Alexandra Blumenfeld - Red Rover Founder

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Thank you to Rob this particular episode is not necessarily sponsored by them but it's actually kind of brought to you by myself Elliot Turner. Josh Terrace off and trach up in this episode features. A young woman named Alex, Blumenfeld and she is somebody who I think is a very unique individual. She is 20 years old.

She's at Vanderbilt University. She has founded a Research service, that sends surveys to college students, you know, gen Z. I believe that she says in this episode that it covers 150 colleges now. And if you are interested in how people are interacting with an app or I was interested in whether or not her peers were open to the idea of nicotine pouches versus being completely closed off to Nick. Teen and or how they perceived nicotine patches relative to cigarettes, right?

So we send out the survey and I got the results back. What I can tell you is when I talked to Trey about Alex he said there's a strong chance. We're all going to be working for one day and I've never recommended her to anybody who hasn't enjoyed talking to her eye separately talk to Elliot and Josh about her. Both of them have used the Service, both of them speak. Very highly of her and I hope that you listen to this episode and it resonates.

And I hope that you understand potentially why reaching out to her and using her service makes sense. I don't want to quote the price that I paid for my survey because I don't know what her actual list price are. And whether or not I paid it. So I'm just going to say I'm super happy with what I did with her. I'm super happy with the results. And I was happy with the amount that it cost, I thought it was very reasonable, rather than rambling.

I'm going to let y'all listen. I would just again, really encourage you to reach out to her Red. Rover is the name of her company. I'm going to drop her contact information in the show notes, and I hope you all enjoy the episode. So Alex, how you doing today? I am doing very well.

How are you Bill? I am excited. I am on my second podcast recording of the day. And yeah, well I've decided to wet my palate with a little bit of wine. I look forward to speaking to you, wonderful. Same here. So people are going to say, who is Alex Blumenfeld? And I'm going to say to them someone that comes highly recommended by Elliot Turner, Josh Terrace off and Trey

coppin. And if you know those three people then I think that that should be Enough and if you don't know those people, we will provide quality entertainment and people can figure out why down the road. So Alex, you want to tell people a little bit about yourself.

So I am a junior Vanderbilt currently studying H OD which is human and organizational development, and I'm also the founder of a survey company called Red Rover and this all sort of started because I was interning NG at a concentrated long only fund this past summer called Greenbrier partners. And I was conducting some qualitative anecdotal research

for for them. And part of what I was doing that seemed most valuable to them was conducting some surveys on the side where I was just asking my friends what they thought of certain products and services that gen Z which is my generation. Use a lot and my boss and Folio manager, try and Shad were really shocked at a how quickly the results were coming back from these little holes that I was running and be the kids were really excited to answer them and they weren't even getting paid.

So that was sort of how this started one day - Alex getting content and not paying for content is a good business and charging a lot for a survey not that you do. I'm just saying that would be a good business. It would be if I could find more people that didn't want to be paid. But unfortunately, once you get out past your close friends, they do want a few cents that stinks. Have you considered paying in

Busch Light? You know, we talked about Busch Light and pizza as an alternative to venimos, but it turns out that Mo's are a little bit more motivating. But yeah, who knows, maybe we'll do a combo in the future. Yeah, I think As long as you're focused on the college crowd Busch Light and pizza, should always be in your back pocket. Their common place here on campus has indeed. Well, I lived some of that commonplace.

Almost two decades ago which is said to say out loud, but it's also true for people that may not know I have used Alex, well, not Alex, but Red Rover. And we did a survey on Tobacco. So your Or well, nicotine pouches specifically is what our survey was on. But do you have a specialty? I would say that the value that we bring, is this expertise that gen Z has in the tech and the consumer space because gen Z is the first generation that are truly considered Tech natives.

So we actually are the first generation to grown up with technology. These are the kids that grew up using iPhones and iPads when they were toddlers when they were in Middle School. And because of that, they have a very unique perspective on a lot of the tech companies that are publicly traded today and part of that expertise means that they're very picky. So if you can get this demographic right, then you can get a lot of other demographics,

right? But it also just means that these are the primary users for a lot of these companies and their opinions are really valuable for that reason. But on the consumer side, this generation is soon. In to be the largest generation of consumers right now they make up 40% of the consumption in the US and they're only growing.

So as they get older and you know, get jobs and become more successful and have, you know, means to spend money, they will continue to grow but that's why people are really interested in what they have to say when it comes to Consumer Brands and also tech companies. Yeah, that makes sense. Do you mind talking a little bit about the context? In which like how Red Rover started and what Trey was

looking to accomplish. Because I know he looks at the world through sort of a win-win-win lens and I'm just kind of curious to hear you talk a little bit about your experience at Greenbrier and also how your service added value to them and spawned into, you know, wherever it's going to go in the future totally well. So we really just started out doing it. A few small surveys with a few

girls. In my sorority actually, we had a group shot with about 50 kids in my sorority and I said, I want to know if these kids know what an app called Xin, it's not the nicotine patch, ironically, but it was an app that was similar to Tick Tock but they paid you and I said I've never heard of it but I'll run a survey just with my friends and see if anybody else has has heard of it and the results came

back. Unsurprisingly that No one had heard of or use the app but trade was curious about it because it was I think it was close to number one, most downloaded on the App Store that week and he thought, oh, like maybe this is the next big Tick Tock and sure. Enough within about two weeks, it was off of the, the apps were chopped up charts list and never to be seen again. But I think that is when he first recognized the value in asking the consumers of these products.

If they use them and why they don't. But I was able to write a report as sort of a member of this Target demographic saying why it probably wouldn't work and why I thought people didn't use it, and he found that Insight really valuable. So, that is sort of how the idea for this first got started. He started to refer to me, as sort of the, the Spy into the newest generation of consumers, and this spying sort of evolved into collecting responses from a

broader group of friends. He walked by my desk one day and said, jokingly you could make a business out of this and the light kind of went off. In the back of my mind. I've always been pretty entrepreneurial. I started a little art camp in lower school. And then, I head up, marshmallow business, and middle school. And I had some Drop Shipping business with your marshmallow business. Do I need Gourmet marshmallows? I was allergic. It's still am to everything.

