Speaker 1: Episode one seventy three, The Financial and Environmental Benefit of
Speaker 1: a Circular Economy with Ron Gonan. Welcome to the Frugal
Speaker 1: Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity rights,
Speaker 1: and liver with your life. Here your host Jen and Jill.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast.
Speaker 1: My name is Jen, my name is Jill, and we
Speaker 1: are really really excited, more so than normal to bring
Speaker 1: you this interview because I don't think there's ever been
Speaker 1: a guest we've had on that aligns so perfectly with
Speaker 1: how we see the intersection of finance and sustainability. Again,
Speaker 1: we're just taking it to the next level, I think,
Speaker 1: and hearing from Ron, He's got so much knowledge about sustainability,
Speaker 1: but on the macro level. I know, we talked about
Speaker 1: a lot on the micro level, So this is such
Speaker 1: an important conversation and I think there's so much more
Speaker 1: to be said. We're just scratching the surface, but really
Speaker 1: excited to kind of venture into this topic for I
Speaker 1: believe the first time in our over three years of podcastings.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's kind of hard. You kind of feel
Speaker 1: like you're recycling. That was a pun. The content about
Speaker 1: finance and sustainability because I feel like there's only so
Speaker 1: much to say, but Ron Gonan really does take it
Speaker 1: up a level and bring some fresh perspective and so
Speaker 1: we're very excited to share this episode. But first our sponsors.
Speaker 1: This episode is also brought to you by the Society
Speaker 1: of Unknown Recyclables. Pizza boxes, carpet, batteries. Can you recycle them?
Speaker 1: No one knows, well, fear not the good people at
Speaker 1: the Society of Unknown Recyclables. No pizza boxes, rip up
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Speaker 1: Batteries some recycling centers actually take them. Check with yours
Speaker 1: Here at s O you Are or SOUR for short.
Speaker 1: Our goal is to tell you if that thing can
Speaker 1: be recycled or not. The Society of Unknown Recyclables literally
Speaker 1: just here to tell you to google it. Wall I
Speaker 1: learned so much, I laughed a little and now I'm
Speaker 1: close to crying, which tells me that was a good journey.
Speaker 1: But also, is this a real thing? Or you literally
Speaker 1: just have to google? Okay, google it. Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Some cities are different, like some things you can some
Speaker 1: things you can change. A real problem that I have,
Speaker 1: and uh, the solution is google it, Google Google area.
Speaker 1: You just gotta google it. So that is an intro,
Speaker 1: a little warm up to our conversation today with Ron Going.
Speaker 1: And he's the CEO of Closed Loop Partners, which is
Speaker 1: the first investment firm dedicated entirely to financing companies that
Speaker 1: solve linear problems with circular solutions. So you're gonna learn
Speaker 1: what the circular economy is. You know what the linear
Speaker 1: economy is, which is the economy we are currently on.
Speaker 1: And I know we don't want to get like super
Speaker 1: like let's study economics, but it is super important to
Speaker 1: know what economics is. So I just want to read
Speaker 1: you this a little easy to understand definition. It's from
Speaker 1: the cusp Um and it says, our desire for stuff
Speaker 1: is endless. Stuff is not endless. So economics is the
Speaker 1: study of how we make, distribute, and consume stuff that
Speaker 1: is in limited supply. So it involves money, but it's
Speaker 1: not about money, if that makes sense. It's about the
Speaker 1: invisible forces that influence how we use the money to
Speaker 1: buy and sell the stuff. And so while we will
Speaker 1: hear a lot in this conversation about how to save money.
Speaker 1: We always want to include that nerve episodes. Some of
Speaker 1: this it's higher level, and so some of it does
Speaker 1: involve maybe spending money to save money in the long run,
Speaker 1: but maybe not even for yourself, maybe just for the future.
Speaker 1: And yeah, maybe saving money in ways that don't actually
Speaker 1: directly benefit you. So it is important to at least
Speaker 1: have a familiarity with economics and economies how economies work,
Speaker 1: so that you can better understand your place in the economy.
Speaker 1: Thank you, so, without further ado, thank you for coming
Speaker 1: to my ted talk. Here is Ron Gonan. Welcome run
Speaker 1: to the Frugal Friends podcast. So happy to have you
Speaker 1: here to be with you today. We couldn't be more
Speaker 1: enthused about this topic and we know that it's going
Speaker 1: to be something that our listeners are very excited to
Speaker 1: hear about learn more about. I think this conversation is
Speaker 1: taking us to the next level of understanding and awareness
Speaker 1: and then actionable steps. So thank you, thank you for
Speaker 1: sharing your knowledge with us today. Absolutely so, Ron, can
Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit about yourself? What is
Speaker 1: the circular economy? What got you interested or even passionate
Speaker 1: about this way of approaching economics and sustainability. Sure. So
Speaker 1: today I'm the founder and CEA of Closed Loop Partners.
Speaker 1: Closed Loop Partners is a investment firm an innovation center
Speaker 1: focused on building the circular economy. And what we mean
Speaker 1: by the circular economy is developing manufacturing systems where you're
Speaker 1: able to manufacture of the products that we all want
Speaker 1: without a dependence on natural resource extraction for manufacturing those
Speaker 1: products or the disposal and landfill of those products. Those
Speaker 1: are the two most expensive parts of the economy of
Speaker 1: manufacturing products, is the extraction natural resource and the disposal
Speaker 1: and landfill, not the actual manufacturing of the product. And
Speaker 1: if we can eliminate those two parts of the system
Speaker 1: natural resource extraction, disposal and landfill, we're going to significantly
Speaker 1: cut costs and protect our environment. So that's uh what
Speaker 1: I do today and the area that I'm passionate about.
Speaker 1: How did you get involved with this ron? How did
Speaker 1: you decide this is what I really want to focus
Speaker 1: in on and even to start Closed Loop Partners or
Speaker 1: be the CEO of it. I was very fortunate. When
Speaker 1: I was in high school. My first job was working
Speaker 1: for one of the screen architects in America, and through
Speaker 1: his eyes and his experiences, I got to see first
Speaker 1: what it means to go against the grain, so to speak,
Speaker 1: because he was really one of the first and blazing
Speaker 1: a trail. And I also learned about all of these
Speaker 1: principles around sustainable design very early on in my life,
Speaker 1: and it just intuitively seemed to make sense to me,
Speaker 1: and that really got me started on a career that
Speaker 1: I've been very fortunate to have focused on sustainable business
Speaker 1: practices and maximizing financial returns. This topic excites me so
Speaker 1: much because when when my eyes are open to it,
Speaker 1: when I have conversations like this, or I have opportunity
Speaker 1: to watch shows that are focused on sustainability and you're
Speaker 1: identifying architectural design and it it does. It bleeds into
Speaker 1: an intersect with all aspects of our life. There's such
Speaker 1: a problem solving component to it and creativity that I
Speaker 1: don't know if this is common, but I feel it's
Speaker 1: pretty common amongst humanity that there's something that draws us
Speaker 1: to that. But we don't necessarily know that this is
Speaker 1: something that we should be problem solving or utilizing our
Speaker 1: creative juices about. And yet I hear so many people
Speaker 1: complaining about plastic, right if it's the toys that their
Speaker 1: kids use, or how much plastic is just around their house,
Speaker 1: and how there's trash everywhere. Okay, well, there's also a
Speaker 1: component to what can we do about that. This doesn't
Speaker 1: just have to happen to you. There's something that can
Speaker 1: be done. And you even talking about, oh, there's there's
Speaker 1: ways that we can be selling products without extracting natural resources.
