Speaker 1: I'm off my game today, You're not. People are going
Speaker 1: to have to start making better content. I think we're
Speaker 1: gonna be talking about this for a long time. When
Speaker 1: you program for everyone, you program for no one. I
Speaker 1: think it's that we're purpose driven platform, like we're trying
Speaker 1: to get to substance. How was that? Are you happy
Speaker 1: with that? This is marketing therapy right now? It really is?
Speaker 1: What's up? I'm Laura Currency and I'm Alexa Kristen. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to at Landia. The only thing separating me from
Speaker 1: the Jersey Shore right now, and it's the only thing
Speaker 1: I would have came to Brooklyn for UM. We have
Speaker 1: Cody Levine and Mike Tongue coming into the studio to
Speaker 1: ex agency young guns who have broken out to turn
Speaker 1: their passion and to purpose their side hustle into the
Speaker 1: main hustle. And I think we have a thing or
Speaker 1: two that they can really teach the agency about where
Speaker 1: we're missing the mark on creativity agency brands. I think leadership. Seriously,
Speaker 1: these guys have a anything one liners. So with that,
Speaker 1: we'll be right back. Welcome back, everybody. We're here with
Speaker 1: Cody Levine, Hi, co founder of toothpaste brand twice and
Speaker 1: the total Brooklyn artiste Mike Tongue is in the building.
Speaker 1: Mike Tongue is a marketing manager over at the Brooklyn
Speaker 1: Museum and also the founder of the Culture LP. Hello. Hello,
Speaker 1: both of you ex agency people that Alex and I
Speaker 1: have had the fortunate opportunity to have worked with in
Speaker 1: some capacity in our careers and as young guns. If
Speaker 1: I may say this under the age of thirty, how
Speaker 1: old are you? Just call it out? Yeah, And something
Speaker 1: happened for the both of you where you decided in
Speaker 1: the not too distant past that you were going to
Speaker 1: take your path actions and turn them into your everyday work. Tom,
Speaker 1: talk about what that was like for you, kind of
Speaker 1: stepping away from the traditional agency world where you had
Speaker 1: been somebody who's hot in the art scene out in Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: and talk about your kind of diversion back into that
Speaker 1: via the Brooklyn Museum. Yeah. I mean it's been I
Speaker 1: guess it's been gradual the whole time. The two worlds
Speaker 1: have been colliding. They collide in the work to right,
Speaker 1: you see it in the agency space, like let's do
Speaker 1: this art activation, let's do this sort of street art
Speaker 1: um kind of integration or whatever. It may have you,
Speaker 1: but for me, I had never stopped doing the cultural work.
Speaker 1: It was always a five to nine thing. But it
Speaker 1: just got to the point where five to nine am
Speaker 1: the next day just to clarify. But it just got
Speaker 1: to the point where it just made too much sense.
Speaker 1: And on a personal tip, you know, my father was
Speaker 1: an artist, and it just was like, this is when
Speaker 1: I have to go full go and and really lean
Speaker 1: in on you know, the culture right. And it's something
Speaker 1: that I think institutions like the Brookn Museum and other
Speaker 1: cultural institutions need, right. They their new fundering stores and
Speaker 1: things of that nature. Are these tech companies and these
Speaker 1: media platforms and everybody wants to show up cross screen
Speaker 1: and things of that nature, but they can't do it
Speaker 1: without actually understand how these companies work. So it was
Speaker 1: kind of a perfect fit for me. They brought their
Speaker 1: agency services in the house, so it was just you know, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was so funny because I was talking to a
Speaker 1: group of cmos and I said, do you are you
Speaker 1: actually looking at your teams instead of when we've talked
Speaker 1: about this on the show, like you're looking at your
Speaker 1: teams instead of resources. Actually his talent and I used
Speaker 1: you as an example. I was like, because if I
Speaker 1: need someone to think with me, really think with me,
Speaker 1: and think about how people are going to show up,
Speaker 1: how they're going to interact and not showing up as
Speaker 1: a brand that's tone deaf. You need people like Tong
Speaker 1: and Cody. Yeah, and coincidentally, both of you have been
Speaker 1: inspired by your dad, so do. Your father is a
Speaker 1: well known dentist in New York City, and he inspired
Speaker 1: you and your brother to walk away from UM your
Speaker 1: nine to five's and chase down the opportunity to build
Speaker 1: your own DTC brand. Can you talk about twice? Yeah? Absolutely? UM,
Speaker 1: for me, it was interesting. I always knew I wanted
Speaker 1: to start my own brand, but I didn't know what
Speaker 1: exactly would be. And through some work we have been
Speaker 1: doing as a family, dad being a dentist, mom and
Speaker 1: dad building brands together in the space of oral care,
Speaker 1: they started a nonprofit which was really set up to
Speaker 1: provide full service dentistry to underserved communities. And Um, what
Speaker 1: happened was I go down with my brother and a
Speaker 1: group of dentists. We team up with a patient of
Speaker 1: my dad' who's Lenny Kravitz, and we end up we
Speaker 1: end up in the beautiful mouth. He's got a great,
Speaker 1: beautiful mouth. Yeah, smiles important for him. And we go
Speaker 1: down there where he spends, you know, most of the
Speaker 1: year recording his music and he calls at home, and
Speaker 1: we set up a full service shop, and um we
Speaker 1: treated everyone from cleanings and whitenings to full extractions and reconstruction.
