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the more you can own the customer life
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cycle the better I always recommend to
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do as much as you can to turn these big
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Tech Giants we rely on into just a
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traffic
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channel hello I'm your host John cish
00:00:16
and welcome to season 3 of the Amazon
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strategy show the show that's all
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strategy with no hacks no silver bullets
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and no magic pills just real practical
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strategies for your Amazon business
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today I'm joined by none other than Greg
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elfrink from Empire flippers Greg a
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friend of mine and he's also based in
00:00:31
hoim Min City Vietnam where I was based
00:00:33
until two months ago now I live in uh
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Central Vietnam so from the oil fields
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of Alaska GRE has become one of the most
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influential speakers in the e-commerce
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industry talking about strategies on how
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to maximize the exit of your e-commerce
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business actually and many different
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types of online business today he joins
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us to share about where we are in the
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selling cycle and if it's a good time to
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buy or sell your Amazon business right
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now so Greg welcome to the show thanks
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for having me John I'm glad uh we were
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able to get on each other's podcast for
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everyone listening to this if you want
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to hear John's wisdom check out my
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podcast but yeah man good to be here
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always always a pleasure to chat with
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you yeah you too and yeah we did it two
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days ago so if you're interested in the
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story of cell candy you can go and check
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out the Empire purpose podcast I'm sure
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it's got a great uh optimized name being
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that Greg is the marketing manager oh
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Lauren takes care of that for we be
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relying on her I guess awesome so we are
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now in 2024 um September we had the huge
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boom when everyone was throwing down
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getting rich then we had a lol
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whereabouts are we now between the highs
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of 2021 and the lows of 2023 yeah so I
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think we're in a weird spot so when it
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comes to buying or selling businesses
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people can do it in a Up Cycle or a down
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cycle the moment that they stopped doing
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either is in moments of uncertainty
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which for the last I would say 2 years
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we've been in a pretty uncertain Market
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as the co hangover ends as the asset
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bubbles pop as uh you know Capital
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becomes more expensive all this kind of
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stuff right now with that said buyers
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are coming back buyers are buying
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businesses again they're being much more
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conservative than they used to which is
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good because they were honestly like you
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know my take on it they were pretty
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stupid the acid bubble they were like
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doing crazy dumb acquisition strategies
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and just like way overpaying uh and like
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from a broker perspective seller
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perspective that's great but from a
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buyer perspective like it was a very bad
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strategy right uh so they're doing
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better they're coming back uh due
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diligence is taking longer so like back
