198. 2024 Personal Yearly Reflections + Meme & Meal of the Week

Foreign.

Of the Ben and Bergs Podcast. I'm Ben, your favorite high school dropout and founder of collective shift alongside Ms. Burgs, your favorite MBA and CEO of Collective Shift. Join us as we bring you world class crypto research and strategies to help you dominate this crypto bull market as well as behind the scenes viewers view of us scanning the leading crypto research company in Australia. And if you like the podcast please leave us a follow on your favorite podcasting apps or subscribe if you are on YouTube and today folks, probably one of the last episodes we'll do in 2024. So we're going to give you a yearly reflection of how we went bergs and I've been catching up briefly. He has not changed since I saw him a week ago. He's still a pain in the ass. So I'm going to give you a bit of reflection mate.

You're just as useless as ever. Like you roll, you barrel in. You've not got half your stuff. Look at your camera. Looks like it's from 1982. You stuttered three or four times during the intro, mate. You haven't even done your hair properly. Like what's going on bro? Like you're like, you stop, you get a coffee. It's not even real coffee, it's instant coffee. Your life's falling apart. You go, you're traveling to America. You haven't even got half a. With you I'm like prepared. I've written the episode, got everything ready. You just barrel in, blow everything up as usual.

Welcome to a day in the life, mate.

You haven't even done your visa and you're traveling in like two days. Yeah, you're not getting in. They turn you around.

Forgot you need an Esther. Trying to get an Esther. Left my passport in Melbourne. Got to get that sorted. But I do have a Makona. I grew up in Makona, mate. Instant coffee. Humble beginnings, mate. I remember my parents house. I did buy a new microphone because my other one busted, didn't bring the right call for the camera. I don't have a camera but humble beginnings.

I grew. Grew. Is that the bedroom you grew up in with your brother in the bunk bed?

Yeah. No, this is the timber floor that I grew up on from 5 to 5 to 15.

Oh yeah, yeah. Just. Just sleeping in like a tent. Just a swag. Didn't have anything mate. Just by the river.

Not even a swag mate. Just like a fly net during summer, killing mosquito away.

So good, so good. But now I run a seven figure.

Business.

From timber floors.

Bro. You should start a timber flooring business as the next one.

But for people that grew up with humble beginnings, you go get your timber floor bed.

That's what you can call a humble beginnings. And you just sell timber floors and bunk beds.

Wouldn't know how to put a timber floor together, but you can buy one off me.

Oh, you got people for that, mate.

Oh, dear. So every year, if you've been listening to Bennett Bergs now for. We've been going on two and a half years now, which is crazy to think. So every year we do a reflection of the year and we set out 20, 24 or the, sorry, the following year goals. And a part of that, it's a. It's a checklist or a process we follow. I'm not sure if Bergs does this, but we. I do Highlights. Low lights of the year. How have I changed? What are the lessons learned? What wisdom have I brought into this year? What do I definitely need to change for the following year? What do I get my energy from? Like energy drainers and energy charges. Personal goals. And then what I think is the. Is the. Is the best one is the fantasy story. And the fantasy story is more just about. Where do you want. It's a G rate.

Like, I'm not sure if Berg does this. We literally did it together, wrote exactly the same like things and did a podcast on it, mate. We talked about it just before the episode.

You just mean so little to me that I just forget what you do, mate.

You keep reinforcing it and showing it to me all the time. I'm gonna burn this company to the ground. You're going on holidays, you're gonna come back to me. Nothing, mate. Scorched earth. See you later. Money's gone. Customers are gone. ASIC in the ATL are after you. Enjoy.

And I've just busted my legs on a. On a slope. Can't walk, lost my company.

Back to Tickle Cross, mate.

Back to Humble Beginnings.

Humble Beginnings round. Thank you, Tassie. All right, so we're both going to read out our fantasy stories and how we went. Ben, do you want to kick off with yours and let us know what your fantasy story was? Yeah, and you can do some commentary along the way, mate.

Okay, so for context. Wait, when did I write this? January. This year? Oh, yeah. Or December. Last year. So we're at a time where we were still. I think we just. I don't think we were profitable yet. Burks. Were we? No. In terms of like a month maybe? Actually, no. I don't think we were, no.