Speaker 1: And I think, right then and there, in that moment,
Speaker 1: my brother and I we saw what the power of
Speaker 1: a smile was. And it opened my eyes and it
Speaker 1: gave me purpose to what I ultimately want to do,
Speaker 1: which is start a brand, but one that has purpose
Speaker 1: behind it and and meaning and true depth and could
Speaker 1: get back. So we, you know, after formulating over a year,
Speaker 1: two years, we go back down to Luther and we
Speaker 1: we decide to each other. We say, let's do something
Speaker 1: about this. We pink got to do more. We I
Speaker 1: don't think I can go back to my day job.
Speaker 1: I can't go back to the desk. I UM, let's
Speaker 1: go build. So we looked at the oral care space
Speaker 1: and and we ultimately ended up with Twice, which I
Speaker 1: could tell you a lot more about, but um, it's
Speaker 1: a direct consumer brand in oral care. We're starting with toothpaste.
Speaker 1: We want to make the products that you use every
Speaker 1: single day, twice a day to be um as beautiful
Speaker 1: as a smile is. So you know, it's something that
Speaker 1: I took the jump on back in September, uh to
Speaker 1: leave my job and say, you know, this is what
Speaker 1: I'm going to do. And I talked to a ton
Speaker 1: of friends that are entrepreneurs and they said, you know, well,
Speaker 1: before I did it, I had milestones I wanted to hit,
Speaker 1: UM things I wanted to accomplish. For me, it was UM.
Speaker 1: I was still you know, I was working and and
Speaker 1: proud of work I was doing, but ultimately knew if
Speaker 1: I really wanted to do this, I had to dedicate
Speaker 1: everything UM. And it was a it was an incredible
Speaker 1: moment in time when I did that. UM is scary
Speaker 1: in a yeah, it was scary, but the adrenaline was
Speaker 1: just beyond I actually, yeah, I quit on a Wednesday.
Speaker 1: On Wednesday night, I actually was on a flight to
Speaker 1: go pitch the brand to a potential partner and and
Speaker 1: a co founder of ours. So um, the rush was
Speaker 1: everything nervous, Sure, every day you're you're nervous, energy you
Speaker 1: turned into excitement. I think there's a whole thing going
Speaker 1: on in the marketplace, which I know both of you
Speaker 1: know well having worked with you, that your generation, our generation,
Speaker 1: the millennial generation, is one that is compelled to associate
Speaker 1: or align themselves with brands that identify with purpose. I
Speaker 1: would say, respectively, both of the places you work for
Speaker 1: with our building, UM resonate with that. Can you talk about,
Speaker 1: both as consumers and as entrepreneurs in your own right,
Speaker 1: what purpose means to you and how you see the
Speaker 1: intersection of those things, translating from how you think about
Speaker 1: brands versus how you're creating them. Yeah, I think. I've
Speaker 1: always thought that people don't buy what you do, they
Speaker 1: buy why you do it, and behind every product, you
Speaker 1: need to help consumers understand, you know, how you relate
Speaker 1: to them on a personal level. And UM, I think today,
Speaker 1: more than ever, consumers are I don't want to say
Speaker 1: they're skeptical, but you know me and my friends, they
Speaker 1: need to know more, they need to see more the
Speaker 1: world of transparency. UM. A brand like r X bar
Speaker 1: are completely shaking it up by saying like there's two
Speaker 1: eggs in almond and a dayton Yeah, no bs, And
Speaker 1: I think UM, in the world of brands that have
Speaker 1: social at the core or or are driven by purpose,
Speaker 1: they that's part of their DNA and it's no longer
Speaker 1: just like attack on UM and you have to prove
Speaker 1: that day in and day out, and people have to
Speaker 1: really feel it. Yeah. I mean for me, it's interesting
Speaker 1: because the the idea of culture is like super lucid, right,
Speaker 1: like it's everything that we do UM. So I ended
Speaker 1: up building a business model kind of around just in
Speaker 1: my lifestyle. I would like to go to art shows.
Speaker 1: I like supporting my friends they needed help with mail,
Speaker 1: chip and social media and ship like that, and it
Speaker 1: just ended up turning into a service offering, which is like,
Speaker 1: looking back at it, now I can't go to an
Speaker 1: art show and not think about work. So it's kind
Speaker 1: of something I was talking about last night, is like
Speaker 1: this blurred line between the two. But the idea of
Speaker 1: UM purpose is just something that's been at the core
Speaker 1: of on both sides. Right. The museum is a place
Speaker 1: that you know, it likes to think about the community
Speaker 1: and put the community first, whether it's through for free
Speaker 1: events are just bringing in different speakers to talk about things,
Speaker 1: whether it's the election, whether it's you know, UM, immigration rights,
Speaker 1: things of that nature. UM. So to be able to
Speaker 1: work at us space like that is super refreshing and rewarding. Um.
Speaker 1: And then for me purposefully, I like to stay in Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: I like Brooklyn. We didn't get into culture lp We
Speaker 1: didn't get into the side hustle main hustle. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: um So the culture lp um started as a blog
Speaker 1: about maybe six years ago. I was still in school.
Speaker 1: I really had some friends, like kind of similar to
Speaker 1: what we're talking about this age of transparency, but I
Speaker 1: feel like Twitter was a place where people were just
Speaker 1: talking a lot of ship, having fun, getting attention for
Speaker 1: being funny, not really like anything of substance at that point. Um.
Speaker 1: I feel like I was one of them, and I
Speaker 1: was like, well, I have some friends doing some really
Speaker 1: creative things. I want to highlight them. I grabbed SLR
Speaker 1: from you know, the Bucknell Library, and I videotaped a
Speaker 1: couple of my friends who had done some poetry on
Speaker 1: you know, microaggressions and things that we were going through
Speaker 1: at Bucknell University, just being really white space in the
Speaker 1: middle of Pennsylvania where all kids from different cities Boston,
Speaker 1: d C, New York, UM, and I kind of just
Speaker 1: left them freestyle and you know, did a spoken word video,
Speaker 1: put it on Vimeo. I was like, this is cool,
Speaker 1: made some T shirts. I was like, this is cool.
