The Best One Yet - 🦋 “Take me to DollyWood” — Dolly Parton’s $600M empire. Wall Street’s Super Six Stocks. Bilt’s credit card for rent.

Episode Date: January 26, 2024

Dolly Parton just launched a new album, a new food brand, and celebrated a 78th birthday — So we jumped in TBOYstyle to the $600M conglomerate of DollyWood.Wall Street just hit a record high and everyone’s crediting “The Magnificent 7” stocks — But we think it’s really “The Super 6”... because 1 should be out.And Bilt hit a $3B valuation for letting you pay your rent with a credit card (and earn points) — How does this business model work? An alliance of 4 million apartments… and a lot of loyalty.$META $GOOG $AMZN $AAPL $NVDASubscribe to our newsletter: tboypod.com/newsletterWant merch, a shoutout, or got TheBestFactYet? Go to: www.tboypod.comFollow The Best One Yet on Instagram, Twitter, and Tiktok: @tboypodAnd now watch us on Youtube Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Friday, the real Friday, January 26th. And today's pod, it is the best one yet. Jack, this is just a T-boy. It's the top three pop business news stories you need to know today. Jack, do you see what I have in my hand? I'm holding it up to the camera.

Is that a Hari-Boh gummy bear? It's a Harry-Boh gummer. After recovering, Harvey-Bohs, I figured I grabbed a few. I saw him at L-A-X. You get one for me? Jack, I got you one because I know you like the sours out there. And guess what? What?

Did you know that each of these gummy bears, They put the chest hair on the Haribo gummy bear chest? Bears have chest hair. That's the level of detail of the Haribo Candy Company. Yetis. If you haven't heard that story, we did it earlier this week. Jack, three stories for today's show. What do we got, man?

For our first story, country singer Dolly Parton just celebrated a new birthday, a new food brand, and a new musical album. So Jack and I are looking into the billion-dollar business of Dolly Parton's Dollywood. For our second story, Wall Street is closing the week at another. the record high. And we know exactly which stocks to think. It's not the magnificent seven. It's the super six. And our third and final story is Built. Built just hit a $3 billion valuation for a credit card that lets you earn points on rent. Because your biggest expense may actually be your biggest opportunity. A besties, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories to finish the week.

It's a wonderful mix of stories and I just may eat this gummy bear, Jack. Can we talk about the greatest mysteries of our time. What is the meaning of life? Where does the universe end? And what are those lines on the red solo party cups? What are those lines exactly, man? The red cups. The ones you tip, the ones you flip, and the ones you wonder, what are those horizontal lines? The red solo cups. There's one line at the bottom, one line at the top, and one line kind of in the middle. Well, the solo cup company just officially answered the purpose of those lines. But first, Jack and I got a sprinkle on some context, because Yetis, you know the Red Solo Cup. You held the Solo Cup last weekend at Grandma's Barbecue.

You've held the Solo Cup seven years ago over at the Sigab Basement Beer Pong Party. Oh, here's some context. Solo Cup, the company, was invented way back in 1936. Perfect timing, Jack. That's right after the end of Prohibition. Well, Solo Cubs sells 60% of their cups as Red Cups today. The other 40% are clear cups because you got to make sure that they filled those cups on the other side of the table, buddy, Timmy. But again, the...

The Solo Cup mystery. It's the lines. There are many legends about the purpose of those Solo Cup lines. For example, do the lines indicate drink portions you should fill to? Liquor, then wine, then beer. Or the lines engineering user experience features. Sipability and gripability. Or do the Solo Cup lines mean absolutely nothing?

The Solo Cup lines just arbitrary edges in the cups design. Well, we got the answer. Solo Cup confirmed it. Jack, what is the answer for the reason for those lines on the Red Solo Cups? They're measurements. Their measurements. The lower line measures one ounce. Optimal for liquor.

