Transcript 0:00 Shipping, billing, admin, payroll, marketing. You're managing all the things, so why waste time sending important documents the old-fashioned way? Mail and ship when you want, how you want with stamps.com. 0:12 Print postage on demand and schedule pickups from your office or home. Save up to 90% with automated rate shopping. Over one million small businesses trust stamps.com. 0:22 Get $20 in free postage when you sign up for the pro plan at stamps.com/blackfriday2026. Terms and conditions apply. [gentle music] Wheelhouse DNA. [upbeat music] Hi, everyone. 0:39 My name is Boye Kolade. And I'm Chris Sawtelle. And welcome to an extra special episode of The Future Forecast, a podcast where we explore the intersection between business, technology, and entertainment. 0:51 If you heard our episode from earlier, you'll know that we had founder and entrepreneur Larry Fitzgibbon from Tastemade on to hear his thoughts and opinions on some of the week's news. 1:00 And it would be an absolute waste to have Larry here without talking about his incredible career. 1:06 He is the co-founder and CEO of Tastemade, an independent media company that engages a global audience of hundreds of millions of monthly viewers on all major streaming, TV, and mobile platforms. 1:19 Tastemade creates award-winning video content and original programming in the food, travel, home, and design spaces. 1:26 But even prior to Tastemade, Larry was one of the founding team of Demand Media, serving as the EVP of Media and Operations and was also the VP of Business Development at Citysearch. 1:39 We are so excited to have him here with us today, so please join us in welcoming Larry Fitzgibbon. [clapping] All right. Thanks, guys. I'm excited to be here. We're excited to have you. 1:50 We had a fun conversation earlier, and now we're gonna ask you some questions. We're about to interrogate you like the FBI and CIA. Okay. Oh, oh, raining. All right. Yeah. I feel the heat. Yeah. I feel it. 2:01 [laughs] No, we're just gonna hang out. First things first- [laughs]... um, Larry, tell us a little bit about your early days getting started to, to where you are now running, like, an awesome food media business. 2:11 Well, it's been a bit, a bit of a journey. 2:13 Um, you know, I love this podcast 'cause it actually is the, the sort of intersection of all the things that I love, entertainment, technology, um, you know, uh, i- it's, it's kind of those are the things that have always kind of inspired me. 2:27 Um- Thank you. You're welcome. Mm-hmm. Um, I got my start, uh, k- kind of coming to California, I guess, is kind of how the, my career kind of really began. Um, when I was in college, I worked at a Kinko's. 2:38 I was a copy guy. I was the guy making copies. Um, and, uh, when I- Thank you for your service. No, thank you. [laughs] You're welcome. 2:45 Um, when I got out of college, I got a job actually working for the headquarters of Kinko's, which is in, uh, California, and so that was my first, uh, journey, and that, that first project was kind of technology-related, so I ended up in the technology department, ultimately making software and applications for, for the corporation. 3:01 Um, but probably most relevant to, you know, kind of what I'm doing today is, is, was sort of my next stop, and that was, I, I went to work at a, a startup here in LA, um, back in '98, um, dating myself a little bit, um, which was called Entertainer. 3:15 And, and Entertainer was essentially Netflix too early. We were streaming movies and televisions from all the major studios, um, over the internet, um, on a subscription basis. It, it really was, um... 3:28 But the problem was that there were only, like, 100,000 consumers on, in the United States at the time- Mm-hmm... who had enough bandwidth to accept the service. So great idea- Wow... wrong time. 3:38 Um, but it was, it was a great step in for me just to understand technology, understand the, the media industry. 3:44 We worked a lot with a lot of the broadband providers and the cable companies and the telcos, so it was a, it was a great, it was a great fertile ground for me to kind of get the basics on, um, how this, you know, kind of town operates and, and what's happening here. 3:57 Uh, from there, as you mentioned, I, I made my way over to, uh, Citysearch, which is, uh, owned by IAC. Um, and there, like I said, I headed up business development. 4:06 That was kind of a, you know, kind of started to see the beginnings of maybe my passion around food. Obviously, Tastemade, that's a cornerstone to what we're doing. 4:15 Um, but, you know, back in, back when Citysearch was, uh, you know, it was kind of the predecessor to Yelp, very popular. 4:21 If you were, you know, in your 20s and wanted to know what to do each weekend in LA, you could go there and, you know, get the best restaurants or the best restaurants for whatever you were looking for. 4:31 So it was a great service, um, and that was a great run. Had a, had a good time there and learned a lot, um, working at IAC. Obviously, IAC is Barry Diller's company. 4:40 Um, some very smart executives that I got to surround myself with, um, and just learned, um, you know, learned what it really took to operate a business. So that was a, sort of great learning lesson for me. Yeah. And so 4:56 you went from IAC to Tastemade? No, I went there, uh, I went from IAC to Demand Media. So, uh, Demand Media, um, was, I was part of the founding team. There were six of us. Started in kind of May of 2006. 