But we had that uptick in November 23rd when we went to Oz Crypto Con.

That's right.

And that was like, that was a big turning point in the company because it was like, hey, either this works or you know it's going to end badly. And we had a couple of cracking months so we were feeling pretty good.

So I think we did our first six figure month in November or December and we still weren't profitable. And that was obviously a huge goal of ours and a very stressful time to go through building a startup. When you're trying to build something in a, in a bear market and you know, startups in general, just fucking hard. But my fantasy story for the end of this year so now was we are doing approximately 2.5x the revenue per month based on our biggest month last year. So it was basically like 2 1/2 x growth from you know, our best month, which was a huge sort of like goal. We're clearing about 30, 35% net profit margin. We haven't added to our core team too much but our staff and ourselves are paid now above average and we have hit our revenue per month goal which has been epic. The profit, profit figure not quite there yet, but I think it's definitely exceeded my expectations of where we got to like when we had our biggest month, I can't remember when that was now November. You know, that was a 5x increase on revenue from our biggest month last year, which is nuts or 4.5 basically x growth. So revenue crushed it. You know, it's been a little bit choppy this year in terms of just, you know, the market and the business. But yeah, this year is way exceeded my expectations and it's been an absolute cracker year. So super, super pumped about that. We're profitable now and we haven't added to our core team too much. We brought in some pretty epic people which have been massive, massive, you know, ads to the team and we've added.

50 to our team.

It's been nuts, hasn't it? Well, no.

In terms of, well, 50.

What, six to nine.

But that's what I mean. It's not like three people. It's like cool. It's not that many people. Like 50.

Yes it is. Okay. We've increased that team size by 50% for full time employees and then we've actually. More than that, more than that.

That's full time.

That's the reason, this is the reason why we haven't hit the profit targets, hit the Revenue ones. But we've also increased our staff significantly. So we've hired another full time analyst, full time ea, full time sales, and then a couple of contractors as well.

Yeah.

So now I think we've got nine full time people compared to three, which.

Is okay in that context. They're growing 50%. Yeah, that sound sounds a lot. But in my head, with 5x increased revenue and we've added three full time people. Like, that's ridiculous. Like that's really good.

But that was, that was one month earlier. You're so funny where you're like, oh, we haven't grown the tea that much. It's 50% bigger.

It's so funny, man. The way you justify things is like.

What we think differently anyway, nine people. So like we do.

Because my thought is just rooted in reality. Just off in like you're already living on Mars with Elon, mate, like four years ahead, mate.

We're not, we're not even, you know, we're nowhere near anyway.

So. No, no, if you think about it that way. So like, sure, fixed costs in terms of wages would have increased like roughly 50.

Yeah.

So that's, yeah, that's a significant amount. That's a fixed cost. We have to pay every single month. But we have had some cracking months along the way.

And you're right, in terms of like where we were last year, what we're spending, like we're spending a significantly more amount based on the reinvestment that we've had through the revenue to grow the business, which has been epic.

Yeah. So that's a strategic choice where we probably maybe doubled our spending because we cut it right back. Yeah. But we're like, hey, if this bull market is coming, these are the people that we're going to need. We're going to need this support person. We need another analyst, we need a salesperson. We've even expanded the sales team now and that was one of the best choices we've made. Like we sacrificed profit to reinvest into the business to get even more profit. And if we didn't do that, we wouldn't have had that massive month and we would be struggling because we wouldn't have the resources to support the demand that's coming our way. Yeah, yeah.

If you include the contractors, part timers, like, it's actually probably a pretty fucking crazy number to be honest. I don't even know how many people.

But.

I've got no idea who works for us. I have no idea what it costs. I just show up and the magic just happens. That's what your investors want to hear, mate.

I create the Magic Man. That's what I'm here for.

The Magic Man.

So outside of that, I'm working primarily on content. And our Platinum service, we'd only just grown. We've only, we only had just launched the Platinum in October last year. So this was the. When I wrote this, the platinum was only two months in. We probably had 10 platinum members at that point. We now have 110, which is nuts.

Let's pause there because that's been like one of the best innovations and money earners in the company. Like that, that's, that's huge. Like, because we tried to, we've tried to do this for so many years and tried to model it and what does that product look like? And then we got to a point where we've nailed it and people love it.

