Today, Toni and I are doing our first annual awards episode! From the Best Investment of the Year to the Coolest Moment of the Year, we’ll celebrate the wins, laugh at the losses, and reflect on the lessons that shaped the past 12 months.
Stick around as we crown the Biggest Winner, call out the Biggest Loser, and share the life hacks, personal changes, and standout products that defined the year!
00:00
Welcome back to the podcast, the show where I cover all of the latest strategies and current events related to e-commerce and online business. Today, Tony and I are doing our first annual awards episode from the best investment of the year to the coolest moment of the year. We’ll celebrate the wins, laugh at the losses and reflect on the lessons that shaped the past 12 months. Stick around as we crown the biggest winner, call out the biggest loser and share the life hacks, personal changes and standout products that define the year. But before we begin, I wanted to let you know that tickets are now on sale.
00:29
Seller Summit 2025 over at SellersSummit.com. The Seller Summit is the conference that I hold every year that specifically targets e-commerce entrepreneurs selling physical products online. Unlike other events that focus on inspirational stories and high-level advice, mine is a curriculum-based conference where you will leave with practical and actionable strategies specifically for an e-commerce business. Every speaker I invite is deep in the trenches of their e-commerce business
00:57
entrepreneurs who are importing large quantities of physical goods, and not some high-level guys who are overseeing their companies at 50,000 feet. I personally hate large events, so the seller’s summit is always small and intimate. Every year we cut off ticket sales at around 200 people, so tickets sell out fast, and we’ve sold out every single year for the past eight years. If you are an e-commerce entrepreneur making more than $250,000 or $1 million per year,
01:24
We also offer an exclusive mastermind experience with other top sellers. The Seller Summit is going to be held in Fort Lauderdale, Florida from May 6th to May 8th. Right now, this is the cheapest the tickets will ever be. So head on over to sellersummit.com and grab your ticket. Now onto the show.
01:47
Welcome back to the My Wife, Quit Her Job podcast. It is 2025. And what we’re going to do today is we are going to reflect on 2024 and do, guess, our first annual awards show, so to speak. I got this idea from another podcast. I thought it was pretty cool. And both Tony and I, we all have our own spin on things. So ready to rock,
02:12
I’m actually curious to see how far apart our answers are going to be. I know. know. Because we’re totally different. I am very curious also. Yeah. OK. So the first award is best investment that you’ve made of the year. It can be a product. It could be a stock. could be anything that you want. Yeah. This one panicked me because I’m not a
02:37
I’m like a dump my money into fidelity, not pay attention. And when I hear the word investment, I immediately think like, money, right? It can be a product that really helped you out too. Yeah. Right. So I would say like just financial wise, because I’m not like a fine, I’m a good at saving money. I’m not, don’t ever follow me for investment advice. But one simple thing that I realized that I didn’t take advantage of early enough last year was just the high yield savings accounts. Like the numbers are still pretty good, right? Like they’re not as good as they were last year, but
03:07
I do think moving some money, because I’m the type of person that would just have your money sitting checking account. just taking advantage of that was a really good investment. And then the other investments that I actually think was just investing in like personal growth. So whether it was just taking more time to like subscribe to podcasts or, you know, buying a better pair of like walking shoes.
03:30
I think anything that I did last year in the personal growth space, I saw the best return on investment. Actually, I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but it’s something that’s very important for me in 2025. Okay. I had a couple of answers for this and I wasn’t sure where you were going to go with it. My first stock investment best of the year was Nvidia. I’ve owned that stock for a decade now because I used to game a lot. Yes, yes. I was always bullish on that company.
04:00
it just blew up like this. mean, not just this year, but the past couple of years. And then I was using Highbeam, which was really good, which is this bank for e-commerce stores where you get really insane yields because the interest rate is so high. Yeah. And what’s great about this company actually is you know how money comes and goes when you’re running a business, right? Right. A lot of times you’re paying for expenses and stuff and it’s sitting in a checking account that’s not yielding. Yep.
04:30
Well, by using like a high beam account, for example, the money comes and goes and even the checking earns interest. But you can put it into this high yield savings where it instantly like instantly at the snap of a finger, it’ll start earning, you know, as high as four and a half percent. Now it’s gotten lower because the rates have been cut, but it’s just a great easy way to to just make money on the money that you’re making.
04:54
Yeah, and that’s kind of going back to what I was saying is there are a lot of opportunities out there still where you can do that even on a personal account. think actually Capital One has something similar for personal accounts and check all fact check me please. Just because I was researching this this week just for personal reasons because I like to have money sitting in my checking account for whatever, know, like today I’m taking a car to the.
05:17
To the repair shop because someone got into an accident, know It’s like you have this money sitting for emergencies, but it’s nice to see that money earning a little bit of extra money Yeah, actually what sets the high beam apart though, and this is not a commercial high beam. They’re not spot-seeming I’ve just been very happy is that you can write checks you can wire out of it You can credit cards out of it essentially make it your real bank. Yeah Okay, what’s the worst this one? I really struggled with
05:45
Okay, this one’s easy for me. That stupid BMW. Oh, yes. so I had just gotten done paying about $2,500 to fix the thing. Because it was at that age where stuff starts breaking. And then all of a sudden I have catastrophic engine failure. I actually haven’t told the story on the podcast, so just give me 30 seconds to just crash BMW real quick. once, so the engine failed. I think the timing chain had failed.