Speaker 1: I just want to hear so much more. Are there
Speaker 1: any overarching basics of what you can say regarding how
Speaker 1: we can go about doing this aiming at a circular
Speaker 1: economy not extracting so much natural resources. Tell us about
Speaker 1: the problem solving and the creativity. Sure. The first thing
Speaker 1: that's really important for people to recognize is that while
Speaker 1: recycling is absolutely a major benefit for protecting our environment,
Speaker 1: it's not the only reason why you should be recycling.
Speaker 1: The other reason why you should be recycling is it
Speaker 1: means that your city doesn't have to pay two stick
Speaker 1: your waste in a hole called a landfill. Unfortunately, the
Speaker 1: way our sanitation system was designed in the United States
Speaker 1: post and this was intentional to hide numbers and costs
Speaker 1: from the general public to the benefit of certain industries.
Speaker 1: The cost of disposing of waste and landfills. It's buried
Speaker 1: in our tax bill. It's not priced like other utilities
Speaker 1: like water or electricity. It's just a cost that's embedded
Speaker 1: in our tax bill. And we have no idea how
Speaker 1: much are we actually spending and who are we paying
Speaker 1: all of this money too. And so the first thing
Speaker 1: that's really important for people to understand is that when
Speaker 1: you recycle, when you reduce, you reduce the amount that
Speaker 1: your municipality uses your tax dollars for disposing of material
Speaker 1: in landfill. And that's a really important thing to anchor
Speaker 1: everybody on. Yeah, I know you talk in your book
Speaker 1: about using New York City as an example of the
Speaker 1: way that they approach waste and the burden that it
Speaker 1: is on the city, but also surrounding states, like they
Speaker 1: have to cross Tate lines to take trash to what
Speaker 1: North Carolina, even as far south as North Carolina. So interestingly,
Speaker 1: New York City has probably the most robust recycling and
Speaker 1: circular economy infrastructure in the United States. So we're the
Speaker 1: only city in America where the cardboard boxes that recycled
Speaker 1: in New York City actually get turned back into cardboard
Speaker 1: boxes in New York City and put back into the system,
Speaker 1: which is a great example of a way for the
Speaker 1: city to reduce disposal costs, generate revenue because it gets
Speaker 1: guaranteed payments for its recycled cardboard, and create a lot
Speaker 1: of local jobs. But New York City, even with the
Speaker 1: best recycling infrastructure in the country, could still do a
Speaker 1: better job recycling. And the material that doesn't get recycled
Speaker 1: has to go to landfill, and New York City doesn't
Speaker 1: have any landfills, and so it ships its ways to
Speaker 1: landfills in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and South Carolina. And so if
Speaker 1: you live in those three states, you're effectively the dumping
Speaker 1: ground for New York City's garbage. And there's private companies
Speaker 1: in your state that make a lot of money off
Speaker 1: of using your land to dispose of New York City's garbage.
Speaker 1: And oftentimes, if you're stuck on the highway behind a
Speaker 1: big eighteen wheeler and you think to yourself, well, at
Speaker 1: least that's American commerce and the American economy and goods
Speaker 1: being transferred around the country. In many cases, it may
Speaker 1: just be garbage that's being moved around from one city
Speaker 1: to another state to find landfill space. That's insane. We
Speaker 1: so often everybody forgets about taxes. They think taxes are
Speaker 1: just something they can't change, they'll always pay, so they
Speaker 1: never think about, like, how can I effectively lower my
Speaker 1: tax burden? And this is actually one thing you can
Speaker 1: tangibly do. Like I know some people complain about like, oh,
Speaker 1: recycling is expensive for our city, and like nobody talks
Speaker 1: about how expensive landfills are for the city. Absolutely, and
Speaker 1: that's that's intentional. There's a phenomenal marketing campaign that for
Speaker 1: decades was driven by the extractive industries and the landfill
Speaker 1: industries to hide the cost of extraction and hide the
Speaker 1: cost of disposal. And that's eats its way into the press.
Speaker 1: So I'll oftentimes get calls from the press and they'll say, well,
Speaker 1: the city just signed a contract to recycle and they're
Speaker 1: gonna have to pay forty a ton to recycle. What
Speaker 1: is your answer when people say why shouldn't we recycle?
Speaker 1: It costs four dollars a ton? And I say to
Speaker 1: the reporter, have you looked at how much it would
Speaker 1: cost to landfill those recyclables? And more often than not,
Speaker 1: the reporter hasn't looked up that information at all, because
Speaker 1: they've been pitched on the story by landfill other haters
Speaker 1: who have invested interests in creating this perception that there's
Speaker 1: a zero sum game either you pay forty dollars to
Speaker 1: recycle or do you snap your fingers and it all
Speaker 1: just magically disappears. And invariably what happens is I tell
Speaker 1: the reporter go back and find out what are the
Speaker 1: landfill disposal fees, and oftentimes come back we go, oh,
Speaker 1: that's interesting. The landfill disposal fees are fifty five dollars
Speaker 1: or sixty five dollars or eighty dollars, and say, so,
Speaker 1: that means that if you don't a forty dollars to
Speaker 1: recycle and potentially get the revenue share that's in most
Speaker 1: recycling contracts, which can completely eliminate that that forty dollar
Speaker 1: thing create a revenue source. If you don't do that,
Speaker 1: if you just say, hey, I'm not going to recycle
Speaker 1: my throwe in the garbage, you will pay that instead
Speaker 1: sixty seventy or eighty dollar Tipically, Now, what was your
Speaker 1: question again about is it worth it their recycle? And
Speaker 1: they're kind of like, yeah, I don't really have much
Speaker 1: of an article here do I go, um, you have
Speaker 1: a new article. But it is is the United States
Speaker 1: spends billions of dollars a year of taxpayer money to
Speaker 1: subsidize extractive industry. So if you think about the oil
Speaker 1: and gas industry, which is where virgin plastic comes from,
Speaker 1: for decades, they've gotten billions in federal and state tax subsidies.
Speaker 1: People oftentimes will say to me, well, if we let
Speaker 1: capitalism work, recycled plastic, if it were less expensive than
Speaker 1: virgin plastic, everyone would be used. You know, I say,
Speaker 1: I agree with you. Let's let capitalism work. Let's allow
Speaker 1: the free market to see who's cheaper. Unfortunately, if we
Speaker 1: continue to use federal and state tax dollars to subsidize
Speaker 1: the oil and gas companies, we're not allowing capitalism to work.