That's called the Ben Simson magic, folks. That's what it is. Just, just a sprinkle, little, little sprinkle of salt.

It's called Ben trying to do stuff. And then you tell him like, mate, no way too much. You can't even support it.

What's my strike rate? Am I 1 in 10 or am I 1 in 20? Good ideas to actually. What ideas? To execution. Probably more than that.

One in 4,000. Most of them don't even make it past like the first couple of sentences. Like, you, you've got, you think about like the first two sentences and then you're five years down the track where it's actually working and like, there's nothing in between. That's Ben's barbell strategy and it fails all the time. I'm like, mate, let's just think about what would have to do. And you're like, oh, yeah, nah, your eyes. Too much work. I'm not doing that.

But when you do have a good idea, it transforms the company.

Mate, only one in 4,000. I'll keep coming up with them.

That's pretty lenient.

Pretty much. I just come to, I come to Bergs and his, his whoop goes from 90% recovery to, to 15. When I, when I seen. Because I just, I, I just trauma dump ideas on you.

Like so many red days, mate. Like, my God, the amount, like when we're talking, we're literally talking about something in the company. You're like, oh, what about this and what about that? How's this opera? You know, we need to do this. I'm like, literally, we've just had an hour conversation about how we're going to settle this thing has been bothering us, and now you brought up this other thing. I'm like, bro, you already packed your bag. You're leaving. I'm still eating. I'm like, dude, what are you doing?

I'm on the next flight out. And you. You just sat down for an ordered entree or something.

Amazing. All right, let's finish off your story.

So what I want to say is well done on the platinum. That's been transformational for our company, and it's a significant portion of our revenue now.

Yeah.

And they are our. Our favorite customers because we get to deal with them. It's a bit high touch. Yeah. And we'll do them in a more personal way. I really enjoy it.

And well done for you for looking after team who. I don't know most of the.

Right. Next. I have my own place in Victoria, and I was still living abroad. I was a nomad, so I was living out of a suitcase still. That's crazy to think about.

You weren't a nomad. You were homeless. For what it is.

Timber floors. On my beginning, I have.

You used to go from. No, people wouldn't remember, but used to go from, like, Airbnb, Airbnb to Airbnb. You'd be traveling around. You don't. You'd have to figure out how the aircon works, the laundry, how the lift works.

Do you remember?

You're walking around, like, do you remember? Yeah, exactly. Trying to do better burgs. The Internet's not working. I'm getting frustrated. Cameras walking around it. Yeah. You're walking around at like 3am and you don't know how to get into your apartment or get keys.

Walking the wall because I'm half asleep. Forgot I'm in a different hotel. Like, don't know what room number. I am, like, constantly losing car. Like, keys. Don't know where to get food. Like, it's just a disaster.

I mean, losing keys, you don't know where to get food. That hasn't changed. But actually.

Actually, everything I just said still happens. So let's just.

How much. How much of your brain power do you think that was taking up? Like, that would be considerable. Right.

Like, I love traveling and I will continue to always travel, but I think now, like, traveling full time and trying to run a company and a podcast and, like, managing people and just like it and. And trying to stay healthy and eat is just so intense. Like, it's so much work.

And that was one of my goals here. So I had my own place in Victoria. Preparing to buy mum and dad a house. I have a Tesla and I have a great home office and recording studio. So I don't have my own place, I'm living with my housemate, but have a Tesla preparing soon, hopefully in the new year to get my dad a house and then home office and studio. The home office man. Just having that set up at my place. Multiple screens rode my camera. It's just so easy. Like. Oh, it just. If the efficiency now is unbelievable compared to last year, roll out of bed.

Straight into the studio, mate.

Literally straight in. Like I could come from a meeting and then a minute later I can be on a podcast, you know, where before I be like, where am I? Oh, it's hot. I'm in Bali, my laptop's on 12%. Forgot my camera, it's noisy. The Internet doesn't work. Like fuck. You know.

I'm just remembering all these things. Anyway, I'm earning X amount per year plus when I'm, you know, paying out dividends, not quite at dividend stage, but I'm at the, at the number that I was, I was looking to earn, which is great.