06:13
And I reached out to BMW and I was like, hey, you know, it’s only got 50,000 miles on this car. What’s going on? And they didn’t tell me anything. They weren’t willing to do anything. And then I just did some research and I found out there was a lawsuit on my exact car. And when I thought I had the smoking gun at that point, so I went back to them, I said, hey, you guys lost this lawsuit. You should fix my car. Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you issue a recall if you knew this was going to fail?
06:41
if you knew that my car was a ticking time bomb. And they said, Oh, you know, when you lose a lawsuit, or when there’s a settlement lawsuit, we’re not required by law to tell people. And I was thinking to myself, wow, my son was in my car at the time. And if it broke down on the freeway, could have been really dangerous. And that answer of they’re not obligated just really pissed me off. So anyways, worst investment of all time for me, worst investment of the year to
07:09
All that money I spent into it and it just died. And BMW is a rotten, horrible company. I hope they go down and they’re hurting. I This is also not sponsored by one of their competitors. This isn’t sponsored by Toyota. Okay. What is your worst investment? I didn’t have a bad investment this year. Thankfully. I have had many bad investments over time, but this year I somehow managed to avoid because I didn’t really, I bought one thing this year and we’ll talk about this in a minute.
07:38
But I started thinking about this like, okay, what do I think are really bad investments from last year? And just based on, and this is terrible, I get most of my news from TikTok, but I think if you purchased real estate without, if you just bought something, you probably paid too much money in 2024. Also, I think if you have a car loan and you got a car loan in 2024, it was a horrible investment. Interest rates are sky high, car prices are nuts. There’s supposed to be a major auto crash coming.
08:08
And those are like, did buy real estate last year, but that’s, there’s a nuance to that. But I almost bought a car last year and I’m so glad that I didn’t. feel like I, cause you know, I was like on the fence for like six months about buying a car. And I didn’t do it because I, I often feel that making, staying put is better than making a decision sometimes for something. And I just felt like, especially with cars, the price is so volatile right now that it was not worth.
08:34
even though I would get more for my car if I decided to trade it in or something like that, it just wasn’t worth the risk. So that is the worst investment that I guess I avoided in 2024 was I did not buy a car. Well, I had to buy a car in 2024. Yes, did. Junk broke. Yes. But on the real estate front, actually, I consider it the best investment. We did move my mom out to my neighborhood. So she’s literally like six streets down. And that’s the best investment just for me personally, because I get this fear all the time.
09:03
Yeah, like literally almost every day. I think if you didn’t have to buy real estate in 2024, you could have could have made because pricing was prices were so high at the beginning of the year. And ironically, that house is already up 20 percent. And that crazy. Yes. But you live in you live in a different area than I know. OK, next topic is the biggest personal loss of the year. I’ll let you go first, because mine’s going to be a little long winded. OK.
09:32
I do not have one at all, thank goodness, because I have had some massive personal losses over the past four or five years. I needed a break from loss and I got one, thank goodness. I know it’s not true for everybody, but I am very thankful that I didn’t really have a personal loss in 2024. I think for you, just like in the last couple of years, I feel like your life has profoundly changed for the better. Yes, yes, for sure.
10:00
because there was many, many decades of misery. Yes. I was looking at that question last night and I was thinking about it and I was like, I’m really happy that I didn’t have one because I feel like I’ve been hit from all sides year after year after year. It was really nice to not have that for 2024. For me too, actually, I was really good.
10:29
And technically, this didn’t happen in 2024. Yes. But my house just got broken into three, three days ago. I don’t know. It feels like it happened again. But it wasn’t a personal loss financially. I mean, they ransacked the house, took a bunch of stuff and like the house is disaster. They broke windows and everything’s in disarray. But it wasn’t like the financial loss. It was it was more the mental security loss. Yeah. Because, you know,
10:59
My wife is visibly was visibly distraught. The kids were distraught. They’re worried. I had this big gaping hole still in my in the back of my house where the sliding glass door and in the other windows that they broke. Because for some reason they had to break multiple windows to get in. And now, like I’ve been looking at alarm systems and beefing up security. And this is just not where I want to put my mental energy. And now we’re setting the alarm.
11:30
Even when we’re in the house at night. Yeah, that’s hard. It’s hard to not feel safe outside to even do run a quick errand. We set the alarm and then we forget like in the past couple of days, we’ve forgotten that we have it set and then we open the door and the alarm. Yeah, I don’t know. It’s just a huge personal loss. I think it’s because if you think about your house is supposed to be sort of your safe space.
11:55
and now it doesn’t feel that way. And then on top of that, I feel like most of us start off the new year with like this sort of refreshed energy of like, oh, I’m gonna get to all these things. And you started off the new year with like crap. I’ve got all this extra, like you can’t even get into work yet because you’re still dealing with the aftermath. So it almost is like a double whammy, right? Like the pain of like having to take care of all this stuff plus the like feeling of like being violated. And then on top of that, you’re like, hey, I was.