And so the idea was that marshmallows really only contain gelatin and sugar, so Could consume them as could anyone else with lots of allergies? How is that different than than jello? Well, the texture is different and yeah, so you figured out a fluffy Jello is that I don't understand because I'm not allergic to anything. I just put everything in my body and then my body gets bloated and maybe that's the problem. Maybe that's the problem.

You I'd be gelatin and sugar. Maybe you'll okay a little less blooded. Yeah, clearly it together with cornstarch. Yeah, it's it. It's a whole process. Huh? That's interesting. How much did you sell these marshmallows for? Oh gosh, I think they were seven dollars for a little pack of three of them that were wrapped up in these little plastic sleeves, but I missed the date for the the farmers market, which I needed to submit my form to go to it. And I thought I'd submitted it

and I hadn't. And so we ended up just running a stand in my front yard ran the business online for a few months, but I was devastated. When after the business, sort of wind it down, my dad didn't really I love the sound of the mixers going in the kitchen. All the time.

I can understand allowed. Yeah. So, after the business part of winding down, I was devastated to go to Whole Foods and see something called smash mellow, which is literally my idea that it, that it worked so well, that's a good lesson in entrepreneurship. Yes, it it motivates you to go and find something else that you think might work and put in the effort to make it happen. Yeah. Okay so what was after the marshmallows, would you So post marshmallows was some eCommerce.

Dropshipping experimentation. I created this LLC called trendies company, which is essentially just an umbrella company for all these different Ventures that was running. And I created a bunch of Google and Facebook ads for about 60, different products and try to use targeted advertising to, to find the right customer for these products. But it's a little bit harder than you would think, what were what were some of the products. One site was at home fitness.

So this was during the pandemic. It was actually while I was interning at Greenbrier, I was still doing a little bit of this, but I figured that there were lots of people at home that needed at home, workout supplies. So, I was selling a little bit of that and I was selling some, you know what their gun is? No, it should essentially, you should actually if, if you're ever sore having muscle issues, they it's a handheld device that sort of Pummels you until you.

Yeah away. Yeah, I think it was either fed speaker alcoholic. I think fed speak on the Twitter machine was talking about this thing said it, like, changed his life. Yeah. They're people love them. They really are supposed to help, but I was selling a Chinese version of that to American consumers. And they weren't loving it, because it was pretty close to the same price as at their gum. But it wasn't a real there again. So you live and you learn. Yeah. Matters. It does, it does?

Did it work? What you were selling or were you just talking junk? No it worked. It just wasn't it didn't have the same brand name so it didn't have the same appeal. I don't think I understand that. It's like trying to sell Athleta verse Lululemon. It's just a little different. It is it certainly is okay, so you've always had this entrepreneurial bent. You go to Greenbrier trays asking for surveys and the light

bulb goes off. So not only did the way he tells the story is you came back within, like, two days with a business plan and The him. What do you think of this? And he gave full encouragement for you to pursue the plan. Is that a, is that an accurate representation? It was, it's pretty close to that after he left my desk that day I reached out to 10, friends from high school and I said, hey, would you guys be interested in answering surveys?

If you got paid for them, and they all said, yeah, I mean, as long as it's easy and it's in a third-party app, it's already on my phone. And I was like, okay.

And so since all 10 of them said, yes, I decided that I was going to make this promotional video, so I went on up work and I hired this guy from I believe Pakistan to make this promotional video but I drew out all the different scenes and described them to him and thought that I've been really clear but he made a video about a pole is happens to all Be a pole on a boat and the video ended up being about boats. So we had to scrape, the Slate clean and start over with a

different. It's funny. It's pretty funny. Did you have to pay that person or did you say kid? Oh, that's very nice of you. Well, you know, it was services that he technically did provide a creation of a video. Just wasn't the video. One would argue, there was an immediate Meeting of the minds, they're there for no contract but but eventually we did get the video made. Nice showed it to try and said,

you know, what do you think? And he said this is pretty exciting so I sent the video to those 10 friends who had initially said, yes, I'm down for this and said, hey can you just send this to a few friends from your college that you go

to, and within a week? I had 200 people in the group chat within two weeks. I had 300 people in the group chat. Then three weeks at 500 people in the group chat from 70 different schools and universities around the country. And at that point, I thought to myself, okay? This this could really be something because it really did. It just went viral, where is your group chat, like this court in or actually? Oh, so, what are you using are using slack or Discord or what?

Is it just like on your iPhone? You have 700 people way they, that's a lot of things to keep up with, okay? Yes, it definitely is, but they're all within one group. And we've figured out, I have a, this really awesome coder from Stanford who I've been working with, to sort of create this software that allows us to use that third-party app in a way that is unique, and sort of custom to what we need it for.

So we can collect the data from there and it's been Out our PDFs and demographic information in a way that is useful to us. So the third party app. What is what is that? Is that the Red Rover app. So that's group me, okay? And we've created software, that works with group, me to sort of control, our little heard of Voters, monitor them, and send them, these surveys and then collect the results of these surveys and print out. PDFs reporting back. All of the results that come out of them.

So when I asked you to do a survey, I was interested in whether or not you are generation, was open to nicotine pouches because I am interested in whether or not Altria can pivot and how Swedish match is going to compete. And what not, I'm looking at a 399 page, PDF and I've got data

on home state. I've Data on political leaning. I've got data on gender age. I mean, it's very impressive. How detailed all this is? Thank you. Well. So, what we do is when people join the group chat, we have a process by which we message them and collect all of this information from a survey and then the information from that survey goes into a Google sheet, which this code that Aiden are coder has built. Pulls from when it's analyzing the data within group me.

