Derek - More Plates More Dates | Optimize Your Life & Invest Into Yourself

Welcome back to the Casey Adams Show. Today I am joined by Derek from More Plates, More Dates. Derek, thank you so much for coming the show, brother.

No, thanks for having me, dude.

I know we've been looking to make this happen for a while now. So super excited to dive in.

Yeah, yeah. It's been a long time coming.

Absolutely. And you know, for context, we met I think like a year and a half ago. We met initially just through mutual friends and you were an investor in Media kits and just seeing, not only seeing your journey, but just getting immersed in your content over the years, it's, I've been so fascinated with not only what you talk about and your journey, but just to get to know you as a friend. And yeah, I'm super excited to dive in today. And for people that may not know from a business perspective where you spend your time, the companies you build, I would love for you to just give a high level of where you spend your time and what you are building.

Yeah. So my main areas of time investment essentially at this point are Gorilla Mind, which is my dietary supplements company that focuses around pre workout formulations, nootropics, anything performance related, but also health optimization. We're kind of stemming into a bunch of different verticals now, but kind of like the supplements realm. And then Merrick Health is my preventative medicine platform. It's a telemedicine platform that I get people elaborate diagnostics which then they have medical oversight to then interpret those diagnostics and make educated assessments for making informed conclusions for what to do moving forward with their health optimization practices, whether it be lifestyle intervention changes, dietary manipulation, sleep hygiene improvements or pharmacology medications or supplements when warranted. It's kind of like turnkey concierge level healthcare is the kind of outlook of it. And then in addition to that, a smaller scale company called Intelligent Shop, which is kind of like miscellaneous products and it will stem into other verticals in the future.

Very cool, very exciting. And there's so much to dive into within all of them. And you know, I really just want to start with where did this journey begin of health and wellness and you know, body optimization. I know just before we were getting rolling here, I was telling you like the past year and a half I've, I've been getting super deep into, you know, I got the cold plunge outside in terms of optimization, sleep data. They got the eight sleep bed, the Oura ring and you know, ran my first marathon in December. And I've just been really getting health conscious and just optimizing in my Eyes like, you know, just taking those initial steps for you in this journey and your YouTube channel initially. Where did this all begin for you?

Yeah, so I guess it probably stemmed from way back in teenage hood when I started working out and getting. It's kind of like called getting bit by the iron bug is when you get like addicted to the, you know, the progress you're seeing in the gym and the newbie gains and really enjoyed the process and started to get into the realm of seeing what went on in the enhanced bodybuilding side of things. Which led me down rabbit holes of exploring pharmacology, like the research of how steroids work and interact with the body and how people are using it to gain, you know, exorbitant amounts of muscle, improve their performance, et cetera. And then down the line that led me to realize, and it's kind of like, I don't know, cart before the horse sort of thing, learning about the side effects they cause and how problematic they can be, and then working backwards. I kind of became more enthralled with the idea of optimization, but encompassing brightness, broad spectrum health as well, as opposed to just like cranking your body hard and redlining it, which is what I did from, I don't know, age 20 to like 24 maybe or something like that. So. And then after that I started to look into, you know, cognitive health also got kind of more longevity and not anti aging, but more like stuff that is conducive to staying alive and not just killing yourself sooner in pursuit of like a crazy, you know, exorbitant physique kind of thing. So for me, it's been stemming from bodybuilding, which then transitioned into a whole bunch of different rabbit holes of how do I, I don't know, maintain a good body composition while also, you know, optimizing my cognitive health while also dialing my macro and micronutrient intake while dialing in my sleep. And it just, all these things have overlap with each other and it kind of led me to becoming a. I don't know, I'm kind of like a nerd at heart. So that's kind of like how I got to where I am. And just a lot of reading online.

Yeah, no, it's so cool to see. And for people, even someone like myself, like the past year, going into these rabbit holes, there's so much to learn, and hearing you talk about certain topics and concepts, people kind of may be overwhelmed. It's like, well, okay, where do I begin? Where do I start? And I'm curious, what does Your daily routine habits look like when it comes to an optimization standpoint, just so people can get like a tangible understanding of someone that has so much knowledge in this space, that strives to optimize in so many areas of their life. What does your schedule look like? Especially when you're traveling, you're in la. There's so many things that I'm sure people are curious about that I'd love to just take for what it is in terms of the simplistic of just habits and daily routines.

Yeah, when I wake up typically I try to do my best to get eight hours of high quality sleep. And that is what I would always preach in general. And again, it's always, I don't always practice what I preach unfortunately, but I try to the best I can. But on my ideal day it would be eight hours of high quality sleep. I would wake up, probably stand on my porch and look out at the sun, get some sunlight in my eyes for 5, 10 minutes or so and kind of just get awake and let my kind of like cortisol rise and get me kind of redlined or get ready for the day. As far as how that day starts in general, I used to, I've tried working out earlier in the day, I've tried working out later in the day. I've tried a bunch of different stuff. And some people, again there's no one size fits all for when you should work out. Some people, they feel great after they work out and they want to continue like they ride that endorphin high until like their actual heavy mental work. For me, when I lift heavy and I train to failure, I am cognitively taxed and my body is taxed. So I don't feel like sitting on a computer and grinding out work after. So I typically save it for later in the day. But that is, you know, highly variable person to person. But for me typically it's don't eat anything, wake up, look at the sun for 10 minutes, sit down and crank, work for like eight hours straight. Like that is my, that is my day typically. And for me, intermittent fasting is a massive impact on my mental sharpness, clarity. I don't know cognitive flexibility. Like for me that's the biggest needle mover as far as having a extended duration of mental sharpness throughout, you know, skewing going past just the morning and further through the afternoon. If I eat a really heavy carb dense meal, for example, or I go train, to me that kind of derails my mental sharpness a little bit. So I Try to extend that window out as far as I can. And that is like the main practice that is consistent, at least for me. And then after that I typically just put out any fires that have come up overnight because oftentimes when you're running multiple businesses, there'll be little things that pop up that weren't on your to do list on the night prior but are now on your to do list because you just have no alternative but to immediately address those.

