The Best One Yet - 🦢 “Ugliest product ever” — Dyson’s cancellation headset. Campbell’s Madden strategy. Amazon’s TikTok zucking.

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

Amazon’s newest product is a TikTok-style video shopping feed, but it’s not to compete with TikTok - it’s to compete with itself. Campbell Soup stock is up 30% this year thanks to Chunky Soup’s Madden strategy. And Dyson just revealed an air-filtering headset with noise cancellation, but it violates the fundamental rule of product design: You can make an ugly product, but you can’t make the person ugly.$CPB $AMZN $AAPLFollow The Best One Yet on Instagram, Twitter, and Tiktok: @tboypodAnd now watch us on YoutubeWant a Shoutout on the pod? Fill out this formGot the Best Fact Yet? We got a form for that tooLearn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Friday, the real Friday. December 9th. And today's pod is the best one yet. It's a T-Boy. Ah, Nick, can you update us on the Elon show, episode 43? Ah, you mean the beds that he ordered?

The beds that he ordered. Yeah, what's going on there? Yeah, Elon ordered some beds to Twitter, apparently because everyone's working so late. Okay, can we move on to the first story? Mattress, mattress, mattress. What's our first story, Jack? Amazon just added something that looks like TikTok right into the Amazon app. Amazon's not competing with TikTok, it's competing with itself.

For our second story, Dyson. Yeah, like the vacuum company, they just unveiled the first ever headset, air filter. And this thing violates our number one rule of product design. And our third and final story is Campbell's Soup. The stock has surged this year because one soup is actually playing bad. Campbell's Chunky Soup has got itself a dude strategy. But Yeties, before we hit that wonderful mix, I love this mix of stories.

This weekend, you're shopping to buy gifts for others. Maybe you're going to slip a little something for yourself into that shopping bag, too. Did you just buy a $500 handbag for yourself this weekend? Yeah, Jack, I just splurged on that thing I won't use. Classic Ti-Woo. Well, you know what, yeties? To quote Goodwill Hunter. It's not your fault.

It's not your fault. No, it's not. Blame your overspending on your latte. Who wasn't you? It was the orange mocha frappuccino. According to a study from the University of South Florida, the more coffee you drink, the more likely you are to overspend. I'm sorry, caffeine made me do it. Yeah.

According to the PhDs, caffeine intake leads the body to shop impulsively. We jumped in T-boy style. That report went on. A higher number of items purchased and a greater number of spending is a result of caffeine on your credit card. Look what you made me do, latte. Look what you did, you little 20-ounce perk. So stores are catching up. Yes, they are.

Stores are giving away free coffee so you spend freely. Because according to the study, shoppers who drank a free coffee while shopping spent 50% more money than those who didn't. Get this, you ended up spending 30% more on those items too. That's why Sacks Fifth Ave is next to Starbucks Fifth Ave. That's why Bloomingdale's got itself a blue bottle.

And targets into Timmy Ho's. Darlita Duncan, she doesn't just double-pump that hazelnut syrup, Jack. What does she do? Those two pumps mean you get a socks hat and a Patriots jersey for yourself. Hey, Amex, the Machiato made me do it. Yetis, let's hit our three stories. Fifteen years before this song, two boys from the Northeast met in the dawn. 50% that's a 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. For our first story, Amazon just launched a TikTok feed in their own app for shopping. But is Amazon zucking or is it disrupting? Before we start this, Amazon, it's Jack and it? It's us. Don't take it personally that I don't own shares of you. But Jack does.

Jack does. And Amazon, here's the thing. Here's the thing. The first step is admitting that you got a problem. Yeah. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon. That's the problem.

Yeah, Amazon stock. It's fallen 50% in the last year. According to the Wall Street Journal, customer satisfaction among Amazon shoppers has been slipping for two straight years. Just a couple weeks ago. Jack and I told you Amazon let go of 10,000 employees. Holiday sales are expected to be below expectations for Amazon. Santa Watch 2020 is not looking so good over at Amazon.

Plus, Amazon now faces online competition from TikTok. Are you talking about that TikTok story? We covered the other day, Jack? TikTok is hiring for e-commerce and fulfillment roles. TikTok is coming for Amazon as Amazon is down on the ground with a pulled hamming. It's TikToking Amazon while it's down. Since Jeff Bezos left Amazon as CEO, Amazon has just lost its mojo.