So we use group means API to see what the answers were. And then this code goes back into this public, Google sheet. Well, public to the code, but not public to everyone and finds the demographic information for each respondent and sort of compiles. It and aligns it with the the way that people have answered the poll. So you get, you know, the answers to the pole. And then after that, Who everyone was that answer that poll, and who everyone was? That answered a specific answer

within that pole. Yeah, and do you as a sampling. So you go to Vanderbilt. You said, 70 different schools are represented. As is that as of now or is that as of when you were building it? Sorry, that was when we were first building at. Yeah, it's it's a little bit bigger now. It's about 150 schools. Wow, which is very exciting. Yes, that is exactly states are represented. Now, just great. Eat how it what I'm getting at is how do you or and if you

don't now that's fine. As long as people understand what's going on. Are you trying to get past some sampling bias like it's something when I, when I snapshotted some of the results to the survey that we had a response to me on Twitter, was I suspect these people probably skew High income. Um, and I forget what states he had mentioned. I'll note it looks like thirteen percent are from Dallas or whatever, on, at least one question. That's actually the demographic

breakdown, it appears. So, there's some Geographic certain concentration in a way, I guess, right? Yes. Well, so, that the concentration, Texas is a natural outpouring of just meeting from Texas and a lot of the first people that joined where Texans, but This. Yes, you're right it initially

spread through college campuses. So this is an educated group of kids were biased towards college educated or at least High School educated kids and we are on a major kick to diversify our polling base Beyond campuses and universities right now and also into the states where we need a little bit more concentration.

So, California is one of those and I believe organ is another one but the goal here is really to Provide a representative sample, but the question comes back to the representative of is relative to the question that you're asking. So today we have bias from the perspective of someone wondering about gen Z as a whole since these are predominantly college kids, which as you said, has implications about income and

education. But I wonder how many of our clients are just interested in the population. We do represent which is these individuals with higher purchasing power, these more influential kids right now the answer A bunch probably. But, you know, right now we answer that question, better. And over time we will develop the ability to answer more general questions because that really is the goal. Yeah, or do your point leaning

into what you have, right? I mean that's it's I mean, having some sort of insight into the next generation of I hate to say it this way, but it's somewhat true higher educated, likely higher income earning individuals is, I got to think a pretty interesting demographic to have insight into certainly. And so that, that is the value that we bring right now. But for people who, you know, do want that broader gen Z Demo,

that's where our expansion plans come into play for sure. Yeah, so let me ask it a different way. Just sort of like as a tactic. I think it would be a tactic not a strategy. Maybe it's strategy. I don't know. Whatever. Do you think, like, how do you think about leaning into what you have versus sort of building something for everybody because I can make an argument that really leaning into this Niche is pretty smart idea. I mean, it really comes back to

what our clients want. Want the company is built around, trying to provide value to the hedge fund community and eventually hopefully to it and even broader Community but right now just to fund. So if this is something that our clients are interested in more interested in than the broader demographic than we would certainly lean into that through

the, the Outreach programs that we have started with colleges, it's definitely easier to reach out through colleges and high schools than it is to try and go to your local, you know, convenience store and find someone who is Not enrolled in college and interested in joining the chat, but it would stem from the, the desires of the consumers. Yeah, that makes sense. What are some examples of some surveys that you've run? Oh, gosh.

You don't have to use like who you ran it for, but I know you've done one on wine consumption. Yeah, I know you've done one on nicotine pouch consumption, I know you've done one on Xin, not the nicotine pouch. But you know, like if people are listening to this and they're thinking boy, that's a that could be an interesting thing to add to my process. What do you think to date your core competencies are and kind of where of you had experience

running. Surveys totally well some of our most popular categories are streaming services payment processors, just generally, speaking food, delivery apps. Zoom versus teams questions and social media. Those are probably the largest categories of interest and recently, actually alcohol, which you mentioned, but what about booze, what do people want? I just on wine. Actually, about alcohol.

In general, we went, I think it was last week, we ran one and it was really interesting that about 50% of the kids prefer, hard liquor, over any, they say mixed drinks or like their most popular drink it, which is really interesting. I thought it was going to be Seltzer but only about 25% of them favored, Seltzer and 18% for beer. Beers in a tough spot. Have you done any for weed?

We haven't actually, that's how I'm going to run 100% 100%. Yeah, I'd be really interested. I wish it. I, we might have to have a yearly, we'd won, because I have a theory on the adoption curve of marijuana and I think it's just going to go higher and higher and higher. The, the hard liquor, I I think is interesting because we live in this world where I think a lot of people like to say, oh well, health and wellness, is this trend.

I actually think there's a trend that's unspoken among a lot of people that health and wellness has this weird. it's almost like, Like the opposite of health and health and wellness where like people are leaning into harder and harder stuff. Interesting. Yeah. But because they're not going to get fat necessarily.

They're going to go to hard liquor as opposed to boot like beer because you can drink a shitload of hard liquor and still look okay on Instagram. Yeah, you know, it's interesting you say that because we asked them, you know, what are your priorities when you're picking an alcohol and one of the options was Drinks that? Get you drunkard faster. That was like, one of their priorities for kids that were choosing Liquor. Yeah, I don't know.

I talked to some people in California and, you know, they were talking about California sober and then I dug a little deeper about what California sober means and I realized it's not necessarily healthier. Yeah, but it's not. Yeah, that's that's interesting. Okay, so we can get off Isis. What about streaming services? What did you find out about streaming services? The most popular TV streaming

services. Um, we're pretty, even in terms of just, if whether or not people had a subscription, but then when it came down to loyalty, they differed. So the most popular ones were Amazon, Prime video Disney plus HBO, Max, Hulu and Netflix. Those were all tied, basically for how many people use them and then Apple TV and ESPN have about half of the users that those places do and YouTube TV and Paramount plus were about a quarter Hmm. Yeah, Paramount plus MTV. I have a sick.

Loved for MTV only because of the challenge. Shout out to Johnny Bananas and the rest of the oh jeez. So who where was the most loyalty? Was it Netflix, it is Netflix? Yes, yeah, I mean by far when we asked people, okay, if you were going to give something up, if you had to choose, we through Spotify in there too. But Spotify Netflix, Hulu, Disney plus sixty percent of them said they would give up Disney plus 20% of them.

So they give up Hulu and then the other 20% was split between Spotify and Netflix. Really You're gonna Crush. Some Disney bowls here with that comment. Yeah. The the guy who ran the survey was pretty shocked by it, too. Actually. Why do you think that is? I mean, just like opining.