12:23
Roarin’ 2025 and now it’s like screeching halt. Yeah, I mean, we didn’t exactly roar into 2025 anyway. I was giving you some credit where you didn’t deserve it, but it was the worst 2024 Christmas break ever. I know. Also, not to go into too many details, like at our Christmas Eve Christmas party, Jen’s cousin’s dog passed away and then Jen’s uncle passed away.
12:53
It was just terrible. Yeah. So those are my biggest losses for the year. And maybe we should just skip on to the more positive awards of this episode. OK. Yeah. What was your biggest win? Let’s get you some positives. you want? OK. My biggest win was writing the script to automate the creation of new print products for our store. So one of the strategies now that e-commerce is changing and whatnot,
13:22
is we’re focusing more on printed custom printed products because the margins are super high. The problem is, like whenever I want to make a custom printed product before I’d have to take the image, Photoshop it on a product. Actually before that we were taking pictures of products, but now it’s like Photoshopped on, then we got to write a product description, upload it and all that stuff. It takes a lot of time. So I just took some time to write a script thanks to Chachi BT and it automatically Photoshop’s the image on
13:52
the three products that we’re printing on automatically uses AI to create a product description or product title, uploads it, and all I have to do is just kind of massage it before the product goes live. And the goal here is to target every single special occasion known to man and have print products for those occasions. And this is kind of like taking a page out of the Hallmark book because Hallmark made up all these holidays and that’s how they thrived. You’re capitalizing on the Hallmark.
14:21
Yes. I feel like my business last year was just a little bit on autopilot. I had a lot of just personal stuff that I was dealing with. My biggest win of the year goes back to the best and worst investments was that I sold my house. I had someone say to me the other day, oh, you got lucky selling your house. I was like, no, I didn’t. I studied the market for six years. Did it crash? I don’t know the market in Florida.
14:49
So now it’s it went from a seller’s market to a buyer’s market literally overnight. Really? Yes. And I think for a lot of reasons, right? Too much inventory, high interest rates to the point where like sellers are giving concessions, all sorts of things. And I had been I knew that I wanted to sell my house at some point because it was big and very it was like just expensive to operate. Right. The payment was super low thanks to 2020, 20, 20 interest rates. But just the operating cost of the house was something that I didn’t want to
15:19
continue to like incur. And so I had been watching this for years, right? Like just the market where, especially specifically to my area, right? Like my county, my zip code, things like that. And so I feel like I sold at the absolute top of the market, which one made me a good amount of money that I could put into another house, which is why, you know, if you sell a house, usually have to buy something else to live in unless you’re gonna go RV it for a year or two, which is not me.
15:49
So I felt like that was my biggest win. Just being really in tune to what was going on and basically, I mean, you know, because like one day I woke up and I was like, I got to sell, I got to sell in a month. And I was like, I mean, yeah. And it was a house that I bought for the purpose of renovating and eventually selling. But like I had a lot of renovation products that were like projects that were like half done or three courses done or nine eights done or whatever, eight, ninths. So
16:18
Like getting it ready. I mean, we turned it around in about six weeks and sold it. It was nuts. I remember that. Yes. It was crazy. Yeah. Which was part of the reason for like my business kind of having to be on autopilot too, because then I bought a house and once again, it’s another renovation project. So, you know, I’ve been living in a half renovated house for the past four months, which is not not definitely not going to be the coolest moment of my year. It’s not going to make that. How you live like that, because you have so many people in that house. But I guess you’re used to it. Your family’s used to it.
16:48
There’s certain, I mean, that’s a whole other podcast, right? There’s certain things you got to take care of and certain things you can live with. Although there’s definitely some things now that are grading on me. Like I still don’t have a bathroom and that’s super annoying. But yeah, so, but I, that’s definitely the biggest win for me financially and personally. Mainly, know, financially, obviously I made a lot of money selling that house, but then also personally, like, it’s kind of like when I, we talked about when I had my Audi.
17:14
and I loved that car so much. That was just my favorite car I’ve ever owned. The stress of owning that car is like the BMW. It breaks down and you’re out 2,500 bucks when you sneeze. You need brakes, $2,500. You need tires, $2,500. European cars are not inexpensive to maintain when you don’t live in Europe. That house started to feel like the car.
17:41
Like, oh, this is broken. Oh, I need to fix an AC unit. Oh, that’s $50,000. It got to be like, I dreaded, oh, what’s going to break next? Because it’s going to be this big expense. So that was a big stress reliever for me, just cutting out the expenses as well as just the financial wind.
18:04
I just wanted to take a moment to tell you about a free resource that I offer on my website that you may not be aware of. If you are interested in starting your own online store, I put together a comprehensive six day mini course on how to get started in ecommerce that you should all check out. It contains both video and text based tutorials that go over the entire process of finding products to sell all the way to getting your first sales online. Now this course is free and can be obtained at mywifequitterjob.com slash free.
18:33
just sign up right there on the front page via email and I’ll send you the course right away. Once again, that’s mywifequitterjob.com slash free. Now back to the show.
