Trading Secrets - 239. Sofia Franklyn: One hoodie making over $1M?! From Stanley Morgan to podcasting, how she built her own empire post-Barstool, being up front about finances and being on her own journey

Episode Date: June 16, 2025

This week, Jason is joined by  social media personality and podcast host, Sofia Franklyn! Sofia established herself as one of the first true podcast success stories while co-hosting the Call Her Daddy podcast during her time at Barstool Sports dating back to 2018. After leaving Barstool Sports in 2020, she then started her own podcast Sofia with an F, which has also proven to be a massive success. Sofia, however, is not just a podcaster but also a trailblazer in her own right, known for her fearless approach to discussing topics such as sex, friendships, and mental health. From her beginnings to her current ventures, Sofia has captivated her audiences with her unique perspective and unwavering authenticity. Sofia opens up about why she keeps her relationships private and how her mom’s past shaped her dating standards. She unpacks the viral podcast clip that sparked debate on Fox News, when she chooses to talk finances with a partner, and her take on red, beige, and green flags. She shares why she believes women are often unfairly judged and how that’s impacted her personal and professional choices. Sofia also reflects on majoring in economics, working at Morgan Stanley while secretly recording Call Her Daddy, and the lessons she learned about contracts and business. She details how she rebuilt her career after a public fallout, what helped her rise again in the podcasting world, where she sees the industry going, her dream guests, and how she handled being villainized—and what she’s planning next. Sofia reveals all this and so much more in another episode you can’t afford to miss! Host: Jason Tartick Co-Host: David Arduin Audio: John Gurney Guest: Sofia Franklyn Stay connected with the Trading Secrets Podcast!  Instagram: @tradingsecretspodcast  Youtube: Trading Secrets Facebook: Join the Group All Access: Free 30-Day Trial  Trading Secrets Steals & Deals! Thrive Market: Thrive Market is like your favorite health food store-but online, and way more affordable. Skip the junk without overspending. Head over to ThriveMarket.com/TRADINGSECRETS to get 30% off your first order and a FREE $60 gift. Boll & Branch: Feel the difference an extraordinary night's sleep can make with Boll & Branch. Get 15% off, plus free shipping on your first set of sheets, at BollAndBranch.com/tradingsecrets  Square: your all-in-one business partner making your day-to-day easier. From point-of-sale systems and payments to inventory and customer tools, Square brings everything together in one simple platform-so you can stay organized, sell anywhere, and keep things moving. For up to $200 off Square hardware when you sign up at square.com/go/tradingsecrets

Welcome back to another episode of Trading Secrets. Today we are joined by social media personality and podcast host Sophia Franklin. Sophia established herself as one of the first true podcast success stories while co-hosting the Call Her Daddy podcast. during her time at Barstool Sports, dating back to 2018. After leaving Barstool Sports in 2020, she then started her own podcast, Sophia with an F, which is also proven to be a massive success. Sophia, however, is not just a podcaster,

but a trailblazer in her own right, known for her fearless approach to discussing topics such as sex, friendships, and mental health. From her beginnings to her current ventures, Sophia has captivated her audiences with her unique perspective and unwavering authenticity. And we are here to talk all about your story and more. Sophia, thank you so much for being on Trading Secrets.

Jesus Christ, that intro was like, my ego just went through the roof. Just popped, right? I'm going to start being rude to people. Start being rude. Start being rude. That's right. This is your show right now. You're owning it.

You're killing it. Let's start with this. So I wrote a book about love and money, right? We'll talk about the finances. we have to, if you're going to talk about relationships and we're talking about jobs, I got to go back to Peter Nelson. So he was a boyfriend of years, right?

He was an HBO exec, of course, heavily involved in this whole deal. And he got a lot of attention. I just said his name. So his name's everywhere now. Like, was there any part of his involvement in that deal business aside that irritated you because he was being the one talked about when you make a comment like, I want to be the star of the relationship?

No. And I think that that's kind of false. I think the media really try to put a spin on it and say he was just so involved. He was my boyfriend. Like, you know, you're obviously going to confide in your boyfriend about your work and everything going on in your life. But I guess he wasn't that involved. But what was your question? My question was you had said that you want to be the star. Oh, right. If he overshadowed me. Did you feel it all? Like, I will, you know, maybe we can dive into that down the road on this episode. But did you feel it all like he became the star in your spotlight at all? Because I just kept seeing his name everywhere. Right.

And like even, hey, Fortnite, all he's talking about is the boyfriend. I'm not even talking about you anymore. Like, did that at all play into the fact that you're like, I don't want anyone ever in the spotlight again? Yes. But not for the reasons of like, oh, they're getting attention for the reasons of like they're getting negative attention. they didn't ask to be a public figure, and I don't want to be this public with a relationship again. Understood. He didn't want to be, you know, talked about publicly in the news.

Okay, got it. All right. So back to the love and money. No professional athletes, no stars, but you have to have wealth. And so a lot of people are listening to this podcast are single. And it's about 70% women. So give me your take on that when you're connecting the thought process of like your love life with money. why does they have to come from wealth?

What's the thought process? So when I say wealth, I just mean they need to be financially stable. I'm not like I need this amount, this dollar amount in their bank account. I'm not looking, they don't need to be a multi, multi-millionaire. But the dynamics in a relationship, I need them to be kind of on par with the finances I bring in. Sure. So we both need to be ambitious. We both need to care about work and we need to be on the same playing field or he can be a little bit above.

Okay. Or a lot above. I won't say, no. There's no max capacity. But so your point is, like, what I'm hearing is I'm an independent boss. I'm making this much. Either level with me or even do better. That's kind of your threshold.

Listen, my mom, I love her to death. She's always been the breadwinner. Yeah. She's very, very attractive, and her relationships, she is single, and she's been married a few times, and a lot of those relationships that didn't work out were with men who didn't make as much as her or even worked for her at, like, at one point, which sounds like that's not allowed. HR's like, what do you mean? Like, they worked for her, but. What did she do? She, it's like the most, she works for HUD, which is like the housing government agency and she'll just get contracts around the U.S.

Interesting. That's the most simple way to put it or else it gets crazy. Yeah. But it didn't work. I don't, I think it's very rare that men can be making way less than a woman in a relationship and that it works for them. Interesting. Okay. So one thing you had mentioned is like the salary component of things.

And what we know is that this is a true statistic, 50% of relationships, they don't feel comfortable talking about money. And then of that 50% where they do talk about money, they say that like three quarters of them have huge arguments about money in the relationship. And then it even ties into intimacy. So I know we're going a little deep here, but of that three courts, so 75% of the people that do feel comfortable talking about money that get into fights. Over 50% of them say they have massively decreased intimacy because of money issues. So there's all these connections to people that talk money, don't know how to talk about healthy, and then it turns into issues and decrease intimacy. And the people that don't talk about it, there's like cheating through money.