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in the Heyday like we were selling a
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million dollar business once per a week
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like now that takes like 90 days to 120
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days to I really get that deal go
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through and it's not terribly uncommon
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for a buyer to say hey I want 45 days of
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due diligence and that turns into you
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know an extra two three months of due
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diligence on top of that so much slower
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but uh overall all uh like I talked to a
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lot of Sellers and they'll say like oh I
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I'm going to wait until the next moment
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like that to sell and I think this is a
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a very bad thing to do and ultimately a
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foolish thing to do I'm not saying that
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from like a buas of I want you to sell
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with me of course I do but the reason
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why I say that is if you look at
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multiples back in 2019 so I've been in
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this industry for a little bit over
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eight years now brokering businesses
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I've helped sell 2,000 businesses built
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a buyer Network in the billions right so
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I've seen a lot of different business
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models and seen a lot of Trends come and
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go and in 2019 the multiples were
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extremely low compared to 2020 to 2022
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now we're in 20124 inent toward is 2025
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and we're in a quote unquote pretty down
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Market compared to where we were but if
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you look at the multiples 2day versus
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2019 they're significantly better like
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like 90day difference so it's still the
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second best time to sell and the reason
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why I think it's foolish for a lot of
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sellers to wait is for that another
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asset B is because it probably won't
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happen because that in order for that to
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happen you need like several Black Swan
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events all working together historically
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cheap capital globalwide a pandemic
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that's forcing the function of everyone
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going to online purchases you know a
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incredibly boomy Market uh high
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employment rate remote work like all the
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stuff that needs to come together to
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recreate that scenario so I say that
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again not to get a seller to sell with
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me but to say like if that's your goal
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like you might miss out on on millions
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of dollars waiting for something that
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likely won't happen again but yeah so
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that's where we're at with the market
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still good it's wounded recovering uh
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deals are happening it's just happening
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more rationally Now versus what it was
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used to do so yeah oh yeah I saw some
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crazy crazy deals some of our friends
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and some of our clients just got
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acquired at all Cash 3 to 5x so yeah
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crazy crazy good deals for them that's
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great for them so what were the kind of
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average multiples or the range multiples
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in 19 compared to now for specifically
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for Amazon Ecom businesses Amazon
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Centric Ecom businesses sure so I I for
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your audience if they're used to annual
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EA multiples like the 14x uh just to be
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clear EF we always price things in