18:44
This just reminded me like when our house got broken into, I had just sold the BMW, the broken BMW for a thousand dollars. So I just happened to have a thousand dollars lying around in cash in the house and they found it. Anyway, just pour salt in your wounds for that car. I I was wondering if it was an inside job, but the guy who bought it was actually our neighbor’s friend. I doubt you. Yeah, probably not stealing his money back. So yeah, my biggest one had to do with the business. My other biggest win, you know, just
19:13
in general was we got my mom’s house at a really good rate. And it just so happened, like it doesn’t usually rain that much here in California, but that week during the open house, it had rained and I think there was some other disaster or something. So people didn’t really attend the open house. And I think the agent screwed up on the pricing too, because they, set it really high initially and then they cut it by like $500,000.
19:43
Which I people listening to this like, oh my God, how much is this house? They just way overpriced it. Yeah. And so that drove a lot of people away from it. They’re like, oh, what’s wrong with it? What’s wrong with it? So we I think we got it at really good price. And then, of course, the win is my mom is right down the street, too. Yes. Big win. Yeah. OK, what about the coolest moment of the year? Moment. I have a couple, so I’ll let you go first. This one was really hard for me, too, because I feel like I always have really cool moments. Well, I really.
20:13
Don’t you think I do? I think I get to do cool stuff all the time. Yeah, I guess that’s that’s the positive way. But there’s nothing that stood out. Yeah. No, no, no. I it was hard for me to like narrow down because I feel like, you know, there’s always really cool things. I would say hands down and we have to go back a full 365 days. Last New Year’s Eve, I was in Budapest. Oh, yeah. Which is my one probably my favorite city.
20:38
and then went skiing in Austria for my birthday. And that is something that if you would have told 30-year-old me that I would be doing that, I would have thought you were crazy. And so just realizing that I have had a lot of really cool moments like that in my life, and that one definitely topped the chart. The other one happened just last month, and of course, it’s another travel moment, but being in Denmark during Christmas time and
21:06
kind of happening on an outdoor cafe that had heaters and heated seats and blankets that you could wrap yourself in and just sitting there like watching the people. Like those are the moments that I love. Those are the moments that you can’t really put a price tag on. And so those would definitely be my top two of the year. That’s true. You’ve been going on a lot of vacations. They’re educational trips, Steve. More so, yeah. Yeah, they’re business related, right? They’re business trips.
21:34
That’s true. Yeah, you’re living your best life. More so than any other year I can remember, actually. Yeah, it’s been a great year. And I’ve had lots of other great moments, too. But those were definitely. And you know, my other quote, I got to give a little shout out to one of my kids who is not a good student. And I know you cannot relate to this, but my only kid left in school is not a great student. And she made the honor roll for the very first time, I think, in her life.
21:59
and she’s in high school now. That was a really cool moment. I was really proud of her. I didn’t have anything to do with it. She just woke up one day and decided she wasn’t going to slack anymore. Shout out to her for- What’s the secret? Did you do anything? Other than just continue to yell at her for 10 years to get her grades up. threaten her? Other than threaten to kick her out of the house unless she made the autumn? It’s a cool moment when you see a kid that doesn’t get it and then they get it like, this is important.
22:25
And you you’ve tried everything. You’ve tried taking the phone away. You’ve tried all the things. And then all of a sudden they just figure it out like, I need to be better. That’s always a cool moment. OK, I got to tell this story now. I was at dinner with my family and my mom last night, and my mom just spoils the crap out of my kids. reports are report cards are coming out tomorrow. And my son was.
22:48
he was like, Oh, you know, I might get a B on this. I’m like, what a B. And then my grandma or my mom, their grandma was like, Oh, you know, that’s okay. B is okay. Well, we’ll celebrate. You know, just I’m like, what? You know, this is the same mom when I grew up, I couldn’t get bees. And now you’re telling my son that he can get a B and it’s okay. What world am I living? I’m like, who are you?
23:15
It’s I’ll tell you, as someone who has grandkids, it’s 100 % a grandkid thing because during Christmas time, I took all three granddaughters to Target to let them buy gifts for their parents. And I was like, we can go through every toy aisle. You can play with all that. Do you think I ever let my kids go through the toy aisle of Target or play with a single toy? Absolutely not. I was like, we’re in, we’re out. I’m like, we got nothing to do. Push all the buttons, make all the noise you want. I did not care. So, yeah, it’s totally a grandparent thing. It’s great. I mean,
23:45
Your standards change. Your standards change 100%. Yeah. Okay. Wait, so my coolest moment, and I actually had two. One is always been on my bucket list to go to the Super Bowl. That’s right. Yes, I forgot. I went to see the Niners and the Chiefs. Unfortunately, the ending was not what I wanted, but it was probably the best Super Bowl that I’ve watched in recent history. It was close. Yes, it was a good game. and everything.
24:13
And it somewhat justified the gobs of money I had to throw at it to get really good seats. I told my wife it’s a once in a lifetime thing. I’m not going to do it again. Well, the Niners aren’t making the Super Bowl, so you’re definitely not going this year. the playoffs. Good Lord. In terms of fun, though, I think it was better than going to an NBA Finals game because there’s only one game. Yeah, everything’s on the line. And the halftime show is just ridiculous and whatnot.