5:09 We grew that company from 6 people to 600, took it public on the New York Stock Exchange in about 2011. Wow. Um, that company was founded by a guy named Richard Rosenblatt and Sean Colo. 5:21 Richard was, um, the guy who had just come off selling MySpace to Fox. So he sold Fox- Oh. He sold MySpace for about 580 million, and this was his next deal. So we, it was kind of a, um, uh, a, a pretty quick run. 5:35 We raised a ton of money, raised, like, $120 million, uh, um, bought a, a bunch of companies, all in the kind of media space. 5:43 Uh, grew the, our audience to be pretty big, built a kind of an innovative content model, um, using the crowd. Um, and then ultimately, uh, as I said, took that company public in 2011. 5:53 About a year after that, me and two of the other co-founders of that company, Joe Perez and Stephen Kidd, we all left, um, and, and, and started Tastemade, and for us, it was kind of a combination of things. 6:05 Um, one, um, one, we, we all loved working together, right? 6:09 We had kinda been working together every single day, and I think that's kinda key any time you're founding companies, is working with people that, um, you know, you know you can work with well. 6:18 And then the second was, you know, if you're gonna do startups, right, you all, you all do that kind of work, it's really hard. 6:25 Um, you know, you have to really be passionate about it 'cause it's just gonna be, you know, it's sometimes really fun, but it's also oftentimes a grind. Um, and so you gotta really be into what you're doing. 6:35 So the notion of coming to work for us every day, talking about things like food and travel and home and design, these are all passion categories for us, so kinda easy to get out of bed in the morning. 6:45 And then the second was, you gotta put yourself back in the time machine. We started Tastemade in kind of the beginning of, or kinda mid-2012. 6:52 Um, and at the time, the only kind of video platform on the internet was really YouTube. I mean, I think Vimeo existed, but, like, the only, um, you know, kind of truly open kind of social-type platform was YouTube. 7:05 Um, and our view was that we were gonna see the rise of video, which obviously we've had. All the platforms in, have embraced video. Uh, two, we were gonna see the rise of social, right? 7:14 Particularly in their embracement, you know, we're gonna see things like, you know, um, you know, Facebook embracing video, we're gonna see things like Snapchat and all the things that have come since emerge. 7:24 Um, we thought the, the world was gonna be kinda instantly global, so that's how we thought it was gonna be different versus the kinda first gen- or the second generation of media, called the cable industry. 7:34 Um, you know, with these platforms you could be live and reach the whole world instantly. 7:39 Um, and so it's sort of a combination of those kind of mega trends married with our own personal passion that we thought it was a good time to start Tastemade. Yeah. I love that. 7:48 I mean, it seems like you've had a lot of success, a lotta ups and downs and zigzags through your entrepreneurial journey, and, um, you know, Chris and I are both entrepreneurs. 8:01 And so I'm very curious, I'm sure the audience, the, our listeners are very curious, what's your experience been as an entrepreneur? Like, what are some of those struggles you kinda touched on, 8:13 like, earlier, and maybe some of the benefits too? Yeah. I think, um, you know, probably the first, uh... 8:21 When we, you know, up, up until I started Demand, I was really just working at, you know, fairly, you know, I guess, uh, Entertainer was a startup, but it wasn't mine, right? 8:30 I wasn't really, I was a early employee, but not, certainly not the people behind starting up that company. 8:35 It wasn't really till Demand that I got a real taste for what it meant to, you know, be on the founding team or be the, you know, fir- first people starting a company. 8:45 Um, to me it's ex- you know, it's exhilarating, right? Because you, you really do come to work with sort of a blank slate, um, and you get to, you know, kinda paint. It's kind of our version of maybe being artist. 8:56 Um, [clears throat] but it is fraught with lots of ups and downs, right? You know, um, you know, the Demand was sort of famous for, uh, really understanding search. 9:05 Like, it was, you know, that was sort of built on that era. Um, and, you know, that era was fraught with lots of different changes relating to search. 9:15 I mean, those are actually kind of reemerging here las- lately because of, because of the AI stuff. But, um, you know, that had dramatic impact on our business. 9:23 So there were days that, you know, even post being a publicly traded company, we could walk in the office and Google had made a change and maybe we lost 25% of our audience. Mm. 9:33 Um, and this is a fairly scale- you know, we're talking 100-plus million people. So, uh, pretty meaningful and pretty, could be pretty devastating. 9:39 And then once that type of thing could happen, really have to, you know, think hard and navigate, you know, what changes you have to make about the business. 9:48 Those things are really challenging, particularly when you're working so, you know, those, those particularly are hard because you are working so hard towards what you think, um, you know, is something that's, you know, g- good and people are gonna love, um, and then, you know, you do find yourself in situations where things change in your industry, things change in your business, and then you have to kinda quickly adjust. 