Speaker 1: We're not allowing the free market to work. We're behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, unbeknownst to a lot of taxpayers and consumers,
Speaker 1: subsidizing UH an industry that's actually harmful for our health
Speaker 1: and environment. And the same thing, we're spending billions of
Speaker 1: dollars then sending stuff to landfill, and that cost oftentimes
Speaker 1: is not transparent to taxpayers. Yeah, so in your book.
Speaker 1: So there's the circular economy, which is what we want
Speaker 1: to move closer towards, which is like make use, reuse, remake, recycle,
Speaker 1: But we're currently on the linear economy, which is take,
Speaker 1: make use, disposed, pollute. Is there any other ways that
Speaker 1: the linear economy is costing us that we don't know about? Well,
Speaker 1: the two clearest ways that the linear economy costs money
Speaker 1: is you're paying to extract natural resources to manufacture when
Speaker 1: you could just be using recycled material. It's much less
Speaker 1: expensive use recycled material verge. And the other obvious way
Speaker 1: it's costing us money is the disposing of Protestant landfill.
Speaker 1: The less obvious ways are all of this extraction of
Speaker 1: natural resources, it harms our environment and that causes pollution,
Speaker 1: It causes health issues. The transportation of all of this
Speaker 1: waste to landfills causes huge amounts of pollution with these
Speaker 1: trucks rolling around, but it also damages our roads and highways.
Speaker 1: These are eighteen wheelers rolling around our highways causing a
Speaker 1: lot of damage and it's completely unnecessary. So there's some
Speaker 1: very clear direct cost, and then there's a number of
Speaker 1: externalities as well that that cost is borne by the
Speaker 1: average citizen, And the element of what I would call
Speaker 1: severe unfairness is that if you do a great job recycling,
Speaker 1: or you do a great job reusing, your tax burden
Speaker 1: is very love. You're not really sending anything to landfill.
Speaker 1: But if your neighbor is somebody that says, I don't
Speaker 1: care about any of this stuff, I'm lazy, I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna throw everything in the garbage. The way are just
Speaker 1: in a structure today is your tax dollars will be
Speaker 1: partially used to pay for the disposal of their items
Speaker 1: and landfill, because the way we're structured is everybody just
Speaker 1: kind of shares in the cost of disposal, and that's
Speaker 1: completely unfair. Yeah, there's been some I know we're talking
Speaker 1: a lot about trash, and that's a lot. That's a
Speaker 1: lot of what this is about. But I know that
Speaker 1: there are some cities who will approach it and that
Speaker 1: you purchase a bag, trash has to go in that bag.
Speaker 1: So then you're only paying for however many trash bags, which, yeah,
Speaker 1: that seems a bit more just for I'm going to
Speaker 1: pay for the amount of waste that I actually use.
Speaker 1: But I think it seems to me as though when
Speaker 1: we talk about the linear economy, that's what we're talking about.
Speaker 1: We're talking about trash and how it's just easy you
Speaker 1: you mentioned being yeah, I'm just lazy. It's the easiest
Speaker 1: route and the way it's set up, that's the path
Speaker 1: of least resistance, such as buy it, use it once,
Speaker 1: throw it away. But when we talk about a circular economy,
Speaker 1: there's a whole lot more involved in that that I
Speaker 1: think touches on a lot more aspects of our personhood
Speaker 1: and lifestyles. That is more creative, does engage with more
Speaker 1: problem solving, and there's a lot more components to explore
Speaker 1: versus just the trash that happens in a linear economy.
Speaker 1: The end of life of the product is the last
Speaker 1: point in the chain, and what we want to think
Speaker 1: about from the beginning of the chain is material sign
Speaker 1: Can we come up with new types of materials that
Speaker 1: don't involve any extraction? And then can we use product
Speaker 1: design to design products and solutions that use less material
Speaker 1: So I'll give you a couple of examples so to stream,
Speaker 1: I'll use that example first because they're not a portfolio
Speaker 1: company of ours, So we can rag on them. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: I mean, but you want to think that I'm just
Speaker 1: sort of promoting what are my companies neutral? Neutral? So
Speaker 1: let's let's take so to Stream as an example. Soda
Speaker 1: Stream is a great example of innovation and entrepreneurship where
Speaker 1: a system was developed where if you want great tasting seltzer,
Speaker 1: you can get great tasting seltzer without all of the packaging.
Speaker 1: You can just make the seltzer at home with one bottle.
Speaker 1: So that's a good example of product design where you're
Speaker 1: actually providing additional convenience to the customer, you're helping them
Speaker 1: reduce costs, and you're preserving our natural resources and the environment.
Speaker 1: So that's a good example of innovative prop design that
Speaker 1: got to scare. Yeah. I love how you talk about
Speaker 1: sustainability as being profitable because so often we think of
Speaker 1: it as you have to sacrifice profitability for sustainability, or
Speaker 1: you have to spend more in order to be sustainable.
Speaker 1: But that is I mean, that myth is getting debunked,
Speaker 1: that that myth is a hoax that decade was perpetuated
Speaker 1: by the fossil fuel industry, the landfill industry to make
Speaker 1: people think that yeah, you can go be sustainable, but
Speaker 1: it's going to cost us money. Now, behind the scenes,
Speaker 1: the fossil fuel industry was getting federal and state tax subsidence.
Speaker 1: It was a complete hoax, is a complete hoax. It's
Speaker 1: much less expensive to live us sustainable, less off and actually,
Speaker 1: if you look back pre and this is one of
Speaker 1: the things that cover in the book, all of the
Speaker 1: marketing that we got in the United States was focused
Speaker 1: on two things, quality over quantity. Quality over quantity, and
Speaker 1: the recycling of our paper, metal, glass, and plastic as
Speaker 1: a patriotic duty. Because if you have to abstract natural resources,
Speaker 1: you're harming land in the US. But also if you
Speaker 1: end up being dependent on natural resources from foreign countries,
Speaker 1: especially if they're not friendly to us, that's not really
Speaker 1: good for our national defense. And so that's what you
Speaker 1: saw pre Quality over quantity and recycling as a patriotic post.
Speaker 1: There was a concern an effort by some major industries
Speaker 1: to change that messaging that people saw, and the messaging
Speaker 1: in the nineteen fifties and sixties changed from it's about
Speaker 1: quality to your status is directly connected to just how
Speaker 1: much stuff you have. It doesn't matter if it's like
Speaker 1: good stuff it's gonna lasting long time. It's just about
Speaker 1: how much stuff you have. And it went to, hey,
Speaker 1: don't worry about recycling like you just put it out
Speaker 1: and it'll all just disappear, and we'll make you think
Speaker 1: it it's all free to have to go away. And
Speaker 1: it's a complete it's a complete hoax that unfortunately a
Speaker 1: lot of a few industries made a lot of money
Speaker 1: off the back of taxpayers and consumers. But living a
Speaker 1: sustainable life, it's much healthier for you and your family, um,
Speaker 1: and you're gonna save a lot of money. It is
Speaker 1: quite striking to see the change that you've pointed out
Speaker 1: in just seventy years, Like nineteen fifty was not that
Speaker 1: long ago, and we used to Americans have a reduced reuse, repurpose,
Speaker 1: be creative with your resources, be good stewards of it.