24:44
You know, but outside of that, you know, it’s just something that I wanted to do. Second coolest moment of the year was going to the Paris Olympics. I had always wanted to go to the Olympics as long as I can remember. So that was like a bucket list item too. And we watched my favorite sport, which was indoor volleyball among other sports. We watched beach volleyball underneath the Eiffel Tower. I went to a basketball game. Actually, basketball was not that fun. Olympic basketball. Oh, bummer. Well, the reason is, is because like all the stars are spread out.
25:14
on other teams. it’s just like, since we had the NBA, it’s like watching bad basketball. Yeah. It’s the best way that I can describe it. Yeah. Compared to the NBA. But yeah, that was an amazing experience. That was my first time in Paris, too. And I think… I didn’t know that. didn’t know Yeah, it was my first time in Paris, even though I took like 12 years of French. I got there actually, and I could not communicate with anyone or understand anything.
25:42
Okay, but you don’t need, I was just telling this to Andrew this morning, you don’t need to speak French to go to Paris. You don’t, but I wanted to be able to read the signs and maybe try a little bit. Your coolest moments are basically unaffordable for anyone in the real world, by the way.
26:04
Yes, it was an amazing experience. Again, don’t Paris was just amazing. It’s probably one of my favorite cities. I know it’s not yours for some reason. not. I want to go back, though. I want to give it another chance. had July. Oh, I went off my low carb diet. had literally a lot of every day. had these chocolate croissants. I love a chocolate croissant. So much better than anything in the US. Yes. And I was expecting everyone to be impolite there because I just heard that. No, everyone was super nice.
26:33
Because everyone there was there for the Olympics. Yeah, probably everyone there were was expats and everything. They weren’t real Parisians. Yes. Probably. But beautiful city. The weather was perfect every day. Yeah.
26:47
Okay. What about your best life hack? Move on to some practical achievable things for people other than unlike going to the Olympics. I mean, a trip to Paris. How many people have been to Paris before? I like I, I just never been there. Yeah. All that. Okay. Best life hack. This one’s super easy and it’s probably a cliche at this point, but using chat GPT and Claude to write code and to help write YouTube scripts. Huge game changer for me.
27:15
I’m so much more productive. got rid of all of my writers as a result. So I used ChatyBT to write a loyalty program, which I, which was, guess, a big win for Bumblebee Linens. I can’t remember when I launched that, but that’s just like another excuse to email people, another excuse for people to buy and add more to their order. And then I also used it to code up a spin to win pop-up, a two-step version.
27:42
If you guys want to check it out, it’s over at Bumblebee Linens. But basically this new pop-up increased my email conversion rate by about three X, three and a half X, which was a huge deal for Bumblebee Linens also. just AI, know everyone’s using AI, but I think especially the coding and if you’re using, if you’re doing any sort of creative writing, Claude.ai is fantastic. It writes better than, than humans.
28:08
I was going to say Claude, but I knew you would use it, so I had to come up with some other ideas. I have another one too. can use it. How are you using Claude? For the scripts. For the scripts? I’m using it to take blog posts and turn into scripts, which I started doing last year and then moved and now actually was working on two scripts yesterday. Then also using it, and I think we talked about this in our webinar, using it for the hook. I actually think it does a great job for the hook.
28:37
For some reason on YouTube videos, I’m great in a hook in email, but I’m not great for a hook in video, so I’ve been relying on that. What’s your other life hack? The other life hack was 11 Labs. What I did is I cloned my voice. Now, if my assistant over in the Philippines needs a voiceover for something or whatnot, she’ll just type in what she needs and it sounds like me.
29:07
I sent you a sample. What did you think it sounded like? think it does sound like you. Yeah, I do. And then there’s this slider that allows you to add intonations where it thinks and it’s actually pretty good and it keeps getting better. They’ve updated the model since since the last time and this new model is amazing. Oh, good. So if you need yourself cloned, uh, voice wise, I, I guess it’s only really helpful if you’re a content creator, a podcast or something like that. But
29:37
It just does an amazing job. I knew you would use Claude, so was like, I got to think of another one. I have two more. My first one is my morning routine, which is get up, get directly out of bed, don’t check your phone. I know not everybody’s a morning person, don’t email me. This isn’t for you.
30:03
basically doing the morning meditation, like the five minutes of breathing. I will tell you, I was not a breathing fan like 18 months ago. I thought it was a bunch of bonk. I mean, I like breathing in general, like guided breathing. But Mike Barnhill, shout out to Mike and Dana Jean-Zima, shout out to Dana, really changed my mind about this. just doing, and I’m not one who can sit for 30 minutes and do this, but five minutes of guided breathing is…
30:30
radicalized my mornings and my energy level, along with sitting in the sun, whether it’s walking, sitting, whatever. So something like my last house, I could sit out on my balcony and like sit in the sun and do the breathing here. I have to I walk and then I do the breathing another time. But huge life hack. Highly recommended if you’re not doing that. My other one, which is like I am definitely late to the party, so don’t come at me.
30:58
Why was I not following the points guy before? I don’t know. I was talking to someone and they’re like, oh, yes, I found on the points guy. I’m like, know who that is. Why am I not? I just signed up for the daily emails. You definitely get stuff that you don’t want, but I’ve learned and you know I’m a travel hacker. We talk about going to all these places. I’ve gone for almost free on points to all my trips.