Starting to really grow my wealth. I am. I've had some positive conversations about potentially, you know, the next stages of the business, whether it's, you know, series A acquisition, whatever that might look like. You know, we're very, very early in those days. I don't think we're really going to go down the, the acquisition path, but in terms of, you know, growing the business and getting some, you know, the next, you know, few years of plans together, we're starting to really talk about that, which is really exciting. We've actually got a little retreat planned, Bergs and I and, and Trav out in, out in Perth in February, which I'm looking forward to. We're going to go and probably drink more beers than anything, but we'll talk about where things will go.

I don't know how much of a retreat it's going to be. Just talk with you. The stress levels are through the roof. I need a retreat. After the retreat.

Yeah, mate, I'm gonna go have a week off after speaking to, speaking to you for three days and then next one is.

He just, he just runs away from accountability. Folks, this has been.

Media media Brand focus has brought us most of our sales and we're pushing local crypto events showcasing the value to deliver and the lives of change, which has been epic. So social media has been massive for me this year. I'm only at 50, 000 followers on Instagram, LinkedIn's gone really well. The podcast is growing, Twitter's growing. Yeah, that's all a YouTube channel. I started a YouTube channel actually this year, so I've got nearly two and a half thousand subscribers on that. I've been doing a video a week, which has been a huge effort. Really underestimated YouTube. That's a really tough game to crack, but it's massive if you can win on there. And then we did the summit, which was massive. We had 2,3000 people join, that had 30 speakers. One of the best events I think, all year for crypto in Australia, which was fantastic. That was actually a really big one, I think for me this year, or us as a brand, like having Bennett Burgs really start to take off, which will show some numbers in a second. And then personally on, on the growth of the sales stuff we do, the social media content, like, that's been phenomenal and that's, you know, to headline. Well, I didn't headline. So be on the main stage, the headline stage on at Oz Crypto Con, and just see a thousand people in the, in the, in the crowd and just the people that came to us all week, like, that's awesome. Like, I love that. That's a real sign of the brand that we've been able to build, which is super exciting to see everyone.

Absolutely, man. What about if you look back on 2024, what are some of the highlights that you had? Some unexpected things that happened or some wins or some travel or friendships, Anything like that? That's outside of that story. When you, when you think about it and you look back.

My trip to Greece. I love Greece. The Europe trip was fun. Really enjoyed that.

Yeah. I'd always wanted to go to Europe and just to check out what life is like over there. Like, it's a completely different world.

Outside of that, I think just living.

Won a couple of awards, mate.

Oh yeah, the Community the year award. That was cool. Really awesome to get some recognition there. I think the. Even just living back in Melbourne, to be honest, and just having a routine and just the simple things of having a house and a ward car. And a car. Like the simple things. My fuck is unbelievable. Like things are so, so, so easy.

And then. Yeah, I don't know, outside of that, I just feel as though it's been a. It's been a big year for the business. Like we really put in a lot of effort this year. I remember the start of the year you and I spoke and I was like, look, this is the year we've got to Crack into it. Like, this is the year we're have to really take advantage of. The market grows and it has. And just to be able to see all of the work and research that we put in and testing we've done for years now in different areas come together and it all just started to really compound and I felt for like two years we were just bashing our head against the wall trying to do these things and getting no results and going, what the hell's going on? And then finally, you know, we sort of made it happen. It clicked and. And things so took off. So. Yeah. Oh, even my finance course.

The.

I did a finance course.

Yeah, you end up doing that. Yeah. The Platinum day was huge as well. That was really good together. The summit as well.

Yeah, yeah, the Platinum day was awesome. To see all the platinum members coming to person, meet all them, even go to token 2049. That was really cool to. To see the Singapore event.

Yeah, it's been. It's been a pretty awesome year, to be honest. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

So that was pretty much it, mate. So in terms of like the fantasy story, pretty stoked on that. A lot of my goals, I. I ticked off a lot. I didn't as well, but.

Yeah, I feel as though probably been one of the best. It was best. The best. It's been the best year for the business 100. And personally, I think just to get everything together, it's been awesome.

So cracker year keeps compounding every year, mate. Like, it's definitely exceeded my expectations.

Yeah, yeah, same, same. Right. How about you, man?

All right, man. So those goals were cute. Let's get into some real goals, mate.

Here we go.