Speaker 1: And and then that switch that has happened. And I
Speaker 1: think many of us, you know, might claim, oh, I'm
Speaker 1: not victim to advertising, but really, my goodness, in seventy
Speaker 1: years the shift that you have described, and how many
Speaker 1: of us have bought into that and haven't even thought
Speaker 1: twice about the way that we utilize products. This is
Speaker 1: just how it is. We use things once and we
Speaker 1: throw it away, and even the potential of manufacturers making
Speaker 1: things intended to break like quality isn't I mean, I
Speaker 1: hear my grandparents saying they don't make it luck that
Speaker 1: us and something that you have the stories in your book,
Speaker 1: Like I was shocked when I was reading some of
Speaker 1: the intentional stories of early manufacturers, like the light bulb
Speaker 1: people getting together with their competitors ensuring that everybody creates
Speaker 1: light bulbs that will not last past two thousand hours.
Speaker 1: Then then you got to buy more light bulbs, and
Speaker 1: knowing that there's still like there's a video camera on
Speaker 1: a light bulb that's been been shining for what like
Speaker 1: a hundred years or something, and the light bulb has
Speaker 1: outlasted three webcams the people. That's that's absolutely true. And
Speaker 1: that's an example that I use in a book because
Speaker 1: I thought that would be an example that everybody could
Speaker 1: relate to, because everyone has the experience of every year
Speaker 1: a lightbulb going dead, you gotta changed the light bulb,
Speaker 1: and so and so forth, and so you read about
Speaker 1: the reality that the original light bulbs over a hundred
Speaker 1: years ago, we're capable of maintaining themselves for years. But
Speaker 1: the light bulb manufacturers realized, but wish. Second, if we
Speaker 1: make light bulbs that last for years, that's going to
Speaker 1: cut into our profits. If we make light bulbs that
Speaker 1: run out after a certain amount of time, people will
Speaker 1: have to spend money to buy more. That was an
Speaker 1: example I used in the book because I thought it
Speaker 1: was something everybody could relate. Unfortunately, there's dozens of stories
Speaker 1: like that. A more modern story is, let's look at
Speaker 1: a lot of the smartphone technology that we have. Smartphones
Speaker 1: are amazing. I'm in my forties. When I was a teenager,
Speaker 1: so just you know, a little over twenty years ago,
Speaker 1: if somebody tried to describe a smartphone, people were thought
Speaker 1: you were out of your mind, like you were talking
Speaker 1: super futuristic type scenarios. So the designers and developers of smartphones,
Speaker 1: these are incredibly brilliant people. It's hard for me to
Speaker 1: believe that they're brilliance ends at the ability to develop
Speaker 1: something that can't always just use the same charger, right,
Speaker 1: It's always the charger. It's always the charger. You're just
Speaker 1: happened with my phone last night? Yeah, it's like you're
Speaker 1: telling me that this amazing iPhone or sam some phone
Speaker 1: that you developed. It can take pictures, I can watch movies,
Speaker 1: I can watch sports on it, I can do email,
Speaker 1: I can do all of this amazing stuff. But you
Speaker 1: couldn't figure out how the next version of it uses
Speaker 1: the same charger as the previous one. That's intentional. That's
Speaker 1: a revenue generating opportunity to just get you to buy
Speaker 1: another charger. That's the kind of stuff that we need
Speaker 1: to start stripping out of our manufacturing systems and our
Speaker 1: society because it's pushing costs onto the consumer that shouldn't
Speaker 1: be there, and it's pushing disposal of products that are
Speaker 1: completely necessary. Those chargers that don't work anymore on phones
Speaker 1: have to be thrown out. Those companies aren't taking a
Speaker 1: responsibility for picking them up and throwing them out on
Speaker 1: their dime. Their things that you consumer, You sity, you
Speaker 1: figure it out, and that's uh, that's not an efficient system. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Another thing that I've on shocking from the book was
Speaker 1: the concept of obsolescence by desire. So like that wasn't
Speaker 1: like manufacturing goods. That break wasn't good enough for manufacturers,
Speaker 1: it wasn't fast enough, So then they turned to advertising
Speaker 1: to make people think they needed new stuff, and that
Speaker 1: was so much quicker, and I think that's something I mean,
Speaker 1: that's the main thing that we talked about on this
Speaker 1: show is to not be like tricked by that, but
Speaker 1: to read it was crazy. So your your listeners that
Speaker 1: may have been fans of mad Men, mm hmm, this
Speaker 1: is actually what the show was about. Right, post World
Speaker 1: War Two, this advertising industry grew exponentially. There's always been advertising,
Speaker 1: but post World War Two, this industry grew exponentially. And
Speaker 1: the whole focus of that show is how do we
Speaker 1: hawk this product? How do we spin a story to
Speaker 1: make the consumer believe that their personal status is directly
Speaker 1: connected to owning this product. And what you find interesting
Speaker 1: about mad Men is there's not a lot of satisfaction
Speaker 1: in the characters on the show. That the show isn't
Speaker 1: full of people who go, Wow, I come in at
Speaker 1: work every day and I get the hot products, whether
Speaker 1: or not I believe in the product or not. I mean,
Speaker 1: my focus is really only I got to convince someone
Speaker 1: else that they absolutely need this product. Wow. I'm just
Speaker 1: I just feel so personally fulfilled. That's not that's not
Speaker 1: the story, right, They're all strugg like what am I doing?
Speaker 1: But that's effectively would happen in the in the nineties
Speaker 1: is we started moving our economy towards one of we
Speaker 1: just need to maintain this massive industry we've built around
Speaker 1: the World War Two, which was really important industry. It
Speaker 1: helped us win the war, but it really should have
Speaker 1: been unwound or focused more on parts of the economy
Speaker 1: that actually benefit citizens. Unfortunately, it transitioned itself into one
Speaker 1: of like, make as much stuff as possible and just
Speaker 1: hawk the hell out of it. Yeah, like, you just
Speaker 1: had a really couple tough here do you deserve literally
Speaker 1: all the stuff? And I think we've brought that mindset
Speaker 1: for the last seventy years. You're going, you know, life
Speaker 1: is hard, you deserve stuff. I mean, that's the mindset
Speaker 1: we live by. And what and what psychologists have shown
Speaker 1: us is that what makes you happy isn't lots of stuff.
Speaker 1: What makes you happy is your family and relationships, your
Speaker 1: your your friendships, and the satisfaction you get out of
Speaker 1: what you do for a living. How much you have,
Speaker 1: it's not core to your happiness. Everybody likes nice things,
Speaker 1: but the nice part of it is the key, which
Speaker 1: is what you should be focusing on is As a consumer,
Speaker 1: I want quality. I something that looks good, it feels good,
Speaker 1: it lasts long time. When I no longer want it,
Speaker 1: because I know that it was made well and designed
Speaker 1: with a certain aesthetic, I'll be able to sell it
Speaker 1: to somebody else and recoup some of the value. And
Speaker 1: if my aesthetic has changed, or I just my lifestyle
Speaker 1: has changed, I'll go out and get something else that's
Speaker 1: again designed well, high quality materials, so and so forth.