31:21
But he has like the ends, like I’ve wasted a lot of time trying to find out this information where he literally like the website’s amazing. The information’s great. It’s all real. It’s not gimmicky. Obviously, he makes money if you sign up for certain credit cards and things like that through him. So like good for him. But I will say, like if you want to travel hack and you don’t want to have to do all the work, I would just sign up for the email for points guy. And we’re not affiliated with them in any way. Can I get mad real quick?
31:50
Yes. Do you remember when I came back from Mankation and I was raving about Wim Hof breathing? Yes. But you didn’t like bat an eyelash. But now when Dana and Mike Barnhill tell you that breathing is really good, then all of sudden you do it. Yes. I’m sorry. I feel about that. I’m sorry. Okay. Wow. We’re running out time. have a couple more here. Okay. Best product of the year.
32:18
Okay, mine are all like construction based. They’re not work based. That’s okay. So anyway, best two products of the year for me, noise canceling insulation. If you are building a house, you need to this installed. This does not apply to like 90 % of the people here. it blow or what is it? No, it’s like roll. You roll it or it’s in sheets, but it’s like the pink stuff, but it’s not. It’s basically still wool. It’s amazing.
32:42
Never thought I would be singing the praises of insulation. But in the sound of you might think that I hate noise, I got the, I have them right here with me, my Bose open ear headphones. If you hate headphones in your ear, like the ones like Apple AirPods, the ones that stick inside your ear canal, which I cannot stand, these actually hook to your ear. So if you walk, run, cycle, anything like that, you can actually still hear everything going on around you. But the sound quality, 10 out of 10 amazing.
33:12
I like them so much better than AirPods. I’ve had an issue connecting them to my Mac computer, but that’s almost 100 % user error. But I love these little bows. Can you hold up the camera? curious. I want those too, actually. Yeah. So they hook. Let’s see if I can show you. Oh, I see. I see. OK, so let me try to describe it since you guys are listening here. They hook. My nails are too long, but they hook around your ear. Right. So nothing goes physically in your ear.
33:40
Nope, they hook on your, what’s the outside of your ear called? I don’t know. The part that like loops around, that’s where they hook so they’re on the backside. And to me, like, I don’t know about if you’re a female and you’re getting ready and like trying to do your hair and you have AirPods in, I always knock an AirPod out and then it’s rolling across the floor under the bed, whatever. These do not come off your ear. So, definitely recommend. My best product of the year is a service, I guess, and it’s
34:08
It’s not chat GPT, it’s search GPT. Okay. Uh, search GPT came out earlier this year and now it does citations and it does somewhat of fact checking with citations. So it has replaced Google for me across the board. I do not use Google at all anymore. Um, I tried perplexity as well. Perplexity is another AI search tool, which is much better than Google. I just prefer search GPT because I think it does a better job of citations. Um,
34:38
And there’s just less clutter in the answer that it gives you. Nice. Google’s, you know, I hate Google. Yeah, I’m going to to check that out. I agree. Well, it’s already kind of built into Chachi BT. So yeah. What’s your biggest change for the coming up here? Ah, so. I used to play Ultimate every week. Yeah, but then we’re all old now. Like one guy I was playing with was like 60. And so people just started getting injured.
35:07
Like literally every time we went out and played. so that game kind of died and I’m playing tennis once a week now, but I still need to wait to exercise the other days and not, I hate running. And so I don’t want to, I tried running and I tried to force myself to go running. I’m usually good for a couple of weeks and then I stop. So biggest personal change of the year. And this might be my product of the year, even though it’s been out for a long time.
35:34
There’s this exercise game on the Nintendo Switch. Okay. It is called Ring Fit. And there’s like this Pilates ring that you get, and then you fight monsters by exercising. Okay. And I’ve been doing that every day. Nice. Nice. And so the goal is to exercise five days out of the week, whether it be lifting weights, playing tennis. So that’s two and then a Ring Fit for the remaining three days. Nice. I like it.
36:04
It’s a game of fine fitness. always works. So I spent the last week with our friend Liz and Adam and Mike Jackness. And this was the biggest change was like the number one topic of our conversation. And so I started the conversation out by saying, I need a gigantic change this year. I don’t know what it is, but something needs to change drastically in my life.
36:30
And then as the days went on and we continued to have these conversations and Jackness was like determined to figure out what it was gonna be. And I was like, the problem is I don’t know Jackness if I knew I would tell you. But I woke up one morning actually on my birthday and I was like, you know what? It’s not a big change. I need to shift. And the idea came to me because of, I was thinking about like, and I’m not a science person so, ugh.
36:55
But I think about like tectonic plates, right? And how they move and shift over time. And it doesn’t seem like that big of a deal when you think about the size of these plates, but actually it causes like massive issues, right? It causes earthquakes. causes huge crevices and canyons and mountains, like, right? So this shifting of the plates is a really big deal, even though like in theory it’s not, right? Shift doesn’t seem like a big word, but I was like, that’s what I need. I need to shift. So I need a slight change that will produce massive results.
37:22
And so that’s kind of what I went with after I did the cold plunge and all the world became very clear to me after that. So a couple of those things that I just kind of came to like real practically. So, you know, last year I bought that big ass calendar, but I lost all the pieces in the move. So I had this calendar that was like empty. this year I was like, Liz was like, I’m going to buy the calendar. I was like, I’m not buying it. It sucks. You know, it doesn’t suck. I’m joking, but.