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monthly so my mind thinks in monthly
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multiples so don't be shocked when I say
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these numbers uh just divide them by 12
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you get the annual e 48 uh 50x please
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yeah yeah yeah yeah uh so we're the only
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ones who price it in that way so I know
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someone grew up on the F Kool-Aid if
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they're saying like 48x versus like
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4X but uh yeah during the height of it
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all man like we saw some deals literally
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go for 65x I mean we're talking about
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like a large SAS company multiple that
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is being applied to a small Amazon FBA
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business and this is what I mean about
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irrationality right uh because there's a
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lot of flaws with the Amazon model like
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there's a lot of value in it too but not
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that kind of value at least not in the
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way that business was set up right so I
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I think during the height we were seeing
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between 45 and 55x was like decently
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common if you're above seven figures in
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terms of your valuation now if you go
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lower than that then you're really
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inching closer to like 37 to 42x around
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there um nowadays uh I would say smaller
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deals will probably be between 30 to 35x
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and bigger deals would like over a
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million dollar valuation will probably
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be closer between 33 and
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40x okay see toen in the old yearly
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multiple terms 2.5 to 3x on the smaller
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end uh three I didn't catch the last
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number but like 3.5x on the higher end
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3.5 to
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four and this like some people will look
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at oh God that's so low but like if you
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look at all business brokering so not
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just in the digital space but like you
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know your mom and pop shop in UK or
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America like your local plumber whatever
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almost all smbs get a valuation between
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1 to 4X and you'll e it up so so this is
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what I I mean again like we're just back
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to normal basically and it feels painful
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but it's actually as far as digital
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businesses go way better than it was in
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2019 because in 2019 you'd be lucky to
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get above 2x uh because not a lot of
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people really trusted online businesses
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like when I first came on to EF in 2016
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we were known as the 20x guys you divide
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that by 12 is not even 2x cuz everything
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we like only sold for 20x and we would
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have to tell sellers like no we will
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price it higher but no one would buy
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higher
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because there's like no trust in digital
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assets so now there's a parody with
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digital businesses like there's never
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been before uh with more brick and
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mortar businesses yeah I wonder if that
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number the overall number is brought
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down by the fact that a lot of the
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businesses smbs are sold you know a
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boomer businesses that they just want to
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get out of a 1x so they can get
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something out of the asset they built
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for the last 20 years so that's part of
00:07:54
it but uh there's more other other