So for you to understand if someone's making, what you're making or more, you clearly have to be able to talk about it. How early on in the relationship dating process are you going to be like, let's talk like, how much you make it, man? How much you make it? What's your credit score? What's your debt? Like, how early are you doing that?

date one, date five, date 10. Tell me about it. Do you have my whole Fox News Daily Mail situation that went down? I have a lot of your stuff, but I don't have that one. I had done a podcast with my good friend Leo Skeppy. Okay. And I made a joke, which it was like mostly a joke, but there was some truth to it that I will ask a guy to pull up his bank account on a first date. So that little clip the media. I do have that. Okay, I was like, wait. But they didn't say Fox.

It literally says that she exclusively is seeking wealthy partners, asking for their bank statements on first dates to gauge compatibility. So I do have that information. So let me tell you where Fox News comes in. Okay. So I get sent this clip of this panel of people at Fox News. Tommy Leran, is that how you say her name? Yeah, yeah.

She's on this panel and they're discussing this clip of me saying, I ask a guy to pull up his bank account info on the first date. Yes. Why Fox News is, you know, spending time and energy debating this thing that I said in a podcast joking. I don't know. But they felt very passionately about it. Tell me.

I mean, like all this podcast is taking like pretty much pop culture and breaking down the economics. They're stepping into that because it's a very polarizing subject, which creates a lot of attention and people want to click and see it. And the reason they want to click and see it is because they want to do it. They want to have the chops to ask them for the bank statements. They want to start talking about money and know about it. It's the only reason this podcast does well. It's not me. It's that people are just interested in this shit. But no one talks about it because we were never taught it in school and therefore we don't know how to talk about it. So 90% of relationships are sitting back home wondering what their partner spends, wondering what they make and they don't talk about it. So they hear someone like you say it and they're like, I need to fucking know because I don't do it. That's so, that is so insane to me. And even that's not the first time I've heard that. couples don't talk about finances, I could not do that. Am I actually asking a dude how much he makes on the first day? If he's like younger and I'm fucking around and like I'm trying to push

my limit and just see how crazy I can act, because sometimes I like to do that just for fun. Okay. That didn't make me sound crazy. I will, but no, like the real me and how I'm going to go into dating moving forward. I wouldn't ask that on a first date. I'll be asking it, though. I would say what date number i think the second we become exclusive and like in a committed relationship okay you want to know what they're making yeah now are you going to also because we know there's there's another stat i only know all these stats because i literally wrote a book called talk money to me and it's all about money and love so 43% of married or cohabitating couples have what's called financial infidelity so it's lying and cheating through money but we're not talking about like

buying a six-pack of trilly we're talking about like massive material cheating through finances, similarly equivalent to like if you were cheating on your partner. So big stuff. Almost half of relationships do it. So if someone tells you they make a million bucks here, two million bucks here, whatever they're trying to make, how do you know the validity? Do you take the word for it or do you actually want to see the numbers? I need to see the numbers. I love it. That's great. My last relationship, I think it's great. I had him actually pull up his several bank account so I could see. And did he, what his bank account said and match what he said?

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Actually, the bank account was better because I'm looking at the stocks and I'm looking at like everything. So he had more money saved than he was making. Yes. What number did you see?

Because we haven't said the person. We don't know which boyfriend. In the millions. In the million. Yeah. Okay. And so that hit your, okay, I'll date him. And yeah.

But it wasn't, okay, it wasn't the millions, but I mean, it wasn't that. That was not the reason I was like, I'll date him. I was already dating. him, but I needed him to verify because, listen, people are out here scamming. Oh, oh. Like, for real. The thing I always say is people, like, gaslighting is a huge topic of conversation. Majority of people are gaslighting through assets, right?

They're making you believe something is a reality just through what they're wearing or what they're driving or what they're showing. And it's, in fact, the opposite of the reality. So I think people gaslight through their assets. Thank you. Yeah, I agree with you on that. Yeah, because I got, I think it was actually like Barstle and Dave, like he has a pot and they were like talking shit saying, well, you can kind of just tell if someone has money.

No, you cannot. And no, you cannot. Those are sometimes the worst, right? I mean, literally as a banker, we used, I get to see all the stuff people would do, but then I got to see their numbers all the time. And then if you're doing a big deal with a CEO or CFO, you see all their personal financial statements. There's almost never a correlation to what you think of the numbers say, ever. And in fact, what I learned is when you judge a book by its cover,

it's usually almost the opposite from what you see. And then, I mean, you could throw more statistics out there. Household incomes of $250K in the United States. We're in New York City. Everything's inflated here, but just go to Midwest or other areas. $250K household income is massive. Majority of those people are driving Toyotas, Hondas, and forts. Thank you.

Yes. Warren Buffett. Yes. It's the Warren Buffett style. Totally. All right. Let me ask you all, we're still on this subject. I do a podcast once a year every year where I go in the hot seat. And my co-host drills me on every day. How much you make on that deal? How much you make this year? How much do you have over here? And I share all my numbers. I expect if my guests are going to share anything, even touch it, that I got to be willing to do the same. So I'm going to act like you're the host. And there's the future boyfriend right

there. And you're asking them, how much at the minimum does he have to make for you to be like, I would seriously think about a long-term relationship with you? What's the number, the minimum? It's like so hard. What if he's like in med school and he's like about to be a surgeon? But like, What's the cap for a surgeon, honestly? 700K? No, depending on what kind of surgeon, it's more than that. But we had a doctor come on the podcast who said him and his doctor buddies all tell their kids not to get in health care unless they have a huge desire to do so because the insurance in between the government, the earnings is actually being decreased. So they're making less and less over years. That's great.

But back to your question. Give me a roundabout. It doesn't have to be, we don't have to say, Sophia will never date a guy making less in this. I'm just curious, like, what do you think of? You know what? All the men on the internet already paid me for that bank account thing. So I don't think I'm going to make more enemies. Yeah.

I would say he's got to be, he's got to have a very safe savings account. Okay. There has to be a question there. At least a few hundred thousand. I also live in New York. Yeah. And I'm also, when I'm looking for a partner, I'm thinking, okay, what if I have kids with this person? Yeah.

And what if they lose their job? And what if I can't work? Like, will we still be okay? Yeah. You know? I think there's also probably a lot, like you think about therapy, it ties to your inner child. There is something financial therapy and seeing what you said about your mom, like your mom being breadwinner and seeing it not work out. I'm sure that instills some of these things that you hold while you're thinking about dating when it comes to love and money.

A hundred percent. Okay. let me ask you this and then I'll move on from love and money we'll do red flag green flag beige flag I'll throw a couple scenarios out there okay tell me what it's like first date they asked to split the check bye red flag goodbye flag see you're done you're done if they ask you split the check will you split the check fuck no at that point I would just pick up the bill so you'd be like, no, I got it. I would really try to, like, emasculate at that point.

Be like, you know what, I just got it, but, like, also never text me again. That sounds really harsh. Yeah. I just think either pick up the bill or let's do, let's go to the park and bring a baguette and a thing of cheese. I like it. You know what I mean? Serena Kerrigan came on saying something similar. And she said, my take on it is first three dates, they must pay, absolutely.