37:49
We decided we were to buy it basically together and fill it out together on a call. That’s a big thing as I want to plan my, I want to get an outline of my year now. Wow, we’re like the opposite. I know we are. That was the big one. I was like, if I have Liz or anybody to do it with me, the accountability will be there to get it done.
38:14
Because I do know that because I have so much chaos like in my personal life and my house and everything like the things that I can control I really need to control and then in in that conversation I realized the one thing that I feel like all of us for the most part have been missing over the past several years is like I need to get out more I’m very happy in my cave. I’m very happy in my office. I’m very happy in my house You know, I’m like a whole if I leave I’m getting on an airplane and I need like more
38:44
people in my life that are in are like not necessarily doing exactly what we do, but in like the entrepreneurial slash founder space. And so just making a concerted effort and I have a lot of things like in the works for this, like probably attending more events, networking more, just being better about getting out there because I tend to like close in if, because I wanna get stuff done, right?
39:10
And I’m realizing that I’ve missed out, especially like if you think about like 2020 and everything that happened and how like my life before that and now like we are going to multiple events a year. And I’m at the point now where my kids are all older. While it’s still difficult to travel a lot, I can make it happen. And I think that’s really important for my own like personal growth. You know, it’s funny is I’m going in the opposite direction. I know. And I think it’s because our kids are at different ages, like your kids are older. Yeah.
39:40
I feel like my kids need us right now to be at home because over the break we toured colleges for my daughter and it’s just so hard to get in college now. There’s so many things that… Not when you make the A honor roll. Not when you make the A honor roll. I wish that’s all it took. Yes, I know. But there’s a lot of work involved and so many activities now. Both kids are playing volleyball. I’m literally driving to the gym.
40:09
like four times a week, five times a week. there’s and yeah, Karina is learning how to drive. Yeah, that’s a nightmare itself. I told you this story, right? I go in, she gets in the front seat and I’m like, OK, let’s drive. And the first question she asks is, OK, which one is the brake? I’m like, OK, get out of the car, get out of the car right now. Yeah, yeah.
40:38
We went to like a parking lot where I could show her which pedal was which. This is after she she passed the learner’s permit test. And I don’t think they ask you that question. So here’s and you’re right, like we’re in very different seasons. Like think about this. I’m teaching my seventh kid how to drive. I know I’m just like I’m in there smoking a cigarette, like drinking a glass of wine, like let’s go, kids. You know, really guys, but like.
41:04
There’s very little, not all my kids are great drivers. I’ve had some near-death experiences with them behind the wheel. Now I’m just like, let’s do it. It just very much unfazes me at this point for driving. That’s so funny. I think once they’re off to college, I’ll be there with you. I’ve just realized that I miss that part of I need people to hold my feet to the fire.
41:35
And I think that getting out there for me is the best way to do it because I quickly go in. I quickly am like, I could not leave my house for a month and be totally fine. Like literally not leave it, except for I have to take a kid to school. But like I don’t go to the store. not like it. I don’t want to interact with you. Like I very quickly want to go inward. So I think this is a good push for me. I mean, those were great years. They really were.
41:59
I was speaking like six or seven times a year at various conferences, had a blast, met so many people. I would love to go back to that actually, but just not these next two years for sure. Maybe afterwards. Actually, I feel like there’s less events now too. There are less events. yeah, anyway. Okay. Biggest loser of the year. I have a list. Oh, you do. Okay. Let me just get my one out of the way then.
42:27
I think the biggest losers of the year were Amazon sellers who only rely on selling on Amazon. That was on my list. was okay. Amazon introduced so many new fees. You could avoid some of those fees by using their new service, which was a disaster this holiday season. was Amazon warehousing and distribution. just recently they announced that they are not reimbursing you the full price of a product when they use your product. I saw that. Just the cost of
42:55
Good, whatever it is. the cost of goods. Yes. What they consider your cost of goods or you can submit your factory invoices and get that reimbursed, but it doesn’t take into account the cost of customs duties and freight forwarding and all that stuff. Just the pure cost of the product, which- That’s garbage. To me is outrageous. Yes. Okay. This was my funnest part. I was like, I love fighting the losers and winners.
43:24
Biggest losers of the year, SEO blogs. Blogs that rely totally on SEO. Pooh in the toilet. The Democratic Party, guys messed up. We’re a little bit tone deaf. We don’t talk about politics here, but they are definitely a big loser for the year. Did not do a good job marketing, that’s for sure. Actually, if you’re in marketing, learn from this. Chain restaurants, the Red Lobsters, TGA Fridays. Once again, I feel like a lot of this has to do with like
43:51
people being tone deaf to their audience, not knowing what people want, not adapting to the new world, right? Department stores, right? Macy’s closed 150 stores, same thing. I didn’t hear that. Yeah, do people not shop there anymore? No. As department stores. So I read a couple years ago that Macy’s does the majority of their sales online anyway. And a lot of people just walk into Macy’s to pick up their order, right? And I don’t know about you, but like shopping malls, like the traditional everything’s inside shopping mall,
44:21
Bankrupting right the outdoor malls the plazas. Those are the ones that are are doing better malls Yeah, were you walking? Yes. Oh, no Yeah here they are packed Yeah, so you know like Red Lobster filed they got a new CEO so they’re restructuring but TGI Fridays went down Okay, another big loser Aaron Rodgers. What are you doing, dude? Like once again like but
44:47
Like, once again, I feel like all this kind of relates to like they’re like a lot of these people are just tone deaf, right? To what’s going on around them, not like understanding the market. Right. Aaron Rodgers did not understand what it was like to play in New York where your fans will boo you. Right. He was in Green Bay where everyone loves you. They’re all cheeseheads. Right. I would say X, formerly known as Twitter, big loser this year, lost a lot of users. Once again, I feel like in that tone deaf category. I mean, you stopped putting effort into it.