Yep, put them out.

Yeah. And then it'll be kind of just going through a task list that I've set up for myself the previous night. Like for me goals on like a micro scale as much as everyone has big, large, grand scale goals. For me, if I don't actually map out my day the day before, it's very difficult to stay on task cuz my brain is just going a million miles a minute. So yeah, yeah, for me I literally just lock myself in my office, which is a very boring setting. But it's me staring at a wall. If I have a nice view or something I get distracted. But I just have my task list literally this hour to this hour you have to do this, this hour to this hour you have to do this. And it's just broken down by micro tasks throughout the day, even down to when I start eating. And maybe that sounds insane but for me it's just kind of how I've dialed in. And then after I've worked probably like eight hours in general, I will eat, which is my first meal. After that I will try and do a 10 minute walk which is kind of good for like blood gluc, blood glucose control and like getting them back to a set point that is I would say healthier and helps nutrient assimilation. Like it's just a good practice to be getting your steps in. And I try to, yeah, I try to get as close to 10,000 a day. Not always the best at it, but ideally I would. And then work until it's time to go to the gym. Typically gym work, you know, train as hard as I can. Then after that dinner kind of wind down and yeah, from there, you know, start. I have some like, you know, sleep transition principles that I think kind of most people are probably aware of. Like try and avoid blue light, you know, avoid stuff that's going to stress you out super late. Try not eat too close to my sleep time because I can elevate your body temperature and be problematic for trying to get to sleep. It's kind of like some of the stuff has some overlap Where I'm not like super dialed every day, but I do the best I can. And that's kind of like a. An overarching bird's eye view of my day, as elaborate as that might have sounded.

No, no. I mean, it's good to even just hear that, right? Because you hear all these different concepts and things and for you to test all these different theories and concepts to then have just the simplistic understanding of what your day looks like. I learned something in that and I hope others did as well. When it comes to the business of what you've built, multiple businesses in this idea of health and optimization, what was the first business that you started? Was it prior to social media? Did social media spark the initial idea to get into the business world? I know you went to college and studied marketing and business and where did this drive for entrepreneurship and the, you know, the willingness and just the entrepreneur drive, like, where did that stem from?

It's tough because I think sometimes there is a brain chemistry component of it where some people are just wired a certain way for dopaminergic activity or very, very stress resilient and thrive off of pressure and achievement, whereas some people are very content in their current environment. So it's not something you can, I don't think you can really like train. Maybe you can. But like, to me it was kind of inherent. Like, I just kind of had it from the get go. And it was not very focused though. Like, when I got into starting online content, I had no conception about how an online business started or even the importance of content. Back at, it was like 2016.

Yeah.

It's funny because now people think, am I too late to start posting? Back then I was thinking that in 2016.

Yeah, I used to think the same thing.

Yeah, I was like, oh, look at all these big people on YouTube. There's no, no point. That's what I, that's what I thought at the time. Um, but yeah, for me it was just baby stepping my way through. Like, affiliate marketing was the first kind of taste of success I had where it was like, wow, my influence is impactful on converting people to use something that I otherwise already use and I can get monetarily incentivized and compensated for telling people to use the same thing I already use. Like, yeah, and like, yeah, and like helping them find something that I deem to be a good product. So from there I had reasonable success, I would say, from a making money online standpoint. And it kind of, as you accumulate some level of. I don't know, financial independence, you can kind of translate that in terms of if you have a business idea now, you actually have the flexibility to put something down to start, you know, get some basic inventory or, you know, buy a new domain or hosting or whatever it is. And like. So for me it was kind of just trial by error and going as I go and learning as I go, but there was no blueprint. I think that's one of the scariest things is people don't have a blueprint so they don't want to start. And I'm very, again, like I mentioned at the beginning, task oriented. So I need like a step by step of My Day at 8am Is this to this. And then from there I go from this to this. But in business school, I got a marketing degree at a reasonably prestigious university and I learned nothing that was relevant in any capacity to what I do now. There was no education about how to start a business or what the steps are, nothing of the sort. So it was wrapping your head around it when you haven't started can be overwhelming, but it's just taking the first steps is all you can really do. So for me it was, I guess even though inherently I had some of that chemistry, brain chemistry, it was still like a learning process to wire myself to get to where I am.

Yeah, no, I mean, very cool. And just for context too, I didn't go to college and this whole idea of business and social media and marketing, I not only learned through doing, but the quality of mentors and the people that you associate with. For me, having this podcast for five, five years now, since I was 17, has been, in my opinion, truthfully, my school of business. The conversations, the questions, what I've learned, the experiences and a lot of people that I've had on the show were then investors and media kits. Through building those relationships and just by connecting with a lot of people. Genuinely, I'm curious to know, for you, when you talk about college and how it maybe wasn't impactful for you, who were some people or mentors or just people that you looked up to in a sense, maybe that were inspirations for you early on in your career and maybe there's no, no one, but I'm just curious if there's anyone in particular.