And if you can't afford the big restaurant, That's fine. Do something thoughtful. What's your take on that? A hundred percent. Let's go. Let's do a picnic. Okay. Got it. There you go. You know? All right. Someone says they have massive debt of some sort. But they let's say they have high earnings. Yeah. Red flag, green flag. Can I say beige flag?

Bege flag on that one? Again, doctor, they're going to have student loans of the union, you know? Yep. Okay. Also, how much debt are we talking actually? In this case, we're talking $95,000. Is that? 95,000? Yep.

High earnings, though. Yeah. It depends what field he's in. Okay. Depends. And we're definitely signing a pre-up. You are also, by the way, you know how we start with the funnel of like who's going to end up with Sophia Franklin? You're really bringing this.

No actors, no athletes, no social media. Can't be the star. Can't be this. Okay, now you've got to be a doctor, but you can't be a doctor with too much debt. You must have a couple hundred thousand dollars in savings. You're getting fucking tight here, Sophia. Shit. You might have to go be the next bachelorette.

Fuck, I actually might need to. This is not good for me. You just know the girl that did this song, looking for a man in finance, except, right? That whole thing, she came on and she was saying there's only two of those men in the whole country. Oh, shit. Statistically, there are only two men

that have six, five blue eyes and have a trust flag. Oh, I don't care. The six, five, and the blue eyes, I don't give a shit. Don't care. You just want some cash. You're making me sound so bad. Here's the thing, you know what? On the flip side, what are dudes looking for?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hot. Like, you guys want, of course. Physical attraction for sure. Yes. I kind of see money and the way you look going hand in hand. They're both superficial things. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Except money, I actually think is less so. Wait, by the way, I'm not making the hook bag. You only date girls for how they look. Because I agree with you. I think, like, there's a lot of behaviors that also align with something you might want a partner that correlates to financial success in some capacity, right? So if someone has shitty credit or someone has bad behaviors, that doesn't mean the other shitty person. It doesn't mean anything. It can actually be adjusted and fixed quickly. But I think through like money and

financial transparency, you can learn a lot about a human's character, priorities, historical behaviors, their impulses. Like you can truly, you can, it's not is, materialistic as I think it's made out to be. I'm here to fight that. So I agree with you. Yeah. And I'm in the same category there. I'm with you. Okay. Thank you. And I think girls get a bad rap, right? Like when I made that comment about the asking for the bank account, all of these news outlets, the headline was gold digger. Yeah. And it's like, well, I have my own finances. I'm successful in my own right. Right. Exactly. So you just want someone to meet you there. Yeah. And I totally see all that. I think if I had any criticism for it, I feel like,

the messaging, we could polish it up a little bit. But I think the intention, I'm like totally there with you. Okay. Love it. Okay. Let's get into some of your successes. I think your career story is like really cool. So many people are inspired by what you've done, how you've navigating, where you've gone. What I think is really cool is that you actually started your career in finance. You started at Morgan Stanley. I did. So that also might have a derivative of why these things mean something to you, right? What was your job there? What did you do? So in Utah, there is actually Morgan Stanley in Utah, but I worked in operation, so I'm not really dealing with finances whatsoever. Okay.

Then I kind of use that as my golden ticket to get out of Utah and come to New York. Okay. Because Utah, like, it's not that fun. Yeah. It's a little bit of a bubble. So I come to New York, and then I just worked for a team of financial advisors, which I do want to flex, the financial advisor who his career just, like rocket launched. I was working for him. And now he's my financial advisor. No way. Yeah. How about that? Yeah. That's really cool. And so you're working that was your goal before

everything happened in the podcasting and entertainment space like trajectory. If you go to Sophia while she's working for the financial advisor, what was the plan like for your career with 10 years? What did you ideally want it to look like? So I didn't love finance. I didn't love economics. Did I force myself to major in economics. Yes. Yeah. Because I just wanted to make sure I was going into a field where, you know, money can be made. Yeah. I probably should have majored in something like English. Like that probably speaks more to me, but I was like, what the fuck am I going to do with that? Sure. In hindsight, what you major in doesn't really matter too much. I agree with that. But my plan was just to kind of get my foot in the door. Morgan Stanley is a huge, you know,

top five bank. And we'll just see where we go from there. Cool. I think I was studying for my series seven. Okay. But then I just kind of didn't take it seriously. It's a that test is a bitch. Right. Right. Right. Yes. All right. So you get to that point. You're in finance. You're maybe working your way towards being an advisor. You're making, let me guess around 75 grand. Yeah. Wow. I know that. See? Yeah. Well, it's, it was like, like 60. Okay. And then I got a raise and then I think we ended up.

Actually, it's 65. That's it. Okay. So 60. Yeah. But also inflation, 2018-ish, right? Very true. What year was that?

2000. That was like, yeah, 2018. 2019. That was a different ballgame. Okay. So then, you know, you meet Alex. You come up with this idea. You start the podcast.

At what point do you get to a level where you're like, I can quit. my full-time job. Like, how long did that take from starting the idea to being like I could be done with it? So I was working at Morgan Stanley and recording on Mondays. Okay. And then I started walking into the office and people were like, oh, you're talking about sex and all this crazy-ass shit. And I like, I remember walking through the hallway and hearing my voice. And they were like these two dudes like watching on their phones. And I was like, I'm going to be so fucked, you know. Yeah. But then three episodes went out and then Barstool reached out. And when Barstle reached out with a contract with a salary that was 10K more than what I was making, I was like, wait, I can

just like talk shit and talk about my life for a living and make more money. This is insane. And said full time at a desk. Yeah. Like, this is crazy. Yeah. And I'm from Utah, you know? Like, didn't know about entertainment. I didn't know those avenues really existed. But yeah, when all of a sudden they're giving me 10K more and it's to talk on a microphone, I'm like, hi, let's go. So it wasn't a position where, because you had talked about the fact like, you know, this isn't good that I'm saying things that aren't kosher at the bank. It wasn't the bank pushing you out. It was you saying I'm leaving the bank. Yes. Yeah. But I think they would have pushed me out eventually. I got, so I got fired for my bank. Oh, you did. Yeah. So.

Yeah, I went on the reality show, got off the show, and I did like a double-dip thing. Like, I was living like two lives. It was like a meeting with a CFO of a $500 million, billion dollar company, and at night I'm doing like a bar appearance, you know? Like, I'm going to structure, a big, like, interest rate derivative swap on floating rate debt. And then, like, at night I'm taking photos for a, like, weighted blanket. Like, it was out of control. But I had, it was my accident time told a story about our sex life.

And that story is what ended up getting me fired. Were you going into work stress to shit? Like your day job? It was the worst. Like it was a great financial year for me because I'm like working all these angles. I still to this day, I haven't worked at the bank since 2019. I still to this day will wake up once in a while in like a sweat that I'm not hitting my number or that I'm brought into the office at the bank because I like did something wrong. Right.

I'm still haunted by it's PTSD. It's unbelievable. Yeah. So I have some sympathy for that. I understand it. So you go to Barstall. You're making the 75K. And then, you know, there's been, obviously, you've talked about it at length. There's a million articles about this. I don't want to get into the drama. What I want to do is hear some of the numbers, though, just because I think there's a lot of learning lessons with it. You guys are making more on a show than your entire salary for the year based on the downloads. Yeah. Like, like without a doubt, right? Now, did you get any bonuses at all? Like, because you're you guys were crushing merch, you're crushing all this. Were there any other incentives other than the base or no? Yeah, we each got 2.5% off of merch sales. Okay.