The middle line measures five ounces. Right sized for rosé. And the top line measures 12 ounces. Which is best for beer. Boom. Mystery solved. Yeties, you're not holding a cup. You're holding a measuring device.

Jack, let's re-rack those three stories. Olympic rings, Jersey Turnpike, or Power Eye? No bounties, no sendbacks. Jack, let's hit him. Fifteen years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dawn. idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best kiss. 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. Start the show. For our first story, just this week, Dolly Parton dropped a brand new album,

launched a new food brand, and celebrated her 78th birthday with a concert. So we jumped into the business of Dolly Parton's Dolly One. Yet is Dolly. Dahlia. It is Dolly. Pardon, she's got the biggest hair east of the Mississippi. Actually, and the biggest hair west of the Mississippi. Now I think about it. You've wrote her songs. Nine to five, Jolene, here you come again. There's literally thousands of others.

Born in a logwood cabin on the Little Pigeon River in lovely Tennessee. She's like Will Hunting. Dolly Parton has 11 siblings. Her first public performance was actually at a church where she was singing by age six. But by 13, she was belting out notes at the famous grand old Oprah. Now, yet he's Jack and I told you. we jumped in T-boy style to Dolly Parton, the legendary country singer, and we found some legendary numbers. She's written 3,000 songs.

She's sold 100 million albums. Those are country music records. And that song catalog from Dolly Parton is worth $150 million. Because all of our listening on Spotify and Apple Music and on the radio, it generates $8 million in annual royalties. Those $8 million are like one big, loud, symphonic dividend change. Jack to Dolly Parton. Now, remember that famous song by Whitney Houston from the movie The Bodyguard? I will always love you.

Classic Whitney Houston song, Jack. Originally, that was Dolly Parton. And she's made $10 million by letting Whitney Houston cover it. In fact, he had he's Elvis Presley and Dolly Parton sang a duet. And Elvis asked Dolly if he could have her rights, her half of the song. And what did she say, Jack? No, thank you, Mr. King. Dolly Pardon, love is like a butterfly.

But in business, she's like a hornet. Yeah, she is. But what separates Dolly from the rest of the musical moguls out there is her business range. This is what Jack and I found fascinating about this story. Dolly Parton has built a more diversified entertainment conglomerate than Disney. Dolly co-founded a TV production company called Sand Dollar Productions, which brought us Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Father of the Bride. If you like those movies, yeah, you can thank Dolly Parton for those two movies. She also built a famous theme park called Dollywood, which gets visited by Thoultry and, 3 million people every year.

It turns out Dollywood is the most visited attraction in the entire state of Tennessee. Like the GDP of Tennessee, Dolly Parton. And Dollywood's worth $400 million. If you're at Cracker Barrel, you can eat a Dolly Parton meal because she partnered with that food chain. Or you can eat on Dolly Parton plates made by William Sonoma. And just this week, Dolly Parton expanded her partnership with the $15 billion food giant Canagra. She already had Dolly Parton buttermilk pancake mix. you can have Dolly Parton frozen fried chicken?

Do I have to wear a bolo if I do a check? A bolo? Somebody hasn't been to the grand old opry. No, I haven't. I'll just go to my list. Oh, Dolly Parton didn't just write a memoir. She also has a line of fiction books. This is amazing.

She wrote a thriller series along with James Patterson based on the stories from one of her albums. Dolly Parden even runs a dog apparel company called Doggy Pardin. Because every beagle needs a blonde wig. But yet he's at all this. up in this business empire is worth over half a billion dollars, and we're not even talking about the charity part, Jack. Dolly Parton is like the Princess Diana of our time. She is philanthropic and loved by everyone for it. Her charity just got $100 million in funding from Jeff Bezos of Amazon.