Yeah, so Chris Diotis is my current business partner and he kind of, I think as much as I say I had no blueprint, he sort of paved the way for what a gym bro could do online, I guess. And I was like a fanatic follower of his brand and his blog, because he back then writing articles was actually a big deal and being like ranked on SEO terms actually mattered for certain things. And I would follow his stuff religiously about, you know, self improvement in general. A lot of it was social related, like exposure therapy to get over your anxiety of talking to women and stuff like that. And also he had a lot of good gym and, I don't know, body optimization content and whatnot. And I had seen him achieve what I deemed to be like very financially independent success through his endeavors and start a few different businesses. And to me that was a blueprint I could wrap my head around. It's like, okay, this guy is similar interest to me. You know, he's a young guy who has these interests and it stemmed off through talking about making content about stuff. I was also directly interested in myself and felt like I was accumulating reasonably relevant experience on that I could impart on people that was valuable. I was like, okay, this is a blueprint I can wrap my head around and made sense. And when you're, you know, just starting out being an affiliate is, you don't have to, there's no risk really. So it was, yeah, that was kind of the only mentor slash blueprint I had really other than, you know, over the, over time though, you know, you talk to a lot of people and pull and extrapolate what you can from and assimilate it into whatever is relevant for your own journey. And I've had multiple mentors along the way, but from inception, before I had any idea of what I was doing, that was probably the primary one.

Got it. I'm curious, right? Even speaking today, you've been in on not only so many podcasts, but many influential shows such as Joe Rogan. When it comes to getting eyeballs on you, getting attention, coming back to just what happened to December Liver King. I know you've gone super in depth on this another show, so there's no need to go crazy in depth here. But when it comes to just this idea of attention, you've had so much attention on you over the years and I'm curious to just understand the attention or maybe lack of years prior when you were just getting started to the business growth and how you've seen that firsthand in terms of your personal brand to brand and company relationship. I'm just curious about what you think about that and what's your advice to other founders that are not only looking to go build a personal brand, but seeing you in the influence you have an individual. And I'm just Curious to know the correlation of business growth to personal brand growth and just kind of provide people that blueprint because it's worked so well for you and again, you have so much attention on you for great reason.

That's tough to define in any sort of practical application because for me, I think the main thing that separates longevity in what you're doing is true passion for the subject matter. So if you're starting a business because you see financial opportunity, that's one thing. But if you're passionate about what you're selling, service wise or product offering wise, that's another major underpinning of what will make you actually incentivize and motivated. Not just from a monetary aspect, but from like a value proposition aspect for helping people above and beyond. I'm making a profit. Like you actually feel the desire to go work in spite of the other stuff because you were already interested in it. So for me, that's been the major underpinnings of everything I do is because I actually like care about this stuff anyways and would otherwise do it for free. In general, like for me, I would dissect blood work or learn about optimization or do these things regardless of this company existed or not. So for me, it's something I'm highly passionate about and it is something I'm going to be able to continue for years to come without ever feeling like I'm stagnating or it's I'm burning out or anything. Like I'm just for me, I can't imagine doing a business model that is solely surrounded around. I saw financial upside. Yeah, yeah.

I mean that makes sense. When it comes to this idea of blood work. I've never had my blood work done and I know that.

Didn't we set you up with a panel?

I know Kieran did.

Oh, I gotta get you one.

Yeah, I haven't had one yet and I'm curious, you know, someone who's 22, I've heard this from you and you've been a huge influence and I was waiting to bring this up on the POD because I know I need to do that and it's something I want to do to have that baseline of just longevity and understanding where I am currently. What do you think when it comes to someone who's 21, 22 years old, getting blood work and creating that baseline? From a blood work perspective, what's your thoughts on that?

Yeah, in general, people that are in their young 20s, it's not like there is an immediate concern of or impending disease, hopefully which is needs immediate addressing. So it's kind of. It makes you wonder, why would blood work be warranted for me if I could go back in time to being 21? I wish I had that elaborate baseline, because when things go awry, it's the only way you can then go back and see, okay, this marker is thrown off or this is imbalanced or what have you based on previous to that, when everything was dialed in, this is where it stood. And now in a suboptimal state, or more interested in optimization, you see kind of where these variations and operations have happened, and you start to educate yourself as to why. So for me, it's not something that I feel like is necessary from, like, an immediate practical application aspect, as in, you're going to. Maybe it is. And this is again, because some people, they're so genetically predisposed to atherosclerosis, you might be able to pick it up at 21, 22, and actually be able to modulate your diet and lifestyle accordingly to attenuate that risk. Because some people, they don't find out until they're 40, 50, and they have plaque buildup. Oh, for the last 20 years, if you knew that you had familial hypercholesterolemia, maybe you could have intervened accordingly. And if you needed medication, like, you should have been on it for the last 20 years. Yeah, that kind of stuff. As much as I would preach lifestyle is massively impactful, which it is. But there are some things that ultimately genetics and predispositions, you can't really circumvent entirely through that. And that as much as the ancestrally consistent people and the certain natural lifestyle zealots will tell you otherwise, frankly, at the end of the day, you have to be open to all approaches. And for some people, they're so genetically predisposed that knowing at 20, you could have otherwise avoided a myriad of disaster or a significant disaster when you're in your later 40s, 50s, 60s. So for me, it's more about not how do I optimize my whatever. Like, it's great to know that, but it's the lesser of important things. It's more about identifying if you have any unique risk factors at a young age, and then to change, make the changes accordingly early, before it manifests into, like, an actual problem, and then also just have that baseline so then if something were to happen, you can go back and address accordingly and actually see what went wrong and why.

