In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews Dave Claffey, Head of Communications at Earnin. Claffey shares a formative story about founding a Boston softball league after being laid off as a newspaper photographer, illustrating the value of choosing challenging paths. He highlights the massive scale of the paycheck‑to‑paycheck problem in the U.S., noting that 78% of full‑time workers live paycheck‑to‑paycheck and Americans have accrued over $50 billion in overdraft and late‑fee charges, with even small subscriptions like Netflix triggering overdrafts for many users. Claffey offers business advice centered on nurturing motivation, fostering experimental team cultures, and assigning projects to those who are genuinely excited. He stresses the power of networking—buying coffee and talking to industry peers—as a catalyst for insight and funding, citing the founder of Improvado as an example. He recommends the book What I Learned Losing $1 Million for its candid lessons from failure, shares his favorite quote about hustle versus waiting, and reflects on happiness as the freedom to choose one’s path. The episode concludes with Claffey’s online handles and Earnin’s web and app locations.
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Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Wags Media. Wags Media provides you with everything you need to generate more customers and grow your brand. Head on over to wagsmedia.com, W-A-G-S-M-E-D-I-A dot com, to enter a contest where you can win a free, done-for-you custom website valued at $2,500 for a limited time only. Now let's jump into the episode.
Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Dave Claffey with us. He's the head of communications at Earnin, a smartphone app that allows anyone with a job and a bank account to get paid the minute they leave work. So welcome to the show, man.
Thanks, Tyler. Absolute pleasure to be on. I love this show. Thank you, man.
Grateful to have you on. I, uh, I love the app. We were talking about it before, so I'm excited to talk about that more. Um, and we'll dive into the first one. The first question I have for you is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
Yeah, so this one actually has nothing to do with that, and it's, it's just me at a point long ago. Early in life, I was a newspaper photographer and I was laid off and I was kind of going from job to job, living paycheck to paycheck. And during that, I kind of started this side hustle with the softball league in Boston. And with— we started off with 6 teams. It was fun. We had a good time. A lot of folks loved it. The next year, I jumped on the marketing cycle a little early and I reached out and wanted to see if anyone else would be interested. We got a ton of interest. I had 30 teams look to sign up in the first week or two. With, with adult sports, expansion is really limited by field space. I had one softball field for 4 hours once a week and you could put 3 games on it, but you can't really do much more than that. At that point in my life, I had call it a pretty standard path. You have a few options before you either pick the easiest or the most attractive option. And I could have very easily in that case maxed out the field space I had, rejected the other teams and gone on playing. But I just, I took on the challenge and I started making phone calls. At the time I was working at a little chicken wing place. We had a big delivery map on the wall and I started looking at all the fields and who on those fields, whether it be the city, a university, a high school. And I started making phone calls and we, uh, we ended up taking on, I think, 36 teams that next year, um, had a huge league. People loved it. And I ended up selling the whole company a couple years later. Um, so really for me, it was the first time I went down a path that wasn't the easiest and most attractive. And sometimes it works out for you. Sometimes it doesn't. But I think if you don't push yourself, uh, you're not going to get anywhere beyond where everyone else has gotten.
And what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
Yeah, with my industry in particular, I think the scale of the problem is really unknown. 78% of full-time workers say that they live paycheck to paycheck, and that just keeps going up and up. Americans have racked up over $50 billion in late fees and overdraft fees, and it's those fees there that really hit you. It can really set you back. You can be frugal, you can be a great budgeter, but if you get an unexpected parking ticket or you get an overdraft fee, it's going to set you back and set you off, and a lot of folks don't have the resources to recover from those financial shocks. We actually have— we did a report the other day, or we're in the process of doing this report, but I got the stats the other day, and roughly 1 in 9 of our of users who pay for Netflix have had overdraft fees sparked by Netflix. And that's a $10, $11, $13 plan depending on what you have. And it's surprising, but it really shows the extent of the problem. These folks aren't— these folks are people who might have cut cable and they only have Netflix and they're still overdrafting on these things. It can really happen to anyone. So I think that's it. I think there needs to be more awareness at how the system works. The system is really not set up for these type of folks and it can almost prey on them if they stumble or something doesn't go their way.