Speaker 1: When we talk about consumerism, that's what we should be
Speaker 1: talking about. Not the route to my happiness is just
Speaker 1: how much stuff I have, whether or not it was
Speaker 1: made well or not, and how cheap can I get it?
Speaker 1: How can I get it? The question like how cheap
Speaker 1: can I get it? You also have to think about,
Speaker 1: like what kind of person do I want to be?
Speaker 1: Because if you're buying a four dollar T shirt, that
Speaker 1: means that there's somebody someplace in the world that was
Speaker 1: paid so little to make that sure that that company
Speaker 1: could get the cotton, make the shirt transported to the
Speaker 1: store for you to buy it. That means somebody was
Speaker 1: paid so little that you were able to get it
Speaker 1: for four dos. So you have to just also have
Speaker 1: to just think about like what kind of person do
Speaker 1: I want to be and and what kind of system
Speaker 1: do I want to participate in? And if I saw
Speaker 1: the making this, like how would I feel about it?
Speaker 1: And how well am I going to care for something
Speaker 1: that I only spent four dollars on? When am I
Speaker 1: going to need another four dollar shirt probably in a
Speaker 1: month from now? Yeah, exactly right? And then and then
Speaker 1: it gets it, Then it gets thrown out right and
Speaker 1: you got to go to landfill. And you know, we
Speaker 1: we have a weird sense of patriotism in America where
Speaker 1: we'll say things like American made. We want manufacturing in
Speaker 1: the US, but when I go to the store, I
Speaker 1: want the cheapest thing possible, which obviously means it it's
Speaker 1: got to get made someplace where there's no lay for lass.
Speaker 1: So we have this weird sense of patriotism in America
Speaker 1: where we espouse certain values, but we're not willing to
Speaker 1: pay for those values. And and that's a challenge I
Speaker 1: think as a society we need to overcome and understand,
Speaker 1: you know, the ramifications of of that and how it's
Speaker 1: all interconnected. When when you have somebody who can barely
Speaker 1: survive working in a factory and a developing country making
Speaker 1: our key shirts. What they're gonna ultimately try to do
Speaker 1: is they're going to try to get to America uh
Speaker 1: and and make a better life for themselves. So if
Speaker 1: you want to solve the immigration issue in the US,
Speaker 1: think about who's making your products and how poorly they're
Speaker 1: being treated, and create a motivation for them to to
Speaker 1: stay with their in their home and their family where
Speaker 1: they want to be by giving them a livable weight.
Speaker 1: I did. I didn't even think about that, Mike drop Roun. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: So let's talk about some like some actionable tips, like
Speaker 1: what are um because most waste is created I think
Speaker 1: it's created at the manufacturing level, if I've heard that right, So,
Speaker 1: like we're not the manufacturers. We can do what we can,
Speaker 1: but like, what are the most significant things we can
Speaker 1: do to promote a circular economy, like whether at home
Speaker 1: or urging companies to change. It's a great question, and
Speaker 1: different people have different interests. So I'm going to give
Speaker 1: a few things that people can do depending on what
Speaker 1: their intuests are. So, if you're somebody that's very active politically,
Speaker 1: great opportunity to go to your local political officials and
Speaker 1: say how much are we spending on landfills? I want
Speaker 1: to know what why are my tax dollars being used
Speaker 1: to send all this material to landfills? Like, there's lots
Speaker 1: of examples of cities and communities around the country und
Speaker 1: the world that robust recycling systems where this material is
Speaker 1: getting collected and process and sold. So if you're someone
Speaker 1: who is interested in politics, get engaged around this issue
Speaker 1: of we should be manufacturing in the United States. We
Speaker 1: have all of these commodities through the products we have UH,
Speaker 1: and we don't want to be sending things to landfill anymore.
Speaker 1: And the good news is there's a lot of bipartisan
Speaker 1: initiatives right now focused on building circular economy and recycling search.
Speaker 1: So that's something you can do if you're interested in
Speaker 1: in politics. If you just somebody at home wanting to
Speaker 1: do the right thing by the environment but also save money,
Speaker 1: make sure you're recycling everything possible, really understand how to recycle.
Speaker 1: If you've got a local curveside organics program where your
Speaker 1: city is not collecting your food waste, make sure you're
Speaker 1: giving your food waste for composting. So that's that's something
Speaker 1: you do. Then if you're really interested in product design
Speaker 1: and products when you're at the supermarket, we're at the store,
Speaker 1: research the products you're buying and make sure that they're
Speaker 1: using as much recycled content as pos sable, Understand the
Speaker 1: materials that are being used, and try to shop responsibly
Speaker 1: or in a way that aligns with your with your values. Absolutely, yeah,
Speaker 1: spending in alignment with your values. It does result in
Speaker 1: actually spending less, like consuming less. And yeah, that's like
Speaker 1: the first part. And that's not even to mention investment. Right,
Speaker 1: You've got closed loop partners where you can even be
Speaker 1: wealth building in this vein. So that thank you for
Speaker 1: bringing that up. So that's the other things. If you're
Speaker 1: interested in investing, if you over the last decade focused
Speaker 1: on investing in renewable energy, electric vehicles, recycling systems, you
Speaker 1: would have made a lot more money than if you
Speaker 1: would have said, I want to stay in x on mobile,
Speaker 1: I want us totay in cars companies that aren't going electric,
Speaker 1: I want to invest in landfill operate. So if you're
Speaker 1: an investor, this is definitely where the world is going,
Speaker 1: and it's going there for a very important reason, which
Speaker 1: is the more sustainable a company is, the more transparent
Speaker 1: they tend to do, meaning they're proud to tell you
Speaker 1: the materials they use, where those materials come from, the
Speaker 1: labor that they use, how their supply chain operates. They're
Speaker 1: proud of it. It's something that they have designed with
Speaker 1: efficiency in mind. And what do you want as an investor.
Speaker 1: You want to maximize transparency. You want to mitigate risk,
Speaker 1: you don't want any surprises. You want as much information
Speaker 1: as you possibly can get. And that's what they're going
Speaker 1: to get out of investing in investment firms like Closing
Speaker 1: Partners that focuses on circular economy and recycling, or other
Speaker 1: firms that do it, or just do public equities that
Speaker 1: are focused in this area. The beautiful thing about what
Speaker 1: you're saying, too, is that as we move towards this
Speaker 1: more search ular economy and make both macro and micro
Speaker 1: level changes, it does save us money again on the
Speaker 1: macro level and the micro level, which I know we
Speaker 1: we want to do. We don't want to be spending
Speaker 1: as much, we want to be saving more, we want
Speaker 1: to be earning more, we want to be building wealth,
Speaker 1: and all of this aligns beautifully We're not sacrificing one
Speaker 1: thing for the other. To be content with the products
Speaker 1: that we have, to have quality over quantity, to be
Speaker 1: concerned about the level of items going to the landfill
Speaker 1: impacts our taxes. Like I love that every single thing
Speaker 1: that we've talked about does benefit us on the micro level. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: you know what else benefits us macro every level. That's right,
Speaker 1: It's time for the best minute of your entire week.