I love that. I definitely need to make that happen and get it done. What are your Thoughts on not only just longevity, but when you think about longevity and with modern science, what do you believe is possible from a life expectancy perspective over the next 50 years with modern science, modern just ways to optimize, how do you think about that and do you have, you know, like I want to live to X number and I believe I can do that through optimizing this way over a multi decade perspective. Like do you think about that?

Absolutely. And the only thing for me on that is I want to live with high quality of life. I don't necessarily want to live just for the sake of it. So part of the problem is a lot of the anti aging research is centered around how do I live in as frail and not vital state as possible to extend my lifespan. It's like yeah, a tiny Asian woman will outlive like a jacked, you know, sick foot for a guy just based on body composition and demands of organs. Like that's just how it's going to work. But there is a trade off where it's, you know, how do you want to live during that lifespan too? So I am optimistic about some of the stuff going on and you know, rodent models and whatnot. But unfortunately I haven't seen like significant practical application in humans yet. Yeah, I do think that modern medicine is helping people extend their lifespans and I think that people are becoming more educated about this stuff and it's going to definitely be impactful for the certain minority of individuals who take it seriously. I don't really know what to expect as far as where the lifespan with high quality of life goes in the Next, you know, 40 years from now or not. But I do know one of the most just red flag risk factors is cardiovascular disease. And I think some of the education around it coming out is going to be super impactful on those who care attenuating and avoiding that outcome in the future. So there's certain things that are very manageable or more manageable if you're educated about it well ahead of time. And it seems like a lot of people are very interested in actually learning and getting the context behind what's going on in their body now, which is great.

Yep, that's very interesting perspective there. I wanted to go back to what you said at the beginning about your different businesses. The third one you said different types of products. Can you expand on that and just remind, remind myself like what business is that? And just what is where did that idea come from in terms of like what you wanted to become?

So intelligent shop was meant to Be a miscellaneous product brand that just encompassed anything that I used that wasn't dietary supplement related or actually fell into the realm of. It has some overlap with some of the miracle stuff, but not, not medication related. Like basically, hair loss prevention is a big component of my channel and a lot of education surrounding that. And the things I've learned over the years that move the needle and some of those products have been there's only so many things at work. It's like a very snake oil ridden industry. And for me, there are certain products that have been long standing needle movers for me and for others that I've recommended it for again as an affiliate too over years. And people have been. Had amazing results with. And it got to the point where, you know, I should make my own product because this is stuff I've used for years and otherwise think is very, very useful. Yeah. And so it's kind of just started with that. Like I came up with a hair loss prevention shampoo. And then from there we had.

And this is already a product that you're selling?

Yeah, got it. And then we had a fast drying non oily minoxidil, one of the. It's like the only thing that stimulates new hair growth very significantly.

Oh, wow.

Yeah. And it's one of the problems. Well, it's not. I guess it depends on your hair type.

I'm curious, when does that, when does hair loss typically start happening in men? Specifically?

Teenagehood.

Teenagehood, yeah.

Like if you're genetically predisposed, as soon as you have that big spike in testosterone and DHT as you go through, literally the thing that pushes you through puberty is also the commencement of androgenic alopecia, unfortunately.

Got it. And is that something that I'm guessing you dealt with?

Yeah, yeah, heavily. Yeah. And like walking that back and recovering is so much harder than preventing it.

So you had, I remember I saw a video just in terms of acne. Right. Skin care, like that was something I don't know if you've seen. I don't post about it too often, but I had very bad cystic acne. Took Accutane, just did the whole thing, tried so many different things. Took almost two years to, to go through that process. But how did, how did you end up solving that problem for yourself?

Same thing, dude. Accutane.

Accutane, yeah.

Yeah. I wouldn't, I would say again, if I could go back in time, there are certain things I would look at before Accutane because that's the literal nuclear bomb of acne. Prevention, but again, similar to the genetic predisposition thing. As much as you would love to think there are natural things I could do to fix this, I can guarantee there's somebody watching this and maybe yourself even where you tried a bunch of stuff and it didn't and it didn't work and then Accutane moved the needle.

Yep.

So, yeah. And maybe you deal with perpetually dry lips at this point, maybe similar to me, but you have no acne and it's improved your quality of life, presumably 100%.

The dry lips lasted for a while. Nowadays I don't notice it too often. Every now and then I'll have dry lips, but very infrequently, not too frequently.

Considerably side effect ridden drug though, so be wary of that. Some people get, you know, it's not emotions. Yeah. It's not common necessarily for there to be, you know, side effects significantly worse than the brutal dry skin and chapped lips. But some people do get pretty bad side. So again, it's just being mindful of the pros and cons and you weigh it out accordingly. But yeah, yeah.

So these different products, right. Hair loss, hair prevention into the future for that business. Right. I look at it like, it's like you're vertically integrated. All these products that you promote that have helped you, that you want to help now with the experience of building companies, building products that then you just want to not only sell, but that have been impactful for you. What are other products that you can speak about today that you're looking forward to with that business specifically?

Okay, yeah. This is something I never talk about, so this is cool. So cologne. This might sound absurd, but back when I started the channel, I was pretty big on fragrances. We were actually just talking about your Creed event. It's two seconds.

It all makes sense.