In November of 2020, early pandemic, when we invented the mRNA COVID vaccine, the New England Journal of Medicine thanked Dolly Parton's COVID-19 research fund, which she established at Vanderbilt, Oh, and by the way, she's also the godmother of Miley Cyrus. Party that in the USA. So Jack wants the takeaway for our buddy, Dolly Parton, Inc. Humor transcends all. Yet he's the biggest business takeaway that Jack and I have gotten from Dolly Parton, it's how she reaches such a wide audience. Dolly Parton manages to reach a range of fans who are culturally quite opposites.

Because Dolly Parton, she's a red state, patriotic, deep south, working class icon. But she's also a top ally of the LGBT community. And a key reason why she's so relatable to everyone, it's because she's funny. She uses humor. Oftentimes, Dolly sounds more like a comedian than a singer or a business woman. She makes fun of her own plastic surgery. Like, she once told Oprah, it takes a lot of money to look

this cheap. She once said, I'm the first woman to burn my bra. It took the fire department four days to put it out. Jack, that's like a feminist thing to say, but like also not a have a thing to say? One thing we've learned in life is that humor can transcend cultural lines like politics, race, and income. And Dolly Parton's billion dollar, Dollywood Empire proves it. For our second story, what's the key driver of the record high stock market right now? Analysts say it's the magnificent seven. But we think the VIP group of elite stocks is really the super six. A couple weeks ago, Jack and I told you about the top stocks of 2023 and who is the

the big surprise, Jack. Abercrombie and Fitch nearly quadrupled in 2023. Abercrombie, popping collars, popping stocks, not too shabby Abercrombie. But Abercrombie and Fitch is not a member of the S&P 500 stock market index. Good point, Jack. We should sprinkle on some context here. The S&P 500 is the 500 biggest stocks in the U.S. and it's the best measurement of the overall U.S. stock market. Well, the New York Times just declared that seven tech stocks are driving the market right now in the S&P 500. Those seven tech stocks are so big and they rose by so much last year that the rest of the stock market almost doesn't even matter. And those seven companies, those seven magnificent companies are Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla.

If we go back to October 2022, that's when stocks bottomed out. Since then, those seven magnificent stocks are up by 60%. 60%. Get this yet, is. Invidia, its stock has quintupled since October 20. And V-Vidia makes the chips that do virtually all of the artificial intelligence computing. And meta, the owner of Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, its stock has tripled since October 2022. Because Zuck enforced his year of efficiency. It's not just those two.

Microsoft and Apple and Amazon, they have all made huge gains in the last year and a half. That's why the magnificent seven are superheroes for the stock market. Like, there's going to do a Marvel movie about this. Is Disney on this? Yeah, we'd pay to see Zuck and Spandex. We'd pay all day. We'd love to see that. Zuck, we're here for it, man. But Nick and I have to remind you, there's 493 other stocks in the S&P 500.

There are 493 other companies saying, hey, those magnificent seven, they're getting all the attention. We're here. We're cool. Since October 2022, those other 493 stocks, they're doing okay. They're up by 25% in that year and a half. But since the S&P 500 is a stock index weighted by the company's size, the seven tech stocks we just mentioned, have you, sway on what direction the index goes. The Magnificent Seven are only seven out of the 500 companies, but they represent a quarter of the S&P 500's weight. And that is why it is thanks to these seven shining magnificent stocks that the market is at a record high. Without the Magnificent 7,

the S&P 500 would be 10 percentage points lower. But Jack and I, we've got a question for the Magnificent 7. We actually have a different number in mind, don't we, Jack? Yeah, one of you don't really belong. It's awkward. Let's get to the takeaway. Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies who are driving the stock market? It's time to kick one stock out of the Magnificent 7. Yet he's funny timing, but just this week,

Tesla had its earnings report, and it announced that sales of their cars rose just 1% compared to last year. That is not magnificent growth. And Tesla admitted that real growth won't return until they finally produce their next generation cheaper car. In fact, while all these big tech stocks are at record highs, what's Tesla stock doing right now, Jack? They're down 50% from their all-time high. And they're down 25% already in 2024.