I know you don't know, but just curious when I talk to people about that stat, my reasoning behind, it would be that there's much more content on Netflix and Hulu, then there is on Disney plus, when it comes to like categories, Disney plus, really is Movies that are new that disease created or like old series, that you just want to sit back and feel nostalgic

about. So it's a special mood that you sort of need to be in to use that platform compared to Netflix and Hulu. And of course, Spotify is a different animal and itself. What do you when you sit down to watch Netflix, is that a confusing experience to you? Or do you find that to be like, native to what you expect? It is totally native everything about it feels intuitive. And I think if you asked any other person in this generation, they would say the same thing that makes me feel old and

things. That answer, what do you feel like when you look at, let's call it Direct TV or some sort of cave Legacy cable asset. When you see a channel guide, what do you think? Does that feel native to? You also, it does. But I think the difference there is that, I grew up with different kinds of cable and they were structured like slightly differently. So accessing your favorite channels in cable is different

for people. Depending on, you know what their household was subscribed to when they were younger, where is Netflix is universally, it looks the same everywhere and everyone knows how to use it because it looks the same. So, you find Discovery to be like on Netflix, that is what

you expect Discovery to be like. I would say, yeah, the ability to search through different categories that it's displaying for you and then in addition to that the ability to just search for an individual show that you you know, already know the name of and are just specifically searching for is easier than scrolling through this long list of just what's currently playing on like a. Do you find shows? Because you said like to search for a specific show, right?

So part of what my Boomer complain about Netflix. Is is I don't know when I go there. What I'm looking for, right? So sometimes I get lost in the process of search. So like what's your search process look like? Well, so you're saying when you go in and you don't know what you want to watch, you have a hard time finding. Yeah, I find myself scrolling forever and then I'm like, a screw it. I'll go do something else. I think the recommended for you section is usually where I go first.

Yeah, so that customized content that usually hooks me. And if it doesn't, then I'll go to whatever mood I'm in. So comedy or Bromance or horror? I'm not a big whore girl but if I was Yeah, I would, I would go there and just start scrolling through, but I don't watch Netflix alone. I think that is. It's about 50/50 kids this age group watched alone and like only use it for watching TV with friends but I only use it. So when you say alone you mean

like by yourself. Yeah I don't have time for it honestly. So I the only one to run a business and you're invincible. So you keep you've got other things going on and you have to party. Yeah, I think that this probably the reason why it just busyness, but since I'm only watching it with friends, it'll it's sort of a voting Endeavor. So we all sort of say that one versus that one within this category.

That's super interesting. I hope that we can continue to talk in the future because I'd like to know how that evolves as you get older. I I'll keep you updated. Yeah, please do. What are you thoughts on? Did you find anything interesting on Spotify? Media is super fascinating to me because there's so much change right now, right? So it's like, how do people interact with it and brand loyalty and all that?

I mean, what we've seen with Spotify so far we've Quite a few polls on it, is that it is by far the most popular music streaming service, and it is really not losing ground to anyone else. It is so popular and the kids are so loyal to it. There was one survey that we ran. The basically said, if we reduce the price of Apple music by 50%. Would you switch and the vast majority of our voters said, no Spotify. Ball is going crazy right now. They love you.

Hi, Sure, Alex, there you go, Red Rover. That's awesome. That's wild, I am. Yeah, I feel, I don't know. I used to, I used to not like Spotify that much. Some of this may be because I hold the stock now, but I honestly believe the experience is much better now. They I truly think from a user perspective. I don't know if Apple just like messed up their podcast, and that's what pissed me off or whatever. Spotify is like, got me.

Yeah, they have a really great way of I think recommending relevant content and for my generation especially we are we expect that of tech platforms, we expect for them to know what we like and provide it to us and make the process easy for us. And Spotify, does that really well with podcasts and music and playlists? They recommend songs? We asked kids. Okay. What is so great about Spotify and the vast majority of them said that they recommend song? To add to their playlists,

switch. Apple still, it's beyond me that they don't do that. Hmm. Interesting. Do you know, do people get song recommendations? I mean, I know they do this such a dumb question, but I started asking it. So I'll ask it through the Spotify, like, through the playlist, the Friday, you know, whatever, and how like, okay, here's another may be a smarter way to ask it.

I'll edit out my stupid question or not. Anyway, do do people care who's popular currently? Do you think that the recommendations can create popularity? Does that make sense? This is an opinion. It's not a I don't think you could pull on this. That's a really interesting question. I think that The recommendations. I mean, you're assuming that like Spotify recommends, the same thing to every person and then they all listen to it, then it becomes popular.

Is that sort of yourself. So a while ago, Michael Madison wrote a book and he showed that or he at least cited a study that said that songs that were sort of like above-average were popular. I might mess this up. Read. Think twice if you think I did to the listeners but like popular songs are popular, no matter what, but an average song in a social setting can be perceived as like way above average.

And so I'm interested in the extent that you think that like Spotify can maybe create hits out of non hits if that makes any sense. Yeah I think it probably could because a lot of the music that I now listen to on a regular basis has come from those recommended playlists.

Yeah. And I mean that is partially because it knows what style of music I like but if it's a just a pop song, And it's recommending that pop song, that's sort of regular to every kid that likes pop, which is most of them, then it ends up on all of their, you know, liked pages and they just Shuffle their liked music everyday when they're listening to music, then it becomes something that they

all know and then they play it at parties and then it becomes popular. So yeah, I could see that happening. Did you do any really likes? Did anybody ask the percentage of people that just recycle playlist versus those that are looking to Spotify? Recommended playlist for new songs. We didn't ask it in that exact way but you should we might have

to just wait it out. Alright Spotify bowls, reach out to me. We're going to coordinate something with Alex and we're going to we're going to answer these questions or bears. I don't care. It doesn't have to be anybody. We just need to have some answers. Very cool. All right. What else? What else have you done? That's super interesting. I could go on and on about this, but I think we would beat a dead

horse. But what do you like about being on the inside of the hedge fund question asking? Like, what's the most fascinating thing about that? It's really interesting because I ended up in this position because I was interested in the stock market's. So it's a really cool thing to have all these very thoughtful, people who spend their entire day, you know, Doing these companies asking questions about them that are really getting to the core of whether or not that company is going to be

successful. So that's that's what's interesting for me about it. One thing that we did recently was asked about just podcasts in general and seeing if people listen to podcasts and watching as people's interest in and Usage of podcast, has increased most recently, we found that like 70% of kids, listen to podcasts whereas before I think it was like 50. So I mean it really is on the

rise. But getting to watch those trends that have a real impact on companies is really cool because these when guys ask questions like you do it Sparks an idea for us to continue to ask a similar question or that same question over time. And then we can build this timeline sort of You know, a trend and show what that the and how the answer to that question, has changed over the past year. That's something we've done with social media which I found super and just interesting, we found it.