Yeah. So anyway, for me, I used to get girls to rate fragrances. I would go around my university and different campuses and get girls to rate them and just. I was just pretty into it. Like, there are fragrance connoisseurs who actually collect these things and have a different fragrance for different situations and whatnot. And I'm not like necessarily, you know, like a total. They call it a frag head, which is like, like a nerd about fragrances. But I'm enamored enough by them that it has led me to have a pretty significant collection built up over the years. And what does that mean?

Because I'll tell you, I have one fragrance, Creed Aventus, and you said the cliche one that means I Got some work to do. I won. So what does that mean for you? Is it 10, is it 20, is it 100?

I've got probably 25 different ones.

Okay.

Yeah. But at this point I probably have a hundred plus samples of different fragrances just to test. Everything out there that I felt was either popular, obscure, but had high, I don't know, was highly acclaimed or well reviewed by like the actual frag heads in the community that I've never heard someone say that. And just a bunch of different stuff to kind of get like a more informed perspective about what's out there. And it's kind of led to the creation of. We came up with our first fragrance Carbon earlier I think mid last year and I'll have I think 10 more coming out this year.

10 different fragrances.

Wow.

That's insane.

Yeah.

What have you learned about the fragrance business that you didn't expect to learn?

I should say, I guess fragrance oil concentration doesn't dictate potency always. Like there are different, like for example, Creed Aventus I believe is a, like a perfume, perfume concentration and the more oil you have in it, it doesn't necessarily mean it's going to perform better. And you kind of learn that there are certain fragrance DNAs that just like don't work well and will like you spray it and then becomes a skin scent shortly thereafter or some will project really aggressively and it's overkill. You learn a lot of stuff as you're kind of formulating and it's been fun to try and dial in what I consider to be, you know, a good date night fragrance or like, you know, something that makes you smell fresh but isn't offensive in like a gym setting, for example, stuff like that.

It's so fascinating, like getting into the fragrance business. What else? Like what else are. What else? Not even that you're launching because I'm sure there's things you can't talk about in the setting but that you're interested in or products that you know, that you see value in, you know, creating in a different way from a business.

Respect perspective through Intelligent Shop in particular. It's tough, dude, because I, it's very ever evolving. I don't really know where it's going to go for sure. And that's why I had such a not clear answer at the beginning. Like we, we have some other products coming out but they are hair loss related. So I guess it's not as, not as unique to talk about, but that's kind of like the extension of the fragrance Line is kind of where I'm excited about it going. And anything that falls into the ingestibles will probably be under guerilla Mind in the future. And anything health service related falls under Merrick Health. Even when it comes to a compounding pharmacy is something that's on my radar for either building or buying. And that's something that is a high priority as well. And above and beyond that, I don't have a whole lot more interest and I try to stay in my domain. So I'm not gonna just sell stuff for the sake of, you know, putting out what I think moves product. It's more like what I think has practical utility.

Yeah. Would you ever get into skin care stuff for men specifically or.

We actually have that. We have it already. Oh, yeah. We just sell it through the most incongruent site for skincare ever, which is Gorilla Mind.

Got it. Okay. I didn't know you guys had skin care.

We might actually put that, I don't know, through a separate brand. Like it is technically sep. It has a separate brand name. It just is not segregated to a separate website. It sits in this weird subsection category of skincare on our site. And it's the only things I'm aware of that really move the needle. We have a hyaluronic acid serum moisturizer, an exfoliating cleanser, and then we should have a sunscreen at some point that's mineral based, but that's to be determined.

Got it. So with Gorilla Mind, just for those who don't know, when did you initially launch Gorilla Mind and what led to just the launch of that specifically and just the whole setup of launching the company.

The official launch, I think was January 2018, or it might have been December 2017. Basically what led to it is Chris, the guy I talked about, mentor, inspiration, blueprint guy. Yep. He had a supplement company with somebody else who was in the, like manosphere is what they call it. It's like the self improvement space for men. And how they, I don't know, these were like two of the forefront guys of that, I don't know, niche, and they started a supplement company called Red Supplements, which is, it's funny, it's like red pill, like the matrix. It's like a big, you know, thing in the manosphere. Anyway, so all their products were red pills essentially and different products under that. And I was, you know, the customer service guy, social media guy, helped with formulation a little bit.

How old were you then?

23. Okay, maybe. Yeah. And then from there the company didn't really blow up or anything. And Chris and that guy separated. And when Chris parted ways, he asked, hey, do you want to start this nootropics company with me? And frankly, I liked working for Chris more than this other guy. So I went with him. And then it led to the creation of Gorilla Mind, where I formulated Gorilla Mind Smooth and Gorilla Mind Rush, which was our stimulant based nootropic formula and stim free. And then from there it kind of stemmed off into. It was originally supposed to just be a nootropics company. We had Gorilla Dream as well, which is a sleep enhancing formula. And then from there it was kind of, okay, we should get a pre workout. You know, at the time I thought it was actually a dumb idea. That sounds pretty pre workout or. Yeah, like I was like, I was like, no, we're a nootropics company. So eventually we came out with Gorilla Mode, which is a hit. And then after that I came out with our stimulant free, vasodilation focused and hyperhydration focused formula nitric. And then it just stemmed off into a whole bunch of stuff that was performance based and kind of evolved into what it is now.

Wow.

Yeah.

What thinking. And you know, you said this earlier about you sell all these YouTubers that are so big and you were like, oh, why would I start a YouTube channel? They're so big. I think about that in terms of I don't have any experience in the supplement industry, but you walk down an aisle or, you know, you go online, you see the vast amount of supplements and it's a massive industry. What was your initial plan or just how are you going to differentiate and build a brand in the market that just has so many not competitors, but just so many brands that are looking to capture attention and capture those, you know, the customers?