10:10 Yeah. Speaking of the challenge, can I, may I, may I just ask, 10:14 for many of our listeners, either they currently are entrepreneurs and founders themselves, or individuals at companies thinking about what it would mean, like, to be an entrepreneur or, or with side hustles, 10:28 I'd be curious to hear what was that inciting moment for you, if there was one, that kind of propelled you into the, the founder seat? How did you either pave that, pave that way or stumble into it? 10:46 Yeah, I definitely didn't stumble. Um, m- my... Well, I guess any, everything has some luck, so I, maybe there's some stumbling going on. 10:52 What happened for me was in the beginning of 2006, in January of 2006, I called a friend of mine who I knew, um, who was working at Yahoo at the time. He, he was, like, one of the first, it's Steven, Steven Kidd. 11:05 He was, he was one of the first employees on the entertainment, he was, like, the first employee in the entertainment division of Yahoo during that era. 11:13 Um, and we had got to know each other 'cause we had done, we had, like, we were both biz dev guys, we kinda had done deals at our, when I was at Entertainer, he was at Yahoo. So we just were sort of friendly. 11:23 We weren't, like, best friends or anything, but we were friendly, and I, I just kind of knew him well enough to know that he was kind of a smart, ambitious guy. 11:29 And so I called him in the, in January of 2006, um, and said, "Hey, I think..." You know, remember, this is the early 2000s. Like, the internet was not clear. 11:38 It was not clear, um, how this whole thing was gonna turn out. There was a, you know, people were still recovering from the dotcom bust. Um, and so it was, you know, it was, it was not clear. It was... 11:49 And so I, I reached out to him, and this was kind of just as Web 2 was sort of starting to kick in, and I was like, "Hey, I really think there's going to be a good opportunity." 11:57 I know it sounds stupid as we sit here today, but, like- [laughs]... I was like, "We should figure something out." So basically, um, we started meeting every weekend in the beginning of 2006. 12:08 Just talking about either, talking about business ideas, talking about could we start something. We were both just kinda out in the market, right, talking to other companies or recruiters or whatever. 12:18 Um, you know, just trying to analyze what's going on out there, um, and kind of working the problem together, you know, as kind of like co-f- I mean, I don't think we were thinking we were gonna be co-founders at that time, but just sort of, you know, how could we collaborate, think could we... 12:31 Both had kinda the same in- the, the same idea about the moment in time and, and then kind of what role we wanted to play. 12:39 And so through that process, uh, Steven met the, you know, the, the, the co-founders of Demand Media who were starting to put this thing together. 12:48 Um, I quickly then, he inter- you know, he kinda was getting some traction with them, kinda explained the idea. I knew a lot about the basis of the idea, 'cause it was a lot of stuff that I had learned at IAC. 12:59 Um, and, uh, I quickly met them, and then, you know, like, it's, you know, the, the other story of entrepreneur- like, sometimes this stuff happens, like, in days, right? Yeah. 13:09 So, like, I may have met them on a Monday, and, like, I was a founder of a company that was raising $120 million, like, eight days later or something like that. It was, it was pretty fast. Um, [clears throat] and so, 13:20 uh, you know, I, I think that was part of my journey. So it was certainly luck, right? It was a little bit luck that we, we, you know, kinda connected with the, the, the founders of the company. 13:31 Um, but it was also, you know, preparation, you know, on the way to some good luck, right? So- What is that great phrase? Preparation, w- uh, uh, there's a, there's a terminology. It's- Like, yeah, I think we know it. 13:43 You know it. It's like chance is like you have to be disciplined and be ready for that luck almost. It's, yeah, it's simply a commentary on the amount of preparation and training and time meets- That's right. Yeah. 13:54 Larry, how, how big is Tastemade right now? Uh, we're about 100, a little over 100 people. Okay, cool. Yeah. And, um, where are your offices? 14:04 Uh, well, we have, uh, uh, we're a virtual company, but we have a physical studio in Santa Monica. That's kind of where we got our start. Um- Nice... 14:11 uh, we've got a great space there where we've been, uh, really this whole time we've existed. 14:17 Um, you know, one of the things that we did over time is, uh, expand internationally, and so we have a, we have an office in São Paulo as well. Sick. So you can find us in Brazil. 14:27 Um, and then an office in London, which, uh, well, you know, uh, we're doing a lot of good stuff there this summer. We maybe will talk about. 14:34 And then, uh, we have a joint venture with a company called Mitsui, which is one of the big Japanese conglomerates. Um, and, uh, so we have an office in, uh, Tokyo as well. Sweet. 14:42 But you, but you're, it sounds like you're predominantly remote. Uh, we are predominantly remote, yeah. But- But, you know, the office, well, in Japan, I think it's a little bit more hybrid. 14:50 Um, obviously we have days where we'll get together, right? And so that will happen in the physical space. Um, and then the, the offices we have in these places are really tied to studios, right? 15:00 They're places where we're making either short-form content for ourselves, short c- for- form content with brands, or streaming television shows that might air on our networks or, you know, some partner's network. 15:12 That's very cool. We've talked a lot about remote work, and it, it's, I feel like there's no good answer. Like, there's positives and negatives to both, so I'm always fascinated about super large companies. 