Wow, yeah, I would not have thought that. That is a pretty wild statistic there. Yeah. And what's your best piece of overall business advice? You could speak on like that or like maybe, you know, just even how your whole journey, you know, like you sold a business and now this, like, you know, how are you? I don't know, it seems like you have a nice little success, a success path here. So how is it all working for you?
I think for me, it's about nurturing motivation, whether it be in yourself or in your colleagues or in your subordinates. I've worked in a lot of startups, and there's always a lot more problems than there are people to fix them. And I really feel like the best The best teams are ones that experiment and find creative solutions to solve problems. But that has to come from the team culture. It has to come from your mentality. I've seen a lot of projects be assigned to folks, or people take on tasks that they're not necessarily excited about. And yeah, they may get the work done to a satisfactory level. But if you really want to move the needle and you want to make impact, I think you really have to be either motivated for that project or find someone who is motivated on that project and let them go. Let them ideate, let them, let them give it a shot because that's really the only way you can make substantial change, in my opinion.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Oh, my younger self. I would say meet Talk to a ton of people and buy them coffee. I've really been blown away now that I've had a little bit more success in life at how helpful people are. I had a chance to talk with the founder of Improvado, and he funded his startup. Improvado is a marketing platform, marketing dashboard, and he funded his startup essentially by grabbing coffee with dozens of the best marketing minds in San Francisco. And he picked their brain and he learned where there was a hole in their operating process in the market. And he built something to fill that hole. So not only did he have a great product, but then all these marketing folks who knew the problem, knew that this product addressed it, helped fund the seed round for him. So I think it's a really— I think that's sort of the extreme of the impact. For me, it's just best practices, talking with other communications folks, talking with other marketing leaders at startups, and just seeing what they do. Everyone's super open. Everyone's trying to solve problems. And I think there are a lot of great folks out there if you just take the time to ask.
And in your opinion, what's the key to happiness?
Oh, I have no idea, Tyler. I have no idea. I mean, you probably have a better idea now after asking this question to so many.
I do.
For me, I think it's the freedom of choice. If I can put myself in a position where I can determine what will make me happy at any given moment. I think that is the key. It's avoiding the anchors and maximizing opportunities, and hopefully that will make me happy at the end of the day. But who knows?
And what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
So I read a book called What I Learned Losing $1 Million, and It's by Jim Paul. And what I liked about this was that everything went wrong. Like, we hear so many wonderfully motivating stories about successes, and sometimes I just want to know, what did you screw up? How did it impact you? How did you recover? And I thought this was a great book, a lot of lessons learned by him. It just really goes to show you that there's very few straight paths in life and you have to constantly be reinventing and pushing yourself to find that happiness, which I'm still looking for.
And what is your favorite quote and why?
So I have a favorite quote. I had to do some research. And it turns out this person might not have said it, but great things come to those who wait, but only the things left behind by those who hustle. And I've always attributed it to Abraham Lincoln. Now, because of the uncertainty, I'm going to attribute it to Michael Scott, but I still think it's a great quote.
Yes, I love that quote as well, man. So, dude, thank you so much for coming on. The last question I have for you before we let you go is where is the best place for people to find you online.
Yeah, so you can find me personally on Twitter and Instagram at @orlandoclaffey.com. For Earnin, come to www.earnin.com. That's E-A-R-N-I-N. And we also have some great social media channels as well. We love— we have so many wonderful customers and so many great stories. If you want to see a couple of those, we try to highlight them on our social media feeds. So that's how you find us. And of course, Earnin', the app, is in both Google and Apple app stores.
Perfect, man. Thanks again for hopping on.
Tyler, you're the best. Thanks.
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