In a sense, for me at the time, I felt like there was a severe lack of transparent formulas. At the time, proprietary blends were still rampant, which is not as much the case anymore. And I think hopefully I at least had some part of that. But it's also just education of what customers want. And for me, my perspective at the time was, okay, if I'm going to make a pre workout, which is something I buy and use and like, what would I want to see in this for it to be what I consider effective, stacked, worth the money, bang for the buck. So I made Gorilla Mode based around what I would want to see from a vasodilation perspective. Hyperhydration, stimulation, mood elevation, all that kind of stuff. And at the time there was really no formulas on the market that were using. They'd use clinical dosages but oftentimes it was what's the minimum effective dose? Not what's the max effect of those. So I dug into some literature, found for example, we were the first company to use what is the maximum efficacious dose of L citrulline. So and it's funny because on our product page on Amazon it says the only formula in the industry to have this. And it's like that's such an old write up now that a bunch of companies have done that since. But at the time it was like a reasonably revolutionary thing. Ali. And maybe there were some obscure companies that I'm just unaware of that already did that. But for me that was like, that was my idea was I don't even care what the other people are doing because this is what I deem to be the effective product and I would buy. So I didn't even really, I didn't have a conception of oh, how do I differentiate myself? Like I just did it on its own. Yeah, over time, you know, certain companies use the same kind of, you know, marketing tactics in terms of, you know, transparent labeling, maximum dosages, etc. Etc. But I just continue to grind out what I feel like I would buy as a consumer and it served us well.

Wow, that's so awesome. I'm curious, if you were to give your younger self advice, if you were to be starting Gorilla Mine today, just from what you've learned, what would that advice be and why when it comes to that, you know, younger Derek that was looking to go solve that core problem and bring something different to the market, what would you tell yourself? And maybe those that are watching this that may have an interest to not only start a business, but whether that's supplements or tech or just anything that they want to go do something different, what's your advice to your younger self?

Probably question every doubt you have. For example, the pre workout, which is now last I checked and it fluctuates obviously. But I think we reached number two bestseller on Amazon in the country, which is competing against companies that I use their product when I was a teenager. So that's kind of, that's a big deal in my opinion. So yeah, to like stand with them who have had a decade on us is, is wild to wrap my head around. But just a handful of years ago I was thinking we're a nootropics company, why would we do this? But it's just like you know, being able to question and think outside the box. It sounds perhaps not like a practical takeaway but oftentimes people will similar to the social media. Why would I start? Yeah, I couldn't possibly succeed given there's so many people with millions of subscribers already. If you have some sort of value to bring, there is likely an audience that will benefit from getting educated and, or entertained by you depending on what your, you know.

Yeah.

Industry or niches.

Yeah. What were, what were some of your self doubts that you've had over the years that you've had to question and you know, just change your perspective on.

Will this investment pay off and be worth it? Is me going to, I don't know, a position where I'm not getting a salary or whatever the best move for the longevity of the company and being able to be enterprise value minded? Like you think of a lot of these things in terms of short term financial gain versus long term potential enterprise value. Oftentimes entrepreneurs will face these multiple different forking roads where you could go one way or the other and it's going to have a massive impact on your trajectory and being able to ground yourself and think okay, what's actually most important to me in the long run? What does 65 year old Derek tell me now, given realistically what's the smart move? And oftentimes it's investing in yourself and being confident that you're here for a reason and if you're passionate about what you're doing, it's going to translate into success long term and don't sell yourself short by going for the short term gain. On the monetary side.

Powerful. Where do you, I should say, when you're, you know, when you say this idea of passion, you've brought it up a couple times now. What's your thoughts on passion overall? Do you, does this come to you naturally? Do you believe passion is just something you're, you know, you experience something and you just start to go down that path and therefore passion builds within it or how do you define passion and how do you recommend people define it for themselves?

Yeah, for me it more so stems from. It's tough because I feel I'm ultra competitive and also am very interested in certain domains and for me the intertwinement of those two in a business capacity equals me being very passionate about how I am approaching that business and how I, how much time I dump into it and how much I care about it and the outcome. It's tough man. Like some of these things, it's hard to Say they're easily learned and not inherent. Like for you, I think some of the stuff comes with exposure and just, you know, throwing yourself out there. But it all depends on how much you want it at the end of the day too. Because you can only convince yourself of things so much when you don't actually give a shit. Like with you, I know you're an incredibly good social networker, for example, but how would you tell an 18 year old kid how do you become you? I feel like that's like maybe that wasn't inherent to you either, but it's. I guarantee there are very few people in your age bracket who have the networking and connections that you have. It's a very, very unique and rare thing. But how would you impart to somebody that, oh yeah, just like go do that. I think a lot of it is, you know, brain chemistry derived, but also like your intertwinement of what, I don't know, you're passionate about potentially. Yeah, I don't know.

No, absolutely. And I, I think it's so interesting because like for me over the years, the, this idea of connecting and networking, you know, Larry King was someone I interviewed back in 2019 that he taught me so much of just my interview approach. He has this famous quote, it's. I've never learned something while I was talking and just emphasizing listening and staying curious about the world and about people. And I think just that simple foundational element of how to live your everyday life, to learn something from someone, what not to do, what to do is so impactful and I think it's led me to just remain curious in all aspects of life and just be present in moments like this where I can just genuinely learn from people. And that compounded over time as paid off in terms of just knowledge, experience, network, et cetera.