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mechanics going on it on there so with
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the a lot of brick and mortar businesses
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they most of them honestly can't even be
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sold so they're never even going to get
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to the 14x they're like zerox right like
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it's an impossible business to sell like
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my dad he he owns a multi-million dollar
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real estate agency firm in Alaska the
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asset value of that is zero dollar
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because he's the only producer what are
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they buying there's nothing to buy you
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know so uh like a lot of businesses are
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that way so most businesses just out of
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the gate don't even qualify to be able
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to be sold so there's that uh but a lot
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of the Boomer stuff like like that is
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being talked about a lot but there's a
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bit of overhype in that too like a lot
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of those businesses are being sold on
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the cheaper side because again they ran
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out of energy to grow and maintain it so
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a lot of them are declining this is why
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you see like gurus say the no money down
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deal which is totally possible but the
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way they uh pitch it to newbies because
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I have to break newbies dreams every
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week who comes to me wanting to do a no
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money down offer it's like this is an
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extremely Advanced strategy and and
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extremely risky like you should only be
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doing a no money down strategy if you've
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done like some normal stuff you have
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some like normal Acquisitions if you
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done like uh you know you have some
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Capital you like know what you're doing
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like it's not newbie friendly even
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though it's very sexy to a newbie to do
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stuff like that but yeah so that that's
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kind of my take like uh the Boomer stuff
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yeah it does drag down the multiple a
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little bit but not as much as you might
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think like even they have to have a
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pretty quality business to be able to
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sell it if they're brick and mortar CU
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most of them just aren't selling
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that makes sense yeah I mean we're not
00:09:31
all going to get rich on car washes and
00:09:33
laundromats because otherwise there
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would be in the world would be inundated
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with just oh the laundr to be like
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Vietnam and coffee shops I'm so glad you
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brought this up so I will not mention
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names but there is a famous influencer
00:09:44
uh in my world that uh bought a launder
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mat using no money down like basically
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debt and one of my broker friends he ran
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through the numbers and like she the
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person never said what uh uh uh you know
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how much money she was making she just
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like put the numbers up on there hoping
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no one would look into them right but if
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you look into the numbers like you're
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losing like a100 to $600 a
00:10:07
month with the business and it's ainger
00:10:10
mat you know you're not going to go 3x
00:10:12
ainger mat right it's very local like
00:10:15
there's things you can do to tweak it
00:10:17
and like lower expenses obviously but
00:10:20
it's not like a SAS business or FBA
00:10:22
business where you increase your
00:10:23
conversion and double your customers
00:10:24
with the same amount of money right it's
00:10:26
just that's not the business model that
00:10:28
can happen so yeah there's a bunch of
00:10:30
disinformation now surprise
00:10:32
surprise yeah I love the idea of those
00:10:34
businesses you know you got a bunch of
00:10:35
cash like I love the idea of just buying