Speaker 1: You know. I just kept going with that, you know,
Speaker 1: fast forward. UM. I now worked closely with a few
Speaker 1: visual artists who have done you know, street murals for
Speaker 1: a city bike in South Africa. Patrick ey Jean just
Speaker 1: did a live art installation up in Massachusetts at the
Speaker 1: Met Museum. Um. These are all folks. You know. Ronald
Speaker 1: Draper just got the awarded uh Urban Public League, you know,
Speaker 1: a c P. He's the curator at Harlem Hospital. And
Speaker 1: these are guys that like we rented his first studio
Speaker 1: in Harlem for eight hundred bucks to do a show,
Speaker 1: and we had like seventy r s v p s.
Speaker 1: And now we put out a show. We had like
Speaker 1: fives in the first four days, had a closing link,
Speaker 1: you know. And it's like, but by just believing in
Speaker 1: these creators and being a partner to them, someone who
Speaker 1: understands like marketing frameworks and how brands think we're able
Speaker 1: to you know, secure sponsorship with Essential Water or you know,
Speaker 1: any other partners that we've worked with. Pad did a
Speaker 1: commission for Nike like things of that nature. Um. But
Speaker 1: the two worlds are just so parallel from the museum
Speaker 1: is dying to play in that space. So it's really interesting. Well,
Speaker 1: I want to talk about that, but I want to
Speaker 1: first say the other day we were having lunch and
Speaker 1: you said to me, and it was so simple. You
Speaker 1: were like, you know that friend that you had, or
Speaker 1: maybe you were this person that you would call and say,
Speaker 1: what's going on this weekend? I haven't talked about that, right.
Speaker 1: So the other thing, because you have like a million things, um,
Speaker 1: is this new service that you put together. And I
Speaker 1: thought it was so smart because everyone has that friend
Speaker 1: or you're that friend, which sometimes becomes a burden. Are
Speaker 1: that friend? Um? Yeah, I feel like there was a
Speaker 1: there was a tipping point where somebody had text me.
Speaker 1: I asked me, I have some my families in town.
Speaker 1: What's going on? Is there an art show I should
Speaker 1: take them to? Is there a museum opening? This before
Speaker 1: I started working museum, probably before I started working, uh
Speaker 1: in any agency role. And I was like, I can't
Speaker 1: keep doing this every weekend, every day, somebody's asking me
Speaker 1: this question. And Ryan Leslie has a service called super
Speaker 1: Phone that's really made for musicians to like directly connect
Speaker 1: with their consumers. You know, off of social media you
Speaker 1: can track shopify integrations and who's spending the most money,
Speaker 1: what zip codes are supporting you. So we were using
Speaker 1: that right now, just texting people on like twice to
Speaker 1: three times a week telling them art, food, music related
Speaker 1: events that are happening locally in New York. Um, it's
Speaker 1: great for us because for the past five years we've
Speaker 1: been building these cultural experiences with people who you know,
Speaker 1: are poets, are our event producers, so they're sending us events.
Speaker 1: We're finding events in the wild, but using that filter
Speaker 1: to disseminate through Slack and and you know, group think
Speaker 1: what we should send out. And um, it's been a
Speaker 1: it's been an interesting test around. I'm definitely excited to
Speaker 1: see where we where we take it over the next
Speaker 1: few months, especially this summer coming up. And it's called
Speaker 1: what are you calling it? The Cultural Hotline? How do
Speaker 1: you sign up Culture Hotline dot coorn text number. You know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting both of you watching your socials. Other than
Speaker 1: it making me completely exhausted, I feel like you just said,
Speaker 1: watching your social watching socials. I saw this week and
Speaker 1: it was crazy Um, I thought I was busy. So
Speaker 1: both of you obviously have super magnetic personalities. You're building
Speaker 1: these insane communities and your respective circles. How do you
Speaker 1: go out and seek the people that you're adding to
Speaker 1: your circles? And then how can brands infiltrate that? What
Speaker 1: is the value exchange that your circles are looking for? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting because you know when you're when you're on
Speaker 1: the agency side and you're you're building other brands, you
Speaker 1: can go out and talk about it and you're proud
Speaker 1: of it, and um, you see the work that you
Speaker 1: you put out. But when it's your brand, it's your
Speaker 1: d n A, it's your life, your blood, sweat and tears. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm out there and I'm just naturally talking
Speaker 1: about what I'm doing. And and you know when I
Speaker 1: when I can speak to a friend or someone I
Speaker 1: just met, and their eyes light up and they say, wow,
Speaker 1: this is really interesting, like how can I help? I think, UM,
Speaker 1: when it comes from a real place of authenticity and
Speaker 1: genuine like I think they can see the passion behind
Speaker 1: the entrepreneur and they say, wow, like this could be
Speaker 1: really cool. How can I help? Um? I was out
Speaker 1: in l A. And I was, UM. I was with
Speaker 1: a friend who has an ice cream popsicle company, and
Speaker 1: he was doing a pop up an outdoor voices. They
Speaker 1: were doing a running club and UM, I come like
Speaker 1: the runners come in and we're handing out popsicles and
Speaker 1: I'm just there kind of hanging out. And I start
Speaker 1: talking to a guy and he's got a branding agency,
Speaker 1: and UM, he he loved everything we're doing. Is I
Speaker 1: got to connect you to this guy and this guy
Speaker 1: and this person and this woman. And next thing I know,
Speaker 1: I'm in l A for three days and I'm meeting
Speaker 1: a ton of people that that UM, I had never known,
Speaker 1: I never even known existed. But by the fact of UM,
Speaker 1: you know, having conversation and not being nervous or or
Speaker 1: scared to talk about what you're doing, UM, it opened
Speaker 1: up all these doors at My community is slowly building
Speaker 1: and building and building, And I don't know what it's
Speaker 1: gonna look like in in six months or a year,
Speaker 1: but I know that if I keep surrounding myself with
Speaker 1: the right people who believe in the mission and and
Speaker 1: can see like, hey this, you know what what is
Speaker 1: being built here is a little different or UM I
Speaker 1: know someone who can help. I think if we all
Speaker 1: just rally around that idea of helping each other and
Speaker 1: but being a part of something that a lot of
Speaker 1: shared value. Um, I think the community, it just becomes
Speaker 1: incredibly powerful. So you're talking about people who are helping
Speaker 1: you build your business. But do you think everything you
Speaker 1: just said actually goes over to consumers and how you're
Speaker 1: going to interact with customers of twice? Yeah? I think so. Um,
Speaker 1: maybe I'm a naive entrepreneur, but I I think when
Speaker 1: you can build a brand that stands for something bigger
Speaker 1: than the product you make, um, they can see it.