15:25 I mean, like, what's it like running a 100-person company? Well, I mean, I think of, I think of people, I was talking to somebody the other day has 1,500 people, right? 15:32 So, uh, you know, and obviously the big corporations, uh, are massive. Um, you know, I, I think for us, uh, it has a lot to do with the, maybe the age of the company, right? 15:42 Like, um, and I've advised a lot of startups, and so I've talked to a lot of companies lately about this topic. 15:48 Um, and, uh, I think there is kind of a high interest in getting people back physically together, for sure, particularly when you're shaping and forming something from the beginning, right? Tastemade's over a decade old. 16:01 Um, we kinda know better what we are. We know kind of what we're doing. The people, you know, I've, many people have worked f- with me for some, uh, over a decade. 16:11 Um, and so I think that takes out some of that shorthand that we've developed over the years. 16:15 The other thing I would say is we were always fairly distributed, um, which I think made it easier for us- From a personnel perspective, you're claiming? 16:23 Correct, yeah, right, because, you know, we had a big sales team in New York. We still have a large presence of people in New York, or we have sellers in Chicago, as an example. So we're a media business, right? 16:32 So, uh, advertisers all over the country, so we were fairly distributed from that standpoint. 16:37 And then because we, um, you know, we kinda have these small footprints globally, it's not like they're massive, massive offices or anything, but, you know, if you're operating that way, guess what? 16:47 You, well, we were doing lots of Zooms, you know, essentially, or Google Hangouts is what we used, but, uh, we were doing all of that, like, kind of pre-pandemic, and so I think it came a little bit more natural to us. 16:58 We actually didn't make the choice to be, uh, remote until after the pandemic ended. I felt like making any choice during that was, like, a, gonna be a bad idea. 17:07 It's like, uh, you know, you shouldn't make big life decisions if you're, you know, some big mean, you know, someone in, someone in your family died, right? That's not the week you decide what your career's gonna be. 17:16 That's just kind of bad timing. So we sort of postponed the decision, um, until, you know, kind of the pandemic was kind of well over. 17:24 Um, and then the other kind of important piece to it is I always thought, like, if we're gonna do it during the pandemic, we should sort of act as if we're never coming back. So, like, do it right. Don't half... 17:35 You know, I think a lot of companies sort of half did it. Mm-hmm. And so they didn't maybe build the muscle strength, um, or, you know, kind of the resilience you need to do it right. 17:45 'Cause there clearly are companies that are born this way, you know, that are doing it really well, that are, have world-class communications, you know, systems and skills. 17:55 Um, they've, have already figured out how to overcompensate for the fact that they're not virtual. 17:59 They've got, uh, great regimes around, uh, getting people together, either sort of ad- you know, kind of ad hoc or, um, you know, kinda systematically every quarter. 18:08 So there are some great prac- best practices about being good at this. 18:12 And so we try to try many of those things on for size during the pandemic as if, we didn't tell everyone this, but as if we were going to Not come back, and so that transition I think was more natural for us. 18:22 Uh, that being said, I, you know, this is still a, you know, many of yous- you guys remember during the pandemic, like, almost every conversation you started was a debate about this. 18:31 You know, every Zoom call you would do. Uh, that disa- that's dissipated a little bit but, you know, I've, you know, I meet with people who work at the big tech companies. 18:39 Um, I was just talking to some people last night about it, or just startups. I do think, you know, um, particularly the bigger companies like, 18:48 how do you train that next generation of, you know, you know, that, that new class of first-time employees, you know? It's hard to do virtually if there's no culture around it. Um, 18:59 and then I think for the small companies, I've seen startups, like, really crave it, you know? 19:03 I think they're like, "We need to be in the office together to figure out who we are as a team and then what are we doing," right? 19:10 That's part of the startup game is you're oftentimes sort of just trying to figure it out. Yeah. How do you balance that without it becoming micromanaging? 19:20 Y- uh, you mean the, the being in the office or not being in the office? Yeah. Like, uh, maybe it's, uh, for our listeners or for anyone managing a team, 19:29 there's, there's that push/pull now that we're in a work from home, especially if you're advising startups. How does one give their team the breath and the space or the grace for that matter to do the work 19:43 while simultaneously ensuring c- that they're building culture and an ethos that everyone operates and lives be- lives behind? Yeah. We, we've, uh... 19:53 I mean, this is probably an overused word, but we're gonna say intentionality, right? 19:56 That's, that's kind of how we addressed it was, you know, being super thoughtful about what you're, how you're going after it and how you're trying to do it. 20:04 And, and I would say, too, I think this is, now that we're kinda in it for real, right, it's n- no, you know, I think the pandemic was a little bit of, like, a practice rounds. 