And merch sales, like what did that, do you remember what that led to? There was one hoodie in particular that, that hoodie just by itself, made a million dollars. One hoodie? Mm-hmm. Yeah. What? Yeah. What was the hoodie?

I've all the people that have come on it. Maybe I was like, A-Rod, Grand People, a lot of people sell merch. I don't know I've ever heard of someone having their own merchming a million on one skew. It was fucking crazy. Like, it was just lightning in a bottle. It was this gray hoodie and it said Unwell, which is like this term that I told a story about. It was a story about Morgan Stanley. No way.

Because I was at Coachella and I definitely had work that day. And I'm in California. Work is in New York. And I just sent an email saying I'm unwell. Oh, my God. And then that's all I said in the email. but the that's funny and I went up my banking days the days I'd call off I would be so nervous that they were good because if I was calling off it was for a reason yeah and I'm like they're going to see me

somewhere being like you're so full shit oh my god the anxiety of having to call in sick it was just that's all I could muster is I'm unwell and I just it was whatever the hoodie said unwell in the front and I think that was it yeah and that made a million dollars and it wasn't a cool design it It was just... Boom. Mm-hmm. Got it. All right, we talk a lot about negotiating on this show.

And anyone listening to this, they can be a nurse, a teacher, they could be a salesperson. Like, there's a million different industries out there. Annual reviews come up. People struggle with negotiating. Specifically, when you think about everything that you had to deal with in negotiation phase, whether it was after Barstool or before Barstool, what are some tactics maybe you would have done differently knowing what you know now that possibly someone listening to this could be inspired by as they go to negotiate whatever it is they're negotiating. If you're going to go into business with a

business partner, you guys need to have a contract between the two of you. And I remember people telling me that. But I was just so naive because I'm like, what, 25, I think, maybe 27 at that point. I don't remember, but I remember thinking we're best friends. Like this, you know, like we're like family. We don't need, in hindsight, you do. So I think that, I would say that was kind of the biggest takeaway. It's just so like the focus is if there are words said, and I think this is related to anybody out there.

If there's words said, get the words on a contract. Right. And it's kind of similar to a pre-up. A hundred percent. You know? Yeah, 100%. And people feel like it. identical to a prenone. Yeah. And people think it takes the romance out of it. And it's you saying,

I don't trust this person or I think you're going to fuck me over. And it's like, it's, it's not necessarily that. It's just crazy shit happens. People will act in a way that you didn't expect. Yeah. And with pre-knit, my own take on pre-nums are that, they actually already exist. It's just your state law. So like, if you get, whatever state you get married in, there are different. And there are all, laws are all different based on what state. And there's those state laws that tell you what happened. And you can either customize those laws or you can have the state's pre-knotes. That's smart. Right. So, and I think with any business partnership, having an operating agreement is so important. And I think even a larger lesson that maybe isn't

as specific to you, but can relate to anybody is like, put stuff in fucking contracts. Yes. You know, there are things today that I am burned still to this day. Right. But I didn't have in contracts in either form of relationships or business partnerships. And unfortunately, the only way to learn. I feel like is you to listen to things like this or get burned. I totally agree. And when you get burned, it sucks. So I can get a contract. Trust me. Trust. My God. Okay. And then the last thing I just want to ask you on this topic, because I know it's one you probably don't enjoy talking about. But I'm doing the research and I saw it was November 2023. Alex revealed she hasn't spoken to you since. Is that true? Still having

touch base? No. Okay. Well, I'm sorry to hear that. But you, where you, where you, able to be in a position where maybe it felt like rock bottom and you spun out of it and you've created an unbelievable podcast. Thank you. I couldn't believe like I'm looking at all the numbers and again, all these numbers just blow me away. 82,000 reviews in a period of time. There's, I know like you're left, but there, anybody out there, go look at a podcast you listen to often. Go check the reviews. I almost guarantee you you're not going to find many podcasts in the entire world that have 82,000 reviews. I don't even think like Joe Rogan has that meant. It's an insane amount. Are they all positive? I mean, a lot of them actually are very positive. But yeah, I forgot about

the reviews. I do have quite a few of those. It's insane. That's usually a good. I always, because we own a talent agency together, Manchester all the time. We're thinking about different podcasts people can go on. We have different tools. We could see success rates of podcast. But the best way to do it is like look at the reviews. How engaged our people? 82,000 is a number, I don't know if I've ever seen it. Yeah. So congratulations on that. When you did have to pivot that and you're stuck at rock bottom and you're fighting media,

you're fighting bar stool, you're fighting a good friend, you're fighting demons, you have all these things in the world piling on you, then on top of it, the envy that has to be there of seeing the other person have success, what are some things that you would tell someone right now that maybe not to that extent, but they're feeling rock bottom in their career, their personal life. What were your steps to get out of there, to get to where you are today? I wouldn't recommend the steps I took because looking back, it was very much I was numbing. I was just dove into work and I didn't even give myself like the time to really heal or process like what was happening. And I don't regret any of that. But for someone who's at

rock bottom right now, I think a really major and very important thing. And to this day, I think about this every day is you are on your own journey and your own path. And that needs to be your focus. And if you're living your life comparing and looking at what could have been and who got this and what you didn't, you will always be unfulfilled and unhappy. Yeah. And even if it's just this one incident, you can't live your life that way. I could live the rest of my life being super sad and upset, you know? Yeah.

When you said numbing, was it form of like productive numbing? You mentioned working. So were you just like working, channeling all your emotions to just work? Yes. To build? Yes. I also. What did that look like?

that looked like me hold up in a room that size in my mom's basement with no windows and working like 17 hours straight and I also had a lot of people around me like my agent at the time my publicist at the time saying if you don't you know put something out you're going to be forgotten yeah in hindsight do I think I was going to be forgotten if I spent six months before I came back no yeah But I think that also contributed to it. Okay. So you had the people like not only in the outside circle, but in the inner circle also

putting all this pressure out. Right. Because ultimately they want to make money. Yeah. You've had a lot of success since then. Yes. Do you look back at that time and you're like, yeah, I was numbing, but like kind of thankful I did bust my ass?

Or do you look at that time like, actually I should have done it differently? I don't live with regrets, like about anything. Yeah. Do I kind of wish I would have strategized, like, what I wanted this show to be about? Did I want guests? Do I want, you know, instead of just being like, get the episode out and we'll figure it out like next week's episode that week. I mean, sure, yeah. I think it would have been a lot less stressful for me because it was like a crazy time.

But I don't have regrets. Love it. With the podcast, did you sign with a network? Did you kind of do your own thing? Like, what did that look like? I signed with a network, but it was, it's, and it still is very much a partnership where they are just taking care of ad sales, you know. It's not like this huge conglomerate that's doing the marketing.