Speaker 1: And I think, um, you know you and talk to
Speaker 1: ten people, and and if only five of them believe
Speaker 1: in you, that's great. Go with the five, yeah, and
Speaker 1: and leave the other five. It's interesting. We had the
Speaker 1: founder of Away Suitcases on a couple episodes ago, and
Speaker 1: we were talking about founders living the brand out loud,
Speaker 1: and I think you just gave wearing a twice hat.
Speaker 1: But can I just say you have a twice What
Speaker 1: are these things? I didn't know what they were called,
Speaker 1: and now I can't believe you didn't bring us any merch.
Speaker 1: Think about community for me was like the first event
Speaker 1: that we did that was formal was literally called Connected Dots,
Speaker 1: and I was like, I realized, like people that are
Speaker 1: musicians and people that are like trying to do events
Speaker 1: for nonprofit they need something like there's something missing, right.
Speaker 1: So I literally invited people that were not I myself
Speaker 1: and my co founders. We invited people that were working
Speaker 1: in the starting nonprofits are did like pr marketing, r
Speaker 1: musicians because they always needed performers. They always need a promotion.
Speaker 1: It's very interesting. There's a small brunch MABE like forty
Speaker 1: um and at that brunch with some people that I
Speaker 1: still keep in touch with that our movies and shakers,
Speaker 1: but that was one of our first organized events, and
Speaker 1: that that essence of like minded individuals of like, this
Speaker 1: idea of community something you can't replicate. You can't go
Speaker 1: to a you can't go to an agency, can't go
Speaker 1: to a brand. Partners say like, hey, we want to
Speaker 1: do this event and we need like people that work
Speaker 1: with each other to be there. That's so like being
Speaker 1: able to overtime, you know, put people in the same
Speaker 1: room that can have similar issues but have solutions and
Speaker 1: have different perspectives on those on those problems. It's something
Speaker 1: that you can't really quantify. And that's I think what's
Speaker 1: been difficult and why I've kept it as a let's say,
Speaker 1: a five to nine for so long. It's just it
Speaker 1: takes a while to show and prove what that what
Speaker 1: that value is. But um, now with the idea of
Speaker 1: like micro influencers, people are seeing that that those are
Speaker 1: the those are the folks, these people in Brooklyn and
Speaker 1: New York and Uptown and Washington Heights, in the Bronx,
Speaker 1: these pockets of community that have been around forever. But
Speaker 1: now with social media you're able to have a voice
Speaker 1: in a platform. It's given a whole new value to
Speaker 1: like these underground communities. What you just said tongue and
Speaker 1: something Alex and I have brainstormed about for a very
Speaker 1: long time in terms of building community is you can't
Speaker 1: go and buy it overnight. It's something that a long Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean that's why red Bull has been so successful, Right,
Speaker 1: they get in at the grassroots and they but they
Speaker 1: built and they fund these communities and they stick with them.
Speaker 1: What should brands be doing for your very cool hip
Speaker 1: like culture driven communities that you would find to be
Speaker 1: a tangible value exchange. I mean, really, they need to
Speaker 1: get out of the office, right, Like I felt like
Speaker 1: a lot of times, Uh, we're ideating and we're all
Speaker 1: white boards and we're doing things, and it's like, go
Speaker 1: talk to the people you want to talk to. There's
Speaker 1: so many people that already doing these things. You need
Speaker 1: influencers to help you aggregate influence, right if it's like, hey,
Speaker 1: I want to you know, I want to talk to um,
Speaker 1: I want to talk to black women about hair. I
Speaker 1: can give you five communities that have blogs and instagrams
Speaker 1: with double digit thousand followers, and the women that run
Speaker 1: them probably work in corporate America. Like, it's not it's
Speaker 1: not this thing that's so far removed. You can sit
Speaker 1: down and have a conversation with people who are moving
Speaker 1: and shaking these communities. I think we've treated like it's
Speaker 1: this far fetched thing, you know. And I think just
Speaker 1: going out and touching people something that it's hard to
Speaker 1: do when you have that kind of corporate structure role
Speaker 1: or that brand role. I met this woman named sam
Speaker 1: Hi Sam shout out. I told you I'd shout you
Speaker 1: out at the I A B say Hi Cody Hi
Speaker 1: sam Um at the I A b Women visionary Summach.
Speaker 1: She came up to me and she was like, I
Speaker 1: love the show. It means a lot. She started talking
Speaker 1: about like just how do you break because she's like,
Speaker 1: I'm not leaving right this world. I love this world.