But the new CEO seems to have found a way to get out of Bezos' shadow. And here is Amazon's plan, Zuck TikTok. Like everyone else. They're going to copy TikTok like pretty much every other media company out there. Yesterday, Amazon started rolling out new updates to the app

with Inspire right in there. Interesting term, it's called Inspire. And you can see this maybe in your app. is a light bulb icon in the bottom of the Amazon app. It's one of the tabs and it's dedicated to short form video. We're talking a customized feed of videos but 100% focused on Amazon shopping. You're going to see videos of clothing, of furniture, of pets, of skin care. And in every video, the highlight isn't the influencer.

It's the one click to add it to your Amazon cart. So you're not going to see a video of a dancing cat. Unless that dancing cat's khaki pants happened to be sold on Amazon Jack. And you're not going to see a two-minute makeup tutorial either. Unless that mascara is also sold on Amazon, Jack. True. In fact, don't you remember that Amazon was recruiting influencers, online social media influencers, for months? Jack, we did that story over the summer about the Amazon Mexico resort where they were recruiting influencers.

Now we see what they were really up to. We're not buying that slamming salmon sweater unless it's dancing like Shakira, Jack. In the Amazon app. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at... Amazon. Amazon's biggest challenge is switching from search to discovery. Okay, Yetis, here's what we actually found fascinating about this story. There is one data point that reveals the real problem facing Amazon, and that data point, 25%. 25% of purchases on Amazon are executed in less than three minutes. That's it. You are in and out, you make the purchase as quickly as possible. Now,

that means that quick three-minute purchase, it means you had intent. You knew what you wanted, You bought it, you searched for it on Amazon, and you got it. Look, Amazon has dominated search for online shopping, but it fails at discovery for online shopping. And discovery is where the big money is. Discovery is when you swipe through videos, you feel inspired, so you splurge on that cute top you suck. When you search, you're buying one thing at its lowest price. But when you discover something, you toss in a bunch of things to the shopping cart that has the highest fabulous. That's a real thing.

the highest amount of fabulous. So Amazon isn't really zucking TikTok here. It's disrupting itself. It's trying to transform from search to discovery. For our second story, Dyson, the vacuum legend startup, just launched a noise-canceling air purifying headset thing that we had to jump into T-boys. More like a helmet thing,

because this thing breaks our number one rule of product design. Yeties, if you're having a tough day and you just failed at something, you should hear this. Enjoy failure and learn from it. Because you never learn from success. That's a quote from Mr. James Dyson, who failed a lot before success. Well, let's back up to 1978. That's when a young James Dyson bought a Hoover vacuum.

He and his family hated that Hoover vacuum. Hated it. He tried inventing his own vacuum. He had to eliminate all these vacuum bags. Those bags were the worst. His goal was to develop a vacuum that you did. He didn't have to buy 100 vacuum bags for. So it took him 5,000 tries.

He failed at 5,000 prototypes. It just wasn't looking good. But then, on try number 5,126, he succeeded. Boom, fast forward to today. The Dyson vacuum is now one of the top selling in the world. And Jack, what kind of revenues are they bringing in on this thing? Dyson does $7 billion a year in revenue. And it also cleans up seven billion Cheerios a year with that vacuum.

We should make one correction here, though, Jack. That is Sir Dyson to us. That's Sir Dyson because Queen Elizabeth II knighted him. He was a big fan of Brexit, but then he moved the headquarters of the company to Singapore. Now, yet he's here's why Jack and I wanted to talk about Dyson. They seem to be using the one plus one equals three strategy for their newest product. You ready for the latest product next? Talk to us, Jack.

A noise-canceling headset air purifier. At the same time. That's right. They just launched an air-purifying noise-canceling headset. It's a one of a kind baby. This thing's got no precedent. It's unprecedented. It's $950 because there's a 10,000 RPM motor on this headset that cleans the air before you breathe.

Okay, that's one half of it. What's the other half, Jack? There's eight microphones that listen to the world and then cancel that noise before it hits your ear. Okay, so this is a headset with bulky earphones that cover your ears. That's the noise-canceling headphone part. But it's also a face mask that wraps around. around your head and covers your whole mouth. That's the air purifying part.

So the target here, I think we got to go with hyper-specific, Jack. It is a commuter in a loud, polluted city who has a lot of money right now. We think that's who they're targeting. Like someone who is paranoid of germs, but really likes pure-sounding music. Now, Jack and I jumped in Devois style here, and this thing looks less like a headset and more like an aggressive snowmobile helmet. It'll protect the wear from noise and pollution. It will.

But it's going to scare the lady standing next to him. It reminds us of that scene from the mask when the mask eats Jim Carrey's entire face. You got to see it to believe. So, Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies who are expanding over at Dyson? This product breaks our number one rule of product design. The ugly rule. Yeties, this is a very nuanced rule. Here's the rule.