It pretty consistently, the ranking order goes Instagram, Snapchat. Tick-Tock Twitter and then Facebook which literally no one uses and Tick-Tock actually had an increase in there. Sort of share of usership.

And so did Instagram over the past year, they went from fifteen percent of kids saying that it was their favorite to 21% and Instagram. Went from thirty six percent to 46 percent. Wow, yeah, pretty crazy. And they stole that from Snapchat and Twitter which went from thirty six percent to twenty six percent for Snapchat and ten percent to 4 percent for Twitter.

Huh, what do you think is What do you think Instagram is doing so well, that's very interesting to hear because we are like, literally on the back of a Wall Street Journal article, talking about how Instagram is terrible for teenagers and whatnot. So kind of interesting to hear you cite that data. Yeah, I mean Instagram is done a really good job of, I think, diversifying the type of content, they provide, they

copied Tick-Tock with reels. And we've seen the use of reels go up in the past few months among our voters. But they also have Done a really great job of integrating advertisements into their sort of scroll. And even though people might say that they don't like advertisements, a lot of my generation actually does like these advertisements and said that they would prefer to have ones that are customized to them and get ads for things that they

actually want. So it's almost like Instagram is helping them shop while they're on social media. It's like a win-win. That's interesting. Do you do you think that your generation also circling back to the Netflix idea, with expects recommendations? Do you think your generation on average is more comfortable with sort of the quid pro quo of, you're going to, you're going to know more about me, but in exchange, I expect better recommendations or better advertising.

And like, do you think that you all are more comfortable with, for lack of a better term, a lack of privacy. We are we've run surveys on it and this generation is much more comfortable with a lack of privacy than say, Millennials or even our parents generation. It's just a very different sort of acceptance and understanding that in order to get what we want out of the media platforms, we use which is these

personalized recommendations. We have to give up some privacy and we're kind of okay with that because we've been giving it up since we were really young and so we're used to it. That's interesting. I, it makes sense but it's also it's like a little bit surprising to me in a way. So if Instagram is growing like is Snapchat, falling off as Twitter falling off, like, what is going on with the usage? Is it, is it just that Instagram is growing exponentially or out

of her? You know what, you know what I'm asking? Like, are they taking share of they just growing shares kind of the question? So If you're assuming, the kids are spending the same amount of time on social media every day as they, you know, right now is they did a year ago, then it is stealing it from from Snapchat and Twitter, but we ran a poll three weeks before snaps earnings that were crazy back in July that said, that 97 percent

of our users use Snapchat. So it's not that they're not using it, it just might mean that they're using it a little bit less or that they're just using social media more in general. Which do you have a gut reaction on which that is? It seems to me probably using it more as the answer, but I'm not sure, I think it's just that they're using it more in general if they are using SnapChat. Last it's a very small amount less, they're still using it.

Most of our users on a daily basis just checking it checking in on people's stories and often times, they don't realize how much they use it. We've run a few surveys and are

continuing to do. on a regular basis now which I'm really excited about that are basically asked kids to submit screenshots of their app usage page and keeping track of which categories of apps and which apps are at the top of everyone's list and trying to sort of develop a thesis around why that might be and asking our voters about the app that they're using the most often and seeing why they use them.

And also keeping track of that question you just asked whether or not the social media use is just growing in general or if the increase in one app usage results in a decrease of another yeah yeah that'll be interesting to see over. Time. For sure. It's amazing to me that Instagram continues to grow given how ubiquitous it is at the same time. Feels like every time I'm like on a plane or whatever the person next to me is just like, scrolling through Instagram.

Yeah. Sometimes you can find Twitter addicts but they're very minority population. Yeah, the, I think it's interesting when you talk to adults, they assume that Twitter is much more popular among kids than it is because I think Twitter's demographic is much more Millennial and just adults, then, it is Gen Z and gen Z kids. Honestly find the platform a little bit confusing, compared to Instagram and Snapchat, and Tick-Tock. So they definitely use it a lot less. Twitter is confusing to my

generation as well. It's just if you can get past the confusion, it becomes addictive. At least to some of us. Yeah. You know, I was talking to I think it was maybe try or Josh about this idea that you are sharing. Thoughts on Twitter and on Instagram you're sharing images. Yeah. And so it is conducive to a more thought centered, you know, Community people who are trying to have discussions rather than show off their lives and photos

of their lives. So that's why probably you get the younger demo for Instagram, who's trying to show off. All the cool things they're doing in the pretty clothes they're wearing and, you know, more academic intellectual community. It is or political arguments on Twitter. Yeah, I actively try not to show my life on Twitter. Interesting. Yeah. And I locked my Instagram account because I don't want people that I interact with on Twitter to see my personal life, really?

Yeah. Why Because I don't mind sharing things that I don't mind sharing on Twitter. If that makes any sense, like I don't mind sharing thoughts, I have a personal boundary at sharing how I live and what my kids are like and the stuff that I want to keep private. Interesting. I think the answer is when I go to Twitter, I'm trying, honestly, to figure out if I'm thinking correctly and I'm trying to have, if not a debate, a social conversation around the way that, like, my brain works.