That's why Jack and I are looking at the numbers here and we're like, we need a new name for these top stocks. And we need a new number for these top stocks. We need a smaller number. It's not the Magnificent 7. It's the Super 6. 10 years ago, all we were talking about was the Fang stocks. And then all we were talking about was the Magma stocks. And now we're talking about the Magnificent 7.

But when you look at the numbers, it's really six stocks that are driving the stock market. The stock market is at record highs thanks to the super six. For our third and final story before the weekend. Built, the company that lets you pay your rent with a credit card just raised $200 million and hit a $3 billion valuation. Built is letting you pay rent with a credit card because it's willing to lose money today to win your loyalty tomorrow. But yet is Jack and I.

I've got to talk about something with you because you've thought of this, but now you're really going to think about this. Rent. Rent is probably your single biggest expense, isn't it? Rent is the biggest single expense for Americans. Or mortgages for homeowners. And yet, you cannot pay your rent and you cannot pay your mortgage using a credit card. Imagine the points you would get. If that huge monthly expense you could pay for with your visa card or your master card. I've already upgraded us to business class on the next trip. I'm loving it, baby. First class from here on. out. It'd be incredible. So when we read about the startup built, we couldn't believe their business model. Because Bill's entire business model is that they let you pay your rent with a credit card.

But how? Right. We didn't think this was possible and why didn't we think it was possible to pay our rent with a credit card, Jack? Landlords, that's why. Because credit cards charge one to three percent on every swipe you make and they charge that three percent to the merchant. It's called the merchant fee. And in the case of rent, the landlord is the money. merchant. And the landlord does not want to pay that swipe tax, Jack, not paying that fee. If you're paying $3,000 for your New York City apartment, the landlord's not going to pay a 3% fee on that huge amount of money. That's why your landlord in Midtown makes a schlep up to 55th Street and drop off a real paper check every time. That's what we had to do in the East Village, Jack. It's a huge frustration, but so many rent payments still have to happen with a paper check. Or if the landlord

does let you pay with a credit card, then they charge you a 3% fee too. They're not paying the merchant fee, but you can if you want. So how did this $3 billion startup figure out how to let you pay your rent with a credit card when that hasn't happened in the history of money? Built figured it out by building an alliance. Yeah, it turns out Bill's business model Yetis is getting four million apartments to basically team up with them. It's called the Built Alliance. A bunch of huge landlords have agreed to have their four million apartments be paid. Be paid. by credit card. Basically, Bill convinced landlords that it was better for their landlord business if you could pay with your credit card. Because if you pay with your credit card, you're more likely to

pay on time. Because mailing a check, that's ancient, that's outdated. And sometimes your paycheck and comes a little after the rents do. Another way that credit card payments help landlords, renters will be thankful that they get to use a credit card and they'll be less likely to leave the building and go somewhere else. So the landlord is going to have fewer months of vacant apartments because you're not leaving that building. You love it so much. You love it so much because you get points every month on that huge rent payment you have to make.

The renter is getting credit and the renter is building points. Not too shabby. Jack, that feels like always. Spring break and abetha because you got to put rent on your card. Jack, you stuck the pronunciation. So, man, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Built?

Built isn't in the credit card business. They're in the loyalty business. Yet he's huge. Huge detail about Bilt we didn't even mention yet. They'll let you pay your rent with a credit card even if your landlord will accept one. If your mom and pop landlord requires an old school check, Bill will send a check on your behalf and take the money from your account. So you'll get credit card points for paying your rent,

even though Bilt didn't receive a merchant fee from anyone. Bilt is willing to write a check for you. Send that check in a mail and give you points out of their own pocket. Now, Built is losing money on everything we just said, but it's doing that because it's making a bet. Their bet is that if they show commitment to you today, you'll show commitment to them tomorrow. As Built launches more profitable products, they're hoping that you'll remember what Bill did for you. How did I afford my cruise to Cartagena? Oh, yeah, from the points I got paying my rent with my Bilt card.