You can make an ugly product, but you can't make the user ugly. And this Dyson, it's not a headset, it's a helmet, Nick. It is more like a helmet jacket. You look like Bain from the Dark Night when you're wearing. Now, Jack and I should point out, we've seen ugly products succeed before. The dad's shoe is a raging trend right now. It is. Crocs, how are Crocs doing, Jack?

They're top selling, like of all time. But this is the key distinction. You can't cross the line of making the user ugly. That's why Google Glass never took off. It's why Facebook's virtual reality headset have not sold mainstream at all. Those products can mess with your face to the point that wearing them

can just look bad. Those products, they broke the ugly rule. A product can be ugly, but it just can't make you ugly. Now, a word about our sponsor, Robin Hood. You know, honestly, your salad, it says so much about you. Nick, you like to blaze your own trail

at the salad bar. I'm ordering a salad. I go off menu, man. Like a combo of kale and croutons that has never been made. before. Me? I'm not reinventing the wheel. I like to go classic. If Sweekerian thinks it's a good combo, Jack's not going to change that. Kind of like investing strategies. Some want to build a custom portfolio of stocks,

crypto, and options. Others don't want to reinvent. Just give me the most standard ETF. Whether you're tweaking your one-of-a-kind portfolio every day or prefer a more hands-off approach, Robin Hood has the tools. If you're not investing on Robin Hood yet, to get started, go to robin hood.com slash T-boy to choose your free stock. That's robinette.com slash T-B-O-Y. limitations apply. Stocks offered by Robin Hood Financial LLC, member SIPC. Crypto offered through Robin Hood all investments involve risk. By the way, this podcast is not owned or part of Robin Hood, and we are not employees of Robin Hood. For our third and final story before the weekend, Campbell's Soup has become one of the surprising best performing stocks of the entire year. Campbell Soup. And it's all thanks to video games, to Madden Action. Can I ask you an existential question?

Sure, hit me. Does one eat soup or does one drink soup? Eat, definitely. There is a spoon involved and it is a liquid jack. There's a spoon involved in cereal too. You eat that. Unless he's a straw. No one uses cereal with a straw.

Yet. That is a classic U-Ly. Yetty siff on this. Campbell's soup stock is up a shock in 30% this year while the market is down. Campbell Soup Company is number four. 40 on the S&P 500 leaderboard this year. For years, Campbell's soup suffered, struggled as millennials spat out their condensed soup.

But sales jumped 15% last quarter, and we want to know why. Yeah, Jack and I jumped into the earnings, and the thing we want to know is what was it? What was the top product and why did it succeed? The top product was Campbell's Chunky Soup, and it succeeded because of their guy on a couch strategy. Campbell's Chunky Soup. The only soup was more protein than broth. For five straight quarters, Campbell's Chunky Soup has been gaining market share in Big Soup. The only soup that could stuff five types of livestock into a drink.

It's not a drink. And don't try to pull that on me. You definitely drink it, Jack. Yet he's Jack and I have said before, meet the customer where they are. That's a marketing move. But better yet, meet them where they play. Yeah. Well, the top TV commercial when Jack and I were grown up, what was that commercial, Jack?

It was the Campbell's Chunky Soup commercial. You had Jerome Bettis, the bus, and his mom telling him to eat Campbell's Chunky soup. We're talking about pro football players and their moms. Their moms became celebrities. That chunky soup ad, that's what we're talking about. And it wasn't just Jerome Bettis. Campbell's picked an NFL player and their mom from each NFL fan base for a commercial. We're talking about a commercial campaign that lasted for two decades, 40 players, and 40 moms.

But did you notice those commercials aren't around anymore? Did you notice that in 2019, the CEO of Campbell's Soup was a new CEO who canceled the campaign? Instead, he made a pivot. He wanted to reach the same guy sitting on a couch watching football, but in a more engaged channel. And in a much cheaper way. So Campbell's Soup shifted all the money they were putting into Campbell's Chunky Soup commercials from TV over to Madden. They put the Campbell Chunky Soup money into Madden video games. Baby. Madden, the classic football game for PlayStation Xbox, whatever. Yet he's logging to Madden right now, the legendary football video game, and you can compete online against other players in the chunky soup bowl invitational tournament. Millions did, and they saw helmets with chunky noodle soup all over them.