00:10:38
you know after being in digital business
00:10:39
for so long and it being so intangible
00:10:42
they're being like Oh yeah I mean it's
00:10:44
here we just make ourselves available
00:10:45
and then people will come you you think
00:10:48
that till the washers start breaking and
00:10:50
you have to hire a high-end $50 an hour
00:10:52
technician to fix it yeah or either You'
00:10:55
got that which is one problem or you've
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got the problem of having a bunch of
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lowlevel employees Which is far wor far
00:11:01
worse problem to have because then you
00:11:02
have to manage those people which is my
00:11:05
least favorite part of business if I was
00:11:06
to do that yeah and in those businesses
00:11:08
you often don't even have the margin to
00:11:10
hire a higher level employee right so
00:11:11
you're always kind of limited you have a
00:11:13
skilled cap of what you can hire for
00:11:16
unless you own a bunch of them at scale
00:11:17
Everything Changes obviously but just
00:11:19
like one off shop yeah it's uh rougher
00:11:21
than Twitter makes it out the same okay
00:11:23
all right just realized way off way off
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topic let's go back on to online nor
00:11:28
laundromats
00:11:29
um we don't sell though don't worry so
00:11:32
we've been through it it's possible to
00:11:34
sell now multiples are are better than
00:11:36
they were in 2019 which is awesome um
00:11:39
what about buying businesses like who is
00:11:42
you know if you can share I mean who's
00:11:43
your kind ofo for a buyer right now and
00:11:46
what's their goal with buying yeah so I
00:11:49
would say our average buyer today is
00:11:51
much like our average seller just a
00:11:53
little bit further along in the road so
00:11:56
at EF we've always had like a smattering
00:11:58
of different typ YP of buyers like the
00:12:00
people want to become digital Nomads
00:12:02
people want to buy side hustles and then
00:12:03
other entrepreneurs looking to grow
00:12:05
through acquisition and during 2020 to
00:12:07
2022 we got a new segment which was
00:12:09
Private Equity started really coming in
00:12:11
hard and they're still there like we
00:12:13
just sold a uh close to $13 million
00:12:15
business to a multinational corporation
00:12:18
they were a strategic buyer back with PE
00:12:20
funding all that kind of stuff so
00:12:21
they're still there but I would say the
00:12:23
average buyer today is much more of an
00:12:26
entrepreneur in the trenches so they
00:12:28
don't have like you deal with two
00:12:31
different unrealistic things in my
00:12:33
marketplace with two different buyers
00:12:34
you have the Newbie who thinks like oh
00:12:36
Amazon FBA it's passive I only have to
00:12:38
work an hour a week which yeah that's
00:12:40
true if you like tweak it out and you
00:12:41
like systemize and stuff but like
00:12:43
there's going to be weeks where you're
00:12:44
working 80 hours a week because
00:12:45
something goes wrong like that's his
00:12:47
business right so they come in with a
00:12:49
bit of the passive income dream and then
00:12:51
the private Equity people uh they often
00:12:53
come in with the spreadsheet spreadsheet
00:12:55
dream which is like spreadsheet goes up
00:12:58
and just no connection to the reality of
00:13:00
business you know like your spreadshe
00:13:01
isn't taking into account Co or like a
00:13:03
CO hangover or like your marketing sucks
00:13:06
your operations sucks everything is
00:13:07
confused and it's a mess like where's
00:13:08
that in your spreadsheet you know so
00:13:10
they often like miss out on reality with
00:13:12
the business which I think the
00:13:13
aggregators suffered from but the actual
00:13:16
entrepreneurs buying from us they are
00:13:18
obviously much more attuned to how
00:13:20
business really works because they're in
00:13:21
the trenches now they often don't give
00:13:24
as sweet of a deal to the seller as say
00:13:26
like the private Equity does uh they're
00:13:27
not as bad to deal with with with the
00:13:29
newbies I shouldn't say bad but there's
00:13:31
not less handholding because they know
00:13:32
what to do right ver the newbies are a
00:13:34
lot more they have a lot more anxiety
00:13:35
because it's a pretty big purchase uh so
00:13:38
I would say any business over a million
00:13:40
dollars between like1 to $3 million uh
00:13:43
like private Equity might still be in
00:13:44
there but often it will be just a higher
00:13:46
level entrepreneur further along on the
00:13:48
path and their goal is to grow through
00:13:49
acquisition because uh like buying a
00:13:53
business is the most legitimate shortcut
00:13:56
to wealth in my view and they totally
00:13:59
get it oh yeah so can you expand on that
00:14:02
a little bit you know the benefit you
00:14:03
know the reasons for buying instead of
00:14:05
starting your own business no there's so
00:14:07
many but I I'll share a funny story to
00:14:09
kind of highlight what I mean uh I to be
00:14:12
clear to your audience I do not
00:14:13
recommend anyone to do this this is a
00:14:16
very risky thing I'm going to say but it
00:14:18
happened on our Marketplace and I think
00:14:20
it's very funny and it shows the
00:14:21
difference between starting a business
00:14:23
and buying a business I think quite
00:14:24
clearly so we had this guy he bought a
00:14:27
very small business from us I think it
00:14:28
was like1 ,000 so it was a Content site
00:14:30
you know monetize your affiliate display
00:14:32
ads so he buys this business it was
00:14:34
quite competitive to get there's a lot
00:14:36
of people who wanted to buy it was a
00:14:37
very quality site and after he buys it
00:14:41
we haven't even started migrating it yet
00:14:42
to him so we open up a migration ticket
00:14:44
to hand over the business to him from
00:14:46
the seller right he asked this our team
00:14:47
like hey was there a lot of other people
00:14:49
looking to buy this and we said yeah it
00:14:50
was quite competitive he said well I'll
00:14:53
you want to reach out to any of those
00:14:54
guys I'll sell it to them right now
00:14:56