20:13 We're in it for real, then you also have to kinda stay committed, right? I think it's something you gotta keep coming back to to make sure that you're on top of it. 20:20 I, but some of the, I thought kind of the, I don't know, beautiful maybe overstatement, but some of the beautiful stuff I thought about the pandemic and some of the changes we saw was, hey, I'm going to judge you on the quality of your work. 20:33 I'm gonna judge you on, you know, what you deliver. Um, I'm not gonna judge you for did you stay 30 minutes after I left the building. Yeah. You know, I'm not gonna judge you did you get into the office before me. 20:44 You know, they s- those are, seem very healthy things, right? That seems to be very logical, right? 20:49 It's kinda crazy that, um, those other things I mentioned to, like, when we were grow- or at least when I was growing up, like, that is what you did. 20:56 You wanted to be in the office before your boss got there and you wanted to stay after he left or she left, right? You, that, that, that's, you wanted to send a message that you're willing to go the extra mile. 21:05 Um, you know, that's okay, but that's kinda, you know what I mean? I don't think that's necessarily was the most productive or was really the greatest, uh, representation of the type of work that I would do. 21:15 I think that was a trick that people- Yeah... learned in the office to get an edge. Um, and to me that doesn't sound that healthy. 21:22 It sounds healthier if, uh, you know, you're gonna judge me based on how I delivered on the, you know, the s- the, the work that I was asked to do. Yeah. We should talk about your content, right? 21:33 So, uh, you recently launched a new show that provides shoppable content. We were also talking, you know, in our last session about Amazon. 21:41 Uh, tell us more about what you're up to and, and we're, we're also curious or how brands sort of layer into, you know, the partnerships aspect of what you're doing. Yeah, great. 21:52 So, you know, we got our origin story, right, was really born on YouTube and, and then ultimately on social, right? And so we did a really good job of building audience in that ecosystem. 22:02 Still today, you know, we're very relevant there, but as you mentioned, hundreds of millions of people globally watch Tastemade each month, um, in that kinda short-form realm. 22:11 In that part of the ecosystem, we create a ton of original content, right? Uh, that's, that's short form. Could be 10 seconds, could be, you know, three minutes, could be 15 minutes. 22:21 Um, but we also do that a lot with brands. That's really been kind of a core r- in, in that sense we're kind of like a mega influencer, right? 22:28 We make the money the, almost the same way as they do, um, where we've struck, you know, we've done, like, hundreds of millions of dollars of sponsored brand video content, probably more than a lot of- Wow... 22:40 companies on Earth. And we've done it with every brand you could imagine, you know, Netflix, American Express, uh, Constellation Brands, um, you name it, you know, all the CPG food brands. 22:52 We've worked with a whole variety. And so that's been a very important type of content that we've created historically and it is very important to us today. 22:59 That is still how Tastemade makes, uh, generates a lot of its revenue is working with brands closely, helping them particularly navigate social, um, and putting the right content in front of our engaged audience and delivering that kind of engagement and audience, uh, that the brands are looking for 'cause, you know, they were struggling to find it somewhere else. 23:18 So that's a type of content that we create. It's kind of our origin. In 2018, we launched a 24/7 linear streaming television network. So essentially a k- brand-new kind of type of cable network. Mm. Um, our, 23:31 um, our first distribution point for that was YouTube TV, so not YouTube Core, but YouTube TV. That's the kind of skinny bundle or- Yeah... bundle of cable channels. 23:40 So you could watch ESPN, you can watch NBC, you can watch the Food Network. You can also watch Tastemade right there in your, in your guide. 23:47 Um, and so we w- from there went on to get distribution from all of those types of companies, you know, Sling, S- you know, F- DirecTV... Philo, and then along the way, Fast kind of emerged. 24:00 Um, and, and we distribute those networks. 24:03 We now have, you know, Tastemade, Tastemade Home, Tastemade Travel, and Tastemade en Español all in the United States, and they're launched on all of those, you know, whether it's, you know, the, the Tubis of the world, or Samsung TV Plus, or Amazon has Freevee. 24:15 We're distributed across there. So for those channels, we create a ton of original streaming television content, so that was the show that the- one of the shows you were referencing that we just made shoppable. 24:26 That's called Kitchen Glow Up. Our host is, uh, Ellen Marie Bennett. Uh, she's of, uh, Hedley & Bennett fame. 24:33 If you've been to any restaurant in the United States, um, oftentimes the chefs or, or the staff are adorned with one of her amazing aprons. Has the little ampersand. 24:43 I'm sure you've, many of your listeners or you guys have seen it. Um, and so we're doing a kind of a kitchen remodel show for people who really cook. So it's like- Nice... 24:52 if you're passionate about cooking, um, you might have a space that's suboptimal for, you know, kind of what your current life situation is. 25:00 Ellen comes in, does a little remake, and, and, and, uh, uh, and you know, there's, uh, obviously a cool reveal. That's a brand-new show that just launched. We're very excited about it. Ellen's an amazing talent. 