How did that come to be Larry King interview?

Well, I mean ARFA actually shot the interview, so it was so fun having her there. But how I met Larry King was. It was like this domino effect where a good friend of mine, Michael Gruen, he invited me to this dinner after I interviewed Tillman Fertitta, the owner of the Houston Rockets. And he was coming out with a book somewhere around here. It's called Shut up and Listen. This is back in 2019 and he invited just handful of different YouTubers, podcasters, people that help promote his book, probably 30 of us at the Mastro's restaurant in Beverly Hills, which he owns, Mastro's. And we were all going around the table introducing ourselves, saying, oh, my name's this, I do this, et cetera. And then when it got back to Tillman, he pointed to someone who was actually, Kieran was there. He was sitting right next to Kieran. He's like, chance, it was such a pleasure being on your father's show today. Just wanted to say thank you so much for being here. Like, love you, love, love your father, Larry. And just thanks so much for being here and put it together as Larry King's son. And, you know, for me, it wasn't like, oh, I want to go meet Chance and have Larry on the show, but I genuinely wanted to meet Chance. He was my age at the time. We were both 20, 21 years old. We became genuine friends. And a couple months go by and after just thinking about it, like, I knew I wanted to interview Larry. I'm not the one that would say, hey, I want to interview the father. Your father. Can. Can you get him when they come on the show? But it was such an organic relationship where I remember asking him on Thanksgiving Day or a couple weeks before, and he responded on Thanksgiving Day. And he was like, hey, my dad said yes. He was coming out of a stroke at the time and was feeling a little bit better. He was like, let me know when you're in LA in two weeks and we'll make it happen. I was living in Arizona at the time, and we ended up doing it December 10, 2019. And, you know, it was actually one of the last in person physical interviews he did at his studio before he passed away a year later, which was Covid. And, you know, he wasn't doing any in person stuff. So definitely an impactful interview that just the dominoes unfolded in a very unique way.

One of the craziest things about that to me is not even just that you interviewed Larry King, but also that somehow you were so entrenched in this stuff at 19 years old that you were in that position to even network your way to. To that happening. Like, how do you even arrive where you were at 19? Because for me, like, even, you know, understanding social dynamics and, you know, business, it's crazy to me that, you know, all the people you do at your age, like, how did you even get to where you were at 19? Just.

Well, I mean, I started the podcast when I was 17 and even before that. So what really got me into this whole world of podcasting social business was When I was 16, I was almost paralyzed playing football. So I got injured. I was diagnosed with inner spinous ligament damage. So I was in a neck brace for six months. Was told I could, could have been paralyzed, I could never play football again. And it just led to this deep depression of not knowing what I wanted to do with my life. I was a sophomore in high school that had these aspirations to, you know, play college lacrosse or college football. But being 5 5, you know, the cards unfolded in a. In a great way. Um, but during that six month period, I just immersed myself in like business biographies, learning from different founders, and just caught the bug where six months after that, I hear about podcasting. I'm coming from a small town in Virginia where I have no network, no relation, like no relationships, no access to the business world. My parents are the least entrepreneurial, but in any sense of the world of as didn't go up, didn't grow up around anything or any business minds. So I just knew that there was so much more in this world from the content I was consuming. And the podcast was that gateway initially to spark conversation. And the goal was to sit down with interesting people that were doing cool things. And it started off just interviewing friends of mine, like Kieran, who was one of the first 10 guests on the show, and slowly but surely, and through social media and reaching out through DMs and coming up with creative ways to pitch the show. And it was just a snowball effect. And I ended up interviewing 60 people in 90 days just on a pure sprint. And from there it was just. The momentum started shifting very, very quickly and I just doubled down.

Wow.

So, and that was, you know, from like 17 to 19, I think it was like 250 interviews. And that compound, it just opened up a lot of doors.

Are those all in video on your channel or where are those?

Not all of the videos. A lot of them are just me on either zoom or pulling up to someone's office with like a single microphone, like in the earliest days. But I would say like 90% of them have all the videos and most of them are on the channel.

Oh, nice.

But, yeah, that's a little bit of context there.

Wild.

What were you doing at 18, 19.

Working on a golf course and as a lifeguard and starting university. So, okay, yeah, just, I don't know, it's nothing related to what I do now in any capacity whatsoever. So it's wild though, because a lot of people will see successful individuals on social media and then think it's too late. But I don't know, like, a lot of people in my generation, I guess, often were doing nothing significant in teenagehood and even early 20s. Like, for me, I was getting a Traditional education and going to marketing classes every day and then trying to balance out with the gym and then going to work, work for $8 an hour at a golf course. Yeah, that was my life essentially.

So when you started to have some success on, on social, building your brand, launching the companies, just what, what change for you to become that type of person in terms of the momentum, in terms of, you know, going from someone 18, 19, working these, these different jobs, creating a channel, gaining some momentum on a social level, launching these businesses, just what changed mentally and how did you just put yourself in that position looking back?