$155,000 no questions asked where
00:14:58
they're like like uh okay so we reached
00:15:00
out to all the buyers who wanted it one
00:15:02
of them sure enough did buy it for
00:15:05
$115,000 that guy owned the business for
00:15:08
an hour and made 15 grand like he didn't
00:15:11
have the asset like wasn't it wasn't
00:15:14
like basically arbitraged it right now
00:15:17
right if you start a business you're at
00:15:20
zero traffic zero money you're not going
00:15:22
to make 15 grand an hour it's impossible
00:15:25
you have no history there's no way to
00:15:26
sell it like the youngest like that I
00:15:29
recommend to sell a business is 18
00:15:31
months and even that is pretty short
00:15:33
there's not enough history but when you
00:15:35
buy a business that guy only owned it
00:15:37
for an hour but he owned five years of
00:15:40
History within that hour it's not like
00:15:42
that history goes away CU there's a new
00:15:44
owner it's still all there right so
00:15:46
that's like one of the really powerful
00:15:48
things of buying a business and what I
00:15:49
mean by shortcut like that guy literally
00:15:51
profited off five years of work that he
00:15:53
only had to spend an hour and show he
00:15:55
had the money to acquire that hour of
00:15:57
ownership right uh so that's like the
00:16:00
beauty of buying business and again for
00:16:01
obvious reasons do not recommend doing
00:16:03
this like it like if that's your main
00:16:05
strategy there's a very high chance it
00:16:06
won't work out worked out for him but
00:16:08
that shows you the power of buying a
00:16:10
business versus building interesting
00:16:12
just to dive into that a little bit did
00:16:14
that make him any money after he did you
00:16:17
have he did you pay you the 15 10 15% on
00:16:21
that as well and did he actually make
00:16:23
anything in the end yeah I think I think
00:16:25
he came out at like six or seven Grand
00:16:28
in profit after our commission something
00:16:30
like that yeah which is like two months
00:16:32
of what the business was making I guess
00:16:34
yeah pretty close interesting
00:16:36
interesting strategy I don't know if I
00:16:37
would personally flip something for like
00:16:39
you know 6% when if i' spent all this
00:16:41
time negotiating and finding and like is
00:16:44
it worth getting out of bed for that
00:16:45
much money so if you're a newbie buyer
00:16:47
and like I said I don't recommend doing
00:16:49
this I I don't remember if he was a
00:16:51
newbie buyer or not I think he might be
00:16:53
because of the price but deals like this
00:16:55
actually happen all the time with m&a
00:16:57
junkies like they the they view
00:16:59
businesses as their product not as their
00:17:01
asset so they view themselves as a store
00:17:03
of businesses right so I I know of
00:17:05
people who will go and buy A5 $6 million
00:17:08
deal and it's not like an hour thing
00:17:10
like this guy but it's basically the
00:17:11
same concept they will they have a
00:17:13
network of higher buyers they got this
00:17:15
deal out a low low multiple because of
00:17:17
negotiation there's often like private
00:17:20
like a great example so there I was
00:17:22
talking to a guy he has a eight figure
00:17:23
marketing agency I was telling him about
00:17:25
an agency rollup idea uh where you put
00:17:27
white label SEO Services together and he
00:17:30
immediately scoffed at it he's like
00:17:32
white label no they want in-house Talent
00:17:35
like who is they and is this bigger
00:17:38
private Equity that goes and buys big
00:17:39
agent big agencies and they refuse to
00:17:42
buy white label because they view it as
00:17:44
low quality and like well their view is
00:17:47
actually our opportunity because if you
00:17:49
went and bought those white label stuff
00:17:51
that they snuffed their nose at well
00:17:53
guess what you get to do you're the
00:17:54
owner you just make a not white label
00:17:56
easy done yeah yeah like you you use the
00:18:00
white to go acquire other agencies that
00:18:02
have a better retail face and then you
00:18:04
package it up and you go to that agency
00:18:06
hey I heard you buy really great agent
00:18:07
yeah but no white label oh don't worry
00:18:09
we're not white label and they're like
00:18:11
great and they'll go pay you like 3 5x
00:18:14
of a of a bigger mult no probably not 5x
00:18:16
but two to 3x bigger than what you
00:18:18
bought it for and that could all be done
00:18:20
with like very minimal changes over a
00:18:21
period of 6 to 12 months so this is what
00:18:24
I mean like deals like this happen all
00:18:26
the time another example would be I know
00:18:29
a buyer he not with us but a different
00:18:31
business he bought a business uh I think
00:18:33
it was like 3 mil and he he got it for
00:18:36
like 2 and a half the fair market would
00:18:37
probably be 3 mil and he went to the
00:18:40
leadership of the team sold them Equity
00:18:42
as if it is at 3 million because that's
00:18:44
what it was going to be like after two
00:18:46
months and he was able to bring down
00:18:48
that uh his own cash uh intake pretty
00:18:51
quickly and then within six seven months
00:18:53
he again sold it to a bigger private
00:18:55
Equity so stuff like this happens all
00:18:57
the time in the m&a world but again is
00:18:59
these are Advanced things and I don't
00:19:01
recommend someone starting to try to do
00:19:03
this no I love it I mean actually I have
00:19:06
another story my friend did the same
00:19:07
thing you know some of my friends who
00:19:08
sold FBA they bought in their FBA
00:19:10
business like 3x um thinking they were
00:19:12
going to grow it loads off Amazon they
00:19:14
grow it significantly off Amazon but
00:19:16
they went from 10% sales to 30% sales
00:19:18
off Amazon and the rest of the revenue
00:19:19
kind of stayed the same so it went up a
00:19:21
little bit but during that time the
00:19:22
market went from 3x to 5x for that type
00:19:25
of business so they walked away with you
00:19:27
know 3 million bucks so you and you
00:19:29
couldn't do that if you were starting
00:19:30
from zero in in within two years you
00:19:32
know two two and a half years as you
00:19:33
said absolutely absolutely and here