25:10 Um, and, uh, that does have a shoppable component to it. So we partnered with a company called Shopsense. Um, they, uh, they, uh, have, you know, kind of, uh, enabled kind of that easier flow in transaction. 25:25 Some of these things have existed, so you might be watching. You'll, you'll be, you know, see a QR code or URL, takes you to kind of a mobile-friendly site. 25:34 Um, and they've just made it really, you know, kind of one click, um, you know, one click easy to buy these things on kind of wherever, whatever retailer you wanna buy them on. 25:44 So it could be Amazon, could be Walmart, whomever, Etsy. Um, and so, you know, I think some of those components had existed, right? The QR codes aren't brand-new. Mobile websites aren't brand-new. 25:55 Shopping, trying to connect it with TV is not new, but, um, they've, uh, they've made it, uh, a really kinda clean process, which I think is what we're excited about. 26:04 And then they have some, uh, AI technology on the back end kind of helping do recommendations so that once you get into a show, it's a bit of a richer commerce experience. So it's so far, so good. 26:15 We're pretty, pretty excited about that integration. We think it's just logical, right? 26:19 We know that this stuff is gonna be coming to TV, that it is a little bit clunky, but we know that most of us sit and watch TV and have our mobile phones in our hand. 26:27 So it's not that big of a stretch to think someone's gonna scan and then be able to purchase right there on their phone. Speaking of Amazon, I just, I just, I have to ask, 26:35 what is your favorite purchase that you've committed to Amazon to date? I mean, I, I still buy a ton of books from Amazon. Do you really? Yeah. Shout out. But Audible or, or you- I use Audible. 26:46 Are you a- I actually- Do we go hard, hard... Do we do hard copy? I do. They tend to, like, I, they, they, like, I buy them. Then they get stacked up. Yeah. And then they don't really get read until I go on vacation, so. 26:57 But they look pretty on the shelf. [laughs] That's right. I look smart. I impress my friends with my, you know, uh, s- astute choices. But, um, no, yeah, that's, I think books is probably... 27:07 I mean, I, ev- at this point you can buy... I mean, it's amazing, right? So- But you like to, you, you prefer vi- the visual, uh, the visual grasp of it versus au- audio? I do. Yeah. Actually, I'm never... I don't... 27:20 I, I mean, I've listened to an audiobook, but, uh, that's not my preference. No, that, that's really good to hear. Yeah. But- I fall asleep. 27:25 I have, I have the issue, I get tired, and so I just was cur- uh, I do it when you're running I listen to a lot of podcasts, particularly those about the future. Those are important to me. There it is. Oh, yeah. 27:32 [laughs] There it is. 27:34 Um, you were just talking a lot about, you know, your shows and your streaming, and, um, we obviously know Tastemade to be really big in the social media world, and it almost seems like you have two sides of your business, right? 27:49 You have the social media, and then you have this more linear route that you're sort of, I guess, diving into. How do those work hand-in-hand? How important is one versus the other? 28:03 Yeah, I think, uh, for us, we, uh, if we go back in time, right, when we, when we kind of were starting the company, um, we, we really were th- at the time thinking about things like the Food Network or HDTV or Travel Channel. 28:16 Like, these were all the Scripps networks. Um, we had great admiration for those. We had grown up on those. They t- covered the topics they, we, we wanted. They were great businesses. 28:26 Um, you know, ultimately those Scripps networks got sold to Discovery for about $15 billion. Um, they were great with advertise- There were so many things about them that we loved. 28:34 We wanted to just try to do the modern version of those. We thought they were great, but it was for, you know, in our mind, a different era, the cable era. 28:42 Um, but if we were gonna tackle that problem and you wanted to do video on the internet, the place to start in 2012 was on YouTube. Um, and that's where we got our start. 28:52 We were kind of one of the last funded channels, if you remember that era of YouTube. [laughs] We were, uh, that. We sort of- Multi-channel networks That's, we were that, too. 29:00 We aggregated a lot of YouT- you know, uh, food-related YouTubers in the beginning and built an audience, and it was really that kind of audience coupled with our channel that was sort of the birth of what w- we brought to the market. 29:12 Um, but, um, so it's so much part of our origin, and then we followed the users, right? Again, sort of the core premise was younger consumers would want different types of content. Well, guess what? They did. 29:23 Um, and they just wanted it on TikTok and Pinterest and Reddit and, you know, Facebook and Instagram, and so Tastemade became prolific, prolific still to this day of reaching those consumers. 29:35 Um, but again, ultimately we wanted to be on the TV, and we had done other things, like, um, in, like, 2015, there was only six apps on Apple TV. Like, the platform Apple TV only had six apps. Yeah. 29:51 And Tastemade was one of them, right? Uh- Oh, oh, I know. Oh, yeah, you were watching? Oh, I consumed. Are you kidding? Okay, thank you. Thank you. So we, there we put a lot of... 29:58 We didn't have a lot of TV content at the time. We were putting mid-form stuff, you know, 15-minute-long content, kind of what YouTube is today, by the way. Mm-hmm. 30:05 Um, and so, uh, uh, you know, it was kind of always our aspiration to get to the big screen. Um, it was just about how do you get there? 