So I guess similar to how it was unfathomable to have a big YouTube channel. When I started, I saw all these people doing crazy things. Even I remember seeing some of the fitness influencers would have. You know, at the time, 300, 400,000 subscribers on YouTube was astronomical and a lot. Almost no one had a million subs. It was crazy to me. And I was just thinking, these numbers don't even make sense. They must have an in at YouTube or something like that. I just couldn't even wrap my head around how you arrived there. Yeah, I was like, this guy was born into stardom somehow. So for me, I started from zero and slowly grinded my way to 20,000 subscribers, 30,000, 40,000. Then I had a couple videos go viral, or at least what viral I considered at the time, which, you know, if, if YouTube picks up something as a small creator and serves it to like a million people, that's, you know, viral. I would say, yeah. And seeing the traction that had, I was like, oh, I'm actually capable of a viral video. That's nuts. Like, I never thought that would ever happen. And then a couple times it happened. At this point I thought, wow, this is actually a repeatable process. And they don't just randomly. Sometimes it seems like they cherry pick random stuff and just serve it for the sake of it. Like, I have no idea why some of my videos that popped off did. Like, for example, I did this video about egg whites and it's literally me sitting there talking about egg whites in for 8 minutes with not even 1920 by 1080 formatting, it was like a crop. Oh my God. With black sides on.

You're kidding.

Yeah, on a webcam. And it was very poorly executed. I was not speaking clearly or confidently and for whatever reason talking about egg whites blew up. And yeah, so I had a few of those videos and I thought, wow, this is actually translating to subscribership and people care about what I have to say and this is actually something I could see growing. And you know, for me, that was kind of the motivation I needed to double down on it and take it way more seriously and start hiring editors and figuring out how to outsource the tedious tasks that were not relevant to me. Putting out high value content or putting in work into formulation or whatever it is. That's my highest value use of time, essentially.

Yeah.

So, yeah. And then from there it kind of all snowballed, but it was kind of on the back of a few videos that really popped off that gave me the push I needed that I knew, oh, wow, I could actually be reasonably successful on YouTube, which until you have that really happen to you, it seems like back, I think now it's a lot easier to pop off. As absurd as it sounds, it seems like it's saturated. So it's harder to. I think now it's easier than ever. I've seen channels go from zero to a million in less than a year, which back then was, unless you were Logan Paul or something was never going to happen. So, yeah, like back then that was the push I needed. And I don't know, as much as I would love to say, oh yeah, I just kept like, I guess I did persevere because I could have said, oh, I'm not getting traction for three plus years where I had, you know, less than 15,000 subscribers, I think after three years in. So I guess I did. But having that reinforcement and kind of, I don't know, positive reinforcement from the YouTube algorithm definitely helped me. That was kind of, I think, the trajectory shift where I thought, okay, wow, I can actually make a difference here.

That's awesome. And seeing the growth there, it's just crazy where it's like so many people do stop and they don't even see the potential or they say, oh, I've had three years here, 15,000 subscribers. And just the simple, you know, cliche thing of like, you just didn't quit. Like, people always ask me, like, what did you, what have you learned from all the people you've interviewed? It's very, very simple. It's just people just simply didn't quit. There's no, there's nothing more to say besides they just did not quit. Simple as that.

Yeah, I've seen some people who have way less quality content and way less knowledgeable persevere just by sheer grit and like completely destroy people who I deem to be far more intelligent and educated and like resourceful or, I don't know, like high quality information that I would use as a resource or whatever. Like oftentimes it is literally just the guy who works hard and you know, people are going to like you. You know, some people are going to like what you're doing unless you're, you know, a dickhead. Yeah.

So absolutely. Well, last question before we wrap up here, Derek. Just thinking about the future of your content businesses, everything that you're working on, what are you most excited about and just where what can people look forward to in terms of just the future of what you're building, Content wise, business wise and everything.

Overall, the content thing is it's always difficult to balance the businesses and the content. Like right now as we speak, I have posted a handful of videos in the past several months, which sucks. But it's one of those situations where hopefully taking one step backwards, I can take two steps forward because sometimes that is a necessary, you know, thing you have to do to actually get ahead so you're not constantly, I don't know, grinding out tedious stuff that you could otherwise delegate. So for me, I'm kind of in that process to try and automate a lot of things to get me back to that very frequent posting schedule and I would like to tangent into more entrepreneurial focused stuff just because I feel like I have the experience to actually back it up at this point versus for the last seven years I've been doing it. So I don't know, there's just like a lack of content from like guys like Hermosi I think have set a great standard for people who've actually built businesses and then create practical takeaways and business knowledge that they can, you know, impart on people that is, comes from a place of experience rather than a place of speculation and hype. Because a lot of the existing business education on the platform was previously how you can, you know, here's how much money I make with my Photoshop, you know, Shopify page and come buy my course, which is then what made me rich. It's like, yeah, so I feel like tangenting into entrepreneurial content would be worthwhile and also just continuing down the path I have gone of continuing to educate myself and connect with high level people in the medical space, preventative medicine space, and hopefully continue to learn in the process and impart as much useful info as I can.

I absolutely love that. And last thing, where's the best place for everyone watching or listening to follow you and just stay connected overall?

More plates, more dates on any platforms. Some of them are more plates depending on the length of the handle. I think you can't do certain length on certain ones. Merric Health if you want high quality preventative medicine, high quality medical oversight with elaborate diagnostics and panels that have been audited by me and other people I deem to be high level educators and medical providers in the field who are staying up to date on all the cutting edge literature. Gorilla Mine for supplements and energy drinks and some other cool stuff in the works for that. And Intelligent Shop, I guess if you want some cologne and hair loss prevention products and love it. Yeah.

Awesome. Well, Derek, thank you so much for coming the show today. I really appreciate it.

Thanks for having me, dude. Glad we could make it happen.

Absolutely. And for everyone watching or listening, thank you so much for tuning in. Make sure you subscribe and I will talk to you guys soon.