You're just kidding, mate. Enjoy. Makona. All right. What would tastes like? What would my life look like.

In.

25 fantasy story or 24 fantasy story? I wake up early, complete my morning routine and feel unstoppable. I've had a hard workout, the little things don't bother me and I'm willing to take on the world. I've got a lot of energy and I'm ready to give to others. The day is already one, so I definitely feel that way. But I don't do morning workouts. I've tried to and it is just not for me. Like waking up, going for a workout. I need to eat something first before I lift. Yeah, yeah. I've been working out consistently since May and I feel great. Like feel a lot better, a lot more energy. Sleeps through the roof. Don't really have any pain in my body. It is Awesome. I love going around between 11 and 1. No one's in the gym. There's like four people. You feel so rich. Yeah, Absolutely amazing. So definitely done that, man.

I remember when jumping, when you first started working here, mate, you were. Your body was. You're like. Your back was sore, your nose was corked. How to get that fixed? Like, you're just like. You had the corporate body, mate. Corporate, just.

Oh, bro. Sedentary body. So now, like the. The body' getting better. It's just like just the mental trauma from dealing with you I have to work with. So that'll make an appearance in 2025. To work on that.

What's the name? In billions, we've got to bring in one of those psychologists. What's her name?

Oh, Wendy Rose.

Wendy Rose, Yeah.

We've got Trav. He's pretty much Wendy.

Yeah, true, true. Yeah.

But he'll just be like, you get. Get hard. What are you doing?

All right. I don't care about money and I don't measure myself on it. That's pretty much true. Relationship with family is better than ever. It is. We have a dog and he lights up our lives. Yeah. Little arch. So we've had him since Australia Day. He's an absolute legend. He was a monster to begin with, but he's. He's a little legend now. He's just had his one year birthday. A little cavoodle. Absolute lad on the board chair of the school. And I elevate what a board chair can be. That was actually a lot harder than I thought it would be. So I was like, oh, yeah. You know, you do an agenda, you rock up, but when you're leading a group of people that you only see monthly, that has a weird cadence. You're trying to achieve things and you're trying to unite all those people towards common goals. And you're calling people, you're dealing with ministers and politicians absolute wankers. Like, it's a tough gig, but I've really, really enjoyed that. I hang out with my friend.

Completely different. Sorry. Completely different to a startup as well. Right. You've gone corporate startup, you know, school board. Like, it would just be a completely different ball game, right?

Oh, yes. Within my wheelhouse, because I've worked in government for so long. Yeah, but it's like, it's.

Yeah, just in terms of the.

Oh, the pace and.

Yeah, the page.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, the pace. The language you have to use. Yeah, it's. It's all very. A lot of. It's just like signaling and for show like, you have to show up in a certain way, dress a certain way, say certain things. This is more like the. The government side of it, not the school side. Yeah, yeah. It's definitely a different game. All right. I hang out with my friends at least twice a week for dinner or coffee and meet at least one new person per week. That's probably down. I see my friends at least, yeah, once or twice a week, but I haven't met a whole bunch of new people. Again, something I need to work on. I'm more focused and calm at work. Collective Shift is in a bull market and we're helping all of our customers. Customers navigate the market conditions. Very nondescript there. But I think I am a lot calmer at work. I don't stress out. We worked a lot on reporting, finances, all those kind of things, and I think you and I sleep a lot better now. We've got a better view of the business. We understand what's going on and we can make quite rapid decisions. Like we know where things are at. I think the list. Would you feel the same way?

Well, I think the listeners could appreciate that. I don't even know how many people have been added to the company or the percentage growth of where we were last year, this year. And that's just the amount of people that work for us, let alone reporting and numbers and forecasts. And there was none of that when I was. I was running the. Running the show.

It's amazing you got someone competent in. No, no. Three guesses who that is, but.

I just.

I wish he's bringing all the magic mates. I'll just keep doing my job.

All right, so this is what happens when you're a majority owner in a company. You could just do whatever you want, like, it doesn't matter.