And how I see the world and Instagram feels more like bragi to me. And I really don't like that. Yeah, there was a trend for a little while on social media towards like make Instagram casual again and it's sort of its evolving into that a little bit more. I think as people begin to use it more it started off as just a method for people to show off their best self. And I think Tick-Tock has sort of helped other platforms evolved into a place where maybe you're not showing your best

self. You're showing a little bit more of yourself than just your best self. Tick-Tock is generally regarded as A more honest, social media platform and where people are sort of sharing a little bit more about their private lives and like, how it really is, instead of just trying to make it look Rosie, whereas Instagram

is much more of a cultivated but they crafted image. Do you feel like you have to cultivate your Instagram image? Absolutely, that's insane to me. I think you'll find if you talk to a lot of people in this generation that It's a lot of how we find friends and determine. If people are worthy of being, our friend is looking them up on Instagram and making sure that they're like normal by way of what they have published on social media.

Yeah. But then if that is truly the case and everybody is trying to create a filtered image of what they are then like the definition of normal becomes, what's filtered? You know what I mean it?

Yes exactly, exactly. yeah, it's all become filtered but then it becomes a measurement of how well people are able to filter and how well they're able to create this image of themselves and a lot of time people in our generation can see through when someone has Is presenting themselves differently than they are? Yeah, you can smell out the bullshit a little bit better, a little bit. Yeah, I mean, we're spending between one and four hours on

this platform a day. Huh. So, how much TV watching, do y'all do And I am going to lump Netflix in that but if you're spending that long on on Instagram that's how long the older generation spent watching TV, right? Yeah. Live TV gets barely any time barely any but Netflix I believe it was. Most people, they ranked their

hours on a weekly basis. I want to say it was like 4 hours a week was like the average five hours a week, but then there's always that kids, you know, that are watching it two hours a day. Yeah, that makes sense. It also it seems dependent on whether or not people were binging a series. So if they were binging, then they were watching six hours a day and if they weren't obviously they weren't because you can't stop binging.

That's the passion of binging. And did you notice the Netflix decreased the amount of time between episodes? It used to be before it autoplays. Yeah that makes a huge difference.

Spotify. Does it now on the Pod to? I listen to the intro a lot. I'm kind of obsessed. Like how this whole thing flows. It's a little bit of my art project and I used to notice that when the outro would stop the next episode first, it wouldn't even autoplay now, just like plays immediately, huh? Obviously, people should be listening to more me, but I don't know that it needs right? Well it's the guess I got a circle back to this.

It's surprising to me that you feel the need to I guess cultivate an Instagram image because from my perspective, you like a very attractive young lady. You've got all this stuff going on. You're an entrepreneur. You've got, you've had this great end like internship. Do you like, does the instant? You feel a sense of insecurity in Instagram that you have to cultivate? Or is it just kind of like what it is? It started off.

I think it's sort of An expectation that like everyone has one, and you only post the best photos that you have of yourself on it, but it has turned into a little bit more of an ego boost. I think, for people, I find that after, like, after weekends, when I've taken a lot of great pictures, or when other people have taken a lot of big pictures there will be just, I mean, massive amount.

My feet is just chock-full of people who have posted because they're trying to show off these like best. Moments in their lives. But I do think it does stem from insecurity and people trying to sort of fill a little bit of a, whole, a lot of times people who, like, influencers, who were like Instagram, influencers often don't have a lot of

friends in real life. There are a few that go to school here and you they aren't in sororities or fraternities and you don't see them in huge groups of people. And I think that a lot of times those people people created

their Instagram presence and sort of a replacement for, you know, having a huge group of friends. Hmm. That is interesting, and it makes sense. Huh. I mean Twitter does that somewhat I think in a similar way? But I do think it's a little different. It is different because people aren't looking at you, I think. Yeah, I'm Twitter, so it's especially for females, there's a huge Focus around body image and our people, I mean, just seeing the likes roll in on a

photo. You get a Adrenaline Rush from people Harding, you know, your face or your body. They're saying. I like the way that you appear. So I think females really get satisfaction from that. Yeah, hmm. Well, don't let it fuck you up. That's my recommendation. That what did you think? When you were reading the Wall Street Journal stuff? About the Instagram, you know, like how come - yeah our how it can have negative impacts or whatever.

I don't know if it, you know, being bad for you is fair. But yeah, I mean, I think this is something that like we've been talking about that. I mean, we talked about it even even in my English classes in high school of okay, what effect does this really have on us? So our generation because we were the users, they used it. Most I think have always been and we were in this really crucial stage.

Development when we were using it have always sort of been in conversation about okay what is this really doing to us? And so this isn't a new topic of conversation for for people my age. I think we understand that it is probably somewhat detrimental to our mental health but people are willing to give it up because it's addictive and it's become so ingrained in the way that real life works that Without it, you feel lost. What do you mean the way that

real life works? So I guess an example of that would be, you're a freshman in college and you are trying to figure out who your roommates going to be you get to pick. And so you go through the Facebook group and this is one of the only times you will ever use Facebook. By the way, you will go through the Vanderbilt freshman Facebook group and you will scroll through profile pictures until

you find. Someone that looks like you and then you will look at that person's name and then you will look them up on Instagram and you will see if their private or public. And if they're public, you'll probably move on. And if they're private, you'll see if you have any friends in common. Hmm. Then you will go through the Friendship. They haven't what I mean, we will pop up. Where will we public? You'll move on? What do you mean? Like? They're not cool enough because

they're not private. So there's sort of a distinction I think between people who are public and people who are private on Instagram, because Is people who are private are sending the message that they have a close Social Circle and therefore, their Social Circle is more desirable, maybe to be a part of hmm. Smart. Yeah, little supply and demand, but I think that that is just one way that it can play out in life is like that.