Speaker 1: I love the advertising marketing media world. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to leave it, But like, how do you start breaking
Speaker 1: through with some of these ideas and some of the
Speaker 1: thinking that I have coming from the outside on the inside,
Speaker 1: How have you done that? Even in my early days
Speaker 1: of B Video where I met Laura UM, the brands
Speaker 1: that broke through became part of culture UM in a
Speaker 1: unique way. Not probably trying to force themselves in saying
Speaker 1: like hey I want to be in music, UM, but
Speaker 1: on a ground level, trying to help build something new. UM.
Speaker 1: And when you're not the elephant in the room saying
Speaker 1: like yeah, I'm here with the cool kids, it's it's
Speaker 1: more of like, hey, how do we how do we
Speaker 1: help you? UM? Remember Boccardi, you know, four or five
Speaker 1: years ago, I was getting into the music space, and UM,
Speaker 1: they were always around, how do I provide and create
Speaker 1: culture for emerging artists and UM even you know artists themselves. UM.
Speaker 1: From a visual perspective, right, like they were they were
Speaker 1: allowing them opportunities to grow their personal brand. Um. And yeah,
Speaker 1: you know it became an experience that you would you
Speaker 1: would be a part of. But I think ultimately if
Speaker 1: you were to ask one of them musicians or artists, say,
Speaker 1: was this helpful? Like it can? It can make a career, right,
Speaker 1: I think, Um, to create culture and to be a
Speaker 1: part of subcultures and communities means um, not trying to
Speaker 1: you know, barge through the front door, but but hanging
Speaker 1: out and like learning, right, like stop talking and just listen,
Speaker 1: um and you'll figure out something really cool to do together. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you touched on something that's really important about like solving
Speaker 1: a need. Are providing access on a platform like you
Speaker 1: look at what Pocardi has done and then their partnership
Speaker 1: with Swizz and like the Dan Collection are sparing often
Speaker 1: what they've done for you know, women and trans women
Speaker 1: in music and specific leaning in on that, right, like
Speaker 1: not trying to be not trying to be everything for
Speaker 1: everyone in music. Are chasing a E d M trend,
Speaker 1: but it's like who who Who's not getting shown any love?
Speaker 1: Who deserves you know, some a corporate Stamp are to
Speaker 1: do a show for us in a brand, So it
Speaker 1: makes a lot of sense. You guys are really young.
Speaker 1: I worked with you at G and you had some
Speaker 1: of the best, bravest and loudest without screaming voices. How
Speaker 1: do you come to the table with a client like
Speaker 1: a g E or a PICCARDI or right and be
Speaker 1: the young person in the room man or woman? Man
Speaker 1: or woman? Like what do what do you do to
Speaker 1: get those ideas across? Yeah, and it's, um, that's a
Speaker 1: good question. I think from my experience I was. I
Speaker 1: was fortunate to be put in a room, um, you
Speaker 1: know with the bigger folks in the creative department and
Speaker 1: the account management teams, and and they looked at me
Speaker 1: and I was like the young millennial in the room
Speaker 1: and they and they were trying to solve big problems
Speaker 1: of how big brands maintain relevance and create community within
Speaker 1: you know, a younger demo. And I just talked about
Speaker 1: my experience, um, and I never overthought, you know what
Speaker 1: I was saying. I really was just like, hey, guys, like,
Speaker 1: this is what's happening today. It was everything was from
Speaker 1: my phone, my world like projected out on the walls
Speaker 1: and on the screens, and at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it helped evolve creative work. It it helped unique partnerships,
Speaker 1: and I was super grateful and fortunate to be in
Speaker 1: those positions. UM, But ultimately it was it was me.
Speaker 1: I didn't try to be anyone who wasn't like your brand. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that the it came up a couple of
Speaker 1: times with the idea of authenticity, and then that's when
Speaker 1: people actually listen to you and care what you have
Speaker 1: to say. If you're trying to fake the funk or
Speaker 1: pull you know, pull inside out of the sky. And
Speaker 1: I think you know when people hear that in your voice, right,
Speaker 1: if you're talking about something you know about and not
Speaker 1: speaking about things you don't know about, asking good questions.
Speaker 1: When you ask those questions, people realize you're you're coming
Speaker 1: to the table, you know, with with some sort of equity.
Speaker 1: You're you're not just trying to show out and be
Speaker 1: the loudest, our smartest person in the room, but just
Speaker 1: actually adding value. What would your advice be to the
Speaker 1: C suite listening to this conversation UM, within agency world,
Speaker 1: within brand, with our industry at large, what would you say, UM,
Speaker 1: now that you're on the outside of it, that you
Speaker 1: think you could kind of give us a feedback loop
Speaker 1: to help advance or progress, UM, what's currently going on
Speaker 1: for people your age and the agent you right, and
Speaker 1: also getting those ideas out because like how many leaders
Speaker 1: sit and say I want these ideas. I want these ideas.
Speaker 1: Either they're sitting at the middle layer right of your
Speaker 1: organization and you don't even know it, or you've selected
Speaker 1: some like weird advisory group and made them think only
Speaker 1: in a certain way on a brief. On a brief, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think outside of the brief and outside of the process,
Speaker 1: you have to enable you know, the young kids in
Speaker 1: the agency UM to go outside of their daily job.