How did I get my first mortgage? Oh, yeah, it was thanks to my credit rating that I built up with Bilt. Now, this could backfire, but Bilt is spoiling you today, hoping that you'll remember the gesture tomorrow. Built is taken a huge risk betting on your loyalty. Because Bilt isn't in the credit card business. It's in the loyalty business. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us for the real Friday? Dolly Parton is still peaking, business-wise, at the age of 78.

Dolly Parton's popularity is so broad because humor transcends all. For our second story, it's the magnificent seven. They get most of the credit for the stock market's record high. But we think Tesla is out. It's really the Super Six. And our third and final story is built. Their valuation just doubled to $3 billion by offering you points on your rent payments. They're not in the credit card business.

They're in the loyalty business. Spoil you today. Remember them tomorrow. But besties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, we just got America's growth. scorecard. Our GDP grew 3.1% for 2023. That is better GDP growth than in any of the five years leading up to the pandemic. And second, the Wall Street Journal just released their airline rankings.

And for the sixth year overall, third year in a row, the number one airline is Delta. Alaska was number two. United was number six. JetBlue was last place. And finally, the tallest building in America could be coming to Oklahoma. Oklahoma City. A developer has pitched a 2,000 foot tall building. Now time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by our buddy Khaled all the way over in Kuwait. Tom Cruise held the Hollywood filming record for holding his breath the longest amount of time underwater. When Tom Cruise was filming Mission Impossible, he was underwater for a few minutes. He was underwater for six minutes. But get this yeties. Kate Winslet, broke Tom Cruise's record while filming Avatar 2.

She held her breath even longer. She held her breath for seven minutes. And what's the record for holding your breath underwater, Jack? I'm looking at the Guinness Book of World Records right now. A 56-year-old man, free diver, held his breath for almost 25 minutes. Not too shabby. I am flabbergasted. I thought like two or three minutes was the most as possible.

I didn't realize humans can hibernate. Underwater. Yeties, you... We're looking fantastic all week. And if you haven't yet, remember to click to follow us so you get T-Boy every day. Follow us, subscribe to us, whatever it is, get your T-boy every day. Celebrate some wins this weekend, maybe with a red solo cuff. And Nick and I, we'll see it Monday.

And before we go, a happy birthday to Leah Cordy, who's turning 25 in Cleveland, Ohio, and her boyfriend, Steve, has a special day plan for her today. First up is breakfast at first watch, followed by a shopping spree. And then a trip to Asia. Yes, we would love to join. Thank you, Steve. Buried the lead on that trip to Asia. And a happy birthday to Austin Jacobs from San Jose,

who's celebrating his 30th in Vegas. Happy birthday to Sebastian Gonzalez in El Paso, Texas, who's celebrating an engagement, a new house, and a birthday. And Colin Van Coonans turned 28 in lovely Conifer, Colorado. Happy birthday to Phoebe Dekandia in Baltimore, Maryland. And Lauren Hopshine of North Carolina is turning 26 on the 26. Big shout out to Denise, who's going to the BU Women's Hockey game to celebrate her birthday just outside Boston. And Jenna Leon is feeling brighter as she turns 35 in Austin, Texas.

And happy 20th birthday to Liam DeVia Bork at UCLA in Bel Air. And Jake Jordan's working in his garage in Atlanta celebrating a birthday under that chest. Happy birthday to David Salpy, from Atlanta or Nashville to Portland. No one really knows. And Sarah Zicar was an OG snacker turned yet he who's turning 30 inless. California. Happy birthday to Carolina Mountain, who's enjoying an English gray tea in Sierra Leone right now. And congratulations to Chris and Maggie, who just got engaged in Hornell, New York. Let's see some ring picks. Congratulations, guys. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon,

and Nick and I both own stock of Apple and ETFs of the S&P 500.