Speaker 1: Maybe a baby was born and his name is William.
Speaker 1: Maybe you've paid off your mortgage, maybe your car died
Speaker 1: and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore.
Speaker 1: That's bills Bufalo bills, Bill Clinton. This is the Bill
Speaker 1: of the week ron. Every week we invite one of
Speaker 1: our listeners or our guests to share with us their
Speaker 1: bill for the week. So do you have a bill
Speaker 1: for us today? I do, And I really like this
Speaker 1: concept that you do because it forces you to really
Speaker 1: think creatively about how to connect dots. And so my
Speaker 1: bill of the week is gonna be Bill Moyers. Bill
Speaker 1: Moyers used to he's getting up there in age, but
Speaker 1: Bill Morriors, for most of his career, has produced exceptional
Speaker 1: documentaries and um, I've always learned a tremendous amount watching
Speaker 1: Bill Warriors documentaries, and one comes to mind which I
Speaker 1: would recommend to everybody to listen to, which is the
Speaker 1: Power of Myth, which is about Joseph Campbell. And I
Speaker 1: bring that up because I think studying history is a
Speaker 1: really important way to understand the system that you're living
Speaker 1: in today and why it was constructed that way, and
Speaker 1: to just have greater self awareness. So Bill Moyers would
Speaker 1: be my Bill of the week. We can't know where
Speaker 1: we're going if we don't know where we came from.
Speaker 1: This We've never had this one before, so yeah, I
Speaker 1: love it like a person. Bill, Um, those are my
Speaker 1: Those are my favorite. Yeah, it's interesting that you say
Speaker 1: that's My husband just this week was saying how he
Speaker 1: really wanted to watch a documentary but was having a
Speaker 1: hard time finding one that interested him. And so here
Speaker 1: we go. I know what we're doing this week, and
Speaker 1: anything you think by Bill Moyers will be uh an
Speaker 1: exceptional learning ariands and just help you think about just
Speaker 1: systems and structures and where we came from and how
Speaker 1: we lived today. I really like the Power of of
Speaker 1: Myth by Joseph Campbell, which was a book that Joseph
Speaker 1: Campbell wrote, but Bill Moyers did a special series interviewing
Speaker 1: Joseph Campbell on it. But he's got lots of great
Speaker 1: documentaries that that he's done on all different topics. So
Speaker 1: I thought it was a great question for a podcast.
Speaker 1: I wanted to come up with an answer that hopefully
Speaker 1: is unique and uh and and full of get unique expense.
Speaker 1: I know and clearly we like creativity and problem solving,
Speaker 1: and you did both today. So if you all who
Speaker 1: are listening want to submit your bill of the week,
Speaker 1: you've got something creative. You've solved the problem. You know
Speaker 1: a guy named Bill. Visit FRU girl Friends podcast dot
Speaker 1: com slash Bill. Leave us your bill. You know we
Speaker 1: love to hear it. Yes, So now it's time for
Speaker 1: the uh. We do a lot of noises and singing
Speaker 1: and yelling. It gets exciting in the second right, So um,
Speaker 1: today we're going to share. This is where we kind
Speaker 1: of get a little more personal, like what we're doing
Speaker 1: to promote the circular economy personally. So Ron, as our guest,
Speaker 1: we would love it for you to go first. You're
Speaker 1: gonna have the best answer, and our answers are going
Speaker 1: to are gonna pale in comparison, but we are very
Speaker 1: excited to hear what you say. First, what I am
Speaker 1: doing to promote the circular economy is to try to
Speaker 1: build the most successful investment firm UH focused on backing
Speaker 1: the most brilliant entrepreneurs building solutions for the circular economy. Nice,
Speaker 1: what's like one that you're really excited? I know they're
Speaker 1: like children and you shouldn't pick a favorite, but like,
Speaker 1: what are you really excited about right now? What's one
Speaker 1: of them? Which one is the coolest? Though? For that preface,
Speaker 1: because yes, fifty portfolio companies and I love them all equally.
Speaker 1: And um, one that we're very excited about is home
Speaker 1: bio Gas, which is a company based in Israel that's
Speaker 1: developed the first household sized anaerobic digester. Anaerobic digesters convert
Speaker 1: food waste and biological waste into gas and so. In
Speaker 1: the United States, a lot of the wastewater treatment facilities
Speaker 1: have large digesters. These are like fifty million dollar type
Speaker 1: facilities that turn bio solids into energy. Some municipalities now
Speaker 1: have anaerobic digesters for food waste. A number of dairy
Speaker 1: farms have them, but these are big big, multimillion dollar facilities.
Speaker 1: No one's ever figured out how to miniaturize the technology
Speaker 1: down to the household level, and home Biogas has been
Speaker 1: able to develop a all anaerobic digester that looks like
Speaker 1: an appliance. You put it into your backyard, you put
Speaker 1: all of your food waste into it. It It converts it
Speaker 1: into gas that can pump into your hot water heater
Speaker 1: or into your stove. So home biogas dot Com check
Speaker 1: them out. We're super excited about them. Totally disruptive, and
Speaker 1: back to the earlier point on our conversation, a great
Speaker 1: example of how sustainability saves money. You take all of
Speaker 1: your food waste and rather than sticking it in the
Speaker 1: garbage where your city is going to use its tax
Speaker 1: dollars to ship it to a landfill, instead, you take
Speaker 1: that food waste and you put in your home biogas system,
Speaker 1: and now you're generating your own gas for cooking or
Speaker 1: for hot water in which also saves you money. So
Speaker 1: that's one portfolio company that I'm very excited about. Oh
Speaker 1: it's amazing. I love hearing about such cool innovative things
Speaker 1: that utilize Yeah, you're a waste and then make it productive.
Speaker 1: It's people are brilliant. It's amazing. Yeah, alright, my turn, chill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I am turning my food waste into system.
Speaker 1: Funny you should say that. No, So it's very very simple.
Speaker 1: I think some of the things that I'm doing, but
Speaker 1: again hailing back to my days of tiny living, it
Speaker 1: really connected me to my waste, the amount of water
Speaker 1: that I was using just every I mean, you're very
Speaker 1: connected to all of your waste in some really gross ways,
Speaker 1: but in some really challenging ways to when you live tiny.
Speaker 1: And I think some of those things have carried over.