The details won even deeper. There are soup stains, we noticed, on the jerseys of the players in these video games. Instead of TV commercials, they took over this online e-spouse. Madden tournament. Two years after pivoting from TV, the top Campbell's Soup product is Chunky Soup. Chunky Soup met the audience, guys on a couch, where they play. So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies and their moms over at Chunky Soup? Reinvention is the mother of relevance. Yeties, the best way to stay relevant isn't to change the product, the recipe, or the logo. It's to change the message. Campbell Chunky Soup is an iconic product. You don't want to mess with the recipe or the brand. But Jack and I have noticed old brands can't just hope for nostalgia to charge their

sales. They must reinvent their message. Chunky didn't reinvent their product, but they did reinvent how they speak to customers. Campbell Soup's pivot from TV to video games is a reminder of what brands learn over and over and over again. Reinvention is the mother of relevance. Jack, can you whip up the takeaways for us for the real Friday? Amazon has zucked TikTok's vertical short form video feed. Or has it? It's actually disrupting itself, going from search to discovery. Dyson is crushing it with their vacuums.

We're not so sure about the noise and germ cancelling helmet. Because it breaks our number one fundamental rule of product design. And what is it, Jack? A product can be ugly, but it can't make you ugly. It can't make you ugly. Our third and final story is Campbell's Soup. They are a standout stock this year, led by their chunky soup brand. Because reinvention is the mother of relevance.

Now, time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by legendary Yeti Savannah Westwood down in Orlando, Florida. We hope you have the pleasure of whipping up a gingerbread house for your holiday party. Jack, are you in the pod sun going to whip up a gingerbread house this weekend? Oh, we sure are. I bet you are. You better do that. Well, the earliest known recipe for gingerbread goes way back to ancient Greece, 2400 BC.

Now, here's the big innovation. In the 1500s, Queen Elizabeth I of England is credited with making them cookies. And decorating them. In fact, Queen Elizabeth I was famous for decorating gingerbread cookies with icing at massive at massive scale. At scale. Yeah. The Queen of England shaped her gingerbread cookies to look like nobles who visited her at court,

like a court jester. Every one of the nobles, a tradition that continues in some form. kind of today? Not the gum drop buttons. Yetis, you looked fantastic all week. And remember, don't just celebrate the wins this weekend. Get yourself a double-digit latte and treat yourself to that cute top. It's not your fault.

It's the Macchiato's fault. Anything with the highest fabulous, right, Jack? Exactly. The highest fabulous. Nick and I, we'll see you on that. Can we. And before we go, congratulations to Yeti Dean Hwang, who just, spot an apartment down in New York

City. He's got a housewarming party this Saturday over at Deans. Party at Deans. And Taylor is getting married on Saturday in London, Jack, same day as the England-France World Cup game. I hope you have an outdoor viewing situation. And Chris Mejia and the

Riverside Community College Tigers are playing in the California State Football Championship. Go Tigers. And good luck to Brian Evans who's finishing finals over in Cambridge right now. To Kieran, Diana. a happy 16 year anniversary down in East North Port, Long Island. And happy anniversary to Jorge and Amanda, who have been boyfriend and girlfriend for some

number of years in Highland, Michigan. And a happy birthday to Mayank Hirani over in New Delhi, India. And happy 33rd birthday to Lorraine Di Chaco in Las Vegas, Nevada. And Andrew Kayser's turning 21 in Caledonia, Michigan. Happy 30th to Ben Myers in Boulder, Colorado. And happy birthday to Kristen Michael. Charlotte, North Carolina. Happy 27th birthday to Maria Puenta over a state dinner down in Dallas, Texas.

And Kelsey Odom has got a birthday down in St. Louis. And happy birthday to Victoria Pereja in Houston, Texas. And Molly Miller just got a job offer on her 30th birthday in Illinois. Not too shabby. And happy birthday and third year T-Boyversary to Cheryl Haggard in Frederick, Colorado. This is Jack. I own stock of Amazon and Crocs, and Nick and I both own stock of Apple and Robin Hood. Now, a word about our sponsor, Robin Hood.

You can do just about anything from your phone, but some industries, they've just been slow to move. The finance industry was slow to move from phone to computer, and then from computer to app. Robin Hood wasn't. It's the Silicon Valley-based brokerage that's been updating app since it was born in 2015. Using the Robin Hood app for your stocks and crypto is almost as easy as downloading it. So you can invest to your pace on your terms by downloading the Robin Hood app. If you're not investing on Robin Hood yet, to get started, go to robin hood.com slash t-boy and choose your free stock.

That's Robinhood.com slash T-B-O-Y limitation supply. Stocks are offered by Robin Hood Financial LLC, member SIPC. Crypto offered through Robin Hood. All investments involve risk. By the way, this podcast is not owned by or part of Robin Hood, and we are not employees of Robin Hood. First of all, I could tell that you pivoted midway through a few of those to adjust. seamlessly, Jack.

That was a pro move. I could tell I was like, oh, wow, he's going in the wrong direction on this. You were like having a birthday over steak dinner. It was like a great reveal. Dude, it was a master class.