What are you doing today, Ben? Doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter, mate. It's just the magic, bro. Sold 8 million platinums in 30 minutes. Come at me. That does nothing for six months. All right. I've supported the Mrs. All year and she's achieved her study goals. That was a lot of work as well. So doing more of the parenting. The missus is doing, like, quite a heavy, like, master's course. She's smashed it in that. Really enjoyed it, but it was full on, so she's on the tail end of that. We've been on a. A trip to Japan or Singapore, so I haven't done that. Have tried to plan it multiple times. Haven't been able to do it because of, like, schooling and the missy Schedule. Although I do have. We do have a Singapore trip booked, so I'm going to F1 with the lads. I think we're going to do, like, token 2049, which is gonna be massive, but I'll also have one with the family hopefully in the next few months.

Nice.

I always have something booked in my calendar, something to look forward to, which I absolutely do have. And this is very interesting where I've achieved all that, plus a ton more that wasn't even in there, but these are more.

And the way I was thinking back at the start of this year was more about how I want to live my life day to day. Not very specific goals out of those. I have specific goals of like, you know, fitness goals, everything like that.

But.

But I think next month when we do our view of 2025 and our fantasy story, my goals are ultra specific. So I've already done those. I haven't written the story, but my goals are like, do this to this level. Do this within this period of time. This is what's happening now. And I think I was at a stage where I was very comfortable and happy with where things are at and it's kind of like that's consolidated. I've achieved those things. I've fixed my mindset to the point where I'm happy day to day, and now it's time to build on that with very specific things. Yeah.

Yep. No, I. They were in similar boats, man. It's been a massive year, I think personally and for the business. And I think now I feel as though we've got the foundations of what could be something pretty exciting in the next few years. So I'm super pumped to sit down and think about what next year looks like and. Yeah, who knows, who knows where we'll be this time next year.

Absolutely, mate. Well done for achieving everything. It's been great now.

You too, man. And it's pretty like, if you. If you don't do this, folks at home, like, I would recommend doing it and save them somewhere. Like, I've got these now in my notion. And like, I even just look back before, like the 2022 fantasy story and. And goals, and you're like, wow. Like, you kind of. You underestimate what you can do in the long term and overestimate what you can do in the short term. So when you look back and go, shit, that's where I was two years ago. Like. Like, we've come a long way.

Yeah. The amount that it's kind of compounded, even, like the big things You've done as well, just with your, like, personal finance. That's been huge. Sorting all that out, paying off your ATO debt. Yeah, you're gonna get your parents a house relatively soon. Like, they're massive goals to achieve, man.

Yeah, yeah, that's. Yeah, it's a lot. It's pretty exciting. Even being able to, like, sponsor my sister at basketball, like, that's awesome. You know, that's been so rewarding. Like, that's what you do all the hard work for, so.

Oh, and, bro, one thing you didn't. Big note that is probably maybe your happiest business achievement is you've cracked ads.

Oh, mate.

I cracked it. The funnel.

Final.

So explain. Explain to people what this is and how long you've been after this. Mate, this is Ben's, like, unicorn. This, like, holy grail.

So in any online digital business, ads play a massive role. Usually for some businesses, the whole role of acquisition, whether you're selling a digital e commerce product, you know, an info product like ours, like a coaching product, Usually everything comes through paid traffic, and then you've got some organic on the sideline. Well, we were never that. We were always organic. And no. Paid for nearly three and a half years. And we were trying to crack. Well, I was trying to crack ads because I'm like, this is the mother. This is the holy grail. This is the mother. Lord. And then for about, what, burks, 18 months, ripped through a bunch of cash, heaps of tear, spent a bunch of.

Money, and I felt all my dividends and half my wage just gone.

Burks is future generational world.

I was living in a bunk bed on a timber floor.

We were back to Humble Beginnings. Zach was getting rich. None of us were.

Bro, we have to start a company called Humble Beginnings.

Oh, dear. Yeah, no, we'll wait. We'll do that. But Anyway, so after 19 months, Mark, I basically got an intervention from Berkson and Trav to say, look, Ben, we get it. We know you want to crack this, but it's not working. We need to, like, focus on, you know, building up our other areas of business. And I was probably quite visibly frustrated around that decision, but I remember that.

We were around a whiteboard in Perth and we're going through, what.