00:19:35
here's another crazy thing that a lot of
00:19:37
people don't think about so if you're a
00:19:39
newbie buyer I do recommend you like
00:19:41
like buy a sight hustle first and get
00:19:43
used to the process use a broker if
00:19:45
you've never done it doesn't have to be
00:19:46
me but like a broker can be quite
00:19:48
helpful and what is often a confusing
00:19:49
Journey but buy something small and be
00:19:52
okay if you might lose that money but
00:19:53
once you get like your feet like wet and
00:19:56
you get a taste of it like one of the
00:19:59
least risky ways to go buy a business is
00:20:02
to buy a bigger business like instead of
00:20:04
doing a 200k business try to buy a $3
00:20:06
million business because the bigger you
00:20:09
get the less fragility is in the
00:20:11
business and the more leverage you have
00:20:14
and multiple different ways so uh a lot
00:20:16
of people are afraid to go big but often
00:20:19
the in my view when buying a business
00:20:21
the risk is in the smaller smaller
00:20:23
businesses so actually I guess the
00:20:26
question I would have if if you said
00:20:27
that to me and if I was the if I was
00:20:28
sitting in the buyer shoes now would be
00:20:30
so I assume I'm going to buy that
00:20:31
business that's definitely going to be
00:20:32
debt I guess an SBA loan or something
00:20:35
else would that be personally guaranteed
00:20:37
in your experience so all s Spas are
00:20:40
personal guaranteed yeah uh so one thing
00:20:43
I'll say on personal guarantee
00:20:45
is again I wouldn't do it unless you are
00:20:49
completely comfortable with losing
00:20:51
everything never invest in anything
00:20:52
anything could happen business is a
00:20:54
risky game to play high reward but high
00:20:56
risk right now a good way to look at a
00:20:59
personal guarantee is like if you think
00:21:02
that is risky you should probably not be
00:21:04
an entrepreneur like you're like I think
00:21:08
I think it's risky I wouldn't take on a
00:21:09
personal guarantee that would wipe me
00:21:10
out but you are you are doing a personal
00:21:12
guarantee right now you're putting in
00:21:13
your own money into seller candy at any
00:21:16
moment a train wreck can happen and
00:21:18
Destroy seller candy now the reason why
00:21:20
you view it differently is because you
00:21:21
view the risk of it differently it's the
00:21:23
same risk like you like if you are uh
00:21:27
the only difference is you don't have
00:21:29
the leverage of the bank and most that's
00:21:31
where I see the sorry interrup that's
00:21:33
why I see the r differently because I
00:21:34
can I'm only risking Equity value not
00:21:38
you know not whatever I have in the in
00:21:40
the back you know if I got seven figures
00:21:41
in the back and I risk all of that then
00:21:43
that means that I it could completely
00:21:45
wipe you out sure but that the bank
00:21:47
doesn't want to wipe you out like
00:21:49
they're not like they don't want to go
00:21:51
and destroy a good creditor for no
00:21:54
reason that that's like the last thing
00:21:55
they want to do often if you have issues
00:21:58
you can just renegotiate with them and
00:22:00
they will work with you like I have a
00:22:01
friend he has an SBA loan right now uh
00:22:03
he bought a business and it went really
00:22:06
bad like extremely bad uh and he was
00:22:09
able to renegotiate his terms like does
00:22:11
that happen all the time no but if
00:22:13
you're going to use any kind of uh debt
00:22:16
or any kind of loan then you got to be
00:22:19
okay with that kind of stuff like
00:22:20
personal guarantee is how SBA does it
00:22:22
but like if you do go with private
00:22:24
equity which has way harsher terms uh
00:22:27
than SBA minus the personal guarantee so
00:22:30
like you're giving up significant
00:22:31
portions of the business that so again
00:22:34
it comes down to risk like I personally
00:22:37
don't like if you are confident in the
00:22:38
business and you have skills you have a
00:22:40
track record of success then I wouldn't
00:22:43
let a personal guarantee stop you like I
00:22:45
I have another friend he's used the SBA
00:22:47
loan uh I think three times and he now
00:22:50
has a portfolio over $10 million with
00:22:52
like less than 30% debt on it so and he
00:22:55
was able to leverage that uh into those
00:22:57
bigger businesses
00:22:59
right yeah uh again I wouldn't recommend
00:23:02
it for someone starting out but if you
00:23:03
have the skill set track record all that
00:23:05
kind of stuff I want to let personal
00:23:07
guarantees scare you away that's cool I
00:23:09
think it be really cool to get him on
00:23:11
your podcast and share his story
00:23:12
sometime because I feel like that's uh
00:23:14
that's inspirational story so here's a
00:23:16
guy you uh you'll have to Google it
00:23:18
because I don't remember the episode but
00:23:20
there's this guy uh Brett bore he runs
00:23:22
permanent Equity I I think it's called
00:23:23
permanent Equity but anyways uh Brent he
00:23:26
started his business by using the SBA
00:23:28
loan to buy I think it was a marketing
00:23:31
agency of some kind and he was and like
00:23:34
yeah he had a personal guarantee on that
00:23:36
too and like it would did not start off
00:23:38
easy for him like he talks about that
00:23:40
story and is in his book as well which I
00:23:42
highly recommend uh but now he runs like
00:23:45
one of the biggest private Equity firms
00:23:47
in America like I mean yeah you could
00:23:51
like if you have two three houses yes
00:23:53
you can lose it but like if you're okay
00:23:55
with that risk you can also gain what
00:23:57
Brett has right I'm not saying it's easy
00:24:00
but that that's the different levels of
00:24:02
risk like he didn't he used that
00:24:03
personal guarantee uh leverage to build
00:24:06
a you know $100 million plus fund over a
00:24:09
period I think like 10 years so like
00:24:11
relatively quickly yeah that's really
00:24:13
cool love it to go check out the episode
00:24:15
with Greg um all right we on to the next
00:24:18
bit of the of the episode Greg so this
00:24:20
is the called the controversial take so
00:24:23
um what's your most debatable or
00:24:25