Like, I'm very much on my own. Okay. Yeah. Got it. So you're doing your own thing. They do the sales. You produce everything yourself. Yeah.

Book all the guests yourself. Mm-hmm. Everything. That is awesome. Yeah. What do you think has led? You've had a ton of success with the podcast. what specifically has allowed you to go from ground zero to the success with the podcast?

Is it the subject? Is it the guests? Is it the pre-production? Like, what do you think? Like, what's the special sauce of Sophia to go from nothing to, like, again, back to everything? I would say that I'm still learning. And very recently I've made this major switch where I was putting blood, sweat, and tears into the show. And podcasting is not what it once was. Yeah. It is so saturated. And it's crazy.

It's, and it's crazy. And that's not to say don't do a podcast, but it used to be if you had a huge podcast, people will go check out your socials. Now it's, if you're huge on socials, people will go check out your podcast. Yeah. In my opinion. So I kind of went from the girl who, in my own way, which is weird. I'm private on socials a little bit. I don't, you know, go to post my entire life. But as you could tell by my text message exchange with my mom that I posted, I'm now really putting more time and energy into socials. Gotcha. That makes sense. And has like, do you think that the podcast space will, like, continue to grow? Or like, when you look at just the business model of podcasting, what do you think the future looks like for it being someone that's been in it

for, I don't know, what's six, seven years now? Yeah. It's a long time. It's going to continue to grow. Okay. I think video podcasting and the video element is what's really going to take off now. Got it. Almost like a show.

Yes. More so than just audio, which I have one of those rare instances because I started podcasting so early. People still listen to me just audio, you know, which I'm sure they do with yours, but it's a big chunk. So I think video podcasting is going to take off. And then I also think that guests interviews are great. I've seen a lot of people use, like, celebrity guests to get a lot of viewership, right? And I actually did that. I, like, hired a company that was, like, helping me for a second.

And it's great because you'll get a lot of listens and views on that one episode. It doesn't – those people don't stay with you. for sure. And so I kind of was like, yeah, it's cool for that episode, but I'm really trying to cultivate just me. Yep, exactly. You have your community, right? Your community, you call them the sleuths. Okay. Which is a play on the word slut. Yeah, I figured. Put one and one together. Is part of that community building? Like, are the sleuths? Are they the ones that, like, drive the business? Like, is that a huge strategy as you're building, like, your plan out? It's a huge strategy and they're also the ones that when I went through this, I kind of for like a year

really focused on guests. They did not like it. Because they wanted to hear you. Yeah. And they're like, do solo episodes. Like we don't care about like these people. Yeah. Okay. So that's another reason. I'm like, I'm going to go back to like my real fans, you know. I love it. Speaking of guests, I did see that your top five dream guests included Amber Heard, Olivia Rodriguez. Donald Trump, Lana Del Rey. I met Lana Del Rey. I got to talk to her for like two hours at stagecoach. She was like one-on-one got to talk to her for a lot.

She's fucking awesome. That's a sensitive subject, by the way. Why? Because I did, in my Coachella episode, I took a drug at Coachella. Okay. What drug? I took Molly. Okay.

Have you ever taken Molly before? I have. But it had been a while. How many times do you take a Molly? Oh, when I was younger, I would take, I would take X. Well, back then it was X to C. And then it was like Molly or X to C. Like, is there a difference? There's not. So you take Molly. You're at Coachella. It's not working. I'm like 45 minutes an hour in. So I'm like, hey, I need more Molly and this dude is like, you're like tiny. I really don't think that's a good idea. I'm like, hand me the Molly. Like I have to go see Lana Del Rey perform. I take the like next dose and five. minutes later, like the first dose hits me, which is like the worst place to be because you're

like, oh, I'm rolling balls and there's a second dose that's about to hit me in like 30 minutes. So long's very short, right before Lana went on, I went home. Oh, you missed her. And I could have just like rolled around in the grass, but I don't know. People were also coming up to me and like taking pictures and I was like, this is fucking crazy. I need to get out of here. While you're on Molly. I want to show you the photo.

This was, it was funny. It got posted. and then like all her like fans like her fan accounts all reposted that was us that night that I met her we were at the we're at the Patron house shout out Patron Steph Rufo and she was staying at the same house as us just over there what she just hung out with us all night she was awesome you guys are also matching I know I know that was just ironic honestly wow actually I didn't think about that we were matching there's that's insane any of those guests though Amber Hurd, Olivia Rodrigo, Donald Trump, Lana Del Rey, Lady Gaga.

Have you gotten close to getting any of them? I definitely have not. I didn't even see Lana Del Rey perform. And I haven't even really reached out or tried. But Amber Hurd is really my dream. I think she was done so fucking dirty by the media. And I know no one will stand up for her to say that. Why do you think she was done dirty?

Because all of a sudden, Johnny Depp, Pirates of the Caribbean hero. he just became this like superhero and she was completely villainized. And I think they were both about shit crazy. Yeah. And I think they both were to blame. And I think it's crazy. Do you feel any of that? Do you think through what you went through that you were villainized?

Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Do you think that was taken out of context? Yes. Yes. For sure. I mean, I had the biggest, you know, sports media.

company in the world who have all the resources in the world having to spin a narrative so that this show can live on without me right yeah um and then i'm over here in utah not saying shit so yes i think it was fun a certain way i struggle with also when things are coming my way publicly where it's bis labeling or taking out of context stepping into it because sometimes i'm like you know what sometimes the path of least resistance is just like let it be stay sure to you the truth always surfaces do you at all have any regret of taking approach of like I'm just going to keep quiet for a while and let things happen would you have done that part of the business differently like the PR side of the business differently absolutely and that wasn't even my choice right I'm seeing stuff

being said and I'm like, I want to post something immediately. Yeah. And again, everyone around me is saying, don't, don't look like the angry person. Right. Which, you know what? They probably had a point. Mm-hmm. Now that I'm actually like...

So do you think it was the right move? I think I should have said something. Yeah. I don't think I should have just been completely silent. Sure, sure. But I think that it was probably good that they were there to, guide me a little bit because I probably would have gone, you know, wild and then you end up looking crazy. Yeah. You get involved, though, and shit's said about you? No. Oh, you don't.

Unless, unless, unless, I don't think I'd do, right? No, unless you take, like, you can take shots, you can deceive, you can lie, do your thing. If someone says something that is just completely defamatory of like incorrect that's going to impact my livelihood or my reputation, I'm going to come at it. And I'm going to come at it hard. That's good. Like I'm coming at it very hard. Yeah.

But like little, I'm not going to like you're making dumb innuendos that are false. So you're trying to portray something that's not a reality. And then there's no validity to it. And there's no way that you know, there's no one's showing validity to it. Yeah. And then they're not lying. I'm just like, whatever. have your time.

I agree with that. Yeah. Do you, with the Amber Hurd situation, then connecting it to yours, are there any other situations out there where you see someone on like the opposite side where like money and like fame and all these things are connected to either a settlement or a judgment or opinion that you feel strongly about? Because there's so many things out there that connect storyline to money, hero to villain. Yeah.