Speaker 1: Like It's funny when I was when I was a BBDO,
Speaker 1: I wanted to do everything but my job. I wanted
Speaker 1: to make weird partnerships happen and and pushing ideas that
Speaker 1: weren't you know, traditional UM. And when you also when
Speaker 1: you when you get when you attract yourself towards someone
Speaker 1: in the agency, UM who's in a different position. I think,
Speaker 1: I know mentorship platforms and programs are are in a
Speaker 1: lot of agencies, but UM, a lot of the times,
Speaker 1: people naturally, you know, link up with someone and I
Speaker 1: was fortunate to have a mentor and in Simon Bond,
Speaker 1: who is the CMO at the time, and um, you know,
Speaker 1: he brought me along on on projects that were you know,
Speaker 1: not the normal. Um. But I think if if big
Speaker 1: time leaders in those agencies have more of an open
Speaker 1: door or not that you know, the junior strategist is
Speaker 1: knocking on the door every twenty minutes, because that's not
Speaker 1: gonna get anything done. But um, you know they don't
Speaker 1: feel um, you know, put aside if they had a
Speaker 1: great idea, um, you know, you have to enable every idea.
Speaker 1: I remember I was at Live Nation and I had
Speaker 1: I had a thought for how Ticketmaster and Live Nation
Speaker 1: could sell each individual seat that goes unsold every night. Um.
Speaker 1: And I was maniacal about this idea. I was like, well,
Speaker 1: there's like there's five thousand seats in every arena that
Speaker 1: goes unsold every night, Like we can Live Nation could
Speaker 1: sell those and they could actually give them away to charity.
Speaker 1: I came up with a whole platform and at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, like, um, you have to have
Speaker 1: be enabled to thrive in any environment. Um, long story
Speaker 1: short and noo. They actually integrated a new new tech
Speaker 1: into their website that minimized the risk of individual seats
Speaker 1: being created. But every venue is so different in the
Speaker 1: seating arrangements and how people are buying that it's inevitable. UM.
Speaker 1: I actually pitched it to a brand and I re
Speaker 1: skinned it into what I thought was incredible idea. So cool. Um,
Speaker 1: we could talk about that offline over tequila or something.
Speaker 1: But yeah, no, we pitched it to that. We pitched
Speaker 1: to a booze brand and they loved it. We actually
Speaker 1: had their UM, their head of pr say like, this
Speaker 1: is the ideas that we're looking for. She like slammed
Speaker 1: her hands on the table. She was like, this is fantastic. UM,
Speaker 1: and it worked really well with their new campaign. Um.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, UM, you know,
Speaker 1: I remember leaving the room and someone on the team
Speaker 1: said that's impossible to do, and I said, well, that's possible.
Speaker 1: Is it like giving your kid a Yester day? Have
Speaker 1: you heard of this? Parents now are giving their kids
Speaker 1: yesterdays where they literally don't say no to anything. My daughter,
Speaker 1: my husband and I would be like sitting on the
Speaker 1: roof for something. If we just said if we had
Speaker 1: a yes day would be like terrifying. But like, is
Speaker 1: this like giving your employees a yesterday? Like is this
Speaker 1: giving your middle management like you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like let them go fucking do the moon shot even
Speaker 1: if it's not gonna work, as long as it's logical,
Speaker 1: as long as it has purpose, as long as they're passionate,
Speaker 1: Like does that hurt? Yeah? I think, um, you know,
Speaker 1: I think it definitely opens the door to say, hey,
Speaker 1: we believe in your thinking. Yeah, because it's it's very
Speaker 1: easy to get discouraged as a as a junior or
Speaker 1: a young person the agency, because hey, like that's the cycle,
Speaker 1: Like you're you're there for a specific role that you
Speaker 1: know you're not at the level and the experience and
Speaker 1: the expertise to walk in the door and smash the meeting.
Speaker 1: That's right. Um, But if the right people are continually
Speaker 1: saying like yeah, I can't like the way you think. Yeah,
Speaker 1: my grandmother has this line You're welcome every time, just
Speaker 1: not any time. And I think there's something really interesting
Speaker 1: about sort of a strategic use case, like bring these
Speaker 1: ideas forward, but make sure that we're helping as seasoned
Speaker 1: veterans in the industry shape those ideas so that they
Speaker 1: can get them at the table, but but don't like
Speaker 1: yesterday should be every day. As far as yes, this
Speaker 1: industry needs a lot more yesterday, Tom, What do you think?
Speaker 1: I think the magical thing that happened at the spoon
Speaker 1: is that that that discovery fund, that that was happening.
Speaker 1: Most people talk about stuff like that and don't actually
Speaker 1: let it happen. But what you said it is stepping
Speaker 1: away from your day to day. I think every review
Speaker 1: I've ever had since I started working as like, he's great,
Speaker 1: but he always wants to do this other and it's like,
Speaker 1: now a lot of people interesting, is that positioned as
Speaker 1: a negative? Yes, exactly, And it's like but now you know,
Speaker 1: now you get paid to do the other stuff, right,
Speaker 1: and it's so it's really interesting. But I think the
Speaker 1: aspect of being able to travel, our support, you know,
Speaker 1: putting kind of putting your money where your mouth is
Speaker 1: as a company and agency affirm whatever it is to
Speaker 1: let people go explore. Because what you said earlier about
Speaker 1: if you're passionate, if you're responsible, if if you're diligous,
Speaker 1: you don't hire people that aren't those things, right, so
Speaker 1: let him go take a trip, bring your whole self
Speaker 1: to the culture back some insight. I agree. What is
Speaker 1: the culture Fund? Yeah, so giant spoon. The Culture Fund
Speaker 1: is this idea that um, every person in the organization
Speaker 1: gets a stipend to basically go out and explore the
Speaker 1: thing that they're passionate about, so long as they come
Speaker 1: back to the table and educate everybody in the agency
Speaker 1: about what that thing is. What do people do? Like
Speaker 1: I used it to go to l a for It
Speaker 1: was a great time to actually go because it was
Speaker 1: the Dwell Design Festival as well as BT Awards weekend. Right,
Speaker 1: And at the time I had my friend Jason Mowatt
Speaker 1: who has Trapp Karaoke early stages of Trapp Karaoke, which
Speaker 1: is now ridiculous. Uh it's HBO you got see. And
Speaker 1: I presented it. I presented it and it was like
Speaker 1: a very much smaller thing at the time and now
Speaker 1: he has an Apple one deal he had. You know,
Speaker 1: it's ridiculous. But when it comes to like exploring new
Speaker 1: experience is or places or recess um, it brings new
Speaker 1: creative energy without a doubt. I mean, I get so
Speaker 1: much inspiration for traveling and seeing new cultures and learning
Speaker 1: about trapped karaoke or like fight ball or this new
Speaker 1: underground boxing like fight club. And it's kind of like
Speaker 1: one couple friends of MAP projects they just had their
Speaker 1: first like fight night. It was I think it's called
Speaker 1: fight Night. It's you should check it out. It's like
Speaker 1: all these amazing new subcultures experiences that I'm telling you
Speaker 1: will spark new ideas for big brands you got. I
Speaker 1: mean you guys, just I see it. Like when you
Speaker 1: guys come to the table and you get to bring
Speaker 1: your whole self. The level of creative energy and ideas
Speaker 1: that come out of that, it's tenfold. It's ten fold.