30:14 And so we followed those consumers, and certainly the, the consumers are now there and fast. 30:19 I, I, you know, I, I, I know the kind of V1 or at least the V1 perception is it's kind of older people or maybe it's people who cut the cord. 30:27 Um, there's data that's come in, you know, today that, you know, a meaningful percentage of people watching the free ad-supported side are people who have cable, so it's just augmenting what they have. 30:37 Um, and then we know the age of people who are watching our network is that core demogra- you know, kind of the original demographic kind of conceit was, you know, millennials are 18 to 34. 30:48 When we started, obviously millennials have gotten a little, um, a little bit older, and then we've, as, you know, we're on these social platforms, so we've picked up younger people. 30:56 But that core audience of, you know, kind of mid-30s is the streaming television audience that Tastemade is connecting with, which is different than other channels on Fast. They tend to be older. 31:08 And is absolutely different than, you know, people watching cable television, which, you know, in the Scripps Networks world, those people are, like, in their mid-60s, just to put it in perspective. 31:17 And historically, advertisers have been interested in reaching younger consumers. 31:23 Again, that was at least sort of our core business idea was, "Hey, advertiser, we know you love working with these brands and being in lifestyle content and, you know, being skewing more female. 31:33 We're just gonna bring you that next generation or younger generation of doing it." And so, um, our journey to do that was to first get them where they were. They were on social, we had to be there. 31:44 Um, and then as things have evolved, getting them now on the television. And so when a, when a partner comes, you know, either on the con- creator or on the advertiser side, our proposition is pretty strong, right? 31:56 We can, um, talk to them about how we're gonna help them reach consumers on social in short form. We're world-class at creating that kind of content. 32:05 We've, uh, as I just mentioned, we've created a ton of that with brands. We really know how to do it. But then we can also extend that into streaming, which is super premium. 32:14 Um, you know, the session times are quite long, right? People are hanging out 30 minutes to an hour, which is very different than 30 seconds or a minute, um, or even less on, on, you know, 10 seconds on social. 32:25 So I think of it as we're helping, you know, brands and creators reach this younger group of consumers on social and on streaming. Um, we're at- we truly are what we set out to be, a modern version of the network. 32:40 I just had one question back on you being, um, an entrepreneur. Um, how do you get better as a leader, uh, on daily, weekly, monthly, yearly basis? Yeah, I think, um, it's hard. 32:56 I, the part of, part of, you know, I think leadership is just having obviously some vision. I don't think peop- you know, it's hard to lead if you don't, if people aren't excited about where they're going. 33:06 Um, and for me, the way I approach that, it is kind of, um, uh, a kind of internal, meaning I just, I'm super curious, and that's one of the kind of core, um, core values of Tastemade is to be constantly curious. 33:22 Um, you know, particularly in this landscape, uh, media is changing. It's changing very quickly. 33:27 I mean, you guys are talking about things each week that are having dramatic, or each day, right, having dramatic impact on what the future of this is all gonna look like. 33:35 Um, number one, you have to kind of know what's going on. And, and so I'm insanely curious. I read a ton. I, I do listen to a lot of, uh, podcasts. 33:45 I'm just trying to understand what's going on because it will affect, A, how we set the t- you know, where are we headed, um, and how you set that vision, um, and then, um, will impact, you know, kind of the, the sort of how you lead, um, um, kind of along with that. 34:01 Um, I think the other thing is, um, 34:05 you know, I think the, the place where, particularly at Tastemade, one of the, you know, we were talking earlier about, um, kind of maybe things we changed during the pandemic to be good remote work. 34:16 We built a kind of a mentorship program where, um, anyone in the company could raise their hand to either be a mentee or a mentor, and then we did some matching. 34:25 And I, I found those to be, those interactions that, uh, through that program to be some of the most valuable and, um, it's very one-to-one, right? 34:34 So leadership oftentimes doesn't get that benefit but, um, you know, getting to know people, really listening to them. 34:41 You know, one of the questions that if you ever came to an interview at Tastemade, we would ask you, like, "Who do you wanna be when you grow up?" 34:47 You know, to us, trying to understand what's, what's it all about for you, what's motivating you, where are you trying to get to, whether it's in Tastemade or not. 34:55 Um, to me, trying to understand that is key because it's, it's hard to lead people if you don't know what they're really, where they're trying to get to. And then also just you can't do the map, right? 