock market day ever, plummeting 23% in just hours. The reason? Their owl isn't unhinged enough. We repeat, the owl should have been more unhinged. It proves that the most important thing at this tech company is its social media team. Now, yet, he's funny situation, Jack and I have with the co-founder and CEO Luis Vanon of Duolingo, the language learning app. Well, we interviewed him in April.

He came on our show, announced a new product, chess. Yeah. And the stock rose 60% in the three weeks after he came on, T-Boy. Not too shabby. Jack and I have been telling people come on the pod. We basically end up boosting your stock. Not too bad. But apparently that was the peak because Duolingo stock has erased all of those gains and more since.

Investors, apparently they've been lost in translation. And we know the date and the place where that stock downfall began. April 28th on LinkedIn. Now, Basties, Jack and I have never seen someone get canceled on LinkedIn before, but Luis von On, CEO of Duolingo basically did. Yeah, well, he posted his internal memo on artificial intelligence. It said that Duolingo would not hire anybody unless the managers could prove that AI can't do the job instead. Ah, the infamous AI memo. It made their workers anxious, made other workers anxious, and made a whole lot of people mad, really on LinkedIn.

Kind of looked heartless. Yeah, Jack, what's the Spanish word for, uh-oh? I don't know. But for the first time, Duolingo was in the cultural doghouse, so they made a big decision. What was? They told their social media team to stand down. They stood down. Jack, you're going to have to.

to sprinkle on some more TikTok context for us, please. It's a big deal that Duolingo's social media team went dark. Because even though it's a language tech company, they're famous for their social media mascot. Yeah. The owl. The naughty green owl. Yeah, I was going to say on a hinge, but I like how you went naughty on that one, Jack.

What the owl does has nothing to do with conjugating French verbs. It's just a freaky owl that makes you feel kind of weird that you haven't opened the app yet. That uncomfortable duolingo owl has amassed a very real 17 million TikTok. TikTok followers. No other brand social media is even close to as big as Duolingoes. McDonald's, they're sitting at like 5 million TikTok followers. But in the face of that AI pushback from the memo that the CEO published, Duolingo put that naughty owl on pause. The CEO, Luis Von On, revealed it last week in the earnings. We passed on all the unhinged posts

in our social media for a bit. Why? Because we were listening to our community. He said, aka we were in the social media doghouse. Yeah, and the old Instagram. doghouse. So no surprise, the number of likes on TikTok for Duolingo fell from 90 million a month earlier in the year to just $5 million a month recently. But what was a surprise for us? That the weakness on social media translated to weakness in their core business. Because Basties, Duolingo not going viral, led to their daily active users growing by the smallest percentage in years. From going 50% per quarter to just 36% per quarter. I, Carumba Jack, as they say in German, das is an problem. Nick.

Not possible, besties. What we're saying is that Duolingo's unhinged owl stop being unhinged on Instagram, and people stopped using the language app. Strange reason to learn German because a fake owl on Instagram told me too. Do you know how to say owl in German, Jack? I think it's just owl, actually.

Sounds like you don't know. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Duolingo? The most important team at a tech company can actually be at social media. team. Yeties, two months ago, Jack and I noticed that a leader on Duolingo's social media team stepped down so a new job posting went up. And guess what the salary was for this new job posting? $342,000 to manage a fake owl. Sit down, stand up and cash that check again. That is the same salary for social media as for top engineering tech jobs. Best is this combination of that job posting

and this earnings report have made a very powerful statement. And here, It's time to value the social media role with the value it creates and deserves. You see, for apps that depend on you opening them, like Duolingo, social media is a powerful opening tool. So Duolingo's social media manager is getting paid the same as meta's engineers are. Yeties, your top team may actually be your TikTok team. Now a quick word from our sponsor. For our third and final story, Besties, it's that special time of year vest season. From Wall Street to Silicon Valley.

We unzipped the story on how the vest took over corporate America's wardrobe. We did. And it goes back 359 years. And yes, I put on a vest for this story. Honestly, Jack, it looks like that vest put on you. That thing's huge. You know what it's like out there? The leaves are changing.

The football's playing. It is officially vest Vember, baby. Only two more weeks before you got to add sleeps. So enjoy it. The vest. part of the uniform of corporate America during shoulder season. What else we got, Jack? beige slacks, brown leather, uncomfortable shoes. A button-up white, blue, or pink shirt, and it's all wrapped together in a gray vest with an ambiguous bank logo. Yes, since Patagonia put the

cabosh on the finance-branded vest back in 2021, white-collar workers have had to adapt, and they have. I've seen some out there wearing quilted insulated vests like barbores, and others wear huge puffy vests like me. The vest is kind of a career flex, a little bit of a status symbol, right? Like, you know, you got the Arcterics if you made VP or the Zara if you're, you know, entry-level insurance. Or the Cotopaxi, if you want everyone to think that you're, I don't know, a sustainability-minded guy. But Vestis add-all up and they all scream, I'm investing literally. But you can't mark the Vest's performance. It's the only fashion to defy cyclicality. That's right. Because in the 2010s, the vest expanded beyond finance bros to tech and commercial real estate.

Any sector adjacent to cash flow, you're going to see guys wearing vests. And that is why, in addition to cuffing season, it's officially vesting season. But Nick, the origin of the vest. Who invented the vest? You did some research on this. Oh, yeah, we jumped in T-boy style. The inventor of the vest was King Charles II of England back in 1666. Here was his vision.