Speaker 1: When you're not structured in a brief, it is amazing
Speaker 1: the power of what creativity will unlock. I also think
Speaker 1: when you are structured in a brief, when you're thinking
Speaker 1: a certain way because you're allowed, right, you're allowed, and
Speaker 1: you've allowed yourself to think in that way. The other
Speaker 1: great example, right the other day, we were talking to someone,
Speaker 1: Laura and I were at dinner and I was like, well,
Speaker 1: let's be clear, walls don't exist, right, We've we've created walls,
Speaker 1: and we've created them now in institutions, we've created them
Speaker 1: in giant holding companies. All of this, I think goes
Speaker 1: to the fact that you guys have allowed yourself to
Speaker 1: think in different ways, and so even if you're giving
Speaker 1: given something that's structured, the way you see it is different.
Speaker 1: There's what's the quote is like a right drunk at
Speaker 1: it sober and I feel like that that's the name
Speaker 1: of the title Bio actually become Instagram and it's but
Speaker 1: it makes sense, right. What you're talking about is, you know,
Speaker 1: having this recess time, having this you know, uh kind
Speaker 1: of parlor room style brainstorm situation and you go back
Speaker 1: and look at a brief and actually come up with
Speaker 1: structured ideas. So yeah, so just curious before we play
Speaker 1: our favorite Killed by d I y with you guys,
Speaker 1: what is the campaign or ad or brand or something
Speaker 1: in market right now about our industry that you're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: like that that's what needs there needs to be more
Speaker 1: of that. I'm gonna just say my own thing. I
Speaker 1: would say it's the partnership that we did with Spotify
Speaker 1: around the David Bowie is Um Exhibition Museum. Beautiful. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they we did, you know, shout out to Spotify and
Speaker 1: their creative scene. It's ridiculous. But five different you know,
Speaker 1: MetroCard applications from different phases of Bowie's existence are as
Speaker 1: many existences, let's call it. And they were only available
Speaker 1: at the Broadway Lafayette stop. He lived a couple of
Speaker 1: blocks away from there. They did out a home take
Speaker 1: over for a few weeks prior and then wrapped the
Speaker 1: whole station and original photography of Bowie from these different
Speaker 1: eras and um and obviously we we augmented that with
Speaker 1: our own paid media, but them as a partners just ridiculous,
Speaker 1: you know. And you know they got ad Week, We've
Speaker 1: got fast co write ups on it, and it just
Speaker 1: made sense, like people were waiting just on eBay. It
Speaker 1: was only bay within hours of being Yeah, the metro
Speaker 1: cards up on eBay. My girlfriend's dad's like, where's my
Speaker 1: metro card? Every day I come over there, where's my
Speaker 1: metro card? So that lets me know it works. But
Speaker 1: you created that link, you created that partnership between the
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Museum and Spotify, Right, it just made sense that, well,
Speaker 1: that's the whole thing, right, Like the magic, the magic
Speaker 1: is also in the logic, right, the magic is in
Speaker 1: the logic partnership. It was like David Bowie music Icon,
Speaker 1: where do people listen to music? But then but then
Speaker 1: how you guys brought it to life together with genius. Yeah.
Speaker 1: My answer, I think is a little different because I
Speaker 1: think for the last year and a half I've been
Speaker 1: I haven't been looking up at out of homes. Um.
Speaker 1: I think my world is completely changed. The people I
Speaker 1: follow on Instagram, it's so funny. I have conversation with
Speaker 1: with with girl friends of mine. They're like, why do
Speaker 1: you know so much about beauty brands? Like I follow
Speaker 1: every beauty brand under the sun because I want Oral
Speaker 1: care to be a beauty category. Um. And I think
Speaker 1: when I look at what brands are doing an amazing
Speaker 1: job in building community and culture. Like I'm not looking
Speaker 1: at out a home like maybe once in a blue
Speaker 1: moon it'll strike me. But I look at what Marianna
Speaker 1: Hewett's doing with Summer Friday. Um. She created um a
Speaker 1: mask that's called the jet Lag Mask, and it's a
Speaker 1: face moisturizer. When it comes, it's one product and one tube.