That's how you find your first friend and then once you're on campus, you start requesting to follow. All these people that you see around you and building this network of, oh, wait, I saw her on Instagram. Maybe. I, you know what I remember. She went to the same school as my friend from Camp, I'm going to say hi to her and my econ class, like it's little pieces of information that you glean from just someone's bio that can help form a connection. Have you done much thinking

about the metaverse? Now, I really have should start thinking about the metaverse. It's the hot new thing that everyone's talking about, but I do think like fundamentally. It's I think we're some truth in all of this is the melding of online life and offline life. Yeah, and how they're sort of

coming together, right? So it's, it's a very interesting concept and I don't think that we're going to get any I think that the pandemic at least for my generation your generation probably is already been going through this but has really like collapsed, whatever difference there was between online and offline. Like a lot of us were sort of thrown onto online a lot and I don't I don't think this trend is going away. I think it's only going to get

deeper and deeper. I think you're totally right and having an entire like having kids that grow up with it, I think. Is where it all begins, is that they've grown up in this world where it is combined, and then they just see online and offline is one in the same. And that's what's starting to happen. I mean kids that are being born now. That is their perception of the world. Is that there's things that happen in both Realms and

they're both equally relevant. What did I what did Growing Up with the internet? What do you think it did? I guess I have, I have like two questions that are like wringing out. Like, you're not protected from much when the internet is all around, let right? Like you can find anything. So when you had like, I don't know, when you're 14 years old and there's no barrier to what you can find, what do you think that does to your mind or how do

you treat that? Like what was that like I had the internet to but it was different. It wasn't like always at your fingertips. And you can find anything all the time. Yeah. I think your, there's a filter on what you use things for based on here, surrounded by. So if you are in a gamer Community, you're probably going to use the internet to watch YouTube videos of people playing

video games. If you're interested in the environment, then you're probably going to use it too. look up things about the environment people, I think God ideas like from what I remember from other people about what to use the internet for because I'd we didn't realize it was so unique. I think, like, when my parents talked about our ability to look up anything, we need for a research paper within, you know, a few minutes it's baffling to me that they weren't able to do that.

So I guess I just we didn't realize how much power we had at our fingertips. So I don't know that we were always so focused on finding ways to utilize it, it was just if we needed something, we would, we would use it for that. And of course, you know you do spend Some time, exploring or you end up in the YouTube rabbit, hole of, you know, watching a certain type of video or Ted talk.

But I don't know that we necessarily saw it, is this big open field of all the information, you could possibly know in the world because we didn't know that it was special in that way. That's interesting. I am terrified of what my kids will see. I'm and and I think that's just part of the like, wanting to protect them but also knowing that I can't anymore.

Yeah. Like I. So I go downstairs the other day or upstairs, I'm in a split-level but people don't need that detail, but whatever name you got it. Um, and like the kids are playing Roblox and I hear like a gun Mark, and, you know, I got, I mean, they're young kids and no. I mean, I had to chew him out or whatever, but the idea that that's, they can find that, right? And it's like, They're so young. And they're still, you know, these little beings that I look at.

How could they possibly have? Yeah. And like, yeah, how could they even be introduced to that? And then, you know, in the same breath the, the maybe two days ago they had some lockdown drill at school, you know, in case a shooter comes right. And it's like, man, there's a lot of it feels to me and it may not be fair, but that a lot of Innocence has been taken out of life. It's an interesting. Point.

And I think that in a lot of ways, it has one of my friends younger siblings was started using Tick-Tock at a really young age and she got one of the the problems with Tik-Tok that people have sort of identified as that.

Once you get on a certain type of page, it's hard to get off of it. So if you're depressed, you're going to end up watching a lot of videos of other people who are depressed and Then you are watching videos of people who are saying they're suicidal and trying to take their lives or telling stories about how they tried to take their lives. And that's where this little girl ended up. And she ended up. She was, I think 10 and this happened. She started cutting herself.

Oh no, yeah, yeah. And I mean, that's the kind of thing that you would never know about, like, as a normal ten-year-old and lets you ended up on this this weird. Side of the internet. That is just feeding you information like that. Oh, that's so sad. I know, makes you want to give her a little hug? Tell her she's worth it. I don't know. Well, let's try to turn this. Turn this away and uplifting, but I've enjoyed this conversation, very much.

Thank you for having it with me. It's been great.

Thank you. Yeah, well, we'll continue, I just said, kind of, you know, these are like very real issues and I think that They're just not something that I had to deal with quite as much because I, you know, my I remember sitting in Chapel my school when we were in like 8th grade or something and and they were talking about the internet and what it was going to be, right, and people were still on dial-up and I don't know, I used to be on the, on the internet and my dad's,

the phone would blink, the line was busy, if I was on the internet. So my dad know when it when I was on it. I don't know. Sometimes I'd try to download like a naked picture something, and he'd be like, he'd run into my room and catch me. It's a different. It's a different world. Now, right now, it's do it. So, it's just now. Everything is at your fingertips. So it's, it'll be interesting to watch, you know, my children. And it's interesting to talk to you about.

So thank you for doing it. So can you, can you talk a little bit about what your experience at Greenbrier was like and you know, your your inner Action and or what you think about the investment Community now and kind of I don't know where you want to take your life. Yeah, priest speaks, very, highly of you thank you. He's been an amazing mentor and I mean seriously can't thank him enough for everything. He's done to sort of help me find my way and help with Red Rover.

I mean, just incredibly supportive Mentor but I boy was I lucky to have ended up agreeing where I did not realize how lucky I was until that first.

Summer was probably about halfway through but it was just such a privilege to have that exposure to this broader thinking when it comes to analyzing companies, I had was probably before this very caught up in this sort of Robin Hood, ish mindset of, you know, caught up trading on a new product release or headlines that day instead of searching for

longer-term. Value based on how the organization operates and how their customers really feel about their products and services and That was only about Greenbrier is that it really I really connected with their ethos of trying to find companies that do things for the customer instead of to the customer. They have the saying of better faster cheaper and to the Delight of the customer and I loved that.

So that was a really, really neat way to think about the success of a company rather than the shorter-term headline, you know, I've been thinking about this a lot because I'm in the middle of, well, I did take a big loss on I'll tease, but I still watch it whatever. But the, the, that particular entity is a cable company. And I, you know, I think it's hard to argue that they do better cheaper faster, right?

And, and then I was talking about the Wall Street Journal with a friend, and I hadn't looked at my bill, While and here, they're like, billing me, 40 bucks a month and I called them up and I was like, look, I'm not paying this and they dropped it to 1995 or whatever. What says? I mean that's a meaningful savings per year. Yeah. Right. But that's not doing something for the customer. That's screwing the people that don't call you.