45:16
I feel the opposite about X actually. Oh, really? Okay. Why do you feel the opposite? Because I think X has become the platform for people for free speech. I think X is on the rise. We’ll see. Especially after the Trump victory. It might turn around, but I feel like in 2024 it was not. Then I think the absolute biggest loser of the year was anybody who stayed up to watch the Mike Tyson, Jake Paul fight.
45:46
Biggest loser, if you could even get it to stream correctly. then we have to add Netflix to that list of biggest losers for screwing that one up. like we should have just made an entire episode on this. You got a long list. OK, but biggest winners. OK, biggest winners, Nvidia stock, Elon Musk. Those are right, too, that I was thinking of. Like, Elon banked so much on this election. Yes, he did. And he would have gotten screwed if Trump had lost. Yeah.
46:16
So Nvidia, Elon Musk, anything related to AI, killing it right now. the company, not Amazon, the seller. So everything that hurt the sellers benefited Amazon. Since chain restaurants took a tank, these fast casual restaurants like Cava, where you like go up and order, but they bring you your food. don’t know. You know, all those restaurants really did well because they kept their price point right. Right. Like Shake Shack’s like, you know, those places are doing actually really well. Walmart.
46:46
big winner of 2024 and are still coming hard after Amazon. And then people in general, because I had to add Aaron Rodgers, I got to add people that are winners. A huge winner, probably my number one 2024 winner, Caitlin Clark, right? Just crushing it and not only crushing it for herself, but bringing up an entire industry. Like who cared about the WNBA before Caitlin Clark? Nobody. Right. And then along with that, we got Simone Biles, right? Coming back and the Olympics, like
47:16
once again, huge personal winner, Alona Meyer, right? Rugby player in the Olympics that then has, what I like about her is in her and the pommel horse guy, Steven Naderosic, who transformed their Olympic wins into like outside of that monetization and fame. Cause I think so many people like get their 15 minutes and don’t know how to leverage that. So I think they did a really good job of being like slightly obscure, but then leveraging it for huge social media followings, Dancing with the Stars,
47:45
You know, all sorts of stuff. And then the other two big winners for me are YouTube and TikTok. Who knows what’s going to happen to TikTok. We might not be saying this in 2025. In one more week, we’ll find out. TikTok, TikTok, we’ll see. But anyone creating content on YouTube and TikTok, big winner in 2024 and definitely on YouTube. I see that in 2025 as well. I agree. I also wanted to add the biggest loser of the year, I think is the NBA. Yes. Your ship is down like 58 percent or something. It hurts my heart.
48:14
hurts my heart to say that. must say the game has kind of devolved into just like chucking it up. Yes. Yeah. From 3.9. Drive and kick, drive and kick. Yeah. Anyway. right. Well, that concludes our first annual awards show. You’re only supposed to pick one in each of these categories, but maybe we should just do an entire episode on biggest losers and biggest winners because that’s when you like perked up.
48:41
Well, here’s the thing. I know I had to double for some other ones. Here’s the thing about the biggest winners and losers is I think that you can you like the audience us can learn so much from what’s happening in the world. Right. Like you can look at people who like look at Aaron Rodgers. Right. Like so how do you avoid that in your own business or your own branding? Right. Because he’s he’s a person, but he’s also a brand.
49:10
Right? So how do you avoid that negative backlash? How do you avoid getting in that position? Same thing with like, how can you do what Caitlin Clark has done? Right? Now, obviously most of us are never going to be in the WNBA. Mainly we’re too old, and you’re not a woman, but details, details. But like looking at some of these people, looking at what like Walmart is doing, right? Looking at some of these bigger companies or people and like, how are they leveraging what they already have?
49:40
to grow and be better. And then also looking at like, hey, if YouTube is blowing up, should I be on there? Right? How do I need to get on? It’s like just watching these things and making decisions in your own business and personal life, I think is really, really good.
49:56
Hope you enjoyed this episode. If there are any awards that you think we missed, let me know by sending me an email. For more information and resources, go to mywifequitterjob.com slash episode 571. Once again, tickets to the Seller Summit 2025 are now on sale over at sellersummit.com. If you want to hang out in person in a small intimate setting, develop real relationships with like-minded entrepreneurs and learn a ton, then come to my event. Go to sellersummit.com.
50:23
And if you’re interested in starting your own e-commerce store, head on over to my wife, quitherjob.com and sign up for my free six day mini course. Just type in your email and I’ll send the course right away via email.