Speaker 1: It's got a cool blue color. And if you check
Speaker 1: out their Instagram, you see how overnight they created a
Speaker 1: cult community. I mean Marianna Hewett is a huge blogger,
Speaker 1: very influential, and you know when it comes to beauty products,
Speaker 1: she's a absolute like she just gets it um. But
Speaker 1: everything they do day in and day out, like I
Speaker 1: want to use this product every day, like I want
Speaker 1: to be part of this community. They're like sure, they
Speaker 1: they epitomize such a specific person and I think it's
Speaker 1: every you know, hustling millennial today. It's like you're always
Speaker 1: on the road, like jet lag is every day. But
Speaker 1: I don't really care if I'm jet lag cause I'm
Speaker 1: still going to go crush this day. And like they
Speaker 1: created this whole world that like you just want to
Speaker 1: fall into. So kill by d I what you guys
Speaker 1: know we do this right? Okay? So what would you kill?
Speaker 1: It's like kill Mary, what would you kill? What would
Speaker 1: you buy? What would you do? Yourself? Up? Brands? You pick,
Speaker 1: you pick and you cannot use twice. Let's kill pre
Speaker 1: roll ads on YouTube? Okay, all right, what are you killing?
Speaker 1: I would kill overspending on direct consumer marketing. I think
Speaker 1: I see Away Luggage and I see rate In right,
Speaker 1: Like both have competitive products. They both market the hell
Speaker 1: out of their brand, but one is created an incredible
Speaker 1: community that is taking them above the rest. And um,
Speaker 1: I just I heard that you know Away is killing
Speaker 1: it and rate in despite the facade. My you know,
Speaker 1: they're not doing too well financially. So I think, um,
Speaker 1: there's a there's a facade created around brands that throw
Speaker 1: money in subway ads and and traditional at home is like, Hey,
Speaker 1: I'm the new direction consumer brand of X y Z,
Speaker 1: and you know, I'm building a brand in that space
Speaker 1: objection tower. But I want to do it organically, and
Speaker 1: I don't want to overspend on traditional world of marketing
Speaker 1: as a new brand, So I would kill that. Okay,
Speaker 1: are you buying? I would buy the organic foods category.
Speaker 1: I think I see the whole thing. Yeah, I'm gung
Speaker 1: ho on it all. I see, Um, what's the company
Speaker 1: that sends you the cans of Daily Harvest? Like Daily
Speaker 1: Harvest has made it so easy to be healthy, and
Speaker 1: I think it's a beautiful thing as an entrepreneur, as
Speaker 1: a young person in the city, like hustling their way,
Speaker 1: Like eating healthy is important, right, Like I think mind, body, soul,
Speaker 1: everything works together when you feel good. And like those brands,
Speaker 1: I think I look too to say like, hey, they're
Speaker 1: going to help you as a person. Um, and maybe
Speaker 1: that gets back to like a purpose driven brand. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm buying everyone tickets to the Rockaway Beach to go
Speaker 1: do silent retreats. Yeah, I'm in. It's actually pay with you,
Speaker 1: so you know I don't even have to buy it.
Speaker 1: Thanks Tom, that's a great gift. What are you doing
Speaker 1: yourself other than the amazing businesses you're building? Yeah, Um,
Speaker 1: this is one of my biggest pet peeves. It's not
Speaker 1: like a brand or thing, but um, traveling right t
Speaker 1: s A pre check is a great thing. I don't
Speaker 1: have it. You're going to do clear? I have to,
Speaker 1: but every time I like, I totally forget and it's
Speaker 1: a whole pain. Is there like a watch like rental
Speaker 1: company thing that's going on? Because I like wearing watches,
Speaker 1: but I don't like buying watches, Like could I just
Speaker 1: pay a subscription fee and get a dope watch like
Speaker 1: every three weeks? I would put money that that exists.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen it. And that's myself to actually do
Speaker 1: one between friends, you can change. I think we just created.
Speaker 1: Let's create something that one that's perfect. Guys, if people
Speaker 1: want to talk to you get inspiration from you. How
Speaker 1: can they get in touch with you? Um, Cody Hat
Speaker 1: Smile twice dot com is my email. UM, I'm also
Speaker 1: lavicy on Instagram l V I c I. You'll see
Speaker 1: the best overalls at burning Man by far. That's what
Speaker 1: I wanted to use my culture fund. By the way,
Speaker 1: as you can find me at mikey seven eight Underscore
Speaker 1: are the Culture LP And what's the text number for
Speaker 1: The text number is three four seven six nine oh
Speaker 1: seven six seven seven. So you want to get down
Speaker 1: with cool things that are happening that you don't know
Speaker 1: about texts in New York. In New York, Brooklyn's were
Speaker 1: cool stuff happens. But yeah, because somebody who's from Jersey.
Speaker 1: So Cody Been, we love you, Mike Tongue, we love you,
Speaker 1: Thank you for coming. Happy Memorial Day everyone. Those guys,
Speaker 1: I mean, the Inner Huth and Sing I just love
Speaker 1: what they're doing, the kind of risk that they've gone
Speaker 1: out to live their true selves and chase their passions
Speaker 1: and turn it into their purpose, and it's just it's unbelievable.
Speaker 1: One of the things that when we were talking about
Speaker 1: having these guys on, we were like, who represents everyone
Speaker 1: that can go out and burst right, you were special.
Speaker 1: These guys are special, but like also, there are millions
Speaker 1: Mike Tongs and Cody Levine's out there. We're sitting at
Speaker 1: their desk going, I want to work on everything right.
Speaker 1: It was so good, so big inspiration and big inspirations
Speaker 1: for us because we're definitely not under third inption anymore.
Speaker 1: Big thanks to our friends and family, Apanaly, Andy Bowers,
Speaker 1: Matt Turk, and Jacob Weisberg. We'll be back in two weeks.
Speaker 1: Happy summer everyone. Full disclosure, our opinions, our our own