35:06 You wanna map, you know, who does this person wanna be? What is the task at hand? Do those things sync up? 35:12 If not, then let's all have a real conversation about how maybe you should do something different with us or something different somewhere else. 35:20 Um, but I think getting that alignment is, is, is critical in terms of, you know, marshaling the everyone to get behind what you're trying to achieve. Thank you. Thank you for that. 35:31 As we come to a close, Larry, if I may just say on, on, on both of our behalves, it's been a privilege talking about both the past and the present. 35:41 What we, we, we like to leave our guests with now, and starting with you, is, Larry Fitzgibbons, what does the future look like for you? Well, at Tastemade, we're very excited. 35:52 Um, I, I, I'll, like, I tie myself to the, Larry Fitzgibbon to the, to the future, uh, of Tastemade. Uh, very excited. Um, you know, I'll do some more, uh, kind of some plugging. 36:01 This weekend we're going-- We have two things we're doing as a company in its near future, not the far-out future. Yeah, we'll take it. 36:08 The, the near future is, uh, one of the shows we created with a brand as a brand studio, Constellation Brands, called Street Psalm- Um, has been nominated for, uh, both an Emmy and a James Beard Award, and we're gonna, we're gonna find out what happens. 36:21 The Flop happens this weekend, so, uh, we'll- some of us will be in Chicago attending the James Beard Awards. Um, some of us will be here in LA, um, for, for- Will you be at Eats Con? Uh, I won't be at Eats Con. Okay. 36:34 Bummer. Um, um, but, uh, we're friends with the, those guys, and congrats to them. Love Andrew, yeah. Yeah. It's great. The, um, um, but that's what my immediate future is. 36:42 Long-term, we're super excited about what we're doing in streaming. Um, you know, we obviously believe that, uh, social's gonna continue to be what it is and we'll be relevant there. 36:52 On the streaming side, there's still $60 billion in television advertising done the traditional way, tied to cable television. 37:01 Um, these are still very large businesses, you know, like, uh, you know, the Food Network, you know, is, around its peak did a little over a billion dollars in revenue. HDTV did a- about the same. 37:11 These are massive businesses that are transitioning. Um, we think we're- worked really hard over [laughs] the last decade to get to the beginning of our idea. 37:21 Um, and so we're pretty excited about where we sit because the next 20 years are, in my mind, pretty clear. We're going to see, you know, maybe, you know, I think when we started, we thought it would be more immediate. 37:32 Now I'm comfortable saying it, this stuff does take time, clearly. And so I think, you know, over the next 20 years, people will continue to cut the cord. You know? There'll be less people on cable. 37:42 There will be more people who buy new smart televisions. 37:45 Uh, there'll be more consumers who start to understand that there's this new world of content that's free to them, that's ad-supported, that's high quality, it's award-winning, it's for them. 37:55 It's not just, you know, um, catalog-type stuff. And we couldn't be better positioned from that perspective. 38:01 We've, you know, are the most distributed of any kind of lifestyle channel in that new ecosystem, and that e- new ecosystem's gonna grow over the next decade, and, uh, we hope to grow along with it. Love it. All right. 38:14 Thank you, Larry, for, for coming today. A lot of gems in the, in the mix. You're our first guest. I love that. I love being first. That's one of our Elsa thing. We like to be first. 38:24 Always kind of embraced, uh, whatever was happening new. Sometimes that is fraught with disaster. [laughs] Sometimes, sometimes it works out well. 38:33 We've navigated pretty well, so I'm hoping this time, being first, it's a home run. Someone has to pave the way- That's right... and we're grateful, we're grateful for it. I took the risk. I'm an entrepreneur. 38:41 I'm prone to risk. There you go. So there you go. Doing it with you guys. I love it. Well, um, maybe we'll end the, the show today with a call that we should all grab some food sometime. Grab a bite. 38:53 I'm actually hungry, that's why I thought of that. But, uh- [laughs] Thanks for listening to the bonus episode of, of Future Forecast. 39:00 Uh, find us, uh, wherever you get podcasts, subscribe to our newsletter, and go look for Larry Fitzgibbon on social media. Check out Tastemade, basically everywhere. We're everywhere. And, uh, we'll catch you next week. 39:13 Thank you. [upbeat music] The Future Forecast is produced by Wheelhouse DNA for Acast. Our executive producers are me, Gboye Kolade, along with Fannie Baudry, Cassie Berman, and Leah Sutherland. 39:27 Our audio producer is Chiara Noni. Our audio engineer is Matthew Blocka. Our editor is Nick Kurssem. The podcast is hosted by yours truly, Gboye Kolade, and Chris Sawtelle. Thanks for listening, and see you next time. 39:40 [upbeat music] Business is booming. Is your fulfillment ready for peak season? Switch to ShipStation now and handle more volume with confidence when it counts. 39:52 ShipStation connects Shopify, Amazon, TikTok Shop, and over 200 more integrations with one platform that does it all. You can manage orders, sync inventory, track returns, all automatically. 40:02 Everything your operation needs, all in one place. Right now, qualified shippers get a real, dedicated person to get you set up and switched over for free, so when peak season hits, you're ready to go. 40:12 Switch today at shipstation.com, code AUDIO. This show is brought to you by The Future Party and Crosstalk Studios. Produced by Chris Sawtelle, Gboye Kolade, and Paul York. 40:25 Special shout-out to our production team, Arutseli Rubalkava, Max Goolen, Shannon Kline, and Eli Tafur.