Every day, there's going to be a new thing where that happens. Are there any others that you can think about that you're drawn to or that you have like a conspiracy on or an interesting take on? That are in the news right now? Or even in the last like few years, like one that comes to mind. The Taylor Swift Scooter Braun. Oh, that's a great one. Yeah.

So do you like more of Pro Scooter then? Scooter was really helpful when everything was going down. I actually spoke with Scooter. Oh, interesting. Yeah. And then, you know, when I saw, like, the Taylor Swift stuff and looked into it, he looked like a horrible human being. Yeah. Then in hindsight, when I was, like, really, like, looking at the details, it's like, well, he didn't, he bought something legally, like, it wasn't, because he was so villainized.

Yeah. I think that's a good example. He didn't do anything illegal. Right. Right. Right. So, I mean, you can debate, like, I guess, like, ethical, unethical, whatever. But there's nothing he did that was illegal. Right. You know what I mean? Yeah. So, yeah, that's an interesting one. Yeah.

You know what? Like, where did he go? He's, I think he's like, ow. He's, like, done. Yeah, he posted something like. Yeah. Okay. Let me give you another one. The whole, like, Ellen DeGeneres. She has her show. She kills it. She's like, you know, there's a point. Ellen DeGeneres is like one of the hottest celebrities in the entire country.

Right. And then I haven't read all the reports or gone down the rabbit hole, but my understanding is there are people that have worked for her that said she didn't treat people well. And what's wild is the world we live in like that title wave, maybe sometimes it's good, maybe sometimes bad, totally gets rid of her show. Now she's doing live comedy. She can't sell a ticket apparently. And so she says, she cut her tour short and she's, I'm leaving Hollywood.

Oh, shit. And so that's someone who went from literally hero to villain. Do you have a take on that? And just completely could not make a comeback. Could not make a comeback. Career done. Career done. But also like, I'm sure she's fine. Well, yeah, yeah. Ellen's fine. But I think, I do think there's something so much deeper than what happened to you with your perspective that we're getting at. And I do think in every situation, there's always three sides, right? At one side, there's the other side, and then there's the truth. And I think people have to, whether it's in the public eye and a headline, or it's in just anyone's everyday life of hearsay, like, be a devil's advocate in the room. Like when you're in a room and a bunch of people are talking shit about a subject matter, I would always encourage people, challenge that.

I do the same thing. Because if you're not, you're going to be one of those people contributing to the bullshit that's spewed. And guess what? If those people are talking shit about other people in a room, I probably. promise, or I bet you it's pretty likely when they leave that room, they might be talking shit about you next. A million percent. And I live my life that way, too.

I love it. Now, when I look at things in the media or just in life, I always am like, okay, well, what could their take or their side be? I like it. All right. We're getting to the end here. Talk to me about this. Okay.

65K. Morgan Stanley, you go to 75K at Barstool. Are we making more than 10 times that now? we're definitely making well over that now. Wow. Yeah. Well over 10 times. Well over 10 times.

I would say around the 10 times. Well, congratulations. That's huge. And where do you go? Like when you look at the Sophia brand, you look at everything you've done with the podcast and how far you've come. Like, where do you want to go next with it all? Where is the business mind of building your empire go from here?

I'm taking it one day at a time. Okay. I definitely want to start doing stuff live and do, I've never interacted with my listeners in person. And I've been doing this for a long time. Yeah. So that's going to happen. But I'm also, I'm kind of just like figuring it out. You're flowing.

Yeah. Do you want to stay in New York? Do I what? Do you want to stay in New York? I think so for at least a couple more years. Got it. Yeah. Okay.

All right. Would you ever go into reality TV? That's interesting. Yeah. I always used to say no. And then there was kind of this opportunity kind of. And what was it? Maybe I would. I can't say. You can't say? No. Is it still a potential opportunity? Maybe. Okay. Yeah. All right. So maybe TV's in your future. Maybe. Maybe podcasting's in your future. Any a potential book? Spitting all the tea. A lot of people have asked me about the book. I kind of want to do a book when I can really. really do a book, you know.

Yeah, a little bit more time. Yeah. Amazing. All right, cool. Well, thank you so much for coming on training secrets. It's unbelievable your path, the different turns you've taken, and then the financial success you've had along the way. And also the financial transparency you will have, whoever that future husband will be.

But we have to wrap with the trading secret. Okay. You can't learn it from a professor or a bunch of TikTok tutorials which are out there. You can only learn it through your experience. It could be career navigation, financial navigation, anything. It could be just a life tip, but it is a trading secret with Sophia Franklin. What can you leave us with? I feel like I told a lot of secrets.

You dropped a lot of secrets. Talk about your fucking finances with your partner. Crazy, crazy secret, but I didn't realize it was the statistics you were sharing were crazy. Yeah. I mean, what's wild is we've had. over 200 trading secrets, no one's had that training secret, even though I wrote a damn book about it. The last thing I'll just follow up that train secret, has there ever been a situation in a relationship where, like, you didn't talk money and it like came back to bite you? Or are you just learning from

what your mom went through? I'm just learning through what my mom went through. I don't think it's ever, I don't, I've never had an issue. But I've also never been like, you know, thought serious in a relationship, which I'm working on. once you start working on that, if you ever want me to come on your show and break down all the things with love and money, I could drop a million stories and statistics. We could talk about it. But where can people find your show and everything you have going on? The podcast is Sophia with an F. And then I'm on all socials, YouTube, TikTok. Sophia spelled with an F. Franklin is the last name spelled with a Y. Love it. If you are not following her on IG TikTok, even Twitter, you got a big following there. YouTube, go check out Sophia Franklin. Go check. out her podcast, Sophia with an F and Sophia, thank you so much for being on this episode of Sharing Secrets. Thank you. This was great.

Ding, ding, ding. We are closing in the bell to the Sophia Franklin episode. Quite timely with everything going on with the Alex Cooper documentary that just dropped this past week. We got the Curious Canadian with us, the one and only David Ardoin. Before I kick it to you, David,

I do have a little giveaway. I just moved into a new place. So if you give us five stars and let us know what your biggest takeaway from this episode was, I will make sure that next recap, I give something away. And then, David, before I kick a T. and Sophia Franklin, I had a few DMs this past week, actually. Okay. And they were asking me for an update. Swear, they were asking me for an update on your cryptocurrency. Do we have one? Oh. We do not have one. So it's just gone. It's gone. It's gone. You know what? No, I actually

so, dude, it's so funny you brought this up because I was actually going to talk to you about it because someone who works for the trading secrets team, Mark Holzer, is in the crypto world, and he was always like my last resort option, but he seems, he's very confident. You've heard him on the calls. He thinks he can get it back for me. So I'm going to give all of my private information to Mark Holzer and let him rip on this and give him a big, a big chunk of equity in it because, yeah, we're going to need that. We're going to need that back in these crazy times. So I appreciate the people reaching out, but it's so funny you say that because I literally was thinking. about that this morning. All right. We'll have to reach out to Mark Colster and he will be the last resort. And also when I'm thinking about Coler, I got to give a shout out Mark Coler's parents and I met in Charlotte. They're like best of friends. And my mom's 65th birthday is today. So if you see this, go shoot Dale Tartick on Instagram, a little message. Happy 65th to Calutian. Happy Father's Day to all the fathers. This episode obviously released on June 16th and June 15th was Father's Day. So David, happy Father's Day to you as well.

thank you very much also for giving shoutouts uh we are recording this on my sixth wedding anniversary shout out to my beautiful wife ashley um so yeah now you know give us five stars happy six years get get get us five stars get in the giveaways i will actually be doing the next recap from nashville heading down heading down on thursday this week a little a little bit of a boy's trip um and uh we'll be recapping from jason's new digs so i think next recap will be a big We have a really good guest, but I think we're going to do a nice big life update as well. Maybe even, Jason, maybe even a halfway Jason Tell All. Maybe.