Speaker 1: But a little part of me does die when I
Speaker 1: throw things out. So I have been looking at how
Speaker 1: do I stop doing that? One very very small thing
Speaker 1: that I've realized when I go grocery shopping. So if
Speaker 1: I can't get to the farmer's market or find a
Speaker 1: place where I can just like purchase produce, I'm at
Speaker 1: the grocery store purchasing produce. I've stopped using the plastic bags,
Speaker 1: like you know, the plastic bags in the produce section
Speaker 1: where you could just like shove your apples into. I'm like,
Speaker 1: I don't. Actually, I'm just gonna get home. I'm going
Speaker 1: to throw all of this away, So I bring in
Speaker 1: my own bags and Okay, if I don't want them
Speaker 1: sitting in the shopping cart, fine, I'll put them into
Speaker 1: the bag, and then yes, I'm gonna have to wash
Speaker 1: and want to get home, so they're sitting on the
Speaker 1: conveyor belt, and who knows what was on the conveyor belt,
Speaker 1: but it feels a lot better to not come home
Speaker 1: and just immediately within thirty minutes throw a ton more
Speaker 1: plastic into the trash. So that's something tiny And I've
Speaker 1: been mending my own clothing. I've been buying significantly less clothing,
Speaker 1: thank you, Tiny Living. And if it's broken, I mend it.
Speaker 1: So I like my clothes and I want to keep
Speaker 1: them and amend them. And that's that. I think those
Speaker 1: are all excellent examples for your listeners. It's amazing, over
Speaker 1: the course of the year how many plastic bags we
Speaker 1: use at the supermarket for our produce, completely unnecessarily, And
Speaker 1: that just shows you the inefficiency in the system, Like
Speaker 1: the supermarket is buying all of those bags, and they're
Speaker 1: passing that cost off to the consumers because they have
Speaker 1: to cover those costs, and then we as consumers use
Speaker 1: those bags. It's completely unnecessary. You can just put it
Speaker 1: in your shopping cart and put it in your shopping
Speaker 1: bag and and go home. And then at home, we
Speaker 1: have all these plastic bags and we literally used for
Speaker 1: maybe an hour, and then we just stow it in
Speaker 1: the garbage. So I love that example, thanks Ron. I
Speaker 1: love the fact that you mend your own clothes. Um,
Speaker 1: we actually need an industry in the United States where
Speaker 1: people men closed again, fixed electronics again. And so love
Speaker 1: all of those examples. M thank you. Yes, yeah, it's
Speaker 1: sim it's not needed most of the ways that we approach.
Speaker 1: And mind you, you are paying for that plastic right
Speaker 1: like they they offer it like it's free, but like
Speaker 1: you're paying for it in the pricing of the produce.
Speaker 1: That's what I mean by all of these hidden costs
Speaker 1: in the system is you're just grabbing these plastic bags.
Speaker 1: People don't stop to think for a moment. They're like, oh,
Speaker 1: the supermarket, bossy, because I think I want them. But
Speaker 1: they're gonna have to cover their costs, and so that
Speaker 1: cost gets passed on. And this is what I mean
Speaker 1: by like, we gotta break that that system and avoid
Speaker 1: all these unnecessary costs. Jen what you got for us?
Speaker 1: So um, I have a few winds lately on the
Speaker 1: subject of grocery bags. So I do grocery pickup and
Speaker 1: the like, they just put every individual item in a
Speaker 1: plastic bag. It's so useless, but like, so I will
Speaker 1: there's um the other grocery store near me has like
Speaker 1: the recycling for those plastic bags, because we can't just
Speaker 1: throw them in our regular recycling. And so I will
Speaker 1: hoard these bags and get like a big bushel of
Speaker 1: them and then take them to the grocery store. And
Speaker 1: one time I was like taking my carrying my bushel
Speaker 1: and a lady She's like, thank you so much, um,
Speaker 1: and I was like, you're welcome, so um, yeah, do
Speaker 1: that with my bags. But yeah, so I My most
Speaker 1: recent win is I try to buy as much clothing
Speaker 1: as possible secondhand. But jeans have been something I've had
Speaker 1: a real problem with. But I've devoted myself like to
Speaker 1: buying new genes, to really like buying quality and buying
Speaker 1: them secondhand. Um. And so I went to Nordstrom and
Speaker 1: I tried on all the nice sustainable genes so I
Speaker 1: could find my size. Foundas size, went to the saved
Speaker 1: all my sizes and stuff and save searches on thread
Speaker 1: up so I can find when the good genes in
Speaker 1: my size come up. Then it sends me an alert
Speaker 1: so I can see if I want them or not.
Speaker 1: But then I also went into our local um it's
Speaker 1: like a it's like a local consign. It's like a
Speaker 1: Plato's closet, but it's local, and found a pair in
Speaker 1: my size that are not just like good quality, but
Speaker 1: they're the ones that are like also like, we make
Speaker 1: our genes sustainably too, So I got sustainable genes that
Speaker 1: are good quality secondhand, and that feels so good. And
Speaker 1: so I just felt like a real winner that day.
Speaker 1: You were You were a real winner that day, Ron says,
Speaker 1: you were. Yeah. Story, and it's a great example for
Speaker 1: your listeners and one that that every everyone listening can
Speaker 1: can replicate. It's a it's a great story. On the
Speaker 1: example you gave on the plastic bags. We're running a
Speaker 1: major initiative at Closing Partners on reinventing the user experience
Speaker 1: around shopping and what those bags look like. It's called
Speaker 1: Reinvent the Bag. So if any of your listeners want
Speaker 1: to Google Reinvent the Bag or go to our website
Speaker 1: and look for it if they're interested in that area.
Speaker 1: That's one thing that's a major focus of ours is
Speaker 1: how do we reinvent the consumer experience to make sure
Speaker 1: people can easily get the things that they need but
Speaker 1: avoid all of those bags. Another thing you can do
Speaker 1: with those bags is weave them into blankets for the homeless.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can also just give them like good blankets,
Speaker 1: but apparently the insulation factor of them are decent. Well
Speaker 1: that that's That's the thing about plastic is that it's
Speaker 1: this bag that was made to use once. But the
Speaker 1: way plastic is designed is it doesn't really break down.
Speaker 1: So from the perspective of Baker, it's extremely dangerous from
Speaker 1: a usability standpoint. Um plastic can be a great product.
Speaker 1: Literally make it into blankets for homeless and it'll be
Speaker 1: water proof and and and generate heat. It's important people
Speaker 1: listening to understand like plastic in and of itself isn't
Speaker 1: necessarily bad. Plastic has a lot of major benefits. It's
Speaker 1: super lightweight, it can be formed into multiple shapes, so
Speaker 1: there's a lot of benefits of plastic. The key is
Speaker 1: it can never be virgin plastic because that means that
Speaker 1: there's a fossil fuel extracted. We should be using material
Speaker 1: science to develop plastics that can be manufactured in labs,
Speaker 1: and whatever plastic is out in the market, we have
Speaker 1: to make sure that we're always always recycling it to
Speaker 1: make sure that it never ends up in in nature
Speaker 1: beautiful on Where can people get more from you? Your book?