potentially controversial opinion
00:24:26
related to Amazon or you industry or the
00:24:29
buy sell business Arena if you want well
00:24:32
probably personal guarantees because I
00:24:33
don't uh was afraid of the as other
00:24:36
people I have a different mindset on
00:24:37
that having seen so many deals right uh
00:24:40
but outside of that uh with Amazon FBA
00:24:42
in particular something I say that does
00:24:44
uh kind of annoy a lot of my FBA friends
00:24:46
is uh I told them that they have run a a
00:24:50
business with too much keyman risk and
00:24:53
what I mean by that is you rely too much
00:24:55
on one uh single point of failure and in
00:24:57
their case is Amazon I have friends who
00:25:00
are uh you know in the content space and
00:25:02
their their key man risk is Google like
00:25:04
the Google algorithm right and it makes
00:25:06
your business such a slave to one big
00:25:08
Tech Giant when you want to diversify
00:25:10
that risk so I I was talking to another
00:25:13
Amazon FBA guy influencer in the space
00:25:16
uh just you know back and forth on
00:25:18
Facebook or whatever uh you know cool
00:25:20
dude he's been on the podcast too really
00:25:21
nice guy very smart but he he told me uh
00:25:25
like what should or he said like what
00:25:26
should FBA people do and I said they
00:25:27
should diverse I ify into DDC eCommerce
00:25:30
try to expand off the platform and
00:25:33
really be focusing Amazon as just a
00:25:36
acquisition Channel like don't think of
00:25:38
your business as an Amazon FBA business
00:25:40
think of yourself as a e-commerce brand
00:25:42
that's more than just Amazon and he
00:25:44
commented back like well a lot of people
00:25:46
can't do that and said like I agree
00:25:48
because Amazon does a lot of the heavy
00:25:49
lifting for you so your product might
00:25:52
not be able to work out in the wild as
00:25:54
easily or as good as it does on Amazon
00:25:57
but if that's your case then that means
00:25:59
you are inherently running a weaker
00:26:00
business and that's a risky place to be
00:26:03
so I always recommend to do as much as
00:26:07
you can to turn these like big Tech
00:26:09
Giants we rely on into just a traffic
00:26:11
channel the more you can own the
00:26:13
customer life cycle the better and
00:26:15
almost everyone agrees with me I would
00:26:16
to say that's controversial but uh the
00:26:18
way I say like talk about Amazon being
00:26:21
such a mass of risk is usually the
00:26:22
controversial take but I think we all
00:26:25
see that right like Bezos announced
00:26:27
those new finds or new fees I keep
00:26:29
calling them
00:26:30
fines I increase it and if you are 100%
00:26:34
Amazon FBA what are you going to do
00:26:36
you're G to shut down your business like
00:26:38
you're gonna pay the you're gonna pay
00:26:39
the fine the
00:26:40
fee so he's gonna take it yeah like
00:26:44
there's like nothing you could do versus
00:26:46
if you have a a DDC uh branch of your
00:26:49
business right if you're selling I think
00:26:50
I talked about it on our podcast if you
00:26:52
are selling a piece of shoes uh like
00:26:54
shoes on a Facebook ad right they click
00:26:56
it they go to your Shopify store they
00:26:58
they don't buy for whatever reason it's
00:27:00
in their mind they want these shoes they
00:27:02
forget your brand because who want it
00:27:04
like we forget like I forget what I did
00:27:05
yesterday you know they're not going to
00:27:06
remember our brand unless we made a real
00:27:08
crazy impact uh so they go to Amazon
00:27:11
because Amazon's the Google of consumer
00:27:13
search right and they find your shoes
00:27:14
because you're on Amazon you're running
00:27:16
ads but only for your brand so you're
00:27:18
actually not spending that much money on
00:27:20
Amazon in comparison to other channels
00:27:22
like those are the ones and now they buy
00:27:24
your shoes so like that's how Amazon
00:27:26
should be used in my view Amazon takes
00:27:28
all those customers versus if you have
00:27:30
the DTC store all those customers belong
00:27:33
in your ecosystem now which is far more
00:27:35
powerful way more valuable when you go
00:27:37
to sell to cool I love that take and I I
00:27:40
totally agree with you um it all depends
00:27:43
of course with for The Listener on the
00:27:45
product they have whether it's Amazon
00:27:46
you know it is Amazon Centric and
00:27:48
whether it can be taken off Amazon but
00:27:50
if you don't want to sell and you don't
00:27:51
want to expand more on Amazon I mean d2c
00:27:53
is the is the place to go and there's
00:27:55
many many resources out there for that
00:27:57
as well as the Amazon
00:27:59
resources Yeah the more you can do that
00:28:01
the better in in my view love it so Greg
00:28:05
thanks so much for being on the show um
00:28:07
how should people uh follow you online
00:28:09
if they want to hear more yeah uh I mean
00:28:11
you can just email me Greg atmire
00:28:13
flippers.com if you wanted to talk to me
00:28:15
personally I'm usually pretty responsive
00:28:17
on there uh give me a couple days
00:28:19
because I do get spammed a lot a lot of
00:28:21
guest post linkers wanting to sell me
00:28:23
guest post links uh but outside of that
00:28:26
go to Empire flippers.com I run a
00:28:28
YouTube channel uh just youtube.com/
00:28:30
Empire flippers as well uh any of those
00:28:33
you can like reach out leave a comment
00:28:36
and happy to answer any questions if I
00:28:38
can help or not awesome thank you and so
00:28:41
thanks so much for being on the show
00:28:42
Greg if you like this show and if you're
00:28:44
watching please go and like follow and
00:28:46
rate US if you're on a different
00:28:47
platform so if you're watching on
00:28:48
YouTube thumbs up or thumbs down and if
00:28:51
you're watching uh on Spotify uh just
00:28:53
give us five stars or four stars or
00:28:56
whatever St Stars definely
00:28:59
except if you're on Amazon you're asking
00:29:00
for five stars they will down vote you
00:29:02
Amazon you like crazy so I said that
00:29:06
we're gonna get wiped out but no thanks
00:29:08
so much and uh tune in for the next
00:29:10
episode thanks for being here Greg
00:29:12
thanks for having me Matt