Maybe. Maybe. Just going to, if you would like to see a Jason Tell All halfway edition, and it's strictly life update, we're going to say Jason Tell All life, not necessarily the business, the numbers. Just let me know, and maybe we can get past the mics around and do a safe space life chat update. with Jason and Du Bois. All right. We'll flirt with that. I got some time to chew on it, but until that,

and I can't wait for you to get to Nashville. I'm so excited to have you guys here. Actually, you know what? I will give a quick little update. I always like to give the Money Mafia a little update on my life before I go to social media. Essentially what happened is

I was fourth in inches, pre-approval is ready to go, beautiful, almost dream home in Nashville. Something in my gut, it was priced a little bit too high for what I was looking for, but I was two seconds from pulling the trigger. I ended up not. And now I am in a beautiful home. It's a lease. It's

furnished. And it's right by the 12th South area, which is great. Teddy's got a huge backyard. And that's what I'm doing for six months. And New York City is still very, very much on the horizon for this fall. I just wanted to get Teddy kind of acclimated to just like get him back from training, repetition, repetition, repetition. So you're always doing two, three months evaluate if I think he would do well in the city. So that's a little update. Money Mafia. you heard it first, but enough of me. Let's get into Sophia Franklin. Let's get into Sophia Franklin. The polarizing Sophia Franklin. The now back in the news a little more, Sophia Franklin. Always and Forever will be tied to the infamous call her daddy deal and exit with barstool sports. But I must say, I have two confessions. One, I've always thought of Sophia Franklin's voice is a little bit of nails on the chalkboard. And so there's a little bit of, as you guys talked about, mislabeling. But you, you you guys both together, I think, did a really good job of balancing, balancing kind of, you know, giving it back to each other a little bit on certain categories in certain areas and made it a really

enjoyable podcast. I will say that I watched the Alex Call Her Alex documentary before this to see if there's any takeaways from it. My takeaway overall from that is I saw Alex Cooper in a little different light than what I seen her before. And this podcast did exactly that for Sophia F. Totally painted her in a little bit different light in what I see her and what she's, been through and kind of how she's, you know, has such good perspective on the whole thing. And it's what life's all about is learning from our, you know, experiences and coming out better for it on the other side. So that's credit to you. It's credit to her as well for you guys crushing it on this on this podcast. That's great. I love, uh, there's nothing better than when

we get a good David review. And then additionally to a David review, we get a surprising outcome from what your expectation is. So I'll ask you then, being the curious guy that you are, what was so surprising? Like, why? What made you surprise or what are some of the things that stuck out? Well, I'll just take, you know, again, going off both of you guys in the room having the conversation, if you would have asked me before, is there anything you think I'll have in common with this girl? I'll say, I would say absolutely not. Like, not in a million years. But I'm going to list off a couple things that, you know, as she was talking about it, in my head, I was like, wow, that's a really similar situation to Jason. One, let's talk about

you guys both working in the banking field, Morgan Stanley, Key Bank, you know, right as you start, and kind of like the influencer type of lens and then you have some comments. She says she's walking down the hall and she's hearing her voice and it's two guys in her office listening to Call Her Daddy Episode 3 Gluck Gluck 9,000. Like that's going to make you feel a little something

and obviously how you end up, everyone knows the story of how you end up losing your job at KeyBank. But just everything from that, I think like she is probably top five guests that's aligned with your mantra. Talk money to your partner. Obviously you guys went in the weeds a little bit about, you know,

is it and how she's known to emphasize it with her partner. Talked about, you know, being, you know, being a villain in certain situations or the feeling of being mislabeled, you know, not really being able to speak out and maybe having a PR team tell you, hey, let's sit this one out. Let's let's just let it be be quieted down. And the last thing is really talking about the working agreement when you're in business with friends. So of all those things, touch on all of them. I do have one question. It has to do with the working agreement, you know, from that. you're in your co-founder of rewired talent with your friend Evan and co-founder Evan

do you have a working agreement with him and does there any of that stuff that you want to touch on as well yeah no I think it's interesting like her training secret I was like damn like she came prepared that was that was pretty good and with the operating agreement and a working agreement and a partnership agreement all that stuff like you got to have all that and essentially you know it's what's interesting we talk a lot about pre-numps on this show and it's kind the same thing like when you go into a marriage essentially it's like you are going into a business partnership that is literally like that's what's happening and you're just saying like hey if these things happen how do we how do we make things what what's our law and order what's our foundation

and so yeah of course we have that and it's important that you have that what's interesting is you know they talked a little bit on this episode about merch sales and they talked about like, you know, obviously they were with Dave Portnoy. Obviously, there was this huge blow up when they left bar stool, the HBO guy, all these things. And it sounds like from a contract perspective, there was a lot of learning lessons here. You know what? Now that we talked about the crypto in the start from mine, this is why I thought about it, because I was thinking of like how much I'm regretting of my crypto. After I listened to this episode, I was like, she probably feels the same way about dating that suit man from HBO.

in 2020 who was a really huge influence on why she didn't take the deal and now she sees all the success so she probably looks at she everyone has their financial regrets jason's part of uh part of learning our lessons i wonder though it feels like especially with the documentary like it doesn't seem like Alex really was going to move forward with her anyway it doesn't like the soup guy it does feel like got too involved and like totally screwed things up and i remember Dave years ago just trashing him like he became like oh yeah the center of the joke but I don't know it feels like there's inevitably Alex was going to go on her own anyway right Alex Alex made that pretty pretty clear she says they weren't best friends it wasn't sunshine and roses like it

kind of had separated from that so I think and given like a little bit of her background and her upbringing and where she is now she was always going to be on her own it was always going to be you know hyper competitive breakthrough do it her way really quick side note. Do you think I say the, you say documentary? Documentary. I say documentary. Someone in the review just chert me for it, like relentlessly saying like someone needs to get a hold of David. He says the word documentary wrong. I always thought that was like a Buffalo thing. Right? Like, like how do you say before high school? What school is it? Before high school

Minnesota. Same thing. I'd say elementary. Yeah, I say elementary. Okay. I think I know all my in Nashville make fun of me for the way that I say it. And they all say tree. So here's what we'll do. We'll pull some people, Buffalo down south. Actually, go give us a review right now, five stars and let us know. What do you say? Do you say element tree? Element tree or elementary or documentary or document tree. I do think majority of people say tree. But you know what? It's not how it's spelled. Just saying. Well, I got absolutely roasted in our review for saying tree. So interesting there. I want to touch back on something you said, though, about the merch sales. Here's, you know, you know, I'm plugged into this, you know, this world, this pop culture

world. They have two and a half percent of merch sales. She says a hoodie does a million dollars. It was a hoodie that just said unwell on it. They got the term unwell from her being at Coachella in L.A. and having to send an email to her office in New York saying that she couldn't come into work today because she was, I'm unwell. Fast forward years later, Alex Cooper's podcast network is called the Unwell Podcast Network. Do you think there's any legal grounds based on if that story is true where there's probably an email somewhere in writing where she's using the term unwell that then shows up on a retail merchandise hoodie that she then splits from that that partner in business and now it's being used without her at all in a pretty big way? Do you think there's anything there? Because that to me was like a lightball, but I don't think that's ever been talked about on any of the interviews or podcasts or documentaries that have been going on.