Tactics can we deploy in the next quarter. And Ben was like, ads, ads, ads. And you were just like, I feel like you're ganging up on me. You just, like, shooting down my ideas. Like, you guys are just, like, together. It was like. It was so, so funny. It was like getting very Emotional about it, and we're just like, bro, it's not about that. It's like, if you do this, it hasn't succeeded today. And you're like, but I'm so close. I'm like, I'm like, just a few hundred grand away. Or like, some. I'm like, bro, no.

So it was. It was me. Uneducated school dropout versus 2 MBAs, 20 years experience. All this. I'm like, yeah, I'm not gonna win this fucking argument.

It was very funny where it's like, Two incredibly articulate MBAs, Trav and myself, and we're explaining like, okay, this is the. What will happen. This is the way you go through. This is your chance of success. This is what's going. This is when we'll need to call it. And we're not saying don't do it at all, but you're gonna have to do it with very smaller numbers, otherwise you're risking the company. And, you know, Ben's argument was, nah, it's going to work, man.

No data, no thought, no nothing. Just like, nah, I know it's going to work, man.

Anyway, and.

And we went the organic route, and it. It worked and it was great. And now we've got enough money where it's given us the license to do that, and Ben's done it in a completely different way with a lot less capital, has been very successful. Yeah.

Yeah. And we. I learned a lot from, you know, it wasn't, you know, completely a waste of time. Like, we learned a lot of things about what didn't work, which helps us. Help us massively the strategy of this new way. And it is.

You're right. It's not like we're. We're throwing money away and we're idiots. We're like, okay, this is the amount of money we're going to use. This is the experiment we're going to run. And then when we get results, if the results are great, we continue. If not, we try something else. So it's not just us burning money like stupid idiots.

No, it was like, we had some results, but it was just like. It was not. It was not there. But now this new way, it's been flying. We've got three or four salespeople now. We've got ads pumping up. We haven't really, really turned it up the notch yet either. We're still just, you know, building out the infrastructure and the operations to make sure it all works. But, yeah, very, very exciting. So that's been a big win this year. As well.

That's awesome, bro. Let's get into. We're bringing it back.

Yes, we're bringing it back.

Meme of the week and meal of the week.

There is a throwback, so white bags are doing that. If you haven't been a listener for long around here. We used to start.

I've just seen the meme.

So we used to do an episode every week where we used to do like a wrap up of the week and we realized no one really gave a about us too much. So we don't do it too often anymore. But we want to bring it back. We used to do a meme of the week and a meal of the week. We're bringing it back. This might be meme of the year. Meal of the year. I don't know. We'll soon find out.

We've got a couple of memes. This is not of the year. These are just ones I found randomly in my phone that weren't too spicy about Elon or Visas or Indians or any of the, like, latest stuff that's going on Twitter. So this is a very old lady. Grandma's autism didn't exist back in my day. Also, Grandma's sit, sweetie. It's time you see my collection of fancy spoons. It's like, mate, have you seen this? Where people like, even rfk, He's a big one for this. Where they're like, autism didn't exist, ADHD didn't exist. And it's like you go to the movies, but nannies need to take their knitting because they can't be bored during a movie.

Yeah.

Like, there are so many signs out there where you're like, the call's coming from within the house. This is a highly genetic, passed down thing. Or just been adhd. And they're like, nah, it didn't exist, mate. Didn't exist. Bullshit grammar. All right.

Meme number two. There's an old guy and a younger guy and the caption is me showing a rich old man with dementia. Our family photos generated in AI so he can include me in his will.

I love it when people just like take a new technology and they have this, like extreme. Yeah, dystopian slant on it. It is so, so good. And the next one might make you cry, but I'm gonna do it anyway. It's. Is this from. I think it's Fight Club and it's like totally dead. When the war against the machine starts and I have to shoot my air fryer. He's just crying. He's got a pistol it's so good.

The air fryer is the thing that solves my life. It is the most ADHD friendly piece of tech in the world. It is amazing. All right, let's get into meal of the week, Ben. Oh, wait, this is mine. All right, let's go. So here we go. Let's go with this one first. So I cooked up some amazing pork ribs. These are loin on baby back ribs. Absolutely amazing. You only eat like two or three ribs and you're full. So this was the first photo and this is just simply chucked over charcoal. I'm smoking it with pecan and we've got a rub on there of salt, pepper, garlic, cayenne pepper, paprika, onion powder and cumin. I think it was absolutely amazing. And then this is them sauce. So I ended up making my own sauce, which was the best thing I've ever tasted. Sauce. The ribs set them. These things were chonkers, mate. I've got over half of it left in the entire family ate like this was. Each of these ribs is like 2 kilos each. This is one of the most incredible meals I have ever made. Like, I always enjoy.