Speaker 1: More knowledge from you? If this is an exciting topic,
Speaker 1: how do people get at you? There's my book The
Speaker 1: Waste Free World that people can learn about the history
Speaker 1: of delinear economy, the circular economy. There's lots of really
Speaker 1: fun and interesting stories in there. So that's one area
Speaker 1: to learn about the circular economy. In other areas, if
Speaker 1: you go to our website Closed with Partners dot com
Speaker 1: and you just look at our different portfolio companies with
Speaker 1: about fifty companies all doing really innovative things in the
Speaker 1: circular economy, that's also a great way to learn about
Speaker 1: innovative solutions and great companies in the circular economy. That's
Speaker 1: awesome and the book will definitely make you rethink the
Speaker 1: things that you may have taken for granted and definitely
Speaker 1: make you double think about the waste that you're producing.
Speaker 1: I know it did for me, so I highly highly
Speaker 1: recommend the book. It's great. Thank you, Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for saying that. And any of your listeners that
Speaker 1: get the book, I hope they enjoy it and also
Speaker 1: learn from it. And I love to always hear from
Speaker 1: people about what they thought excellent. Thank you so so much,
Speaker 1: Ron for being with us today for sharing about the
Speaker 1: circular economy. It's been a blast, all right. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, guys, and it's great to be with you today.
Speaker 1: Who what do you think of that chill? That amazing
Speaker 1: doesn't feel like the right word, but it's all that
Speaker 1: comes to mind right now. Again, if you didn't catch
Speaker 1: my enthusiasm in the interview, I don't know. You might
Speaker 1: have been sleeping, but I don't know how you could have.
Speaker 1: I Again, I think whenever I am on this topic,
Speaker 1: thinking about it, talking about it, it does give me
Speaker 1: some motivation and determination to then look at what else
Speaker 1: can I be doing. There's something about this that it
Speaker 1: hits a core part of me of Yeah, how do
Speaker 1: I how do I make the world a better place?
Speaker 1: How do I make sure that I'm a part of
Speaker 1: that equation? How do I just even within my own
Speaker 1: little ecosystem, make sure that I am doing right by others,
Speaker 1: by myself, by the products, by that I'm consuming, by
Speaker 1: the community that I'm surrounded by, so so much good stuff.
Speaker 1: I think, not just for understanding more of where we've
Speaker 1: come from, where we're going, and the bigger picture of things,
Speaker 1: but then I think some really tangible pieces. I really
Speaker 1: love how Ron broke it down to your different levels
Speaker 1: of interest. You're interested in politics, are you interested in design?
Speaker 1: Are you interested in investing? I think wherever you find
Speaker 1: yourself or if you're interested in all those things, there's
Speaker 1: something actionable for you. So I hope that you all listening,
Speaker 1: we're able to take at least one takeaway from this,
Speaker 1: And of course, if you've got things to add to
Speaker 1: this conversation, let us know. We want to hear it.
Speaker 1: We're hanging out in our Frugal Friends community group on Facebook.
Speaker 1: So yeah, really, I think that this isn't a conversation
Speaker 1: that just ends here. What excites me about this is
Speaker 1: where we can go from here. Absolutely. Yeah. Ron's book
Speaker 1: actually got me thinking about the American dream, and like
Speaker 1: when that term was coined was far before the nineteen fifties.
Speaker 1: From what I believe. I don't know facts, but from
Speaker 1: what I believe. So the since the fifties, we have
Speaker 1: been reshaping what the quote unquote American dream looks like.
Speaker 1: And so now there are so many people saying the
Speaker 1: American dream doesn't work. And that's because it's not the
Speaker 1: same American dream that people had when the term was coined,
Speaker 1: Like when like reducing your consumption and repurposing, reusing, when
Speaker 1: valuing the quality of your items was really important. Was
Speaker 1: the mainstay of buying things, That was the goal that
Speaker 1: saved you so much money so that you can afford
Speaker 1: other things that build wealth. And and now we have
Speaker 1: for seventy years, so like our entire lives are in
Speaker 1: parents entire lives, most of our grandparents, like we have
Speaker 1: been ingrained with this new quote unquote dream that more
Speaker 1: stuff is the dream. And it just it's all the stories,
Speaker 1: some of them are very sinister, and it just like
Speaker 1: really got me thinking. And so I have definitely changed
Speaker 1: my perspective even caring about sustainability, but like diving into
Speaker 1: this um with the financial aspect, which is something like
Speaker 1: I'm even more interested in that connection has just really
Speaker 1: changed up things for me. Sinister, that's a good word
Speaker 1: to describe it. Yeah, what's being hidden? What's being kept
Speaker 1: secret and ultimately harming us on again the micro and
Speaker 1: macro levels. Yeah. Anyways, thanks for listening everyone. We want
Speaker 1: to thank you so much for your kind reviews on
Speaker 1: iTunes and Stitcher, like this one from Acacia p r
Speaker 1: D says New Obsession happens to be five stars. Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: you are my who is the obsession? I recently discovered
Speaker 1: this pod and I have been doing some serious binging.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for making an otherwise dry and
Speaker 1: complex topic so fun and easy to understand. I've also
Speaker 1: come to love the little quirks, like the fake sponsors
Speaker 1: and bill of the week. Keep it up. I'm hugging that.
Speaker 1: You know. I'm okay being an obsession for somebody. Yes,
Speaker 1: you are. I've got my own obsessions, and so let's
Speaker 1: let's keep it circular. You know, I'll be obsessed with something,
Speaker 1: you be obsessed with us, and we'll just keep the
Speaker 1: obsession going. Oh my gosh, she'll want to thank you guys.
Speaker 1: I'm for sharing these episodes on social media, and we
Speaker 1: really hope you will be sharing this one. This one
Speaker 1: was meeting I will be sharing it. So when you
Speaker 1: share the latest episode on Facebook or Instagram and tag
Speaker 1: us at for a Friends podcast, We're going to enter
Speaker 1: you into a monthly drawing where we for every five
Speaker 1: tags and reviews we get, we are giving away a
Speaker 1: copy of the Frugal Friends workbook. So keep leaving us
Speaker 1: reviews on iTunes or Stitcher, send us the screenshot to
Speaker 1: our email Frugal Friends Podcasts at gmail dot com, and
Speaker 1: still tack us on social just all the ways get
Speaker 1: at us, spread the message, spread the love, and you
Speaker 1: are entered for that giveaway. So stay sustainable, don't be trashy,
Speaker 1: and we'll see you next week. Frugal Friends is produced
Speaker 1: by Eric Sirian. So it takes my design aesthetic being
Speaker 1: hot trash to another level. Well, that's how you're reducing,
Speaker 1: reusing and recycling is by allowing your aesthetic to be
Speaker 1: hot trash. Yeah, as I just use hot trash. I
Speaker 1: am repurposing trash, and I'm in Florida, so it's hot.
Speaker 1: That's actually my house is hot because our a C
Speaker 1: unit is so old. It's a joke that carries over
Speaker 1: from our Frugal Living summit, where Jen described her aesthetic
Speaker 1: as hot trash no, I think that was an episode,
Speaker 1: was it? That was? Our design blends together kind of
Speaker 1: like dreams blend into my reality, and then you are
Speaker 1: from deja vu and your life is I think I'm
Speaker 1: living in the tricks you are. You are taking both
Speaker 1: the red and blue pills.