That was interesting to me. What's your take on that? Well, I think based on what I remember reading, Dave Portnoy, what he did was actually he agreed to transfer all the IP to Cooper. And then I'm sure Cooper had all her attorneys make sure that they had the right, you know, copyrights and trademarks and all the moving parts with unwell. It's interesting. I don't know the details, but it does feel like when it comes to these like arbitration issues and like releasing IP, It feels like Dave Portnoy is extremely fair with that. Oh, the most. I mean, like, I don't know what the deal was. I don't know if it's out there and shame on me if it is out there.

But it does feel like just releasing that IP just to be like as part of the deal to resolve the whatever contract dispute like that, that obviously, other than her being released, that was the most valuable asset. I think that call her daddy kind of became a trend for Barstool in doing that because you remember. mean girls pod uh mean girls yeah left yeah and they got their i pela presley just left he gets sunday conversations so it wasn't and i'm probably missing a bunch but there are a bunch of people that have left barstool because pat mackay show um that have left and being able to keep their ip um from barstool and i love dave's analogy on on you know not being able to he says it's like a it's like a sports team you can't keep all the stars because they grow out of their contracts and you can afford to keep everybody.

So he knows this niche. He knows his niche. It's kind of crazy. Like, you know, love Barstool or hate Barstool. Obviously, there's a lot of good with it. And there's some, there's some negative with Barstool. Like, there's a whole laundry list of a T-chart of what people love and don't like, right? There's negative.

There's negative with everybody. Everything. All right. So we've already addressed that. Let's move on that. The things that have come from Barstool that are like the impact of, let's call it, like, social currency. Like you just said, like Pat McAfee,

you talk about Alex Cooper I mean Alex Cooper now has a dating show coming out on Hulu now what's going to happen all those guests from that dating show where are they going to go? They're going to go to her podcast like it's crazy like the Sunday conversations

is fucking huge man it's it is wild the business case of people that have launched from there 100% 100% and so many people that could like PMT and Big Cat have the biggest podcast in the world the part of my take so

well it kind of reminds me up when we had Breonna chicken fry on and she was offered that big, big opportunity to go. Obviously, her brand has stayed very, you know, in the know, but I wonder, like, a chick's in the office, they've been on the show. You wonder, like, are they best served under Barstool or on their own? I think one of the big things is that what Barstool does is they provide incredible infrastructure and they, networking and whether your show's big or small, when you say you're with Barstool, the likelihood of someone to come on becomes that much greater. And they've done it like they've made big shows so if you have a good product they will get the intangibles

which with our show which has been you know 250 plus you know we're at 200 close 250 episodes running four years plus we're crushing it's going really well but like where we're lacking is actually the opposite it's not the content it's not the show it's the infrastructure to get this thing to to pop to the next level and all the added opportunities like chicks in the office they do chicks in the office how many other barstool events are they included in are they participating that gets them in front of a different audience and not for nothing it's a job it gets some cool experiences you remove yourself you are on your own you have to grind you have to hustle it becomes work work 24-7 strictly for your thing and you're not getting the benefits of

participating in all these other fun events or activities or contests or things that they're doing so i think that the the work culture there is probably fun like people say like it's a fun place to work so um you know and speaking of of those things too like you know i don't want your take on that but Sophia with an F, 82,000 reviews on her podcast, like, and increasing. Like, I don't even know. I haven't checked since you said it, but, like, that's insane. Like, she's still a massive needle mover. That's insane.

82,000 reviews is absolutely insane. Like, absolutely unprecedented insane. So she's obviously putting up numbers. I wanted to quickly talk about the podcast thing because obviously there's a lot of business and podcast here in it directly to what you just said. That was, like, one of the circumstances we actually were thinking about is bringing trading secrets and or me going independently and doing a show at iHeart which who knows that's never off the table but one of the issues in doing so is i would have had to give them my IP and

additionally i would only get like 40% of revenue but what you're getting in return is exactly what we're talking about with barstool you're getting the iHeart infrastructure you're getting ads from other shows about my show you're getting drip and cross-pollination of downloads you're getting access to i heart you know what do they call it like the rock and roll fest or the winter wonderland or all that shit where they're walking the red carpet so there's it feels like every entity and every company you have to take the value of what the infrastructure provides what they can do for you and the revenue side of things so it's interesting very interesting now you know i'm going to just end with with kind of where i started this she said that uh you know

future of podcasting when she started her own podcast it was guest guest guests and she's you know and we've talked about it here too is it always the best thing to have a guest do people come for the guest do they want to hear more from the host is the host what keeps them there she's in you know a little more into like solo episodes and you know or building you know solo episodes about them

that's why we're that's why you know you're going to marinate on this half JTA halfway episode so you can do we can you know we can connect with the connect with our listeners build the community a little stronger on that I'm just throwing it out there

if you guys want you ATA halfway through 2025, and holy shit, I know I predicted Twister in the beginning of 2025. It has been nothing short of that. Wait, real quick, we got Ashley. Ask her how she says documentary. I'm curious. Ashley just walked down. Ashley, we need you on the mic.

How do you say the word? Don't give it. You know what we watched us like? Say it in the mic. Say it in the mic. Come here. Documentary. Have you got?

What she says? She says documentary. let's go. Come on. We got one. Here we go. I don't know if it's an upstate New York thing, though. We'll see. I don't know. It might be. Maybe I don't know. This is, this is, I get chirped on the reviews for saying documentary. And I, I get chirped in Nashville for saying documentary. Maybe it is an upstate New York thing. I don't know. We're going to find out. We're going to find out. And we'll also find out if you guys want a JTA halfway through. Time will tell, but we'll listen to your feedback, DMs, emails, and any type of review.

is great. Sophia with an F. Franklin, thank you for being on this episode. If you're still here, listening to us, always interesting to hear different perspectives. And I'll tell you what, David, I feel like our line of guests these days has been absolutely unbelievable. So trust me when I tell you, the pipeline is stacked. So thank you everyone for tuning into another episode of Trading Secrets. One thing you couldn't afford to miss. that dream making that money money

pay on me making that money living that dream