A British fashion item to take on the French and tied together the whole outfit. I mean, Jack, if you think about it, you can picture the red coats wearing vest during the Revolutionary War. Yeah, under their red jackets was a white vest. And for the next three centuries, that vest remained formal menswear until 1979. That's when Patagonia entered the scene. And eventually, the apparel made for mountain climbers got taken over by ladder climbers. From mountains and altitudes to mergers and acquisitions. But yet is what really fascinated us about the vest. What really stands out is not just the time length, but the acceleration of the vest. Get this. From 2015 to 2018, Moose Jaws sales of vests rose by 700%.

And Jack and I have identified three fascinating reasons why the vest experienced a surge. Number one, a practical reason, air conditioning. Yeah, in the 20th century, trading floors on Wall Street began to be jacked up with AC. I think they do this to keep their workers on edge. Like, a cold worker is a hardworking worker. You think you're going to keep yourself warm by spreading those spreadsheets. That giant vest alleviates the chill. The second reason for the vest surge is hilariously, regulations.

That's right, regulations. Because in finance, you are not allowed to gift a client a product worth over $100. So the vest became the perfect $95 fashion gift that didn't violate regulations. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies who are everyone wearing or staring at a vest? Brands want to stand out, but people want to be in a group. So besties, a lot of business just comes down to. Psychonomics, psychological economics, and the vest is the one garment that effectively reflects your belonging in a group. As one trader put it, you put in the work your whole career to become

VP on the equity research team someday. Well, you know what? The vest with that logo is your only silent way to communicate your accomplishment. You can't customize a suit with a brand. You can't wear a branded hat to work. That's not in the dress code. And you can't stick a corporate logo on sneakers. But the vest can become a tiny billboard of industry and achievement. Fashion's business card, signaling that you belong. Creatives have their branded mullskin notebooks, startup workers have their branded hoodies. But finance has the vest, because in every industry, there's a craving to signal you're part of the tribe. Jack, could you whip up the takeaways for us to kick off the week? Expedia stock hit an all-time high on record U.S. travel bookings last quarter. Because one trip you do

looks like five trips to Wall Street. And that is the money multiplier effect in travel. For our second story, Dualingo's daily active users slowed big time after they put their unhinged social media owl in the cage. The owl needs to be more unhinged. The most important team at a tech company can be its social media team. And finally, it's officially vest season. Not just for finance, bros, for all of corporate America. The vest. It's your subtle, wearable business card because people want to belong. But besties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, Waymo won't stop, baby. Detroit, San Diego, Las Vegas. Apparently they are all getting Waymo

starting next year. This time, Waymo didn't announce Uber or Lyft as a partner for those three cities. And second, the Trump administration is eager to respond to last week's elections so they floated a new idea to address affordability. The 50-year mortgage. Trump's housing director said he's working on it after Trump tweeted about it. In the tweet, President Trump compared himself to FDR, who is the president who brought us the 30-year mortgage. If the 50-year mortgage becomes real, we're cover it. But right now, it's just a tweet. And finally, Sweet Green is selling off its robot salad making business. That's right, the infinite kitchen is no longer a sweet green salad product. We interviewed the Sweet Green co-founder last year and talked about this.

We did. It's core to the strategy to use robots to scale salads more efficiently. Interestingly, Sweet Green bought this infinite kitchen technology for $50 million a few years ago, and now they're selling it to Wonder for $186 million. Ironically, we interviewed the CEO of Wonder as well. It seems like every time we interview someone, something good happens, but then something not so great happens, Jack. Now, we should clarify, Sweet Green, we'll continue using the Infinite Kitchen, but not as the owner, just as a client.

She could still get your robos salads. Now, time for the best fact yet, which, because it's Monday, means T-boy trivia. Jack, what do we got? we asked you about the origin of the name Oreo. And there's no answer. It's actually a corporate mystery. Here's a question about Oreos we do have an answer for. Who is more likely to twist open an Oreo before eating it?

Men or women? That's right. Who is more likely to scrape off the cream filling with their front teeth like it's a snowplow? Men or women, guys or gals? The answer to this Oreo conundrum comes into tomorrow's pod. Yetis, you look fantastic to kick off the week. Jack, you look fantastic considering all the travel you've done lately. But by way, we got to share.

You got to tell the Yetis your cake story. We're at this great New York diner on the Upper West Side. What's it called, Nick? Viont, classic. And Wilder was having to meltdown because his coloring wasn't working right. And some anonymous angel on the other side of the restaurant sent us a slice of chocolate cake to make Wilder get in a better mood. It worked perfect.

Perfectly. And then a couple minutes later, I go to the other side of the restaurant to thank somebody, and they were gone. It was truly just a silent angel looking after our family. So whoever this cake saint was, you may be listening, you may be not, but we just want to thank you for making Jack's son, the pod son, happy. It was an incredible anonymous donation, which leads to a new insight. If you get kids cake, they stop screaming. Besties, we'll see tomorrow. And before we go, a congratulations to Eddie's Catherine and Jimmy in Brooklyn, New York,

who are celebrating the best wedding yet. You guys look fantastic. Congratulations to John and Danny Gill in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who just got married. And a happy birthday to Shee Dawn in Boston celebrating just aside Boston. Happy birthday to Jamie Talbot in South Jordan, Utah. And we definitely know Jamie had cake. And Nick Alves is turning 31 years old down in Hotland of Georgia. to Ellie Scripps in Denver, who just got a new job in sales.

And Krista Gilley, happy new job down in Nashville. Congratulations. And a big shout out and kind of apology to Nick Jordan. Yeah, yeah. We said last week he was turning four, like it's his fourth birthday. It's actually four years he's been at his job. So he's very much not four years old. Much a lot older than four.

Our bad Nick. Great guy, though. Great guy. We'll celebrate your birthday. This is Jack. I own stock of Lyft. and Nick and I both on stock of Airbnb and Chipotle.