Yeah, that's like okay. So my best customers that don't turn and don't bother me are going to get like screwed, totally. That's the business model and when they called The Cotton cancel, Then we'll let them, you know, pay what we can actually charge. Gosh soldiers, that man, it builds a lot of cops, you know customers that moment, it totally does.

I mean Gosh, that's that's one of the things that I think being it Greenbrier has helped prevent in Red Rover, is this value orientation of making sure that we are providing customers with value and not screwing anyone. And that's how I'm wired. So that's why I really connected with it.

Is I just can't understand how someone can sit at their desk and know that they are doing a customer wrong and think that the in the long term it's Work out because when people realize that you're doing that to them, they won't want to be part of your ecosystem anymore, but it also just pains me to think that companies are doing that's people.

I hate it. It's also, I think hard to build an organization that's excited to go to work as it as it Seasons, if that's kind of the business plan, right? Like, if everybody knows that they're doing something good for the customer like here you did a survey for me. I'm really excited to have you on the program. I know. Three people that have highly recommended you, we all want to help you.

Trey his said there's a good chance Alex is going to be employing all of us in the future so be nice to her you know and like it engenders Goodwill. Right. Whereas the how much can I make today? I don't know. There's there's sort of an off-balance sheet liability that is that accompanies that and I think that there are investments that can work if you're betting on Inertia against it.

But I'm going to try to Pivot myself a little bit more to their philosophy because I think it's a little more anti fragile. I completely agree in the culture and Ethos of a an organization's employees that you sort of touched on I think

is so important. One of the things that I really loved about being able to run Red Rover while I'm in school, is that I'm taking some really cool classes that I'm able to just apply in real time to the things that I do with Red Rover and I'm taking this organizational management class.

Right now, we're talking a lot about organizational Theory and how these different ways of thinking about managing a Open E, Impact the output and one of the things we're studying right now is this idea that if you get too structured into bureaucratic into rational with an organization, then you lose a lot when it comes to what you're able to produce because it becomes too modulus and not free enough, and that the personhood of the people working, there really matters.

So the literature backs up what you're saying. Hmm, do you think I have to think? I mean the thing that's raining out my head is what a gift and I don't mean a gift because you've worked hard to create it, but to be able to go through college and have a business and be able to apply the classes that you're learning and the business. Like, I bet you're learning to x what other people are, right? Because it's not just a book. You're able to implement it.

No, I truly agree with that and I joke that, you know, everybody should try and do this while they're in school because you really like, I'm learning So much more right now than I would be. If I wasn't able to apply these Concepts, that I'm learning because a lot of the time that my major feeds into consulting jobs and so you don't really get to utilize the knowledge that you have learned until a few

years after graduation. So this is a it's a real privilege to be able to take the things that I'm learning and Implement them in real time and see how they play out in my business because not only Only does it benefit the business but it allows me to really let that knowledge Thinkin. Yeah, I have a feeling your interview answers. Are going to be a little better than most people's just saying, I sure hope so. I think they will. I mean, it's what experience does it?

You can't help. But not and it's, it's clear that you're passionate about this stuff. It's clearly your thoughtful. It's very, very cool to speak to you. I was, you know, slinging liquor when I was your age. And it was a lot of fun. I made a lot of money, but I don't know that. You know, my takeaways were quite as good as yours. Well, you probably were enjoying life to yes select. I had a lot of current benefit, that's worth something, but it's

really has no, I do balance. I'd rather have done that then nothing don't get me wrong. But it's it, you know, I learned something about turnover, I learned something about theft in cash businesses. I learned the dangers of over-pouring and inventory management.

I mean, I learned stuff like that, but Far from a Consulting gig and or, you know, building what I think could become a very, very cool business for you over the long term and I like how you're approaching it. I think collecting this data over time is going to be really valuable. Thank you. I do too. I really do see that as the the future.

If this is just being a way of connecting these these kids who are experts in this stuff to people who maybe didn't even realize that they needed that Insight, this is really valuable information that I think help people make better investment decisions, and I'm hoping that the build-up of that information over time will help provide a lot of clarity on. A lot of really hot topics right now. Like tech companies and consumer Brands.

Yeah. Do you have a you have employees that you have hired or what is this, is this you and a bunch of subcontractors, are you bringing people on what's going on? So, right now, it's a lot of subcontractors we have, I have to Kids working for me one that is still in college want to just graduated and then are there doing administrative and data work and then my coder, I outsourced his work, he still attend Stanford, he's my age, and he's awesome.

And then our website builder is out sourced through up work but those are the current I guess employees if you will. But we're looking into a new referral program to sort of expand our voter base and so I You could sort of say that we'd be bringing those people on board as well. If we had wraps it, a lot of the schools were looking at that school. Do you need like, is it? Do you need anything from anyone that may be listening to this? Is there something that you're struggling with that.

You could ask for help because I do have a fairly sophisticated audience base. Well, thank you. Yes. Having people ask questions to build up. Our base is hugely valuable, but we Are also looking into, you know, just more, ambitious projects, how to go deeper into financial services, but also outside of that ecosystem and we're looking for a potentially the right strategic partner to take us there. So, we're considering a round of funding.

But the, the primary thing really is having people subscribe to this database or contribute to it in some way by commissioning some custom poles that we can add to our based where can people subscribe and participate. So our website is Red Rover network.com and you can't apply for database membership. There you can order custom poles there you can contact me there but all three of those are available through the website and it's literally in this this top banner and it says order poles.

Apply for membership contact us. Awesome. Well I am going to drive a couple subscribers to you because I think a couple of my friends Is can use your service and I have greatly enjoyed this conversation. I'm going to let you get on with your day but I really appreciate it and I hope if you're willing to do it I'd like to have you back on, you know, to kind of like give some insights into what you're seeing with the polls.

I wouldn't mind if you were returning guest in the future, if you're willing to do it. Well, thank you. Yes. I think there's lots of interesting things to be learned from these recurring poles and I would, Love to share them. All right, well, cool. Well again, I just, I thank you for coming on. It was a really fun conversation and I hope you have a great weekend. Thank you. Thanks Bill.