But this is next level charcoal barbecue. Yeah, yeah, mate.

Charcoal Weber. So, yeah, nice Charcoal briquette snake method with pecan wood to smoke it. Absolutely delicious, mate.

Mate, I've been lacking a bit of feedback. I haven't seen too much bread and Greg Oakford in my feed recently. I think you got to get back on that.

Oh, mate, I've got some stuff ready for Greg. Oh, bro, you wait. I had a little bit of a break. I'm like, I don't want to think about Greg while I'm on my break. Like, I don't want to. I don't want to get depressed, like thinking about Greg. I'll just wait till I'm back at work and I've got so many threads and photos ready. I'm slowly going to destroy that guy. This is what happens if you come after me and my team, Greg. All right now, Ben, we have a meal of the week here. Half eaten meal. Chicken bone is sticking out, mate. What is this?

This is just another classic. Burger's always like, why is all your meals always like half eaten? I'm like, well, I always forget to take a photo. Then I get halfway through, I'm like, oh, this is pretty good. I better take a photo.

So this was Christmas lunch made up at Nan's. And this was more. I think everyone had a meal like this the other day. Cracking. We had ham, lamb, on the Weber chicken. And this was mum's noodle salad that she makes. And, man, I just like this thing. I just devour. I have the whole bowl every year. Mom's like, I'm making a favorite noodle salad. I'm just. I'm just into it. It's fantastic. The chicken's great. I just go all meat, no salad, bit of potatoes on the side. Fresh, frothy, mate. Can't go. Can't go better than that on Christmas Day.

Oh, bro, how good? This is pretty much like our Christmas as well. We've got. We had pork, turkey. We even cooked up some, like, beef tri tip ham and then like 50 or 60 sides. It's just incredible, mate.

Yeah.

How good is Christmas? Oh, bro, you're probably still eating that ham, mate. Getting through it.

Oh, yeah, but ham on toast. Every meal for the last week, but that's all right.

Oh, every morning, like, cooking up with eggs.

Awesome. Well, I think we're done. Is there anything else we're talking about?

I just want to say, mate, been pretty awesome working with you this year, mate. As much as I give you and you give me and you just ruin my life, it's been awesome. I'm really still enjoying working with you. I look forward to it. And the success we've had is absolutely incredible. The team we built is great. I'm really enjoying Collective Shift, loving Ben and Bergs, meeting all the people down in Sydney at Oz Crypto Con. I've had a lot of fun. I'm really looking forward to next year, mate.

Me too, man. It's been a big year. I think we both need a break still. Even I think everyone knows that over family Christmas, just. It's flat out. So hopefully get a bit of a break in early. Jan, I'm gonna. I'm gonna go the slopes in Canada, take some time off. But no, man, things are good. It's been a good year. Appreciate it. And I did see that back in 2022, one of the highlights was hiring you. So apparently, mate, I appreciate you too. I don't know. I don't know who wrote this? It must be me.

I still remember there's a quote from you, mate, where you were telling your girlfriend at the time, you were just like, oh, man, so thankful. Hydberg's oh, so good, mate.

Instantly regretted saying that. But anyway, Berg's eyes are now, sir.

I sometimes wonder where. Well, I don't have to wonder. It'd be in the gutter, where the company would be if you didn't hire me, mate. You'd be. You would. You'd be, like, more in debt. You double down, triple down. Be $8 billion in debt, just burning through capital, trying to crack ads. You've got 400 staff that don't know what they're doing.

Matt.

I sprinkle the magic, you'd be back.

To your humble beginnings.

Startup was cool.

Right, let's end it there.

Right, folks, it's been a cracking year. Thanks for listening. Bennett Bogs, big year next year. Thanks for sticking with us with all of our nonsense. We absolutely love doing this podcast. We're going to keep bringing you, hopefully, some awesome content next year. Thank you, everyone, and we'll see you on the next episode.

Thanks, champions.